BioShock Mockumentary Separates Truth From Legend

[Karloff]

BioShock Mockumentary Separates Truth From Legend


Songbird, Songbird, see him fly, drop the children from the sky.

Irrational's eager to get its latest BioShock out there and, to give you a taste, it's been putting together a mock documentary to tease you with game world secrets, before the game's March debut. Just what is the Songbird, the latest Truth from Legend video asks, and what is its purpose?

It's a clever take on 1980's style docu-drama, complete with overblown 'I must be important, I'm speaking', host, Alistar Bloom. The first one in the series [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/121740-New-BioShock-Video-Fills-Infinites-History-Gaps] was more of an introduction, giving you a taste of what made Columbia the floating hellhole - or heaven - it is today. This episode focuses its attention squarely on the Songbird, and posits a difficult question: most rescue-the-princess tropes assume that rescuing said princess is a good idea, but what if it's not? That Songbird might have the right idea after all ...

BioShock: Infinite, the latest in the BioShock series, is due on March 26th, 2013, for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360.


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[Zhukov]

Does anyone else find these shorts awfully charming? They remind me of the old documentaries we had to watch in school, back in the dark days of video cassettes.

Also, calling it now, Elizabeth is Comstock's daughter.

 

[roushutsu]

Keep em coming! I am loving these videos!

 

[Ishal]

Does anyone else find these shorts awfully charming? They remind me of the old documentaries we had to watch in school, back in the dark days of video cassettes.

Also, calling it now, Elizabeth is Comstock's daughter.

Yeah, that has been heavily implied from some of the info found in rewind versions of the trailers. Also, comstock is the prophet... and it says she is the "seed" of the prophet.

What I wonder is why is she so important to Comstock. It says, "the seed of the prophet shall sit the throne, and drown in flame the mountains of man." I don't know about anyone else, but that actually kinda creeps me out.

 

[Zhukov]

Does anyone else find these shorts awfully charming? They remind me of the old documentaries we had to watch in school, back in the dark days of video cassettes.

Also, calling it now, Elizabeth is Comstock's daughter.

Yeah, that has been heavily implied from some of the info found in rewind versions of the trailers. Also, comstock is the prophet... and it says she is the "seed" of the prophet.

What I wonder is why is she so important to Comstock. It says, "the seed of the prophet shall sit the throne, and drown in flame the mountains of man." I don't know about anyone else, but that actually kinda creeps me out.

My first guess was that her magic power shenanigans were being harnessed to power, perhaps even to levitate the city. Take her out of her tower and shit starts hitting the fan in spectacular fashion.

That seems a bit simple though. Also, "drowning the mountains of man" suggests a more, err... proactive use for her.

Aaaactually... that line reminds me of the floods in the Bible. Y'know, Noah's Ark and all that.

...

Spoiler: Holy crap.

I've got it, I've got it! They're going to use Elizabeth to bring about a second flood. (Don't ask me how, we don't know exactly what she can do. It's magic. Shut up.) But Columbia will be safe because, well, that sucker can fly. And so the healthy, racially pure and appropriately godly will inherit the earth and shit.

So yeah, calling that now as well.

So when you all finish the game and see how right I was in my genius deductions, you'll be all, "Man that one forum guy was so very correct and also intelligent and handsome."

Unless of course I'm completely wrong, in which case you will have completely forgotten about this discrete and humble little forum post.

 

[Lazy]

Unless of course I'm completely wrong, in which case you will have completely forgotten about this discrete and humble little forum post.

Don't count on it. I fully intend to rub it in your face in as infuriatingly smug and self satisfied a manner as possible.

 

[Ishal]

Does anyone else find these shorts awfully charming? They remind me of the old documentaries we had to watch in school, back in the dark days of video cassettes.

Also, calling it now, Elizabeth is Comstock's daughter.

Yeah, that has been heavily implied from some of the info found in rewind versions of the trailers. Also, comstock is the prophet... and it says she is the "seed" of the prophet.

What I wonder is why is she so important to Comstock. It says, "the seed of the prophet shall sit the throne, and drown in flame the mountains of man." I don't know about anyone else, but that actually kinda creeps me out.

My first guess was that her magic power shenanigans were being harnessed to power, perhaps even to levitate the city. Take her out of her tower and shit starts hitting the fan in spectacular fashion.

That seems a bit simple though. Also, "drowning the mountains of man" suggests a more, err... proactive use for her.

Aaaactually... that line reminds me of the floods in the Bible. Y'know, Noah's Ark and all that.

...

Spoiler: Holy crap.

I've got it, I've got it! They're going to use Elizabeth to bring about a second flood. (Don't ask me how, we don't know exactly what she can do. It's magic. Shut up.) But Columbia will be safe because, well, that sucker can fly. And so the healthy, racially pure and appropriately godly will inherit the earth and shit.

So yeah, calling that now as well.

