{"id":1577817,"date":"2026-05-13T15:44:39","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T15:44:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/44DXUiNKkwAVcv8yMuow4S"},"modified":"2026-05-13T15:44:39","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T15:44:39","slug":"the-bioshock-series-has-some-of-gamings-best-intros-because-lead-dev-ken-levine-knows-if-you-have-a-mediocre-beginning-youre-done","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/the-bioshock-series-has-some-of-gamings-best-intros-because-lead-dev-ken-levine-knows-if-you-have-a-mediocre-beginning-youre-done\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bioshock series has some of gaming’s best intros because lead dev Ken Levine knows ‘if you have a mediocre beginning, you’re done’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say that the Bioshock<\/a> games have some of the best openers in the business\u2014descending down into Rapture for the first time while Andrew Ryan’s hypercapitalist croon asks you if a man is not entitled to the sweat of his brow? Chef’s kiss. <\/em>Molto bello. <\/p>\n

Even Infinite, which I have a less glowing impression of, still basically knocks it out of the park in its opening act. Veteran dev and visionary behind the Bioshock games Ken Levine, speaking with IGN<\/a>, says that’s very much all on purpose: “I knew it was important to capture the gamer right away\u2014and to really immerse them in that mystery and the WTF of it. <\/p>\n

“I know this from being a scriptwriter; if you don’t capture the person reading the script in the first five pages you’re screwed.” That’s not even because of short attention spans, mind\u2014it’s writing advice that I’ve heard for basically my entire life. “You can have a mediocre middle part, or mediocre ending\u2014if you have a mediocre beginning, you’re done.”<\/p>\n

Ideally, Levine adds, you shouldn’t have those things, but game development is an act of resource allocation first and foremost: “Sometimes you screw up. Like System Shock 2 had a pretty bad ending, but we had a very strong beginning.”<\/p>\n

When it comes to Bioshock, Levine explains that he “knew we had to capture people right away, and we spent a lot of time in the opening sequences of our games because everybody will see it. <\/p>\n

“You want to get people so excited up front that they’re gonna trust you and stick with you \u2026 We wanna make sure that\u2014those first few minutes with them? They feel like they’re getting way more back than they put in.”<\/p>\n

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