Why Is Bioshock 1 A Masterpiece?!

[Music] i am the act man and i'm here to ask you a question is a consumer not entitled to a complete game at release no says the designers we need more time to fix the bugs no says the publishers you need to buy the season's pass no says the shareholders you have to wait for the next game i rejected those answers instead i chose to play something different i chose the impossible i chose bioshock a place where the gamer need not fear the loot box where the player would not be bound by linear past where the story could be enjoyed to the fullest extent and with the sweat on your controller bioshock can become your video game as well bioshock1 is widely considered to be one of the greatest video games of all time but is it still worthy of that title 13 years later you remember the trailers for this game my goodness they were brutal and since its release bioshock has been the go-to example in the debate of whether or not video games are art let me tell you folks i can't think of a better example all right well you got me there beyond its exceptional art design and setting in so many ways bioshock is the complete opposite of what most first-person shooters are it's a game where you left all your preconceived notions on the surface where they belong but why bring up bioshock now what relevance could it still have well i aim to tell and better yet show you what makes it so awesome several questions need answering are the game's mechanics as deep as the atlantic ocean has bioshock aged well or has the allure of rapture faded with time what of the story and characters is there more to glance from them besides simple entertainment is this game truly a masterpiece well let's hijack a plane rescue some little sisters and splice our way straight into this the development of bioshock is pretty fascinating as it took place over several years it all started with a man named ken levine in the studio irrational games which would later become 2k the first thing they knew was what the core gameplay was going to look like drones that carried a valuable resource protectors that guarded the drones and harvesters that attempted to take that resource these things would become the big daddies little sisters and splicers that have become so iconic bioshock went in many different directions from being set on a spaceship to having a heavier emphasis on rpg mechanics at one point it was even going to take place in a world war ii nazi laboratory after bioshock was remastered players got a taste of all the various designs this game went through and it's remarkable how many fully rendered character models were cut from the game it's gotta be difficult to decide what ideas you scrap and which ones you roll with but the end result speaks for itself 2k made all the right decisions motivated by a free-form type shooter that put player control at the forefront and the desire to break the tired tropes and cliches of fps titles 2k built bioshock under a firm foundation while the franchise had an extremely strong start the two sequels and dlc that followed never really matched or outdid what 2k accomplished in their first go and with that being said let's dive right into rapture the story begins with the first and only words our protagonist jack ever speaks they told me son you're special you were born to do great things you know what they were right words that ignite a mystery in a stroke of bad luck our plane crashes in the middle of the atlantic ocean big oof surrounded by flames and with nowhere else to go we swim to the only piece of land in sight this ominous lighthouse as we step inside the lights turn on revealing a powerful figure and the words no gods or kings only memes as an instrumental version of beyond the sea begins to play we are overcome with a foreboding feeling but that soon disappears as the cheerful presentation is about to show us this magical place we've stumbled upon i chose the impossible i chose rapture immediately bioshock makes the most profound introduction that captivates the player with ease five minutes in i'm sold i'm hyped this is it chief i think everyone even the most cynical people could agree that 2k games crafted one of the most immersive detailed and believable settings in video game history rapture is unforgettable i think a lot of people when they play the game for the first time can they wonder how did you even dream up this place an underwater utopian city gone berserk with gene splicing genetic modification power struggles and corrupted ideals the concept of a once divine city now defiled is amazing and ignites so many questions within the player's mind that the game will answer and eventually you'll get answers to questions you never asked while some models are kind of ugly that's kind of the point and it obviously doesn't compare to the graphical fidelity of modern games this art style is timeless can we just put one thing to rest this is art this is [ __ ] art dude okay keep in mind this is my fifth or sixth playthrough of the game and each time i've gone back to rapture i always take time to look around and appreciate the visuals i'm sure we all wish we could have grabbed an underwater jet ski and explored the opening area and thanks to shazes from boundary break we can do just that now in some games when you take the camera in places you aren't meant to go the developers will cut corners leave out sections of buildings have things that aren't rendered etc but in the intro everything is fully rendered 2k games knew this opening was gonna hook people in like a mystical sea slug the reasoning behind being set in an underwater city was to make the player