Bioshock Infinite's story is OBJECTIVELY better than the original Bioshock [SPOILERS]

[The Madman]

Apart from all the times that it is brought up. Him trying to convince Elizabeth he's not a sicko, the entire guilt trip that was the Museum level... I mean which bit do you want to pick?

The point was he knows he's terrible which is why he's an alcoholic lowlife. Comstock is as well, but he takes pride in everything he does.

Personally I'd feel more guilty in killing somebody who is a mentally damaged addict than someone who righteously believed in a cause I opposed and wanted to kill me for it. I mean if you would prefer killing the first then just keep killing Booker.

The museum was about past guilt and what he did at wounded knee, what he's doing in the present however is never really brought up aside from once, near the beginning, when Elizabeth freaks out when you first kill someone. I mean within the first half-hour of the game you're killing random police officers by the dozen and that's never addressed, later on it's soldiers and then self proclaimed freedom fighters. By the end of the game you've killed probably hundreds of people: fathers, mothers, people just doing what they thought was right and people just doing what they thought they had to do.

There's just a massive disconnect between this story that's trying so hard to be taken seriously and the gameplay where you're literally shooting dozens of random people in the face with a variety of weapons. Both Bioshock and System Shock 2 at least try to rationalize the gameplay and make it a cohesive part of the narrative, with Infinite however there's a clear divide between gameplay mechanics and story.

Bioshock Infinite would have been much better served had it forsaken these massive forces and instead gone with smaller groups of enemies that fought more intelligently and who's conflict could actually have some impact.

Your arguing semantics now, 'removed' was a bit wrong to say but for all intents and purposes that's basically what happened. I haven't even seen any of these diagrams you speak of but it seems they just have to add a tiny little branch saying drowned (which stops all the branching that leads to the infinite Comstocks) instead of that branch being totally removed. The Booker says 'no' to the baptism, his life goes on with infinite universes from each and every decision; The Booker that says 'yes' to the baptism, gets drowned. It seems like you don't know what 'infinite' means. Infinite branches for every decision point are not a requirement for infinite universes.

Sorry to bud in here but yes, yes by definition they are. Infinite implies, well, Infinite. Everything that can happen will happen. For example Comstock deciding to try and become a better person, to redeem himself, and in turn going on to do great things in the name of redemption over his sullied past will have happened in a universe with infinite possibility. Then there's the one where Comstock immediately went on to be hit by a train the next day. Everything that reasonably can happen will have happened in a universe of infinite possibility.

So what about nice Comstock? Or the kindly Comstock that went on to have a family and live quietly with them living a good life? What about Comstock who amassed a great fortune and didn't build a city in the sky but instead used it to aid the poor?

By definition those all will have happened and we would have just killed them all over the selfish thought that Elizabeths timeline was the only one that mattered. What a ***** eh?

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

Alright, here's the thing: we won't resolve this. But here's something positive to take away that has application for the theme of your thread as a whole: I believe that Bioshock Infinite's plot destroys itself if taken to its logical conclusion, and therefore that it has a major, plot-destroying, plot hole. I am convinced of this. You, however, do not believe this to be the case, and feel my logic is misplaced. Likewise, you believe that Bioshock 1's plot is irreparably damaged, and you are convinced of this. Others do not agree, and believe your logic is misplaced. Do you see that it may be possible that just as our different approaches to Infinite prevent us from agreeing, other people's approaches to Bioshock may prevent them from agreeing, and that what seems obviously right to you may well not seem so at all to them? In other words, that this may just be a disagreement born of differing perspectives rather than a matter of OBJECTIVE fact? Just maybe.

1) The first reply in this thread, from a person that likes Bioshock, even agreed that you have to remove the Vita-chambers for the story to not have the plot hole I mentioned. How does sending an assassin to kill someone that can't be killed make any sense?

