Stuff laying around in BS2 -- 7+years later

[watchman]

Ive been playing BS2 thru again and noticed that alot of the bodies left in situ along with the recordings were from events that took place back before BS1 times.


I understand that there was still the story to be told (now with Lambs part) but corpses laying for 7 years in a damp environment and having not been cleaned up (Lamb might be a psychologist but apparently has little medical knowlege/concern).


Recorders must've been designed with One Use Only or they wouldnt be lying around (again 7+ years later). Would have trhought they might need that parts at least to keep all those TVs we see working.


It will be interesting to see how they tell the story of Columbia in the new game (maybe Elizabeth will be most of the narration....)

[philosocaptcha]

This, in the end, was what completely broke my enjoyment of the second game.


To be immersed in a world, you have to believe in it. But anyone with the tiniest knowledge of oxidization and neuroscience can't possibly believe for a moment that BS2's timeline makes any sense. The suspension of disbelief is completely ruined by the fact that the city is still there at all.


It's not that Rapture itself is too unbelievable; rather, it's the idea that somehow, without ANY maintenance whatsoever and constant conflicts/explosions occurring inside it, that Rapture is even still standing after ten long years of violent destruction.


Then there's the Splicers. The nature of their villainy is simple: drugs, an atmosphere of rebellion, and paranoia drove them all violently insane. To the point that they needed to be controlled by pheromones to obey anyone (one plot hole that the original never quite resolved.) They're a great concept for an enemy, despite their mindless savagery.


But BS2 pushes the concept much too far. We're asked to believe that a huge number (I personally killed hundreds of Splicers in BS2) of homicidal, fanatical murderers are still alive. After a decade of having no leader, no new food, and unlike Jack no way of coming back from the dead.


It's just absurd, and wrecks the entire premise of 2 for me. I'm also frustrated that metal items, fresh food and water can be found virtually everywhere, despite the fact that seawater (which causes rust and breaks down most edible substances) is constantly leaking into every structure. None of that stuff would last 3 years without fresh new supplies coming in from somewhere.


And the recorders? A bunch of very strategically important information, left lying around literally everywhere? I know Splicers are supposed to be too deranged to think clearly, but Lamb seemed competent enough. No one that intelligent would leave the clues to her past and her family's weaknesses just littered around for everyone to listen to. Not to mention, audio tape decays over time. Doubly so in a humid environment. The concept of audio diaries in BS2 just ends up seeming silly.


I know it's "just a video game" and that the fantastical ideas are not science-accurate to begin with, but I just felt insulted when asked to believe that somehow all of this stuff was perfectly preserved, waiting for me to walk in as Delta and kill/consume everything in my path.


There are a couple of explanations for why the second game's glaring faults might make sense plot-wise, but they are never explored:


1) The Splicers are using the VitaChambers. Delta uses them, so why not the enemies? Unfortunately, this is never even touched on. In all the wealth of conveniently intact audio diaries, we never get a hint as to whether Splicers can access this incredibly powerful technology. It could have been a great explanation as to how Splicers are still around and keep swarming you despite being killed en masse, too. But even if that was the explanation, how are the VitaChambers themselves still surviving? They're clearly made of glass and some golden brass or copper, two substances that don't handle explosions well and don't age gracefully either. Splicers using VitaChambers could have been an excellent twist, even resulting in recurring Splicers holding personal grudges against the player for killing them. Wouldn't that have been more interesting than waves of generic circus freaks?


2) The Splicers are repaired by ADAM like the Little Sisters, explaining their ability to continue speaking and thinking and their seemingly endless numbers. This is also completely ignored by the plot despite the constant reminders of how powerful ADAM is and how much the player needs it to stay alive. And even if the ADAM is fixing them, wouldn't it still be breaking down their minds? If one year of ADAM use drove an entire city insane, how is anyone still sane enough to be religious after TEN years?


3) The continuity itself is not what it appears. Initially I hoped this was the case, given that the "decade" didn't seem to hold up, and Tenenbaum didn't appear to have aged a day. But later on it's hammered home that yes, ten years have somehow passed and yet Rapture is still somehow exactly the same, right down to the ADAM food chain and the vending machines still functioning (and still dispensing materials!) To have the player being lied to about the passage of time would have been small fry compared to the lies they'd been fed in the previous game.