feel isolated and trapped we knew that we wanted isolation we also needed to sell it we needed a compelling storyline a back story that why would this place exist otherwise how are we going to make rapture feel like it's lived in if we don't have the reason for it to be there and while the bathysphere ride is amazing once we reach our destination we have our first encounter with life and rapture oh damn all right mr ryan you played me man this ain't anything like the opening monologue and with our only means of escape destroyed we're forced to heed the words of our irish companion atlas as he guides us through the dangerous city with hardly any other sane people in rapture atlas seems like the only person we can really trust we're gonna need to draw her out of height but you're gonna have to trust me would i lie welcome to rapture is where we see the most cinematics and get a ton of world building scenes yeah i really don't want to be here anymore yeah it's dangerous as [ __ ] uh okay this guy just assaulted a child and what's that what is holy [ __ ] it's the guy from the front cover watch out watch out oh get the damn out of here that's the big daddy won't beef with you homie you're all good i like your music don't beef with me as we progress atlas gives us a brief rundown of what's happened in rapture after fighting our way through a few bad guys well [ __ ] when in rome just [ __ ] plunge that needle into your arm oh man as we try to link up with atlas andrew ryan personally introduces himself so tell me friend which one of the [ __ ] sent to you the kgb wolf with a c.i.a jackal here's the news rapture isn't some funky [ __ ] for you to plunder and handle ryan isn't a giddy social life to be slapped around by government's muscle this opening level is the perfect introduction it sets up the story andrew ryan's motivations for creating rapture we get a feeling of the depraved nature of everything yet also see how rapture could once be beautiful the seeds of a socio-political commentary are planted the combat mechanics are introduced we learn how big daddies and little sisters function you pick up a wrench a revolver trip balls on a plasmid learn how to shock people and give them the one two punch you witness a ghostly vision listen to a couple audio logs all in the span of like 20 minutes efficient powerful and believable yet this is just a taste a mere appetizer of what bioshock has in store for us hi i'm ken levine the creative director of rational games and we're here today to show you a little bit of bioshock well what are we trying to do it's pretty ambitious what we're trying to do is to redefine what it means to be a first person shooter our goal is to put a stake in the heart of all those cliches you've been playing for years and first-person shooters the linear corridors the very static environments and the cookie-cutter ais now that we understand that's a pretty lofty goal it's really going to be up to you guys to decide whether we succeed but with that said let's go to the world of rapture and take a look at bioshock bioshock's core gameplay in all its nuances defies the trends of most shooters where you unquestionably follow orders go down linear path number 378 kill all bad guys move on to the next area watch a cutscene ramirez protect the burger town from those big daddies there's none of that instead bioshock's story and gameplay interweave the concepts of freedom and choice and that's what makes it different this one too linear this one too predictable this one too forgettable what's this guys an intruder is ugly ugly ugly even over the radio atlas and the other characters tell you what to do but not always how to do it the game doesn't hold your hand for long it respects the player's intelligence and letting them figure things out bioshock is a sandbox game where you're given a wide assortment of weapons and tools and the designers say alright kiddo show us what you can do with these each individual who plays this is inevitably going to make different decisions in the plasmids they use weapon upgrades and tonics that's what makes bioshock so replayable you might think ah that cyclone trap looks kind of stupid i'll stick with the happy bees and in your next playthrough you just might experiment there's a million ways to take out the splicers stun them in the water burn the poor bastards alive hack turrets and watch them spit rounds while you sit in a corner sneak up on them and bash bash bash their head in freeze them with winter blast you can hypnotize big daddies cameras turrets force your enemies to fight each other you can set up traps and learn in the big daddies nearly every item can be picked up and thrown using telekinesis it's recess baby and rapture is your playground i've always liked the idea of giving the player a lot of agency in terms of their play style and experimenting with the play style and trying different things and seeing what worked and didn't work and interacting with the environment the notion that it's sort of a playground and i'm so surprised how every strategy is viable and fun every weapon plasmid upgrade has a use nothing feels over-tuned or underpowered and you gotta love the little propaganda tutorials before you learn a new plasmid cry out for big daddy's help make him think you're a little sister watch as he fights to protect you bioshock concocts the perfect blend of balance and fun although here's a pro tip upgrade the chemical thrower to use less ammo and once you do that select the electric gel and you have now trivialized every big daddy fight not so tough now are ya amazingly bioshock is one of the extremely rare video games that justifies