Me and Anand have descended from our treetop houses once again to bring you this week’s episode of the Not So Horrible podcast. The monkeys were particularly feisty this week, and the vines secreted some sort of strange goo all over my khakis. But luckily, the water taxi was on time, and we made it to the shortwave radio with only minor discomfort.

Note to self: bring back monkey repellent.

Having spent all our money on Khaki-specialty dry cleaning, we couldn’t afford paper this week. Thus, today’s episode is being brought to you with little to no planning whatsoever. This is probably for the better — the trees have taken root in our inkwells. Talking points include:

• The Super Bowl comes to town. We pretend we actually watch sports. Pigs everywhere worry for their skin for yet another year.
• We discuss Caprica, the new, hit teen drama! It’s like 90210 in space. But not quite. In fact, not at all. It’s a Battlestar Galactica spin off, you fools. With wallpaper I can’t stop looking at.
• I finished Mass Effect. In unrelated news, 2007 called — they want my computer back.
• Anand plays Oblivion all day and forgets to take out the trash again.
• Finally, we talk Project Tentacle Titan, Facebook’s rumoured webmail platform. With over 400 million users worldwide, this could be the platform that ensnares us all.

Listen here, or at the Not So Much News!

Length: 32:49
Close: M4 Part II – Faunts (Mass Effect OST)
Download: 31.5 MB
iTunes / RSS

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I’m convinced that, in the video gaming world, there’s some giant love affair for crowbars. It’s as if the sight of a rusting metal shaft is just the sort of thing that gets game producers all hot and bothered, to the point where the item is hastily coded into the game while the rest of the development team goes for a cold shower. Somewhere – and probably in Australia – this is actually true.

And so we arrive at Bioshock, a game that was released some two years ago, and that I am only getting to now. The latest in a long line of crowbar-porn titles, Bioshock sends you, as the protagonist, into the heart of an underwater empire, constructed by the mysterious Andrew Ryan. Why is he mysterious, you ask? All moustached men are.

But really, Bioshock is another one of those games that tries to illustrate a once-ideal society thrown into dystrophic decay. It’s not a communist society, nor a capitalist one, but some twisted, hypocritical invention of this elusive Ryan that you must piece together as you plumb the city’s depths.

Without spoiling the game all too much for those who’ve yet to play, your ultimate goal is to figure out what’s brought you to this undersea maze in the first place, a role which becomes increasingly obvious as the story progresses. It’s during the third act, upon which the true nature of your arrival is revealed, does Bioshock truly shine.

It’s also the point at which I had to move my firmly-dropped jaw back into place.

The problem is, while this is the main plot-point, it’s not the most interesting. Rapture has so much depth and promise, and yet it is ultimately squandered by the decision to make the game’s story secondary to its game play. While both the fate of the city and your own often intertwine, the clues and records that tell more of the city’s past are largely optional, and easily missed.

It’s one of those instances where forcing players to further immerse themselves in the game’s lore isn’t such a bad idea, as it makes the final reveal all the more stunning.

Instead, we get to fetch a lot of items, all because the voice on the short-wave radio told us to. Story be damned.