Dystopian video games merit the same critical analysis as their literary and film counterparts; providing meaningful site in which questions about the future of technology play out against the logic of dystopian alternative histories. Irrational Games’ video game series Bioshock represent an important example of video games that have the potential to be thought-provoking and complicated texts. This essay will address the alternative histories that the Bioshock series presents, understanding these alternative histories through scholarly exploration and ?. Bioshock is an exceptional exemplification of a video game that simultaneously celebrates and investigates dystopian notions of technological progress and free will. Its complexity originates from its dynamic theme which is continually reinforced through ludic gameplay elements. Through a combination of quality gameplay and complex narrative content, Bioshock investigates alternative histories that transmediate prodecural strategies. Bioshock’s entire premise centers on the concept of Rapture, the lost underwater city. Rapture’s location, ideology, and history form the foundation upon which Bioshock builds …show more content…
The game also deviates from other first-person shooters dealing with questions of the posthuman on the level of setting. While many shooters negotiate the posthuman, they typically do so in scenarios of future worlds and struggles with alien races. Bioshock rather chooses to place the posthuman within an alternate history setting. These two deviations, especially in combination, open up the game for a very different reading of interactivity and agency in regard to the utopian imagination that is embedded in the posthuman discourse (Schmeink,
...he development of characters and their response to the events of the plot, Ridley Scott and the actors communicate the way relationship between humanity and nature has evolved (deteriorated) into the world of 2019 LA.
In conclusion, the technological advancements in the world of Gattaca to create a perfect society demonstrated the problems and flaws relating to fates ‘measured at birth’. It was obvious in order for an individual to thrive, it is their human will and spirit of character that are more important than their DNA. The film exhibits that no DNA structure could ever entirely determine a human being’s potential to begin with and that in allowing such action to take place only challenged the individuals’s control over their own life.
The author primarily appeals to the audience using logos. He brings statistics and data from research studies throughout the essay. He either provides background information on why the studies are misleading or just presents a fact. For instance, “According to a 2001 U.S. Surgeon General 's report, the strongest risk factors for school shootings centered on mental stability and the quality of home life, not media exposure” (Jenkins, “Reality Bytes: Eight Myths About Video Games Debunked”). He provides data like this through the essay. He is strongly trying to appeal to the audience’s sense of logic and
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline is a novel set in the year 2045 where almost everyone engages in a virtual reality called the OASIS. Cline’s novel published in 2011 can be compared to The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins and the Divergent trilogy by Veronica Roth. Collins’ first book was published in 2008 and Roth’s published in 2011. These three novels written and published during the same time period share many similar ideas and concerns of our culture. The appalling future society, the budding romance, the teenage protagonist are all found in novels like Cline’s. A Cultural Criticism of Ready Player One examines the similarities it shares with other dystopian novels of the twenty-first century and possibilities as to why the genre has been thriving.
Imagine for a moment, a world of death. For 200 years your family has been sealed away with a thousand other people, to protect you from the dangers outside. Now your father has disappeared, and it’s up to you to find him. After a harrowing escape from your subterranean home, you walk through a tunnel to the outside world, past dead bodies, stretched out in front of the door, as if to say “don’t leave us out here to die!” As you walk through the gate to the outside, and as your eyes slowly adjust to the sun you have never seen, a wasteland emerges before you. The world is devastated, destroyed and annihilated. Broken twisted hunks of metal lie next to a sign on the side of the mountain saying “scenic overlook” on your right, the broken remains of the interstate bridge stand as a monument to a destroyed culture. Petrified trees are all that remains of the local fauna. Off in the distance, all that remains is destruction. While you may think of this stunning visualization of a wonderful novel, this is actually one of the opening scenes from Todd Howard and Bethesda Game Studios’ “Fallout 3.”
The Hero’s Journey (Vogler 2007, p. 8) is a 12 stage narrative pattern refined by Christopher Vogler from Joseph Campbell’s book, The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Campbell 2008). This theory can be related to a multitude of different mediums which involve narrative. The pattern is generally easy to identify within a story, but can sometimes be harder to decipher as is the case with the narrative in Bioshock Infinite (Irrational Games, 2013) (Infinite), and for this reason, not all stages are mentioned. On a psychological and cultural level, Bioshock Infinite draws the player in, making them connect on a deep level with the main characters, involving them in the story and convincing them to continue playing.
