Interactive Storytelling

I am currently enjoying a wonderful storytelling experience that is a great example of how current-generation computer and console games are stretching themselves.

Programmers are using the technology available to them to stretch the limits and involve the player in new and more wonderful adventures.

The game I am currently playing is Bioshock and it is a revolution in involving the player in a story they have control over. The game is set in 1960 and the plane you were traveling in has crashed somewhere in the Atlantic ocean. You escape the wreckage and enter the underwater city of Rapture.

Rapture was built in 1946 by industrialist Andrew Ryan who wanted artists and scientists to live in a city without government controls, were they would be free to create bigger and better things. But when the player arrives it is clear that something has gone drastically wrong and society in Rapture has collapsed on New Years Eve 1959.

The game is atmospheric with the city of Rapture created in a wonderful Art Deco style and the steady collapse of its society shown in the way the city is starting to crumble and fall into disrepair.

I have not finished the game yet but look forward to many hours of enjoyment in this wonderfully created world.