Tyranny of The Masterpiece

I love The Room(2003) a lot. The alien world presented in a late 90s city aesthetic, the way Johnny becomes alive in the screen, the daring sex scenes, the impeccable dialogue, the naturalistic scenes, how the dramatic music is juxtaposed with everything else, and all the other small details create a magnificent experience we will perhaps be able to see only in this movie. I usually can’t remember movie quotes, even after watching them several times, but the dialogue in this movie is very easy to remember despite how mundane the conversations often are. The combination of the great dialogue and bizzare visuals create many, many perfectly memorable scenes. Whether it’s the small talk in the flower shop, two guys throwing a ball at each other in a weak attempt to replicate how humans actually play sports, Johnny throwing the plastic bottle to the floor, the sex scenes which manage to erase all the sexual tension from the movie; all scenes bring their unique flavor while also building up to a unified tone. The acting undoubtedly play a huge part in this. When you pick apart scene by scene, most of the acting is — albeit filled with golden moments — nothing legendary on its own; but together they all contribute to the otherworldly, surreal feeling that’s present in every shot of the movie. Of course, Tommy himself dominates pretty much every scene he is in, creating all the memetic scenes we love. For me it’s more than “weird funny speaking”, it doesn’t really make me burst out laughing, but rather I am simply amazed at the character that comes alive in Johnny’s acting. It is a truly brilliant performance, had Johnny been “just himself” or tried to act more restrained it would not be the same way. The end result is as it is right now only because he really wanted to act as a nice person who got inexplicably betrayed by his lover. As video creator Hbomberguy puts it in his video (link), the movie is an honest representation of the way misogyny operates in how cis straight men view relationships. Had movie been more “competent” in certain ways, for example had it succeeded to connect people with Johnny as a unjustly wronged man, it would be actually a worse movie. It would speak to many guys who “can’t just understand women”, and criticisms of such a depiction would be regarded as cynical. I can pratcially hear people saying  “Are you saying men don’t get betrayed or what?” and feeling really smart about it. By being “worse”, it’s much more wholesome, bizzare, memorable experience that is also a honest examination of men-women relationships and much easier to dissect without someone feeling like being insulted. Dare I say, The Room is a “good” movie.

Multiple copy-pasted Johnny’s throwing the bottle at the roof scene

Now, someone (which I admit to exaggerate for the sake of argument) might say:

Great art is a product of great minds. And art is essentially a transmission of ideas and emotions from the creator towards the audience. A work of art consists of two things: Intent, the underlying concepts, themes, the premise etc, and the execution: the way creator transmits the intent. So, if the intent is great and it is communicated well, then the the work is good and creator is talented. If you happen to enjoy something in any other combination, then it’s just bad art you like, accidentally.

