A few more decades and they'll probably create college classes about the cultural imperative of video games same as "Art Appreciation" and "Film Appreciation" and various literature classes.
Fact: Ken Levine stated in a commentary for The Bioshock Collection that the final boss was a decision made by 2K and NOT Irrational and as such, even he states that the ending was a mistake and moral choice system were never intended to be in the game.
Its funny that he gonna makes a linear game that offers no choices when the game is about free will. How can you say there are free will in your game when you was gonna offered us no choices
xXsomethingfishyXx It's the classic UA-cam problem. Channels that do more with games such as breaking down themes or looking at the science behind a game are vastly drowned out by Lets Play channels.
New Age Gam3rs Yup. It's occasionally a sad thing to realize, that a 30-second video of a guy screaming over Call of Duty footage will always get more views than I ever will. But it's how it goes. What fans I do have like what I do, so I'm alright with it.
Well as I am a new comer to your channel I do enjoy your quality and topics of your videos. I enjoy breaking down games and learning whats behind it. I do that on my channel as well. I look at the science, technology, and philosophy behind games and look at the real life implications behind those elements. I'm always actively looking for channels like ours because I get sick and tired of the million Lets Play Channels.
When it comes to the Little Sisters, I think it actually fits in with the story, specifically with Ryan's view of choice. He believes that men make choices, but in the end those choices end up making the man. So the moral system of choice is the only time Jack is allowed to have free will, so in those moments he is a 'man' rather than a 'slave'. And, just like Ryan said, Jack having a choice in how he treats the Little Sisters ultimately forms what sort of person he is, reflected in the ending. So, in the end, Jack truly becomes a 'man' because of the one choice he was able to make throughout the story, the one time he was allowed to exercise his free will. That's just my take on it though. Personally, I was never really bothered by the moral system.
Cool take, but I think the "allowed to have free will" part shows what's going on. Jack was only able to save the little sisters because he was allowed to. If Atlas had used If You Kindly to make Jack kill the little sisters, he would have killed them. So I don't know if it's fair to say Jack had free will regarding the little sisters at all. Jack's freedom to save the little sisters comes from Atlas's attitude toward morality. When Jack encounters the first little sister, Atlas says right and wrong don't count for much down here. It's a line that tells us what Atlas thinks about right and wrong, that morality is relativistic. It also teases the player with moral relativism, cluing the player early on that Bioshock won't mind if he behaves like a hero or a monster. Anything goes. This moral freedom is inherently intriguing and alluring to people, because it's an opportunity to explore our darker sides and thereby learn things about ourselves and morality that we wouldn't be able to learn otherwise. However I think it's clear that Bioshock convicts the player for killing little sisters in the end, thematically demonstrating its stance against moral relativism. It convicts the player with critical dialogue from the little sisters, and by rewarding him less materially in the long run, and through the revelation that Atlas, the man who tempted the player with moral relativism to begin with, turned out to be the player's enemy the whole time who's using him and intends to discard him when he has worn out his usefulness.
I agree, but I would’ve loved it if you didn’t get as much ADAM out of it, it removes part of the Morals or Reward equation by essentially giving you more of a reward for three rescues than harvest’s in the long run, I also would’ve loved more endings, kind-of like the second game where having conflicting morals results in a less sweet but still fine ending, the two endings we have in the original game are too extreme to be enjoyable, the good one is satisfying but the bad one is a little too ridiculous for me
I agree, but I would’ve loved it if you didn’t get as much ADAM out of it, it removes part of the Morals or Reward equation by essentially giving you more of a reward for three rescues than harvest’s in the long run, I also would’ve loved more endings, kind-of like the second game where having conflicting morals results in a less sweet but still fine ending, the two endings we have in the original game are too extreme to be enjoyable, the good one is satisfying but the bad one is a little too ridiculous for me
+Janos Biro M. Leite Thanks! Personally I think I outdid it with the Last of Us analysis, but this is one of my favorites I've done so far. And I just love Bioshock so much.
+Games As Literature Will you do a follow-up with infinite and burial at sea? I feel the sequel is essential in filling in the whole bioshock narrative.
+mikeyman2010 I plan to do the series in order, yes, just spread out a bit. Doing them all too quickly would get it out of the way too quickly and alienate people who haven't played the series, so I'm spreading them out. Bioshock 2 is due in the coming months, if I remember my schedule correctly.
Can I pick a bone with you on the ethics of Bioshock? I think the game is not really criticizing Objectivism (which I regard as a terrible way to think about ethics and economy). Yes, it rewards the player for sacrificing himself, but it also rewards the player for stealing, murdering, and committing other terrible things. The player is, after all, a slave, he does Fontaine's dirty work, and he is very corruptible. Not exactly a hero, even in the good ending, if you think about it. The ideia that Rapture could work if the "parasites" didn't interfere kind of remains. What do you think?
I absolutely LOVE this analysis to bits! Here's some small interesting facts that you forgot to include as well, though: * Andrew Ryan was Jewish, which actually was a huge part of his fear for the war. * When Brigid Tenenbaum 'participated' in Nazi Germany experiments she was still a child. (She was also Jewish and has Autism, so most of her participation was so she would stay alive.) * While it's never stated explicitly, the fact that Sander Cohen is gay is made very clear in subtext (it was widely believed he had sexual relations with his proteges/you later find out all his proteges are male when send out to kill them/etc.) and the Audio Diary about his ears is most likely about internalized homophobia. * I could go on, but these were the most interesting things I missed!
I can’t play FPS games because they give me “motion sickness” so this video has been the closest thing I’ve heard to experiencing this game. Thanks for your hard work on this.
Man, I truly miss this class. I just replayed the remastered version of this game and was blown away by Andrew Ryan. Back when this game premiered I was too young to truly understand his character and now I can't get enough.
As for Bioshock being art under Rand's definition: It would qualify, as she did consider science fiction to be art (in fact, she was a Trekkie). Some of her stories are borderline-science fiction (Anthem was even titled "A short science fiction novel") However, she didn't much like abstraction in art. You can think of it like: A sculpture of a dragon is art, but a cube of granite with "Dragon" drawn on it in sharpie is not.
one of the greatest regrets of my life is that I had the Bioshock 1 twist ruined for me (via Google images of all things) and I wish I knew what it felt like in that moment when the rug is pulled out from under your feet. great analysis and fantastic work!
I am so happy I stumbled on this brilliant analysis. It was so in depth and did the game's story and philosophy justice, exploring every nook and cranny of this fantastic game. I've been a fan of Bioshock for quite awhile and this literary analysis was a joy to listen to. Keep up the great work!
This was a fantastic analysis. It's a pretty long video, but its treatment of the material, as well the crucial ideas and sources from which it draws, is so well done and goes into so much depth that it was absolutely worth watching all the way to the end. I have a lot of respect for your project here. I'll be recommending this to friends of mine!
The real plot twist is that Sander Cohen is a hilariously-competent genius with precognitive powers. Calling it now: if there's ever a Bioshock 4, he'll be revealed as the mastermind behind everything.
This was absolutely amazing. I've never seen a better review of a product, from games to movies to books, and the fact that the review was on my favorite game made it even more pleasing. Thank you for the lesson, and have a good day.
Calvin & Hobbes put it well when describing why philosophies based on Selfishness don't work: "I didn't mean EVERYONE, you dolt, just ME!" It's all well and good to say we should fend for ourselves and the needy are parasites, until someone else decides it's YOU who's in their way, and until it's YOU who suddenly needs help.
Speaking of Literature (Bioshock spoilers below): I just realized that, as Andrew Ryan's son, technically Jack's full name would be Jack Ryan. Like Jack Ryan, the CIA agent in Tom Clancy's books who made his debut in 1987. Like Jack Ryan, the spy? ...well played, Bioshock. Well played!
To play devil's advocate, Bioshock could be argued to be pro-Objectivist, as harvesting the little sisters would qualify as "parasitism" (you're taking what they produced at their expense). Saving the little sisters is mutually beneficial for both Jack and the Little Sister (which is more in line with objectivism-you don't have to do harm to help yourself). Likewise, he frees the Little Sisters from a life of altruistic service to Rapture and the Adam Industry so that they are no longer slaves, and free to seek out what they want from life.
Matthew Campbell In one short paragraph, you made a better argument for Bioshock being pro-Objectivism than I've seen elsewhere. Seriously, I tried looking up those arguments before writing this episode, and couldn't find any I felt checked out. Well done. :D
Thank you very much! Oh, another thing: Rescuing the little sister is actually the first time Jack rebels against Atlas, and the only time Jack is shown to act like an individual rather than some mindless drone. By saving the little sisters, he's fulfilling both sides of the objectivist ethos: He doesn't sacrifice himself to Atlas, and doesn't sacrifice the little sisters to himself.
Makes sense. Though Atlas didn't actually command that he harvest the Little Sister, simply advised it, so it's hardly rebellion in the same way as later on. More of Jack acting within his freedoms, rather than grasping freedom that was denied to him by authority. My only major contention (which I of course realized this evening rather than when I replied to your original post) is that neither Jack nor the player are aware of the fact that saving the Little Sisters benefits them more in the long run, making the game less about acting simultaneously in your interest and that of others and more about giving of yourself and ending up richer for it.
Fair enough, though even given that, the pro-objectivist narrative still works (between profiting greatly while becoming a parasite, and profiting less while not trampling on the rights of others, the latter is the more 'objectivist' choice) Though that leads me to what my actual interpretation of the story: I like to think the bad ending is anti-objectivist, while the good ending is pro-objectivist. Evil Jack is a straw objectivist who uses the self-interest to harm others, while Good Jack is an objectivist paragon who helps break the chains of oppressive altruistic servitude to the parasites.
This was an awesome analysis of the first game in my favorite game saga. I'm so glad I found your channel! Would you kindly analyze Bioshock Infinite? I feel like you could get a good 2+ hours out of that!
This deserves WAY more views. Some great analysis, a helpful overview of objectivism, and just a generally well-presented discussion of Bioshock. I love this game, and I'm now a total fan of your channel. Keep it up!
fanboy58 Glad you enjoyed it! This one was an absurd amount of work, but I enjoyed making it. And hey, if you think it needs more views, share it! This series is growing, but it's growing quite slowly. I wouldn't mind any help speeding the process along. :)
Just before the final battle, when Jack's transformation is complete, he becomes part of a experiment to test if the objective to induce him to turn himself in a Big Daddy was done right. I think he really was turned in a Big Daddy and the ending is only part of the mind control applied to make him defend the little sisters in Rapture until death. In my interpretation he never left Rapture and all the happy ending is just the final lie used to consolidate his paternal love and make him act as a Big Daddy. During all the game he only kills splicers and the only real person he kills is your father, who represents is own principles and at the end he kills Atlas (thinking that is killing Fontaine), who represents his own ideals and objectives, turning himself irreversibly into a slave.
It legitimately surprises me how this profile only has ~6,000 subscribers - so much effort and time is put into these videos and they are always a joy to watch and really do a fantastic job of teaching a lot about everything behind games and the media around such content. I feel as though a collaboration between this channel and another known as Extra Credits (a very similar, but much more bite-sized premise to this channel) would create an awesome video. Also, I realized that in the beginning of this video, you mention about teaching (I believe?) what sounded like a gaming class in high school similar to this channel? If you could elaborate on this that would be much appreciated.
I really enjoyed this. It's pretty neat that we can still find new interpretations and even have our eyes opened to things we might have missed in a game when we view it through the lens of someone else, even years after playing for the first time. I'll have to catch up on the rest of your work as time allows, as I'm a first-time viewer, but now that I know about you, I'm subscribed. Many thanks for your time and effort on this; it really shows.
SERIOUSLY UA-cam ? This video has 1659 views, few comments and 76 likes ?! Damn, I can't believe it, that's must be unrewarding for the awesome guy behind this video, I mean, look at the work in put into this hour long video ! Dude, you're awesome and from now I'll be a faithful subscriber !
Thank you for this video. My love for this piece of art that is the bioshock franchise is obsessive. Tattoos, books, Quotes Stuck up on my wall beside my bed so it’s the first thing I see in the morning. These games have possessed my mind since I first played them and I’m nothing but grateful. If Bioshock isn’t proof that video games can be works of art, Then i don’t want anything to do with art.
On Cohen, I don't know if anyone else noticed this but for me every single time I play the bit where he sends Splicers after you in the Foye, and plays classical music the bangs of the shotgun and even the pumping action afterwards always lined up perfectly with the music.
kirtur Thanks! Really glad you like it; this one nearly killed me. :P I may need to hold off on such long and complex analyses until I have enough Patreon support to justify taking a day off work or something. Totally worth it, though.
Finished Bioshock 1 just today and am so happy I found this channel explaining some of the plotholes i had about bioshock since i couldn't manage to find all voice tapes. Instantly subbed, great work and an hour very well spent!
Just want to say your content is very refreshing. With guys like Mathew Matossis, Joseph Anderson, and, Mauler, it’s nice to see these games broken down in the least biased way you can. I find you to be up there with them and I think it’d be great to see you do one of these longer analysis on something like Bloodborne. Anyway, hope your able to keep the content going. Makes work go a little faster, and I can tell you enjoy doing this. Cheers!
This was very well done and your passion for the game and the medium inspiring. Do you think you'll ever do an analysis of Infinite and compare the big ideas of the games and how they delve into and show the pros and cons of the opposing viewpoints?