4) The audio diaries left in obvious places could have been some kind of masterful plan or ploy by Lamb to lure Delta or string him along. But this too isn't even considered. The diaries are diverting, but they just don't make sense.


All in all, I'm saddened that the game couldn't even be bothered to explain any of this. Instead we get a previously unheard-of major villain, and the perfect boogeyman to explain swarm behavior: religion. Obviously I don't hold Irrational accountable for any of this, but all the same, it's just annoying.

[IGlegacy_Felonious]

@philosocaptcha ,


As far as maintenance is concerned - pretty sure its touched on that the Big Daddies were tasked with doing repairs on Rapture during the 7 years think even under Lamb's order if I'm correct.


One of two of your other points may have an explanation to them


I'm one of those players who doesn't need all the details explained, not saying it's bad you ,the watchmen, or anyone else does. Some members really want detailed explanations whether in Infinite how Columbia is flying around and how does it get supplies and so on. I'm in it for good story and characters and don't need everything to have a scientific explanation.


Something totally unbelievable and seen may bother me. Take the movie the Grey which just came out. These guys survive a plane crash and some crazy encounters with a pack of wolves chasing them. None of that bothered me but at one point Liam Neelson falls into a near river which he has to be near freezing point ( He's also been exposed to freezing cold weather for days at this point). He's in there for minutes and comes out - no fire or way to dry himself. He doesn't nor is there any sigh of hypothermia setting in which would have killed him so fast. That irked me a bit. Something like the Wizard of Oz a fantastic story in a fantastic world doesn't need explaining. I say Bioshock and Bioshock 2 falls somewhere in between the two in terms of how much explaining on the details needs to be said. That's my opinion on it anyway

[watchman]

Having the BS2 game take place only a short time (1/2 years) after the BS1 timeframe might have made things easier to explain/justify. Eleanor had to be older so thats why so many years were chosen, but we had already seen Jack's growth accelerated by the technologies available. The same could have been done to Eleanor by Lamb (who proved she wouldnt have any compunction about doing that to her 'daughter' to reach her goals). 1 or 2 years would have been long enough for the (actually few) changes we saw in Rapture.


The corpses left about in tableau matching the recordings made pre-BS1 still could not be justified even for that shorter timespan(unless there was something about adam that acted to preserve them).


I could see Lamb (and others with real knowhow) keeping things running sufficiently doing maintenance (who's to say how much of the city is left habitable outside of the parts we tromped thru). Lamb being a trained 'button pusher' might have supressed/channeled much of the insanity (as well as the Adam supply may have largely dried up by then).

The games era was modern enough that partially automated machinery could still produce some things and large caches of 'pre-civilwar' goods could keep a much reduced population going for a while. By that point most occupants may have been happy to just be handed a fish to eat as their 'dole' . Their walking about 'pretending' to act their 'old lives' would not be out of line with delusional insanity.


The fact is though, that most things presented as even hard 'sci-fi' have logical holes in them that you could fly a zeppelin through and it take monumental effort to make everything conform to the laws of physics.


BS2 largely rode most of the innovative ideas and game mechanism developed for BS1 (it saved alot on expenses not to have to come up with too many new things) and as usual its hard to make a sequel as 'epic' as the original (real or perceived) .


The cultish collectivist's false religion shown could have been played up more -- including alot more 'examples' made out of those who would not 'tow the line' of Lamb's regime

[banky00]

The only thing im peeved about is the audio diaries were Ryan and Lamb have a public debate or the two talk about each other because in Bioshock 1 their wasnt one sentence about Lambs existence.

[watchman]

banky00 said:The only thing im peeved about is the audio diaries were Ryan and Lamb have a public debate or the two talk about each other because in Bioshock 1 their wasnt one sentence about Lambs existence.

Lamb likely didnt even exist as an idea when BS1 was made, so not much reason to expect references to her when there was the whole BS1 plot to deal with already.


Later for BS2 they backstitched Lamb into the overall plot and had her interacting with Ryan and others. Its just a little weird to have these AccuVox things laying all about (and not just squirreled away in out of the way places). I suppose they may have been 'record once' and werent reuseable so people would at least leave them alone .

