Answer: 19th Century Diving Suits

The 2007 smash hit video game BioShock is set deep under the sea in the Utopian-turned-dystopian city of Rapture. The city was founded (in the game’s time line) in the 1940s and, as you can imagine, there are two influential design elements present in the construction of the city and in the design of the creatures you meet therein—Art Deco building design and aquatic themes.

Among the most prominent (and certainly the most memorable) aquatic themes you’ll run into is the design of the game’s frightening “Big Daddy” characters. These enormous and dangerous creatures are garbed in huge diving suits wrapped in protective metal bumpers and furnished with thick glass peepholes.

The design of these angry and heavily armored behemoths is strongly based on some of the earliest diving suits created by late 19th century inventors and explorers. In fact, the design of the “Big Daddy” armored diving suit so closely resembles the 1882 “Atmospheric Diving Suit” (ADS) created by the Carmagnolle brothers in Marseilles, France, that we could very easily call the ADS the “Grand Daddy”, if you will, of the BioShock characters’ design.