2) You yourself are making Bioshock Infinite have this major, plot-destroying, plot hole. You don't seem to understand the concept of infinites. It really sounds like you think you need infinite branches coming from every decision point to have infinite universes, that's not the case. Some decision points only have 2 branches (yes/no, right/left, etc.), some have 3, some may have 10, etc. Removing (I'm only using this word because it's just simpler) the set of infinite Comstock universes does not make it so there are no longer infinite universes. Some infinites are bigger than others. The set of universes starting from when Booker is literally born to when he dies is infinite while the set of Comstock infinites, while still infinite, is smaller when compared to the entirety of all the universes created during Booker's lifetime. Removing a subset of infinite universes from within a set of infinite universes results in still having infinite universes. For example, the set of all numbers is infinite and the amount of numbers between 1 and 2 is also infinite; if you remove the infinite amount of numbers between 1 and 2, you still have an infinite amount of numbers. Your poor understanding of infinites plus your own adding of rules (which are never stated in the game) are creating these plot holes that aren't there. You are giving the game plot holes because, I guess, you want to. You want to not like the story.

Sorry to bud in here but yes, yes by definition they are. Infinite implies, well, Infinite. Everything that can happen will happen. For example Comstock deciding to try and become a better person, to redeem himself, and in turn going on to do great things in the name of redemption over his sullied past will have happened in a universe with infinite possibility. Then there's the one where Comstock immediately went on to be hit by a train the next day. Everything that reasonably can happen will have happened in a universe of infinite possibility.

So what about nice Comstock? Or the kindly Comstock that went on to have a family and live quietly with them living a good life? What about Comstock who amassed a great fortune and didn't build a city in the sky but instead used it to aid the poor?

By definition those all will have happened and we would have just killed them all over the selfish thought that Elizabeths timeline was the only one that mattered. What a ***** eh?

You're not understanding what an infinite can be. There doesn't have to be a nice Comstock to have infinite Comstocks. The game explains that with the constants and variables. Comstock being evil is a constant, that always happens in every instance of the infinite amount of Comstock universes. There can be an infinite amount of evil Comstocks.

 

[The Madman]

You're not understanding what an infinite can be. There doesn't have to be a nice Comstock to have infinite Comstocks. The game explains that with the constants and variables. Comstock being evil is a constant, that always happens in every instance of the infinite amount of Comstock universes. There can be an infinite amount of evil Comstocks.

I understand perfectly what infinite means, it's Bioshock Infinite that's got it a little confused with that constants and variables stuff.

infinite (ˈɪnfɪnɪt)
- adj
1. a. having no limits or boundaries in time, space, extent, or magnitude
b. ( as noun; preceded by the ): the infinite
2. extremely or immeasurably great or numerous: infinite wealth
3. all-embracing, absolute, or total: God's infinite wisdom
4. maths
a. having an unlimited number of digits, factors, terms, members, etc: an infinite series
b. (of a set) able to be put in a one-to-one correspondence with part of itself
c. Compare finite (of an integral) having infinity as one or both limits of integration

By definition, if there are infinite parallel worlds then anything that can happen will have happened.

You can't go: "It's infinite except for this guy, he's always the same." Because if there's any limits then it's no longer infinite, and considering the game is called Bioshock Infinite I'd say infinite is what we're working with here, not 'almost infinite'. So either someone at Irrational didn't care or there are infinite worlds, in which case anything that can have happened will have happened, including the world where Comstock is a nice guy, or Comstock had a pizza pie instead of a sandwich for lunch of Tuesday, or he got hit by a train after leaving that baptism thing. The only limits on infinite are those laws that define existence itself and which are literally impossible to break, which brings me to...

Constants and Variables as much as the twins liked to say it is kinda rubbish as well when you think about it. True that in an infinite universe there can be constants and variables (In theory), but those tend to be things like E = mc², not things like whether a coin lands heads or tails or whether being baptized magically makes someone both rich AND evil. Bioshock Infinite is pseudo science, it's fun and it mostly makes sense within the context of the game, but it's not terribly realistic.

But honestly this is all semantics. All that stuff works within the context of the game, I'm just being nitpicky now. I really did enjoy Bioshock Infinite, honestly!

Although I will point this out: For all her supposedly god-like power and knowledge at the end there Elizabeth should have realized the most prominent variable leading to timeline isn't Comstock, he's just some rich asshole, it's the Lutece's. Without Lutece Comstock just remains a rich asshole and there's nothing he can do about it, whereas so long as Lutece is around everything is still malleable. That's the biggest variable, the wrench in the gears. The only way to absolutely make sure Columbia doesn't happen is to eliminate any Lutece, otherwise there's always the possibility he/she/it will do the same under some other rich bloke and everything repeats itself, only minus Booker and Elizabeth. And this time I'm not being nitpicky, that's working under Infinite's own psudo-sciency rules.