every aspect of gameplay and it creates this unbreakable level of immersion that is typical of a masterpiece you got your adam and eve not so subtle biblical references audio logs reveal characters experimenting with the plasmids right i'm introducing lot 44 now we record the name the lot of 44 enrage because of its tendency [Applause] bioshock explains why atom is a currency at all why there are stores everywhere civil war going on hacking is mentioned in several audio diaries it has been brought to my attention that some citizens have discovered ways to hack the vending machines with all the craziness going on in rapture people started building automated defenses ryan had cameras set up everything is connected to the lore even the audio diaries themselves have advertisements in the medical pavilion seeing as how rapture was built as a capitalist haven everything is a business and it's advertised like a business the weapons too are a byproduct of the story and setting fitting in aesthetically with the 50 60s biopunk theme but of course fontaine also smuggled weapons and other things in from the surface even the respawn mechanic is justified through the vitta chamber and characters acknowledge that bioshock adds context to the gameplay in ways that most games don't even bother now all this is nice and interesting yet it don't matter if the gameplay is busto but it's a regular mother goose these weapons feel and sound awesome [Music] each weapon has three ammo types for different situations got stuff like incendiary bolts explosive rounds anti-personal armor piercing there's even a crafting mechanic introduced halfway through this aspect of survival horror is awesome in bioshock you're constantly scavenging for supplies to stay on top of things there's nothing worse than feeling ill prepared however bioshock is not perfect am i supposed to be impressed he was here second ago on consoles aiming in control can feel very stiff hit detection too you can aim down sights but it's pretty sluggish cycling through weapons is tedious but most of these issues aren't a problem on pc now the camera while a neat mechanic allowing you to research enemies learn their weaknesses the function is poor [Music] while at first it's fun to photograph splicers and whatnot you quickly just start spamming pictures to get that research bar filled up in the middle of a gun fight later in the game some enemies have just arbitrary increases in health while others are much weaker some fights become more a test of endurance than skill as you tank bullets and spam health hits until your enemies are dead throughout each level the designers sprinkle in new plasmids weapons refresh your arsenal and add in some new enemy variety to uh splice things up [Music] i feel like enemy placement in a level is also a severely under discussed aspect of game design splicers and big daddies are guaranteed to show up in certain places you have some scripted encounters for instance when you grab this shotgun you will always be mobbed by a group of thugs valuable items are often put in front of the player as a gleaming trinket come grab me shouldn't have done that bioshock teaches you through these moments to always be careful about where you're going and what's happening around you in the fort frolick auditorium there's a gene tonic hidden up top and you have to jump to it after grabbing it enemies spawn and cohen remarks on your athleticism what an outstanding display of that letter i mean goddamn this game is detailed even if you clear an area should you return there's always the possibility of splicers or big daddies roaming the area it functions a little similar to the director from the left 4 dead series unlike say dead space where the spawning of necromorphs is specifically tuned bioshock is unpredictable as far as i remember there's only one area where the spawning feels really cheap and that's the beehives in the farmer's market it's not just the combat that makes bioshock fun it's how the combat is set up let me show you some examples in sinclair spirits there's a hidden button behind the bar leading to a power to the people station if you use it turn around walk up the stairs and those six plaster splicers are gone scattered around fort frolic in arcadia you're stalked by these mysterious cultists they set fire to things and teleport away from you bioshock doesn't rely on jump scares to frighten the player all the fear is psychological the lighting sound design that's what makes bioshock scary when peach wilkins lets you inside he takes all your weapons and you're forced to fight him with just your plasmids and wrench just like the flood splicers will pretend to be dead before hopping up and opening fire and my favorite encounter of all when you give sander cohen the third picture for his quad tick and he thinks you're gonna betray him all the lights except one turn off splicers invade the area as waltz of the flower plays in the background [Music] this game is magic as you walk through rapture and hear the manic voices of wandering splicers it puts you on edge when big daddies are nearby their steps shake the screen you can listen for falling ceiling tiles to locate a spider splicer whether or not you realize it the game is signaling enemy movements to the player i'm not a bad person ai is pretty smart too they'll fight each other if you light them on fire they jump into water or heal at a first aid station in terms of difficulty bioshock has four choices with hard being the best difficulty it's pretty challenging early on but as you get stronger gain new weapons it becomes a bit more manageable however the vita chamber does negate