Bioshock Infinite is literally, physically, driving me insane (MASSIVE SPOILERS)

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Piorn

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It's a nice ride, and I especially love the Songbird design, but other than that, there is really nothing there to remember. I think I forgot most of the game already.
The most striking thing about this game was the exclusion of a dual morality. It surprised me there was actually none, despite being implied everywhere.
And the plasmids make literally no sense. Neither from a narrative perspective, nor in the setting. In Bioshock 1 they were justified by the setting, enabled the most extreme form of Andrew Ryan's Individualistic Philosophy, and were the cause for Rapture's downfall. In Infinite, they're just there because Bioshock.
 

zombiejoe

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I will give Bioshock Infinite some credit. It was a fun ride while it lasted, and got me to appreciate Bioshock 1 and 2 even more.
And yes, I will argue that Bioshock 2 is a good game, which gets its themes across better than Bioshock Infinite.
 

Dijarida

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I got into this thread really hoping to see some non-duality commentary. Usually the Escapist offers up commentary that differs from either "This game is better than sex" or "This game is worse than being hit by the dead baby thrown through the window of your church". This thread however is full of duality. As a story told from a single perspective, infinite does an excellent job of taking us through new settings and making us think about the implications of our actions. HOWEVER, praising this as the best game evar isn't valid, it well and truly is one of my favorite games made, but the thing is a game is never perfect, especially one large enough to lead Ken levine into dissolving Irrational.

A large game isn't an excuse, but as a product, Bioshock does its job and then some as a way to provide a truly enjoyable experience. As it is a narrative driven singleplayer experience, it doesn't have too much in the way of replay value as it is, and it is a valid line of thought to say the plot holes add more fuel to the fire (Even if they can be excused by reasoning along the lines of things we simply don't know AKA the lazy way out), but as always, games journalism doesn't come down to black and white, with Bioshock showing us many hundreds of shades in between. Or perhaps I should say the shades are....

Infinite.
 

BloatedGuppy

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Dijarida said:
I got into this thread really hoping to see some non-duality commentary. Usually the Escapist offers up commentary that differs from either "This game is better than sex" or "This game is worse than being hit by the dead baby thrown through the window of your church". This thread however is full of duality.
Where are you seeing "duality"?

I'm seeing polarity, and annoyance at said polarity.
 

zombiejoe

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Dijarida said:
I got into this thread really hoping to see some non-duality commentary. Usually the Escapist offers up commentary that differs from either "This game is better than sex" or "This game is worse than being hit by the dead baby thrown through the window of your church". This thread however is full of duality. As a story told from a single perspective, infinite does an excellent job of taking us through new settings and making us think about the implications of our actions. HOWEVER, praising this as the best game evar isn't valid, it well and truly is one of my favorite games made, but the thing is a game is never perfect, especially one large enough to lead Ken levine into dissolving Irrational.

A large game isn't an excuse, but as a product, Bioshock does its job and then some as a way to provide a truly enjoyable experience. As it is a narrative driven singleplayer experience, it doesn't have too much in the way of replay value as it is, and it is a valid line of thought to say the plot holes add more fuel to the fire (Even if they can be excused by reasoning along the lines of things we simply don't know AKA the lazy way out), but as always, games journalism doesn't come down to black and white, with Bioshock showing us many hundreds of shades in between. Or perhaps I should say the shades are....

Infinite.
Oh come on, that was just cheesy.

But yeah, it is true for a lot of games that duality does form between people. It's either all perfect or all terrible, and the people who look at the pros and cons are ignored.
 

Madame_Lawliet

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BloatedGuppy said:
Madame_le_Flour said:
I only just got around to playing Bioshock Infinate about a month ago and since then I can't seem to get it out of my mind, not because it was this unbelievably great game that I just couldn't stop thinking about, but rather because it has literally the most contrived and poorly executed story of any game I've ever played in my goddess damned life.
I'm curious. What do you think a "story" is? Do you view a story as a collection of events, the goal of which is to fit together like blocks in a game of Tetris, with no visible gaps between the seams? Or do you think there are other elements involved in crafting a narrative, some of which may be viewed as more or less important depending on the type of story you are trying to tell?

What did you think Bioshock Infinite was about?
As far as I can tell Bioshock Infinate is trying to tell a centralized story about the different ways in which guilt can lead to self destruction that takes on different forms depending on the circumstances...

