Atlas (BioShock)
Atlas is a male video game character who features in BioShock.
Contents |
Biography
Origin
Frank Fontaine
Fontaine arrived in Rapture sometime in 1948 where he soon expanded his income by creating a smuggling ring to bring high demand, contraband items into Rapture. He soon expanded his income by creating a smuggling ring to bring high demand, contraband items into Rapture. Fontaine loved nothing more than the power of a good grift. He regularly disguised himself with various false identities to carry out crimes.
In a chance encounter on Fontaine's fishing dock in Port Neptune, Brigid Tenenbaum observed the result of a sea slug's venom upon an injured hand of a worker. That sea slug produced raw ADAM, a substance with near miraculous medicinal properties. Tenenbaum went to Fontaine with a proposal that he fund research on the slugs, and he quickly saw the business possibilities of the endeavor. Fontaine set up an ADAM business, Fontaine Futuristics, employing Tenenbaum and Yi Suchong to research and develop Plasmids and Gene Tonics. Tenenbaum informed Fontaine that they required little girls to mass produce ADAM. Fontaine created the Little Sister's Orphanage, a charity which was a front to get parents to willingly give up their children, who would then be turned into Little Sisters to generate ADAM. Taking inspiration from Sofia Lamb's appeal to the lower class, Fontaine created Fontaine's Home for the Poor, which provided for the destitute in Rapture's free market society. Fontaine used these charity angles to boost his public image in opposition to Ryan's, while at the same time using the unfortunates for medical research.
Andrew Ryan at first observed Fontaine's rise to power as proof of the opportunity for determined men to better themselves, exactly the purpose for which Rapture was built. Even when Fontaine's empire began to compete with his own, he merely admonished Fontaine's detractors, who complained of ADAM's side effects, to "offer a better product". When Ryan discovered the criminal arm of Fontaine's enterprises, he saw Fontaine's smuggling operations as a serious threat to Rapture, as such activity might reveal the city's location to surface dwellers. Ryan instructed Security Chief Sullivan to put an end to the smuggling ring, employing increasingly severe measures to prove the connection to Fontaine.
After Ryan nationalized Fontaine Futuristics, Atlas was among those that protested against him in front of citizens.
Facing growing pressure from Ryan, Fontaine engineered, as his back-up plan, an elaborate scheme to take control of Rapture. Secretly acquiring the unborn son of Ryan, he instructed Suchong to artificially age, brainwash, and train the child, creating an obedient assassin whom he sent to the surface as a sleeper agent.
Atlas
On September 12, 1958, Fontaine was apparently killed in a shootout with Ryan's men. His death was faked, allowing Fontaine to escape punishment for his crimes, and giving Ryan and Rapture false hope that their enemy was dead. Fontaine reemerged as Atlas claiming to be a fisherman, proletariat hero, and family man where his original voice now covered by a heavy Irish accent. Atlas characteristically charmed the masses pretending to be a humble freedom fighter, and by handing out supplies to the poor, telling the disillusioned what they wanted to hear. He channeled the growing discontent and disenfranchisement of the poorer citizens, setting the stage for the civil war, which would soon tear Rapture apart. Atlas rebuilt his army of Splicers and released mayhem and destruction upon Rapture, terrorizing the populace, disrupting Rapture's economy, and forcing Ryan into taking drastic measures. Even without Fontaine Futuristics, Fontaine still managed to produce much sought after Plasmids, some in his illegal production lab hidden behind Joe's Green Groceries in Siren Alley.
In the desperate arms race with the rebels' numerous Splicers, Ryan was forced to use more and more security measures, eventually restricting most public transportation in the city in an attempt to block movements of Atlas' followers. But even the increasingly oppressive policies Ryan resorted to were not enough to snuff out the rebellion and public order in the city continued to degenerate. In the end, Ryan used a plan left to him by the late Dr. Suchong: modifying Ryan Industries' Plasmid line to make Splicers vulnerable to mental suggestion through pheromones. With much of his Splicer army now neutralized, Atlas and his few remaining unspliced rebels went into hiding in the ruined city, unable to escape Rapture with the bathyspheres locked down since early in the war.
When a plane crash occurs near the Lighthouse above Rapture, one of Atlas' followers, Johnny, tries to reach a survivor of the accident, Jack, who had descended in a bathysphere. With Johnny killed by a female Splicer, and the bathysphere severely damaged, Atlas helps Jack via a shortwave radio and guides him through districts of Rapture. He wants Jack to help him rescue his wife Moira and infant son Patrick, who are trapped in the city. Atlas states that he had come to Rapture in search of a better life (like many among the working class), but now feels as if "God's punishing [him] for bringing her and Patrick to this place." Atlas came to act as a guide and ally to Jack in the unknown and alien city of Rapture. He explained to Jack the fallen utopia, ADAM, and the events that occurred after the 1958 New Year's Eve Riots. He would ask Jack to help him reach his family in a submarine hidden in the Smuggler's Hideout, a secret cave used by the smugglers before the Civil War and located below the foundation of Fontaine Fisheries in Neptune's Bounty. Atlas' plan was to escape the city once he was reunited with his family at the submarine.
