A Stitch in Haste

I've been asked by two separate readers now whether I saw the Wired story suggesting that a new shooter game for the Xbox 360, Bioshock, is inspired by Ayn Rand and Atlas Shrugged and whether I have played the game or intend to.

The answers are "yes," "no" and "yes," respectively.

This trailer does not strike me as particularly Randian:


But this review does:


The fictional creator of the Bioshock city ("Rapture") is named Andrew Ryan — a little anagrammatic fun there? The main character's helper, who guides him by radio, is named "Atlas."

But if the underwater "Galt's Gulch" was a failure (which it clearly was), then how pro-Rand can it be?

More:

He's a man of bottomless ambition who built a city under the sea, obsessed with the idea of what makes a man, what differentiates a man from a slave. He's the Randian hero, a man who holds his own creative vision above all else, and he's [Crime and Punishment's] Rodion Raskolnikov's exceptional person, someone who can be excused for committing crimes to achieve a noble goal, or at least with noble intentions — and he knows it. His vision, Rapture, is clearly a colossal failure. The driving force behind the game is your quest to discover why this man's alluring vision of an artistic utopia failed so completely and why you've stumbled upon it.

Sound's more like Krugmanesque socialized medicine than Galt's Gulch.

I will buy the game after my upcoming vacation, not out of any Randian obsession but simply because first-person shooters are the only Xbox game I ever play, and new releases are few and far between.

So I will report back once I figure out just how Randian this game really is.

Anyone who has already played the game, feel free to weigh in.