BioShock Game Elements

* See also BioShock_Games
* See also Infinite_BS_Was_Not_Really_A_BioShock_Game
* See also Explaining_Too_Much
* See also Trap_Mechanisms_and_Ammo
* See also Twist and Choice and ADAM
* See also Simply_Copy_the_Previous_Games_Elements_BUT_BADLY ( Infinite BS )
* See also Politically_Correct_Targets_Of_Player_Mass_Murder
* See also Slaughterfest_Game_Element
* See also Infinites_Degenerated_Combat
* See also Quick_Change_Plasmids/Tonics
* See also Nostalgia Element
* See also Vita_Chamber game Reload after Death
* See also Choice ( or forced lack of it with Infinite BS )
* See also Puzzles
* See also Crapsack_World - Failed "Utopia" Setting
* See also Marketing_Hype (( Too Much Talk, Not Enough Doing ))
 THERE IS ALWAYS A SLAUGHTER-HOUSE 
--- --- --- --- ---
==A List==
: An Isolated 'City' Setting ( Player need lots of targets to kill )
: 'Dystopia' with some strong political/Social leaning ( Capitalism, Collectivism, Theocracy ) - Opponents 'deserving' killing - Alas_Dystopia
: An Over-exaggerated/distorted/Severely-Flawed 'Utopia' ( an understanding of real society wasn't the writers strong point OR interest )
: Nostalgia - America Historic Type Setting/Motif/Theme Terrain/Props ( Caricature - easy to clone )
: Pretty Cityscape
: Vending Machines ( easy interaction for Player supply needs in a wasteland )
: Silent Avatar ( silent protagonist in majority of the games ) - Mostly Unseen ( except for limbs holding stuff ). OOPS We have the utterings of Booker in response to Elizabeth's many talkings.
: Plasmids (Vigors) - magic super powers with upgrades ( the added game element to give some 'Wow' effects )
: Quick_Change_Plasmids/Tonics a way to use from a list of Plasmids ( the magic potions/posers )
: Murderous Opponents (some mechanized)
: Secondary ability upgrades (ie- Tonic) ( Advancement ramp to make certain things easier, and to compensate for increasing difficulties )
: A Big Villain ( Fontaine, Sofia Lamb, Comstock, Wahl )
: Story 'Twists' ( Usually with a obfuscating/writer-contrived build up ) 
: Iconic Opponent - Big Daddy ( Note - SongBird was a Game Pre-canned Event employed Character )
: Weapon Upgrades (and Ammo variations) - Target appropriate selection and for varying tactics 
: Hacking - some little skill required
: Linear Progression ( levels with blocked paths ) - Needed for the storytelling
: 'Story' - Usually still less than you get in competent a one-page 'Short Story'.
: Choice (kinda) 
: 'Boss Fight' scene - Required 'test' challenge
: Safe Opponents ( Nazi-like Police, Murderous Mutants, Attack-You-On-sight )
: 'Manic_Magpie' ( Looting of Containers and Corpses )
: Sci-Fi justification ( Raptures 'Magic Plasmids' based on the 'new' Science of that time )
: Audio Diary storytelling recordings by individuals ( often with 'arcs' ) - way to 'tell' backstory ( often biased and 'leading' )
: Politically_Correct_Targets_Of_Player_Mass_Murder
: Puzzles, Locks and Keys for Missions - Adding a break from just 'shooting things' and 'bin diving' containers
: A Pretty Terrain Setting ( Easier to do than 'story' - But "a picture is worth a thousand words' ... )
: Children as the Empathy element ( Little Sisters in Rapture, Eleanor, 'Sally', "poor children" in Shantytown )
: Slaughter-fest ( Shooter-game ) Violence - Player demographically pleasing
: Vague/Missing explanations ( Less work to just hint and less work correlating details )
: Metaphysically named things ( Mythic_Themed_Names in Rapture, Pseudo-Christian names in Columbia )
: Masks (helps to dehumanize human targets, also helps simplify NPC animations EVEN IN COLUMBIA)
: Mechanical Security Opponents ( Turrets/Scanners/Flybots )
: Jump Scares (at least a few)
: Research on Opponents To Gain Ability 
: Pseudo-Saves mechanism ( Where the Player comes back to life after dying ) Consoles don't have "Save Anywhere" feature like PC BioShock did ? This is where the Quantum_Hokem got its start.