[StudiedApollo8]

philosocaptcha said:

1) The Splicers are using the VitaChambers. Delta uses them, so why not the enemies? Unfortunately, this is never even touched on. In all the wealth of conveniently intact audio diaries, we never get a hint as to whether Splicers can access this incredibly powerful technology. It could have been a great explanation as to how Splicers are still around and keep swarming you despite being killed en masse, too. But even if that was the explanation, how are the VitaChambers themselves still surviving? They're clearly made of glass and some golden brass or copper, two substances that don't handle explosions well and don't age gracefully either. Splicers using VitaChambers could have been an excellent twist, even resulting in recurring Splicers holding personal grudges against the player for killing them. Wouldn't that have been more interesting than waves of generic circus freaks?

It's explained in Bioshock 2 that Elanor Hacked a Vita Chamber and programed it to seak out his Genetic signal. It would make sence that Vita chambers use a type of AI the monitors the users vitals then sends signals to the Vita CHambers surrounding rapture to seak out the user in case of death. That's the only explination I can come up with. in Bioshock an audio diary explains that the Vita Chambers only seak out Ryan's genetic signature, so it would be impossible for splicers to use them.

philosocaptcha said:

2) The Splicers are repaired by ADAM like the Little Sisters, explaining their ability to continue speaking and thinking and their seemingly endless numbers. This is also completely ignored by the plot despite the constant reminders of how powerful ADAM is and how much the player needs it to stay alive. And even if the ADAM is fixing them, wouldn't it still be breaking down their minds? If one year of ADAM use drove an entire city insane, how is anyone still sane enough to be religious after TEN years?

it's explained in BIoshock that Adam doesn't exactly make you crazy. When you use Adam you have to keep pumping it in or else you genetically fall apart, this means stuff like mental illness and disfiguring happens. You need a steady stream of Adam in order to stay sane and normal or else your body breaks down hence why the splicers in Bioshock look like they're falling apart and are "insane" they need Adam in order to go back to who they were.

it's also explained that Lamb sent her new followers to counseling at Persephone after Ryan was killed in order to ween them off of Adam. I'm guessing that through sheer will power they were able to break free of the Adam's hold and try to keep their lives together after "treatment." Much like Elanor was "treated." That and Probably Lamb's religion helped them take back control as well as shock therapy that probably helped as well. But you notice there's a lot of dead splicers there already which means that without Adam a lot of them simply died.

[StudiedApollo8]

banky00 said:The only thing im peeved about is the audio diaries were Ryan and Lamb have a public debate or the two talk about each other because in Bioshock 1 their wasnt one sentence about Lambs existence.

In an audio diary Ryan gives us an explanation as to why Lamb isn't mentioned. the Audio diary is titled "Alone at last" And talks about how both Lamb and Fontaine are gone so now he can focus on his city with the assumption that Lamb will never be mentioned again and that Fontaine is dead.

Ryan said: This facility belongs to the city now -- to Ryan Industries... at least until the rioting subsides. While it is unfortunate that such measures had to be taken... I must admit, it is gratifying to see this building condemned. Fontaine is gone. Lamb is gone... or close enough. I am alone at last... alone with my city.

that's why we don't hear about Lamb in Bioshock.

[watchman]

" When you use Adam you have to keep pumping it in or else you genetically fall apart , "


From what I got out of the game is that the more Adam you use the worse you got ( the more scrambled your genes get - resulting in the disfigurement and tumors and mental instability ) . It also sounded like it wore off and you lost whatever special abilities you got, so had to use more over time to maintain the ability ( people were originally using it for work related activities and convience and to be ' hip ' ).


Whether they later made longer lasting versions ( like combat plasmids you dont have to get boosters for in the middle of battle ) that could change the whole mechanism ( as in using EVE to power it ) . We ran into endles numbers of Splicers in BS2 after the main ADAM manufacturing had long previously shutdow n , so it may be that the later ADAM plasmids were near permanent.


Bodies ( some many years old ) everywhere ?? Lamb just didnt giive a damn ...

[StudiedApollo8]

in a Tenenbaum audio diary in Bioshock titled "Adam Explained" Tenenbaum says:

Tenenbaum said: "Adam acts like a benign cancer, destroying native cells and replacing them with unstable stem versions. While this very instability is what gives it its amazing properties, it is also what causes the cosmetic and mental damage. You need more and more Adam just to keep back the tide. From a medical standpoint, this is catastrophic. From a business standpoint, well... Fontaine sees the possibilities."

so I assumed it was you need a steady stream of Adam in order to be normal again hence why splicers are bandaged up and look like pieces of their faces are falling off because they've been cut off from Adam and need it. The Adam is both helping and hurting them.

