AaronMD

kmattson

However, the Incinerate plasmid is pretty useful throughout the whole game, because (like in any FPS) there's lots of explosive objects. The decoy is great for testing if there's an ambushing splicer in a dodgy looking area, or good for drawing out enemies to be sniped. Likewise insect swarm seems to go around walls and stairs, so if you can hear an enemy, you can get the drop on them even if you can't see them. Whirlwind trap is good for flinging enemies into proximity mines or trap bolts. I don't like Winter Blast though. No pickups and it seems to take a lot of blasts to freeze enemies later on.

onikuwagata

mcderek3000

Not to mention if they did rework stuff to be more awesome in terms of the endings, I doubt we would have gotten the game on time also. Then people would have been bitching why didnt it come out on time.

Witzbold

I do think it's a shame that the ending of the game is so abrupt (in a very Teen Girl Squad-esque "IT'S OVER!" way, even), but by the same token, given the way the game's overall story it told, I can see where it would have been pretty difficult to narratively bring things together without pulling the player out of the game entirely.

Granted, that doesn't mean that a 30-second FMV didn't disappoint me a little, but I still think that the rest of the game was solid enough that I can't say I was "ripped off" by what was otherwise a great gameplay experience.

Rikoshi

GuardianEarth

Game developers need some lessons on PR.

brucifer

the stuff that sucked was the suits and I tried to stop them but they were too powerful..

ps: 1 sale, 1 game install 1 time from now on, it's for the best...

luv ken

railskins

UncleScrotar

Oh Slowpoke. Ahem...

THIS IS NOT NEWS.

Thank you.

Surfninja

WTF happened to game swith real endings? Some of the older 8-bit and 16-bit games had more compelling endings. It seems that in order for a game dev to spend any time at all on a rewarding conclusion to a game, they have to be developing an RPG.

Screw that!

FACT.50

brucifer

grangerfx

Also, he needs to shave. That beard makes him look dirty.

goddessakasha

ZeroFlowne

1D10CY

Enigma_20XX

in bioshock's example it also has the worst part gameplay-wise tied to it. perhaps if the hand-holding part was earlier somehow, then the bitter taste of the ending wouldn't be so horrid.

xbulletholes

Heyyou27

The copy protection is chosen and attached on by the publisher, not the developer.

So, there's another checkmark for "Suits have no place in gaming."

ImmortalZ

thebluick

raptorzrevenge

Also Levine said he wasn't responsible for the multiple endings, he's still responsible for the last third of the game where things completely unravel.

manusdei

Telekinesis was the one I used the most, due in part because of how much I love telekinesis, but also for how incredibly broken it was. Tossing a dead body into a splicer was almost always an instant kill. Two or three tosses would take out the more powerful splicers.

I got so accustomed to it that I wouldn't even cross a room to pick up some EVE anymore. Anything I wanted I would pull to myself and grab out of the air.

@Witzbold:

The bees were more fun to use than useful, though they did provide a few moments of safety while your opponents focused on them rather than you. It works pretty well as a strategy against Big Daddies to be able to distract them while you reload or get to a safer distance.

Alo, lighting someone on fire and then attacking them with bees never gets old. XD

Heliophage

Billkwando

Islandkiwi

RocketFella

When you have, *for example*, the direction of a hardcore fantasy RPG shaped by the preferences of 15 year old girls because the developers previous game did well in that demographic...well of course it doesn't work. (and this is a real example, just genre changed to protect my ass)

Anyways, I just remembered I never did manage to see the second ending in bioshock....I just couldnt bring myself to harvest the little sisters :(

mrbandersnatch

phonicpod

Although having just a single excellent ending can be argued to have a much more positive impact though.

Regardless, I thought it was nice that there is at least some sort of "choice" for the player to try and take to get a different ending.

Witzbold

BlackDove

PacManess

executives should have absolutely no say in game development policies.

Can we get some stone tablets to engrave this in?

CyberSkull

Interesting insight then, considering the articles that Ive read about him including the one done by Kotaku / Gaygamers very own Flynn De Marco was very positive about him.

About Cliffy B. though I give him credit to having his "hip" name since hes been a big help with the UT modding / mapping community for ages. Which is more than I can say about the previous 2 examples. That and I havent really heard about Cliffy B. going off at other developers all that much.

