Long time no post! No clue if anyone reads these, but I thought I'd leave something... not sure why I bother, but still!

Not much to say other than I got royally fucked this semester. And by royally fucked, I mean I'm not in college at the moment. Woot! I signed up for classes, but I also forgot about how I would pay for said classes. Awesome, huh? Summer semester, here I come!

I've been job hunting, but haven't gotten any calls. I'm going to fill out a few apps tomorrow and pick up a few more. With any luck, I'll find something.

Still single. Still wish that wasn't the case. Still feel like I'm too awkward around people to even be in a relationship. Doesn't help that there was someone who was interested, we hung out, and then... nothing. I admit that I wasn't at all interested, but I was going to give it a shot. Meh. I suppose I still feel super pissed because of that certain situation, which won't likely disappear until I really do fall for someone else.

On top of that, I've been even more anti-social, as of late! Well, not really, but mostly stuck at home. Which is why I'm getting a car ASAP. ASAP I tell you!

I have absolutely no real way to end this. So in place of that, I will talk about BioShock, then this blog will end abruptly.

So, BioShock. Where do I begin? Perhaps I should talk about the best part of this game: It's atmosphere. I shit you not, this game does so much to immerse the player, it is ridiculous. 2k Australia and 2k Boston did an incredible job creating every room, every building. You begin the game with a plane crash which, by coincidence, falls in the middle of the ocean directly in front of a lighthouse. The first thing you notice is the depth of the sea as Jack swims to the surface, flames sprouting up all around him. The second, or perhaps the first, thing you will notice is the gorgeous water. The water, quite literally, is a its' own character in BioShock. Whether you're playing the opening scene where you swim to the lighthouse for safety, or you're traversing one of the halls of rapture, hiding in the shadows to avoid the gang of Splicers raiding a dead body at the end.

Back to the opening scene. After getting a sense of your surroundings, you notice the lighthouse just past the sinking tail-end of the plane. You come upon some steps, which mysteriously come up from the water (allowing you to walk straight from the ocean to the front doors). You can immediately tell that this is not an ordinary light house, since the first thing you see is the a gigantic bust of Andrew Ryan holding a banner that reads, "No gods or kings. Only man." This quote is likely something pulled from one of Ayn Rand's philosophical teachings, which Ken Levine (who served as the creative director at 2k Boston) worked into the plot with fantastic results.

When you enter the lighthouse, the doors close behind you, and the lights flick on one by one. The stairways ahead lead you to a pod, which you must enter to proceed with the game. As you descend (which the game lets you know by having the number of fathoms painted onto the wall of structure), you're treated to an introductory film created by Ryan Industries to let the soon-to-be residents in on the ideals of Rapture.

I am Andrew Ryan, and I'm here to ask you a question. Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow? 'No!' says the man in Washington, 'It belongs to the poor.' 'No!' says the man in the Vatican, 'It belongs to God.' 'No!' says the man in Moscow, 'It belongs to everyone.' I rejected those answers; instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible. I chose... Rapture, a city where the artist would not fear the censor, where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality, Where the great would not be constrained by the small! And with the sweat of your brow, Rapture can become your city as well.

An ambitious claim, indeed. As the slide show ends, the screen is pulled up and the player can now view the outside again. You are now in Ratpure. A beautiful, fantastic city built at the bottom of the ocean. Everything is here. From neon-signs straight from the 50s, to a gigantic humpback whale that swims by your pod, and to finish it all of a Big Daddy moaning out for a Little Sister in one of the numerous connectors between buildings (for lack of a better name).

Finally, your trip ends and you're in Rapture (to those with a keen eye, you will notice the message "All Good Things/Of This Earth/Flow/Into The City"). The first thing you see is a scene being played out between a Spider Splicer and a Thuggish Splicer, both residents of the once great Rapture. To say the least, one of them ends up a dead. This scene is one that completely captures everything there is to love about the mood and atmosphere of BioShock. The lighting, the voice acting, everything. From the film-noir style of story telling, and the fact that the mesh of story and gameplay is absolutely wonderful, to the wonderfully demented characters you will run into as you progress through the game.

My message is simple: If you have ever played a video game in your life, you owe it to yourself to play BioShock. I didn't touch on gameplay, but I can assure you it is incredibly deep and as wonderful as the story. BioShock, summed up into one sentence, is the perfect balance of narrative and gameplay, combined with incredible atmosphere that makes this game worth a play through on that merit alone.

Did I mention the fantastic, 50s inspired, licensed soundtrack the game has? It, too, was intelligently placed in phonographs throughout the game. I admit, though if I had one complaint, I would want more songs and I would want them to get louder during high-action parts of the game to add to the creepiness/awesomeness factor. Probably just me, though.