As the "spiritual successor" to System Shock 2, another game I've never tried, Bioshock was supposed to be creepy... nay, scary. Perhaps this is a failing of my own, but I've not found any game other than Resident Evil 2 to be "scary". Was it disconcerting at first to see Big Daddies crushing people to pulp as I watched safely from a separate underwater tube? Yes. It was intimidating. But the closest thing to which I can compare the ever-so-slight feelings of tremulousness I felt upon hearing the distant sub-bass moan of a Big Daddy is the feeling I got upon hearing the whispered chants of enemies in Heretic years and years ago. Bioshock is not scary.
And were there moral choices in the game, as I'd heard there would be? Kind of. They were all the same choice. Over and over. Save the Little Sister, or harvest her for Adam? You know what? Although I've saved every Little Sister I've happened across, the consideration for me is not so much whether it's wrong to kill a little girl, it's what game benefit comes from the different choices. Because to me, it's not a little girl - it's a collection of pixels designed by a game artist. And this is the crux of the problem and likely the reason why I don't get scared at games or movies - I can't get myself to feel that they're real.
The same holds true for movies. With one exception, the last movie I got scared at was Jaws, the first time I saw it as a kid. The movie exception is The Grudge, and I'm at a loss as to why the movie freaked me out as much as it did - what about it was different? I don't have an answer. It may have just been my state of mind on that particular night.
So what video game characters do I care about? Which to me feel real rather than a simple collection of pixels? Only one comes to mind off the top of my head. Alyx Vance. And those of you who've played Half-Life 2 Episode 1 will know what I mean when I refer to the CG acting just after the train accident. Seldom do I look at a game and see actual acting. But the faceposer artists and the voice actress in that whole game were amazing.
I agree, it wasn't really scary.
What I did like was the retro look and feel of Rapture as well as the story/character development. While the characters would be very two dimensional in a book or a movie, I felt there was almost too much development for a game. A few times I thought, "Sweet Jesus! Not ANOTHER tape!?!?"
I want to say more, but I know Greg and other people probably haven't finished yet.