: Pretend Police State Utopia ( Dystopia ) - Numerous aggressive opponents, with 'quick trigger fingers', who attack the Player on sight.
: Revolutionary-type leaders : Atlas and Daisy Fitzroy ( Part of the 'Punk' aspect, which is supposed to be popular with the younger Players ). Likewise to be opposed : 'The Man' - the 'Establishment' figure (Ryan and Comstock).
--- --- --- --- ---
Nostalgia Game ArtWork/Assets - Just Copy Something Existing :
Few game artists have the skill to do original 'real world' quality period-art. Simpler - just copy something real. The makers of BioShock did this quite alot.
Example - https://tessa.lapl.org/cdm/search/collection/fcl ( Fruit Crate labels )
Just about all these fruit companies (hundreds of them) are long gone, so have no copyright issues ( for the game company to need to have to pay for the Trademark right to use ). Creativity simply copied. (( Saves alot of effort. With the project problems, without these easy assets the game would have be much poorer ))
The shame is : Because of Rendering/Data/production-budget limitations, they had to repeatedly use these Assets many times in the game, instead of having different ones ( The MMORPG can have far MORE Unique Content ).
--- --- --- 
The Paid Reviewers, They Grade Games "On A Curve" :
Faked deaths, secret identities and 'Luke I am your Father' ARE cliches. With a little better Writing ( before they create the expensive and time consuming game Assets ), maybe ALL the BioShocks could have been much better. It may simply have been a case of too many things being changed at the last minute. Articles/Interviews were published about the BS1 game production describing that situation -- How the Studio had to rush things after mismanagement and delays -- A simple illustration was the differences in Infinite BS story settings presented in the various Trailers which showed SIGNIFICANT changes to the story and game experience. 
Unfortunately, Infinite BS borrowed (recycled/copied) so many aspects from the earlier games that they were 'worse for wear' and had a degradation in the game's logic and playability. So many good elements were Dumbed-Down, making them pathetic compared to what was in the previous games.
BioShock Infinite at best gets a 'C' Grade - Simply for showing up ( In a game industry where 'Safe and Mediocre' is the common byword ).
--- --- ---
CONSOLIDATE THESE BELOW Pictures for each ?
CONSOLIDATE THESE BELOW
CONSOLIDATE THESE BELOW
Infinite's Was "Similar" (But Not the Same) Game Elements Compared to BioShock Rapture :
* Magic potions in place of Tonic/Plasmids (RetCon'd by BaS to be ADAM-based)
* 'Lots of Guns' of course ( and oodles of duplicate/repetitive NPCs to shoot wholesale, except now with less gun/ammo specialization )
* Enemies Tactics mostly are : Run at the Player while shooting ... basic NPC behavior. Traps ... never heard of traps/ambushes or enemies who run away ? ( Ones placed out of site 'around a corner' from the obvious linear progression plot path is the simpletons method to have an 'ambush' at a point the Player MUST go through. )
* Vending Machines selling unusual goodies - often at ridiculous prices
* Manic_Magpie Looting containers, while the human's/being's (Corpse) "Loot" was similarly common and uninteresting ( and often Bizarre, without Splicers existing to perhaps explain it ... )
* Hacking (now Possession Vigor) is much more auto-magic ( and the Perp ( equivalent to a Security machine ) conveniently even will 'off' itself ). Possession of a machine ? Well in Fantasy metaphysics (made possible by Quantum_Hokem) I guess Quantum_Particles_Can_Do_Anything ( kinda hard to explain when RetConned into somehow being ADAM caused ... )
* A Shanty Town ( people that Utopia supposedly shits on ... ) - like Paupers_Drop In Rapture it was actually Sofia Lamb's Post-Ryan poverty mess seen in "Paupers Drop" - The Same kind of 'not caring' for the underlings as Comstock for Columbia's untermenschen.
