History Fridge / BioShock

* Got peeved off by the difficulty change in Bioshock 2? Consider this: the only living non-spliced people were in hiding (Tenenbaum, Grace Holloway, Stanley Poole) and the rest were immediately killed by splicers. Splicers are constantly battling each other to harvest ADAM from their corpses. So between Jack's departure and Delta's resurrection, splicers have been fighting each other with the better spliced one prevailing, and the ones Delta fought were the strongest of the strong. In other words, ''natural selection is the reason why Jack wouldn't have survived Bioshock 2.''

** And lastly, Jack's never smoked before that day in his life. He's only smoked once, that day on he plane. That means that the reason it was so easy to ignore the cigarettes in the game... was because he wasn't subconsciously looking for them! He wasn't thinking about smoking because, since he hadn't smoked until then, he wasn't addicted to the nicotine! His body was still new to it, so he didn't have a hard time kicking the habit since he didn't ''have'' that habit to begin with!--/@{{Dragon 573}}

* The good ending. It seemed odd. Taken out of the dank confines of Rapture, it presents a an abridged lifestory of the little sisters saved. It seemed completely at odds with the tone of the game. Then it occured to me that this was the final ironic f-you to Andrew Ryan. You spent the entire game saving small abused little girls and, ultimately, what did you give them? Their freedom.
** Not only that, but you're freeing them from Ryan's "great chain" of industry. The "chain" in this case being ''shackles''. Peach Wilkins puts it best: Ryan's chains are the ones that go around your ankles, and by not only ''freeing'' the Sisters from that chain, you're also giving them the purest form of charity imaginable - a titanic middle finger to Ryan's philosophy if there ever was one. And not only that, the choice to save or kill the Little Sisters is entirely up to you. In fact, its the only real choice you ''have'' during the course of the entire game. And by choosing to spend the only real choice you have completely and absolutely defying Ryan's philosophy, you're showing him the most absolute rejection imaginable. A man chooses....and this man chose charity and kindness. And that comes out to a resounding '''"Fuck you, Andrew Ryan."''' -- Tropers/UnknownTroper
** Here's one for you: consider the endings, stripped of Tennenbaum's judgements. In the selfish ending, you gain control of a whole city, an army of loyal super-soldiers, and, eventually, a nuclear armada - with which to hold the world at ransom. In the selfless ending, those you have helped go on to live rewarding lives while you live humbly, grow old and die. Thus, everyone gets what they most desire - there's no bad ending if you act according to your beliefs. -- Tropers/SirFrederick

* It always bugged me that every single time I played the Fort Frolic level, Atlas's description of Cohen would get drowned out by the rendition of "Rise, Rapture, Rise" that's playing over the loudspeakers. I always assumed it was a game bug (this game, at least the version I got, had a good number of issues with background audio making it hard to hear my shortwave). Then I realized: Cohen can hear your radio conversations. He's probably piping the music in on purpose to drown out the terrible things Atlas is saying about him. Note that the song fades in during Atlas's line, and fades out soon afterwards instead of continuing to the end like all the other muzak. - Tropers/ThePocket
** In fact, the song is probably coming from the jammed radio, not the loudspeakers. I realized that after playing the level again after the above post.

* Was watching Batman: TAS, in season 3 we have Deep Cold which is about a underwater city for the world's elite. Batman:TAS already uses retro 60's tech. And at the end Batman blows the place to Kingdom come, And then it hit me. Rapture is set in the Batman:TAS universe. Ok it might be a WMG but there are a lot of similarities, and Batman is just a Badass Normal so Rapture could be a Alternate Universe. -- NekoLLX

** A perfect name for such an inbred statement.

* I didn't think much about the area of Rapture that was forcibly sunken into the oceans depths at the end of Bioshock 2.... until I realizde what that area was called: '''''Persephone'''''. It became even more brilliant when I realized that it sunk into a ''trench''. Trenches are essentially the closest we can get to the literal "underworld" of the earth.

*** This troper would like to expand on that. Sophia Lamb's success in making the cult occured because it was in the HiddenElfVilliage of Rapture. Could she do it on the surface at all? Even if she gets back to civilization, how can she do anything? How can she explain her absence for 20 years?