Booker DeWitt feels guilty for what he did at Wounded Knee, and that guilt manifests itself in two different personalities depending on how he chooses to deal with it, the Booker that refuses the Baptism and stays Booker is unable to cope with his sins and instead wallows in them by becoming a high-stakes gambler and raging alcoholic, as well as an agent of the Pinkertons as if to say that violence and sin are all he's capable of as far as he sees it. However, the Booker that takes the baptism views himself as cleansed and lives a life of denial as Zachary Comstock, building whole museum pieces framing the things he once viewed as sin as heroic acts of patriotism, and establishing a racist demeanor as a rectory method of justifying his actions further.
From what I can gather this seems to be the closest thing to what Bioshock Infinate is about, how one seemingly insignificant decision can cause a chain reaction of different re-actions, while ultimately working to the same end.

However this presented in a such a way that seems to work on all fronts to obscure the ultimate point of the story from the surface, and I think this may have also been part of the plan. which I give them credit for even though I personally feel like it just got out of hand. When you start dealing with the multiverse you have to be damn careful because failing to answer reader/viewer/player questions in an adequate way is a plot hole waiting to happen. It seemed to me that the writers of Bioshock Infinite were falling back on the same devices the writers of Bioshock one did, and that is answering any and all loose ends with "because Adam," this kind of worked because Adam is a foreign substance to us, it's never fully explained just what it's capable of, and we have no frame of reference making it far easier to suspend disbelief.
However, when Infinite does it they use the phrase "because alternate realities," that's something that's actually grounded in quantum physics and we have a much more immediate understanding of. Indeed, chances are the intended audience of Bioshock Infinite has atleast read or watched a decent amount of Sci-fi before, and may indeed already have come across this kind of story before. So when you start using the multiverse in the same way as adam, players are much more likely to catch inconsistencies because they probobly already have a frame of reference as to how the multiverse works, and there goes your suspension of disbelief.
 

BloatedGuppy

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Madame_le_Flour said:
However this presented in a such a way that seems to work on all fronts to obscure the ultimate point of the story from the surface, and I think this may have also been part of the plan.
Really? I found the messaging of the theme to be almost ridiculously overt. Right down to the clumsy handling of Fitzroy's transition to the fact the theme of the piece is right there in the signature song. Infinite does a lot of things well. Thematic subtlety is not one of them. Yes, it's not quite as "beat you over the head with it" as the original game, but it very much wears its heart on its sleeve.

Madame_le_Flour said:
However, when Infinite does it they use the phrase "because alternate realities," that's something that's actually grounded in quantum physics and we have a much more immediate understanding of. Indeed, chances are the intended audience of Bioshock Infinite has at least read or watched a decent amount of Sci-fi before, and may indeed already have come across this kind of story before. So when you start using the multiverse in the same way as adam, players are much more likely to catch inconsistencies because they probobly already have a frame of reference as to how the multiverse works, and there goes your suspension of disbelief.
Bioshock Infinite is most definitely NOT hard science fiction though. It's using a "scientific" concept as set dressing for a fantasy story, that involves time travel and intelligent steampunk robots and magic powers. At no point did I ever consider the game was attempting to construct a deliberately detailed reality for me to dissect at length, nor did I find it an impediment to my understanding of or enjoyment of the central narrative thrust...which was the story of Booker and Elizabeth.

I'm glad that Fox brought up Potter and the time turners, because it makes a good comparison point. Reading criticism of Bioshock Infinite that focuses solely on the verisimilitude of the quantum mechanics is rather like reading a dissection of Harry Potter in which is was implied that the piece was a meditation on time travel, and her failure to grasp the fundamentals of it ruined the story.
 

Madame_Lawliet

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FieryTrainwreck said:
Couldn't disagree more with the criticism leveled at this game. I'll just leave it at that.

No wait, I won't. I think it's insane that people criticize this story in an industry where 99% of the narratives and virtually all of the writing/dialogue are routinely and completely god-fucking-awful. What the Bioshock games attempt to do, and often succeed in doing, is light years ahead of the bullshit churned out by most game makers. If we saw even half a dozen titles with the storytelling ambition of Infinite each year, I'd be completely satisfied as a gamer.

Just ridiculous.
I see and understand your point, I truly truly do, but if we're going to count games like Bioshock Infinite among the greatest we've ever made from a narrative standpoint we need to take a damn microscope to it, and pick apart it's failings because criticism is what leads to improvement, and if we get scared to criticize something then it will never get any better.
As I always say, criticize the things you hate, and do double to the things you love.
 