A more accurate model of art would be someone shouting poetry they wrote a while ago, but now does not fully remember to a stranger across a busting, crowded street. Perhaps the listener doesn’t know the language, perhaps they can’t even hear at all. Perhaps there is a music playing. Perhaps, there are two people having a heated argument. If the “poem” is to be alive as an artwork and not mere ink splattered on paper, the street itself and the condition of the listener are as important as what the poet wrote and how they are shouting it. A unintenional interpretation is never true accidents in the vein of forgetting to save your file or putting wrong laundry to the washing machine, people will always hear things in the ways you did not intend. On the process of the creation, far it be from the flawless plans, or — even worse — whimsical inspirations of great minds, decisions are often made on coincidences, the particular mood of creators, compromises on not only with resources at hand, but with team members and one’s very own conflicting opinions. After many hours of meticulous planning, careful execution, discussions and retakes; they all fail, as art is human, that’s what art makes so special [1]. They are not computer programs that are expected to give predictable output, where unexpected result is to be simply cast aside as error.
Speaking of computer programs, despite being built on them, in video games the mistakes of the machine themselves become genuine expressions. In Pokémon(1995-2018+) series, there are “X Items” which increase a certain stat of a ‘mon by certain amount during the battles. In Pokémon: Red/Green/Blue/Yellow(1995-1998) games, instead of raising the value, X accuracy simply removed the check for accuracy. This mistake did not result in an inferior game overall, many simply did not care enough for X items and for others, it was an opportunity for new strategies. Its existence brings a legitimate question about the place of move accuracy in the design: As the later installments brought more and more ways to deal with the accuracy, removing the accuracy check outright proved to be the most popular method. However, one can also make the argument that getting rid of accuracy too easily would take the risk from using poweful moves, remove the thrill that chance factor provides, and make certain mechanics like sleeping even more broken, so a balance is necessary. Perhaps then, the glitch isn’t necessarily inferior, but also neither reveals a fatal flaw; instead it creates a different and equally valuable experience. In video games, this phenomena happens all the time(link), even in works which aren’t (in)famous for its bugs, it’s not always easy to differentiate oversights from “intended features”, and it’s not rare to see glitches later being adopted as “true mechanics” by the developers.  In “Are video games art?” discourse people often brought examples of games which held as brilliant creations; but for me something like out-of-bounds glitch is precisely what makes video games so unique, complex, messy and human, like what art is at its core…
I can hear a certain objection:

If we have it your way, then we can’t differentiate between a picture made with effort and dye poured over paper or random outputs from a computer. You imply that skill or effort isn’t relevant.

Creators should not limit our personal relationship with art, but this doesn’t really imply we need to treat art like something which sprung the existence out of thin air. All works carry a part of their creator, accepting author as “dead” does not contradict this. Rather, it’s a natural conclusion of this thought, the meta context does not rule over my experience, but rather becomes subservient to it. Definitely, what makes The Room what it is now is deeply connected to who Johnny Viseau is and the fact that he wanted to make a drama movie. Enjoying the movie as an anonymous comedy flick is also perfectly fine, but to me, this context makes it all better. Best art truly comes from what’s deeply personal, and The Room is a “mistake” that was born from the depths of a man’s heart, and shaped with the honest effort of the cast. This separates it from creations which are “deliberately bad” or “random”, even as parodies, they sometimes succumb to feel cold. A good example are the games whose wacky glitches were the main appeal are funny, they often don’t have the charm and the lasting appeal of bugs in Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion(2006), as they are in a context where they transcend being mere accidents. Trainwrecks can be interesting to look at, but they eventually need to be cleaned up; artistic media is on the other hand is meaningful with its failures as much as its successes.
Bioshock Infinite(2013) is a game that I don’t have many positive feelings about. It is too fast and frantic, wastes its own setup for a less interesting conclusion, somewhat emotionally empty, overall vastly inferior to Bioshock 2(2010). Yet, Bioshock Infinite is certainly competent. The creators were excellent at tension escelation, creating an alive city, using visuals to struck the player in awe while indulging in relentless gore, the music, the character writing, the voice acting, the controls, the guns, the machines, the cinematography of cutscenes… and many more little things. And this isn’t merely a matter of opinion, they are just able to hit certain notes for a certain player base. There  isn’t too much magic to it, just hard work and experience. Popular things are popular because they are competent. However… doesn’t this refute me? If there is a reliable metric for art to create a range of feedback from a range of groups of audience, then what I am rambling about here? Then, there is a merit to this random quote[2] from Twitter:

“…. there is no GOOD fantasy literature. There is fantasy literature you LIKE, and that’s great, I’m not saying that’s wrong…”