But then I guess drowning her dad (sorta) was more important. Talk about daddy issues, jeez!

 

[ThreeName]

I came in here to say it's not objective, it's your opinion, stop pretending it's fucking objective and get over yourself.

 

[Woodsey]

I've yet to play Bioshock Infinity, but I wholeheartedly agree about the original Bioshock. When you took a step back and looked at the plot as a whole it was pretty silly, and just not believable.

It's a computer game and I appreciate that believability isn't gonna be a prime concern, but the game's plot definitely shouldn't be lorded as astounding either.

The praise for the game as a whole has me a bit baffled too. It's presented astoundingly, and the tone and vibe of the whole shebang is brilliant, but how people think that translates into either superb gameplay, a superb game or superb story is a bit beyond me. The combat lacks, the story lacks, the game......just lacks. Still good - 7/10 for me - but overrated beyond words IMO.

Things can be more than the sum of their parts.

 

[Hero in a half shell]

Infinite's story might be impressive to someone who has never heard of the whole multiverse theory before, but otherwise it's pretty ordinary. In other words, if you know who Ace Rimmer and Arnold Rimmer are, it's hard to take Infinite seriously. It's certainly not 'OBJECTIVELY' better, because that isn't a thing that exists.

Best multiverse EVER!


I haven't played Bioshock 1 or Infinite, but you just cannot argue that something this open to personal taste is objectively better than the other game without a major major reason like "This game is physically broken"

Also I wanted an excuse to post that video. Always worth it.

 

[MysticSlayer]

When the twist happened in Bioshock, my initial reactions were "Wow! Awesome! Really great twist!" Literally 10 seconds later, I put everything together, and then realized it didn't make any damn sense. Bioshock's plot is basically an elaborate assassination plot that happens to be, perhaps, the worst assassination plot ever (since it had an extremely low % of actually working). You couldn't kill Ryan with physical violence because of the Vita-chambers, and Ryan knew about the mind control (All Ryan had to say was "Would you kindly not kill me?"). The very reason Atlas/Fontaine wants you to kill Ryan is because he knows the Vita-chambers will work for you (the same blood as Ryan) so you can't really die from the splicers and whatnot on the way to Ryan; therefore, he had to know you can't kill Ryan by normal means. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt about not knowing that Ryan knew about the mind control. A much better means of killing Ryan would have been poisoning him or something. Ryan only died because he wanted to and he disabled his own Vita-chamber.

Actually, Fontaine didn't hire Jack because he understood he could use the Vita chambers. He hired Jack because his DNA contained enough of Ryan's DNA to throw the security off long enough to disable it or take it out. He tells this to you as you approach his apartment suite. For all we know, he didn't even think the Vita chambers worked, especially since Suchong, his chief scientist, didn't think it would ever work.

Anyways, I think the whole notion of trying to find plot twists in either BioShock or BioShock: Infinite is ridiculous. They both suffer from similar problems with regards to some minor issues in relating storytelling to gameplay, but their plots, in it of themselves, are mostly complete and without holes. Sure, I still have some serious issues with both games' storytelling, and they are hardly the prime examples of good storytelling that they've been credited as, but they still manage to explain everything well and get you thinking about the issues presented. Not perfect, but great none the less.

 

[ATRAYA]

Logical narrative = competent narrative, competent narrative > incompetent narrative.

But anyway, given that caveat, here's a good old-fashioned plot hole in Bioshock Infinite for you, one which renders the entire final battle totally pointless: Elizabeth now has full control of her powers, and can open up a tear into Kansas and bring a tornado out of it - and she can do this at will, not randomly, because she threatens Booker with it for a moment. Then - inexplicably, amazingly, ridiculously - she reverts back to 'person who throws you things' for the final battle against the blimps. Why? Because they needed to give all us rootin tootin bad boys a final battle - a Call of Duty 'defend the area' battle, no less - so the story had to be ignored and indeed utterly contradicted for a few minutes. Maybe some people would have lost their hardons if the final battle had been 'won' by Elizabeth as we/Booker looked on in amazement, but it would have been more consistent with the actual story.

