Its funny, all of the satire of Bioshock that they love to talk about and how it shows the evils of Objectivism and Capitalism.
But never a word for Sander Cohen. The Jewish "artist" who thought himself above needing to produce anything the public would want, so he got into Rapture to literally devolve into infinite degeneracy and hedonism of drugs, gay sex, and producing art no one wanted.
You'd think it would be an easy dunk on Ryan's philosophy, as his very existence undermines it as he is very much a parasite. But he is also a fucking perfect example of a modern Leftist, so he just gets brushed aside as the silly funny man from one level.
Tenenbaum gets off easy too. "I did human experiments on little children, but I feel bad about it now, so I'm a good person." This sentiment would never be extended to someone like Mengele, who Tenenbaum studied under.
Its because she's a woman. Levine even made that clear when he admitted they gender swapped her (the subtitles to her office still use her old male name) to the only major female in the game.
Its why the novel emphasizes her crippling autism and how Fontaine would use her for sex constantly. To slowly chip away any agency and blame she could have.
The 'doubters' is so scary close to how modern celebrities use 'haters' as a disdainful dismissal of any criticism is so on point it barely counts as satire. It's the same with dr lamb, not a peep about collectivism being just as bad or how manipulative bad actors can be worming their way into power under the guise of good. Maybe that didnt help the sequels reputation, come to think.
Nothing about the sequel helps its own reputation among the fart sniffing Lefties that make up game critics and a huge part of the original and Infinite's fans.
It has a black mammy having to realize that her prejudice is wrong and that her hurt feelings were making her easy to manipulate by an evil party, and just because she was discriminated against doesn't make it okay for her to do the same to someone else. The line "A monster doesn't do that, a thinking man does that" could come straight out of an anti-racism PSA from the era.
That's a single boss from one level. Nothing about that would go over well with them and is a huge reason why it never gets "forgotten gem" coverage.
Muh objectivism is the midwit, surface-level interpretation of BioShock and its themes. If you want to peel the onion and get to the core of Rapture's creation within Ken Levine's (and thus Andrew Ryan's) head, watch American Krogan's video essays on both the first game and Infinite.
Unlike Levine's shitty Ayn Rand "satire", this theme effuses out of both BioShock games he worked on like stench from a corpse. It's also why he hates BioShock 2 and refuses to acknowledge it.
2 did the unthinkable, in treating Leftist rhetoric and ideologies with the same brush that the first did to Right leaning ones. It called out collectivism, victim narratives, and the brainwashing power of therapy. Things sacrosanct to the Left.
So even if Levine's ego was small enough to acknowledge it, he still wouldn't because its an evil game that would get the studio cancelled if released today.
Hm, didn't know this, I skipped out on the sequel because I thought it was (at the time) just a way to 'add more' to a story I already felt was good, and thus would be worse.
Most people did. It was made by a B team and wasn't marketed super well. But it ended up being a better game in everyway, with a well made story that barely touches the original other than adding some background to it.
BioShock created a fantastic world full of philosophies and moralities worth exploring, then decided "eh, too much work" and made it Half Life But Capitalism Is The Bad Guy. Very lazy Saturday morning cartoon morality.
BioShock 2 is a better game because both extremes are represented and portrayed as disastrous. Anarchy got us the hellscape of drug addicted supervillains that is Rapture, while collectivism got us The Rapture Family. Midwits accuse it as being boomer-tier "both sides are bad, I just want to grill" fence sitting, but the real message is that extremism itself is bad no matter what form it comes in.
Ironically, the splicers tell probably some of the most indepth and philosophically groundbreaking stories in the original Bioshock. Unfortunately this story is entirely told by their random dialogue while they aren't hostile and is basically impossible to assemble with a video putting them all together (Dark Souls before Dark Souls!). It does better at showing the flaws of the system than any "Ryan is a hypocrite!" could ever do.
The sequel actually does rather well at not making it "extremism v extremism" anymore. Sinclair alone would be an absolute villain in any other story (including Bioshock 1), and he is filled with villainous actions the game doesn't shy away from showing, but in the end he is shown to not be a cartoon caricature and capable of thinking beyond his ideology and politics plenty of times like a normal human.
All of them tell a complete "story" of their fall if you assemble their dialogue in some semblance of order. So its less of a monologue and, much like Dark Souls, a bunch of random one liners that tell a bigger story.
But the ones I was thinking of when I wrote that were specifically Wader, Toasty and yes Pigskin from the first game, as well as Spider and Brute in the second. And Baby Jane in both.
Each one in the context of Rapture presents a specific moral quandary about its world that focusing on the "big stars" like Atlas and Ryan never could. Focusing on those extremes is basically useless because its all vacuum philosophy based on larger than life guys, wherein the Splicers present real problems that exist in our current world and how more "power/technology/freedom" could exacerbate them into horrific levels.
Also, Brute is my boy and is full of legitimately good quotes for everyday life.
I've noticed many lefties (even ones I've known personally) do not have either media literacy or the ability to abstract an idea presented in a game, especially through the 'villain'.
