I am often fascinated by what the non-gaming press picks up on. Being as immersed in gaming culture as I have to be to write for Kotaku, it sometimes takes an outside influence to get me to see the shock value in certain titles. Boston's Patriot Ledger explores one such game as they delve into BioShock's Little Sister monsters, and the choice they give the player. Kill them, or free them? The game seems to reward killing them over rescuing them, presenting an interesting ethical choice to players.

The goal was to present players with difficult choices, 2K Boston President Kenneth Levine said.

''As a piece of art, we want to deal with challenging moral issues and if you want to do that, you have to go to some dark places,'' Levine said. ''And 'BioShock' certainly does go to some dark places.''

And killing little girls is a pretty dark place indeed. I do like how Levine pulls out the work of art card. Seems to be the norm whenever the violence of a video game is questioned these days.

The article goes on to explore gaming violence, spewing out some of the same things we've posted here time and time again. Studies, incidents, court cases, etc. Pretty much all an outsider sees of the gaming industry. What the article doesn't touch on is this one, overwhelming fact. Giggling little girls are pretty damn creepy.

Would you kill 'Little Sisters'? Quincy company challenges taboos with game violence [The Patriot Ledger via Joystiq]