Which is better,which is overrated. Bioshock infinite vs the last of us

[gphjr14]

I felt Last of Us had a great story but the crap shooting mechanics and spending most of the game crouching and looking at a black and white screen bored me to death so I never finished it.

Infinite was fun but after I beat it I never really felt compelled to play it again. Despite the simplistic gameplay the narrative was enough to make me want to finish where as Last of Us annoyed me with shit shooting mechanics that led to QTEs with the infected which usually meant a clicker enemy was closing in to instantly kill you.

 

[00slash00]

Bioshock Infinite is much better, in my opinion.

The characters were much better in Last of Us but that's the only thing I really liked about it. Neither game had strong gameplay but Bioshock's gameplay was simply mediocre and run of the mill. The Last of Us, however, had gameplay that actively took away from my enjoyment of the game. The controls just felt awful to me, both in terms of shooting and even just moving around. Both games would have probably been more enjoyable if I'd simply watched them on YouTube, but Infinite was the game that was the closest to being fun

 

[Strelok]

The Last of Us, was a good story, but yet another zombie apocalypse in an endless march. Finished it, never touched it again, zero re-playability. Never bothered with the DLC. Infinite I have finished a few times, usually more than two plays for the main game and the story DLC. Finished 1999 mode and 1998 mode. Great end to the story, loved every minute of it.

 

[Whitbane]

Found both to be overrated. The Last of Us had some great VA work with a lot of great sequences, but the rest of the game is pretty limited in actual gameplay. It's worth a run for the story, though.

Bioshock was disappointing when compared to the advertised footage. The gunplay was lacking, and holy shit did enemies eat bullets like tic tacs on 1999 difficulty, which wouldn't have been a problem if you could hold more than two weapons or had access to more ammo. Tie that in with crappy weapon design in general, and you just want the shooting sections to end. The plot isn't anything to write home about either, with some of the twists being easy to call.

Worth picking up on sale for like $10.

 

[ExtraDebit]

For me it was infinite, both the gameplay was extremely lacking for me, it's just another shooter and a mediocre one at that.

Last of Us on the other hand I genuinely enjoyed.

 

[zelda2fanboy]

I thought both games were fairly accurately rated. I greatly enjoyed both of them... but if I had to pick, I'd say I managed to break Bioshock's gameplay over my knee about three hours before the game was over. Fully upgraded bucking bronco plus shotgun = zero difficulty whatsoever. I didn't care for the parts of Last of Us that were almost a cover based shooter, but it was a lot shorter than the amount of time in Bioshock spent shooting fish in a barrel. Both games were great, though.

 

[lacktheknack]

Ugh.

Y'know what's overrated? The word "overrated". It's just inherently so fucking smug.

This, and beyond smug, the word is so incredibly cheap now.

You know what's overrated? The Emperor's new clothes. You know what's not overrated? Skrillex, Bioshock: Infinite, The Last Of Us, hip hop in general, Valve games, and anything else that's about as likely to draw a sneer vs a grin.

...so basically anything that's ever been called overrated, ever.

 

[rbstewart7263]

I haven't played TLOU and I probably never will. I'll just add my two cents about Infinite:

Infinite hat really lackluster gunplay and the upgrade mechanic contradicted the whole weapon limitation system in place (you up weapons and limit yourselfs to them because other will be shit in comparison. This leads to ammunition problems and the fact that you won't want to spend your big gun ammo on smaller enemies. Or you go like I did and don't upgrade at all and rotate your weapons in regard of what is avaiable), the plasmids were forgetable (I only used shock in my playthrough, no need to ever switch them) and it just had way too many enemy encounter for them to be fun.

Is it overrated? In regard of its many flaws: Yes, I would say so. Is it bad? No, not at all.

More or less this. I though that the combat dragged down the game a great deal by being really borning and repetitive. It felt like it was using modern military shooter gameplay because that's what's popular and not because it fits Bioshock's style at all.

See I didnt feel that at all. It was more frenetic and swashbuckly to me.

 

[Something Amyss]

Y'know what's overrated? The word "overrated". It's just inherently so fucking smug.

