History NightmareFuel / Bioshock2

*** Worse is imagining ''that'' swimming around in the very brightly illuminated depths near Persephone. The luminescent biomass the bottom of that trench is [[https://forums.2k.com/showthread.php?78622-Introduction-time!-Steve-Gaynor-writer-Lead-Designer-of-Minerva-s-Den/page3&p=970066#post970066 confirmed]] by WordOfGod to be the ultimate source of ADAM. Gil can't avoid seeking the stuff, as revealed by the plants attracting him to the front of his tank even when he knew that they could kill him. Imagine [[EldritchAbomination what might happen]] if he found his way down to the bottom of the trench and gorged himself for decades on more ADAM than he could possibly consume.

** The Little Sister Training Facility is pretty unsettling in its own right, once you find out how the little sisters are trained. There are two buttons on a wall in that area. One of them is labeled with a picture of a Big Daddy, and the other with a picture of a normal person. Pressing the first gives you a free bag of chips, the latter electrocutes you. This is the EXACT same method that is used to train lab rats. These little girls are LAB RATS, nothing more. It's as chilling as it is tragic.

--> '''Sofia:''' Subject Delta ... I know you can hear me. You have stolen my life's work, and with it — my only daughter. But Rapture is the house of monsters. The surface will not have us. And now, we shall be buried as a family. Side by side.

--> Male Splicer 2: "Well la-ti-da, princess!The next time you're eating out of the garbage, you think of me!"
--> Female Splicer: "A lady has to have some standards! (begins sobbing).

--> Male Splicer: "We got plans for you, sweetheart"

--> Female Splicer: "(Screaming) '''HELP!'''"

** When confronted with that... thing, you have the option of either fulfilling the person it used to be's final request for euthanasia, or letting it live, after it promises to "go outside." Now imagine ''[[https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/bioshock/images/e/e3/Gil-a_monster.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20100308212248 that]]'' swimming around in the cold, lightless depths of the Atlantic...

--> '''Gil:''' Whatever you saw inside the tank, that was indeed...me. I fear the fate of Eleanor Lamb will be less physical, but no less grotesque.

** Or that they see the Big Sister armor as Tiara (the helmet), pretty dress (the suit) and silk glove (the weapons). When I grow up I wanna be a princess!

** Especially the one in the movie theater area of Dionysus Park. You find yourself in a totally abandoned toilet block. No splicers anywhere to be seen, full of food and health packs...and one gene tonic. By now, you're pretty certain that nothing is coming for you, so you take the tonic, and nothing happens... Until you're halfway out of there, and a Spider Splicer just DROPS on you.

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iKOuIXpcJE What happens if you harvest a Little Sister instead of rescuing her]]: the little sister will squirm in your arms, crying and begging you not to hurt her. Then, the screen goes black...and you're holding the poor girl's slug which had been implanted in her stomach. The worst part is that the Little Sister simply doesn't know why her supposed protector betrays her. Tearjerker indeed.

*** You don't need to imagine it - if you've harvested Little Sisters in the game you get to see the exact treatment you've given them from Eleanor... while you look through the Little Sister's eyes.

* Amusement park [[UncannyValley animatronics are naturally creepy already]]. So what about damaged, vandalized, abandoned ones that spew propaganda? Hell, even ''Ryan himself'' said he was creeped out by them.
-->'''Ryan:''' Seeing myself transformed into that... [[UncannyValley lurching waxen nightmare...]] Do children really respond to this?

* Early in the game the player comes across a photo reading "Rapture's best and brightest 1952". Who's on it? Tenenbaum, Cohen, Alexander, Ryan, Lamb, and Suchong. Tenenbaum looking nervous and childlike, Cohen looking oddly [[UncannyValley warped]], Alexander distant and unfocused, Ryan [[DeathGlare glaring at the camera]], Lamb smiling calmly, and Suchong utterly indifferent. In other words it perfectly captures everything that makes each character scary. Talk about a picture being worth a thousand words.