Witzbold

kuroturtle

PurpleMonkey

Malkavian

Having worked with him on two projects "Freedom Force" and an unrealeased console project that had to do with hell (it was very system shocky), I think I have a little insight.

I would agree with you about Jaffe, and lets add Cliffe B to the fire. The gaming industry is full of daft punks that think they are E! hollywood celebs. Gaming is still in its infantcy. We once paved a road for entertainment, now we mymic everything around us.

Not to digress but escapistmagazine's latest review of HALO sums up the future.

Back to the point: One of Ann R.'s major points was giving individuals and ego the spotlight.

Meet and work with the man, you get a little insight.

Babygames

Dr Terror

sure. the game could've been more innovative. but hey, next time around, i bet Irrational's gonna have a lot more creative freedom and money! so all's well ends well.

djcoffee

As per the endings, I thought the endings were so at odds with the theme of choice. I mean, I just felt like I was being told that I needed to choose my own path, decide my own fate, take control of my life, but the gameplay was too conventional to convey that. At the end, I just felt like I'd played a creepy, kind of fun shooter. I was really excited up until the last part, though. I just expected more. I think you know what I'm talking about...

Cola82

Witzbold

Luke Plunkett

Chickeninja

DeadPlasmaCell

Piemonkey

Zootalor

It really is a small world after all!

Witzbold

Id hardly say hes egotistical when put into comparison with others like Jaffe and Itagaki for example.

Witzbold

I sincerely hoped, on my first play through, that I could refuse to halt the cities destruction after killing Ryan, and have the ending occur there. I didn't do it the first time through, and found on my second play through that it didn't do anything. I think, though, that if that had been a potential ending, to right there break Fontaine's spell and let it all die, the story would have truly been perfect. It just set it up so well, with all the stuff about choice and obediance, that I would have loved to defy Fontaine and choose to let Rapture be destroyed. Alas, it was not to be. And so a great game doesn't quite qualify as perect.

etho

GettinMyGooseOn

Witzbold

Apparently he only wants to take credit for the "good" parts of the game and none of the bad. I bet the suits were responsible for the widescreen issues too?

Babygames

With developers, Im not saying blame doesnt fall upon them, since Ive seen some pretty stupid ones too. But balance must be taken with development also to not make a game so much that you want to play, but something that the fans will want to play.

Game designers have done what they are for years / have degrees in what they do for a reason and not to be told what to do by pencil pushing tits who are just trying to figure out how to turn the fastest buck.

When you get the suits sticking their dirty little fingers where it doesnt belong, project schedules get fucked up and work just starts to get messy when things need to be "doctored" to meet the needs of the man in the golden chair.

Let the people who know what the fuck they are doing do their jobs.

Witzbold

There are many, many games that would have been great had they only made some minor change or removed some annoying system that the lead developer had a deep love for. Instead, those games were released with the artistic integrity we always speak so highly of, but remained terminally flawed.

I do agree in general, though that allowing artists to create art unencumbered by any form of censorship is a good thing. Sometimes, however, a little criticism goes a very long way.

Sugoi

huginn

Witzbold

Remember that boss battle where it was just Snake moving down a canal being hounded psychologically and haunted by the ghosts of anyone he'd ever killed in the game? That part could be really crappy or really easy depending on how many people you'd murdered on your way up to that point.

I think that's the analog that Levine is talking about.

turkeyfunk

Designers need to do the exact same thing. After making something, find out whats wrong with it and improve from there.

Witzbold

Gutzman

humilitybecomeshim

Other than that I really enjoyed the altruistic ending. It seemed fitting. Heven't had a chance to see the selfish one though.

Agies

Konchu

WaterMedia

Moonshadow101

MeanMF

Stormrider

littletad

On a higher level (execs) it's motivated by cash, but can you really just call the creativity of the staff into question because they're making a sequel?

onidavin

Excellent post. If it weren't so ripe with spoilers, I'd say it was a shoe in for comments of the week.

doubtful

Bioshock is one of those games that makes you feel something. Yet the ending makes you feel the binary, Your an evil bastard, or a saving saint. And if you don't fall into either of those roles (which I can assure you, feeling are as gray as Taylor Hicks's hair) tough

huginn

I couldn't have said it better myself. I couldn't have said it as well myself either. >.<

Heliophage

chimp_o_death

TC

"Suits have no place in the gaming industry."

