Home

 › 

Articles

 › 

The Beauty of Bioshock

The Beauty of Bioshock

One of my favorite things about Bioshock is the city of Rapture. It is one part terrifying, two parts utterly fascinating. Rapture and the atmosphere it provides is what makes Bioshock such an amazing game. Mood and atmosphere are about lighting, sound, and mise-en-scéne. For those that don’t already know, mise-en-scéne is a film term for everything you can see on the screen and its arrangement—composition, sets, props, actors, costumes, and lighting. Rapture, of course, has this in spades.

My first encounter with the game is what I live for in video games. It was also my first time playing a first person shooter, and to say I was jumping at my own shadow is an understatement. Going into the Bathysphere for the very first time was definitely terrifying, but I was soothed by the dulcet tones of Andrew Ryan’s voice. I’ll never forget his first speech, and the moment he almost whispers in reverence “Rapture”, like the city is a holy temple dedicated to the dream of anarchy, and the city itself rises into view. The city is beautiful at first, in the apparent harmony Ryan just described. Then your Bathysphere docks, and the horrific scene unfolds. It’s the beginning of the realization, that Rapture is not the paradise Ryan described at all.

Now that the scene is set, let’s talk about lighting in Rapture. Irrational Games used lighting in the best ways possible, always to maximize the shivering horror the player feels. In general, the lighting was dim, the same blue of the ocean. Any other light signalled various types of attacks, and was often used to trick the player into approaching a docile scene with too much caution. My favorite example of Irrational Games using lighting to the max is this scene. If you’ve played the game, it’s certainly one you’ll never forget. You’ve just come up the elevator, Atlas just told you about his family and your next destination, and you hear a woman singing to her child. In the game, you have two ways to go, right or left. To the left, a memorial to a dead man (possibly Ryan? I’ve never been sure) with very handy supplies. To the right, a superimposed shadow of a woman crouched over baby carriage.

The shadow is larger than the real thing, and before the player realizes it’s just a Splicer singing to a revolver, the scene is almost idyllic. It expresses the running theme of Rapture in the most eloquent way possible. The theme being the facade of a working ideal of laissez-faire over the obviously infected city. In the case of this scene, the ideal is a mother taking care of her child and the infected part is that she’s a Splicer who might very well be mourning the loss of a child, but in reality is singing to a revolver.

If that’s what clever lighting can do, imagine what role sound can play. There is no one better fitting to talk about for this example than Sander Cohen. The entire quest is punctuated by scenes of Cohen’s insanity and soft piano music. Otherwise, it is complete silence. Save for the sounds of Splicers dying, there is no background music whatsoever. What better way to ensure the player listens to even the tiniest details than to keep silence between each of them. Cohen, of course, operates precisely in the theme of pretty facade over deadly reality. The most revealing of this, is when Cohen is forcing Kyle Fitzpatrick to play the piano. While the piano is rigged with excessive explosives, Fitzpatrick plays and Cohen is never satisfied until the man gives up and dies. Again, despite the soft piano music, Cohen shouts and nearly screams in deranged madness. The contrast of the sounds echos the theme of Rapture and displays to the player quite clearly that sometimes, the artist should be restricted by the censor.

The Beauty of Bioshock

Lastly, mise-en-scéne is probably the most significant way Rapture is able to convey mood and atmosphere. For this, I’m going to use the scene the player approaches upon entering the Neptune’s Bounty area. Even without the context of the civil war between Fontaine and Ryan, it’s easy to understand what happened. The word ‘smuggler’ written above helps, but is also reminiscent of crucifixion. The criminal punished for his crimes and used as a message for others, held in a position so familiar to repentance. This repentance theme is made especially clear by the evidence of the crime at the body’s feet, right next to a suitcase full of bibles. This scene, just like the story of the game itself, allows the player to see the reality behind the facade of Rapture as less insane and far more rational. Here are no caring mothers or soft piano notes, but the plain facts of two ideologies clashing (one of righteousness, the other of greed). The fall of Rapture was inevitable, with or without Adam, with personalities like Fontaine and Ryan existing together inside an anarchic system.

Needless to say, the atmosphere and mood of Rapture reinforces just how amazing Bioshock is. The lighting is used in the best possible ways, especially to show the idyllic facade of Rapture over the actual infected reality. Sound, in the speech and music of Cohen, show again that facade, but more flimsy this time. And finally, mise-en-scéne removes the facade completely to reveal a reality less insane and more the rational result of Fontaine and Ryan clashing.

To top