Um, I'm pretty sure Elizabeth gets full control AFTER that battle. Remember? Booker loses control of Songbird (the one who was destroying the blimps) after he destroys the Siphon, and you are immediately brought to Rapture. There is no more fighting after that moment. Perhaps you should pay more attention to the subject you are critiquing so fiercely.

Logical narrative = competent narrative, competent narrative > incompetent narrative.

That is a subjective judgement. There really isn't anything to add to this point, other than to keep rephrasing it.

A story with fewer flaws is OBJECTIVELY better, technically; whether you view that logic differently is your own SUBJECTIVE opinion. If I hand you two mugs, one has a big, fat hole in it and the other is in pristine drinking condition, which one would you say is objectively better?
I think people are getting caught on the fact that, while BioShock: Infinite's plot is objectively better in the sense that it has fewer flaws, people could still say the original BioShock had a better narrative. THAT is subjective - which story you think is better/was more entertaining - NOT which one had fewer detrimental mistakes. The OP has been trying to clear that up, though not very well.

Infinite's story might be impressive to someone who has never heard of the whole multiverse theory before, but otherwise it's pretty ordinary. In other words, if you know who Ace Rimmer and Arnold Rimmer are, it's hard to take Infinite seriously. It's certainly not 'OBJECTIVELY' better, because that isn't a thing that exists.

Multiverse theory is more scientific philosophy than actual science to begin with.

I meant that 'OBJECTIVELY better story' isn't a thing that exists, not multiverse theory. Science fiction stories involving multiple or infinite universes based on branching paths are old hat.

I'm sorry, what? "Old hat"? Most science fiction stories we get stuck with these days are all about "how many neon lights can we shove into one scene?" and you say the subject of multiverse theory, which is still fairly untouched, is "OLD HAT"!? I don't know what you expect from your media but, holy crap, are your expectations high. As soon as even a theory has been touched upon by a unique perspective it becomes utter garbage, and we should move on to another subject, apparently.

Almost every kind of story has been done before. The only NEW stories we get are derived from new scientific theories. You're gonna be waiting a LONG time if you want a new story right away.

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

I objectively feel the need to object to your objectification of the word objectively.

Also, I disagree with you.

Have a nice day.

On a sidenote, kids in Ramallah just voted for the new king of the jungle.

Dinosaurs were disqualified from taking part, as they don't exist.

The dolphin won.

I wish the dolphin all the best and I will be watching him growing legs or people defending his early demise, blaming all the furries and creatures with legs on not accepting a dolphin to be their leader.

Hooray for democracy!

 

[zumbledum]

I read through a few story/ending discussion threads to see other people's reactions, different takes on the story, etc. I was shocked to see some people saying Bioshock Infinite's story was just bad writing/storytelling/filled with holes to then see that same person point to the original Bioshock as a good story. What?!?! The plot of Bioshock was horrible.

Well for me its not about it making real world sense, good sci-fi / stories don't need to do that , they just need to make sense in the laws they create for the world they build. and that's why i don't like Infinite's story, or part of it anyway.

i the first scene you see Elizabeths actual character in Infinite shes standing by a picture of paris, theres no tear but she still opens a portal across time and space to a universe of her choosing. fine whatever that was just an error i can live its with the ending i have real problems , their actions are plain outright non nonsensical and full on retarded.

really self deletion? she has just got her full suite of powers back and thats the best answer they can come up with? it irks me because the game has been banging home the infinite multiverse idea all the time then in the last scene it pulls a "source code" on us.

 

[ATRAYA]

People keep saying "There's always a Comstock because 'infinites'! DERR!", and you people clearly did not pay any attention to the plot at all. The whole purpose of the game, whether you knew it or not, was to create a paradox in which ALL Comstock timelines are destroyed! The Luteces guided you along the path that showed you how drowning yourself at the point of the baptism (i.e., when you CHOSE to be born again as a religious man) was the ONLY option (which strengthens Booker's character. As we know, he is the "no one tells me where to go!" type), and would ultimately kill ALL Comstock possibilities (instead of being baptized and "born again" as Zachary Comstock, he is drowned, thus leaving only the baptism-rejecting-Booker's timelines, because Booker cannot be born again and make that choice to become Comstock if he rejects the baptism or is drowned before rebirth, obviously). It's similar to the INFINITE amount of numbers between 1 and 2 (i.e., 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, etcetera), where 1 and 2 are constants, but every number between is a variable and can be removed.