1. a) The simile that I found was, “ An apprehensive night crawled slowly by like a wounded snake”. I choose this simile because it creates a type of suspense and makes the reader become engaged with the story. When a story is set in the dark it often has suspense, which tells the reader that something scary is about to happen. If this part was not included in the story then it would not tell us the pain Rainsford must have been in when this part of the story was happening. In this simile the part that says snake gives us goosebumps. Snakes are always scary. Snakes are vicious and venomous. They are especially scary in the dark. The simile gives us the setting and a picture in our mind of the story.
1.) The main protagonist of the first game was Aiden Pierce, who was about as flat and one dimensional as a character could get. Yeah, something terrible happened to him that motivated him to take down a group of hackers. Yeah the story was decent (depending on who you ask) but Aiden was such a dry character that it left so much to be desired. Now enter Marcus Halloway; Marcus takes everything about Aiden and turns it on its head. Marcus Halloway is a young man living in the San Francisco area who is wrongly profiled by the CtOS for a crime he didn’t commit. Due to the racial injustice and overall negative nature of the CtOS, Marcus uses his knowledge of computers and hacking for good, in the hopes that no one must go through the troubles that he did.
Whether they be first-person shooters like Call of Duty, sports games like Madden or Fifa, racing games like Forza or Mariokart, or even games and apps on your phones, there are quite a bit of gamers in here. According to the Entertainment Software Association, about 59% of American play some sort of video game, so gaming isn’t all that uncommon (Entertainment Software Association, 2014). As such, there must be some sort of effect on the audience of this growing form of entertainment.
Runge, Paul. “Video Games Represent the Most Powerful (and Potentially Dangerous) Era in Storytelling”. Huff Post Tech. 10/21/2013 31 January 2014
Mass Effect is a multi-award winning sci-fi action-adventure video game trilogy by development company Bioware. In many gaming circles Mass Effect is regarded as one of the best story driven games ever created. In “Why Mass Effect is the Most Important Science Fiction Universe of Our Generation”, Munkittrick makes the argument that due to the themes it forces upon players and its reflection upon humanity as a whole, it is the greatest piece of sci-fi of our generation. Munkittrick does a great job presenting his argument often citing how in Mass Effect humans are the perceived minority. Throughout the article he builds his credibility with the audience through using numerous specific references to sci-fi and gaming pop culture.
In the article “Why we need violent video games,” Gilsdorf draws attention to the fact that violent video games are not the reason for aggressive behavior amongst youths; rather he suggests that they are an outlet for people’s aggression (Gilsdorf, 2013). Ethan Gilsdorf started out in journalism as a Paris-based travel writer and he is the author of the travel memoir investigation Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks: An Epic Quest for Reality Among Role Players, Online Gamers, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms. He is known to be a writer, journalist and a critic (“About Ethan Gilsdorf”, n.d.). The author’s purpose in this article is to inform the readers that violent video games are not always related to the violence in reality. This is a timely argument as the article assesses the relation between violence and video games
3. “Video Games” by Chris Jozefowics. Published by Gareth Stevens Publishing 2010. Pleasantville, NY 10570-70000 USA. Produced by Editorials Directions Inc.
Mikula, Maja "Gender and Videogames: the political valency of Lara Croft." Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies 17.1 (2003): 79.
Many people believe that video games change people and mislead them to do bad things, such as drugs and alcohol, but it is the opposite. Gaming prevents people from such acts and actually helps to keep them away from the substances. Lots of people, mainly parents, believe that video games harm people so they try to keep their children away from them. In reality, video games make your life better. Video games can provide many benefits to your lifestyle as “numerous academic studies indicate that playing video games has many psychological and even physical benefits” (Guarini). Gaming helps stimulate the brain and advances your problem solving abilities. There are disadvantages to gaming, which is true, but the amount of benefits outweigh them by far.