In similar vein, maybe I am just wrong about Bioshock Infinite? Maybe people are wrong about liking trash? Maybe endless debates between music genres are meaningful? I might just have the wrong mood or mindset, or my tastes might not be trained enough to appreciate good art? I mean, classics are classics for good reason, after all…
No.
First of all, “skill” cannot be isolated from the context which art resides. From today’s perspective, Half-Life(1997)’s complete rejection of cutscenes, at times excessive dedication to leave the player on their own, tight first-person platform sequences feels outlandish. Especially US military not only being depicted as an antagonist but doing so in a manner that’s eerily accurate to its real life behavior seems downright absurd for a big budget game of today, but yet it was the state-of-the-art PC game of its year. In 1997, it was the next stage for FPS games and 3D engines. If the same exact game has been released in 2007; it would be seen as outdated, unprofessional, lacking of content, perhaps controversial for its portrayal. In 2017, it would be seen as an avant garde indie project, a call back to the past, and most likely too “sjw” for some. In all cases, audience are certainly different, but developers have exact skill for level design, 3D modeling, sound design and writing, and for the sake of argument, same mindset. Even so, a “Half Life” of 1997, 2007 and 2017 would still be not the same games. They have the same pixels but they point to different people, a different world, a different time, a different existence. The fact that even marginal differences in time, place, socioecological background, life experiences, beliefs, momentary mood, art viewing habits, the platform which art is being viewed by and other many minor hard to predict elements all not only influence how people judge the quality but also shape the very existence of art in society in the first place makes it very daunting — I would say, impossible — to find metrics for judge the whatever true goals art should exists for, unless we just decide — as people who try to define rules for art often do — the people who experience art is completely irrelevant to this discussion.
Even if we could find an objective — or inclusive enough — mission for art, it would mean nothing, because all it achieves is to make people enjoy art less. “This isn’t good but I really like it.”, “I just enjoy trash sometimes”, “I like this more but I just have a bad taste.”, “You may not like this, but it’s still very important.” are some of the phrases I commonly encounter. (Often in jest, but just as commonly with full sincerely). Adding (however subtle) social pressure to keep art from the person only scrubs all meaning from it. Instead of being transgressive, de-personalized art is a tool of conformity. Instead of being the voice of the silenced, it becomes a tool of propaganda for status-quo. Instead of personal catharsis, it exists as source of pre-approved thoughts and feelings. Before gaining the heart of the reader, de-personalized art aims for “higher”, more prestige, more numbers, more approval… Any kind of set standards stop improving art and instead art becomes a mere tool to reproduce these standards. Obviously, art cannot become truly de-personalized, so what I am talking is hypothetical; but the idea of what art means for mere individuals is a secondary concern was and is a quite a common opinion. Aristocrats, radical thinkers, many academics, the Church and stakeholders of  intellectual properties all love their standards, their values, their rules, their “refined taste”, they all contempt  “trivial”, “unambitious, “lazy”, “shallow”, “mediocre” art.
The words  “good” or “bad” are extremely loaded when it comes to media. If they were only easy shorthands for a group of personally chosen metrics, something like “I liked the bad movie” would be entirely fine. Unfortunately, there is definitely a collective crutch to our relationship with media, if we weren’t so obsessed to separate “great” art from others, then why there are so much content about praising extremely popular media and drag-down hated ones? The moment a person starts to be slightly conscious about media, they have a chance to bow to the tyranny of the masterpiece, where “I liked the movie because it had cool special FX” is no longer an acceptable take, now it must be “groundbreaking”, “classic”, “meaningful”, “important”. So, “bad art” now instead describes the opposite: “wretched”, “cheap”,” lazy”, “immoral”, but still “great” in the opposite the way. “Liking trash” is a powerful phrase because not only one makes it clear that they share the same values on which metrics make a work of art great, but it also saves oneself from the greatest curse of all: Mediocrity!
In most contexts, “mediocre” really seems to be worst insult for a work of art. “Forgettable”, “lackluster”, “not a masterpiece”, “flawed”, “average”, the opposite of “great”, art which is blamed to a serve no purpose other than itself. “Mediocre” art comes in two flavors: The first kind is “derivative” and “safe” one, it does not challenge the audience enough, often “done for cash”. The second is “failed experiments”, it challenges the audience too much, too “unfamiliar”, “interesting but unpolished”. Either way, they fail at being “great”. Here, it’s assumed that money is merely something keeps art from reaching it’s “true” purpose, but marketability, or simply getting a paycheck, is just another external goal, like spreading propaganda, honoring your commisoner sultan, playing an instrument to be cool and attractive or doimg calligraphy because that just what your family has always did. And a lot of popular “mediocre” media is excellent at being marketable, it takes serious skill to depict realistic issues while avoiding saying anything controversial about them, to use flashy parts to keep the audience from thinking too much about details, landing a edgy but still family-friendly and uncontroversial humor, coming up with witty quotes, memorable shots, cool merchandise-friendly designs while consistently maintaining a certain degree of fun. Sure, popularity isn’t an indicator of merit, it’s mostly an indicator of advertising power and luck, but the content still needs to be advertisable. In that way Marvel movies are skilled, competent, “objectively good” art; in the way a more flawed older superhero movie is not. Prioritizing standards over personal connection will not only encourage conformism among the audience, but creators as well. This is true for the designs of the beautiful mosques of certain periods, explicitly mission-oriented art movements and the commodification of art alike, the difference is that commodification clearly enforces conformity on an unprecendented scale and magnitude, as capitalism does. When it comes to this, people often want to have their cake and eat it too: “Oh, objective standards matter, but this popular trash doesn’t follow my standards!” No, your standards are also derived from how you feel about art,  if you enforce impersonal standards, then in the end your own personal standards will also get invalidated: Spiderman Into the Spider Verse(2018) is a movie a lot of people like a lot. I have never witnessed people talking so passionately about a superhero movie before, yet it was one of the less profitable Spiderman movies(for comparison: link1, link2). If the mission is to make the most money, there is an ironclad rule: “live action is better than the animation”, animation is doomed to the second kind of “mediocrity”, it is still too challenging for a lot of people. As with any area of life, class society will favor certain goals and thus will reward certain skills over others. Purposely engaging with art with the same logic only ends up validating mediocrity, ironically in the name of escaping it.