Sir, you made an amazing video, and I can only hope to make a video analysis that comes close to this level of quality and intellect. I'm so happy more people are making these connections. What's funny is that I just took a college course on music history and culture, and one day my professor spent the whole class time lecturing us about the musical anachronisms in Bioshock Infinate as a way to prepare for his presentation at some music theory conference. It was awesome. I've never seen the class so involved. Anyway, great video. And I look forward to witnessing a his channel grow. (Btw, I'm working on a literary analysis in the Mass Effect Trilogy. I hope you tackle that series too. Wish me luck!)
Antonio Valenteen Fuentes Thanks! I'm always happy to hear that people appreciate the videos. ^_^ Also great to see video games being used in college! That's becoming increasingly common, and I hope it won't be too much longer before there can be actual classes all about those concepts. And yes, Mass Effect is coming, but RPG analyses take so absurdly much time and effort that I'm waiting until there's a certain level of Patreon support. When I can justify taking some time off work to make it, that analysis will certainly be on its way! (Also, feel free to subscribe/like/follow/share if you want to see the channel grow) :P
Antonio Valenteen Fuentes Oh, and good luck on your own analysis! I'll subscribe so I make sure not to miss it when it happens! That's a pretty huge undertaking, as the series' themes and arcs are many (even if the ending of 3 kind of invalidates most of them). :)
One point I kept waiting for you to make is that Andrew Ryan's dying statement (a man chooses, a slave obeys) is just flat out incorrect. The difference between a man and a slave is that a slave had choice taken away from him, usually through some form of coercion by external forces more powerful than himself. Objectivism is often very picky about when it does or doesn't accept the reality of people's material conditions, often preferring to believe men are simply better than slaves through some innate characteristic of their person. Choosing to believe a person's social status is an indicator of their value to society. If Ryan believed there was something innately special about his son that would allow him to simply choose to reject years of torturous mental conditioning, then his death was as inevitable as the fall of Rapture itself. And even as he lie dying, still taunting his own son for not being as rational and self-determined as he is, thinking he still got the last laugh, he clearly didn't learn a fucking thing from the experience and I don't feel the slightest bit bad that he died the way he did. Full disclosure here, I don't like Bioshock, and I found the twist kind of insulting.
What I found interesting is that "World of Tomorrow" pretty much is the movie version but basically choose the bad ending. Speaking of movies. One often hears the phrase "The 'Citizen Kane' of gaming has yet to come". I think it has been here for quite a while now. Well Orson Wells classic was not considered that masterpiece in its time, either.
Fantastic and intelligent analysis. I would definitely like more of this calibre and the long length is a pro not a con imo :) thank you for all your effort.
I find that the game doesn't trash objectivisim, because Ryan doesn't follow one of the most basic rules of objectivist principles. Ryan prohibited free trade. Doing that, he created a market for smuggling. If Ryan had simply opened trade, I don't believe the problems Ryan faced with people like Fontaine would have come up.
Charles Owens Though free trade doesn't exclude the secret of rapture, something Ryan wanted to keep under lock and key, to protect it against the afformentioned so-called "parasites". Fontaine didn't want that either, as with no one with authority over him, he can do whatever he wants. THIS is the failure of objectivism. we are not perfect and some even get where they are BY hurting others directly. indeed, the freedom that's granted to pursue what we want without hurting people directly, also grants the freedom to hurt people directly, something that Fontaine took full advantage of, to everyone else's determent.
Charles Owens good point. Maybe the inability of Ryan, the ultimate Rand hero, to follow objectivist principles is a commentary on how alien those principles are. Are humans even capable of following them?
I think the Cohen level wasn't just made to explore artistic freedom in Rapture. It also showed that Jack,after losing radio contact with Atlas needed instructions to go about his existence,thus doing Cohen his bidding. Though it's likely you're basically playing the part to continue getting through to Andrew Ryan. anyway, you did an awesome job sir,and have earned another subscriber.
One of, if not THE, best explanations of this game as not just a piece of software, but also a piece of learning and immersion that has defined this game. Excellent. Although one thing, would you mind doing a video on the book, I know it's a book and you do games, that was developed as a prequel to Bioshock 1 and 2, Bioshock: Rapture.
I have read it, and I have a particular interest in adaptation to and from games, so I might do something on it at some point. Not as in-depth, though; as you said, books aren't my specialty.
Good to know, thanks for the response. another question: Have you done/do you plan on doing a video on Bioshock 2, Bioshock 2: Minerva's Den, Bioshock Infinite, and Burial At Sea? I realize this video probably took a long time, and the rest of the franchise took longer, but have any been done/are on the radar.
One other thing. In this analysis, you said that Bioshock rewards Altruism because what tennenbaum said, "The path of the righteous is not always easy", is not true because of the exclusives you get from the Little Sister Gifts. This is actually not true, if you look at it, the harvest path COULD be considered easier, due to the fact of the Gatherer's Garden. While the Plasmids and Gene Tonics (GT's) are exclusive and quite useful, they are not the standard ones we typically use. After all, they don't give up upgrades to the main Plasmids and GT's we use. They also don't give us a Health Capacity and Eve Capacity upgrades, or the Gatherer's Garden exclusive items. And while yes, you do get Adam from the gifts, it is not as high as a pure harvester would have, or as frequent as a pure harvester gets it. Harvest gives 180 ADAM, while Rescuing gives 80 ADAM and then every 3 Rescues a gift containing 200 ADAM and other stuff. Through calculation you learn that a Harvester gets 40 more ADAM then a Rescuer. This amount of ADAM is significant enough to enable them to purchase more from a Gatherer's Garden. You also as a Harvester get more ADAM more frequently, rather then waiting for the gifts. So, in terms of the Gatherer's Garden, yes Harvesting is the better option, while rescuing gives you the exclusives, they aren't major things that heavily impact your gameplay. Now this does not include any of the moral or philosophical means.
THIS ONLY HAS 4,000 SUMODD VIEWS?! That's a gosh darn shame!! I'd been waiting for this kind of break down so for long and appreciate this extensive analytical effort SO MUCH!!! OFF TO THE SUBSCRIBERS LIST WITH ME!!
+Hannah Smith Ha! Yeah, that's certainly not the intention of that one. :P And thanks for the Patreon backing! I'll be thanking a few new patrons on the actual site in a bit, but no harm in thanking you here too. That support helps out a lot. ^_^
Awh you're so welcome! I really appreciate what you're doing with your craft. Gaming on UA-cam is no small market but THIS truly legitimate analysis corner of the genre is, as far as I see. So both you and The Game Theorists in my opinion are doing the community a really worthy service!
Im a Bioshock fan so while browsing through Bioshock videos I found this one and Im so glad I did. The video was so great I immediately subscribed to you and began browsing through your other videos and it's so great to find someone else who appreciates video games as an art form and speaks about it the way you do. If this class was offered at my school I would be the first to sign up but unfortunately it isn't.
Justin Loo I'm very happy to hear that! I am particularly proud of this one, so I'm glad you found it. I hope you enjoy the rest of the show just as much ^_^ And yeah, I've not seen the class much at all. I think I found a couple offerings at colleges, and I'm the only one I know of who's taught it in high school. But I hope to have a part in making it a bit more common.
Justin Loo Oh, it'll definitely happen. Just trying to space these things out. I do one analysis per month, and filling my schedule with Bioshock would be fun, but severely lacking in variety. Both games will happen in time. ^_^
ahh the Bioshock series. Bioshock Infinite is most likely my favorite video game in terms of music, taking a second to only Minecraft. And I definitely agree with you on the violence. It's a very amazing series, but not the most family-friendly.
Interestingly, I read on TV Tropes that Bioshock was only going to have one ending, which was the evil ending. However, the execs demanded that they have a happy ending thrown in.
Matthew Campbell Really? Now that's interesting. It certainly would have meant something quite different, though exactly what would depend on how they go about it. I do hope they planned to flesh out the evil ending a bit more though, because as it stands it's incredible weak.
Games As Literature I'd imagine the moral would be something along the lines of "Humans are bastards", which is something the people at Irrational seem to think. According to Levine, his interpretation of the evil ending was something along the lines of "Rapture becomes a third superpower, and turns the Cold War into a 3-way conflict". Which could contain interesting stories in its own right.
Games As Literature I think the Execs were right this time. In fact, even Levine seems to prefer the good ending, given that it was officially made canonical.
Matthew Campbell True, that would be interesting. And yeah, Irrational does kind of seem to think that, though it doesn't help that all their games have been about dystopian societies ruled by one brand or another of political extremism. Which is fine--that's what makes them interesting--but certainly means they portray a lot of terrible people being terrible.
1:03:09 "altruism is rewarded" (paraphrasing) But isn't this in some ways saying and essentially conceding to the idea that objectivism, or at the very least selfishness, is the driving force of altruism. In Bioshock, being "altruistic" after all reaps you higher rewards. This essentially turns altruism from being a selfless act into more of an investment. "I will have access to less 'money' now, but I will have more later than if I'd not invested it into 'helping' ". In the financial world, while buying stocks of a company is giving said company more money to work with, you don't buy stocks out selflessness or altruism because you want to help Apple or BP, you buy stocks because you plan on reaping larger dividends than your initial investment (aka "sacrifice" of money). And while not all acts of altruism will result in a net positive monetary gain, you do always get something out of being altruistic. Always. That gain changes from person to person and situation to situation, but there is always a personal gain involved into an altruistic "investment". This can be positive reputation (or a negative reputation and ostracisation by society if you refuse to do so) if you do it with witnesses present. It can be an increase in self-worth or self-esteem. It might give you a sense of moral superiority. It might please your supernatural deity. You might do it because you think it will help the world (something you and potentially your offspring are and will be a part of). It might simply make you happy. But all of those reasons are for your own, essentially selfish reasons. If altruism would not be for your own gain, then it should not matter to you what someone does with the results of your sacrifice. If you give 20 dollars to someone in need and they literally burn the money in front of your eyes, and you get upset about that, then you deny them their own free will to do with said gift however the please, at which point you have to concede that you gave them to money for one of the aforementioned reasons. In conclusion, even charity and altruism could fit into a objectivist model, if one agrees to the theory that even selfless acts are purely a form of investment that are expected to reap some type of benefit for you, even if said benefit is purely satisfaction with yourself. Also: 22:16 Black kitty! 24:13 Tricolour kitty!
The main problem with that is that the main proponents of a philosophy where people of exceptional ability are given total freedom are people who see THEMSELVES as "exceptional". People of that mold often find themselves falling into the traps that ensnared the characters in Bioshock. Ambition and a disregard for the well-being of others is a toxic combination in any society but its praised as a virtue by many of the more public voices advocating Objectivism. I don't think its possible to find a version of Objectivism that will find any traction among its current "fanbase" if it incorporates altruism as a mandatory component. A quick google search of "objectivism, altruism" can show that. Yet as Bioshock shows, no society can exist made up entirely of "winners" and that even exceptional people are still human beings. Simple probability shows that some individuals will be on the losing end of any unequal transaction. Objectivism abandons them to their own devices but fails to take into account that "quantity has a quality all its own." The health of the overall society is VITAL to creating an environment where the exceptional can prosper or the rest of society will turn on its leaders out of simple self-preservation. Society NEEDS exceptional individuals like Jack who either by choice or by compulsion SACRIFICE their own well-being for the good of the many WITHOUT thought of personal reward or else society will collapse into dictatorship or anarchy. Objectivism calls those people immoral fools. I call those people HEROES.
Replaying the game recently, it is semi-punished. You cannot get a ton of Plasmids that may be helpful right away. You can only get a few. It takes three rescues each to eventually be reward and if you had just harvested you'd probably have gotten every plasmid and tonic you could want quicker and sooner. You certainly wouldn't have had to potentially choose between winter blast and upgrading your health So it's sacrificing the long term for short term immediate returns. The inevitable result of all greed and selfishness. I get what I want now at the expense of others rather than later through a vague promise I might be rewards. You have no reason to trust that Tenebaum will reward you or keep rewarding you. You just have to trust she's on the level and your good deeds will be rewarded somehow. There's no garuntee they will be though. Infinite probably does this better, as there is no immediately obvious reward for being moral or good. Only your own perception of what you feel is right and whether or not you can live with yourself after. Much like Booker who is denying his own guilt and refusing to face what he did. But I still feel the Little Sisters are a well done element illustrating the idea of empathy for others and sacrificing something for your own ends to achieve a greater whole. Even if Objectivism doesn't advocate harm and simply disuade charity, it's logical conclusion is abject selfishness. Rand herself promoted the exploitation of the Middle East and its resources based purely on the fact America was the only country capable of getting it. So even if it was in another country, it was America's by simple fact they developed the technology to get it. That's like saying my car belongs to the manufacturer even after sale and I'm obligated to give him a ride because he put the time and effort into building it for me. So, a little bit of hypocrisy there.
Grizabeebles As someone who has worked with the ARI (Ayn Rand Institute), no voice has publicly supported chasing your self-interest to the detriment of others. Not one. So I’m curious as to whose voice you’re listening to? It can’t be anyone from the Institute.
You are correct and what you say in your comment is just a tiny bit of what makes objectivism utter garbage. It is based on criticising a strawman. What Rand is talking about, "collectivism" as sacrificing yourself for others without getting anything in return, simply doesn't exist. Even an episode in Friends was better at looking at this issue than she was with all of her books and interviews.
I just wanted to thank you. I'm using you for my son's homeschooling curriculum. This is a great game to cover: anarchy, atheism, plato's save, noble savage noble liar, capitalism, stockholm syndrome and the cause and effects of the drug world. Besides it's always nice vegging on the sofa playing games all day long doing nothing with my kiddo. Thanks again!