*** ''Especially'' since [[http://bioshock.wikia.com/wiki/File:GilScreen_d.png he]] looks more akin to an [[http://bioshock.wikia.com/wiki/File:Gil-a_monster.jpg oversized fetus]] than anything else. [[UncannyValley *shudder*]]

[[quoteright:250:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/bigsister.JPG]]
[[caption-width-right:250:"Big Sister doesn't want you playing with me..."]]

** Another thing: don't. watch. Marble Hornets. and then play this game. The Spider Splicers might just look like everyone's favorite tall, slender stalker...

* Injecting your first plasmid is just as nightmarish as it was in the first game. Subject Delta is brought to his knees, violently spasming in excruciating pain while electricity sparks from his hands. And the entire time he is grunting in pain, if it wasn’t for his vocal modifications he would probably be screaming bloody murder.

* Injecting your first plasmid is just as nightmarish as it was in the first game. Subject Delta is brought to his knees and violently spasming in excruciating pain while electricity sparks from his hands. And the entire time he is grunting in pain, if it wasn’t for his vocal modifications he would probably be screaming bloody murder.

** The Little Sister Training Facility is pretty unsettling in its own right, once you find out how the little sisters are trained. There are two buttons on a wall in that area. One of them is labeled with a picture of a Big Daddy, and the other with a picture of a normal person. Pressing the first gives you a free bag of chips, the latter shocks you. This is the EXACT same method that is used to train lab rats. These little girls are LAB RATS, nothing more. It's as chilling as it is tragic.

** When confronted with that... thing, you have the option of either fulfilling the person it used to be's final request for euthanasia, or letting it live, after it promises to "go outside." Now imagine ''[[http://bioshock.wikia.com/wiki/File:Gil_Concept_Art.png that]]'' swimming around in the cold, lightless depths of the Atlantic...

* The fact you're called ''Subject'' '''DELTA''' implies that, even with all the screwed up stuff you learn about your past, there are/were ''3 more Alpha-Series Big Daddies'' before you.
** In one of Alexander's Audio Diaries, they mention that they were currently testing Subject Sigma. Its implied that Delta may be the only one with sanity and considering later events, it is implied that Alpha Series Big Daddies are still being made. Makes it something of a relief that you actually get to ''play'' Sigma, huh?
*** Actually, they stopped production on Alpha Series (with Delta and Sigma being the only sane ones)... well, Sofia Lamb actually had one more Alpha Series produced, which acts as the final boss of the game: [[spoiler:Augustus Sinclair]].

** The fact that she [[spoiler: is just waiting next to Eleanor when Delta finds her in Persephone, prepared to smother her own daughter just to stop him.]] This pretty much drives home the fact that she doesn't see Eleanor as a daughter; as something to care for as a person. She sees her a tool to be used as ''she'' sees fit and for nothing more and no-one else, and is fully prepared to [[spoiler: nearly kill her]] if it means she's denying her to someone else.

--> '''Sofia:''' But there is one detail of your mutual bond she failed to account for: [[spoiler: [[WhamLine your body was designed to lapse into a coma when her heart ceases to beat.]] Eleanor... forgive me.]]

*** The novel makes it clear that Lamb was like this before coming to Rapture, but it wasn't until she had access to desperate people incapable of escape that she started thinking about a 'revolution.' At first you chalk up Ryan's hatred of Lamb to her being a DirtyCommunist, but then you realize the utter disconnect between her [[DissonantSerenity terrifyingly soothing public face]] and her utter lack of empathy for ''anyone,'' from her followers to her daughter. Lamb emphasizes '[[AllLovingHero caring for everyone equally]]' to the point where she ''does'' feel the same thing for everyone: [[DeconstructedTrope Absolute indifference to their status as humans, concerned only with how they can advance her]] [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans Greater Good]].
** After [[spoiler: Eleanor and Delta begin their escape]], Sofia chimes in with this. She's gone off the deep end. [[spoiler: And she intends to drag everyone down with her]].
--> '''Sofia:''' Subject Delta ... I know you can hear me. You have stolen my life's work, and with it — [[spoiler: my only daughter]]. But Rapture is the house of monsters. The surface will not have us. And now, [[spoiler: we shall be buried as a family. Side by side.]]
** Unlike any other character in the franchise, including Atlas, Sofia doesn't show any genuine emotion. At all. [[spoiler: Not even sadism.]]
** Even creepier is one later on, where she reaches out to [[spoiler: Eleanor]] in a vain attempt to change [[spoiler: her]] mind. And she ends it with "Mummy loves you."