TL;DR: If you think there is still a Comstock somewhere, you payed no attention to the plot of the game.

 

[Glongpre]

What I don't understand is where all these plot holes are, I mean...I didn't find any.

 

[layden radeen]

it is a little unfair to compare the two games in the story department because one is trying to be dark and have mystery to with one being more about place and people its also worth knowing that bioshock dose have a lot of its story based of the work of Ayn Rand so its going to have some tropes and shout outs regardless of how new the plot is

 

[Lionsfan]

The very reason Atlas/Fontaine wants you to kill Ryan is because he knows the Vita-chambers will work for you (the same blood as Ryan) so you can't really die from the splicers and whatnot on the way to Ryan; therefore, he had to know you can't kill Ryan by normal means. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt about not knowing that Ryan knew about the mind control. A much better means of killing Ryan would have been poisoning him or something. Ryan only died because he wanted to and he disabled his own Vita-chamber.

I don't see the problem.

Fontaine and Tennenbaum created Jack years before. Fontaine sent Jack to the surface to be triggered to later on to go kill Ryan. Frank couldn't get to Ryan because he was too far away, and also because of the amount of ground. Ie, he would die before reaching him.

He used Ryan's half son knowing that he wouldn't die because he was engineered to be stronger against splicers, and also because, in the games lore, the security bots wouldn't do as much damage because they were engineered to not target Ryan. But because he was only his half son, they wouldn't completely leave him alone.

I don't see how this is bad storytelling.

The Vita-chambers revive Ryan too!!! If Jack goes in there and beats him up or shoots him, Ryan is revived. Ryan only died because he disabled his own Vita-chamber for some reason.

Wasn't that the whole point of his monologue? "A Man Chooses, A Slave Obeys"

I mean look at it from Ryan's POV, at that point Rapture is almost destroyed and anyone loyal to him is a crazed maniac. To top it all off Fontaine is coming for him with some nigh-invincible assassin, so things are pretty bleak for his future.

So rather than fight the inevitable, he chooses to go out on his own terms, which included setting Rapture to self-destruct.

I don't know how much of the lore you've read or not, but that act pretty much epitomizes Andrew Ryan. "We all make choices. But in the end, our choices make us". It all fits into his objectivist free-will above all else outlook on the world and avoiding "parasites" who would take what's not theirs.

For instance, in his youth he owned a forest, and refused to let any groups in despite their claims that "It should be for God/the People". When the Government stepped in and made moves to Nationalize it, he burned the whole thing down. Sometimes he can a bit of a baby

 

[Festus Moonbear]

Um, I'm pretty sure Elizabeth gets full control AFTER that battle. Remember? Booker loses control of Songbird (the one who was destroying the blimps) after he destroys the Siphon, and you are immediately brought to Rapture. There is no more fighting after that moment. Perhaps you should pay more attention to the subject you are critiquing so fiercely.

I'm talking about her ability to summon things at will through tears (rather than this being random and not under her control fully, as it is in most of the game). She uses it to remove the guards holding her, and then threatens Booker with it, in the form of a tornado, showing that she can bring it at will. This takes place before the final battle. She does get further control after the siphon is destroyed, but she already has this particular power, and thus is far more useful in a scrap than Booker, before then. I was paying attention. Thanks.

As for this 'numbers between 1 and 2 are variables and can be removed', it is nonsense, pure and simple. You cannot confine the concept of 'infinity' in terms of the space between two finite numbers and then subtract it. That's not what infinity is.

Two simple, simple points to illustrate this, and then I'm done with this wankery once and for all:

1. Lizzie's choice: (a) drown Booker
(b) don't drown Booker.

Both have to occur, based on the notion of branching paths based on binary choice, which is the game's own logic. (a) Leads to the ending we are shown. (b) leads to Booker's own story continuing in its own paths. Either way, Comstock cannot be erased in every universe, only some (which in the context of infinity is meaningless anyway).