Just found your channel off the end of video youtube links for the philosophy of system shock. There is a remake of System shock is coming out so I went on a bit of a binge watching of vids relating to it and urs struck my interest. Just telling you how I came across your channel. Bioshock is just one of those games which is an experience. I hope your channel grows cause the content is very good.
I think that Bioshock (Bioshock 1 and 2) shows the merits and shortcomings of Objectivism and altruism, as the 'villains' of the story have understandable reasons to believe what they believe and they're not entirely bad (except Frank Fontaine/Atlas, he definitely had evil intentions). Both of their stubborn beliefs in their ideals led to their respective downfalls and demises, even if Ryan believed he had triumphed in the end.
This is the first video of your series I ever watched. Can't remember how I found it but immediately after watching it I wanted see more of your work. As a fan of the BioShock series I thought this literary analysis was PERFECT. It even answered a question I had for a long time about that stupid "Wild Bunny" poem. Until now I thought it was just another example of how unhinged Cohen was (as if he needed one). This video also introduced me to Miracle of Sound, so bonus points! Now, would you kindly do an analysis on BioShock 2 and BioShock Infinite?
Is it weird that I consider introducing you to Miracle of Sound just as much a victory as making a video you describe as perfect? :P And yes, I do plan on Bioshock 2 and Infinite. the whole show has been slower lately since I have a full-time job and have trouble managing my time to keep up a regular schedule, but I plan to do them sometime, for sure. (I am also obligated to note at this point that you can force me to do them over at Patreon, if you want)
I loved the videos, very nice work man I too think its appaling you not having more visibility. One thing regarding the bioshock twist that I was sure you were going to touch on, but didnt. Killing ryan was actually Jack's choice, not fontaine's in the end. Pay attention to ryan's speech. He ends up taking control of Jack, telling him to run, stop, etc using the WYK phrase. When he puts the club back in jacks hand, he does not say would you kindly kill me, he just says Kill. He never commanded jack to do it. at this point the order to kill ryan was no longer active, because ryan had took control of him, so jack could choose not to do it. Another thing, in ryans office after you kill him, there is a vita chamber. when you go there, the description says that it is deactivvated. it is the only one like that in the game, making the case stronger for ryan wanting to stay dead, and not having this way out, after all he could merely turn that chamber on and rezz right after jack kills him. Keep doing this awesome content man, expect a patreon from me soon. You deserve it.
+Vitor Araujo I don't think that Jack chose to kill Ryan, despite Ryan not saying 'would you kindly.' After all, by this point, Jack was still under Atlas' (Fontaine's) order to kill Ryan. Ryan adding a few new short commands wouldn't have overridden the older one, I think--not until it was completed, at least. Having this in mind, I think another video on the topic of the illusion of choice in Bioshock and Spec ops: The Line would be a great idea--if this guy does that kind of thing.
+Lunavarion Ryan could at any point override the command. He was showing jack that he as free, he could do whatever he wanted, but he didnt want to comeo ut and say it, he wanted him to be able to choose. A man chooses, a slave obeys. The last command jack had was an open command, "Kill" and not "WOuld you kindly kill". Throught the entire game we seen jack only following one command at a time. Every chapter is one commadn only, so I am sue he was free when he killed Ryan.
Vitor Araujo I think I understand your point, and yet, Jack was sent there to kill in the first place. I think we need to accept that there is no clear answer to this since the extent of the programming was never explained in-game. Maybe Jack could deal with only one command at a time. Maybe he could have more than one at once. We can't say for sure one way or another.
what we know for sure is that Andrew could have sotpped him, just by commanding him to kill Atlas instead. Or have him kill himself. And he didnt, to prove a point. Best character ever
Vitor Araujo I think it was said either in the video or in another comment here that Ryan didn't command Jack to stop simply to illustrate the difference between being a man and being a slave. Ryan chose to die while Jack was following an order to kill.
+m0ZZaik Yeah, I've been informed of that since this video; the research I did in preparation for this episode indicated that it was, and it seems to line up with Rand's approach to those who don't contribute to society. But yes, this has been corrected since then.
That’s actually not true. Yes, it’s immoral according to Objectivism to force charity, but that’s sort of a derivative issue (more political than moral). Nor is charity itself immoral. What’s immoral, according to Objectivism, is sacrifice: giving up a higher for a lesser value. And that is exactly what altruism demands: to sacrifice that which one values personally for the “greater good” (but lesser personal value) of others. And that is how much charity is presented and thought of. And *that* is immoral. Whether it is, objectively, a sacrifice to give charity in any one case depends on the personal objective values of the giver, but it can only be moral in the first place if he seeks to gain a value by it, rather than destroy one.
Also, at the risk of nitpicking a two-year-old comment, Rand would be horrified by a phrase like “contribute to society” as applied to her views. That implies that society (others) are owed something, that one gains value from giving to others. She would rather talk about whether an individual is doing the best he can for himself, or not.
The problem with objectivism is that nobody follows its principles. Because its principles are built on the assumption that human beings have no morality, no emotions, no feelings and no flaws. It should be really telling that Ayn Rand herself was a hypocritical piece of shit who argued it was completely reasonable for her to have an affair with a younger, more handsome man. And then got butthurt about him doing the same to her without a shred of self-awareness or decency.
On a slightly unrelated note, my other complaint with Infinite's story is that the villain wasn't as rounded this time. Andrew Ryan started out a reasonably ok guy (if a bit of an idealogue) who turned to evil when his dreams of utopia began to fall apart. By contrast, Comstock is little more than a Klansman. When you arrive, the evils and racism going on in Columbia aren't (to my knowledge) Comstock being driven to madness by an extant threat to his dreams, grasping at straws for any hope to save it. They were what he was planning from the start.
+Matthew Campbell I've always seen Infinite as more of an omg parallel universes so cool kind of action game as Inception is a fun and thoughtfully plotted movie, but with little philosophical value. Frankly I think Infinite got way more praise for its plot than it should have and the genius of BioShock and objectivism went over 90 percent of players' heads.
@15:40 You make a mistake here. Charity is not morally wrong according to Objectivism. "My views on charity are very simple. I do not consider it a major virtue and, above all, I do not consider it a moral duty. There is nothing wrong in helping other people, if and when they are worthy of the help and you can afford to help them. I regard charity as a marginal issue. What I am fighting is the idea that charity is a moral duty and a primary virtue." -A.R.
mughat I've gotten a few corrections on this one, but it seems to be an issue people are split on. I did research for this video, to make sure I wasn't going to completely misrepresent the issue, and ran it by a friend with a philosophy degree, and it checked out up until I uploaded it and got some comments like yours. I'm all for learning more about stuff like this, and perhaps I'd have worded it a bit differently had I seen this quote before making the video. That said, I think the "if and when they are worthy of the help" caveat may be a problem there. At the very least, it does indicate some level of contextual morality based on who you're helping, and considering Rand wasn't too fond of people taking government aid, I'd be interested in knowing what her criteria were for one who was "worthy."
+Games As Literature "I'd be interested in knowing what her criteria were for one who was "worthy." There is an example Ayn Rand used which clarifies this imho: *To illustrate this on the altruists’ favorite example: the issue of saving a drowning person. If the person to be saved is a stranger, it is morally proper to save him only when the danger to one’s own life is minimal; when the danger is great, it would be immoral to attempt it: only a lack of self-esteem could permit one to value one’s life no higher than that of any random stranger. (And, conversely, if one is drowning, one cannot expect a stranger to risk his life for one’s sake, remembering that one’s life cannot be as valuable to him as his own.)If the person to be saved is not a stranger, then the risk one should be willing to take is greater in proportion to the greatness of that person’s value to oneself. If it is the man or woman one loves, then one can be willing to give one’s own life to save him or her-for the selfish reason that life without the loved person could be unbearable.* It basically depends on your personal values which are hierarchical. If you have very little money and need it for food etc., charity would be considered immoral.
Nicely done! I've watched other videos and even read some academic papers on this and your video I think has the most elaborative and clear treatment of the Objectivist roots (even if you disclaimed your rendering of it!). I didn't check, but if you haven't done another video tying this game, Infinite, and Burial at Sea you definitely should. Plot-wise, it's amazing how Levin brings us full circle!!
+juliomb1 Thanks! I always love to hear that people appreciate the videos. ^_^ And yes, my plan is to work my way through the Bioshock series, but I try to spread things out a bit. So we'll get Bioshock 2 in a while, and Infinite/Burial at Sea sometime after that.
I think having fetch quests was a good idea for the gameplay because in nearly every level it forces the player to explore Rapture and discover more of its wonderfully crafted setting. Fort Frolic especially is a good example of this. The player is forced to look at more and more of the art that is produced when there are no moral limitations.
So is the splicing that the protagonist does not have that pheromone corruption? Is the mental conditioning overriding the pheromones? It seems weird that Atlas leaves the little sister choice in the protagonists hands when he states that he wants them killed without using his favorite phrase.
i just finished the game and came here for a in depth analysis and that i was delivered , well done sir i have subbed and look forward to seeing more breakdown as videogame are art and deserve to be dissected and discussed.
The only discordant note when I played Bioshock was that, as you mention, Jack's motivation is haphazard and pre-assumed at best. Infinite fixes it, giving you a clear goal ("Bring us the girl..."), but in Bioshock I felt I had to listen go here and there to, basically, move the plot along. Nevermind the final plot-twist -- which I think is undermined by the gameplay, giving you no other option than obeying Atlas --, I felt for much of the way that I was being dragged along.
Gato Negro See, Jack's motive makes enough sense to me; he has to get out of there. Pretty sure the Bathysphere wasn't going to just go back up the way it came, and Atlas offered him a way out. So yeah, it's kind of pre-assumed, but makes just enough sense that your average player just kind of goes along with it without thinking twice, which was kind of the point.
+Games As Literature Sort of like Gordan Freeman in Half Life and Isaac in Dead Space 2 ( Didn't play Dead Space 1 and Dead Space 3 had an objective for him , I think)
My thoughts on Sander Cohen are that his masterpiece is probably trying to show the moment of death, as in, what you have accomplished. Everything you have ever done and what it amounts to are only captured in the moment of your death. Rapture is a tomb, so he is taking advantage of the corpses, alive or dead. Normally, when someone dies down there, nobody would ever know anything about them, but to Cohen, he wants the player to take pictures of the immediate poses of his proteges' deaths, so that he can display all they have accomplished in one striking image. Ryan says something similar when you try to get into his office. He has corpses nailed to the walls as a display of power and fear. He tells the player that the people will ask "Who was that, hanging on the wall? Who was that?". I believe Cohen is trying to give an answer "Here it is! THIS is who they were!"
Great series. It is really encouraging to see more people recognising video games as yet another form of art and really putting all their heart and effort into making such analisis properly. I loved the video. Keep up the good work. Ever thought of doing videos on games like Kotor 2, Planescape: Torment, Dark Souls, or any of Final Fantasies?
+Darth Likaon Thanks! I'm glad you like the series. ^_^ Thought of all of them, yes. Will likely get to all of them with time. I have a deep personal love for Final Fantasy, and I plan on tackling the first KOTOR at some point, but at the moment I don't really have time to analyze such long games (the patron-requested Dragoon analysis nearly killed me), so I'm waiting on a Patreon goal so I can reimburse myself for time off work to make them. Though in the meantime patrons of a certain level can make me analyze them anyway.
Ooh You've got the Bioshock 2 special edition. That was my favourite special edition for a long time, it's still the classiest, other SEs have come with LPs but none of them are this soundtrack. I've got that poster framed on the wall next to me right now.
Wow. This is one of the most interesting video I have seen in a long time. I rarely watch videos this long in one go, but this one I did. Also doing a literary analysis on Dark Souls seems like a good idea to me.
I'm glad you liked it! I do get a lot of requests for Dark Souls, and it'll probably happen at some point, but at the moment I have a policy against analyzing super long games just because it takes so long to play, research, and analyze the game, then write, film, and edit the analysis. There's a Patreon goal set up though, so once I get enough support to make the effort more feasible it'll probably happen. ^_^
52:45 the black or white right or wrong choice, could also reflect the theme of objectivism. "A person that doesn't care about anything except trying to win."
"in a /frankly/rather plain and uninteresting boss battle" against frank fontaine. I'm not sure if the frankly was intentional or not but either way it was amusing
You know, it's important to remember that while the interpretation is clearly an indictment of objectivism, Rapture isn't really what Ayn Rand would advocate for anyways. Frank Gamer did a great video on this using Ayn Rand interviews. If you listen to her own words, you'll see that she is indeed in favor of governance to protect the natural rights of man. Clearly there was no government in Rapture, at least not one that was there to protect anyone. The society would be a better example of Anarchism than Objectivist (or Libertarian) society than, as that features no government whatsoever.
+Damian Clark Actually, anarchism is only present by the time you get there. Before, there was certainly a government. People often mistake Rapture's society for anarchy rather than objectivism, because it really looks like "anyone can do whatever they want" from what we can see, but the audio diaries and extended materials give more detail on how Ryan went about it, and there were laws and requirements. There's even an audio diary referencing an appeals system that held businesses accountable to Ryan himself.
Games As Literature But I'd argue that the "government" that was in place wasn't strong enough or even held enough authority that it could accomplish what something like Ayn Rand advocates though. To be fair, it's been a while since I played the game, but I don't remember there being that strong of a central government even prior to the fall. Appreciate the response though.
+Damian Clark That is entirely possible, yes. The game itself only hinted at it, but the details would be found in the book about Andrew Ryan, which I unfortunately haven't read yet, so you may very well be right.