** All the above theories are clear cases of FanDumb. Ryan's philosophy was never about 'doing whatever you want at the expense of everyone else'. It is about 'if everyone do what is rationally the best for them, then society will be a better place at the end'. Refusing to commit murder of children is not a contradiction of his philosophy. Of course, at the end Ryan's actions by the time the game take place is very much 'screw everyone else! It is all about me!'. But it is because he was corrupted by power and became a hypocrite who violated his own moral standards and not a fault of his philosophy.

* This troper didn't think much about the area of Rapture that was forcibly sunken into the oceans depths at the end of Bioshock 2.... until he realized what that area was called: '''''Persephone'''''. It's even more brilliant when you realize that it sunk into a ''trench''. Trenches are essentially the closest we can get to the literal "underworld" of the earth.

* Ok we got outself a Fridge-Coaster here. First starting with Brilliance, The Reason why Sophia lamb simply never fixed Rapture, she had the time an resources, she didn't want Rapture she wanted the collective genius of the people. All she needs to do is stablize Rapture and make sure nobody leaves. Which leads to logic, the population knowlege would surely have degraded due to twenty years of drug abuse. Furthermore after twenty years what ever inventions they had created are ether obsolete as Technology Marches On or were only effective in Rapture, i.e gene banks and Steam Powered Turrets. However the Brilliance comes back we realize that the plan doesn't work, Gil Alexander the first subject is completely insane and the Adam she had fed to Eleanor didn't take. In other words everything Sophia Lamb is doing is futile, which led to Fridge horror.