2. The people who find the story so watertight are also forgetting that there is not only ONE BOOKER who has the choice to be baptised, but many. There's all the guys whose woke up a millisecond later or earlier that day, but whose lives went essentially the same way after that, or who had something different for breakfast, and so on. Not all of them will have chosen baptism and become Comstock, but some of them will, just as all those multiple Comstocks continued to exist despite their superficially different choices. To deny this using the argument of 'constants and variables' is totally arbitrary and amounts to 'magic'. Thus Lizzie's job is now to go from universe to universe drowning her father over and over again like some kind of demented Quantum Leap hero. And here's the thing: every time she does it, she also inevitably creates a universe where she doesn't` do it, again by the simple binary branching. With every Comstock she erases, she creates another (and another Booker as well). She can't help but do it.

EDIT: 3. Here's one more for good luck, and I can't believe I forgot to mention it before, because it's the kicker.

Q: How does Elizabeth erase Comstock?
A: With her powers to move between universes.
Q: How does she have this power?
A: She got stuck between universes when Comstock pulled her through.
Q: How does she get these powers if all Comstocks are erased and there is no Comstock to pull her through?
A: She doesn't.
Q: How does she erase Comstock without these powers?
A: She can't.

Lather, rinse and repeat. Classic paradox. You can't say 'but she doesn't need to erase Comstock any more, because he never existed, and she can now have a normal life with her father', because the only way she was able to erase Comstock was by his existing - without her powers, Booker would have gone through with the baptism and become Comstock, and this would have led to her powers. It's an endless circle. I actually thought they did this deliberately to comment on how games are endlessly replayed but remain the same, and that's kinda cool in my opinion. Does that make it a bad story? Of course not. But it does make it a story that has a major hole. Can we excuse it? Of course we can, just like we excuse major holes in lots of classic works (Citizen Kane, Terminator 2 etc). Maybe we can do it with Bioshock 1, too. I dunno, I've never played it.

 

[Festus Moonbear]

Infinite's story might be impressive to someone who has never heard of the whole multiverse theory before, but otherwise it's pretty ordinary. In other words, if you know who Ace Rimmer and Arnold Rimmer are, it's hard to take Infinite seriously. It's certainly not 'OBJECTIVELY' better, because that isn't a thing that exists.

Best multiverse EVER!

Thank you so much, I was beginning to despair of my countrymen.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

I understand perfectly what infinite means, it's Bioshock Infinite that's got it a little confused with that constants and variables stuff.

infinite (ˈɪnfɪnɪt)
- adj
1. a. having no limits or boundaries in time, space, extent, or magnitude
b. ( as noun; preceded by the ): the infinite
2. extremely or immeasurably great or numerous: infinite wealth
3. all-embracing, absolute, or total: God's infinite wisdom
4. maths
a. having an unlimited number of digits, factors, terms, members, etc: an infinite series
b. (of a set) able to be put in a one-to-one correspondence with part of itself
c. Compare finite (of an integral) having infinity as one or both limits of integration

By definition, if there are infinite parallel worlds then anything that can happen will have happened.

You can't go: "It's infinite except for this guy, he's always the same." Because if there's any limits then it's no longer infinite, and considering the game is called Bioshock Infinite I'd say infinite is what we're working with here, not 'almost infinite'. So either someone at Irrational didn't care or there are infinite worlds, in which case anything that can have happened will have happened, including the world where Comstock is a nice guy, or Comstock had a pizza pie instead of a sandwich for lunch of Tuesday, or he got hit by a train after leaving that baptism thing. The only limits on infinite are those laws that define existence itself and which are literally impossible to break, which brings me to...

Constants and Variables as much as the twins liked to say it is kinda rubbish as well when you think about it. True that in an infinite universe there can be constants and variables (In theory), but those tend to be things like E = mc², not things like whether a coin lands heads or tails or whether being baptized magically makes someone both rich AND evil. Bioshock Infinite is pseudo science, it's fun and it mostly makes sense within the context of the game, but it's not terribly realistic.

Infinite doesn't mean everything that could possibly exist, does exist. It means there is an infinite (unlimited) amount of universes at play. You can have an infinite amount of universes without a single instance of a nice Comstock. I could remove all numbers before 1 and all numbers after 2, and there are still an infinite amount of numbers between 1 and 2. I just showed an infinite while massively limiting the set of all numbers. There's no "almost infinites" going on anywhere in the game.