Few connections to add: Ayn Rand's the fountainhead supports the right to destroy things you've made if others have come and added their own things to it. This is similar to the creator of rapture trying to destroy it by, among other things, destroying the trees. Also, the twist works on another level. It says a philosophy primarily based on free will is doomed because those may think they live under free will, but are actually being controlled by ideology, habit (our expectations for gaming leading us to follow Atlas' directions), and nature/nurture (in this case, a childhood of mind control).
I've heard it argued that for someone brought up in a collectivist state, Ayn rebelled strongly against the state and society forcing their morality on others. Altruism and charity can be twisted, just like Objectivism is portrayed in Bioshock. (And Rand would probably say that altruism and charity were twisted in her land of birth.) I actually find a lot of Bioshock to be a kind of straw man of objectivism. Any ideology run to extreme, corrupted by disruptive elements, can go off the rails. And Objectivism can be a kind of low-hanging fruit for that kind of deconstruction, because people tend to be shocked at the idea of selfishness being thought of as a virtue instead of a vice. As the Little Sisters were a clumsy morality mechanic, so the whole game seems to be in it's statement on Objectivism. Who would find Objectivism appealing when it's portrayal features cold-hearted people in suits, making long winded speeches, and preying on little girls? The themes and ambiance, the setting is wonderfully evocative. And I enjoyed the game, but I couldn't help feeling like I was being preached to all throughout.
I did some research on why he injects himself with the Plasmid as soon as he sees it. Its mostly environmental story telling. 1) You are first introduced to Plasmids and ADAM through an ad for "Incinerate" when the movie in the Bathosphere starts. So that first catches your eye. 2) The art deco environment in which you first experience Rapture also has some ads for this material, but again, they're subtle. 3) And finally, the "Little Sisters" ADAM vending machine, where the electrobolt plasmid simply sits around. As you progress in the game, these vending machines play a significant role (RPG and narrative wise), and furthermore since they advertise the thing too ("Smarter than Einstein, stronger than Hercules, and lights a fire with the snap of (your) fingers"), and that you need it in order to open the first door (you only have a 250mm heavy duty wrench after all - not lockpicking material tbh), you have to get jacked up on the plasmid anyway. Incidentally, 4) You actually are vulnerable when you let it change your genetic makeup. And it is interesting that neither the splicers, nor the big daddy/little sister actually take advantage of the situation. They have their reasons, but it serves a significant narrative purpose, which is shown in this analysis. Overall, its quite robust - heck it even uses the "you need x in order to progress" gaming trope in a legitimate narratively cohesive way, if you think about it. NICE!
Yes. Thank you for this. BioShock deserves a dissection and analysis like the one you have provided. I am glad you do what you do. Please keep it up. I now understand more now why this gem is such a gem. obviously you could not encompass all of what this game was trying to do, but honestly who the hell could? You did an exceptional job anyways thank you. p.s. nice song at the end, eve though personally I liked " Beyond the Sea"
Can you elaborate the symbolism of Atlas? How is it in relation to this objectivism ideology, and why the name Atlas Shrugged for Rand's fictional yet philosophical book?
For some reason those little cue cards that separate chapters on this presentation and show a pic of rapture with the bubbly music, reminds me of assassins creed 2. Idk why but every time I hear it I immediately think of ezio.
bioshock is truly a game that should be considered as great literature. it does what any good book does and that is to engage the reader and for the reader to immerse himself in the story and once done come away enriched by the experience. great job on the vid... subbed.
In all fairness, most people who haven’t delved deep into Rand wouldn’t know that she gave a lot of money to charity. She was not against it by any means, she didn’t assume it was immoral. That’s the greatest misconception about Objectivism. Your rational self-interest can be based around your values. If you value the betterment of the misfortunate over clothes, canned food, or some of your money - she did not see it as immoral to provide them with such things, especially if you were wealthy. However, she did not see this as a justification for your life nor as something that should be seen as moral. This is coming from someone who is not a fan of her metaphysics, but still understands her work and life. Other than that, summary was pretty good! 🙏
Beautiful analysis, I can never get enough from the rich worlds and narratives surrounding the Bioshock franchise. Do you have intentions of analyzing Bioshock Infinite? (and it's DLC, which should likely be a video of its own!) Again, amazing work :)
I will be honest when i played the game i saw it as pro objectivist throughout. If Ryan had stuck with his principles and allowed others to have trade with the outside world there would have been no black market for fontaine to garner his money and influence. because of this he would have not had the money to fund the Adam research but that is somewhat of a minor point because he could have made his money by any means but shows on of the first instances of Ryan failing to follow his own philosophy. The more pressing issue is ignoring the fact that one of the main pillars of objectivism is that one does not have the right to use force against anyone else in society. This point is somewhat muddied with the little sisters as they were voluntarily handed over under false pretenses to the research but they were still forced to become experiments without understood consent. After that the game goes off the rails as far as sticking with objectivism because almost everything is done via force. The nationalization of fontaine futuristics, forced surgeries, the "art". Not harvesting the little sisters is actually the more objectivist action because you are doing something that is beneficial to both parties although the consent is not given so it is technically not a voluntary interaction. On the other hand harvesting them is using force against them that has no benefit to them. So in the end choosing the mutually beneficial and arguably consented to method is rewarded. Also i slightly disagree with the assessment of Tennenbaum as you could argue that inorder to make herself feel better about what she had done in the past she is attempting to right her wrong doings. Framing it in this manner you could say that she has decided it is in her own rational self interest to restore the little sisters to their pre-experimental form. You could argue that she has restored her objectivist beliefs as she has rejected her previous use of force against others. All that being said in my opinion almost all of the negatives that occurred in rapture happened as a result of force, coercion, or the rejection of objectivism. That being said it is still #2 on my favorite games of all time list (behind Portal) and i enjoyed the thoughtful analysis and trip down memory lane. Sorry if this came across as defensive or argumentative i just had a different take on a couple situations. Subscribed, Liked and looking forward to checking out some other vids.
+Cody Weber It didn't come across as argumentative; I love a good discussion from different viewpoints! But ultimately, yeah, I can see where you're coming from. I've seen a few arguments for the game's pro-objectivism since I made this video, and while I still mostly hold to the interpretation given here, I'm impressed at how much more sense it makes now that people have explained it in response to my own. I do tend to more easily understand other viewpoints when I can debate them with people, so maybe that's what I needed for it to make any sense. :P In any case, I'm glad you enjoyed it!
Would love to see more videos analysing games like this! I think it is interesting that Ryan's objection to Fontaine's smuggling is not a philosophical one but one out of the practicality of keeping Rapture secret. ("A city in the Ocean Deep, A promise we will always keep" ). Possibly this game is saying that this philosophy is feasible only if it has completely no contact with any other civilization.
one more thing. In regards to the new bioshock.. In infinite the player is re-introduced to choice except choice with the same inevitable ending. it also introduces the infinite parallel universes with slightly different actions. What if the new bioshock was a spin off of the original except in a different universe.. maybe to where the player is allowed different choices and decisions that ultimately change the entire way the game is played and making it not so much as a repetitive game but an entirely new outlook. Maybe instead of killing ryan.. you work with him instead to kill fountaine .. but with all events being inevitable, some how the death of ryan and fall of rapture are still worked in, in a different way... anyways love your work! you helped me understand bioshock a lot more, and its cool to know someone else shares the same passion about it! you should do an analysis on bioshock 2 and infinite! Part of me feels like rapture wasn't truly destroyed..
Objectivism is misrepresented here. And in fact, the deal with the little sisters is the perfect example. It doesn't demonstrate the greatness of altruism, but of egoism. By saving these sisters, you are acting to your best interest _long term and in a complete way_ (i.e. ultimately gaining more resources, getting to see these girls happy, and not feeling like a monster) An example of a defense of altruism would be if you had the choice to save Atlas _after he betrayed you and tried to kill you_, and you could see no good reason to save him, but saving him would lead to a greater reward later that you couldn't possibly imagine. Altruism does not being nice to others, and egoism does not mean acting like a psychopath. It's about whether you really think about what is, and act towards, your overall self-interest, rather than putting your faith in someone who says that you must not trust your own judgment, but believe in them, sacrifice what appears to be in your interest, and so on.
+hermanessences I would agree, except that Jack and the player both aren't meant to know they're acting in their best interest. That knowledge is only gained from spoilers or replays; harvesting the Little Sisters is presented as the option that's best for you. Acting on knowledge the character could not have (and the player would only have after already completing the game) doesn't have any bearing on how the game is to be interpreted. The player ultimately gains a greater reward from actions that, at the time, they understand to be less beneficial to them.
+hermanessences Though I should add that I am aware of some misrepresentations of objectivism here, and plan to address and correct them when I analyze Bioshock 2.
+Games As Literature Oh, I seem to remember that the game (or even Tenenbaum) told you that saving the little sisters would give you a greater reward in the long run? If not, there is some point in this being a support of altruism, although there's also the issue of feeling like a monster. Even a person who's been an Objectivist his whole life would probably never kill a strange girl just to be physically stronger, even if he wasn't punished or ostracized for it, because we do after all feel sympathy for others who are similar to us, we want them to thrive, and killing them would be traumatic. On the flip side again, it is indeed a "life boat scenario", in which one's own survival is at stake, which might make it more complicated again. I'd say it might be meant as a defense of altruism, but it's not clear cut. And kudos for being intellectually honest. Most opponents of Objectivism are not.
+hermanessences Tenenbaum does say something like, "I'll make it worth your while" in the chaos of that first encounter, but that's all we get, and she doesn't give any of the care packages until you've saved a few of them. Plus, much like the rest of the game, it's banking on the player's expectations of game logic the first time through the game, and the dilemma of the "good" path being less fun or easy is pretty well ingrained into our minds as gamers. I suppose one could argue the effectiveness of the tactic, but I think it's pretty clear the game intended for the player to see harvesting the little sisters as more beneficial to them. And yeah, I researched Objectivism for this video, but I learned more since then. I still don't agree with or like it, and as such I think some of the mistakes I made are still functionally accurate even if Rand herself would have said otherwise, but I still stated them incorrectly, and I try to make sure I own up when I make a mistake.
I wonder if it would be interesting for you to do a video on the concept of plot twists and how they are used, and address their inherent subjectivity. For example, I've never been able to really view that bit near the end of Bioshock as a 'twist'. It was a cool moment, but it was largely what I expected and fit with the game and the tone to the point that, to me, it felt like merely the next bit of plot, not a twist at all. It was interesting, but not shocking or surprising. It just goes to show how subjective the concept of a 'plot twist' really is.
If only my literature classes were half as engaging as this...
A few more decades and they'll probably create college classes about the cultural imperative of video games same as "Art Appreciation" and "Film Appreciation" and various literature classes.
Fact: Ken Levine stated in a commentary for The Bioshock Collection that the final boss was a decision made by 2K and NOT Irrational and as such, even he states that the ending was a mistake and moral choice system were never intended to be in the game.
Minarus Infernus GODDAMN IT STRAUSS ZELNICK
@@Lucas-ez4uj
GODDAMIT GRANDMA
Really? where can I find this? Btw what was the intended ending then? Was the good ending supposed to be the intended one or the bad ending?
Its funny that he gonna makes a linear game that offers no choices when the game is about free will. How can you say there are free will in your game when you was gonna offered us no choices
@@catpurrito5586 and you missed the point.
Why does this dude not have way more subscribers.
xXsomethingfishyXx Good question! :P
xXsomethingfishyXx It's the classic UA-cam problem. Channels that do more with games such as breaking down themes or looking at the science behind a game are vastly drowned out by Lets Play channels.
New Age Gam3rs Yup. It's occasionally a sad thing to realize, that a 30-second video of a guy screaming over Call of Duty footage will always get more views than I ever will. But it's how it goes. What fans I do have like what I do, so I'm alright with it.
Well as I am a new comer to your channel I do enjoy your quality and topics of your videos. I enjoy breaking down games and learning whats behind it. I do that on my channel as well. I look at the science, technology, and philosophy behind games and look at the real life implications behind those elements. I'm always actively looking for channels like ours because I get sick and tired of the million Lets Play Channels.
Good to know there are people looking for this stuff, and glad you enjoy the channel! I enjoy that kind of analysis as well. ^_^
When it comes to the Little Sisters, I think it actually fits in with the story, specifically with Ryan's view of choice. He believes that men make choices, but in the end those choices end up making the man. So the moral system of choice is the only time Jack is allowed to have free will, so in those moments he is a 'man' rather than a 'slave'. And, just like Ryan said, Jack having a choice in how he treats the Little Sisters ultimately forms what sort of person he is, reflected in the ending. So, in the end, Jack truly becomes a 'man' because of the one choice he was able to make throughout the story, the one time he was allowed to exercise his free will. That's just my take on it though. Personally, I was never really bothered by the moral system.
Cool take, but I think the "allowed to have free will" part shows what's going on. Jack was only able to save the little sisters because he was allowed to. If Atlas had used If You Kindly to make Jack kill the little sisters, he would have killed them. So I don't know if it's fair to say Jack had free will regarding the little sisters at all. Jack's freedom to save the little sisters comes from Atlas's attitude toward morality. When Jack encounters the first little sister, Atlas says right and wrong don't count for much down here. It's a line that tells us what Atlas thinks about right and wrong, that morality is relativistic. It also teases the player with moral relativism, cluing the player early on that Bioshock won't mind if he behaves like a hero or a monster. Anything goes.