Fox12

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CloudAtlas said:
Fox12 said:
The weakness is that the plot falls apart when you look at the smaller details, and the mechanics of the universe sometimes make you question characters actions. It's like the first time that you realize that all of Harry Potters problems could have been fixed with a time turner. The story is still good, but you're forced to question a characters wisdom when a plot breaking element like that is introduced.
No you're not "forced" to do anything, and no it doesn't need to be a weakness.

When you're enthralled enough by a story, be it because you find it so exciting, emotionally or thematically powerful or whatever, you just don't notice the minor elements that don't quite add up, the small mistakes, or to "plot holes". And a story isn't necessarily worse just for that. Only if a story doesn't work for you in some way or another, you start noticing this stuff (something about "trust in the story teller"), and everything might break apart for you. And why a particular story works for some but not for others, well, that can have many reasons, of course.

Well, Film Crit Hulk explains it much better than I do - albeit with a few more words: http://badassdigest.com/2012/10/30/film-crit-hulk-smash-hulk-vs.-plot-holes-and-movie-logic/

Edit: For me, Bioshock Infinite had one of the best stories, perhaps even the best, I have experienced in a game. Including the end.
But that would suggest that ANY story is great, as long as you don't think about it too much. The problem is that Infinite clearly WANTS us to think about it. You can't present something as a work of art, and then say "but don't judge it too harshly." Saints Row 3 can get away with a crazy plot because it's not trying to be deep and meaningful. Therefore I judge it by different standards. Furthermore, the mistakes and errors took me out of the gaming experience, and lessened my emotional connection to the characters, as it did to many other players. When someone creates a work of art, they are presenting it too the critical analysis of everyone, and it will be judged by its strengths and weaknesses. The best works may become classics. I'm the first one to admit that Bioshock does certain things very well, but to ignore its weaknesses is a blind as ignoring its good qualities. There's nothing wrong with demanding better art. It's how we learn to produce better works as a collective culture.
 

NuclearKangaroo

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Efrit_ said:
FieryTrainwreck said:
Couldn't disagree more with the criticism leveled at this game. I'll just leave it at that.

No wait, I won't. I think it's insane that people criticize this story in an industry where 99% of the narratives and virtually all of the writing/dialogue are routinely and completely god-fucking-awful. What the Bioshock games attempt to do, and often succeed in doing, is light years ahead of the bullshit churned out by most game makers. If we saw even half a dozen titles with the storytelling ambition of Infinite each year, I'd be completely satisfied as a gamer.

Just ridiculous.
Oh, bull. While there is always a plethora of games being released which ignore or create bad stories, there are more than enough which have good or even fantastic stories. Infinite is not one of them. Infinite is prentious, it plays out just like bioshock 1 did: babies first introduction. Where 1 introduced people to objectivism, infinite introduced them to the concept of infinite realities. Except, unlike 1, it didn't have completely solid gameplay or atmosphere to disguise how utterly dreadful its story truly was composed.

Want to know games with truly great stories?
Spec ops: the line
All silent hills, which put more thought into symbolism and horror than Levine likely did with Elizabeth and her god powers.
Deus ex
Legacy of kain
Final fantasy 4, 5, 6, 12, and fours sequel the after years.
The tales of series
Etc

Infinite was, in all honesty, the most disappointing game I've played since the year 2000 came around.
infinite didnt have good atmosphere and gameplay? pffff i completely disagree, specially regarding atmosphere, infinite has the most fucking beautiful environments ive ever seen in a game
 

Post Tenebrae Morte

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Gameplay: the vigors were an absolute mess, somehow degrading the power system that had been used since the first bioshock. Not to mention, there was no fun in experimentation. I could experiment in the first two, combine the wasp power with the fire power for some delightful carnage. Outside of that, the shooting was off-putting and horribly done. I played better shooters in the 90s than the mess that infinite had to call gunplay, which isn't even mentioning its poor selection of weaponry.

Atmosphere: go play the witcher 2, even on xbox 360. Go play xenoblade, or how about the latest castlevanias? Those are beautiful, jaw dropping environments which enthrall people. The city in the clouds aspect had potential, but it's ruined by a mixture of the plain scenery and how utterly linear the entire setting truly is. After the beach section with Elizabeth, the game essentially shot its load early.
 

