Bioshock

[Animala]

So, I picked up the Xbox 360 and Bioshock from a couple of coworkers. This thread will contained disconnected ramblings!

First! I'm a bit tired of the ragdoll physics model. Why? Because it's all too possible for corpses to wind up in odd places with a wrist constantly twitching or something similar.

This is mitigated somewhat by the fact that corpses can be telekinetically picked up and used as (formerly)human shield and projectiles.

I love the audio logs. I have just found one by an artist who is discussing the wild rabbit, and lamenting his inability to take the ears off.

Guy has a rabbit fixation. It's kind of creepy.

One of the things that's odd about the game is that I know very little about the identity of my character. Unlike in other games, this is not due to amnesia or anything of the sort. My character just doesn't talk. There was a very brief monologue during the intro and now...nothing.

The creepiness factor of the game is pretty high. I'm certainly enjoying it!

In conclusion, I have recently discovered how to shoot swarms of angry bees from my left hand. This is not an ability I have ever consciously desired, but now I can't imagine how I've lived without it!

[Jak Snide]

Cohen is an amazing man. :D As long as you're not one of those doubters. Then you'll regret being around him. :[

The identity thing will be touched on later. That's all I see.

Lastly: bees :D I love those things. And play about with cyclone trap, since that's also tonnes of fun.

[KingOfDoma]

The question arises: How are you treating the little girls?

[Animala]

The question arises: How are you treating the little girls?

Heartless murder. I'm evil in video games.

Also, this ensures replay value, because I'll have to go back and be nice to them.

I guess I should give cyclone trap a shot. I've enjoyed the target dummy power, though. It makes me want to consider buying some more combat slots and going wrench-happy. Once I get the enzyme samples to invent the thing that lets me get health back when I hit people over the head.


So, Cohen (the guy with the rabbit fixation, not the barbarian). Seems to like covering people in plaster or something. The statues creeped me out, of course, both because of "omigosh these were once people" and because of "so these are coming to life, right?"

My dear, sweet wife suggested I knock their heads off with the wrench to alleviate my concerns. Unfortunately, this was Not Allowed :(

There's nothing like turning around and suddenly finding a statue that wasn't there before...
...and then noticing that a bunch of statues that USED to be there have up and gone somewhere else...

And then there was The Big Room. Big room, water on the floor, dressmaker dummies scattered around.

My gamer sense tingled. Water on the floor means paralyzing people with LIGHTNINGANINGANING would be suicidal. Dressmaker dummies are clearly a distraction...

And there is nothing so dangerous to a gamer as a large, empty room.

The FIRST thing I did was telekinetically knock all the dressmaker dummies over before entering. I wanted the only upright humanoid thing in that room to be me.

This would prove to be a wise decision. I'll leave out what actually happened to maintain enjoyment of the Big Room for others!

So I've killed all of Cohen's enemies, and then killed Cohen himself because he might drop epics. (he didn't)

Now I'm on (supposedly) to Andrew Ryan! However, because this is Bioshock, I'm sure that I will reach his office and the ceiling will collapse and I'll have to go all the way around the back way, and collect three hamsters and a drunken zebra and use them to construct a mining laser to cut through the rocks which will trigger a security lockdown and I'll have to go to France to find a hacking expert and bribe him with several adorable kittens which I will have to get from the moon and then he'll betray me and I'll have to kill him and then

[Jak Snide]

You asshole. How could you kill him? D:

And I remember that room. Those three that snuck in after me got metal bolts to the face. Also, electric flesh, no longer need to worry about frying yourself. Well, not as much.

[Animala]

I haven't actually gotten any of those elemental upgrades. Mostly I shoot people with machine guns until they stop moving. Although sometimes I throw flaming corpses at them, which is a treat!

[Jak Snide]

Flaming corpses. Never tried that. Must correct that.

Also: if you've not fully upgrades your shotgun and crossbow then you're a fool. Though the recoil reducer on the tommy gun is excellent as well.

[Animala]

Actually, I don't really use either of those. My weapon of choice is currently the wrench! Wrench Lurker 2, Sport Boost 2, Frozen Field, Bloodlust, and whatever the one is that just straight up adds damage.