* Freaky looking Opponents ( some with weird powers and glowing eyes ) - Because Shooting 'normal' people just isn't PC ( Their faces being hidden/distorted makes them not really 'human', as does being in a police/soldier (uniform) ... Of course which is THEN all fine to shoot at ). The Guy (Slate) with 'crystals' growing out of his skull (( BTW, How did the Upright God-Fearing Folk in Columbia appreciate seeing weirdo's like those walking their streets ? ))
* Player Running around shooting up countless enemies (Slaughter/Blast-Fest) - Only in one DLC did they add a significant "sneak" element. Less Player combat options in Infinite BS ( fewer Plasmid effects, repetitive gun types, no alternate ammos, Gearz, meager tactical options/situations ).
* Odd looking scenery ( Floatyshit(tm) 'cotton candy' wreckage vs Undersea wreckage ). Over-sized 'Impressive' views that don't jibe with reality, or the Laws of Physics.
* Audio Diary entries ( using those idiotic weird over-sized prop devices ), and Public Announcements to explaining things ( now joined by very precisely drawn 'chalkboards' )
* Multiple (random) monologue quips from the denizens for different circumstances
*'Moral' decisions which you can simply 'Flip a Coin' to pick -- For all they really matter to the game. 
* Choreographed non-interactive scene 'situations' ( But then, what game doesn't have this ? Though it might've been a change to do so less *OR* have ALOT more optional ones that shifted the game's plot significantly ). A Linear plot path.
* Little Shrines - The 'Missing' in BS1, The Family 'Lamb' worship in BS2, The Porter Wife thing in Minervas Den, The Creepy Cult candles in Infinite BS ).
-
* Evil Doctors 
--- --- ---
Infinite BS Developers Lazy Game-Element Cloning :
Simply copying the same things from previous games, except less a match-up or compatibility to the game's setting ( STUPIDER by having 'tech' done wrong/out-of-era/illogically ).
* Magic Potions ( It is minus BioShock:Rapture's Genetic Enhancement reasoning/justification ). SORRY, Quantumz don't give you magic powers -- When we did not even see Flying Belts -- which WOULD have been something at least explainable by the Floatyshit(tm) thing.
* Magic Clothing (Gearz) - In place of technological mechanisms in Rapture's technical world ( too many inappropriate 'Fantasy' type ability buffs ).
* Magic Economy ( Magic Cornucopia Trashcans, and/or Boxcars from Never-Never-land ?? Faux-Economy )
* OOPS, ADD Magic Gate Portals going to new dimensions to get you away from the place you just F*cked Up ( or simply to move the Plot forward ). Really no different game-wise from just entering another Map 'Level' via 'transportation'.
* Complex Vending machines doing amazing things ( act as pawn broker feature... ), but which never seem to be used for selling things the inhabitants want/need ( and at costs they could afford ).
* Truely ignoramus created Audio Diary technology for 'backstory. Duke/Dimwit and Kinetoscope propaganda devices which Herr Goebbels "Shat Bigger'in""Shat Bigger'in" - From a Line from movie "City Slickers" - Now a cliche putdown. ( You know they DID have Nickelodeons by that time of the game setting, and definitely available to be 'future stolen'. )
* Lazy Gamemaker Weapon Tech - 'Bought' upgrades at 'machines', but now minus those Alternate Ammo types that made it a bit more interesting. Interchangeable Weapons, but with negligible differences between them. When you only now have 2 available at once to select from ( plus that chainsaw hand thing ). Rapid-fire guns when they weren't common for decades yet ( 'Youse Gots to Have lots of Bang-Bang' so that the Player thinks they are doing something while wearing down the armies of bullet-sponge opponents on their passage through the linear game path ).
* Rechargeable (magic) Shield ( needed because the Player is now more a bullet sponge, and often trapped in an arena for much of the serious firefights ).
* Magic Anything-you-need, via Quantumz, when normal/known (likely) technology doesn't exist for it ( or when it might be only plausible in a whole world 80 years later ). Complex unlikely things easily present with "a Wave_of_the_hand" ...
* "Heavy Hitters' which were just plain bizarre ( Drank Too Deep of "the Fountain of Weirdness and Bad Fantasy"A comment from Gibson ).
* Big over-sized machinery props with their main attribute mostly of being impressive looking.
* Security Devices :
TurretBS.jpg|Game Turret
Oldturret.jpg|Concept Turret 
Mosquito|Mosquito
BlockLock.jpg|Locks
LoveTheseMachinez.jpg|Patriots
VoxGoons1.jpg|Patriot & Friend
Bargast.jpg|Gun-barge
Zeppything.jpg|Zeppelin (The Bathyspheres of 1900...)