any sort of consequence for dying enemies don't get their health restored should you die so you can pretty much get through anything with sheer perseverance bioshock incorporates elements of action survival adventure horror and some rpg elements it doesn't go too far in any one direction and just like dead space it has the perfect amount of action to still feel like a survival horror game a facet that bioshock sequels sorely missed and suffered because of it when it comes to core gameplay bioshock is the fps genre at its best despite some minor flaws it puts player agency at the forefront of its design while the trends bioshock defied are still being recycled in modern shooters it is sad that bioshock's philosophies didn't really inspire huge changes to the fps genre with its innovative design bioshock 1 is arguably as important to the fps genre as the original doom half-life and halo combat evolved were and that my friends is what a masterpiece is all about as a wise game developer once said this space needs to be fun before it's pretty and one of the greatest contributors to bioshock being a masterpiece is its level design partially inspired from resident evil 4 2k was impressed with how open and free players were to engage enemies run around find items the inventory and ammo management so it's no surprise that bioshock employs a free roaming type of level design aren't you always a bit frustrated when you see a bunch of doors in a video game and you just can't go through them or open them while many games have arbitrary reasons for why you can't go to certain areas invisible barriers return to the battlefield even some of the best games are guilty of this but bioshock makes these barriers believable we knew we wanted the game to be in a place that was remote from the world but complete because whenever i play games that take place in an actual place you go up to a you know there's a jersey barrier there you can't jump over and that always frustrates me because i'd rather simulate something completely and give the player never have that never press on that um suspension of disbelief where the players like wait why can't i do that i'd rather make a world where the player can do everything they can expect to do rapture has been a war zone so debris destroyed doors and all manner of blockades do not break immersion bioshock enables the player to explore while making it flow and feel natural now being a survival horror game with rpg mechanics you beg your sweet plasmids there are incentives to explore you're going to want to comb through each area like a detective looking for clues at a crime scene the developers got real creative with the placement of these items and they're everywhere some require you to find a hidden crawl space door while others you need to burn through some ice shock a door panel enter a code or just [ __ ] all that and hack it let's talk about hacking while many people regard it as the most tedious and unfun part of bioshock i don't necessarily agree it's worthwhile to hack turrets instead of destroying them so they can watch your back if you need to backtrack but you obviously don't want to hack everything ain't nobody got time for that so again it comes down to player choice and should you mess up the puzzle you could lose health trigger security bots it's a risk reward type of thing in the search for supplies to survive the player is constantly using their brain to think their way through a situation bioshock's levels are also very interactable sure you could just shoot every bad guy but in the medical pavilion we see these piles of oil what can you do with oil hey anybody got a light never mind i got one each area of bioshock is unique in layout and theme the lighthouse acts as a bridge to rapture welcome center is the first stop for newcomers to the city neptune's bounty is stylized as a fishing port where the city gets some of its food arcadia is an agricultural research center brimming with plant life and trees that create oxygen fort frolic is the neon lit entertainment capital where folks go to unwind and have fun there's hephaestus where the city gets its power a more industrial functional part of rapture olympus heights hosts the more upper-class environment with luxurious suites apollo square has a streets of new york city kind of vibe to it where the working class people live all these locations not only give players a fun landscape to battle and explore but it also shows how each piece comes together to form the whole of rapture it makes it feel like a real place and gives reasons as to why people would leave the surface to come down here now when it comes to the art style holy balls you take time to look at anything and the detail is mesmerizing the style is based on art deco which first appeared in the early 1900s fun fact it's a luxurious futuristic style influenced by geometric shapes and symmetry symmetry dear steinman this game radiates style with its biopunk architecture glass ceilings walls and tubes are everywhere allowing players to see rapture from all different angles each business is named and detailed on the inside lots of blue light shines through the glass illuminating the horrors within rapture cracks leaks and water everywhere illustrating the lack of maintenance it's this contrast of light and dark the beauty and ugliness of rapture that makes it so visually striking if bioshock had little to no story it'd still be a masterpiece based on its gameplay art design and level layout alone but oh man what a story it has when you show up in rapture you know nothing and over time the layers are peeled back like shrek's skin there are few franchises