Is BIOSHOCK Really A "Masterpeice"?

[Seamus Brailey Productions]

Don't get me wrong I love this game, but I realized it's kinda cliche. Now if anyone here hasn't played BIOSHOCK you definately should, so spoilers ahead. As you people know you play as Jack,(generic name) whos plane crashes in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. And of course goes into the lighthouse and goes to Rapture. Now here's already where cliches begin. The doors locking behind him is a giant cliche, and going to something like an underwaer city has been done to death. Think of the Splicers, they are zombie like creatures who have gone crazy with minipulating their DNA. Does'nt that sound familier to other horror games. Now characters like Big daddy's are what I have tosay are probably one of the most original partof the game. They're giant brutes who have been forever implanted into their suits and each one has to protec a single person. I know that's also cliche, but at least that one is fresh and new. The little sisters immediately give a CLICHE ALERT. These little girls have been used in almost every horor game I know, even movies like The Shining which in fact is what they were based on. Even Andrew Ryan being the players father. Now, am I saying BIOSHOCK is'nt original or a good game. OH HELL NO. It's still a great game, it still has alot to be played for original ideas. like the way to be abel to choose your path but you may say,"THAT'S ALSO A CLICHE!" well it may be now but when the game was made that kinda thing in game was like getting a trophy for getting a good ending, and getting shamed for getting the bad ending. Maultiple other ideas are original so BIOSHOCK I have to say is original and still holds up, even with the cliches. So I give it a 4 star rating.

[yueyejinghun]

Originally posted by Darkgamester301:

What makes Bioshock in particular a masterpiece, imo, isn't the fact that you can switch between firing off a gun and shooting out Electro Bolts or setting enemies on fire with Incinerate! (First-Person Shooter). It's not the psychotic, murderous enemies trying to gut you with fishhooks as they run along the walls and ceiling babbling nonsense (Horror). It's not even the way you can customize your loadout to play however you wish (Role-Playing Game).

No, the biggest factor, the thing that actually sets the game apart, what truly makes it unique?

* It's hearing Andrew Ryan tell you the story of how he literally burned down a forest he owned because the government wanted to nationalize it.

* It's meeting the character of "Atlas"

* It's seeing banners all throughout Rapture hailing the fabled "Great Chain of Industry" (TM), along with the city's core values of "Art, Science, Industry" and expressions like "Altruism is the Root of All Wickedness"

* It's hearing "Jim and Mary" over the city's public address system warning of what would happen if the American CIA and the Russian KGB ever discovered the city

The world of the game is quite literally a dystopian time capsule dedicated to Ayn Rand's 1957 capitalist novel Atlas Shrugged, along with many of the very pro-business ideals that were floating around in the U.S.A. during the 1950s (which was about when the city was first constructed, not coincidentally). Even Andrew Ryan's name is literally an anagram of "WE R AYN RAND".

I guarantee you that no other video game series---certainly no other FPS---has ever paid this much attention to a particular time period in human history, or the socio-economic-political cultures of that respective era. Even the game's OST is filled with such famous names as Bing Crosby, Cole Porter, the Andrews Sisters, and the Inkspots, to name only a few.

From the characters' manners of speaking to the consumable cigars and alcoholic beverages to the soundtrack itself, Bioshock quite literally cements you into its setting, right down to the time period.

I've gone through all the relies, this was the first one I saw the book Atlas Shrugged was mentioned, after 5 years. Shame, really.

People were talking about graphics (which was stunning and still one of the best in the DX10 era), gameplay, but reluctant to talk about the true gems in this game, the story and the artwork.

I read a Bioshock introduction back in 2008, since then I was eager to play it, but I postponed and postponed, until 2020, I finally conquered my motion sickness (for a brief period of time), and savored all 3 of Bioshock titles.

Since this topic is about Bioshock, I'll leave the other 2 out of it. The introduction I read mentioned Atlas Shrugged many times, which also brought up my interest in the book. But I wasn't grown up enough nor had learned enough to fully understand both the book and the game back in 2008, so I waited. More than a decade later, I started to read the book again and play the games.

Reading the book wasn't necessary, but it certainly helped me to appreciate the game's background and the world. Why did Andrew Ryan and Frank Fontaine and others build Rapture under the sea, what were they escaping from, why was Rapture a utopia, I found all the answers in the book.

The game extended the book's ending, not in a mocking way, but with a thoughtful story. All geniuses are human beings in the first place, we can't escape our nature. Greed, selfishness and ambitions are born with us, they are in our blood. That's why Ayn Rand's utopia fell in Bioshock, it was bound to.

There are a lot more to think about during the exploration, if one doesn't treat the game as a pure FPS and shoot and kill all the way to the end.

What makes a game masterpiece? The graphics? The gameplay? They can and always will be surpassed by newer generations. The story and the art design are the reasons that make the game unique, and be remembered