Gianourmous_Turrets.jpg
RestrictedIGuess.jpg|armored doors
WeirdGates.jpg|Gates
BadOdor.jpg|Alarm
NotLiveTargets.jpg|Practice Targets
PoliceState.jpg|Callbox
GianourmousWarningSigns.jpg|Signs
Sorry, no 'Electronics' really exist in 1912, and this automation doesn't quite work with 'clockworks' (see below). It is apparently done via Magic - but it is the same type of automation element/idea as copied from Rapture. (( And 'Stealing Many Future Ideas' and then manufacturing with them is almost as Magic Fantasy as a Floating City. ))
Sorry, mechanical wonders ( claimed gimmicks likely only to be found faked in amusement arcades or concepts in futuristic fiction mags ) don't/cannot automatically detect/decide/track targets, so to fire bursts of machine gun fire at them ( They really cannot do that EVEN today without also killing ALOT of your own people ).
Imagine Columbia being run by LAWYERS, brought to power by all the lawsuits for accidental/negligent deaths of Citizens, done by these impossibly inept devices everywhere in Columbia. Rapture was a city of geniuses, Columbia of moronic cultists ( and that's ignoring the 50 years difference in ambient technological advancements as well, which you at least get to have in BS1 ). Keep these murderous moronic machines and Columbia would soon be a city only of ghosts. (( See Dim and Lazy Game Writers and their god Cuz ))
--- --- ---
Nostalgia is Cheaper for Game Design :
Styles already created ... so the game company doesn't have to spend great effort to do appropriate/cohesive styles/themes which 'look right' ( It takes a great deal of REAL talent to make up New styles having proper balance and form ).
Recognizable things/objects that Player does NOT have to think twice what they do -- You need less detail/effort spent to 'explain' what it is as you have, as when it is some unknown lump ( as to what it does and how it relates to other Objects, etc ... ).
Music/Art to be remembered/recognized were originally well done real (World) things that passed Real World standards ( but was created/earned by someone else's achievement/skill ).
Nostalgia type Objects are easier because they come all integrated together/cohesive/consistent in well known sets from The Past ( Most of the work has been done by really good Citics/Artists 'long in the past' ... Who don't need to be paid development $$$. And for some Assets, and the older they are (further in The Past) the less Royalties need be paid ).
Simple Fact : Copying an idea is MUCH Easier than coming up with it yourself. Unfortunately , Botching its use is even easier, when the game developer doesn't understand ( or doesn't care enough ) to use those previously existing REAL things correctly in an appropriate way.
--- --- ---
 "Jump Scare" Situations in A BioShock Game (BS1/BS2) :
Medical Center (BS1) Dentist office - Painless Dental - foggy room, grab tonic, turn around and Splicer right there behind you)
Bathroom at Triton Theater in (BS2) ( same, tonic trigger, guy suddenly right behind you )
A few 'playing dead' Splicers 'here and there' ( one in Paupers_Drop in The Sinclair Deluxe )
Fort Frolic's living statues ...
We can have these fun situations 'in spades' in the MMORPG ( and do things you didn't see in the Solo games ). Lots more interactive terrain/objects too to make use of. We want to sometimes keep the Players 'on their toes' to keep their game experience from becoming boring. There should be 'safe' places where things usually don't 'jump out at you', but then others ( like in Rapture's 'The Wild' ) where players should know that unexpected things might happen.
A whole flotilla of these mini-choreographed scenes could be created to be randomly (and infrequently) encountered. Quest-embedded situations would be easier to script ( less-generalized/more-independent/more-controllable than what the Auto-Generator programming would require ).
--- --- ---
Columbia Turned Out to be Just So Much Lame Regurgitation/Redo From BioShock :
Mostly the same elements except done in an Inferior way ...
We Coulda Had :
* Frankenstein Monster objects seen in the Columbia Nightmare-world/Freakshow - What Tears should have been used to produce.
* 'Paris' full of Werewolves and Vampires (and Pinheads) ?