where i feel compelled to dive 100 percent into the lore dark souls halo bioshock and of course mario party you got two narratives the history of rapture what happened up until you arrive and everything that happens after while there's enough material in bioshock to make a 12-hour long lore video explaining everything i'll try to summarize it briefly rapture was a utopia built by andrew ryan to escape the political social and religious aspects of a world after world war ii andrew ryan had a laissez-faire market in mind where the government had little to no control over economics the idea was all about freedom for everyone to be entitled to the sweat of their brow ryan viewed morality as a blockade to success and so rapture was a place that valued science logic and reason above what was considered right or wrong that's a bold strategy cotton let's see how it plays out for him initially thousands of people moved to rapture it became a bustling city filled with the most talented individuals in the world but eventually cracks began to appear with no social programs public funding or even taxes nothing could be gained without paying a price the less fortunate were given no aid by rapture or ryan and many began to resent the utopia they once called home these sad sacks they come to rapture thinking they're going to be captains of industry but they all forget that somebody's got to scrub the toilets without any real ethical standards in place businesses were able to act in any way they wanted and then dr tenenbaum discovered something miraculous atom a chemical harvested from a special type of sea slug able to rewrite the genetic code of a person without limits many advancements in science were made and adam became a core component of life in rapture but it wasn't all sunshine and daisies adam was highly addictive withdrawal symptoms were fierce requiring more and more adam to stave off the insanity and raptures citizens mentally degraded and broke down as the need for adam skyrocketed mobster frank fontaine used this opportunity to create a criminal empire manipulating the lower class and pitting them against andrew ryan i hand these mugs a cotton a bowl of soup and they give me their lives who needs an army when i got fontaine's home for the poor in order to meet the demand for adam drastic times called for drastic measures and the little sisters program was founded the little sisters were actually used in genetic experiments to produce atom what ensued was a swath of ghastly little girls using needles to siphon the leftover atom from corpses to be recycled and the big daddies were created to ensure their protection these band-aid solutions could not fix the core issues within rapture and a massive civil war between fontaine and ryan began the age of prosperity and civilized society was over the rise and fall of rapture is shown to the player through the environments and told in audio logs the audio logs are fantastically written and come from several different points of view illustrating the complexities of you know a god damn city built underwater this is another major strength of bioshock's narrative as we hear minor and main characters alike give their thoughts on the state of rapture as it degrades like sullivan chief of security who struggles with ryan to maintain order the slimy dr suchong a genetic scientist who embarks on ghastly experiments peach wilkins the leader of fontaine's smuggling crew sander cohen a depraved artist bill mcdonough rapture's general contractor ocean water is colder than a witch's tip not only does the level design make rapture feel like a real place but its citizens do too logs are often found in places tied to a certain part of the story we'll hear steinman's descent into obsessive madness as we see his experiments around the medical pavilion in neptune's bounty you discover a dead couple laying on a bed with pills scattered around and a picture of a young girl nearby the audio log is chilling we saw our nausea today we barely recognized her that's her son said you're crazy i told him that thing this this is our maja but he was right she was drawing blood out of a corpse by fontaine fisheries and then when she was done she walked off hand in hand with one of those officers bioshock doesn't have the characters say how they feel you can't just have your characters announce how they feel that makes me feel angry like oh marsha we are so distraught your little sister we're going to commit suicide now goodbye no awful ass riding like that in neptune's bounty there's a hidden interrogation room where we find a dead man strapped to a chair mr ryan asked me personally to make this clear to you you give us fontaine and you'll be knocking back pints up at the fighting mcdonald's but if you prefer to play the mule we'll treat you like give them a taste patrick timmy ready to talk now do i gotta shark your balls again go on sullivan whatever ryan thinks he consistently when heading to jasmine jolene's private room we hear a flashback and see shadows of ryan beating her to death her log reveals that she sold his illegitimate child my personal favorite is in su chong's room in olympus heights where we hear he has troubles bonding the big daddies to the little sisters the protection bond is just not forming little [ __ ] ironic what's in here i wonder oh that's nice just a couple of dead people and three dead little girls ain't life in rapture grant it's in these mini stories that makes bioshock's overall narrative so compelling um there's i know a dozen storytelling mediums in the game and they're all really rich and they're all designed that even the person who's playing the