The one I always went back to during 'the coof' was the recorded speech/rant you could get out of the villain ( lord commander? I forget) from Dishonored. That none of the people I showed it to thought it had any relevance whatsoever, even though we were literally in the middle of a society fucking health dictatorship with the exact same 'why don't people just follow the rules?!?!?' mentality. I still believe these people are too dumb to not stick a fork in the nearest socket if someone with a title tells them to.
What gets me is they redefine words so 'media literacy' becomes 'agreeing with the message' and they will have thousand-comment threads about how non-leftists can't grasp things like Starship Troopers because they lack "media literacy."
Because while the level and his speech are memorable, the man himself is, fittingly for the royal spymaster, entirely forgettable. Sokolovs painting of him can be mistook for any random noble were it not for the banner and attire declaring his importance
Basically, Ryan (whose name is an anagram of Ayn Rand) is a hyper capitalist who believe in what he calls The Great Chain
It's seven letters, how can you not mentally process a 7 fucking letter anagram properly? Andrew Ryan is not an anagram of Ayn Rand without having a stroke or redefining anagrams so you're allowed to leave letters out like screws in a shoddy repair.
1 point 3 months ago
Holy fk. Never realized Andrew Ryan was a caricature of Ayn Rand till now.
Good god if stupidity was a fuel source this thread could bankrupt Saudi Arabia. Took them 17 years to notice.
It boils down to incentives. If the answer is no then the sweat of a man's brow is going become a scarce fucking resource. It's the same reason that betas' excess productivity dries up when the under 35 SMP becomes a hawt guy only club.
I see a bunch of people(?) grasping at understanding the deeper meanings of the story while completely missing the surface level commonality between Ayn Rand and Andrew Ryan (there's even a character named Atlas in the damn game)
I appreciate anyone who self labels as a socialist so I know right away I don't have to take anything they say seriously
Its funny, all of the satire of Bioshock that they love to talk about and how it shows the evils of Objectivism and Capitalism.
But never a word for Sander Cohen. The Jewish "artist" who thought himself above needing to produce anything the public would want, so he got into Rapture to literally devolve into infinite degeneracy and hedonism of drugs, gay sex, and producing art no one wanted.
You'd think it would be an easy dunk on Ryan's philosophy, as his very existence undermines it as he is very much a parasite. But he is also a fucking perfect example of a modern Leftist, so he just gets brushed aside as the silly funny man from one level.
Tenenbaum gets off easy too. "I did human experiments on little children, but I feel bad about it now, so I'm a good person." This sentiment would never be extended to someone like Mengele, who Tenenbaum studied under.
Its because she's a woman. Levine even made that clear when he admitted they gender swapped her (the subtitles to her office still use her old male name) to the only major female in the game.
Its why the novel emphasizes her crippling autism and how Fontaine would use her for sex constantly. To slowly chip away any agency and blame she could have.
The 'doubters' is so scary close to how modern celebrities use 'haters' as a disdainful dismissal of any criticism is so on point it barely counts as satire. It's the same with dr lamb, not a peep about collectivism being just as bad or how manipulative bad actors can be worming their way into power under the guise of good. Maybe that didnt help the sequels reputation, come to think.
Nothing about the sequel helps its own reputation among the fart sniffing Lefties that make up game critics and a huge part of the original and Infinite's fans.
It has a black mammy having to realize that her prejudice is wrong and that her hurt feelings were making her easy to manipulate by an evil party, and just because she was discriminated against doesn't make it okay for her to do the same to someone else. The line "A monster doesn't do that, a thinking man does that" could come straight out of an anti-racism PSA from the era.
That's a single boss from one level. Nothing about that would go over well with them and is a huge reason why it never gets "forgotten gem" coverage.
Muh objectivism is the midwit, surface-level interpretation of BioShock and its themes. If you want to peel the onion and get to the core of Rapture's creation within Ken Levine's (and thus Andrew Ryan's) head, watch American Krogan's video essays on both the first game and Infinite.
Unlike Levine's shitty Ayn Rand "satire", this theme effuses out of both BioShock games he worked on like stench from a corpse. It's also why he hates BioShock 2 and refuses to acknowledge it.
2 did the unthinkable, in treating Leftist rhetoric and ideologies with the same brush that the first did to Right leaning ones. It called out collectivism, victim narratives, and the brainwashing power of therapy. Things sacrosanct to the Left.
So even if Levine's ego was small enough to acknowledge it, he still wouldn't because its an evil game that would get the studio cancelled if released today.
Hm, didn't know this, I skipped out on the sequel because I thought it was (at the time) just a way to 'add more' to a story I already felt was good, and thus would be worse.
With this in mind I'll have to check it out then.
Most people did. It was made by a B team and wasn't marketed super well. But it ended up being a better game in everyway, with a well made story that barely touches the original other than adding some background to it.
BioShock created a fantastic world full of philosophies and moralities worth exploring, then decided "eh, too much work" and made it Half Life But Capitalism Is The Bad Guy. Very lazy Saturday morning cartoon morality.
