Storytime

* See also STORY
* See also MMORPG Story Telling
* See also MMORPG_Lore and Expanded_Lore_Canon
* See also Choice (BioShock Game Element)
* See also Audio Diaries
* See also Ghost_Story
* See also Radio Messages and Announcements
* See also Authoritative Narration
* See also Perceptions_Altered (eyes of the Player ...)
The BioShock Games have been acclaimed for their "Story" element - setting them apart from other games.
The Story telling was limited by the Game context.
BioShock's Rapture Story was of a Society being 'Shocked' by a new 'Bio' Technology and being turned into a Dystopia, overwhelmed by something it was not capable of handling - An allegory of the potential threat of Technology to the World ( a common Sci-Fi theme ).
Infinite "Story" was more muddled.
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A Bard Tells A Tale - Gamemakers Make 'Props' :
Unlike Shakespeare, who was a Master Writer, who could create complete and profound stories, we really only got a patchy/obscured outline for the BioShock Rapture's Story. It IS a Shooter Game, despite this acclaimed 'Story' element attributed to it ( which the Developers and shill 'Reviewers' endlessly touted and bragged about in interviews/reviews - symptomatic for the general output produced by the computer game industry ).
List of the Most Profound Issues :
* Dystopias are easy to Create ... by writers. Real People generally have more sense in their societies and it requires skilled Storytelling to describe how they happened anyway.
* Rapture lasted for at least 10 years before the ADAM-Bomb 'Shock' hit it. So it wasn't "Ryan's Philosophy" that failed. Rather, it was a 'Bio' 'Shock' which would easily 'take down' OUR so enlightened society EVEN FASTER. (( A society made up of this kind of 'moderne thinking' gamemakers would never even have lasted that long MINUS any significant 'Shock'. They probably would all starve to death in the first months if 'left to their own devices' ( to much reliance on 'make believe' ) - That is assuming they could manage to GET as far as an isolated 'Utopian' world built upon the Parasitism they embrace. )).
* Being Compelled and Lied To, and having NO Free Will - leads you to a living death.
* The god "Cuz" is often utilized by lazy/careless writers.
* The game writers made Ryan into their illogical patsy to forward their weak plot ( When HE was an Epic Character ).
* Rapture was NOT allowed to be what the Writers claimed it was - logic abused to facilitate their rather pedestrian story 'plot'/'twist'. (( Imagine 'The Tables Turned' on Fontaine by Ryan -- A REAL EPIC (counter) 'Twist' opportunity that was Lost. ))
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What Kind of Story 'Twist' Is It When *You* are Channeled to it 'Like a Steer Through a Slaughterhouse' ? :
Considering how many later proven Lies that Fontaine/Atlas told you earlier in the original BioShock game- - How much (if any) of the rest of what he told you was true ? The writers made sure in their story progression that you ONLY heard his lies, and there was no notion/contradiction allowed to indicate the Truth. Even the game's mood music reinforced the falsehoods. Relying on such manipulation is a general lack of storytelling skill. Better to let the Player learn something themselves, to figure it out. But there is little opportunity in this game for that. They have a linear plot you cant have Player CHOICE decisions to go different paths ( few games can, but few tout "CHOICE" ). 
(( "Its Only A Game""Its Only A Game" was something heard from many fanbois when their volumes of enthusiastic illogic was thwarted, and they then tried to alibi their way out of their previous mis-arguing efforts. If it 'Doesn't Matter', then why argue so hard ?? ? Well, then why all the Hullabaloo about the 'Story' which they've touted endlessly about the BioShock games ?? ))
The Player's opinion was shaped by alot of that "PAL'ly" stuff Atlas was spewing at you, and the Player is kept ignorant of anything to the contrary. The Player was FORCED to act as if they had empathy/sympathy for Atlas, and the gamemakers made sure Ryan does NOT get to explain what Atlas actually is and did. (( In "Burial At Sea" you see the glory of what Ryan achieved. In BS1/BS2 you see what Fontaine/Atlas did to ruin Rapture. )) Ryan so easily could have let you know WHAT kind of 'monster' you were made to think you were allied to. 
