Bioshock series review

Over the past few months I finished Bioshock, Bioshock 2, and Bioshock Infinite, a series I've been putting off for years. While there were many disappointments, it was entertaining overall. There is no replay value, but I don't care about that too much since I got the whole series on sale from Steam. Most of all, as a gamer, its a card that needed to be punched, and I'm glad to have experienced it. I would not blankly recommend the series to others without asking them what they're looking for in a game. Now that my review is complete, I can spend the rest of this blog nitpicking all the details that drove me nuts during this series.

Number one, first and foremost, made me crazy during each game multiple times, is the inconsistent world building. I don't demand realism from a world, my favorite worlds are sci-fi and and fantasy, but I want them to feel real. Exactly how you do that would be a fascinating study, but my best understanding of it right now is to make your world consistent. When you establish the rules of a world, of course you can and should bend them and break them for story effect, but you can't do this arbitrarily. There are so many examples of this I barely know what to hold up as examplar.

In every game, a case is made that this world is firmly rooted in our real world, and it forked off at some point, but its still our same world, and this could have happened here. And yet all three games are packed with fantasy elements, especially magic. The plasmids/vigors are really poorly explained (magic sea slugs), and their ease of propogation is even more preposterous (here, drink this). I've got no problem at all with magic in a world, I love it, but you then lose all pretense of ever having been set in the real world we're presently stuck in.

In these games technology is tortured to fit a world that is desperately trying to be magic based. If you know anything about technology at all, you learn that materials and systems are built on previous layers. You can trace the modern car of today back over a hundred years, and point out all sorts of twists and turns in what is basically still just a car. But whether its a car, a submarine, an airplane, a nuclear weapon, a computer, or whatever, you do not go from invention to mature product instantly; there are usually many generations.

The worst example of this by far is Lutece in the third game being the first in her world to think some really deep thoughts about quantum physics, to inventing a floating city within a few years (not sure, not looking it up, but it was within her lifetime). Discoveries in the physical world take time to develop into practical applications, and even once invented, take much longer to mature, especially something as crazy as a floating city. Its even kookier to think you can maintain a monolopy on this technology; usually discoveries are made in multiple places around the same time.

Also, technology needs maintenance, or it starts breaking down really fast. When you first enter the city of Rapture its already in a chaotic state, and it seems like its barely being maintained. While you could argue that a few diligent Big Daddies are patching whatever holes they can, by the second game its even crazier to think that a city that is probably the most complicated system ever created can just keep on going by itself with minimal damage. There are plenty of human cities in temperate places that can barely keep going without constant maintenance, let alone a city that is more complicated than a space station.

Some technologies defy description, and the game doesn't even bother to try to come up with a half-baked explanation. All three games are filled with artificially intelligent weapons, that have perfect identification of friend and foe, are really good at targeting, and can be convinced to switch sides if you have the right ability. The level of artificial intelligence required is so advanced that even in the 21st century it remains a distant notion, whereas in these worlds that are barely out of the 1800s its cheap and commonplace.

The real reason for all this is no mystery - because its cool. Underwater cities are cool. Floating cities are cool. A world with guns, robots, artificial intelligence, and magic is cool. Who wouldn't want to just keep adding cool stuff to their story? At some point, too much becomes a problem in itself. In this way the Bioshock series is tripped up by trying to emulate the System Shock series, which also suffered from the same exact desire to include everything and the kitchen sink. More is not always more, and too much is less.

As much as the worlds suffer from trying to be too cool, they are often pretty to look at. The graphics in Bioshock 1 and 2 are showing their age, but if you can get past the premise, they are almost always visually interesting. The third game is actually stunning in parts. Same goes for sound effects and music, which by the third game are really moving and interesting. Voicework is almost always high quality, and in some places really good. Its what they are scripted to say where things fall down.

The worst character in the game is Andrew Ryan, who creates an artificial person as a surrogate son (or something), complete with embedded hypnotic command words, and then promptly forgets about it. A rival figures out the command words, commandeers the surrogate to go kill Ryan, and Ryan just lets him do it. This is never explained.

Before that, we get to know Ryan as the world's biggest blowhard about predatory capitalism. The Atlas Shrugged metaphors are being poured on with buckets, as if someone really had a deep personal grudge to settle with that book. Its a fine hook to hang some plot elements on, but Bioshock wants to make a deep Aesop's fable about it for the ages.

Bioshock 2 remembers this, but is increasingly playing with religion and the cult of leadership, and by the time of Bioshock Infinite I'm starting to think that's the real message of the game.

The real problem linking all these games is me. I bought three cans of soda from a vending machine, and I'm complaining that all three are just carbonated sugar water. I knew what I bought and I don't have any right or reason to complain. All three of these games were made for consoles, and unlike most ports, they are not even trying to hide it. For console culture, these are good games, in computer culture they are just barely OK. If you want to play some console games on your PC, here are three of them.

