I’m not really sure how to word my experience with Bioshock. There are just so many themes and lessons involved, I’m having a difficult time picking just one word. Themes of morality, religion, nature, and surviving – there’s just so many. One thing for sure though is that the story is phenomenal and it’s one of those gems that makes you think about everything.
The Themes of Morality and Surviving:
The themes of morality and surviving go hand in hand. When the game starts, you’re playing as Jack, a seemingly normal dude who’s life turns upside down after the plane crash. Being the only survivor, you swim to an ocean monument to breath for a moment. Upon exploration, you find an underwater vessel. With nowhere else to go, you board it and eventually enter the city of Rapture – a city of hell, basically. You just survived a plane crash, and now you have to survive in a dystopian, fallen society with no other way out. You have to kill to survive, period. As time goes on, eventually you’ll learn about the Big Daddies and Little Sisters. This event brings the most morally challenging decision in the entire game: do you harvest the Little Sisters for lots of ADAM (a drug that allows you to change your DNA and thus make you more powerful i.e. more likely to survive), or do you save them because “it’s the right thing to do”? The game doesn’t make it clear whether it’s necessary or not. That decision is completely up to you – do you take advantage of the Little Sisters to better the chances of your survival, or do you free them from the horrors of Rapture? You don’t find out if you made the right decision until you eventually escape.
The Themes of Religion and Nature:
The themes of religion and nature are just as prominent as morality and surviving. As soon as you enter Rapture, there’s a giant banner that reads “No Gods or Kings. Only Man”.
The society of Rapture is one created away from the presence of God or absolute authority. It is an anarchic society where people stand hand in hand and persevere through mutual hard work. The city of Rapture believes so strongly in it’s conviction that believing in religion is outright illegal (as you can see “contraband” boxes full of bibles and crucifixes scattered throughout the city). But this setting brings a question that’s been asked throughout human history – how can we survive without the authority of God or the authority of a king? The usual answer many societies have is: “we can’t”. Rapture is an example of this. Without the authority of God or a king, Rapture fell to ruin (in my opinion, of course). This also ties into the theme of nature – with ADAM. The society rushed into scientific advancement to the point where they challenged the very laws of nature itself, and it’s people used themselves as guinea pigs in an attempt to play as God. There was no king to stop this kind of advancement. Both God and human kings understand the curiosity and sinful nature of the human race, and understand what can happen if everything goes by unchecked. People advanced, got addicted due to the advancement, and began slaughtering each other. Children were kidnapped and turned into monsters. Factions appeared and turned the entire city into a war-zone. Human experimentation (by the way, when I learned that you, the protagonist, are the fruit of such experimentation; I don’t think I’ve ever opened my eyes that big before) and literal war crimes went by unchecked and unpunished – the list just goes on.
Anyway; enough of my somewhat biased and opinionated rambling about Gods and Kings. But, my rant is simply an example of the things Bioshock makes you think about: What went wrong here? What could have been done to make this work? Is it even possible for a society such as this to prosper? It relates so much to real life, you can’t help but wonder these things.
All in all, Bioshock is truly a gem. I love games that make you think about things like this mainly because there’s so much diversity in the conclusions and ideas that other people come up with.