This moral freedom is inherently intriguing and alluring to people, because it's an opportunity to explore our darker sides and thereby learn things about ourselves and morality that we wouldn't be able to learn otherwise. However I think it's clear that Bioshock convicts the player for killing little sisters in the end, thematically demonstrating its stance against moral relativism. It convicts the player with critical dialogue from the little sisters, and by rewarding him less materially in the long run, and through the revelation that Atlas, the man who tempted the player with moral relativism to begin with, turned out to be the player's enemy the whole time who's using him and intends to discard him when he has worn out his usefulness.
I agree, but I would’ve loved it if you didn’t get as much ADAM out of it, it removes part of the Morals or Reward equation by essentially giving you more of a reward for three rescues than harvest’s in the long run, I also would’ve loved more endings, kind-of like the second game where having conflicting morals results in a less sweet but still fine ending, the two endings we have in the original game are too extreme to be enjoyable, the good one is satisfying but the bad one is a little too ridiculous for me
I agree, but I would’ve loved it if you didn’t get as much ADAM out of it, it removes part of the Morals or Reward equation by essentially giving you more of a reward for three rescues than harvest’s in the long run, I also would’ve loved more endings, kind-of like the second game where having conflicting morals results in a less sweet but still fine ending, the two endings we have in the original game are too extreme to be enjoyable, the good one is satisfying but the bad one is a little too ridiculous for me
So in depth and well produced. Absolutely love it
Glad you liked it!
This is the best analysis of a game I have ever seen.
+Janos Biro M. Leite Thanks! Personally I think I outdid it with the Last of Us analysis, but this is one of my favorites I've done so far. And I just love Bioshock so much.
+Games As Literature Will you do a follow-up with infinite and burial at sea? I feel the sequel is essential in filling in the whole bioshock narrative.
+mikeyman2010 I plan to do the series in order, yes, just spread out a bit. Doing them all too quickly would get it out of the way too quickly and alienate people who haven't played the series, so I'm spreading them out. Bioshock 2 is due in the coming months, if I remember my schedule correctly.
Games As Literature Thanks, subbed and looking forward to it!
Can I pick a bone with you on the ethics of Bioshock? I think the game is not really criticizing Objectivism (which I regard as a terrible way to think about ethics and economy). Yes, it rewards the player for sacrificing himself, but it also rewards the player for stealing, murdering, and committing other terrible things. The player is, after all, a slave, he does Fontaine's dirty work, and he is very corruptible. Not exactly a hero, even in the good ending, if you think about it. The ideia that Rapture could work if the "parasites" didn't interfere kind of remains. What do you think?
I absolutely LOVE this analysis to bits!
Here's some small interesting facts that you forgot to include as well, though:
* Andrew Ryan was Jewish, which actually was a huge part of his fear for the war.
* When Brigid Tenenbaum 'participated' in Nazi Germany experiments she was still a child. (She was also Jewish and has Autism, so most of her participation was so she would stay alive.)
* While it's never stated explicitly, the fact that Sander Cohen is gay is made very clear in subtext (it was widely believed he had sexual relations with his proteges/you later find out all his proteges are male when send out to kill them/etc.) and the Audio Diary about his ears is most likely about internalized homophobia.
* I could go on, but these were the most interesting things I missed!
I can’t play FPS games because they give me “motion sickness” so this video has been the closest thing I’ve heard to experiencing this game. Thanks for your hard work on this.
I really hate to be pedantic, but we DO hear Jack's voice as a child when he's being experimented on by Suchong.
Wait, that boy who broke puppy's neck was Jack?
@@biocaster777 yep!
And the opening to the game
@@mrhorrorface that’s what the OPs comment is implying. We hear Jacks voice one other time BESIDES the opening.
Man, I truly miss this class. I just replayed the remastered version of this game and was blown away by Andrew Ryan. Back when this game premiered I was too young to truly understand his character and now I can't get enough.
As for Bioshock being art under Rand's definition: It would qualify, as she did consider science fiction to be art (in fact, she was a Trekkie). Some of her stories are borderline-science fiction (Anthem was even titled "A short science fiction novel")
However, she didn't much like abstraction in art.
You can think of it like: A sculpture of a dragon is art, but a cube of granite with "Dragon" drawn on it in sharpie is not.
i wouldn't pay any mind to what she has to say about art or really anything
@Tom Ffrench
I... I don't... What?
I think you need to see more abstract paintings
Weird to think she was a Trekkie considering her politics are completely opposed to the politics of Star Trek
one of the greatest regrets of my life is that I had the Bioshock 1 twist ruined for me (via Google images of all things) and I wish I knew what it felt like in that moment when the rug is pulled out from under your feet. great analysis and fantastic work!
I am so happy I stumbled on this brilliant analysis. It was so in depth and did the game's story and philosophy justice, exploring every nook and cranny of this fantastic game. I've been a fan of Bioshock for quite awhile and this literary analysis was a joy to listen to. Keep up the great work!
This was a fantastic analysis. It's a pretty long video, but its treatment of the material, as well the crucial ideas and sources from which it draws, is so well done and goes into so much depth that it was absolutely worth watching all the way to the end. I have a lot of respect for your project here. I'll be recommending this to friends of mine!
The real plot twist is that Sander Cohen is a hilariously-competent genius with precognitive powers. Calling it now: if there's ever a Bioshock 4, he'll be revealed as the mastermind behind everything.
They're making a Bioshock 4, and we'll see if you're right
This was absolutely amazing. I've never seen a better review of a product, from games to movies to books, and the fact that the review was on my favorite game made it even more pleasing. Thank you for the lesson, and have a good day.
Calvin & Hobbes put it well when describing why philosophies based on Selfishness don't work: "I didn't mean EVERYONE, you dolt, just ME!" It's all well and good to say we should fend for ourselves and the needy are parasites, until someone else decides it's YOU who's in their way, and until it's YOU who suddenly needs help.
Speaking of Literature (Bioshock spoilers below):
I just realized that, as Andrew Ryan's son, technically Jack's full name would be Jack Ryan.
Like Jack Ryan, the CIA agent in Tom Clancy's books who made his debut in 1987.
Like Jack Ryan, the spy?
...well played, Bioshock. Well played!
To play devil's advocate, Bioshock could be argued to be pro-Objectivist, as harvesting the little sisters would qualify as "parasitism" (you're taking what they produced at their expense). Saving the little sisters is mutually beneficial for both Jack and the Little Sister (which is more in line with objectivism-you don't have to do harm to help yourself). Likewise, he frees the Little Sisters from a life of altruistic service to Rapture and the Adam Industry so that they are no longer slaves, and free to seek out what they want from life.
Matthew Campbell In one short paragraph, you made a better argument for Bioshock being pro-Objectivism than I've seen elsewhere. Seriously, I tried looking up those arguments before writing this episode, and couldn't find any I felt checked out. Well done. :D
Thank you very much!
Oh, another thing: Rescuing the little sister is actually the first time Jack rebels against Atlas, and the only time Jack is shown to act like an individual rather than some mindless drone. By saving the little sisters, he's fulfilling both sides of the objectivist ethos: He doesn't sacrifice himself to Atlas, and doesn't sacrifice the little sisters to himself.
Makes sense. Though Atlas didn't actually command that he harvest the Little Sister, simply advised it, so it's hardly rebellion in the same way as later on. More of Jack acting within his freedoms, rather than grasping freedom that was denied to him by authority.
My only major contention (which I of course realized this evening rather than when I replied to your original post) is that neither Jack nor the player are aware of the fact that saving the Little Sisters benefits them more in the long run, making the game less about acting simultaneously in your interest and that of others and more about giving of yourself and ending up richer for it.
Fair enough, though even given that, the pro-objectivist narrative still works (between profiting greatly while becoming a parasite, and profiting less while not trampling on the rights of others, the latter is the more 'objectivist' choice)
Though that leads me to what my actual interpretation of the story: I like to think the bad ending is anti-objectivist, while the good ending is pro-objectivist. Evil Jack is a straw objectivist who uses the self-interest to harm others, while Good Jack is an objectivist paragon who helps break the chains of oppressive altruistic servitude to the parasites.
This was an awesome analysis of the first game in my favorite game saga. I'm so glad I found your channel! Would you kindly analyze Bioshock Infinite? I feel like you could get a good 2+ hours out of that!
This deserves WAY more views. Some great analysis, a helpful overview of objectivism, and just a generally well-presented discussion of Bioshock. I love this game, and I'm now a total fan of your channel. Keep it up!
fanboy58 Glad you enjoyed it! This one was an absurd amount of work, but I enjoyed making it.
And hey, if you think it needs more views, share it! This series is growing, but it's growing quite slowly. I wouldn't mind any help speeding the process along. :)
It is absolutely criminal how underrated this channel is.
Captivating and wonderfully written analysis! Kudos, dude. :)
Emily Reilly Thanks! The channel has been growing slowly, so that's getting fixed. Slowly, but surely.
Just before the final battle, when Jack's transformation is complete, he becomes part of a experiment to test if the objective to induce him to turn himself in a Big Daddy was done right.
I think he really was turned in a Big Daddy and the ending is only part of the mind control applied to make him defend the little sisters in Rapture until death.
In my interpretation he never left Rapture and all the happy ending is just the final lie used to consolidate his paternal love and make him act as a Big Daddy.
During all the game he only kills splicers and the only real person he kills is your father, who represents is own principles and at the end he kills Atlas (thinking that is killing Fontaine), who represents his own ideals and objectives, turning himself irreversibly into a slave.
OMG that tie. I want one! Subscribed!
Here you go.
www.thinkgeek.com/product/9352/
It legitimately surprises me how this profile only has ~6,000 subscribers - so much effort and time is put into these videos and they are always a joy to watch and really do a fantastic job of teaching a lot about everything behind games and the media around such content. I feel as though a collaboration between this channel and another known as Extra Credits (a very similar, but much more bite-sized premise to this channel) would create an awesome video. Also, I realized that in the beginning of this video, you mention about teaching (I believe?) what sounded like a gaming class in high school similar to this channel? If you could elaborate on this that would be much appreciated.
I really enjoyed this. It's pretty neat that we can still find new interpretations and even have our eyes opened to things we might have missed in a game when we view it through the lens of someone else, even years after playing for the first time.
I'll have to catch up on the rest of your work as time allows, as I'm a first-time viewer, but now that I know about you, I'm subscribed. Many thanks for your time and effort on this; it really shows.
I'm glad you liked the video! Hopefully my other content delivers as well. ^_^
SERIOUSLY UA-cam ? This video has 1659 views, few comments and 76 likes ?! Damn, I can't believe it, that's must be unrewarding for the awesome guy behind this video, I mean, look at the work in put into this hour long video ! Dude, you're awesome and from now I'll be a faithful subscriber !
Lord Retro Thanks! I admit your comment reflects some of my occasional frustrations, but comments like this make it worthwhile. :)
Games As Literature btw love your beard ! :3
Lord Retro Thanks! It's the result of so much care, attention, and... really just laziness because I hate shaving. Also I look thirteen without it. :P
Normally I don't really like beards that long but yours looks bloody awesome !
If I don't shave I look 15.... Oh wait I'm 15 ! :P
This is my favourite analysis of my favourite game. This is great! Keep doing this, you're awesome!
Thank you for this video. My love for this piece of art that is the bioshock franchise is obsessive.
Tattoos, books, Quotes
Stuck up on my wall beside my bed so it’s the first thing I see in the morning. These games have possessed my mind since I first played them and I’m nothing but grateful.
If Bioshock isn’t proof that video games can be works of art,
Then i don’t want anything to do with art.
On Cohen, I don't know if anyone else noticed this but for me every single time I play the bit where he sends Splicers after you in the Foye, and plays classical music the bangs of the shotgun and even the pumping action afterwards always lined up perfectly with the music.
Awesome presentation! Thanks for all the effort you put into these!
kirtur Thanks! Really glad you like it; this one nearly killed me. :P I may need to hold off on such long and complex analyses until I have enough Patreon support to justify taking a day off work or something. Totally worth it, though.
Finished Bioshock 1 just today and am so happy I found this channel explaining some of the plotholes i had about bioshock since i couldn't manage to find all voice tapes. Instantly subbed, great work and an hour very well spent!
Just want to say your content is very refreshing. With guys like Mathew Matossis, Joseph Anderson, and, Mauler, it’s nice to see these games broken down in the least biased way you can. I find you to be up there with them and I think it’d be great to see you do one of these longer analysis on something like Bloodborne. Anyway, hope your able to keep the content going. Makes work go a little faster, and I can tell you enjoy doing this. Cheers!
This was very well done and your passion for the game and the medium inspiring. Do you think you'll ever do an analysis of Infinite and compare the big ideas of the games and how they delve into and show the pros and cons of the opposing viewpoints?
I absolutely do plan on doing Infinite at some point, though likely after I've also done Bioshock 2.
Sir, you made an amazing video, and I can only hope to make a video analysis that comes close to this level of quality and intellect. I'm so happy more people are making these connections. What's funny is that I just took a college course on music history and culture, and one day my professor spent the whole class time lecturing us about the musical anachronisms in Bioshock Infinate as a way to prepare for his presentation at some music theory conference. It was awesome. I've never seen the class so involved.
Anyway, great video. And I look forward to witnessing a his channel grow. (Btw, I'm working on a literary analysis in the Mass Effect Trilogy. I hope you tackle that series too. Wish me luck!)
Antonio Valenteen Fuentes Thanks! I'm always happy to hear that people appreciate the videos. ^_^
Also great to see video games being used in college! That's becoming increasingly common, and I hope it won't be too much longer before there can be actual classes all about those concepts.
And yes, Mass Effect is coming, but RPG analyses take so absurdly much time and effort that I'm waiting until there's a certain level of Patreon support. When I can justify taking some time off work to make it, that analysis will certainly be on its way!
