Bioshock - Interview @ CVG

The Bioshock PR assault continues with another interview with lead designer Joe McDonagh, this time at CVG:

One of the most staggering elements of Bioshock is the city, Rapture itself...

McDonagh: Yeah. I remember one of the key moments for Ken and the creative team; the game went through lots of different stylistic iterations and started out very different from how it is now.

There was a key moment where we realised that when you put something in a dark, sinister environment, bizarrely and counter-intuitively it loses some of its power. Because if you're in a cellar, you're expecting it to be a little bit scary and immediately you've got your guard up.

What we found is, if you put something horrifying next to something beautiful, it's very powerful. There's something very unsettling about it. I remember one of the great inspirations was when one the creative team watched The Shining again, which I think is one of the scariest films I've ever seen.

There's the brilliant bit where Jack Nicholson goes down into the ballroom and he meets the ghost of this bartender, and there's all these ghost of people dancing. It's all art deco, this beautiful luminous green environment and it's absolutely terrifying, sinister and unsettling.