DAMN STRAIGHT.

dead_red_eyes

The Amazing Exploding-Man

-spoiler- the part where you become a big daddy has some room and I thought it was going involved in the ending (or atleast, the final boss.... ) But the game failed in the black or white ending.

-more spoilers- First time I played the game. I 'ate' every girl I could. At the end, towards the orphanage, I felt something. As a person and a character. I save every girl from that point on til the end.

My ending? Not of redemption that -I- felt. I get the bad ending where I eat more girls and take over the world. Anyone else feel cheated or do similar?

huginn

catapult37

Bioshock was broken up into basically 3 acts -- the first ending with the submarine, the second with your encounter with Ryan, and the third going to the end. In my opinion, these first two acts were incredible from a storytelling perspective. I felt fear, paranoia, betrayal, and helplessness. The end of the second act was one of the most amazing sequences I've ever seen in a game. Without really spoiling anything, I found the inability to act during that scene drew me into the character's state of mind in a way I've never seen before. I actually stayed up for a while pondering the implication of what I had learned and seen, and impressed with how they subverted your expectation of videogame conventions.

So it was quite a letdown when all the philosophical questions posed by the second act's major revelations were dropped entirely in favor of a "revenge" motif culminating in a doom-esque boss battle. All the questions of free will and fate were left behind. I had high hopes when you were forced to turn yourself into a big daddy (despite it making no sense plotwise -- the little sisters were already on your side if you were nice to them) because the audio diaries made it sound like you would essentially lose your humanity in the process. Oh, guess what? Nevermind, we're not following up on that. (Figures Levine also never realized players might feel sympathy for the big daddies, despite the fact that he wrote all this material about how they were human, too, and how horrifying the transformation was). The "helmet" effect even disappears during the final battle.

Fontaine's plan also makes little sense in retrospect.

Sigh. Great game, immersive, beautiful, ambitious. It succeeds at so much, it's disappointing that it fails to cultivate the narrative seeds it plants.

catapult37

The effect of the bees on the arm model is fucking sweet though!

Also in the game one thing that I was a little disappointed with was the lack of variation with the enemies. Later on it was more like they replaced different monsters with just stronger versions of old ones with more HP. Would have been nice to see more mutated folk, and watch weaker ones run in fear from stronger ones.

Witzbold

I_Hate_This_Place

Though I have seen some insane vids of people kicking ass on hardmode.

Witzbold

Just fire, electricity, and ice?

BEES!

Maybe it's just me, but I couldn't ever get tired of shooting out bees...

Heliophage

Graedus

Well if you harvest even on little sister you get the bad ending.

I don't even know what the bad ending is though. It's very rare that i play through a game more than once.

ArmyofJuan

mossberg

Ergo, the suits would probably feel justified in interfering. This pisses me off.

splines

@TRT-X:

That's one of the things about Mass Effect that I'm excited about. Doing something good doesn't erase the blunt actions you've taken in the pass. Rather than having one bar that raises and decends between red and blue, you have two separate bars that keep track of both aspects of your character.

You can't undo killing and orphan by saving a kitten from a tree, so to speak. And vice versa. That's the best way to go for games with moral decisions, methinks.

Heliophage

I rarely used the plasmids later on cept for the shock one for its stun ability, just due to how little damage they did.

I still think that Mr. Ryan looks like an evil walt disney. :o

Witzbold

Swift_

Heliophage

TRT-X

Shiryu

Asides to watch the money.

Once they start opening their shitfilled mouthes and chip in to the production process, things go sour fast.

Witzbold

hageshiku

MCWHAMMER

Buttpickle

Moonshadow101

I'm not trying to be a smartass here, I'm genuinely wondering if the suits have ever changed things for the better. You hear so much about how they do bad, have they done good?

Lyrai

lolspaceship

The multiple endings was slightly disappointing to me, but since I was good the entire time, the ending was much more satisfying to me than I'm guessing it was to people who flip flopped and got the bad one.

MBCpeanut

Which yet again proves that executives should have absolutely no say in game development policies.

Atheist Jew