Madame_Lawliet

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TheYellowCellPhone said:
Yep, you're where we were a year ago. I still love that game, but the last twenty minutes of that game completely stopped me from wanting to replay it. Which is bad, because I loved Infinite's gunplay and Columbia.

Play the Burial at Sea DLCs though. The first one is a little more of the same, but the second one is probably the best singleplayer experience I've ever played.
I do have every intention of buying and playing the Burial at Sea DLC when I have the time, mostly because I don't want to hate Bioshock Infinite, I liked the look and ideas of Bioshock Infinite, my problem is with the execution, if BaS patches up some of the confusion I have, or introduces a more cohesive story with better gameplay (I chose not to rant on the gameplay because I feel like that's been done to death) then I would be overjoyed!
 

Phrozenflame500

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Goddamn, the more I think about Bioshock Infinite the more I sour on it. It's gameplay is almost absolute trash with the only redeeming factor being the sky rails, and the story seems clever when you play through it but when you give it even the slightest semblance of thought you realize how patched together it is out of a ton of disjointed ideas during it's long development.
 

CloudAtlas

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Fox12 said:
But that would suggest that ANY story is great, as long as you don't think about it too much. The problem is that Infinite clearly WANTS us to think about it. You can't present something as a work of art, and then say "but don't judge it too harshly." Saints Row 3 can get away with a crazy plot because it's not trying to be deep and meaningful. Therefore I judge it by different standards. Furthermore, the mistakes and errors took me out of the gaming experience, and lessened my emotional connection to the characters, as it did to many other players. When someone creates a work of art, they are presenting it too the critical analysis of everyone, and it will be judged by its strengths and weaknesses. The best works may become classics. I'm the first one to admit that Bioshock does certain things very well, but to ignore its weaknesses is a blind as ignoring its good qualities. There's nothing wrong with demanding better art. It's how we learn to produce better works as a collective culture.
If you can make your story super duper consistent without any loss, then by all means go ahead. But it can be worthwhile to trade off "everything making perfect sense" for dramatic or emotional impact. How much someone is willing to accept of the former for the sake of the latter, that is up to any individual.

That said, some people (you know, the notorious nitpickers) would certainly benefit from relaxing a bit in this regard. If logic and supposed plot holes and what not are all someone cares about, he'll miss out on the messages as well as the enjoyment.

Edit: Anyhow, the intensity of the reactions here... "best thing eva" vs "utter trash"... is yet again pretty typical and one of the reasons why you just can't take gamers quite that seriously.
 

TheYellowCellPhone

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Madame_le_Flour said:
I do have every intention of buying and playing the Burial at Sea DLC when I have the time, mostly because I don't want to hate Bioshock Infinite, I liked the look and ideas of Bioshock Infinite, my problem is with the execution, if BaS patches up some of the confusion I have, or introduces a more cohesive story with better gameplay (I chose not to rant on the gameplay because I feel like that's been done to death) then I would be overjoyed!
Burial at Sea doesn't try to justify or explain the story of Infinite. It makes maybe a handful of actual mentions to the plot. The DLC is set decades after Columbia was supposed to exist, right before the events of Bioshock 1 in Rapture. The DLC really really tries (and I think it mostly succeeded) playing more like Bioshock 1 & 2 than Infinite does, whether that's a good thing or not. It's different, I tell you, ammo scarcity and carrying all of your weapons at once is going to startle you.

I would highly suggest playing Bioshock 1 if you haven't first, the DLC half expects you to have played it. It's understandable without the backstory, but you won't be familiar with the characters and won't have any idea what your events are leading up to.
 

CyberSinner

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delta4062 said:
I really wish Bioshock 1 and Infinite (since no one gives a shit about 2) weren't seen as these great games with such a d33p story. Because they're not. The plot twist in 1 wasn't anywhere near as grand as the internet kept making it out to be and Infinite was nothing but pretentious bullshit. I could look past all this if the games were genuinely fun to play but they're piss poor shooters to boot.
I personally am not a fan of Bioshock Infinite, tbph. I like Bioshock 1 more than I like Infinite and 2 was an abomination. I also think the plot twist in 1 WAS as grand as the internet made it to be because of the way it was woven in territory. It was mind blowing how this game turned the tried trope around on its head.

The:

"You follow orders someone gives you and you beat the game" trope that consist of every game. Someone barking orders at you and "forcing" you in a way to do something else.