Bioshock's Infinite's constants are just like Doctor Who's fixed points in time. Even your constants' example of a real constant being something like E = mc² doesn't make sense because within your own definition of infinite universes since there would be an infinite amount of universes where E = something else. Even in a multiverse with infinite universes, there's also an infinite amount of universes that just don't exist and nice Comstock is somewhere in there and he just doesn't exist. Lastly, multiverse theory is pseudo science itself.

I came in here to say it's not objective, it's your opinion, stop pretending it's fucking objective and get over yourself.

I was getting at this train of thought in the matter:

A story with fewer flaws is OBJECTIVELY better, technically; whether you view that logic differently is your own SUBJECTIVE opinion. If I hand you two mugs, one has a big, fat hole in it and the other is in pristine drinking condition, which one would you say is objectively better?
I think people are getting caught on the fact that, while BioShock: Infinite's plot is objectively better in the sense that it has fewer flaws, people could still say the original BioShock had a better narrative. THAT is subjective - which story you think is better/was more entertaining - NOT which one had fewer detrimental mistakes. The OP has been trying to clear that up, though not very well.

Thanks, that's basically what I'm saying. It think most people have similar views that plot holes make stories bad as you see posts saying Infinite sucked because of such and such plot hole (but they don't understand infinites) or X movie sucked because of this or that plot hole.

 

[ronin0331]

I loved both stories, but I must disagree with the OP on the plot holes in the original. I believe the chances of Jack's success, in Fontaine's terms, were much better than you suggest. Let's assume that Fontaine did not know that Ryan had figured out WYK, which you admit makes it more feasible. But consider this, even if Ryan hadn't decided to die Fontaine would have still won. I say this because Jack cleared every obstacle between Fontaine/Atlas' forces and Ryan. Only Jack, whose DNA made him able to use the Vita Chambers and made the security systems less responsive to him could have cleared that path. So Jack gets to Ryan, who has disabled the Vita Chamber to stop Jack from re-spawning, and Ryan asks him to kindly die; Fontaine's splicers then rip Ryan apart. As far as Fontaine is concerned; mission accomplished. Alternatively, if Ryan never disabled the Vita Chamber; Fontaine could still get his people in there, seize Ryan, disable the Vita Chamber themselves, and then kill Ryan. This is why I believe that Bioshock's plot is not as flawed as you describe. Bioshock is my favorite of the two, but I agree that Infinite's plot is also solid.

 

[teebeeohh]

dude, just because you write something in all caps does mean it's true.
I AM SUDDENLY RICH AND HANDSOME AND MY PENIS IS 12 INCHES LONG.
...
nope, didn't work

i love bioshock infinite but i think it wasted the setting since neither the setting nor the mechanics tied all that well into the overall plot. Columbia being a floating city meant nothing in the end and even the explanation why it flies comes in one audiolog and at that point you don't even care about that anymore. and Plasmids worked beautifully in Bioshock but the vigors in infinite didn't tie into the plot at all, this could have been easy if they made the powers something the prophet hands out to his most loyal followers, it would even give a reason why booker seems to be so much more adapt at using them.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

I loved both stories, but I must disagree with the OP on the plot holes in the original. I believe the chances of Jack's success, in Fontaine's terms, were much better than you suggest. Let's assume that Fontaine did not know that Ryan had figured out WYK, which you admit makes it more feasible. But consider this, even if Ryan hadn't decided to die Fontaine would have still won. I say this because Jack cleared every obstacle between Fontaine/Atlas' forces and Ryan. Only Jack, whose DNA made him able to use the Vita Chambers and made the security systems less responsive to him could have cleared that path. So Jack gets to Ryan, who has disabled the Vita Chamber to stop Jack from re-spawning, and Ryan asks him to kindly die; Fontaine's splicers then rip Ryan apart. As far as Fontaine is concerned; mission accomplished. Alternatively, if Ryan never disabled the Vita Chamber; Fontaine could still get his people in there, seize Ryan, disable the Vita Chamber themselves, and then kill Ryan. This is why I believe that Bioshock's plot is not as flawed as you describe. Bioshock is my favorite of the two, but I agree that Infinite's plot is also solid.

It doesn't even make sense that Ryan would be stay in Rapture. He could move around even better than Jack, he knows the city, Jake doesn't. Fontaine's forces wouldn't be able to get there because they can't use the Bathyspheres.