Developer: Irrational Games
Publisher: 2K Games
Genre: Shooter
Release Date: 08/21/2007
Console: Xbox 360

I suppose it’s time to talk about BioShock, the FPS (First Person Shooter) just released on the PC & Xbox 360.

The gameplay is the best I’ve had in an FPS. Ever. The story is engrossing, the challenges many and varied, and the choices meaningful in how they affect the story’s outcome.

But there are those who wish to pee on parades. The Patriot Ledger would have us believe that there should be/is moral outrage about the ethical decision the player must make when encountering Little Sisters after destroying their inhuman Big Daddy protectors.

You can save the child still hidden underneath the horrific exterior, the Adam pouring out of their mouths and eyes, releasing a delicate, polite little girl from a prison.

Or you can harvest the slug that sits in her gut, the bottom-dwelling creature discovered by Rapture’s scientists to be the source to converting humans into Adam, the power to rule the world.

When you first encounter one, the man who thus far has saved your life countless times tells you to take that slug, get that Adam, harvest the power you’ll need to make it out of Rapture alive, to save anyone still alive and unafflicted. The woman responsible for creating these child-like monstrosities yells down from above you, repentant, asking for forgiveness, to save the child still hidden.

This is a video game that gives you choices that shape the future of the game. I ask you, critics and psychologists who believe this game can create monsters out of children–how best are we to serve our own people? By locking objectionable material up in cabinets of secrecy & sin, or by allowing us to glimpse the darker sides of humanity, parts we all contain, to decide for ourselves if we can handle it?

I saved my game right before encountering this first Little Sister. And when I had her in my character’s hands, hearing the voice on the radio telling me to take the power so that I could save his family, I harvested that slug.

I felt so awful, I had to reload that saved game.