A real life little sister needs adopting, big syringe and lamp-eyes and all. Do you accept?Could you nurture her out of rooting around in corpses? Would you try to take her to a physician so she could be "rescued" from her gathering urge -- even if doctors would treat your lil' orphan like a freak? Would you adopt her just to harvest her for superpowers?
Serious question. I've also added a sidebar poll that quizzes you on your quintessential playing habits within the BioShock universe. I am playing 2 quite differently from 1, wherein I killed everything.
For some serious thoughts, read Michael Abbott's take on fatherhood in BioShock 2, and then read Chris Dahlen's apparently-opposing take (they are both for-realsies daddies, whereas I'm probably way more Tennenbaum than Lamb). I did not read their columns, because I didn't finish the game yet -- I'm neurotically spoiler-averse with games like BioShock. But you could, if you wanted to.
I'm going to try to make "question of the week" a regular feature here. I said "try." Today I just wanted an excuse to post this Little Sister picture:
AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!
[Wallpaper-sized edition of above is here]
14 comments:
Hmmmm... well, real life question of a game scenario. Taking into account all of the monetary factors, the fact that I don't actually want kids, and the red tape nightmare that'd result from having a small glowing eyed child suddenly show up in your life?
I'd STILL do what I do in the game. Adopt and cure.
The first Bioshock, I attempted to play through "evil." I couldn't. The first time I was faced with that virtual little face in the screen, I couldn't bring myself to "harvest" her. I didn't even attempt to do so for the second game, because I knew I'd run into an even bigger problem. The little girls in this one aren't struggling to get away, you're their new Daddy, so they look at you with such... trust.
So, yeah. Whether they were struggling to get away, or looking with trust, I'd try to help them. Because, at the end of the day, as much as I try to hide it, I am basically a good guy. And good guys do the right thing.
Simplistic, perhaps, but what can you do.
I'd definitely be the caring parent. When I played the first BioShock, I couldn't even bring myself to look at the "harvest" animation online, let alone do it in the game itself, so yeah, I'd do everything in my power to give the little sisters a normal life. Whatever that would entail, I'd try my best to make it happen.
Though I'm not a father myself, nor have I finished BioShock 2, so maybe I'd be a terrible parent in the long run, ha ha.
Depends. Can I cure her mutation, restore her humanity and make everything better with a wave of my hand? If so, then absolutely.
Games are pretty sweet that way.
"The Little Sisters have awoken something that... in me is an abomination: my maternal instinct." - Tenenbaum. Perhaps my favourite line from the two games. Tenenbaum gets some great material.
OK, to the question. Hmm, well even considering I'm 22, no where near ready to have kids and don't really like them anyway... I would probably still go with adopt and cure. Especially if we're talking about being in a position like that of Jack or Delta, in Rapture post-NY'59.
It's that smile. The way the little girls' faces light up when they see their new Daddy. My second play through BioShock 2 I tried taking the farm-and-harvest route but after... harvesting one little sister I couldn't bring myself to do it again. So silly, really. Press F or press B, they're just keys. But B became they forbidden key.
I think Bioshock would be way more interesting if there were material rewards for harvesting. Instead, you end up behind on achievement points and loot both if you harvest, so there's not much dramatic tension.
As for real life, I would adopt and cure, then put the resulting little girl back up for adoption. I am in no position to raise anyone right now, but the fewer Little Sisters running around the better.
One really surprising good part of Bioshock 2 is the multiplayer "story", basically a couple dozen audio logs that you unlock as level perks.
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Where are the pictures from?
Honestly, I rescued all the Little Sisters when I played the first game not just because I wanted to make the Morally Correct Decision, and not just because I liked to idea of freeing them from whatever form of sci-fi bio-bondage the story was telling me they were suffering from. I rescued them because I thought they were cool, and forced to choose between eliminating their characters and keeping them alive, I opted with the latter.
The thing that annoyed me about the Big Moral Decision aspect of the first game was that I wish I had been given the third option of just doing nothing-- why couldn't I just leave them alone? If it weren't for the resources you need to collect from them, I would've been just as happy to let the Little Sisters frolick about their merry ways, stealing from the dead and ordering their Big Daddies around. Hell, I was always a little dissappointed whenever they were transformed into healthy, "normal" little girls upon being rescued-- like the sacharine Prince Charming transformation at the end of Cocteau's "Beauty and the Beast", it's sort of a let down to see the Little Sister robbed of her monstrous qualities. Before, they were disturbing, but memorable, and actually kind of cute. After, they were just rather plain and boring.
You didn't say whether or not there was a diving suit in it for us. An embarrassing amount of my decision hinges on that.
It's kind of a frustrating choice. The intention, I'd say, is to present you with the choice to follow the Objectivist, Andrew Ryan way, or to sacrifice self-preservation out of sympathy.
But the way it ended up in the actual game is just the same Good vs. Evil crap that every Lionhead game peddles. Atlas shouts that they're no longer human, which should come into the equation...but you can save them and restore their "soul" or whatnot. It doesn't even follow through on the self-sacrifice, since Tenenbaum is happy to give you hampers of Adam and ammo.
Then you have two endings - if you save all the kids, you live happily ever after with your adopted family. If you don't save them, you cause nuclear war.
Bioshock had great ambition and did a lot of things right, it's a great game. But part of the reason I was so excited about it was that it purported to be discussing life philosophy outside of the D&D alignment world games usually operate within. It compromised, and we ended up with the same Saint or Bastard dilemma we always get.
I haven't played the sequel yet but I don't get the impression that it's particularly planning to change the moral framework, correct me if I'm wrong.
To kill or to help a little girl, that's not really a question for me. Of course I cured every single one of them.
However, I really wish I didn't have to kill their Big Daddies while at it. I felt like such a jerk for taking them out and indeed, I first tried to avoid it, but the game made it clear that I had to either cure or to harvest the girls and thus waste the Daddies. Killing the Big Daddies is to date the single most regrettable thing I've done in a videogame.
At least the game's (Bioshock 1) ending cutscene helped my spirits somewhat.
Totally adopt and cure. I wasn't even able to play through Bioshock because the little sisters reminded me too much of my actual daughter.
The greatest thing about the original Bioshock was that I didn't know what to expect. When I broke the surface of the Atlantic as Jack, my instincts told me swim away from the fire and the sinking plane. My instincts led me to trust the kind Irish gentlemen. They led me to trust Tenenbaum. And they led me to Save my first Little Sister.
Unfortunately, from that point on, the game became about ADAM management, and instincts took a back seat to merely completing the game with the best plasmids and tonics. This carried over to Bioshock 2. To me, the story - right/wrong, fatherly aspirations - faded, lost to my extreme focus on splicing up with the right cocktail.
While I regrettably lost out on these more vital, moving parts of Bioshock's overarching saga, I still understand what the developers are trying to convey. Just not as strongly.
Were I more in tune with Bioshock's grander aspirations, I could answer this with considerable deliberation. As I'm not though, I'd have to say that they deserve to be freed, "Saved." In such a hostile environment, it would be difficult to focus on little else, but delivering the sisters from harm's way. I've never desired to be a parent, but I'd still put my life on the line for their safety.
Maybe Bioshock has taught me its lesson after all.
SVGL, how about putting all your old profile pics in a gallery somewhere? I like them so much and you keep changing them.
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