and then it hits, time slows for an instant, and we rush downward in one thrilling moment. We know what’s coming, we can see it up ahead, part of us dreading it and the other part impatiently waiting. It’s that initial climb on the roller coaster. We loved Bioshock because it was tense-because we were vulnerable. Turn them off, though, and Bioshock’s combat falls in line with the game’s quieter, more powerful moments, that window of gameplay that didn't involve shooting splicers. Vita chambers flatten the roller coaster without vulnerability, the risk and reward that makes combat engaging is lost, but that’s not all. With them, there’s no risk or reward in Bioshock’s combat: just keep chipping away at your foes until they’re dead your victory is as inevitable as nightfall. Shoot someone in the face, die, respawn, and now you’ve got fewer enemies to deal with. But the vita chamber system robbed the player of vulnerability set up in the game’s more successful mechanics. Crafting ammunition types with unique strengths or weaknesses was always a delight. Setting up arenas before fighting a Big Daddy was cool, as was turning turrets and security bots to your side. It’s not like Bioshock was all bad ideas, of course. A flat roller coaster isn’t all that fun to ride, is it? At some point, it just becomes a really crappy train, and who wants to ride that? Without a proper balance between the two, the game becomes flat. In order to have fun, players need to experience both tension and triumph. Good gunplay is like a roller coaster-the more varied the experience, the better it is. Likewise, Bioshock’s plasmids weren’t as diverse or interesting as they could have been-many of them were merely the same element reskinned with slight, mostly meaningless differences.
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