most casual way is going to get a sense of what's happening here we don't watch a cutscene of some guy being sealed into the big daddy armor suit we walk through the labs where that happened we follow these characters through their logs we learn more about them like diane mcclintock whose story is one of faith in ryan that becomes shattered is renewed in atlas and when we arrive in atlas headquarters as atlas i got a new face a clean record and a fresh this type of storytelling is not just extremely rare but exclusive to gaming and plays to one of gaming's biggest strengths discovery [Music] so now we have a pretty good sense of rapture's history back to the present as jack we are guided by atlas in hopes of rescuing his poor wife moira and child patrick which by the way you can see a poster for a play that uses the names god damn this game is [ __ ] deep and throughout most of the game atlas is the only person giving us any direction i know you must feel like the unluckiest man in the world right now but you are the only hope i'll ever see my wife and child again here we encounter bridget tanenbaum and the concept of morality is introduced atlas tells us to harvest and kill the little sisters while tenenbaum implores us to rescue them the choice is yours to make we find our way through neptune's bounty to the smugglers hideout where we meet up with atlas and his family oh thank goodness time to get out of here oh no ryan you bastard [Music] no you ooze in like an assassin and then you try to sneak out like a thief you're no c.i.a spook who are you why don't you come here [Music] patrick we'll find the bastard we'll find him and we'll tear his heart out you're right atlas we can't let ryan get away with this i'm with you till the end brother this is when you start to understand the type of storytelling that makes bioshock's narrative so compelling in video games there is cinematic storytelling you know games that toss a bunch of pre-rendered cutscenes at you while you sit with your thumb up your ass nothing wrong with that but bioshock really does emphasize not taking control away from the player unless it's extremely important while julie langford is gassed to death when the bathysphere explodes walking through smuggler's hideout and getting quick flashbacks during these moments the player is in the moment 100 percent because they still have control my problem with a game like death stranding is you have your gameplay sections sandwiched between 30-minute cutscenes and you often forget you're playing a video game it overindulges in dialogue where bioshock gives you just enough to the point where you crave more anyways as jack we head to arcadia where ryan attempts to poison the trees and deprive us of oxygen we fix the plants with the lazarus vector and make our way to fort frolic it's meant to be a short stop but a mysterious man has other plans say goodbye to atlas goodbye ryan and hello to an evening with xander cohen wait who is this man well we're about to find out [Music] no no oh god you sick [ __ ] let me out of there in what could be bioshock's best level this madman tasks us with killing his three disciples taking pictures of their corpses and posting them in a crude art showcase here's what makes fort frolick special each level prior had some character that was the main focus someone who eventually died but in a strange way sander cohen is not our enemy we don't fight against him instead we collaborate with cohen and see his crude plaster molds of people all over spotlights shine on us as cohen watches we are the stars of his show does that sound like a man from broadway or what when you complete his quad tick he has this dramatic entrance and celebration before giving us a tonic and opening the way to hephaestus now would you kindly head to ryan's office and kill the son of a [ __ ] and as we work to tear down his security amidst a swath of splicers he taunts us throughout a world looks up and sees the face of god but look around it's a regular convention of worms in here i haven't chosen the spot for you on the wall yet let me know if you have a preference yeah keep talking your [ __ ] i'm bringing this bomb to you andrew in desperation ryan activates rapture's self-destruct sequence atlas you can kill me but you will never have my city but not if we can stop him haha what what's all this would you kindly she's very pretty thank you papa break her neck for me break that sweet poppy's neck no please break that puppy's neck well those audio logs were weird no time to get distracted we almost beat the game here it comes baby the big boss fight i'm ready the assassin has overcome my final defense and now he's come to murder me in the end what separates a man from a slave money power no a man chooses a slave obeys you think you have memories a farm a family an enemy a crash what's happening and then this place what is this was there really a family did that airplane crash was it hijacked was a man sent a kill or a slave a man chooses a slave obeys no amount of twilight zone episodes or m night shyamalan films could have prepared me for this stop would you guide me would you kindly powerful phrase familiar phrase would you kindly would you kindly get this bioshock is awesome because it toys with the tropes we have been accustomed to as gamers and because jack is a silent protagonist we get to experience the tragedy and shock all on our own [Applause] the deception around why you're doing what you're doing is what makes this twist so incredible also the flashbacks that triggered just a few times throughout the game little hints were dropped subtly all around when you walked into jasmine