[watchman]

"this very instability is what gives it its amazing properties"


"You need more and more Adam just to keep back the tide."


Tides go in and out -- tide might be the 'properties' = 'abilities' and not the damage???

(what good would Steinmans ADAM based surgery be if it was only temporary - which would have quickly killed it as a viable business ?? and such aggressive side-effects would have killed off ADAM use almost immediately for just about anything else)


English wasnt Tenenbaums first language....


"keep back the tide" is an idiom usually for attempting something that will eventually fail


also the word 'benign' for cancers means something that doesnt progress (or only very slowly)

[iglegacy_tracepaper]

I just finished the book, and the walls and windows were not made of glass, but a special alloy they called Ryaninium. It was a specially developed product that could withstand incredible pressures and would not rust.

[watchman]

tracepaper said:I just finished the book, and the walls and windows were not made of glass, but a special alloy they called Ryaninium. It was a specially developed product that could withstand incredible pressures and would not rust.

Actually the windows would still be 'glass' to have the light properties (just not the usual silica glass) The 1960 Trieste expedition to 36000ft depth used a window of plexi-glass - 10 inches thick but not much more than a foot wide.


Depending on the depth of the place (I would put foundations at 800ft and going upto more than 200ft, that is with them being on the side of a submerged volcano in an ocean location that is more like 3000ft) the pressure can get immense at 600ft the water pressure is 280psi (some of those large windows in Neptune's Bounty 30x18 feet would have 10000 TONS of force pushing against them with nothing behind the 'glass' ( The inside is at surface pressure - 14psi)


The buildings could be mostly concrete (with rebar, and possibly of ryanium) and could stand upto the pressure as long as there were enough massive internal Compression struts to hold those flat walls apart.


The large flat windows (even ones 10 inches thick) are the main problem - with all their surface pressures having to be applied at the edges where they are fastened to the much thicker walls. The Shear forces at those points is multiplied to incredible values (and the massive tensile strengths of nanotubes/graphene and such become useless under those circumstances)


At alot of other locations the individual window panes are much smaller and even look curved (or are curved into barrel vaulting) which allows alot of the compression strength of the materials to come into play.


The engineering problem is that whatever the strong materials are they have to perform consistantly - and all-together (just one window breaks (or one corner of the window) that whole section floods) and for last years under thermal stress and various irregularities (have to be designed with ALOT more than the usual 300% overbuilding engineers used to build things with)


http://www.calctool.org/CALC/other/games/depth_press


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensile...ttle_materials


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shear_stress

[dynamic1]

philosocaptcha said:This, in the end, was what completely broke my enjoyment of the second game.

To be immersed in a world, you have to believe in it. But anyone with the tiniest knowledge of oxidization and neuroscience can't possibly believe for a moment that BS2's timeline makes any sense. The suspension of disbelief is completely ruined by the fact that the city is still there at all.

It's not that Rapture itself is too unbelievable; rather, it's the idea that somehow, without ANY maintenance whatsoever and constant conflicts/explosions occurring inside it, that Rapture is even still standing after ten long years of violent destruction.

Actually...it is believable, especially since BioShock 2: Minerva's Den actually addresses this specifically.


The Thinker is an automated central computer that is still running, continually analyzing the city and what is happening in it, and also performing maintenance throughout the city with various machines....and even then, it can't keep up, and the city is indeed falling apart on itself....just not as fast as a city that is completely left alone to rot, since, as I said, the Thinker still has machines performing different maintenance tasks throughout the city.


This isn't even taking into account some of the survivors or even splicers who have crafted out their own living areas in the city, which I'm sure they maintain in some fashion....especially given the visual evidence throughout the game.

[watchman]

dynamic1 said:

philosocaptcha said:This, in the end, was what completely broke my enjoyment of the second game.