Still, there is a clear difference between true art and trash, a fine dinner and fast food, unique and generic, touching and fleeting. By through rigorous study of classics we can cultivate a good taste to seperate wheat from the chaff, truly great works still have a brilliance which puts them above all others, and this is identifiable in even if we are not able to give exact formula for the beauty.

Reducing art to certain metrics of competency does reduce its meaning in another way, because whatever human mind produces, nature does it better, as former also is a product of other. [3] A real tree is more detailed, more lively, more vivid than a drawing; and it’s something you can touch and smell. Real people are infinitely more complex than the best written characters, they have an existence outside of limited words in a paper. An action VR game has the comfort to be away from actual danger, but it can’t ever give the thrill one’s whole body feels on a rollercoster. The director who knows how to make their audience cry is an amateur compared to a doze of the right hormone. Should art be tasked to hold a candle to the shadows of societies when studying history, sociology, anthropology directly enlighten us much better? Are little nuggests of thought art provides can be a match for tomes of philosophy and political theory? If art is primarily a show of brilliance, then it is condemned to be a mere imitation of life.
But it isn’t. There is more to Bioshock Infinite than its goals and achievements. When I listed of the things the game had gotten right, there was a twist. You see, I actually enjoy the game quite a bit, just not particularly for any of the reasons why it’s “competent”.  Even though most of the game doesn’t sit right with me, it is still valuable as it is. It made me challenge and reevaluate my tastes, made me think about how games do stuff, when it game the chance to slow down and take a breath, it showed me how different it could be. Even though I’d prefer Bioshock 2 in a reductive one-to-one comparison, I am glad Bioshock Infinite is what it is. Works of art becomes what they are with its strong and weak points together, just like people who create them. Every piece of art carries the mark of a human:  An amqteur drawing of a tree, a game which routinely enter “worst 10 games of all time” lists, the music perfonmance in the shower, the most stereotypical wish-fulfillment fantasy fanfiction, a short film which solely exists to advertise knock-off cellphones… They all bring something with them. This means neither it is necessarily worth giving attention to just about anything nor all art is equally valuable. There is certainly something that makes certain art truly special above others: It’s the bonds we forge with them.
It is hard to figure out what makes art great because these bonds are undeniably personal. We can talk about traits, styles, genres people commonly enjoy and draw certain rules about art from them: “Study real people for characters”, “don’t let exposition break the pace”, “12 rules of animation”, “emergent gameplay” etc. However such rules can only describe some patterns of enjoyment, the process of forging bonds is truly where art becomes magic; personalized, hard to define, impossible to contain, creates a life on its own. This bond might be the homely feeling when turning page of a book, the film which helped you in the dark period of life, the song that witness your undying love, the show which made you learn to draw solely for making fan art of your favourite character, the game who practically taught you a foreign language. What’s the most important masterpiece one will never watch compared to the soap opera they are so passionate  that they can be distracted from their otherwise dull life? [4] The “cringe” fanfiction a teenager regularly posts might be more magical to them than “the classic” they are obligated to read and “appreciate.” No amount of professionalism and mastery alone can create such bonds, it is only born during the experience between person and the art, special for each person and that ‘person’ in the moment, for the creator and the audience alike. What’s the point of calling someone’s taste’s “bad”, if they are happy about enjoying something? Why a work of art being able to reach a person is a bad thing? Or, why disliking a popular thing has to be about being edgy? Why attempt to destroy the magic, especially when capitalism trying its best to do so?
