Oh, I know Bioshock is an FPS. I watched my roommate play it... sat and watched for a couple good hour-plus sessions, I think. I've played plenty of FPSes – DOOM II, Duke 3D, the first couple Quakes, the Half-Lifes (Half-lives?), the Metroid Primes, a few more, and my favourite, TRON 2.0 – so I know that there can be story and pretty and music and action but the last is really what makes the game worth playing. (It's why Halo sucked. I kept getting bored by the level design.)
My point is entirely that the "moral choices" that keep coming up as a selling point for the game are really thin at best, a curiosity but not nearly strong enough to even bear mention. I suppose it's frustration from two angles: on one hand, there are so many games which had so much opportunity for interesting philosophical play that instead were quite happily plowed through with some sort of projectile weapon. On the other, I've heard so much tell of the richness of morality in the Ultima series and a few other things that I know it can indeed be done, and done well. I know they're different genres, and that's why I don't want anyone mistaking Bioshock for the latter, so the next person who says, "It's great, you even have moral choices!" gets stabbed in the face with my death ray.
Oh, and I certainly would consider it moral to plunder a vending machine for something to help me take on a threat to my well-being. I'm quite cpable of role-play, however, and it's a point of pride that I can consistently play characters with whom I vehemently disagree. So I do ask them whether it was right for them to steal that weapon or hit that person or upload that virus or whatever. I put the RP back in the single MMORPG I play.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-05 12:01 am (UTC)My point is entirely that the "moral choices" that keep coming up as a selling point for the game are really thin at best, a curiosity but not nearly strong enough to even bear mention. I suppose it's frustration from two angles: on one hand, there are so many games which had so much opportunity for interesting philosophical play that instead were quite happily plowed through with some sort of projectile weapon. On the other, I've heard so much tell of the richness of morality in the Ultima series and a few other things that I know it can indeed be done, and done well. I know they're different genres, and that's why I don't want anyone mistaking Bioshock for the latter, so the next person who says, "It's great, you even have moral choices!" gets stabbed in the face with my death ray.
Oh, and I certainly would consider it moral to plunder a vending machine for something to help me take on a threat to my well-being. I'm quite cpable of role-play, however, and it's a point of pride that I can consistently play characters with whom I vehemently disagree. So I do ask them whether it was right for them to steal that weapon or hit that person or upload that virus or whatever. I put the RP back in the single MMORPG I play.