I don't know. I might agree with this sentiment generally, but when it comes to games, it seems less smug and more inherently accurate. It seems as though anything short of gushing praise is seen as hate, and so we have critics and fans who praise everything they even remotely think of as good as though it were the second coming of Jesus, the best sex of their life, and an amazing gourmet meal all combined. I mean, you do get that with other media, but it's never as widespread or as manic. "Overrated" appears to be the default setting in gaming. It even seems like it's really hard to get a bad score if you're a major dev or publisher unless your product actually kills or maims people, in which case it would probably get a mere 80%. 90% of it was Halo or Call of Duty.

In short, everything in gaming is overrated. Except the games I like, which are perfect and probably underrated because reasons.

OT: I haven't played TLOU yet, but I was promised a life-changing experience if I tried BSI, and never got anywhere close to that. I'm not saying hype will kill a good game, but I felt like I was told I was getting a gourmet meal, then got a Big Mac with ketchup.

 

[sextus the crazy]

More or less this. I though that the combat dragged down the game a great deal by being really boring and repetitive. It felt like it was using modern military shooter gameplay because that's what's popular and not because it fits Bioshock's style at all.

See I didnt feel that at all. It was more frenetic and swashbuckly to me.

The parts where you fly around on those rail things were frenetic and swashbuckly and I wish that stuff made up more of the game cuz the rest was a giant slog through waves of bullet sponges. Infinite took out a lot of the fun of the first bioshock game by removing the ability to carry all of your weapons at once and having the vigors all feel very similar and impotent.

 

[Guitarmasterx7]

I liked Last of Us a lot more. First off, the gameplay in last of us and is just flat out mechanically built much nicer for dynamic storytelling than Infinite's bland, rigid FPS bones. In the first bioshock the worldbuilding and atmosphere were the focal points, and the FPS gameplay lent itself to taking it in very well, but the game wasn't too tangled up in the characters themselves save for a couple of key moments. Bioshock infinite has the same presentation style but now the narrative has a very character driven focus. The gameplay doesn't get in the way of the narrative, but it doesn't really compliment it in any way either.

The bigger issue at hand that reeealy pust Last of Us over Infinite in my eyes is is that ending.

Without going too deep into specifics (though technically there will be spoilers here) the characters in Last of Us go through their arcs, and it leads the story to an outcome which is a perfect result of all the narrative buildup before it. Bioshock Infinite's ending took all of the character development in the entire game and shoved it down the fucking garbage disposal for the sake of a plot twist. I don't dislike it because it's confusing, and on its own merits I find it interesting, but it's so jarring to the narrative as a whole that it feels wrong even though it technically works. Elizabeth's character arc in particular is absolutely fucking decimated beyond any recognition and being that she's the emotional center of the whole game before that point, not only does it make it so I never want to play the game again, but it also kind of retroactively sullies the memory of a lot of the character moments I had enjoyed when I was playing it.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Both were strong stories, engagingly told. Both were dubious games, with one suffering from tottering mechanics and delusions of grandeur, and the other suffering from a staggering lack of ambition. Both would place high on the list of "Excellent Stories/Questionable Games", along with entries such as Gone Home, Bastion, To the Moon, The Walking Dead, and others.

I preferred Infinite, btw. It annoyed me less.

Bioshock Infinite's ending took all of the character development in the entire game and shoved it down the fucking garbage disposal for the sake of a plot twist.

Buh? The plot twist was entirely ancillary, the emotional resolution at the end of the story is entirely the result of everything that came before hand. What game were you playing?!

How much more unsubtle does a game have to be with its primary themes, guys? Is writing them into a song they play at the beginning, middle and end insufficient? Should there be a big text blurb at the end, too? Sort of a Coles Notes for people who got confused and thought they were watching a story ABOUT a flying city and ABOUT quantum mechanics?

 

[Animyr]

I didn't play the Last of Us, but I did watch it on youtube and found it more engrossing then Infinite in terms of story. Not that Infinite was bad, but it was too uneven. Can't talk about the gameplay but Infinite's gameplay, while certainly fun, wasn't mindblowing or anything.