Where as Bioshock 1, made you think about how you follow orders, how blindly do as someone constructs.

What I like most about 1 over Infinite was that creepy, uncomfortable and unsettling atmosphere Infinite cannot capture. It isn't that the story of Infinite bugged me, as more it was the direction and the way the game was handled and directed.
 

Fox12

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CloudAtlas said:
Fox12 said:
But that would suggest that ANY story is great, as long as you don't think about it too much. The problem is that Infinite clearly WANTS us to think about it. You can't present something as a work of art, and then say "but don't judge it too harshly." Saints Row 3 can get away with a crazy plot because it's not trying to be deep and meaningful. Therefore I judge it by different standards. Furthermore, the mistakes and errors took me out of the gaming experience, and lessened my emotional connection to the characters, as it did to many other players. When someone creates a work of art, they are presenting it too the critical analysis of everyone, and it will be judged by its strengths and weaknesses. The best works may become classics. I'm the first one to admit that Bioshock does certain things very well, but to ignore its weaknesses is a blind as ignoring its good qualities. There's nothing wrong with demanding better art. It's how we learn to produce better works as a collective culture.
If you can make your story super duper consistent without any loss, then by all means go ahead. But it can be worthwhile to trade off "everything making perfect sense" for dramatic or emotional impact. How much someone is willing to accept of the former for the sake of the latter, that is up to any individual.

That said, some people (you know, the notorious nitpickers) would certainly benefit from relaxing a bit in this regard. If logic and supposed plot holes and what not are all someone cares about, he'll miss out on the messages as well as the enjoyment.
But you're suggesting that in order for a story to be consistent, it has to sacrifice emotion, and that's simply not true. In fact, the opposite is true. Logical writing and consistency actually ADD to the emotion of a story. Just look at Berserk or Oedipus Rex as an example. Consistency is a minimal standard of quality among story tellers. If you can't even nail down the basic facets of writing, then maybe you shouldn't be working in the industry. I would also argue that if a creator was actually emotionally invested in his creation, then he would put his best effort into making it as good as possible. Plot holes are a sign of laziness or thoughtlessness on the part of the story teller. If a story teller really wants to write something with "dramatic and emotional impact" wouldn't it make sense for him to make the story as good as possible?
 

sumanoskae

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SPOILERS! (duh)

I too am in the minority; I did not love Bioshock: Infinite. I enjoyed the game, but the story never grabbed me, and it wasn't because it didn't make sense or that my choices didn't matter.

No, my problem with Infinite is not a structural one, it's an artistic one.

When you first enter Columbia, the game makes an effort to affect a soothing atmosphere, to project an image of an ideal place, but the second I walked into that baptism, I knew exactly how this whole scene was going to play out.

Columbia is entrenched in American exceptionalism and traditionalism; two deeply flawed ideas. It comes as no surprise that such a place would carry within it all the negative connotations associated with those things. Being deeply oppressive and violently rigid is to be expected of a place that makes all of it's decisions based on religious conjecture.

So this begs another question; why would any sane person ever want to live here? Are people drawn here because they believe the quality of life is better? Are they taken by force? If we are meant to relate in some way to people within this tyrannical system that oppose it's values, we never get the chance because the only people who ever stand up to it are being oppressed by it.

This, I believe, forms Infinite's Achilles heel; the story has no point. The only people you can really relate to are Booker, Elizabeth and the Vox, but the problem with this is that none of those three ever do anything to distinguish their characters. The only reason you can relate to Booker is because he is self interested, you can only relate to Elizabeth because she experiences the setting in the same way you do (It's all new to her), and you can only relate to the Vox because they behave like an oppressed minority WOULD behave.

No meaning can be extracted from people doing exactly what you would expect them to do, there is nothing to learn here.

An example of how to do this right; Andrew Ryan. Unlike Columbia, Rapture was built on good intentions; the tragedy of Rapture is that you can sympathize with it's ideas, with it's concepts, with it's goals, but it is the indifferent an inescapable forces of human nature and entropy that destroy it.

Andrew Ryan has a unique and controversial perspective, but it is a legitimate perspective, that you could arrive at with logic and reason. Andrew Ryan is a tragic figure because he is a human one, and as horrific as Rapture was, there was once beauty in it.