** And she is. [[spoiler: ''BOTH'' of them. And if you've been bad, well... Eleanor wants to be exactly like her daddy.]]

* The [[Film/WhateverHappenedToBabyJane Baby Jane]] splicers are ''big'' on the above, mixed with Tearjerker when you realize she was an actress forced into prostitution, veering around to FridgeHorror (in light of the prostitution) when you've got a Little Sister with you.
-->"Why would you bring a '''''kid?!'''''"
** Whenever her delusions about audiences and gofers weren't making you laugh, they were extremely unnerving. Granted, this is while the splicer is attacking ''you'', but that doesn't make whatever they're reliving any better.
--->"You sick bastard!"
--->"I've got my limits!"
--->"You're hurting me!"
--->"This wasn't part of the deal!"
--->"Get away or I'll scream!"
--->"''Help!'' He's in my ''room!''"
--->"Call me a whore? How ''dare'' you!? I'm an ''actress!'' I... I ''[[{{Tearjerker}} am]]''..."

** It's even worse than that. Later in the game we found out that [[spoiler: while her sanity might've been impacted, Lamb's Utopian project wouldn't change Eleanor physically, because Little Sisters are immune to the negative effects of splicing]]. [[FridgeHorror That means that]] under the armored shell of every needle-bearing assassin sent to make you pay, [[UncannyValley there's a perfectly normal-looking teenage girl]] who has been driven mad by the programming they were under for most of their childhood, and kept under Lamb's control by another round of programming before being put in her suit, and forced to do Lamb's bidding. And you can't save them. They're too far gone. You can only frantically riddle them with bullets with the knowledge that it's you or her.
*** ... and wonder if underneath it all she's aware that Mr Bubbles is the one trying to kill her.
*** [[spoiler: The fact that, according to a conversation between Elizabeth and Dewitt/Comstock in [[VideoGame/BioshockInfinite Burial at Sea: Episode-1]], many of these girls were at one point pimped out by Sander Cohen when they were ''younger''.]]

** How about the Little Sisters Orphanage in Siren Alley? When you go in, you find a few bodies about you can search, including a spider splicer pinned to the wall by a spear (and keep in mind, those are a new enemy at this point, so you're not quite used to seeing those freaks yet). On the way up, you catch a glimpse of a live spider splicer as he darts around a corner, but other than that, no real fights. But then you reach the end and get your loot and the power goes out, leaving your flashlight your only illumination. As you charge back the way you came, by that beam you keep catching glimpses of the spider splicer darting around corners one step ahead of you until eventually they trap you in the second floor hall. The following standup fight with the spiders and a brute is outright catharsis at that point! Oh, but on the way out [[spoiler: shine your flashlight at the "dead" spider pinned to the wall: he's about to leap at you]].

** It's even worse because, before FridgeHorror sets in, that's about the happiest audio diaries you come across.
** Add to that that another audio diary from the boy's mother (and yet another one on the website) reveal her husband and the boy's father was taken away by Ryan. You discover the fate of the father in a diary in the cells of Inner Persephone. He... [[DrivenToSuicide escaped]].
*** At one point, you can find a 'Present to the yellow-eyed girl', presumably from the above boy. It contains a single rose. TearJerker indeed.
*** On the plus side, it's implied that [[SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments the Big Daddy was going to deliver the present to her.]]
** Cohen's Collection. Listen carefully when you start up the gathering event in the area. [[spoiler: You can hear Cohen laughing...]]

