Since I just got a computer that can handle the game, I’ve been playing BioShock for the past few days. For those of you who are familiar with the game, BioShock’s creepiness has already been well-established, but I’m revelling in it for the first time.
Little Sister and Big Brother
The atmosphere the developers created is just stunning; art deco designs, creepy evil-clown carnival music, constant leaking, dripping, pinging, echoing background sounds. Combine that with the crazed genetically twisted denizens of Rapture (the name of the underwater city), and the game very closely approaches the level of “disturbing.”
Nothing is more disturbing, however, than the Little Sisters and the Big Daddies. They roam Rapture together, the Little Sister using her giant syringe to harvest genetic goodness from the corpses lying around (mostly thanks to the player). She speaks to “Mr. Bubbles” in a little girl voice and he protects her with a vengeance against anyone or anything that comes too close to her or threatens her.
If you defeat the Big Daddy (which you really have to do), you have the (moral) dilemma of either “rescuing” the Little Sister or “harvesting” her. Rescuing her gives you a warm fuzzy feeling (sort of) and gives you a bit of genetic material that you can use to enhance your powers. Harvesting her gives you no such warm fuzzy, but a LOT of the genetic material. Depending upon which path you choose, the game has a different ending. I’m not there yet, but Mike (the “shoot it in the water” guy) has played it and he rescued all of the Little Sisters and got the “happy” ending. So I’m taking the other path and have harvested all but one.
I’m looking forward to see what sort of twisted ending I get.