Just like magic, the true bonds between us and art are impossible to be co-opted by the capitalism, so instead it replaced by a pale imitation. Just as how commericalized magic is depersonalized, formulaic and often expensive remains of what’s been destroyed long ago that enables us to buy crumbles of spirituality, art is being stripped away from the person to sell the crumbles of humanity back at them: Not only property-holders are self-declared arbiters of how we access the art, but also one’s entire relationship with it. The toxicity of fan communities, fandom rivalries, the state of media criticism are not bugs, they are features: A real gamer has the real gaming equipment and only plays real games with other real gamers. A consumer making a choice — often because they need to manage their money and time — means they hate everything they left behind. Art elitists say they want to further art, but how does exactly enforcing a true/false art dichotomy help literally anything when it is already done so quite effectively? Once again, why destroy the magic?
For me, the goal of art critique is not only examine our relationship with it but also enhance it in a way. Whether by finding new angles for appreciation, exploring our discomfort for a better understanding of ourselves or simply finding catharsis by finding our feelings in words, a great media analysis is able to strengthen our bonds or even creating new ones! This isn’t to say that negative analysis is bad — far from it, i have myself complained about fake positivity in the very last article, (link) — however there is a difference between being negative and destructive. A critique does not need to attack the very concept of liking something, as if personal enjoyment or dissatisfaction are harmful ideas that needs to be debunked, a art is a battle to win or lose and making a critique is an arena to prove one’s mettle. They don’t have to be “nuanced”, “fair” or “neutral” — I, myself, very much prefer criticism that comes from the heart — but they shouldn’t further the masterpiece/atrocity dichotomy. There is more to say about a work than being a 10/10 gifts of the gods or THE WORST THING EVER. A critique may contain many mistakes; it might be dishonest about the subject material, go into too much hyperbole, unable to support it’s points well and so on, but the worst thing it can do is make the audience leave with less emotions and thoughts instead of more, to contribute to render expressing sincere love and hate for something passe, and to succeed in breaking personal bonds between the person and art.
Now, it’s time to embrace my own biases: It’s quite hard for me to carry strong negative opinions about art. At worst, I find something mildly dull or unapproachable, but even then most art is at least conceptually interesting to me, even if it’s not just interesting enough to experience in full. This doesn’t mean I don’t empathize with cathartic hatred nor claim any sense of superiorty in my view, but it’s a feeling I rarely foster towards art. It’s very likely that this feeling is what makes me so averse to the any notion of standards, masterpieces and atrocities in arts. It follows from here that for me, “good art” is the one I enjoy to experience. My ode to the Room in the beginning isn’t an mere attempt to be a contrarian, it is able to connect to me so I don’t find any value in disregarding as a failure. If pre-assumed notions of quality is useless to explain my feelings, then I find them useless. However, even outside of my bias coming from being a complete nerd, my stance still has a merit, because I have truly never seen any application of de-personalization that did not end up in shaming people out of enjoying art or push them to conformity. Thus, I say that if you also feel a need to hierarchize your experiences, you should say “no” to the tyranny of the masterpiece.

