Comments on: Levine: “…opposed to multiple endings”

By: Pidesco

Pidesco — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 10:10:21 +0000

“Especially worthwhile is his final statement where he notes “If the sales success of BioShock means anything, it means that we can trust our audience a little more”. And Amen to that.”

I’d like to see how Bioshock would have done without the marketing millions behind it.

And, on a related note, I’d also like to see how System Shock 2 would have done if it had those marketing millions behind it.

By: JP

JP — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 15:45:56 +0000

Since 2001 most of us Americans know what Manichean means, even if some don’t know the word specifically.

[POLITICALLY TINGED FROWNY FACE!!]

By: Martin Coxall

Martin Coxall — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 14:00:40 +0000

I hope that by saying “we can trust our audience a little more” he means that there will be no more stupid copy protection that plague PC gamers.

Just because the developers trust you doesn’t mean the publishers won’t still treat you like idiots. Developers have a non-zero chance of not being fuckwits. This doesn’t apply to publishers.

By: Leth

Leth — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 12:13:15 +0000

I hope that by saying “we can trust our audience a little more” he means that there will be no more stupid copy protection that plague PC gamers. As of right now I am not buying any game from 2K games anymore. (not that it matters anyway)

By: Trystero

Trystero — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 12:12:49 +0000

Great use of the word ‘Manichean’. It got me through a lot of seminars at university. The last time i heard someone else use it was John Humphrys on Radio 4 quite a while ago. He put it to Tony Blair that he see “the world in Manichean terms” which utterly confounded Blair, who had to ask for the meaning of the word. :D

By: The_B

The_B — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 09:49:51 +0000

“Especially worthwhile is his final statement where he notes “If the sales success of BioShock means anything, it means that we can trust our audience a little more”. And Amen to that.”

How long before someone pipes up with something about the copy protection?

By: CrashT

CrashT — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 01:59:48 +0000

In more BioShock related fun, Chris Kline’s (Irrational Lead Programmer) IGDA Montreal Presentation on “Saying ‘Yes’ to the Player” is up on GoogleVideo: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4508664361400518462

Includes some video footage of original BioShock concepts.

By: Kieron Gillen

Kieron Gillen — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 01:02:06 +0000

It was in that faux-Rolling-Stone-esque interview in the back of (I think) Issue 11.

By: wiper

wiper — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 00:50:40 +0000

Really? I’d forgotten that. I was probably too busy looking at the pretty pictures.

And the wordosity I’m recalling (a word Firefox doesn’t like, shockingly) was years ago, and only occasional, so I’m going to blame you merrily anyway.

Tomorrow I get to play Bioshock for the first time. Yay!

By: Kieron Gillen

Kieron Gillen — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 00:33:18 +0000

Don’t blame me for Edge’s wordosity. I barely write for ‘em.

I got it from Alan Moore who has Ozymandius use it to describe Rorschach.

By: wiper

wiper — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 00:26:49 +0000

“the endings are a harsh Manichean dichotomy” – I’m beginning to think it was you who was responsible for the renaissance of obscure/defunct terms in Edge (Lilliputian, anyone?). I mean, who was the last person to talk about the Manicheans besides Saint Augustine?

In other news: Mr. Levine says he wanted you to “have a sense of your impact on the world through lots of little permutations rather than like a giant ending piece”, but he doesn’t directly say whether he means that he doesn’t think there should be a ‘giant ending piece’ at all, or whether it simply shouldn’t directly reflect your actions: does this mean that the game would normally have had a blank/ambiguous ending, a-la KOTOR II? Or that it would have had a single, ‘grand’ ending that was relatively amoral? Or something else entirely? Curious. I’d read the piece in full, but I’m worried that I’d spoil the game for myself – the binary endings currently disappoint me only in principle as I’ve still not played the game, so perhaps I’ll love them.