Comstock and Columbia are nakedly awful things born of nothing but dogmatic psychosis. It is impossible to relate to this concept, to this idea, because it's the work of a cartoon character; nobody with a functioning brain and a grasp of badic ethics could ever build something like Columbia with sincerity. Perhaps there is mileage to be found in the idea of Comtock being INSINCERE, but this is never touched upon.

Columbia is just an awful place that collapses because (Surprise, surprise) people are not fond of being oppressed. There is no pathos, there is no real tragedy.

So, now to address the ending. In a word; So? I understand perfectly well the mechanics of what's going on with the split realities and such; I even predicted the ending as soon as we entered another reality. "The hero is secretly the villain" isn't a novel idea anymore, in fact, it's just the literal manifestation of the metaphorical "Fighting with monsters" trope, which is older than dirt.

But I will not criticize the game for not surprising me, a good story does not need to be unpredictable. Instead I will ask this; what is the point of Booker being Comstock? What narrative or metaphorical purpose does it serve? The obvious one would be implying that the two of them aren't so different, but since neither of them are fully developed characters, this means nothing. Not to mention that I don't buy that the Booker we spend most of the game with, who reacts to almost nothing other than Elizabeth in any meaningful way, would have the intelligence, charisma or desire to found a national hate group; what few basic personality traits Booker and Comstock have, they do not have in common.

So the idea that Booker might have become Comstock means nothing, because we have no sufficient explanation for how this happened. Oh, we're TOLD that it was a result of wounded knee, but again, Booker does not have definitive enough personality to contextualize these events.

So I will ask again; what is the point of the alternate reality plot? We only ever visit two or three different realities, so it isn't really used as a narrative or framing device, and it doesn't lend the story or characters any depth. I get the impression that it's just in the game because it's unusual and bizarre.

Bioshock Infinite spends so much time just explaining how it's sci-fi twist works, that it forgets to ever make it's existence meaningful. Would it have not been more interesting to, say, see Booker become more like Comstock in real time; to see his philosophy and psychology shift and evolve; to see him actually become the villain, instead of the game just telling us he is.

Infinite seems like it's banking on just the existence of it's final twist to be so amazing that the wow factor alone will justify it's inclusion. But Bioshock Infinite spends the majority of it's time with Booker and Elizabeth trying to escape from Columbia, and that journey is sorely lacking in the areas that really make a story great; it's theme is non-existent, it's characters are nothing special, and it's plot is merely unusual.

I enjoyed the game, overall; the polish and presentation of Infinite are nothing short of fantastic, and I don't think it's entirely lacking in substance, but I do find it severely overrated and nowhere near as profound as many people make it out to be.
 

Azahul

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Madame_le_Flour said:
Okay so ignoring the obvious ones (why didn't Booker cover up the branding on his hand, why are the vigors even here if nobody uses them, why doesn't anybody in a racist city in 1912 use the N word, etc.)in reality #3 (the one in which the Vox revolted) Booker #3 supposedly showed up to Columbia too late and Elizabeth had already been moved to Comstock House before he got there, so as a back up plan he joins up with the Vox so they'll help him out with Elizabeth in exchange. However in the process Booker dies and becomes the martyr of their revolution, thus explaining where Booker #3 is.
Where then is Elizabeth #3?
She can't be in the tower because if she was then Booker #3 would have been able to get to her, and wouldn't have to join up with the Vox in the first place, and she's not at Comstock House when you eventually get there in the same reality, so where is she? This also raises the question of why in the Hell Constock is even bothering to peruse your Booker and your Elizabeth, when his Booker is dead and he would already have his Elizabeth.
And what about Songbird? I thought Songbird's whole "flying Big Daddy" thing implied that he was supposed to be guarding Elizabeth, HIS Elizabeth, the one that we haven't accounted for. Why does Songbird, or Comstock for that matter, care about capturing and indoctrinating your Elizabeth when they both would already have their own?
As others have said, Elizabeth's powers are established to work more along the lines of combining universes together than opening portals to a new universe. This is why the guards you kill moments before going to universe #2 are then seen bleeding from the nose. You just killed them, and now their memories of death are combining with a universe where that didn't happen. Elizabeth herself doesn't seem to be affected by this, she rewrites the universe in such a way that the desired change takes effect (although she has no control over side effects, like Chin being dead in universe #3), and the version of Elizabeth that enacts the change simply supplants any existing Elizabeth.