Even so, you must still have some conception of art being plainly terrible. Clearly, certain works deserve condemnation, not praise.

No, I am very firm about the uselessness of objectivity in art, this should be clear. However, I do think we can have some objective standards for media. If we accept media as the instrument for art and should exist for the benefit of the audience and their creators then we can set such goals to media:

• First, we should be able to access and decipher the contents. A falsely printed comic,  a broken software and a story behind the paywall are all terrible. As discussed, media certainly can create new understandings for art but if there is no understanding, then we can safely call the media a failure.
• Second, it shouldn’t create patterns of harm: Causing seizures, triggered trauma due to untelegraphed inclusion of sensitive topics, setups for addiction, verifiable spread of misinformation or hate speech are examples of such. This extends to the creators too. No media is worth destroying their creators in the process.
• Third, media should not be a tool of validation for actively terrible people, even if their creation is just about cute puppies. The world has enough people who aren’t abusers or fascists that suspending their validation by the society won’t be the end of art.

It might seem there is a contradiction in my rhetoric, but if we hold art as something dynamically exists between the media and the person, it all makes sense. As an example, let’s compare a novel that presents reactionary ideas and Adolf Hitler’s paintings. One can read the former and can make a multitude of interpretations: The text might be in support of the reactionary ideas, deconstruct them, contain contradictory or unrelated themes, be worth experiencing due to it’s other qualities and so on. It’s usually not a good idea to morally judge its readers based on a single interpretation,relationship between art and the person is complex, but we can learn something about the readers based on their opinions, for example the way they frame the story’s depiction of abuse. Even so,  definitely there is a dynamic being we can hate, love, be critical or bored of, but it’s quite tough to call the book bad without a clear pattern of harm.
Hitler’s paintings are the opposite. For someone who has never heard of Hitler, they would be just unassuming normal drawings they might like and dislike; but for everyone else the paintings’ existence is completely overshadowed by their creator for good reason. There is no connection with what paintings are, they only exist as painted blocks of a Nazi, they are media without art. So, if someone expresses adoration for the paintings, it’s quite fair to be suspicious, did the truly get past the whole Adolf part so easily? As the answer is quite literally concerns our safety, even if someone was really giant art-lover, we can be sure about calling those paintings objectively bad media.
In the same vein, a lot of art we like exist within objectively bad media, this is a fact we are facing as more and more stories worker abuse and despicable creators come to light. Something that might be beloved in the past might be now empty. Without ‘the person’, there is no art, when connection is severed, the work of art as previously known is no more. Just as often however, people still embrace the art despite the media. Yes, we shouldn’t “let people enjoy” just about anything, and we should be conscious about our financial support, but the problems of the media is greater than individual creators. Most media is bad, because society which creates them is bad, but just as we can find good people in the bad society, we can find good art in bad media. This fact just adds another good reason against the tyranny of the masterpiece: No art is so bad that it is nothing but an artifact of the society, but also never so good that it can escape the society.
Then, what would a post-masterpiece society look like? It would certainly would be a post-capitalist one. People bringing the trash out from the depths their hearts with no care any rules or taboos, no worry of any approval, no desire of greatness. Imagine modding communities, art posting sites, blogs dedicated to extremely niche tastes but without limitation of the capital. Weird, plain, beautiful, ugly, inspiring, gross… Just their creation, unfiltered, probably unpolished, open to anyone interested. Or only for their in-group, or just themselves. Either way, all the chains between art and person is broken. A beautiful chaos of trash manifests after complete ruin of “artistic standards”, as there is no one to enforce them left. For now however, they still haunt us and will do so for quite a while. Until then, we can at least reject their authority with completely embracing our bonds with art. Please create and enjoy “so bad it’s good”, “cursed”, “fun trash”, “happy accident”, “problematic fave” art, don’t hesitate being contrarian, no more “guilty pleasures”, let all of your love be genuine!
This article is written thanks to my dearest Patrons and special thanks to: Acelin, Alexandra Morgan, Laura Watson, MasterofCubes, Makkovar, Otakundead and Spencer Gill.