BioShock 2 is a better game because both extremes are represented and portrayed as disastrous. Anarchy got us the hellscape of drug addicted supervillains that is Rapture, while collectivism got us The Rapture Family. Midwits accuse it as being boomer-tier "both sides are bad, I just want to grill" fence sitting, but the real message is that extremism itself is bad no matter what form it comes in.
Ironically, the splicers tell probably some of the most indepth and philosophically groundbreaking stories in the original Bioshock. Unfortunately this story is entirely told by their random dialogue while they aren't hostile and is basically impossible to assemble with a video putting them all together (Dark Souls before Dark Souls!). It does better at showing the flaws of the system than any "Ryan is a hypocrite!" could ever do.
The sequel actually does rather well at not making it "extremism v extremism" anymore. Sinclair alone would be an absolute villain in any other story (including Bioshock 1), and he is filled with villainous actions the game doesn't shy away from showing, but in the end he is shown to not be a cartoon caricature and capable of thinking beyond his ideology and politics plenty of times like a normal human.
Are we talking about this splicer monologue? among others or were there a splicer in particular you are thinking about?
All of them tell a complete "story" of their fall if you assemble their dialogue in some semblance of order. So its less of a monologue and, much like Dark Souls, a bunch of random one liners that tell a bigger story.
But the ones I was thinking of when I wrote that were specifically Wader, Toasty and yes Pigskin from the first game, as well as Spider and Brute in the second. And Baby Jane in both.
Each one in the context of Rapture presents a specific moral quandary about its world that focusing on the "big stars" like Atlas and Ryan never could. Focusing on those extremes is basically useless because its all vacuum philosophy based on larger than life guys, wherein the Splicers present real problems that exist in our current world and how more "power/technology/freedom" could exacerbate them into horrific levels.
Also, Brute is my boy and is full of legitimately good quotes for everyday life.
Little Sisters as a sort of "virtuous blood libel" is so incredibly obvious in retrospect, I'm embarrassed a youtuber had to point it out for me.
It really is. That's one of the reasons it rings true is how obvious it is in retrospect. It has the "it could never have been any other way" feel
May be my favorite video series of all time.
It popped into my head, and I was looking up the video/audio, and this showed up.
Just loooook at these low IQ retards, and their low IQ takes.
Look at the absolute coping.
Also if (for some weird reason) you want to watch Hasan prove once against how absolutely stupid he is, here he is talking about the quote.
I like one of the comments:
A low bar...but sadly completely and utterly correct.
He also accused someone of being wrong, since they quoted Marx, but Marx was wrong. Yeah. Uhm...socialists, man. They're retarded.
I've noticed many lefties (even ones I've known personally) do not have either media literacy or the ability to abstract an idea presented in a game, especially through the 'villain'.
The one I always went back to during 'the coof' was the recorded speech/rant you could get out of the villain ( lord commander? I forget) from Dishonored. That none of the people I showed it to thought it had any relevance whatsoever, even though we were literally in the middle of a society fucking health dictatorship with the exact same 'why don't people just follow the rules?!?!?' mentality. I still believe these people are too dumb to not stick a fork in the nearest socket if someone with a title tells them to.
What gets me is they redefine words so 'media literacy' becomes 'agreeing with the message' and they will have thousand-comment threads about how non-leftists can't grasp things like Starship Troopers because they lack "media literacy."
'tards gonna tard.
Lord Regent Hiram Burrows
Thanks, dunno why I can never remember him, the level and the speech is probably the best of the whole game.
Because while the level and his speech are memorable, the man himself is, fittingly for the royal spymaster, entirely forgettable. Sokolovs painting of him can be mistook for any random noble were it not for the banner and attire declaring his importance
It's seven letters, how can you not mentally process a 7 fucking letter anagram properly? Andrew Ryan is not an anagram of Ayn Rand without having a stroke or redefining anagrams so you're allowed to leave letters out like screws in a shoddy repair.
Good god if stupidity was a fuel source this thread could bankrupt Saudi Arabia. Took them 17 years to notice.
To quote a less retarded Redditor:
LOL.
Or, if you were really trying to make it work, I guess you could say it's an anagram for...Ayne Rrwand? Awyn Rrande?
Either way...yeah, it doesn't quite work now, does it?
Heck, if they'd wanted to, Dan Ryan was right there.
Or "Raanndy".
I just don't think they know what that word means
Jesus Christ 😒🤦🏼
'If you believe in empathy for animals, become a butcher!'
It boils down to incentives. If the answer is no then the sweat of a man's brow is going become a scarce fucking resource. It's the same reason that betas' excess productivity dries up when the under 35 SMP becomes a hawt guy only club.
I see a bunch of people(?) grasping at understanding the deeper meanings of the story while completely missing the surface level commonality between Ayn Rand and Andrew Ryan (there's even a character named Atlas in the damn game)
I appreciate anyone who self labels as a socialist so I know right away I don't have to take anything they say seriously