Atlas guides Jack through Arcadia, where Ryan releases a toxin into the air that kills all of the trees. With the oxygen levels decreasing, the area is automatically put on lockdown. Jack meets professor Julie Langford, inventor of the Lazarus Vector, a sort of fertilizer that will restore the trees to health. Jack must find the components for the Vector and goes to Farmer's Market. He manages to end the lockdown and continues on to Fort Frolic, a recreation district. There Atlas' radio frequency is jammed by the eccentric artist Sander Cohen who controls the area. Cohen requires Jack to murder three of his former disciples before he will allow Jack to proceed, which he accomplishes. Jack then reaches Hephaestus, Rapture's source of power, and enters Rapture Central Control, Ryan's headquarters. With self-destruction of Rapture activated, Jack has a final confrontation with Ryan. Jack's true origin is revealed, as well as the fact that Atlas had been controlling Jack through mental conditioning ever since his arrival. Jack had been forced to obey every command Atlas gave, triggered by a single trivial phrase: "Would You Kindly". Ryan orders Jack to kill him to demonstrate Jack having no will of his own. With Ryan dead, Atlas orders Jack to use the city's genetic control key to stop Rapture's impending destruction and to transfer control to Atlas.
Once this had been completed, Atlas dropped his disguise and revealed his true identity which was that of Frank Fontaine. The notorious smuggler, mobster and businessman who had risen to power in Rapture's society and challenged Andrew Ryan's claim over the city had achieved his long awaited goal. Fontaine had admitted that just about everything he said as Atlas was a lie. Atlas was a name Fontaine adopted when he staged his own death in a shootout at Fontaine Fisheries in 1958 when Security Chief Sullivan's city security forces were closing in on him for smuggling. Referring to playing Atlas as his "longest con", where Fontaine had created his new persona as a working-class hero who could rally people against Ryan, use them to seize power, and eventually bring ADAM to the surface to become rich. Jack survived Fontaine's attempts to put an end to his life with the help of Brigid Tenenbaum and her saved Little Sisters and pursues the conman. Jack is freed from Fontaine's control by Lot 192, the antidote to his mental conditioning, found in Olympus Heights and Apollo Square. Fontaine retreats through the laboratories at Point Prometheus, past the Proving Grounds and to his final lair, where he injects himself with massive amounts of ADAM to defeat Jack. Jack fights Fontaine, who finally dies at the hands of a group of Little Sisters. After his death, several of his audio recordings came to be encountered by people. In one recording, Fontaine mused about Sofia Lamb's status in Rapture and her falling out with Andrew Ryan. In another recording, he reflected on his decision to adopt the guise of Atlas.
Burial at Sea
Ryan had Atlas and his men imprisoned in Fontaine's, sinking the area at the bottom of the ocean. At the department store, Atlas and his men come across an unconscious woman named Elizabeth and the Little Sister Sally, and decide to kill the woman and take the child. However, Elizabeth regains consciousness and makes a deal with Atlas, to return her Sally in exchange that she find a way to make their prison return to Rapture. Though initially skeptical, he agrees when she lies that she is Dr. Suchong's lab assistant, realizing that he could have her find the "Ace in the Hole". Agreeing to exchange, he lets Lonnie knock out Elizabeth as they deal with the splicers and Ryan's men trying to kill him.
Overview
Personality and attributes
After his seeming death, he came to re-emerge as the mysterious revolutionary figure known as Atlas.
Fontaine loved nothing more than the power of a good grift.
He did not consider himself to be a liberator as he believed such people did not exist. Instead, he thought that these people were capable of liberating themselves.
Andrew Ryan believed Fontaine to had been a menace to be convicted and hung. Over time though, he considered him to be the most dangerous type of hoodlum which was the kind with vision.
Powers and abilities
He regularly disguised himself with various false identities to carry out crimes which would otherwise fail.
At Rapture, he established one of the first ADAM businesses with this being Fontaine Futuristics that was responsible for the research and development of Plasmids and Gene Tonics.
Within Rapture, he had his followers gather a range of weapons which included Plasmids, and Gene Tonics to arm themselves.
Notes
- Atlas was created by Ken Levine and was voiced by actor Karl Hanover where he featured in the setting of the BioShock universe.
Appearances
- BioShock: (2007)
External Links
This article is a stub. You can help Multiversal Omnipedia by expanding it.