*** It's worse, from a psychological aspect, when you actually have no idea which is the 'good' option. Then you either walk out of there and live with the guilt of having let that thing continue it's reign of terror, or you kill him... and get that image burned into your mind for awhile. If you let him live, later on [[spoiler:when you go through the eyes of a Little Sister, you'll find a statue of Delta pulling a man out of a sea-monster's mouth.]]
*** And just for a final layer of horror the choice you are making is really between two people. Gil Alexander and Alexander the Great, same body but at this point Alexander the Great has diverged enough to be considered an individual all his own not just a rambling mad man. Sure he might well be crazy but he is coherent enough to hold conversations putting him a solid step above the splicers, and he wants to live. Gil Alexander, the man who died before becoming Alexander the Great, wanted to die because he knew what he would become though so who do you listen to? The man he was or the man he is?
*** Worse is imagining ''that'' swimming around in the very brightly illuminated depths near Persephone. The luminescent biomass the bottom of that trench is [[https://forums.2k.com/showthread.php?78622-Introduction-time!-Steve-Gaynor-writer-Lead-Designer-of-Minerva-s-Den/page3&p=970066#post970066 confirmed]] by WordOfGod to be the ultimate source of ADAM. Gil [[spoiler:can't avoid seeking the stuff, as revealed by the plants attracting him to the front of his tank even when he knew that they could kill him]]. Imagine [[EldritchAbomination what might happen]] if he found his way down to the bottom of the trench and gorged himself for decades on more ADAM than he could possibly consume.

* The fate of [[spoiler: Mark Meltzer, who went to Rapture looking for his daughter Cindy who was kidnapped and turned into a Little Sister, and he wound up being turned into a Big Daddy so he could be with her. Then you wind up killing him near the end of the game, but you can still save Cindy]].
* [[spoiler: Seeing Rapture through the eyes of a Little Sister. The fact that everything is beautiful and sunny, with rose petals across the ground and butterflies floating around only makes it THAT. MUCH. WORSE.]]
** [[spoiler: Especially when you get short flashes of how it actually looks.]]

** [[spoiler:The little sisters always see this... every second, a perfect world where no one gets hurt and nothing is scary. This is due to the conditioning they went through. When you rescue a little sister, you remove this perfect dream world, throwing them permanently into a world of sheer horror, death and destruction. When you don't, the little sister's see nothing but their daddy there, ripping out the very thing keeping them alive. Their last thing they see is the one they trust most of all murdering them, most likely staying in their perfect little dream world.]]
*** Somewhat mitigated by the fact that, after playing the first game, it seems likely that the programming lingers after the Little Sisters are rescued ([[spoiler:the ones that you escort around still find your appearance as a Big Daddy beautiful, and apparently still want to harvest corpses, despite no longer having their ADAM slug]]). This, of course, brings up a lot of questions about what life would be like [[spoiler: on the surface for the ones that you have the option of rescuing]]. Coupled with the fact that their programming starts to decay as they get older and that it can lead to insanity if it's not been deliberately broken, this gives a new dimension to [[spoiler: the good endings to both games. Even after leaving Rapture, the Sisters aren't out of the woods yet. However, the ending of the first game shows the little sisters growing up. They seem to adjust to it just fine.]]
*** [[spoiler: Those Sisters had support in, at minimum, each other and Jack. Best case including the DLC, the Little Sisters in 2 have each other, Eleanor, Tenenbaum, Charles Porter, the Thinker, and the unnamed star of the Protector Trials, the Alpha-series who might just be Subject Alpha. The Thinker can and does undo ADAM modifications that helps change Porter from Subject Sigma back into a normal human. If it takes a while for the Sisters' programming to break, then at least it's been a while since they swallowed corpse juice or had people trying to kill them, and they live somewhere better than Rapture, so the contrast would be less sharp. Worst case, Eleanor kills them for any residual ADAM in their systems, of course.]]