I normally avoid console ports, but sometimes you have no choice. Bioshock was so hyped, and so entrenched in gaming culture, that I could no longer ignore or avoid it. I can't really be all that mad at the Bioshock series, because it was never supposed to be something like champagne, it was always supposed to be pop. You can't fault it for being what it is. You can only blame yourself for consuming it. I know the Grand Theft Auto series is a console series, but I still play them as soon as I can get them on PC; sometimes they are even good ports. And if The Last of Us ever comes to PC, or if there's ever a Bioshock 4, I'm going to play it, and nitpick it, and hopefully enjoy it at least as much as I enjoyed the Bioshock series.

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Now then fun part of concluding any media property, I can freely visit the tvtropes and YouTube pages on it.

'Bioshock 1 bad ending' (unleashing splicers on the world, and gaining nuclear powers) - I'm glad I can see this without having to go back and do it.

"BioShock Infinite Easter Eggs and Secrets"
Got most of these myself, couple of interesting music anachronisms I didn't pick up on. I really liked the random tears, and bits of culture leaking from one dimension to another.
It was nice to see again when Booker picks up the guitar and Elizabeth sings. It was contrived, and almost like a sudden Disney-esque break into song, but there was something so human about it that I don't think I'll ever forget it.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Franchise/BioShock
"Bio Punk with a heavy dose of Diesel Punk" - that's one way of putting it
"Mix and Match: Zeerust Science Fiction + Survival Horror + Art Deco + Anarcho-Capitalistic Dystopia = BioShock" - that's another way of putting it.

There's a bunch of DLC out there, but from what I can tell, they don't add any value that justifies the time.

"Bioshock Infinite: Booker DeWitt Has An Eating Disorder"
My stomach hurts from laughter.

There's a Making of BioShock DVD - I listened to a bit and its not as interesting as I had hoped. Maybe I need to give it more time.

"Bioshock Infinite ENDING EXPLAINED! (Complete Analysis)"
Nothing new, but a nice summary. It bears repeating that while most things are explainable, its hard to say what the source of Anna/Elizabeth's powers are. If it is something as simple as leaving a bit of body part behind, anyone with tear powers could grant them to you by nipping off one your toes deliberately with a portal. Therefore, Elizabeth could grant her Dad tear ability, and maybe he could walk off to some neutral world and be neither Booker or Zachary.

And if I haven't stated it clearly enough by now, the biggest problem I have with the game is that there is no throughline from Dewitt to Comstock, and it is insultingly lazy of the story to even suggest it. This might have been a cool idea if they had worked it into the story, writing in little hints or clues about it, but they did not. It feels sudden and forced, and is ultimately a cheat.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bioshock/comments/1bk21y/bioshock_infinite_the_ultimate_spoiler_faq/
So far this is the best write-up that describes the events of Infinite; it helped me articulate a few things I felt were right but I was still thinking through. I knew Booker had been looping for a while, and I wasn't quite clear why this Booker finally learned he was stuck in a loop, and how he broke it.

Interesting problem, I didn't think of this: if entering a new timeline forces you to reconcile memories with your self in this universe, why wouldn't Dewitt have to reconcile memories with Comstock. This blows a huge hole in that notion as presented in the game.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bioshock/comments/1bn88f/spoiler_analysis_of_songs_in_bioshock_infinite/
Again, stuff I mostly knew or figured out, but its nice to see it all layed out. The use of music is one of my favorite artful things about Infinite. I thought the use of music was random, but analysis makes it seem very deliberate. I not only like the musical selections, the use of them in the game, but also the analysis of how they were used. That's just layers of goodness.

All this analysis makes me appreciate Infinite a bit more, but I am still missing a plausible connection between Dewitt and Comstock. I don't think I'm ever going to receive it, because it was never written. I wonder what the DLC has to add, and if its worth buying and playing.

2015.02.20

Another day out from finishing and I'm starting to go hazy and nostalgic about the series. I am forgetting about all the tedium and frustration and the stupidity, and I'm just remembering how cool the visuals and sounds and music were, and how much fun it is to throw fire and lightning around. Elizabeth and Booker were great characters, and it was fun to follow them, until the end when you realize that's all you've been doing, is following them. You never have any choice in what they do; you the player provided animus but nothing more. At least Bioshock 1 and 2 had some choice in how you play and how it ends, even if its the simple but dire choice to harvest or rescue Little Sisters. Bioshock 3 was a console movie with a pretty but dumb soap opera ending, where our hero turned out to be his evil twin all along, and its obvious the writers just didn't know how to wrap up the story that week, and the deadline was looming.