Also, referring to them as universes #1, #2, and #3 is a bit innacurate. By the time you get to universe #3, you are existing in all three universes simultaneously. Elizabeth has simply layered them on top of one another to achieve the desired alterations (and the reason it takes several steps to get there is because this is a newly discovered ability she is still struggling to master).

Also, vigors are new and highly expensive (and, based on the characters you do see using them, have all the same mind-degrading side effects that plasmids have) so it's not surprising they're in limited use. Booker is out of his depth in a foreign society and doesn't have any real grasp on how people will react to the AD (all he sees is a vaguely threatening poster). And as for the N word... eh, I don't really have anything. Just a stylistic convention on behalf of the writers, I guess.
Madame_le_Flour said:
Also, is Comstock just... not paying attention to what's going on in this city during all of this? The Vox have all but destroyed the place and they have made their intentions of coming for him very very clear, why is his highest priority right now torturing and Indoctrinating Elizabeth to become his successor? Wouldn't it make more sense to put that on the back burner for a little while while he focuses on making sure there's a city left to lead?
Comstock isn't a military leader. As Slate establishes, he didn't have any real part in any of Columbia's previous engagements (beyond serving at Wounded Knee, but he wasn't a commander there as I understand it). Presumably, he has military commanders who deal with things like armed revolts.

Also, the bit at Comstock House is implied to be up to six months after the rebellion broke out and Elizabeth was captured. While the war is still raging across the city, with the Vox appearing to be winning, the situation has dragged out so long and normalised to the extent that presumably Comstock no longer needs to spend every moment in crisis meetings.
Madame_le_Flour said:
And that leads me into that bit where future Elizabeth pulls Booker into her timeline to supposedly show him how to save his Elizabeth from becoming her... except she doesn't do that. She gives him a picture of a cage and sends him on his way. Granted this does end up being the secret to controlling Songbird but Booker's already saved her from Comstock House well before that becomes relevant. You could argue that she was really just showing Booker a reality in which he didn't save her to strengthen his resolve in doing so, but when exactly did Booker imply in any way that wasn't his plan in the first place? It would have been a far more effective sequence if there was a bit before that where Booker seemed to have given up or said anything even remotely to that effect, but he didn't, and it almost seems as if future Elizabeth created her own timeline by pulling Booker into her reality (Snake! You've created a time paradox!).
The reason Elizabeth becomes 1983 Elizabeth is because Booker never reaches her, and she eventually gives up. He never reaches her because "Songbird always stops you". She gives him a card which tells Elizabeth how to control Songbird, so that particular event will no longer happen.

Then, finally, she sends you back through a tear to a time and a place that puts Booker pretty much on top of Elizabeth. I've always assumed that the reason for that was that future Elizabeth is actually teleporting Booker past Songbird, letting him reunite with Elizabeth to prevent future Elizabeth from happening. This is what allows Booker to save Elizabeth and stop the future. Had you just been left on that bridge, you would have had to fight past Songbird to get to Comstock House and save Elizabeth. Instead, future Elizabeth creates a tear to let you by-pass that.
Madame_le_Flour said:
But the big thing that just killed it for me was the ending, which again, I really really liked at first... until I started thinking about it. At first it bothered me that Elizebeth just magically knew all this stuff as if Ken Levine just slipped her a copy of the script off camera, but I understand that being hit by the tower exploding turned her into some kind of all knowing godlike figure so i'll let it slide I guess. But the biggest problem I have with the way Bioshock Infinite approaches the whole constants and variables thing, specifically in regards to Booker's baptism. Infinate Realities means INFINATE REALITIES, every single possible thing you can imagine, provided it follows the laws of science, can and indeed already is happening in billions of different universes, and the abundance of like universes is dependent on probability of the variables in question. these variable are not something so binary as Booker taking a baptism or not, and becoming good or evil as a result.
People have been going on these rants ever since Bioshock Infinite came out, and honestly they never cease to completely baffle me. The game is extremely, excruciatingly explicit as to how the "many worlds" theory works in the context of the Bioshock universe. Some things are variables, and others always, always stay the same. In the context of Bioshock Infinite, whenever Booker accepts the baptism, the "constant" is that he becomes Comstock.

Arguing that this isn't how infinite universes works seems a bit pointless. The concept of infinite universes isn't a hard science to begin with, and Bioshock Infinite never positions itself as a piece of hard sci-fi anyway. It's like saying that Plasmids are ridiculous because that isn't how DNA works. Well, yes, you're right, but with that attitude I hope you never try reading/watching/playing any book/movie/game that doesn't take place in a perfect representation of the real world.