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[1] I am not implying any kind of specialness of “humanity” here, if there were other species who are creative enough for art, art would also mirror them too.
[2] The quote includes a part about judging genres, that’s a whole another beast I won’t attempt to tackle here.
[3] Hopefully it is clear enough in the paragraph, but I don’t argue in favor a nature/human dichotomy. “Nature” itself is a heavily loaded word, here it just has a meaning of “systems in universe which humans observe, interact and are part of.”
[4] I am not setting up a false dichotomy of “genuine” vs “pretentious” art here. A person can be just as easily bonded to an arthouse movie or surrealist painting, it’s precisely the existence of such bonds render hierarchies of “artistic value” worthless.

Emotions over Epicness : Bioshock 2

(This essay contains spoilers about Bioshock games.)
Among Bioshock games, Bioshock 2 is often seen as weakest. Bioshock is loved for its strong atmosphere and philosophical depth while Bioshock Infinite is held as fast, daring and glamorous. It is said Bioshock 2 has been found weak on both fronts. But for me, it is the best in the series. I agree that, indeed it is not epic or grand-scale as the other games, and that's precisely what makes it so good, it's purely a journey of sadness, melancholy and happiness.
The game starts with an extremely impactful intro. (take a look, content warning for violence and suicide) You see a glimpse of the Rapture before total collapse. It's just a glimpse, but it is enough to see the moral rot that made it collapse, you see the inhabitants who got addicted to ADAM were just as monstrous before they got lost all of their sanity. Then, after a violent but a cathartic rescue , you watch from your eyes, as the only person you care, the only person who cares about you, the entire reason of your existence is being taken away from you, You don't know anything about this person besides him being a Big Daddy, but it is still so heartbreaking. Especially the part where the Big Daddy tries to resist the suicide order, a brief moment where he tries to assert what's left of his will is always chilling to watch. Then, 10 years later, you wake up again, with one thought in your mind: Reaching to your daughter...

(source)

