BioShock 2: Altruism is New Enemy

[L-C]

I've seen Objectivists portray BioShock 1 as an attack on Objectivism, but it's actually more of a naive and fearful stance against "extremism", i.e. absolutism. Objectivist "Inspector" has had an email conversation with its lead designer, which confirmed this.

[ZSorenson]

I've seen Objectivists portray BioShock 1 as an attack on Objectivism, but it's actually more of a naive and fearful stance against "extremism", i.e. absolutism. Objectivist "Inspector" has had an email conversation with its lead designer, which confirmed this.

This may have been the inspiration for Bioshock.

Rand's heroic industrialist individuals and the art deco, glamorous '20s might just have been an aesthetically interesting inspiration. The contrast was interesting: glamour and heights, but all at the bottom of the dark and dreary sea. The message contained herein is naturally disgusting, as it mocks greatness. Still, that aesthetic is probably what inspired them. I don' think they really were of a mind to attack Objectivism.

Elitist college thinks-they're-somebodies just like thinking it was a stupendous attack on the philosophy. But they're just coming from the other side of the monkey.....

But, who's excited for Iron Man 2? Tony Stark on his suit, "It's mine, you can't have it." An admirable sentiment before a disgusting subset of humanity (congresspeople). But unfortunately, heavy weapons are essentially the one thing the government might choose to regulate. Alas....

Edited April 18, 2010 by ZSorenson

[L-C]

I think you might be reading too much into the underwater thing. It's a bold move by Ryan, it enabled concealment of the city (a big, big deal in the story) and it looks and plays cool.

[rodl]

One thing you have to understand about Bioshock 1 and 2 - was that they are blast-fest FPSs set in a purposely ; CREATED ; distopia (the plot says so).
 ;
Ryan rants against ";altruism"; ; ( ex-

), ; yet his very building of Rapture as a city for others is altruism is it not ? ; He is a billionaire who could have built an Eden for himself alone if he wished.
 ;
The developers make him a strawman for their desired failures of objectivism and capitalism ; Ryan does extremely illogical things for someone who was a successful industrialist (ie- someone who WOULD know how to handle 'workers' and create consistant projects/solutions). ; But Rapture MUST Fail or there would be no game, so they are sloppy in their details of what they vaguely describe (though systematically coming out against objectivism/libertarianism and capitalism) which led to the city's Failure.
 ;
Construction workers supposedly are out of work and fuel ; rebellion, but why would Ryan let them in to stay with that very predictable outcome? ; ; They would have been told construction would eventually end and they woukd have to move on to new occupations (it was made VERY clear up front to everyone who went to Rapture that NOONE could leave) ; ; Such things would be planned for and Ryan would NOT be ignorant of handling the eventualities ; ; Simple enough - it is all supposed to Fail - the plot says so.
 ;
ADAM is discovered and soon is shown to have terrifying long term effects - yet if you follow what they imply, most people in Rapture started using it wholesale (common sense of people seems discounted by the developers also)  ; And then Ryan takes over the industry and continues its use, when it makes people insane and the whole economy is (already) ruined with murderous ADAM Splicers running in the streets.
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They give Ryan no obvious better alternatives to the problems ADAM has caused ; They had him declare ";There is no law"; (except smuggling is illegal = treason because of the secrecy the city would need to survive), when how can you have a modern commerce city without any kind of commercial contract enforcement, ; and he has 'Constables' -- what exactly are the things these Constables ; are to enforce when they maintain order?? ; ; ; ; ; Too much contradiction -- the city could hardly get built with such inconsistancies, let alone sustain itself..
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Very convenient that Ryan never can invoke public health measures after ADAM is understood to ; creates murderous insanity. Instead the criminal who is pushing the stuff 'is just an entrepreneur, so let the buyer beware'
Somehow Ryan for years ; is not able to pin a huge smuggling operation on Fontaine ; - something which would have stopped that criminals rise with the ADAM - quite convenient, quite contrived.
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Later there is effectively a murderous fully disruptive civil war in-progress, with an ; enemy (Atlas) seeking to destroy/steal everything Ryan built ; He finally puts war measures into place and all you hear in-game are voices griping about how he has compromised his principles ( this population largely arrived in Rapture just after WW2, so might have had more understanding than the game developers who make the character mouth THEIR words) ; ; Ryan had done little at first, figuring people will work out the problems and when he finally takes action to directly to end the destruction, he is now a tyrant ; ;
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The most absurd thing of all was Ryan effectively committing suicide by ordering you (the player) to kill him while under mind control ; At that point he has already pretty much ; won the civil war and is closing in on the bad guy (Fontaine/Atlas) whose Splicer army has all but been neutralized (or even turned against him) ; ; Ryan suddenly is a QUITTER after he has mostly restored order, and actually now has a chance to rebuild his City ; HE can control the ADAM and Splicers, and could even work to find a cure for its negative effects ;
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Its so absurd, it can only be justified for that ";the plot requires it"; ; crutch games often have.
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SO any reasonable attempt to judge 'objectivism' in ; this game comes to naught, as it is all a potemkin village perpetrated by a liberal mentality driven by 'bucks', ; instead of any honesty ; ; Its a fabrication to the point of fantasy instead of the science fiction it should have been. Edited May 7, 2013 by rodl

[rodl]

ignore weird chars in text posting above - reediting the posting mangled the viewable text (with html-isms) and I tried to fix it as much as possible

[Hairnet]

    Well, building the city wasn't Altruistic. No one wants to live in a submarine all alone, that is crazy. He wanted to create a functioning society after the horrors of the early twentieth century showed him that modern governments were not to be trusted (very true). 

 

    I think you are correct though. The problem with the game is that it attempts to satire/deconstruct Objectivism at the same time as creating a first person shooter. The whole city was designed as a first person shooter map, which doesn't make any sense from a world building perspective. Really this is a good example of disharmony between story telling and game design. I think an RPG or a stealth game would better fit a story about a dystopia (see Dishonored).

 

   A good example of story telling and game design harmony would be Metro 2033 or Half Life. The themes of those games are extremely compatible with first person shooter mechanics and tropes. 

 

    If you play the newest game you will see a complete breakdown in storytelling ability (but superb game design). The game's premise uses really bad 1990s science fiction premises that do not make any sense. 

Edited May 7, 2013 by Hairnet

[rodl]

Note that I said 'altruism'  versus 'altruistic' (which in posts above sounded able to include implying forced altruism - meant by the man whoi invented the term...)

 

And 'Eden' for Ryan wouldnt have had to be at the bottom of the sea or alone (think of it as anything you would wnt to have if you could afford it and Ryan had enough money to go very far in that direction).   He didnt have to build an entire city and bring 20000 other people down there burning most of his vast fortune (though there may be the ego aspect of his being used to 'being 'he big man' and shaping things as he wanted.

 

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An interesting thing is that they also make Ryan an atheist which might logically have a cause in that (mentioned in the Novel)  he was a Russian by birth who had alot of family murdered by communist/bolsheviks in Russia right after WW1 and he may have seen the official chuch there powerless to stop it  (thus a "you pay the dues but get nothing in return" letdown/failure)

 

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The latest (allegedly) Bioshock 'Infinite' moved completely into fantasy, no matter how they try to doll it up with quantum this and that.  The time travel/multiverse paradox stuff was done to death in the 50s and as employed is a wonderful crutch for any kind of weak storytelling.

 

Alot of players were pissed because several years of  trailers showed a better more interesting game, which eventually swerved (more than once) into the unintelligable weirdness it finally became.  Again its a shooter game, but the effort they wasted when they continued to change what it was could have made it a much better 'shooter' (which IS what people are really buying).