Some time later... there are two DLCs, that together cost more than I payed for the entire series up til now. Maybe if they were more reasonably priced, I wouldn't be watching this walkthrough:
"Bioshock Infinite : Burial At Sea - No Commentary"
Not bad, but it ends in some ways worse than Bioshock Infinite. You're being punished for all sorts of things you don't even remember, let alone have been established in the story yet.

In all my ramblings on this topic, I don't think I've ever mentioned that I don't mind a downer ending. Sad or mixed feeling endings tend to beat happy endings. I rather liked the victory in defeat ending of Bioshock 2. And I like the idea in Infinite of endlessly repeating the same mistake, and how you may or may not break out of that loop. Or rather, I would like it if they had properly established it. I think this is going to bother me until I can figure out how it should have been written.

"Bioshock Infinite : Burial At Sea 2 - No Commentary"
Elizabeth killed Booker, after making him believe he's Comstock for all of 5 seconds - even if we're to accept this, how is this justice? In Infinite, they needed to rush to kill Comstock because he was actively trying to kill Booker and Elizabeth with every resource he could muster. His death was brutal, but explainable. Booker is just quietly living his life and Elizabeth just gets him killed and gloats about it. Its like they doubled down on the stupid premise, and are betting the house on it.
Still, its nice to see the world from Elizabeth's perspective, and to see the Paris she dreamed about. I don't think she ever gets there, but its nice to see what she dreamed about. I love the part where she goes in a bookstore, asks for a book, and the proprietor apologizes that it hasn't been written yet.
It gets even better, as an NPC remarks some things are best left in dreams, and even better yet when the scene goes full Disney and animals are doing cute things like listening to music, and singing while perched on your finger. Elizabeth at her full powers can tear to anywhere, so why couldn't this universe exist? Still, its also a nice callback to songbird, and sure enough, next stop is a cage seller. Of course, things start getting weird as Sally enters the picture, with a Red Balloon (like the movie).
Its nice to finally see Elizabeth as a lead, but having Booker on the radio is shades of Battlestar Galactica reboot. Wait and see.
"Just a normal girl with a normal pinky". Seems like a stealth game, interesting that this is finally an option this late in the series. There's even a stealth plasmid.
The use of schematics while talking is pretty.
"Cross-reality collaboration". Why not.

2015.02.22

I've been thinking about how cool it is that this game explores a multiverse of possibilities, and being able to transverse them. While the endless stars that are lighthouses at the end of Infinite is fascinating, there's also something debilitatingly sad about it. Your victories and defeats matter little if you can just duck into a lighthouse where you got it right. The game says it itself, we defeated Comstock in this universe, but there are many, maybe infinite universes, where he still reigns. What are you supposed to do with this knowledge?

Which makes Elizabeth's mission to save one particular universe's Sally so pointless. Just pop into a universe where she's fine. Not to mention Elizabeth is releasing Atlas/Fontaine from prison to do so, and there is little doubt that he aims to get far more people killed than the one you are saving.

Back to Burial at Sea 2.
The cross reality collaboration is actually really interesting, and helps explain why Elizabeth's time was so advanced. Sometimes the story is smart.

It's cute how Booker always used to hastily slam on elevator buttons, in Columbia and in Rapture, and yet they animated Elizabeth daintily pressing it.

Its kind of eery to hear Ryan talk as if he knows who and what Elizabeth is. And yet isn't this the same Ryan who allows his clone child stick a golf club through his head when he could have just as easily ordered him to stick it through Fontaine's?

Another smart thing, explaining why Big Daddies lose the ability to shoot their drill. I love it. But wait, how old a model was Delta? Never mind, let me enjoy the smart thing while I can. Nice, another reference explaining Vita Chambers, but barely.

The lion with the thorn in its paw, the same method that bound Elizabeth to Songbird binds Little Sister to Big Daddy.

I love the circularity as they set up Suchong's death scene. You know what's coming, and its still neat to see it play out.

Of course, I should have seen that coming, the hero of a Bioshock story always dies at the end. But Elizabeth's sacrifice was not in vain, she set in motion Jack, who would ultimately take down Atlas/Fontaine. Wait, uh, how many more people is Fontaine going to kill once rescued? Just by activating Jack alone, Elizabeth has doomed an entire air crew and passengers. Oops. Let's not think about that.

I like how the end credits once again show the real voice actors doing their thing. It doesn't diminish the game at all, strangely it adds.

Well, the Burial at Sea DLCs didn't help clear up any of the stupid stuff, if anything it made it stupider. I somewhat regret watching it, but I had to see for myself. Infinite deserved a better wrap-up than this; its ending is not much more effective than the old it-was-all-just-a-dream ending.

I can now walk away from the Bioshock series with mixed but overall good feelings, if I don't think about it too much.