So when you all finish the game and see how right I was in my genius deductions, you'll be all, "Man that one forum guy was so very correct and also intelligent and handsome."

Unless of course I'm completely wrong, in which case you will have completely forgotten about this discrete and humble little forum post.

That actually might not be far from the truth. I like the idea that they used her to actually get the city into the sky, but now that is floating they might not need her as much. Or that is to say, she doesn't need to be "plugged in" 24/7

Needless to say, she is important. According to Ken Levine both the founders (comstock's guys) and the Vox Populi are after her, and so are the people who hired Booker to go rescue her. I think you are right about possibly cleansing all the people who Comstock considers to be inferior. But Elizabeth's powers seem to have more to do with time travel.

I'm thinking it will go something like this...

Comstock uses her power to send either himself, or more likely, the entire city of Columbia back in time to founding of America and basically use Columbia (since its a floating battleship) to conquer the world and rewrite history since Comstock considers himself a true American.

Also this... kind of a spoiler? I guess? it was in one of the trailers..

Spoiler

Comstock's wife dies sometime before the events of the game, so that could play into it as well. Either directly or just being the catalyst that sends Comstock further off the deep end stricken with grief. Maybe she died giving birth to Elizabeth. We'll just have to wait and find out

 

[Monshroud]

I love these videos! Being a huge Bioshock fan and seeing how Elizabeth has the ability to open portals to what appear to be the future, I am hoping there is a little nod to Mr. Ryan's underwater city somewhere in the game. She opens a portal and we see a Big Daddy or even part of Rapture.

 

[kael013]

Yeah, that has been heavily implied from some of the info found in rewind versions of the trailers. Also, comstock is the prophet... and it says she is the "seed" of the prophet.

What I wonder is why is she so important to Comstock. It says, "the seed of the prophet shall sit the throne, and drown in flame the mountains of man." I don't know about anyone else, but that actually kinda creeps me out.

My first guess was that her magic power shenanigans were being harnessed to power, perhaps even to levitate the city. Take her out of her tower and shit starts hitting the fan in spectacular fashion.

That seems a bit simple though. Also, "drowning the mountains of man" suggests a more, err... proactive use for her.

Aaaactually... that line reminds me of the floods in the Bible. Y'know, Noah's Ark and all that.

I've got it, I've got it! They're going to use Elizabeth to bring about a second flood. (Don't ask me how, we don't know exactly what she can do. It's magic. Shut up.) But Columbia will be safe because, well, that sucker can fly. And so the healthy, racially pure and appropriately godly will inherit the earth and shit.

Unless of course I'm completely wrong, in which case you will have completely forgotten about this discrete and humble little forum post.

"The seed of the prophet shall sit the throne and drown IN FLAME the mountains of man." If there's anything I've learned in all my years of trying to figure out prophecy twists in fantasy novels it's that you need to pay attention to every. last. word. Also a dev (can't remember right now who it was) described Columbia as "a Death Star without an Empire". So this is my interpretation: Elizabeth is Comstock's daughter (the seed of the prophet) and the reason she is so carefully guarded is because Columbia has a superweapon (it used weaponry -weaponry that's never specified- to fire on Chinese during the Boxing Rebellion) that requires her abilities to use effectively (she was born before Columbia was built so the Boxing incident could have been an early test run). The plan was to brainwash her to the Founder's viewpoint then put her in the command chair of the superweapon (sit the throne) so she could use the superweapon on the rest of mankind (drown in flame the mountains of man). After that I think you're completely right.

Of course, that seems too straightforward - hardly any twists. On the other hand, people have become accustomed to prophecy twists so writers have been making prophecies straightforward... Argh! I'll stop and just wait until I've got the game to figure it out.

OT: I'm loving these vids, the style is just so comforting and charming. I don't like that they're have possible spoilers though (This vid pretty much outright says Songbird survives). Of course there may be multiple endings - I just haven't seen that announcement.

 

[jamesbrown]

OT: I'm loving these vids, the style is just so comforting and charming. I don't like that they're have possible spoilers though (This vid pretty much outright says Songbird survives). Of course there may be multiple endings - I just haven't seen that announcement.

Watch it in 240p for the full experience!

 

[maninahat]

Many questions remain, as we continue to separate truth from legend.
Here on the History channel.

Does anyone else find these shorts awfully charming? They remind me of the old documentaries we had to watch in school, back in the dark days of video cassettes.

Also, calling it now, Elizabeth is Comstock's daughter.

http://i970.photobucket.com/albums/ae185/Caihn/MassEffect2%20Screenshots%20HQ/Miranda%20Lawson/Love%20Scene/Miranda_love_36.jpg
I see what you did there Bioshock!

My God, she looks like Shrek in drag!

It's only just occurred to me how similar this story is to Bioshock 2's. For instance, the girl possesses some kind of unique super power, so she is worshipped to the point of being deified, and being saved up for some kind of puritanical master plot (by her parent?).