Later in Burial At Sea, when it serves those writers to reinforce the (post-reveal) 'baddie' Atlas/Fontaine, they finally disclose many of the nasty things that Fontaine had done - Quite out in the open, smeared across Newspapers and Audio Diaries and in Ryan's comments. 
IF the writer's 'Twist' plot wasn't there in BS1, THEN that evidence could have been shown/exposed in that earlier game - Made plainly visible ( very clearly, and everywhere ). BUT that is 'too late for you' in BS1 -- You had no Choice but to ignorantly progress through the game's plot, led into their rigged Plot Twist 'reveal'. (( Telling the truth about Atlas to the Player would have 'messed up' the gamewriter's forced story narrative done to facilitate that big 'Twist' reveal moment. )) 
The First Time Through (the game), the Player is quite confused about everything anyway, and concerned/distracted with what was going to try to kill them next. It is easy enough to miss Atlas's constant use of "Would You Kindly", which supposedly controls the Player WYK ? A control phrase ? Are we sure it wasn't the word "Boyo" which was the Control Phrase ? 
Simply put : That game's plot was shoveled onto the Player, who was buried under a smelly pile of lies and omissions - Atlas/Fontaine's, AND the rest of the gamewriter's smelly manipulations. It is not left to the Player to figure out and Ryan & Fontaine pretty much just tell you.
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Infinite BS DLC Takes It One Step Further :
Infinite BS is an amazing Story ( Because the writers say so ). It has every decision you make end up not mattering 'a smudge of snot', as you are fated to never have even existed ... (( Actually as a violent mass-murdering thug and kidnapper, that might be a good thing. )) 
Then, with that DLC sequel Burial At Sea ( using the previously 'Stopped from Existing" characters who then magically existed again ), Elizabeth is now conveniently without her 'god' powers, but later regains some (apparently) when it suits the plot - to allow the writer's story mess to finally get finished.
Elizabeth in Burial at Sea, suddenly (and conveniently) regained her 'seeing the future 'Pinky god' power, with a Cutscene showing that when she helped Atlas to destroy Rapture, it will supposedly (in the future) lead to the child Sally being "Saved" - Some unexplained obsession which Elizabeth had. THAT happening even though the whole cosmological 'Truth' in the series is supposed to be 'The future is NOT written yet'. 
We unfortunately had all of Infinite's pretend 'science' ( Fantasy which is NOT even consistent with itself ) intruding on the Rapture game setting -- Which at least previously attempted to be Sci-Fi. (( Infinite was only 'Hack' magic fantasy-writing BS --- now RetCon'd upon Our Rapture. ))
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1927 Movie Metropolis :
Some parallels between Columbia and that "Futuristic City - Where a beautiful and cultured utopia exists above a bleak underworld populated by mistreated workers".
NOPE. Columbia might be 'Floating up Above', but its racist and bigoted religious cult Police State aspect fully thwarts that comparison ( Sorry Kenny, "Americans" don't hold "Stonings" at their Fairs ). If such a story parallel was what the game writers were aiming for, then they botched it. It was too far a 'Push It In Your Face'/'Ram It Down Your Throat' WE GOTS INEQUALITIES HERE !!! plot setting -- instead of it more subtly hiding the society's darkness -- and perhaps letting the Player themselves delve around to discover it ( Oops, needing cliche riot-police/stormtroopers ready for endless Player gun battles - that sales requirement trumped it all ... )
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BUT, with The MMORPG's Mechanisms and Reforms, "WE CAN REBUILD IT, MAKE IT BETTER THAN IT WAS ..." "WE CAN REBUILD IT, MAKE IT BETTER THAN IT WAS ..." : BUT NOT the Six Million Dollar MMORPG 
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