** When you find the Big Sister suit and reality intrudes, you can hear drilling and someone screaming. For all we know, that might be [[spoiler:Sinclair]]!
* Almost the entire endgame in the Persephone penitentiary facility. You find out a ton about the experiments that each Little Sister experienced, including some wonderful audio logs which reveal, in succession, [[spoiler: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BMmUEaAKSI how they feel pain, due to one jumping from a balcony and breaking her legs, and how they had to re-break her legs and reposition them a ton of times because of the Little Sister's healing factor, to how they tested blocking the pain receptors and had the Little Sisters chew their own tongues off out of ignorance]].]] Gah!

** One particular moment of Fridge Horror is, while making your way towards the first little sister ward, you can come across a room with a dead Baby Jane splicer propped up in a chair, facing the corner. If that's not creepy enough, the walls facing her have been [[PsychologicalHorror clawed black]].
** Hell, even the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-W59FzOwYIs loading music]] for Inner Persephone is unsettling. Appropriately it is an old Artie Shaw song called "Nightmare."
* [[spoiler: Even if you've been a paragon of virtue, Eleanor is still terrifying. She's every bit as aggressive as any other Big Sister, and, in between slicing up legions of splicers, can be heard to shout things like "This one died alone and afraid! Stand in our way and you'll get the same!"]]
** Just think: [[spoiler:not only was Sofia prepared to smother her daughter, she was standing there, waiting to do it. And she waited until Delta was there and would have to watch.]]

* Using a fully-upgraded Hypnotize on [[spoiler:Sinclair in his Big Daddy form. He brokenly pleads for death while fighting the mind control. Listening to him beg in that horribly strained and desperate voice]] is horrifying. Having to hear anyone do that...

** Especially the one in the movie theater area of Dionysus Park. You find yourself in a totally abandoned toilet block. No splicers anywhere to be seen, full of food and health packs...and one gene tonic. By now, you're pretty certain that nothing is coming for you, so you take the tonic, and nothing happens... [[spoiler:Until you're halfway out of there, and a Spider Splicer just DROPS on you.]]
*** [[NightmareRetardant Mitigated somewhat]] by the fact that, at least on normal difficulty and lower, Spider Splicers can easily be defeated by [[HarmlessFreezing freezing them Winter Blast]] and then [[LiterallyShatteredLives shattered to pieces with a Drill Charge.]] If you're quick, you can even catch him before he even gets to attack!

* Everything that terrified you and made you feel sorry for the Little Sisters gets so much worse in this game when you remember one simple fact: [[spoiler:these Little Sisters are girls who were kidnapped from the surface.]]
** There is also an uncomfortable element of FridgeHorror to this, as well. When you consider just how broken the Little Sisters are as a result of their "conditioning" (which really seems more like torturing and drugging them to the point of delirium), there's a serious question about how or if their parents are going to be able to care for them. Their behavior is likely to be uncontrollable and dangerous to at least themselves, if not others around them as well. [[spoiler: The seven main Sisters from the first game are at least apparently okay, but that outcome is probably not going to be universal]]. There's a good chance that some of the Little Sisters will end up temporarily or even permanently institutionalized if their conditioning is hard to break.

* Eleanor in the Bad Ending. You just let a complete psychopath, packed full of ADAM and incredibly powerful Plasmids, loose on the world. And now that [[spoiler:Delta]] is dead, the only things important to her are her "survival and joy". And [[AxCrazy by joy, she means ripping people apart.]] Now, think back on how easily she dealt with Splicers, who were no slouches themselves. You do the math.

* The look on Eleanor's face when Lamb forces Delta to shoot himself brings up a [[FridgeHorror tragic and disturbing thought.]] Little Sisters are conditioned to view the world as an idyllic paradise. They see corpses as angels, blood as roses, splicers as elegantly dressed men and women, and Big Daddies as knights in golden armor. So what was she seeing that made her recoil like that?
** The Little Sisters unfortunately don't have perfect conditioning even in the new lines. They know when there daddies die and cry accordingly, though luckily for most of the game you're there to step in and they recover quickly. It's likely that what Eleanor saw was so contrary to what her programming is supposed to do that she got a glimpse of the real world. Ouch, that one is going to leave some emotional scars.