* ''BioShock'' gives us Dr. Steinman, a DeadlyDoctor who experiments on people and creates hideous freaks. That sounds like TheThemeParkVersion of someone. Dr. [[{{Frankenstein}} Stein]]man... - {{Regiment}}
** This troper at first wondered why [[spoiler:Andrew Ryan ordered you to kill him]], since that's exactly what you were going to do regardless. Then I realized what his last words actually meant. "A man chooses... a slave obeys." He is choosing, and you are obeying.
** [[{{theenglishman}} I]] had two FridgeBrilliance moments with BioShock:
*** I was initially turned off by [[spoiler: Fontaine's GiantSpaceFleaFromNowhere final form. It wasn't until I thought about it some more that I realized that Fontaine's final form bore a striking resemblance to the statues that hold up Andrew Ryan's propaganda throughout Rapture.]]
**** The statues are of a character from the GreekMythology: the Titan who holds the heavens on his back. His name? [[spoiler:Atlas.]]
*** The second moment I had was simply an inversion of the traditional use of FinalBoss DeusExMachina. By [[spoiler: escorting the LittleSisters to the final encounter with Fontaine]], you are essentially creating your own DeusExMachina and providing the own climactic redemption in the climactic FinalBoss.
**** I just realized that by reading the above theory: you know how creating your own DeusExMachina is called? It's called ''controlling your own fate''. This... is... brilliance. The game is so much more beautiful right now.
*** [[spoiler: The good ending. It seemed odd. Taken out of the dank confines of Rapture, it presents a an abridged lifestory of the little sisters saved. It seemed completely at odds with the tone of the game. Then it occured to me that this was the final ironic f-you to Andrew Ryan. You spent the entire game saving small abused little girls and, ultimately, what did you give them? Their freedom.]]
*** Not only that, but you're [[spoiler: freeing them from Ryan's "great chain" of industry. The "chain" in this case being ''shackles''. Peach Wilkins puts it best: Ryan's chains are the ones that go around your ankles, and by not only ''freeing'' the Sisters from that chain, you're also giving them the purest form of charity imaginable - a titanic middle finger to Ryan's philosophy if there ever was one. And not only that, the choice to save or kill the Little Sisters is entirely up to you. In fact, its the only real choice you ''have'' during the course of the entire game. And by choosing to spend the only real choice you have completely and absolutely defying Ryan's philosophy, you're showing him the most absolute rejection imaginable. A man chooses....and this man chose charity and kindness.]] And that comes out to a resounding '''"Fuck you, Andrew Ryan."''' --UnknownTroper
*** Here's one for you: consider the endings, stripped of Tennenbaum's judgements. In the selfish ending, you gain control of a whole city, an army of loyal super-soldiers, and, eventually, a nuclear armada - with which to hold the world at ransom. In the selfless ending, those you have helped go on to live rewarding lives while you live humbly, grow old and die. Thus, everyone gets what they most desire - there's no bad ending if you act according to your beliefs. --SirFrederick
** I was nearly through the entire game wondering why the hell Jack had chains tattooed on his wrists. It was not until some time after [[spoiler: Jack is revealed to have been a brainwashed slave of at least one person in Rapture]] that I finally ''got it''. Those tats were actually very clever foreshadowing of TheReveal.
** It always bugged me that every single time I played the Fort Frolic level, Atlas's description of Cohen would get drowned out by the rendition of "Rise, Rapture, Rise" that's playing over the loudspeakers. I always assumed it was a game bug (this game, at least the version I got, had a good number of issues with background audio making it hard to hear my shortwave). Then I realized: Cohen can hear your radio conversations. He's probably piping the music in on purpose to drown out the terrible things Atlas is saying about him. Note that the song fades in during Atlas's line, and fades out soon afterwards instead of continuing to the end like all the other muzak.
** Dr Yi Suchong's proper title is Dr Yi, as Chinese people put their family names first. On the other hand, Rapture was founded in the 40s; Rapture's citizens seemed mostly European or American in origin, and back in the 40s people weren't so big on multiculturalism.
** This troper has seen at least one person express his dislike of [[spoiler: Gil Alexander/Alex the Great]] on the premise that the developers tried to make him too much like Sander Cohen and created what was essentially a bad knock-off. When this troper reached that part of the game and [[spoiler:found out what had been done to Gil]], he started to think that maybe the reason he acted so much like Cohen was because [[spoiler: He probably had some of Cohen's ADAM spliced into him, giving him his thoughts and memories, and possibly even some aspects of his personality which took over. The great Sander Cohen isn't one to share the spotlight, after all...]]
** I was annoyed at Eleanor's insistence on [[spoiler: saving her mother in the good ending.]] Then I realized two separate things:
*** One: She was following your example, esp. re: [[spoiler: Stanley Poole, the DirtyCoward in Dionysus Park who sold both Eleanor and You to the Little Sister and Big Daddy programs. If you spare him (and you have to to get [[MultipleEndings this ending]]), she looks through your memories of Poole and applies them to her mother.]]
*** Two: It's arguably a case of [[spoiler: CruelMercy, because Lamb is effectively stranded on that escape [[BuffySpeak bathyshere-pod-thing]] with no provisions, without the help of her daughter, with whom she's living on borrowed time anyway. Oh yeah, and the nearest landmass? ''The lighthouse marking the entrance to Rapture, which she just left in order to unleash her creation on the world.'' So we have a SadisticChoice between running back to Rapture with her tail between her legs, or dying slowly of starvation, dehydration, exposure, or all three.]] Suck on ''that'' one, ''[[PrecisionFStrike Bitch.]]''
**** This troper would like to expand on that. Sophia Lamb's success in making the cult occured because it was in the HiddenElfVilliage of Rapture. Could she do it on the surface at all? Even if she gets back to civilization, how can she do anything? How can she explain her absence for 20 years?
*** Eleanor pretty much spells it out in the good ending - [[spoiler:she is challenging her mother's belief that humanity is doomed by its own selfishness by saving her, even though Sofia thinks she has been tainted by Delta's beliefs.]]
** Grace Holloway tells Delta that he broke her jaw when she approached Eleanor. No wonder Grace's so angry about that--she's a singer!
*** That, and getting your jaw broken hurts like hell.
** A little Meta here. Remember how reviewers complained that the Vita Chambers harmed the game, making it far less challenging? While it was a valid point, somehow complainers didn't think that even before a patch was released it was possible for a gamer to simply choose to ignore the chambers and reload the game every time he was killed. That's right. It's a game where you can must ''defy'' some of its rules to make it more challenging, realistic and interesting. Of course, you can choose to follow the given pattern instead. To ''obey'' the rules.
* Rapture is suspiciously similar to a [[{{Atlantis}}certain city that sank because of the hubris of its inhabitants,]] but what does Atlantis mean? [[spoiler: Island of Atlas.]]

* The most prominent figures who opposes the Objectivist ideas of Andrew Ryan and Rapture in both games? [[spoiler: Frank and Eleanor.]] Who share their given names with [[spoiler: FranklinDRoosevelt and his wife Eleanor, both who fought to introduce welfare to the United States. Something Ryan vehemently opposes.]]