Worthy of note is that a splicer attacking a Target Dummy is considered to be "unaware" of you, leading to nearly single-attack kills on them. Hmm, I may need to toss in Wrench Lurker 1 to bring that up to a one hit kill.

Nitro Splicers get machine-gunned down when I'm lazy, and get their grenades thrown back at them when I'm feeling creative.

In fact, I have far too much ammo for everything, due to the fact that I am using things that take no ammo. Between Eve Link and Bloodlust, I don't really go through EVE hypos very often, and I make back my cash very quickly to keep stocked on medkits.

Dropping a target dummy next to splicers, regardless of type, will typically get them to stand there and attempt to melee it. Which works well against large groups of splicers, because you can clobber several at once.

Rosies give me some trouble, but the Bouncers are a cinch since I worked out my Master Plan: prox mines properly spaced along a straight line. Stand at the end of them, fire a warning shot.

Right into his head.

Bouncer charges, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, corpse flies past you at high speed.

He had it comin'.

[Animala]

Dear Diary,

Met Andrew Ryan today. He seemed like a pretty nice guy. I kindly played golf with him, since he asked so nicely. He didn't drop epics though :(

Now have to go kill Mister F. It's just killtacular down here.

Met an orphanage full of little girls suspiciously similar to the ones I've been <s>murdering</s> exorcising all this time. I'm sure there's no connection.

They talk about me like I'm some kind of monster. One of them said "He's mean, stay away from him!"

What a little snot. So I ate both her candy bars in front of her.

Score: Me: 2 Small Child: 0

Take that!

I've got to stop writing now, Mister F has used his dark sorcery to make my heart stop beating. I hope I get out of here soon. Until then, if anyone's looking for me, they better check under the sea.

Hugs and kisses,
...wait, what IS my name?

[Kelne]

On the topic of creepy statues:

Don't look away, don't turn your back, and whatever you do, don't blink.

[Jak Snide]

Last time I checked it was Jack. And trap bolts, mah boi! Better than proximity mines, and far more common.

Also: Chemical Thrower + Electric Gel = dead turrets, bots and anything in water. Excellent substitute for Electrobolt.

[Animala]

I didn't have any trouble staying stocked up on prox mines. (see previous notes about clubbing everything in the head)

Trap bolts are the obvious answer, I suppose, but I love watching the chain of explosions.

Incidentally, I ditched the frozen field after further review. The occasional freezing is a drawback when you're typically killing things in two hits. It stinks to freeze them with the first hit, and take that number to ~6 hits to kill, AND no loot. And you don't get Bloodlust health for hitting frozen people. Went with the lightning resistance for obvious reasons.

Why would I need dead turrets? Target dummy + turret research means I drop an illusion and then have a pet turret. Works very well, even against groups of turrets. Friendly turrets can be permitted to live or slain at my leisure, depending upon their position and relative chance of shooting me in the back.

It's particularly fun with turrets backed up by splicers. Everyone shoots at the dummy until it goes away, including friendly turrets. Then as soon as the illusion stops, the turrets go to town on the splicers.

[Jak Snide]

Didn't realise you could hack non-disabled turrets. Or do they just have to be not targetting you? Also, I don't see any talk of cyclone trap. That combined with Target Dummy and a proximity mine on the ceiling could lead to alot of ragdoll fun.

Also, Static Discharge is a pretty useful plasmid for a melee character, though it most certainly isn't friendly fire friendly. It'll piss big daddies off and zap the everloving crap out of any friendlies you've got with you.

PS: How useless is Security Beacon?

[Animala]

Didn't really use Security Bullseye. If it weren't taking up a spot of a plasmid that is more generally useful, I might have.

I tossed static discharge on there eventually, but it's not a big deal with target dummy. People usually aren't attacking me. :o Not in the endgame, anyway. It'll be more important as I go through my second run, where I'll try to optimize for it from the beginning.

Which will be important since I'll have half as much adam.

You can hack non-disabled turrets just like you can hack non-disabled cameras. As long as they're not focusing on YOU. Incidentally, this ALSO works with target dummy. Cameras will call bots in against the illusion, allowing you to run by unmolested.