(Also, feel free to subscribe/like/follow/share if you want to see the channel grow) :P
Antonio Valenteen Fuentes Oh, and good luck on your own analysis! I'll subscribe so I make sure not to miss it when it happens! That's a pretty huge undertaking, as the series' themes and arcs are many (even if the ending of 3 kind of invalidates most of them). :)
One point I kept waiting for you to make is that Andrew Ryan's dying statement (a man chooses, a slave obeys) is just flat out incorrect.
The difference between a man and a slave is that a slave had choice taken away from him, usually through some form of coercion by external forces more powerful than himself. Objectivism is often very picky about when it does or doesn't accept the reality of people's material conditions, often preferring to believe men are simply better than slaves through some innate characteristic of their person. Choosing to believe a person's social status is an indicator of their value to society.
If Ryan believed there was something innately special about his son that would allow him to simply choose to reject years of torturous mental conditioning, then his death was as inevitable as the fall of Rapture itself. And even as he lie dying, still taunting his own son for not being as rational and self-determined as he is, thinking he still got the last laugh, he clearly didn't learn a fucking thing from the experience and I don't feel the slightest bit bad that he died the way he did.
Full disclosure here, I don't like Bioshock, and I found the twist kind of insulting.
What I found interesting is that "World of Tomorrow" pretty much is the movie version but basically choose the bad ending.
Speaking of movies. One often hears the phrase "The 'Citizen Kane' of gaming has yet to come". I think it has been here for quite a while now. Well Orson Wells classic was not considered that masterpiece in its time, either.
Fantastic and intelligent analysis. I would definitely like more of this calibre and the long length is a pro not a con imo :)
thank you for all your effort.
I find that the game doesn't trash objectivisim, because Ryan doesn't follow one of the most basic rules of objectivist principles. Ryan prohibited free trade. Doing that, he created a market for smuggling. If Ryan had simply opened trade, I don't believe the problems Ryan faced with people like Fontaine would have come up.
It was my impression that Objectivism is a hypocritical pile of bullshit and Bioshock calls it out for that.
shingshongshamalama Good look at it tbh.
Charles Owens Though free trade doesn't exclude the secret of rapture, something Ryan wanted to keep under lock and key, to protect it against the afformentioned so-called "parasites". Fontaine didn't want that either, as with no one with authority over him, he can do whatever he wants. THIS is the failure of objectivism. we are not perfect and some even get where they are BY hurting others directly. indeed, the freedom that's granted to pursue what we want without hurting people directly, also grants the freedom to hurt people directly, something that Fontaine took full advantage of, to everyone else's determent.
Charles Owens If Ryan wanted to keep a purely objectivist society.
Charles Owens good point. Maybe the inability of Ryan, the ultimate Rand hero, to follow objectivist principles is a commentary on how alien those principles are. Are humans even capable of following them?
I think the Cohen level wasn't just made to explore artistic freedom in Rapture. It also showed that Jack,after losing radio contact with Atlas needed instructions to go about his existence,thus doing Cohen his bidding.
Though it's likely you're basically playing the part to continue getting through to Andrew Ryan.
anyway, you did an awesome job sir,and have earned another subscriber.
gamingmetalhead1996 Man, that's the kind of thought that makes me mad it didn't dawn on me before I made the video! That's an excellent observation!
One of, if not THE, best explanations of this game as not just a piece of software, but also a piece of learning and immersion that has defined this game. Excellent.
Although one thing, would you mind doing a video on the book, I know it's a book and you do games, that was developed as a prequel to Bioshock 1 and 2, Bioshock: Rapture.
I have read it, and I have a particular interest in adaptation to and from games, so I might do something on it at some point. Not as in-depth, though; as you said, books aren't my specialty.
Good to know, thanks for the response. another question: Have you done/do you plan on doing a video on Bioshock 2, Bioshock 2: Minerva's Den, Bioshock Infinite, and Burial At Sea? I realize this video probably took a long time, and the rest of the franchise took longer, but have any been done/are on the radar.
One other thing. In this analysis, you said that Bioshock rewards Altruism because what tennenbaum said, "The path of the righteous is not always easy", is not true because of the exclusives you get from the Little Sister Gifts. This is actually not true, if you look at it, the harvest path COULD be considered easier, due to the fact of the Gatherer's Garden. While the Plasmids and Gene Tonics (GT's) are exclusive and quite useful, they are not the standard ones we typically use. After all, they don't give up upgrades to the main Plasmids and GT's we use. They also don't give us a Health Capacity and Eve Capacity upgrades, or the Gatherer's Garden exclusive items. And while yes, you do get Adam from the gifts, it is not as high as a pure harvester would have, or as frequent as a pure harvester gets it. Harvest gives 180 ADAM, while Rescuing gives 80 ADAM and then every 3 Rescues a gift containing 200 ADAM and other stuff. Through calculation you learn that a Harvester gets 40 more ADAM then a Rescuer. This amount of ADAM is significant enough to enable them to purchase more from a Gatherer's Garden. You also as a Harvester get more ADAM more frequently, rather then waiting for the gifts. So, in terms of the Gatherer's Garden, yes Harvesting is the better option, while rescuing gives you the exclusives, they aren't major things that heavily impact your gameplay. Now this does not include any of the moral or philosophical means.
THIS ONLY HAS 4,000 SUMODD VIEWS?! That's a gosh darn shame!! I'd been waiting for this kind of break down so for long and appreciate this extensive analytical effort SO MUCH!!! OFF TO THE SUBSCRIBERS LIST WITH ME!!
+Hannah Smith A big part of what keeps me going with this show is when my few fans say I deserve more. ^_^ Thanks! ^_^
+Games As Literature Wow, that comment interpreted my emoticon weirdly...
I'm so glad you REALLY do
+Hannah Smith Ha! Yeah, that's certainly not the intention of that one. :P
And thanks for the Patreon backing! I'll be thanking a few new patrons on the actual site in a bit, but no harm in thanking you here too. That support helps out a lot. ^_^
Awh you're so welcome! I really appreciate what you're doing with your craft. Gaming on UA-cam is no small market but THIS truly legitimate analysis corner of the genre is, as far as I see. So both you and The Game Theorists in my opinion are doing the community a really worthy service!
I love bioshock and I love you for making a sophisticated video explaining the game.
Glad you liked it!
Im a Bioshock fan so while browsing through Bioshock videos I found this one and Im so glad I did. The video was so great I immediately subscribed to you and began browsing through your other videos and it's so great to find someone else who appreciates video games as an art form and speaks about it the way you do. If this class was offered at my school I would be the first to sign up but unfortunately it isn't.
Justin Loo I'm very happy to hear that! I am particularly proud of this one, so I'm glad you found it. I hope you enjoy the rest of the show just as much ^_^
And yeah, I've not seen the class much at all. I think I found a couple offerings at colleges, and I'm the only one I know of who's taught it in high school. But I hope to have a part in making it a bit more common.
Games As Literature And just a personal request, as a Bioshock fan it would be nice to see analysis of Bioshock 2 and Infinite, thanks!
Games As Literature And just a personal request, as a Bioshock fan it would be nice to see analysis of Bioshock 2 and Infinite, thanks!
Justin Loo Oh, it'll definitely happen. Just trying to space these things out. I do one analysis per month, and filling my schedule with Bioshock would be fun, but severely lacking in variety. Both games will happen in time. ^_^
Games As Literature I understand, thanks!
ahh the Bioshock series. Bioshock Infinite is most likely my favorite video game in terms of music, taking a second to only Minecraft. And I definitely agree with you on the violence. It's a very amazing series, but not the most family-friendly.
Interestingly, I read on TV Tropes that Bioshock was only going to have one ending, which was the evil ending. However, the execs demanded that they have a happy ending thrown in.
Matthew Campbell Really? Now that's interesting. It certainly would have meant something quite different, though exactly what would depend on how they go about it. I do hope they planned to flesh out the evil ending a bit more though, because as it stands it's incredible weak.
Games As Literature
I'd imagine the moral would be something along the lines of "Humans are bastards", which is something the people at Irrational seem to think.
According to Levine, his interpretation of the evil ending was something along the lines of "Rapture becomes a third superpower, and turns the Cold War into a 3-way conflict". Which could contain interesting stories in its own right.
Games As Literature I think the Execs were right this time. In fact, even Levine seems to prefer the good ending, given that it was officially made canonical.
Matthew Campbell True, that would be interesting. And yeah, Irrational does kind of seem to think that, though it doesn't help that all their games have been about dystopian societies ruled by one brand or another of political extremism. Which is fine--that's what makes them interesting--but certainly means they portray a lot of terrible people being terrible.
Oh please god would you kindly do Dark Souls!!
1:03:09 "altruism is rewarded" (paraphrasing)
But isn't this in some ways saying and essentially conceding to the idea that objectivism, or at the very least selfishness, is the driving force of altruism. In Bioshock, being "altruistic" after all reaps you higher rewards. This essentially turns altruism from being a selfless act into more of an investment. "I will have access to less 'money' now, but I will have more later than if I'd not invested it into 'helping' ".
In the financial world, while buying stocks of a company is giving said company more money to work with, you don't buy stocks out selflessness or altruism because you want to help Apple or BP, you buy stocks because you plan on reaping larger dividends than your initial investment (aka "sacrifice" of money).
And while not all acts of altruism will result in a net positive monetary gain, you do always get something out of being altruistic. Always. That gain changes from person to person and situation to situation, but there is always a personal gain involved into an altruistic "investment". This can be positive reputation (or a negative reputation and ostracisation by society if you refuse to do so) if you do it with witnesses present. It can be an increase in self-worth or self-esteem. It might give you a sense of moral superiority. It might please your supernatural deity. You might do it because you think it will help the world (something you and potentially your offspring are and will be a part of). It might simply make you happy. But all of those reasons are for your own, essentially selfish reasons. If altruism would not be for your own gain, then it should not matter to you what someone does with the results of your sacrifice. If you give 20 dollars to someone in need and they literally burn the money in front of your eyes, and you get upset about that, then you deny them their own free will to do with said gift however the please, at which point you have to concede that you gave them to money for one of the aforementioned reasons.
In conclusion, even charity and altruism could fit into a objectivist model, if one agrees to the theory that even selfless acts are purely a form of investment that are expected to reap some type of benefit for you, even if said benefit is purely satisfaction with yourself.
Also:
22:16 Black kitty!
24:13 Tricolour kitty!
The main problem with that is that the main proponents of a philosophy where people of exceptional ability are given total freedom are people who see THEMSELVES as "exceptional". People of that mold often find themselves falling into the traps that ensnared the characters in Bioshock. Ambition and a disregard for the well-being of others is a toxic combination in any society but its praised as a virtue by many of the more public voices advocating Objectivism. I don't think its possible to find a version of Objectivism that will find any traction among its current "fanbase" if it incorporates altruism as a mandatory component. A quick google search of "objectivism, altruism" can show that.
Yet as Bioshock shows, no society can exist made up entirely of "winners" and that even exceptional people are still human beings. Simple probability shows that some individuals will be on the losing end of any unequal transaction. Objectivism abandons them to their own devices but fails to take into account that "quantity has a quality all its own." The health of the overall society is VITAL to creating an environment where the exceptional can prosper or the rest of society will turn on its leaders out of simple self-preservation. Society NEEDS exceptional individuals like Jack who either by choice or by compulsion SACRIFICE their own well-being for the good of the many WITHOUT thought of personal reward or else society will collapse into dictatorship or anarchy. Objectivism calls those people immoral fools. I call those people HEROES.
This is why it is important that the game deceive you into thinking that altruism will be punished.
Replaying the game recently, it is semi-punished. You cannot get a ton of Plasmids that may be helpful right away. You can only get a few. It takes three rescues each to eventually be reward and if you had just harvested you'd probably have gotten every plasmid and tonic you could want quicker and sooner. You certainly wouldn't have had to potentially choose between winter blast and upgrading your health
So it's sacrificing the long term for short term immediate returns. The inevitable result of all greed and selfishness. I get what I want now at the expense of others rather than later through a vague promise I might be rewards. You have no reason to trust that Tenebaum will reward you or keep rewarding you. You just have to trust she's on the level and your good deeds will be rewarded somehow. There's no garuntee they will be though.
Infinite probably does this better, as there is no immediately obvious reward for being moral or good. Only your own perception of what you feel is right and whether or not you can live with yourself after. Much like Booker who is denying his own guilt and refusing to face what he did. But I still feel the Little Sisters are a well done element illustrating the idea of empathy for others and sacrificing something for your own ends to achieve a greater whole.
Even if Objectivism doesn't advocate harm and simply disuade charity, it's logical conclusion is abject selfishness. Rand herself promoted the exploitation of the Middle East and its resources based purely on the fact America was the only country capable of getting it. So even if it was in another country, it was America's by simple fact they developed the technology to get it. That's like saying my car belongs to the manufacturer even after sale and I'm obligated to give him a ride because he put the time and effort into building it for me. So, a little bit of hypocrisy there.
Grizabeebles As someone who has worked with the ARI (Ayn Rand Institute), no voice has publicly supported chasing your self-interest to the detriment of others. Not one. So I’m curious as to whose voice you’re listening to? It can’t be anyone from the Institute.
You are correct and what you say in your comment is just a tiny bit of what makes objectivism utter garbage. It is based on criticising a strawman. What Rand is talking about, "collectivism" as sacrificing yourself for others without getting anything in return, simply doesn't exist. Even an episode in Friends was better at looking at this issue than she was with all of her books and interviews.