* Another deluded Fantasy simulation -- Booker is Insane ( What fun !! - Now a reason for the 'shooting gallery style' game ... ) Perhaps he talks to himself in strange voices or Elizabeth is really "Just in His Head" ( What a Twist that would be !!!! )
* "Jetpacks, 'We'll give you Jetpacks!!!' They said ... " ( and "Where is my Flying Car ?" ) Seriously, Personal Wings would have been Awesome, EXCEPT that it is not conducive to the standard 'Linear Maze Adventure-on-rails' progression path blockages that all these typical 'storytelling' games use.
* The Skyline seen in the Trailers ( and a huge cityscape you could actually reach all within the same level ) might have been good, but they couldn't manage to do it ( and I don't recall them giving back the awards for the game they pretended it would be, but never made ). Worse, they Afflicted BaS Rapture with that nonsensical Pneumo Tube line ( like a dog eating its own wreasty(rancid) vomit, and then regurgitating it again ... ) WE coulda had a whole segment of the game exploring all the different paths/parts of the Floating City (( Save it for the MMROPG REDO of that game )).
* An Actual Racist Police State, instead of all the cottony-fake drivel-parading stereotypical 'oppressed' minorities and workers, and their meanie bosses and 'Da Ebil' white people. The 'Vox' (properly) would have been a hunted underground movement, too afraid to do ANYTHING in public ( except plant bombs/throw them while in crowds ) and widespread informers systematically turning them in. And that faux-religion Crap ? Cult weirdness like that has little to do with religion in America -- Levine has ( allowed the game to have ) similar dim ideas about American History as well.
---
Loot for The Manic_Magpie Player Activity
Logical : In BS1/BS2 all that Player 'seen' stuff ( Lootable bits laying about ) is left abandoned and stripped - with good reason in Rapture.
Not Logical : In Infinite BS's BaSx - where the Loot lays all about in Normal Rapture, with a general lack of logical reason. ( Ditto for strange garbage-can crap found in Infinite BS, AND Worse : There could/should have been ALOT of stuff (props) in great quantities present for the Player to freely grab. )
--- --- ---
--- --- ---
==Game Elements TO AVOID==
 NO Shit Port :
Make a PC 'port' where the mini-games ( required to get certain sequences of missions ) mismatch in timing and do not work with the same controls ( clumsy keyboard buttons instead of joystick/controller ) -- stuck with no Cheat Codes to bypass the defect, and have some crappy situations with a bothersomely long game situation leadup ( with no Save Point midway ) to make the endless retried attempts 'nice' and tedious. Add having a few missions that nobody seems to have tested much on the PC - obviously broken which never were fixed.
GTA3 ... the game company did a piss poor port (PPP) job for the PC.
Red Dead Redemption 2 has similar defects the company never bothered to fix (or worse, later break), and a majorly bad interface implementation ( a "Menu Interface 101" Flunk ).
Both of these were the same parent game company as had done BioShock.
If they had a way for the Players to FIX these games, they would be Wondrously Better (beyond 'Mods'). That is one of the NEW ideas for MY BioShock MMORPG implementation.
--- 
Artificial Blockages to Force a longer Maze-like path. This was done far more in Infinite BS.
You could crouch and pass THIS spot, but they force you to activate some mechanism. It could have been easily done far more convincingly.
---
Multi-Player Limitations :
A Multi-Player game which speeds up Player movements at least 3 X 'real' speed ( in a game that touts itself as 'realistic' ) exaggerating network latency issues. Nothing spells fun like getting killed by someone who ran right up in front of you ( which you never saw because of the lag - let alone had a chance to aim at - and of course they have an Insta-Kill they use ). It is almost as fun as getting shot dead thru a closed door ( not bullet going thru door ) before it even opens ( to your Client's view ) for you to see what's on the otherside.
This is the kind of things MMORPGs don't want to have, and they will lose much of the reflex reaction speed aspect due to delays being transmitted across the internet ( including the intermediary Server ).
---
== Griefers ==
I recall in Ultima Online Ultima Online - An early MMORPG , they had 'Red' Marked characters ( killers of NPCs or Players ) who would be attacked by NPC Guards in the Towns. But it was so easy for the Player to have a separate 'gopher' character to do everything in town they needed, so it was not such a great penalty. Getting away (escaping) was very easy, allowing chronic ambushes of weak 'Newbies' by GriefersPlayers who abuse other Players, for the hell of it and other mental issues., and those abusers easily running away ( being the usual cowards ) when anyone powerful enough to kill them ( or 'Hunting a Red' ) turned up. 
