DGC Ep 279: BioShock (part five)

Welcome to Dev Game Club, where this week we complete our series on BioShock. We delve into the end and endings of the game, and of course address our takeaways.Dev Game Club looks at classic video games and plays through them over several episodes, providing commentary.

Sections played:
Finished the game!

Issues covered: Brett's terrible fathering, Big Daddy issues, developing Suchong more as a character, Yellow Peril, leaning into pulp, being like a ship, turning the lower classes via demogoguery, leaning on the Irish, tracing the arc of Diane McClintock, using abstraction to hide real harm, character dualities, turning you into a Big Daddy, seeing the evolution and development of the program, putting the big boots on, fully integrating the backstory into the level and narrative design, redesigning to support the movement of the Big Daddy, changing the perspective, moving from alien camera views to first-person perspective, forcing the section where you protect the Little Sister, being paranoid about keeping the Little Sister alive, playing this section on Hard, BioShock 2 as a better-playing game, handing you the syringe, also becoming a Little Sister, where the series goes from here, the specificity of the series, how to adapt the themes of the series repeatedly, the point of no return, the boss working on paper and maybe not in-game as much, Fontaine being under-developed, still getting Ryan's story after his death, not knowing enough about Fontaine before meeting Ryan, the binary that drives the bad ending, becoming like your fathers, unmotivated world monstrosity, the good ending, doing something other games hadn't, BS jobs, failures of capitalism, a shooter with the heart of an immersive sim, greater approachability, two senses of place (sight and sound), high production values, ease of use/play how you like to/forgiving design.

Games, people, and influences mentioned or discussed: Fu Manchu, Titanic, Ratchet & Clank, Revenge of the Jedi, 2K Games, Cloud Chamber Studios, Activision, Call of Duty, Fallout, Star Wars, Metroid, Prometheus, Alien, Six Feet Under, The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand, Bullshit Jobs, David Graeber, Debt: The First 5000 Years, Occupy Wall Street, Dishonored 2, Prey, God of War (series), Portal, Control, Kirk Hamilton, Aaron Evers, Mark Garcia.

Next time:
Bonus: the sequels!

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