You start the game by a clear sense of purpose, a simple goal which has emotional stakes for the player as well. But it's not just about saving a person you care about, it is an entire journey of asserting your humanity. You are Subject Delta, a Big Daddy whose personality and humanity is not completely crushed. Throughout your journey, you come up with a group of choices you have to make? Are you a beast who crushes everything in your path, can show mercy and compassion despite all the hostility and pain you have been suffered or are you something in between? You can determine what kind of person left in you after your brainwashing.
Of course, you are not only shaping your personality but also your daughter Elenaor's. The reveal that she has been learning from your actions and the many endings that come after that is quite poignant. The endings are complex and include actual gray areas, (not stuff I complain about) An interesting example here is Dr. Gilbert Alexander, who was responsible in creation of Big Daddies and tuned into a deranged aquatic monster from taking massive amounts of ADAM during an experiment. His lucid self wants you to put out of his misery but the monster wants to be alive? Which is more merciful here? The game does not give an answer as either way it won't prevent you to get the most merciful ending. Merely writing about Eleanor and the endings does not make them justice, they are so terrifying, bittersweet and heartwarming. The game is indeed a wild emotional rollercoaster.
Amidst this drama, the Rapture takes a back seat. While the side characters are great and the voice recordings you get are quite well-done, you don't get a delightful villain as Sandor Cohen. But, the second game wouldn't benefitted to have such a villain either, not as much the first game at least. Because Bioshock 1 was about the Rapture itself as much as or arguably more than Jack's story. In the second game, it has merely become a dungeon to save your daughter just the Rapture has got rotten with time and water, lost its importance and glamour more and more. In this way, Bioshock 2 is an excellent sequel to Bioshock 1, Rapture fades away both in-story and literally.
Speaking of villains brings us to Sofia Lamb. Much has been said about her: She is a cheap mirror of Andrew Ryan, her stance on collectivism is hypocritical, "collectivism" is itself an incoherent mess that doesn't stand for anything in real world, she is just a power-hungry cult leader.  I agree mostly too except for maybe first part, because she is excellent as a villain. It is good that she has an inconsistent ideology, that's not what's important. What's important is she is an abusive biological mother who gives up her humanity in delusions of godhood. Which is a brilliant contrast to Subject Delta, whose humanity is stolen and works through to gain it back through the real bonds he made with his daughter. Bioshock 2 isn't ideologically empty, the game's main point is Subject Delta is the real parent, parental bonds aren't a product of blood but developed by actual caring and love. This is a theme that hits so hard for so many people, it's such a shame that it gets lost in the expectations people had about the game.
Dad stories have become a thing in video games for last couple of years. While they can be engaging, I can't personally connect to them very easily. They are very masculine stories --that's not bad thing in itself --  but they are (mostly) by men, for men and about men. When I played Bioshock games in summer 2016, I had not discovered my transness yet, but I was holding similar feelings about gender deep inside and yet, I was instantly able to see myself as Subject Delta. Perhaps, this is because his erased personhood, or because you don't see his actual face. More than anything else though, the game gives the feelings of a very primal parenthood, where Subject Delta isn't the central figure, as you can only directly witness the emotions of the Little Sisters and Eleanor.
And what emotions indeed! Did I say Bioshock 2 is heartwarming yet? Because it very much it is! While it still has (in some places, a lot) creepiness to it, the game just feels cozier than Bioshock 1. Even Little Sisters are remodeled to look less uncanny (Perhaps you are seeing them so as a Big Daddy?) and their dialogue is pure cuteness - and just a tad creepy. Especially in the parts of the game where you see the world in the eyes of a Little Sister, while a lot of it feels sad and creepy in hindsight, the parts where you see the statues of yourself is not. You are really a hero for them, their only source of light in the dark and cruel world they live and by your actions they can see the surface and escape their horrible fate.

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Bioshock 2 is about small heroisms. It's not about getting surrounded by constant horror or experiencing the fall of utopias. It's a clearly game from System Shock heritage but does not feel like one  It is a game people expect epicness and greatness, but it puts the that in the background and gives a very personal story instead. But I feel what made Bioshock really Bioshock is having a scary and crushing environment contrasting the optimism of the story, I liked Bioshock in its human moments the best and Bioshock 2 just makes these moments central to the game. Theses games compliment each other very well.
Even two years later, the feelings Bioshock 2 gave me are still very much alive. Some "defend the Little Sister" sections could  be a little shorter, but other than that the game is a constant stream of... well, I said emotions a lot in this essay am I? Perhaps I like the game so much because I am just a saccharine person who gets emotional easily. Still Bioshock 1 and Bioshock 2 are definitely deserve to be played, especially when their remastered versions are out.
This article is written thanks to my dearest Patrons and special thanks to: Acelin, Alexandra Morgan, Laura Watson and Spencer Gill.