8 Great Games That Said F**k You To The Player

2. Bioshock

WYK Now basically the Citizen Kane of gaming f**k yous, Bioshock forced you to question your illusions of control within a game in one of the most celebrated twists in gaming history. Some of you may view it as just that €“ a clever twist, but make no mistake, it was a f**k you moment, raising you from a position of power as the gamer in control to merely a cog in the game€™s philosophical machine. Just to jog your memories, the game showed that you were little more than a slave to its mechanics by having Rapture founder Andrew Ryan reveal to you that you were bred for a specific purpose, and were now being manipulated by rebel leader Atlas €“ actually Ryan€™s rival Frank Fontaine in disguise €“ into doing his bidding through metal conditioning. Essentially, if he asked you anything with €˜would you kindly€™ in the sentence, you€™d do it. Ryan then manipulates that ability so he can go out as the master of his own fate, commanding you kill him with a golf club. What marks this out as such a deft f**k you moment was that it took away any illusions of power than you as the gamer might have had as the controller of Jack. Make no mistake, the majority of our motivation to play games comes from this feeling of empowerment, and having ran through the bowels of Rapture wielding explosive weaponry and the ability to shoot bees does a bang-up job in convincing us of our power. And yet in one carpet pull everything we thought we had is suddenly lost, and we€™re no better than a slave to the game. It effectively presents us with a middle finger, and rams it home further with a further masterstroke €“ it makes you put the genetic key into the Rapture mainframe after you discover the twist. Smartass gamers may have tried to somehow avoid putting it in, but the game screwed you over with its own mechanics, forcing you to do so nonetheless otherwise you couldn€™t continue the game. It was a true master-class of a game outsmarting a gamer, and that€™s why it belongs on this list.
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Durham University graduate and qualified sports journalist. Very good at sitting down and watching things. Can multi-task this with playing computer games. Football Manager addict who has taken Shrewsbury Town to the summit of the Premier League. You can follow me at @Ed_OwenUK, if you like ramblings about Newcastle United and A Place in the Sun. If you don't, I don't know what I can do for you.