--> '''Sofia:''' Subject Delta ... I know you can hear me. You have stolen my life's work, and with it — [[spoiler: my only daughter]]. But Rapture is the house of monsters. The surface will not have us. And now, [[spoiler: we shall be buried as a family. Side by side.]]

*** Somewhat mitigated by the fact that, after playing the first game, it seems likely that the programming persists after the Little Sisters are rescued ([[spoiler:the ones that you escort around still find your appearance as a Big Daddy beautiful, and apparently still want to harvest corpses, despite no longer having their ADAM slug]]). This, of course, brings up a lot of questions about what life would be like [[spoiler: on the surface for the ones that you have the option of rescuing]]. Coupled with the fact that their programming starts to decay as they get older and that it can lead to insanity if it's not been deliberately broken, this gives a new dimension to [[spoiler: the good endings to both games. Even after leaving Rapture, the Sisters aren't out of the woods yet. However, the ending of the first game shows the little sisters growing up. They seem to adjust to it just fine.]]
*** [[spoiler: Those seven Sisters had support in, at minimum, each other and Jack. Best case including the DLC, the Little Sisters in 2 have each other, Eleanor, Tenenbaum, Charles Porter, the Thinker, and the unnamed star of the Protector Trials, the Alpha-series who might just be Subject Alpha. The Thinker can and does undo ADAM modifications that helps change Porter from Subject Sigma back into a normal human. If it takes a while for the Sisters' programming to break, then at least it's been a while since they swallowed corpse juice or had people trying to kill them, and they live somewhere better than Rapture, so the contrast would be less sharp. Worst case, Eleanor kills them for any residual ADAM in their systems, of course.]]

[[center: [-NightmareFuel/Bioshock1 | Bioshock 2 | NightmareFuel/BioshockInfinite]]-]

[[quoteright:250:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/bigsister.JPG]]
[[caption-width-right:250:"Big Sister doesn't want you playing with me..."]]

*** ''Especially'' since he looks more akin to an oversized fetus than anything else. *shudder* -TerrorCooper

** When you get close to the windows as a little sister you can see the glass isn't smudged or cracked like normal, but rather spotted... with tiny, childlike handprints.

* What happens if you harvest a Little Sister instead of rescuing her: the little sister will squirm in your arms, crying and begging you not to hurt her. Then, the screen goes black...and you're holding the poor girl's slug which had been implanted in her stomach. The worst part is that the Little Sister simply doesn't know why her supposed protector betrays her. Tearjerker indeed.
** And now, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iKOuIXpcJE You can see it yourself.]]

* If you harvest Little Sisters, whenever you adopt one, she'll say things like "Daddy...? You're never gonna hurt me, right?", "Daddy's home! I've been good! Promise!", "Daddy isn't angry, is he?", "I'll be extra quiet! I won't make you upset!", and "Where are we going? Daddy?" They used to see you as a knight in shining armor. What do they see you as here?
* Seeing the [[http://bioshock.wikia.com/wiki/File:GilScreen_d.png picture]] and the [[http://bioshock.wikia.com/wiki/File:Gil-a_monster.jpg Model]] of Gilbert Alexander...one for the UncannyValley feel of it, the other because it's a demonic fetus...Thing...

--> '''Sophia:''' Subject Delta ... I know you can hear me. You have stolen my life's work, and with it — [[spoiler: my only daughter]]. But Rapture is the house of monsters. The surface will not have us. And now, [[spoiler: we shall be buried as a family. Side by side.]]

* Sofia Lamb.

--> '''Sophia:''' But there is one detail of your mutual bond she failed to account for: [[spoiler: [[WhamLine your body was designed to lapse into a coma when her heart ceases to beat.]] Eleanor... forgive me.]]

** And speaking of propaganda, it's not quite the concept of the propaganda itself that is the most unsettling, but the content. It goes on to explain how the governments seize crops and scientific assets, censors what doesn't benefit them, and most disturbingly, drafts youths into war to die early. As if we needed more hints of how Ryan views the world.
* Sofia Lamb.