I just wanted to thank you. I'm using you for my son's homeschooling curriculum. This is a great game to cover: anarchy, atheism, plato's save, noble savage noble liar, capitalism, stockholm syndrome and the cause and effects of the drug world. Besides it's always nice vegging on the sofa playing games all day long doing nothing with my kiddo. Thanks again!
That's awesome! I'm so glad you're finding this useful in an educational context. :D
Just found your channel off the end of video youtube links for the philosophy of system shock. There is a remake of System shock is coming out so I went on a bit of a binge watching of vids relating to it and urs struck my interest. Just telling you how I came across your channel. Bioshock is just one of those games which is an experience. I hope your channel grows cause the content is very good.
I'd love for you to do similar videos for Bioshock 2 and Infinite! This was great!
I think that Bioshock (Bioshock 1 and 2) shows the merits and shortcomings of Objectivism and altruism, as the 'villains' of the story have understandable reasons to believe what they believe and they're not entirely bad (except Frank Fontaine/Atlas, he definitely had evil intentions). Both of their stubborn beliefs in their ideals led to their respective downfalls and demises, even if Ryan believed he had triumphed in the end.
This is the first video of your series I ever watched. Can't remember how I found it but immediately after watching it I wanted see more of your work. As a fan of the BioShock series I thought this literary analysis was PERFECT. It even answered a question I had for a long time about that stupid "Wild Bunny" poem. Until now I thought it was just another example of how unhinged Cohen was (as if he needed one). This video also introduced me to Miracle of Sound, so bonus points!
Now, would you kindly do an analysis on BioShock 2 and BioShock Infinite?
Is it weird that I consider introducing you to Miracle of Sound just as much a victory as making a video you describe as perfect? :P
And yes, I do plan on Bioshock 2 and Infinite. the whole show has been slower lately since I have a full-time job and have trouble managing my time to keep up a regular schedule, but I plan to do them sometime, for sure.
(I am also obligated to note at this point that you can force me to do them over at Patreon, if you want)
Its good to see this great analysis get more views. Bioshock is tied for my favorite series, and I revisit your analysis occasionally.
Thanks! It's definitely the most popular of my videos, by a wide margin.
Sure. I hope all your analysis break the 100,000 mark at least, and looking forward to more in the future.
I loved the videos, very nice work man I too think its appaling you not having more visibility.
One thing regarding the bioshock twist that I was sure you were going to touch on, but didnt. Killing ryan was actually Jack's choice, not fontaine's in the end. Pay attention to ryan's speech. He ends up taking control of Jack, telling him to run, stop, etc using the WYK phrase. When he puts the club back in jacks hand, he does not say would you kindly kill me, he just says Kill. He never commanded jack to do it. at this point the order to kill ryan was no longer active, because ryan had took control of him, so jack could choose not to do it.
Another thing, in ryans office after you kill him, there is a vita chamber. when you go there, the description says that it is deactivvated. it is the only one like that in the game, making the case stronger for ryan wanting to stay dead, and not having this way out, after all he could merely turn that chamber on and rezz right after jack kills him.
Keep doing this awesome content man, expect a patreon from me soon. You deserve it.
+Vitor Araujo I don't think that Jack chose to kill Ryan, despite Ryan not saying 'would you kindly.' After all, by this point, Jack was still under Atlas' (Fontaine's) order to kill Ryan. Ryan adding a few new short commands wouldn't have overridden the older one, I think--not until it was completed, at least.
Having this in mind, I think another video on the topic of the illusion of choice in Bioshock and Spec ops: The Line would be a great idea--if this guy does that kind of thing.
+Lunavarion Ryan could at any point override the command. He was showing jack that he as free, he could do whatever he wanted, but he didnt want to comeo ut and say it, he wanted him to be able to choose. A man chooses, a slave obeys. The last command jack had was an open command, "Kill" and not "WOuld you kindly kill". Throught the entire game we seen jack only following one command at a time. Every chapter is one commadn only, so I am sue he was free when he killed Ryan.
Vitor Araujo I think I understand your point, and yet, Jack was sent there to kill in the first place.
I think we need to accept that there is no clear answer to this since the extent of the programming was never explained in-game. Maybe Jack could deal with only one command at a time. Maybe he could have more than one at once. We can't say for sure one way or another.
what we know for sure is that Andrew could have sotpped him, just by commanding him to kill Atlas instead. Or have him kill himself. And he didnt, to prove a point.
Best character ever
Vitor Araujo I think it was said either in the video or in another comment here that Ryan didn't command Jack to stop simply to illustrate the difference between being a man and being a slave. Ryan chose to die while Jack was following an order to kill.
Charity is not immoral from the objectivist perspective. Forced charity is.
+m0ZZaik Yeah, I've been informed of that since this video; the research I did in preparation for this episode indicated that it was, and it seems to line up with Rand's approach to those who don't contribute to society. But yes, this has been corrected since then.
That’s actually not true. Yes, it’s immoral according to Objectivism to force charity, but that’s sort of a derivative issue (more political than moral). Nor is charity itself immoral.
What’s immoral, according to Objectivism, is sacrifice: giving up a higher for a lesser value. And that is exactly what altruism demands: to sacrifice that which one values personally for the “greater good” (but lesser personal value) of others.
And that is how much charity is presented and thought of. And *that* is immoral. Whether it is, objectively, a sacrifice to give charity in any one case depends on the personal objective values of the giver, but it can only be moral in the first place if he seeks to gain a value by it, rather than destroy one.
Also, at the risk of nitpicking a two-year-old comment, Rand would be horrified by a phrase like “contribute to society” as applied to her views. That implies that society (others) are owed something, that one gains value from giving to others. She would rather talk about whether an individual is doing the best he can for himself, or not.
The problem with objectivism is that nobody follows its principles. Because its principles are built on the assumption that human beings have no morality, no emotions, no feelings and no flaws.
It should be really telling that Ayn Rand herself was a hypocritical piece of shit who argued it was completely reasonable for her to have an affair with a younger, more handsome man. And then got butthurt about him doing the same to her without a shred of self-awareness or decency.
It's quite telling that you feel the need to resort to profanity to smear a person who's been dead for 35 years... :/
On a slightly unrelated note, my other complaint with Infinite's story is that the villain wasn't as rounded this time. Andrew Ryan started out a reasonably ok guy (if a bit of an idealogue) who turned to evil when his dreams of utopia began to fall apart. By contrast, Comstock is little more than a Klansman. When you arrive, the evils and racism going on in Columbia aren't (to my knowledge) Comstock being driven to madness by an extant threat to his dreams, grasping at straws for any hope to save it. They were what he was planning from the start.
+Matthew Campbell I've always seen Infinite as more of an omg parallel universes so cool kind of action game as Inception is a fun and thoughtfully plotted movie, but with little philosophical value. Frankly I think Infinite got way more praise for its plot than it should have and the genius of BioShock and objectivism went over 90 percent of players' heads.
Emmett LaFave Very well said
the good ending still gets to me, it's short but still makes me tear up.
So at 42:30 let me make sure I have this right… the deal is ‘Give us the girl, and wipe away the debt’?! Wow… chills man, chills.
@15:40 You make a mistake here. Charity is not morally wrong according to Objectivism. "My views on charity are very simple. I do not consider it a major virtue and, above all, I do not consider it a moral duty. There is nothing wrong in helping other people, if and when they are worthy of the help and you can afford to help them. I regard charity as a marginal issue. What I am fighting is the idea that charity is a moral duty and a primary virtue." -A.R.
mughat I've gotten a few corrections on this one, but it seems to be an issue people are split on. I did research for this video, to make sure I wasn't going to completely misrepresent the issue, and ran it by a friend with a philosophy degree, and it checked out up until I uploaded it and got some comments like yours. I'm all for learning more about stuff like this, and perhaps I'd have worded it a bit differently had I seen this quote before making the video.
That said, I think the "if and when they are worthy of the help" caveat may be a problem there. At the very least, it does indicate some level of contextual morality based on who you're helping, and considering Rand wasn't too fond of people taking government aid, I'd be interested in knowing what her criteria were for one who was "worthy."
+Games As Literature
"I'd be interested in knowing what her criteria were for one who was "worthy."
There is an example Ayn Rand used which clarifies this imho:
*To illustrate this on the altruists’ favorite example: the issue of saving a drowning person. If the person to be saved is a stranger, it is morally proper to save him only when the danger to one’s own life is minimal; when the danger is great, it would be immoral to attempt it: only a lack of self-esteem could permit one to value one’s life no higher than that of any random stranger. (And, conversely, if one is drowning, one cannot expect a stranger to risk his life for one’s sake, remembering that one’s life cannot be as valuable to him as his own.)If the person to be saved is not a stranger, then the risk one should be willing to take is greater in proportion to the greatness of that person’s value to oneself. If it is the man or woman one loves, then one can be willing to give one’s own life to save him or her-for the selfish reason that life without the loved person could be unbearable.*
It basically depends on your personal values which are hierarchical. If you have very little money and need it for food etc., charity would be considered immoral.
Nicely done! I've watched other videos and even read some academic papers on this and your video I think has the most elaborative and clear treatment of the Objectivist roots (even if you disclaimed your rendering of it!). I didn't check, but if you haven't done another video tying this game, Infinite, and Burial at Sea you definitely should. Plot-wise, it's amazing how Levin brings us full circle!!
+juliomb1 Thanks! I always love to hear that people appreciate the videos. ^_^
And yes, my plan is to work my way through the Bioshock series, but I try to spread things out a bit. So we'll get Bioshock 2 in a while, and Infinite/Burial at Sea sometime after that.
I think having fetch quests was a good idea for the gameplay because in nearly every level it forces the player to explore Rapture and discover more of its wonderfully crafted setting. Fort Frolic especially is a good example of this. The player is forced to look at more and more of the art that is produced when there are no moral limitations.
Only seen about half hour and I gotta say, very well put presentation and narrative summary man
Holy crap, dude. Great job! You clearly put a lot of work into this. You won my subscription.
Yay!
So is the splicing that the protagonist does not have that pheromone corruption? Is the mental conditioning overriding the pheromones?
It seems weird that Atlas leaves the little sister choice in the protagonists hands when he states that he wants them killed without using his favorite phrase.
I just assumed he wasn't doing enough of it or didn't do it for long enough to see side effects.
I thought it had something to do with the fact that Jack was Ryan's son. Like, the plasmids didn't effect anyone in Ryan's gene pool.
I would actually love to see a follow up episode about Bioshock Infinite and how the Burial at Sea DLC ties into all this.
i just finished the game and came here for a in depth analysis and that i was delivered , well done sir i have subbed and look forward to seeing more breakdown as videogame are art and deserve to be dissected and discussed.
The only discordant note when I played Bioshock was that, as you mention, Jack's motivation is haphazard and pre-assumed at best. Infinite fixes it, giving you a clear goal ("Bring us the girl..."), but in Bioshock I felt I had to listen go here and there to, basically, move the plot along. Nevermind the final plot-twist -- which I think is undermined by the gameplay, giving you no other option than obeying Atlas --, I felt for much of the way that I was being dragged along.
Gato Negro See, Jack's motive makes enough sense to me; he has to get out of there. Pretty sure the Bathysphere wasn't going to just go back up the way it came, and Atlas offered him a way out. So yeah, it's kind of pre-assumed, but makes just enough sense that your average player just kind of goes along with it without thinking twice, which was kind of the point.
+Games As Literature Sort of like Gordan Freeman in Half Life and Isaac in Dead Space 2 ( Didn't play Dead Space 1 and Dead Space 3 had an objective for him , I think)
My thoughts on Sander Cohen are that his masterpiece is probably trying to show the moment of death, as in, what you have accomplished. Everything you have ever done and what it amounts to are only captured in the moment of your death. Rapture is a tomb, so he is taking advantage of the corpses, alive or dead. Normally, when someone dies down there, nobody would ever know anything about them, but to Cohen, he wants the player to take pictures of the immediate poses of his proteges' deaths, so that he can display all they have accomplished in one striking image. Ryan says something similar when you try to get into his office. He has corpses nailed to the walls as a display of power and fear. He tells the player that the people will ask "Who was that, hanging on the wall? Who was that?". I believe Cohen is trying to give an answer "Here it is! THIS is who they were!"
Great series. It is really encouraging to see more people recognising video games as yet another form of art and really putting all their heart and effort into making such analisis properly. I loved the video. Keep up the good work.
Ever thought of doing videos on games like Kotor 2, Planescape: Torment, Dark Souls, or any of Final Fantasies?
+Darth Likaon Thanks! I'm glad you like the series. ^_^
Thought of all of them, yes. Will likely get to all of them with time. I have a deep personal love for Final Fantasy, and I plan on tackling the first KOTOR at some point, but at the moment I don't really have time to analyze such long games (the patron-requested Dragoon analysis nearly killed me), so I'm waiting on a Patreon goal so I can reimburse myself for time off work to make them. Though in the meantime patrons of a certain level can make me analyze them anyway.
Thank you so much for this analysis! Adding to my favorites. This really made my day. Thank you.
Fantastic video and analysis. Very, very well thought out and artfully discussed. Subbed and will be looking at your other content. Great job!
Glad you enjoyed it! Hope the rest of the channel is similarly to your liking!
Ooh You've got the Bioshock 2 special edition. That was my favourite special edition for a long time, it's still the classiest, other SEs have come with LPs but none of them are this soundtrack. I've got that poster framed on the wall next to me right now.
Wow. This is one of the most interesting video I have seen in a long time. I rarely watch videos this long in one go, but this one I did. Also doing a literary analysis on Dark Souls seems like a good idea to me.