They ( the game company ) after trying many failing countermeasures, split the entire World into 2 duplicate ( copies of the ) map, with one being no PvP at all being allowed. Before that heavy-handed change, they tried some very Byzantine Rules dealing with "when you turned 'Red'" (conditions), and how long it lasted and such -- Adjustments which never really stopped the mentally-ill/sociopath newbie-killers from getting their abusive jollies via Loopholes ( though they simply could have allowed Players to 'opt-out' of PvP, whereupon the games "Griefers" would be stymied and probably would have headed for some other game's easy victims ). 
I recall that the gamemakers made it So Simple to create new characters and power them sufficiently to gang up on Newbies. I actually calculated later that that bad/inept design cost the company Millions of Dollars in revenues ( ex - 50,000 fewer players than they had - at $25 a month each over the space of years ) --- Happening simply because such abuse was allowed/unprevented, which quickly drove many New Players away -- from what otherwise was an adequate game. 
The MMORPG, if it is to allow freedom, would have to handle this kind of Player with proper countermeasures ( as well as handling any other types of Cheats/Abuse ). The MMORPG game's complexity means there would be more potential loopholes, but via the other component of Player Added Programming then better effective countermeasures could be enacted.
--- --- ---
Utopia : Pie In The Sky :
The Utopia has to exist in sufficient isolation so that external influences are minimized.
But influence interloping from the outside is a 'threat'
Self-sufficiency on the whole is required (being isolated)
Internal problems cause strife to make a fragile situation, where an interloper can have greater effect
"Oh yeah, I Know, LETS HAVE IT FLOATING IN THE SKY !!!!!!!" - Meeting note written on a Denny's Napkin
Game Utopias fail Cuz they (gamemakers) say so ( They actually contrive for them to fail, often rather illogically because lazily the plot says so ).
Rapture :
* Pretty much a Ruin by the time you get there ( at least what you see of it )
* Destroyed by a Technological element which society couldn't 'handle' ( and which would have done-in our 'enlightened' society EVEN faster ).
* Alot of what you 'understand' about Rapture though is a lie told by a liar.
* Ryan's 'radical' Philosophy was largely held by about half the people in the USA at the time
* Oops you kill Ryan (maybe) but Rapture isn't 'fixed' - turn it over to a terrorist murderer ? Good idea.
* Voiceless avatar ( but remember Jack killed a planeload of people BEFORE he even gets to Rapture )
Columbia :
* Seems to have been a despotic racist cult hell long before Booker ever gets there ( It pretty much started out that way ) Shantytown seems to have been 'purpose built' a little too much'.
* Unable to actually show what a town full of people live off of ( problem with having it 'visible' )
* Weird magic 'this and that', and Boss 'ghosts' - which really aren't technology ( more flim-flam the way a crystal ball is )
* Avatar who makes Politically Correct 'comments', but actually is really a very bad/evil person in his own right
* "Isolated', yet there are rockets set to GO there ( kinda like that stupid Lighthouse broadcasting Rapture's existence ). Lack of raw materials would have HUGE required dealings with 'the down below'.
* Fake Americanisms - Sorry Ken, you need to get a refund on your education with what you have in your game YOU label as America
* The usual problem of only having Absolutes as expectations ( ie- the Slums of NYC were still better than most of the places the immigrants came from ... )
* Booker and Elizabeth several times switch dimensions, and THOSE hellholes keep 'going on their merry way' without further intervention ( YES, VERY EMPOWERING LEVINE, BAILING ON BAD SITUATIONS )
--- --- ---
Details - Not All Objects Are Reactive
Infinite seemed a Regression.
--- --- ---
STANDARD GAME ELEMENT : NO HARM TO CHILDREN
Little Sisters are made Invulnerable - Until you are allowed to tear them apart under cover of a Green Mist to take their ADAM.
Murder-Suicide of Children (BS1) - But that is not YOU (Player) doing that ...
Infinite BS - You can Slaughter most Civilians ( except the children )
--- --- ---
--- --- --- --- ---
.
.