I wasn't speaking to any one person, and it's my fault anyway - I should have labeled the thread and article as *non-spoiler* to begin with.Andrew Armstrong said:
BioShock Impressions
- Thread starter Russ Pitts
- Start date
Heh, cool_moe_dee, I'm far from thin-skinned. I survived law school in the People's Republic of Massachussetts. I have a skin of Rearden metal. 
I would be disappointed in the game if it turns out to be a simplistic bash on Objectivism because that would seem contrary to how the game was presented in its pre-release press. But if it's a thoughtful portrayal of the white, black, and grey of Objectivism, I can certainly appreciate that, and either way I'm not going to go into cerebral palsy over it.
I would be disappointed in the game if it turns out to be a simplistic bash on Objectivism because that would seem contrary to how the game was presented in its pre-release press. But if it's a thoughtful portrayal of the white, black, and grey of Objectivism, I can certainly appreciate that, and either way I'm not going to go into cerebral palsy over it.
Gehh...it kind of doesn't have much to do with Objectivism, except in the most cartoonish sense of the term. The aesthetic is very much in-line with Atlas Shrugged, but any moral that I've perceived so far has been that the idea in general was not-so-great. All the same, figured it would be a good idea to get a warning out somewhere. Depending on how deeply a person gets mired in the rhetoric, sometimes, you know, the deep-insider types (like a number of the ones that like to edit the Wikipedia articles on the topic) tend to get apoplectic. Good that you'll be able to tolerate it, though - it's entirely worth your time, whether it's philosophically agreeable or not.Archon said:Heh, cool_moe_dee, I'm far from thin-skinned. I survived law school in the People's Republic of Massachussetts. I have a skin of Rearden metal.
I would be disappointed in the game if it turns out to be a simplistic bash on Objectivism because that would seem contrary to how the game was presented in its pre-release press. But if it's a thoughtful portrayal of the white, black, and grey of Objectivism, I can certainly appreciate that, and either way I'm not going to go into cerebral palsy over it.
I think that the statement it makes with objectivism is along the lines of A) a crazed objectivist can do some amazing things, and B) no philosophy can make a society so resilient that it can survive the ability becoming ubiquitous to turn money into superpowers. (I assume this is not a spoiler since plasmids are basically the selling point of the game)
From what I've gone so far, it's a very mature treatment of the philosophy - certainly not a defense of it, but not an attack on it either. It merely uses objectivism as the philosophical backdrop for the player's lovely romp through the dangerous underwater city full of violent psychopaths. I imagine that roughly the same events would be occurring had some other philosophy been used (leaving aside that for Rapture to be constructed basically requires someone to idolize Ayn Rand), though it wouldn't have given us all the art deco and delightful advertising.
From what I've gone so far, it's a very mature treatment of the philosophy - certainly not a defense of it, but not an attack on it either. It merely uses objectivism as the philosophical backdrop for the player's lovely romp through the dangerous underwater city full of violent psychopaths. I imagine that roughly the same events would be occurring had some other philosophy been used (leaving aside that for Rapture to be constructed basically requires someone to idolize Ayn Rand), though it wouldn't have given us all the art deco and delightful advertising.
