System Shock, Deus Ex, Fallout and the Elder scrolls and of
course Bioshock. All Story game
franchises and all require a commitment
that just doesn't do it for your average run and gun FPS player.
I'm pretty picky about games that demand my undivided
attention for hours on end. A good one
will make hours seem like minutes. A bad
one, well I'd think it was pretty obvious at which point my only consolation
would be that I got it on sale.
That's how I ended up with all 3 Bioshock games...
During the 2013 Steam Holiday sale Bioshock, Bioshock 2 and
Bioshock Infinite went on sale as a bundle for $15.
I only had a passing interest in them but for $15 it was
kind of a no-brainer to take the plunge.
My previous experience with games that focused on a strong narrative was
fairly limited. I'd played a few Elder
Scrolls games including SkyRim as well as Fallout 3.
I still don't know what genre games like this officially
fall into. They're not really RPG's, not
FPS's and they're definitely not MMO's since you never play against anything
but code. They tend to crossover
depending on what you're expected to do.
It's all about the story and the game pulls you along giving
you just enough bait to keep you going.
That's what any good story does.
They're immersive, intimate and often thought provoking.
Bioshock fits the "thought provoking" label pretty
well. It's kind of Sci-Fi but really is
more of a "what-if" experience with just enough reality thrown in to
make it seem plausible.
I decided that i'd play all three games in order. Truth be told I was tempted to rush right into
Bioshock Infinite but I resisted the urge to skip ahead. I'm glad I did too.
BIOSHOCK
I started with Bioshock which came out in 2007. By now everyone know the story so I won't
saddle you with yet another boring rehash of it. There's plenty of YouTube videos out there to
clue you in if you don't already know it.
What struck me was the intelligence of the game. It was creepy, engrossing and I couldn't
resist the urge to look at everything.
That's a good thing too because clues as to what was really going on
were sprinkled liberally everywhere.
From map design to lighting effects and even furnishings everything in the environment
worked to keep you on edge.
I haven't been so creeped out since Doom 3. The best way to describe it was like be
locked up in some creepy old underwater insane asylum and all the inmates had
guns. It was brilliant and I was hooked. Yes, hours passed like minutes and I was both
frightened and thrilled through most of the game.
Till it got stupid...
About halfway through things were getting a little tougher
on me than my patience could stand. This
is the same flaw I saw with Skyrim and now just as I did then I went scurrying
off to find the hacks that would let me continue my adventure relatively
unscathed.
Mostly because there was a lot of "Scathing" going
on....
Which sucked...
I'm all for a challenge but when it turns into a grind it
ruins it for me. Not that every opponent
should just fall over at the sight of me.
It's simply that these types of games tend to put you at a disadvantage
from the onset. The first few hours you
do alright with whatever you can scavenge but soon you find yourself woefully
outmatched. Your only hope of survival
being a lucky break.
I don't want to be lucky, I just want to get to the next
chapter in your story.
Where games like this start to fall apart is when they get
too complicated for their own good. Give
me the opportunity to find what I need but don't make me spend 8 hours of my
life dying in the same spot to do it.
That's the very definition of a grind and it's a cheap tactic used far
too often.
Instead of concentrating on the story we're forced to worry
about things like inventory slots, combination attacks and whether or not we're
going to find a health pack somewhere.
It's tedious; it's stupid...
I honestly think developers do it to claim more hours of
gameplay but to me it's a cheat.
You know how I keep gushing about Borderlands? That's the reason right there. It's about the environment and there's always
a way to succeed that doesn't involve being forced into a grind.
All the Bioshock games made this mistake but to their credit
they did throw you a bone. Death was only
temporary costing only some time and a few coins. Your enemies were still smarting from your
assault as well although they did recover somewhat. That was eminently fair in my book. What wasn't was when I would reemerge from my
demise only to be instantly struck down again because of bad AI programming.
Block the way but at least let me grab a power bar for god
sake!
Ok, so enough bitching about game mechanics, the story is
still paramount in Bioshock and it's a good one.
Andrew Ryan, ambitious, industrialist, visionary and
ultimately megalomaniac. The largesse
of his character is reflected in his sunken kingdom, Rapture.
But obviously something went wrong in his world. A world built on satiating the self was bound
to spring a leak (pun intended) at
some point. His promise was classic Ayn
Rand, enrichment of the self above all else and to hell with the consequences.
It was fun to explore this cultural mix of objectivism
turned fascism. Where else could such a
story go? Bioshock made me want to find
out even if I had to cheat to do it. Which
ironically is in line with the philosophical backdrop of the game.
Bioshock made me stop and think just as much as The Matrix or Inception. Well done....
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