jolene's room there's a little flash frame that was jack finding his dead mother murdered by his father good lord in this scene andrew ryan isn't just taking jabs at jack but also the player and the games industry as a whole for all the illusion of choice we think we have ultimately the player is always contained to what the gaming space will allow them to do but wait it gets worse nice work [Music] why why are you laughing i thought we were friends the elusive double twist we've been had by the greatest con man in rapture frank fontaine is alive now as soon as that machine finishes process and the genetic key you just fished off ryan i'm gonna run rapture tits to toes we've heard all about this man but always just assumed he was dead you never considered why you were in rapture you never thought you were anybody important but you are jack is the key to everything a baby genetically augmented to age rapidly fontaine's ace in the hole working alongside dr su chong and tenenbaum they programmed you with a fake life fake memories and a code phrase that could control your every action you've been doing the bidding of the bad guy all along it makes you think and question everything there's not a single line of dialogue in this game that felt forced awkward redundant or bad characters are exaggerated without feeling cartoony i mean i could listen to frank fontaine narrate an audiobook i do not like green eggs and ham i do not like them sam i am frank fontaine is one of the most badass scary and well-crafted villains ever he's a kaiser soze a boogie man of their own stories hard to find not sure if they're even real dead or alive ryan wanted the best people in rapture when he made it and he got the best man to overthrow him fontaine represents the paradox of rapture in a society with absolute freedom comes the power to take away the freedom of others as shitty a person as fontaine is in his own twisted way he clearly had some affection for jack i called you back showed you what you was what you was capable of even that life you thought you had that was something i dreamed up and i tattooed inside your head no you don't call that family i don't know what it is but more importantly bioshock's cast is complex just like game of thrones most characters don't have a black or white good or bad outline nobody's perfect like you there are no paragons there is no you know gandalf there is no um ben kenobi everybody um is flawed in substantial ways back to the present we are forced to use ryan's genetic key to shut down the self-destruct and then fontaine springs his trap but the little sisters help us escape we awaken tenenbaum's hideout where she tells us she has undone some of the mental conditioning but fontaine ain't out of tricks code yellow it's a ticking clock as we gotta track down the antidote in fontaine's apartment we drink it break the spell you broke the spell and now our goal is to take down the big man what are you planning on going back to your fake family your phony dreams putting you out of your misery will be the nicest thing anyone's ever done for you eventually we head to the top of point prometheus and face down the big man himself yo dude you spliced a little too much fontaine it's a pretty epic boss battle and although he looks kind of strange it's a clear reference to the atlas statue so it's poetic finally we drain him of adam all the horror all the hardship we've been through all the twists and turns at last the world is free of this horrible man but one last thing remains the effects of your decisions if you harvested all or some of the little sisters jack becomes a huge [ __ ] who teams up with the other splicers to take control of nuclear weapons but if you rescued all of them you get the disney ending and oh my god it just warms my heart and since the end what was your reward you never said but i think i know a family there is far more to bioshock than can be summed up in a single video ken levine and 2k games crafted one of the most complex interesting universes in video game history a world as rich in lore and narrative as it is in freedom of choice and engaging game play and by the time it ends you're left reflecting on everything that happened you just wish there was another game like this one bioshock's art style is timeless with detail that is still impressive to this day rapture is a fully realized city with its own culture and where every feature has reason behind its inclusion with its socio-political commentary on capitalism utopias it offers a distinct perspective that could be dissected just like any other important literature in history bioshock's diverse array of characters are amazingly well written and add dimension to the story the way bioshock handles every faceted gameplay every detail big or small not only is it art but it's a masterpiece a title that every gamer needs to play in their lifetime [Applause] let me see it's beautiful

Channel: The Act Man

Views: 3,325,779

Keywords: Bioshock, Bioshock review, act man, bioshock 1, bioshock rapture, bioshock lore, bioshock gameplay, Bioshock act man, bioshock 2, bioshock infinite, bioshock story, rapture, bioshock twist, bioshock andrew ryan speech, frank fontaine, big daddy, little sister, andrew ryan, bioshock (video game), Ken Levine, Irrational Games, 2k Games, act man review

Id: BDFCVOB-RLU

Length: 52min 30sec (3150 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 21 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/RossGraham1996]

I also helped with the introduction. ;)

[u/CatLord90]

Fantastic video! Hopefully he will tackle 2 and Infinite in the future

[u/HonoraryRapturian]

"Masterpiece!?" Yes.