Constants and variables is how the multiverse works in Bioshock Infinite. It's a choice the writers made to help carry the themes and ideas of the story. The game creates a framework within which its science operates, and it sticks scrupulously to that framework. Plot holes are only created when you import ideas and theories from the real world and try to impose them on a fictional universe that explicitly does not conform to those ideas and theories.
Madame_le_Flour said:
What about the realities in which Booker takes the Baptism but still doesn't become Comstock? Being religious deosn't necessarily mean you're going to become a racist cult leader (no wonder Reddit loved this game so much). What about the realities in which he becomes Comstock but he becomes the good guy, while Booker becomes the evil racist tyrant? What about the realities in which Comstock never meets either of the Leutices? What about the realities in which that universe's Leutice dies or is never born? And while we're talking about the Leutices, their existence proves that gender is a variable that changes depending on the universe, so what about the realities in which Booker is born a girl, or Elizabeth a guy? There's a million ways that baptism could have gone down, Booker might have initially refused it, but later changed his mind. Hell one of the first things that happens in the game is Booker being baptized in an admittedly fantastic introduction sequence, so we know it isn't just any old Baptism that can turn him into Comstock it had to be that one at time, so what if the Baptism is cancelled, or the date is changed due to weather, will Booker still become Comstock then if he takes it? And don't give me that "oh those are all just constants," no, fuck you, the date and time of a Baptism is not a universal constant, the earth being the right distance from the sun to sustain life isn't even a universal constant, this is the most tunnel visioned view of the many worlds theory I've ever heard in my damn life.
Yes, it is an exceptionally narrow version of the theory. That's because the entire concept of the many worlds in Bioshock Infinite is as a piece of commentary on video game narratives. Ken Levine adores this kind of stuff, it was central to the plot twist of the first Bioshock game as well. The use of the many worlds theory is him saying "Thousands of people will play this game. Each of these playthroughs will be different, you might shoot enemies in a different order, you might use different weapons and abilities, you might run in circles for an hour or jump on everything or explore the game environments or just run from objective to objective. But no matter what you do, the narrative will play out in the same way."

Your feelings on the science in the game are immaterial. The science is that way for a very, very specific reason, and that is to serve the narrative. So yes, in the context of Bioshock Infinite, the time and place of the Baptism is a constant, because no matter how many times you play Bioshock Infinite, the Baptism will always be at the same time and place. It's pretentious, meta, and hard to wrap your head around, but I promise you that it does make sense.

Like Yahtzee said in the Zero Punctuation review, I'm half-surprised that the characters didn't actually end up meeting God and finding him with Ken Levine's face.
Madame_le_Flour said:
Hoooooooooly crap I only intended to list off a few plot holes and it turned into a rant that took me two hours to type, and I still have boatloads more to throw at this game, but this is just driving the point home further, this game is driving me out of my damn mind and I welcome anyone else reading this to share some of the things that might have driven them mad about this game's plot as well.

Oh and uh, yeah it's presented very well, it has some genuinely fantastic set pieces, the voice acting, animaion and character models are all phenomenal and the game is all around a joy to look at and hear. I'm not saying that it's an entirely bad game, it's plot just takes itself way too seriously and deals with way too many big ideas to be this shot full of holes, and it is truly driving me crazy.
I love and adore Bioshock Infinite. It's one of my favourite games of all time. I am sorry that you're struggling with many of the elements of its narrative, and I completely understand that it isn't for everyone. That said, I don't think the game is anywhere near as flawed as its critics make it out to be. I'm yet to see a single plot hole brought up that couldn't be explained away using the mechanics as established by the game's narrative.

With any luck, some of the answers above will help you out with the craziness. And I do heartily recommend checking out the Burial At Sea DLCs, they're not quite as wonky as all this.
 

sXeth

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The Vox Revolution segment is the one that really stands out as the bizarre hole. Some of the timey-wimey stuff is a bit out there, but not particularly for that sort of story.

The whole Revolution universe seems like someone decided abruptly that they needed to have the war as part of the game and chopped it in using Elizabeth's powers as an easy excuse, but didn't really consider all the muckups that throws in to the main story with multiple Elizabeths/Songbirds. Its only reinforced with the blatant handwave attempt at explaining Fitzroy's "evil turn" in Burial at Sea, which is possibly the most poorly done interaction in the whole thing.