To be immersed in a world, you have to believe in it. But anyone with the tiniest knowledge of oxidization and neuroscience can't possibly believe for a moment that BS2's timeline makes any sense. The suspension of disbelief is completely ruined by the fact that the city is still there at all. It's not that Rapture itself is too unbelievable; rather, it's the idea that somehow, without ANY maintenance whatsoever and constant conflicts/explosions occurring inside it, that Rapture is even still standing after ten long years of violent destruction.

Actually...it is believable, especially since BioShock 2: Minerva's Den actually addresses this specifically.

The Thinker is an automated central computer that is still running, continually analyzing the city and what is happening in it, and also performing maintenance throughout the city with various machines....and even then, it can't keep up, and the city is indeed falling apart on itself....just not as fast as a city that is completely left alone to rot, since, as I said, the Thinker still has machines performing different maintenance tasks throughout the city.

This isn't even taking into account some of the survivors or even splicers who have crafted out their own living areas in the city, which I'm sure they maintain in some fashion....especially given the visual evidence throughout the game.

The place was built fairly well (Ryan was expecting it to last at least for the rest of his life if not centuries and so it would be greatly over-engineered) and his 'self-sufficient' idea would have meant they should have been able to repair and expand it.


No doubt over time ( 46' to 58' is 12 years) they would have worked more of the bugs out of the systems to make them more jam proof and self regulating and while they still had connections to his 'surface' organizations they could bring in more materials/equipment and specialists and technology.


The Big Daddies (or rather Maintenance Daddies) probably would have been 'conditioned' to detect problems and correct them even without 'The Thinker' (or some part of its systems to coordinate). It would have been foolhardy to have the complete city dependant on one system to maintain its existance and 'the Thinker' would have only been only a redundant sstem (besides it wasnt there from the start and its unlikely it would have played in the original plans)


Also on our 'tours' we were largely led thru inhabitated parts of the city and really dont see the extent of whats still there or fell to ruin (though lights on in building you see out the windows at least means they are bot flooded out)


Not everyone was a splicer and those who used ADAM had a spectrum of how much it affected them (or how much they got to use when the supply got limited). So you would have people who would fix things and with Lamb as 'dictator' in her area it might be largely organized (after all they also had to feed all the 'Family' members and Splicers cant eat concrete). Lamb likely only controlled a section of the City and there probably were other large factions/enclaves who for their own survival would have kept things fixed up


It actually would be funny if the sections we went thru are the WORST sections --- the result of Lamb and her Collectivist insanity (inept and inefficient as such systems historicly are) being walled off and isolated by the rest of Rapture's survivors who might have stabilized once the flow of ADAM largely ceased (Heh - a scenario is possible that Ryan himself survived BS1 (fake death twist) and coordinated things once Fontaines disruptive influence was ended by Jack).

It might have been like Ryan to leave Lamb to 'drown in her own excrement' - to cut the cancer out from his World.

[tombi]

WHAT ABOUT DELTA??? How the Hell did delta's dead body survive for 10 years before Elenors little sister team reanimated him in the vitachamber. with no helmet on and and possibly a humid atmosphere, wouldn't Deltas body have decomposed??, it would probably take a a few months to a year but he was lying there for 10 years! The only explanation to this that i can think of is, Delta was reanimated very soon after his death, but then again that dosen't even seem possible as elenor wouldn't have even known how to do so

[watchman]

WHAT ABOUT DELTA??? How the Hell did delta's dead body survive for 10 years before Elenors little sister team reanimated him in the vitachamber. with no helmet on and and possibly a humid atmosphere, wouldn't Deltas body have decomposed??, it would probably take a a few months to a year but he was lying there for 10 years! The only explanation to this that i can think of is, Delta was reanimated very soon after his death, but then again that dosen't even seem possible as elenor wouldn't have even known how to do so

Supposedly they had his DNA pattern and used the VitaChambers (rewired) to completely rebuild him (t-cells can rebuild any tissue supposedly and with the lil sisters there would be alot of ADAM at least) thought that doesnt explain that the suit was there also (sees lil sisters dragging one there...) and the DNA doesnt contain your brain patterns that would be his memories and behaviors and personality and even reflexes.

The best sci-fi explanation would be that as a test subject there would be some recording of his brains n-grams (or whatever) that Eleanor was able to find and add to the reconstitution process (more hacking the vita-chamber --- too bad Ryan couldnt have used it to wipe the people who didnt 'fit in' memories and send them out of the city (and bring in better vetted people who could adapt.))