I'm glad you liked it!
I do get a lot of requests for Dark Souls, and it'll probably happen at some point, but at the moment I have a policy against analyzing super long games just because it takes so long to play, research, and analyze the game, then write, film, and edit the analysis. There's a Patreon goal set up though, so once I get enough support to make the effort more feasible it'll probably happen. ^_^
+Games As Literature Yeah it is quite lengthy. First playthrough took me about 20-30 hours but now I'm able to complete it in 3-4 hours.
Top quality content right here, can't wait to watch your other videos. Subscribed.
Glad you like it!
52:45 the black or white right or wrong choice, could also reflect the theme of objectivism. "A person that doesn't care about anything except trying to win."
"in a /frankly/rather plain and uninteresting boss battle" against frank fontaine.
I'm not sure if the frankly was intentional or not but either way it was amusing
You know, it's important to remember that while the interpretation is clearly an indictment of objectivism, Rapture isn't really what Ayn Rand would advocate for anyways. Frank Gamer did a great video on this using Ayn Rand interviews. If you listen to her own words, you'll see that she is indeed in favor of governance to protect the natural rights of man. Clearly there was no government in Rapture, at least not one that was there to protect anyone. The society would be a better example of Anarchism than Objectivist (or Libertarian) society than, as that features no government whatsoever.
+Damian Clark Actually, anarchism is only present by the time you get there. Before, there was certainly a government. People often mistake Rapture's society for anarchy rather than objectivism, because it really looks like "anyone can do whatever they want" from what we can see, but the audio diaries and extended materials give more detail on how Ryan went about it, and there were laws and requirements. There's even an audio diary referencing an appeals system that held businesses accountable to Ryan himself.
Games As Literature But I'd argue that the "government" that was in place wasn't strong enough or even held enough authority that it could accomplish what something like Ayn Rand advocates though. To be fair, it's been a while since I played the game, but I don't remember there being that strong of a central government even prior to the fall. Appreciate the response though.
+Damian Clark That is entirely possible, yes. The game itself only hinted at it, but the details would be found in the book about Andrew Ryan, which I unfortunately haven't read yet, so you may very well be right.
Few connections to add: Ayn Rand's the fountainhead supports the right to destroy things you've made if others have come and added their own things to it. This is similar to the creator of rapture trying to destroy it by, among other things, destroying the trees. Also, the twist works on another level. It says a philosophy primarily based on free will is doomed because those may think they live under free will, but are actually being controlled by ideology, habit (our expectations for gaming leading us to follow Atlas' directions), and nature/nurture (in this case, a childhood of mind control).
I've heard it argued that for someone brought up in a collectivist state, Ayn rebelled strongly against the state and society forcing their morality on others. Altruism and charity can be twisted, just like Objectivism is portrayed in Bioshock. (And Rand would probably say that altruism and charity were twisted in her land of birth.) I actually find a lot of Bioshock to be a kind of straw man of objectivism. Any ideology run to extreme, corrupted by disruptive elements, can go off the rails. And Objectivism can be a kind of low-hanging fruit for that kind of deconstruction, because people tend to be shocked at the idea of selfishness being thought of as a virtue instead of a vice. As the Little Sisters were a clumsy morality mechanic, so the whole game seems to be in it's statement on Objectivism. Who would find Objectivism appealing when it's portrayal features cold-hearted people in suits, making long winded speeches, and preying on little girls?
The themes and ambiance, the setting is wonderfully evocative. And I enjoyed the game, but I couldn't help feeling like I was being preached to all throughout.
This was brilliant... loved ever second of it.
PS: ADAM and EVE syringes have an apple on them. :P
Bioshock Infinite! DO IT NOW!!!
I did some research on why he injects himself with the Plasmid as soon as he sees it. Its mostly environmental story telling.
1) You are first introduced to Plasmids and ADAM through an ad for "Incinerate" when the movie in the Bathosphere starts. So that first catches your eye.
2) The art deco environment in which you first experience Rapture also has some ads for this material, but again, they're subtle.
3) And finally, the "Little Sisters" ADAM vending machine, where the electrobolt plasmid simply sits around. As you progress in the game, these vending machines play a significant role (RPG and narrative wise), and furthermore since they advertise the thing too ("Smarter than Einstein, stronger than Hercules, and lights a fire with the snap of (your) fingers"), and that you need it in order to open the first door (you only have a 250mm heavy duty wrench after all - not lockpicking material tbh), you have to get jacked up on the plasmid anyway. Incidentally,
4) You actually are vulnerable when you let it change your genetic makeup. And it is interesting that neither the splicers, nor the big daddy/little sister actually take advantage of the situation. They have their reasons, but it serves a significant narrative purpose, which is shown in this analysis.
Overall, its quite robust - heck it even uses the "you need x in order to progress" gaming trope in a legitimate narratively cohesive way, if you think about it. NICE!
so cool! glad I found your channel in this search!!
Yes. Thank you for this. BioShock deserves a dissection and analysis like the one you have provided. I am glad you do what you do. Please keep it up. I now understand more now why this gem is such a gem. obviously you could not encompass all of what this game was trying to do, but honestly who the hell could? You did an exceptional job anyways thank you. p.s. nice song at the end, eve though personally I liked " Beyond the Sea"
Very informative and well put together! Nicely done!
+Emily Brand Thanks!
Can you elaborate the symbolism of Atlas? How is it in relation to this objectivism ideology, and why the name Atlas Shrugged for Rand's fictional yet philosophical book?
Waw..this is my first video of yours that I've seen, Loved it. cant wait to see more~
Glad you liked it!
For some reason those little cue cards that separate chapters on this presentation and show a pic of rapture with the bubbly music, reminds me of assassins creed 2. Idk why but every time I hear it I immediately think of ezio.
bioshock is truly a game that should be considered as great literature. it does what any good book does and that is to engage the reader and for the reader to immerse himself in the story and once done come away enriched by the experience. great job on the vid... subbed.
In all fairness, most people who haven’t delved deep into Rand wouldn’t know that she gave a lot of money to charity. She was not against it by any means, she didn’t assume it was immoral.
That’s the greatest misconception about Objectivism. Your rational self-interest can be based around your values. If you value the betterment of the misfortunate over clothes, canned food, or some of your money - she did not see it as immoral to provide them with such things, especially if you were wealthy. However, she did not see this as a justification for your life nor as something that should be seen as moral.
This is coming from someone who is not a fan of her metaphysics, but still understands her work and life.
Other than that, summary was pretty good! 🙏
Beautiful analysis, I can never get enough from the rich worlds and narratives surrounding the Bioshock franchise. Do you have intentions of analyzing Bioshock Infinite? (and it's DLC, which should likely be a video of its own!) Again, amazing work :)
I will be honest when i played the game i saw it as pro objectivist throughout. If Ryan had stuck with his principles and allowed others to have trade with the outside world there would have been no black market for fontaine to garner his money and influence. because of this he would have not had the money to fund the Adam research but that is somewhat of a minor point because he could have made his money by any means but shows on of the first instances of Ryan failing to follow his own philosophy.
The more pressing issue is ignoring the fact that one of the main pillars of objectivism is that one does not have the right to use force against anyone else in society. This point is somewhat muddied with the little sisters as they were voluntarily handed over under false pretenses to the research but they were still forced to become experiments without understood consent. After that the game goes off the rails as far as sticking with objectivism because almost everything is done via force. The nationalization of fontaine futuristics, forced surgeries, the "art".
Not harvesting the little sisters is actually the more objectivist action because you are doing something that is beneficial to both parties although the consent is not given so it is technically not a voluntary interaction. On the other hand harvesting them is using force against them that has no benefit to them. So in the end choosing the mutually beneficial and arguably consented to method is rewarded.
Also i slightly disagree with the assessment of Tennenbaum as you could argue that inorder to make herself feel better about what she had done in the past she is attempting to right her wrong doings. Framing it in this manner you could say that she has decided it is in her own rational self interest to restore the little sisters to their pre-experimental form. You could argue that she has restored her objectivist beliefs as she has rejected her previous use of force against others.
All that being said in my opinion almost all of the negatives that occurred in rapture happened as a result of force, coercion, or the rejection of objectivism. That being said it is still #2 on my favorite games of all time list (behind Portal) and i enjoyed the thoughtful analysis and trip down memory lane. Sorry if this came across as defensive or argumentative i just had a different take on a couple situations.
Subscribed, Liked and looking forward to checking out some other vids.
+Cody Weber It didn't come across as argumentative; I love a good discussion from different viewpoints!
But ultimately, yeah, I can see where you're coming from. I've seen a few arguments for the game's pro-objectivism since I made this video, and while I still mostly hold to the interpretation given here, I'm impressed at how much more sense it makes now that people have explained it in response to my own. I do tend to more easily understand other viewpoints when I can debate them with people, so maybe that's what I needed for it to make any sense. :P
In any case, I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I think part of the point is that pure objectivism might be effective, but it just isn't possible and it would inevitably be exploited.
Would love to see more videos analysing games like this! I think it is interesting that Ryan's objection to Fontaine's smuggling is not a philosophical one but one out of the practicality of keeping Rapture secret. ("A city in the Ocean Deep, A promise we will always keep" ). Possibly this game is saying that this philosophy is feasible only if it has completely no contact with any other civilization.
I just love the fact that k e game can stir up so many intellectual conversations, with no way being the "right" way.
I heard that Miracle of Sound song at the start. good choice.
+SmexyRula He's my favorite ever. I use his music whenever it applies.
Games As Literature same here. he is my hero
one more thing. In regards to the new bioshock.. In infinite the player is re-introduced to choice except choice with the same inevitable ending. it also introduces the infinite parallel universes with slightly different actions. What if the new bioshock was a spin off of the original except in a different universe.. maybe to where the player is allowed different choices and decisions that ultimately change the entire way the game is played and making it not so much as a repetitive game but an entirely new outlook. Maybe instead of killing ryan.. you work with him instead to kill fountaine .. but with all events being inevitable, some how the death of ryan and fall of rapture are still worked in, in a different way... anyways love your work! you helped me understand bioshock a lot more, and its cool to know someone else shares the same passion about it! you should do an analysis on bioshock 2 and infinite! Part of me feels like rapture wasn't truly destroyed..
OH MY GOD I JUST REALIZED THE HI JACK. HOLY FUCK MINDBLOWN!
I really liked this analysis and the speaker and OMG THERE"S A CAT @ 22:15 !!
Objectivism is misrepresented here. And in fact, the deal with the little sisters is the perfect example. It doesn't demonstrate the greatness of altruism, but of egoism. By saving these sisters, you are acting to your best interest _long term and in a complete way_ (i.e. ultimately gaining more resources, getting to see these girls happy, and not feeling like a monster)
An example of a defense of altruism would be if you had the choice to save Atlas _after he betrayed you and tried to kill you_, and you could see no good reason to save him, but saving him would lead to a greater reward later that you couldn't possibly imagine.
Altruism does not being nice to others, and egoism does not mean acting like a psychopath. It's about whether you really think about what is, and act towards, your overall self-interest, rather than putting your faith in someone who says that you must not trust your own judgment, but believe in them, sacrifice what appears to be in your interest, and so on.
+hermanessences I would agree, except that Jack and the player both aren't meant to know they're acting in their best interest. That knowledge is only gained from spoilers or replays; harvesting the Little Sisters is presented as the option that's best for you. Acting on knowledge the character could not have (and the player would only have after already completing the game) doesn't have any bearing on how the game is to be interpreted. The player ultimately gains a greater reward from actions that, at the time, they understand to be less beneficial to them.
+hermanessences Though I should add that I am aware of some misrepresentations of objectivism here, and plan to address and correct them when I analyze Bioshock 2.
+Games As Literature Oh, I seem to remember that the game (or even Tenenbaum) told you that saving the little sisters would give you a greater reward in the long run? If not, there is some point in this being a support of altruism, although there's also the issue of feeling like a monster. Even a person who's been an Objectivist his whole life would probably never kill a strange girl just to be physically stronger, even if he wasn't punished or ostracized for it, because we do after all feel sympathy for others who are similar to us, we want them to thrive, and killing them would be traumatic. On the flip side again, it is indeed a "life boat scenario", in which one's own survival is at stake, which might make it more complicated again. I'd say it might be meant as a defense of altruism, but it's not clear cut.
And kudos for being intellectually honest. Most opponents of Objectivism are not.
+hermanessences Tenenbaum does say something like, "I'll make it worth your while" in the chaos of that first encounter, but that's all we get, and she doesn't give any of the care packages until you've saved a few of them. Plus, much like the rest of the game, it's banking on the player's expectations of game logic the first time through the game, and the dilemma of the "good" path being less fun or easy is pretty well ingrained into our minds as gamers. I suppose one could argue the effectiveness of the tactic, but I think it's pretty clear the game intended for the player to see harvesting the little sisters as more beneficial to them.
And yeah, I researched Objectivism for this video, but I learned more since then. I still don't agree with or like it, and as such I think some of the mistakes I made are still functionally accurate even if Rand herself would have said otherwise, but I still stated them incorrectly, and I try to make sure I own up when I make a mistake.
You should make your own analysis video if you know so much
I wonder if it would be interesting for you to do a video on the concept of plot twists and how they are used, and address their inherent subjectivity. For example, I've never been able to really view that bit near the end of Bioshock as a 'twist'. It was a cool moment, but it was largely what I expected and fit with the game and the tone to the point that, to me, it felt like merely the next bit of plot, not a twist at all. It was interesting, but not shocking or surprising. It just goes to show how subjective the concept of a 'plot twist' really is.