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

Spoiler

I find both games pretty overrated, though they are both good games. I find Bioshock Infinite decently better because of its setting. The Last of Us, while good, is just yet another zombie survival game in a sea of many. Its set in an apocalyptic near future like most zombie survival games, and it's story was pretty much a familiar Hollywood Blockbuster archetypal script slapped into a third person shooter with barely passable stealth elements. And the "human element" brought on by the story is weakened for me by the wildly unrealistic story involving Ellie. If TLOU is really made into a movie, then I don't think a movie when a 13 year old girl with little training is able to heal Joel from injuries due to him getting full-on impaled by a rusty, probably tetanus-laced bar and bleeding out for a good 10 minutes in a hostile battle zone.

That is ridiculous.

And the fact that that she's a stupidly good shot with a gun also throws reality out of wack. (Same criticism I have about Elena Fischer from Uncharted being a better shot than the gun toting murderous thugs even though she's a reporter with no military experience-_-)

This^ is why video games make horrible movies, because a lot of video games do things to make the game better to play with the player letting some logical fallacies slide. Translating that into film usually leave Hollywood having to plaster or completely change some story elements. If Hollywood or the game publisher's really cared, they'd get a director who isn't just one who makes Summer blockbusters and not rush making the damn movie. A lot of games have pretty weak stories that are given a pass due to gameplay as well as how much like a summer popcorn flick they are.

What got TLOU its praise was its story, which means the best part of the game is its cutscenes, not the gameplay itself. Rip out the cutscenes, and TLOU isn't anything new or exciting. Just a solid 7th gen 3rd person shooter with Hollywood elements, like most Naughty Dog titles as of late. TLOU reminds me heavily of the Road, the book and the movie but more so the movie. What hurts all the praise for TLOU for me is the fact that its stealth system was pretty poor. I shouldn't be able to smash a guy's face in while is buddy, less that 6 feet away, can't hear a damn thing.

Bioshock's gameplay isn't perfect either. I think @TheKasp covered its gameplay flaws perfectly in the 5th post in this thread.(TLDR, poor gunplay mechanics and lack of balance). That being said, its set pieces were epic and uncommon in gaming. It's story, while a bit up its own ass, was still a pretty good one, and the fact that Elizabeth doesn't annoy the hell out of you as an escort AI in a video game is a feat on its own. This is much better than how some of the companion AI in TLOU works.

But.

Outside the awesome setpeices, Bioshock Infinite is a pretty mediocre arcade shooter that, again, is mostly praised for its story and maybe a couple of cool gameplay elements.

We're going through a time in the gaming industry where Reviewers across the board are rating games almost solely on their story while ignoring game mechanics. Sometimes the reviews are opinion pieces that don't even mention gameplay at all(GTAV's Escapist review). Sometimes the review shows how little the reviewer obviously played the game before throwing it a perfect score or near perfect score when the game is clearly flawed(Dragon Age 2's Escapist and PC Gamer UK reviews).

Story over everything.

So as such, games with passable stories are getting high ratings and selling very well while not deserving the high ratings. This is a problem because its turning games from fun challenging tasks alongside great unique stories into Hollywood movies with as many mechanics tonplay the game for the player as possible. At least in AAA gaming.

IMO a lot of these character driven games are watered down and need to seriously make gameplay and stories that aren't just American movie archetypes a focus.

TLDR: Both are overrated, Bioshock Infinite I liked more because its world wasn't as saturated in the gaming world as TLOU. It's gameplay mechanics while not the best, also worked better.

 

[Feylynn]

I'm going to be "that guy" while I address something that bothers me.
To clarify, "over-rated" is something that is rated higher than the merit it possesses.
The merit something possesses is subjective and only measurable by the individual that personally regards the subject.
Thus, literally every thing in all of existence and all things both gone and yet to come are simultaneously Under-rated as well as Over-rated an equal sum of times as there is sentient beings who have come into contact with it.

Since that phrasing relies on knowing the average of other opinions in detail well enough to rate them by linear numbers I'm going to go out and say it's literally impossible to answer and assume you wondered "How do you personally feel about Bioshock Infinite and The Last of Us and which do you like more?"
[hr]
Last of Us: Is an uninteresting game with a cute though tired fatherhood story. They ask "What constitutes evil in an uncivilized land?" and it's fairly effectively delivered.

Bioshock Infinite: Is pretty much the opposite. Interesting game with more originality. It asks plenty of questions in so clumsy a manner I can only assume they intended it as parody of games that try and convey deeper meaning.

I side with Bioshock because it is actually compelling without any deeper meanings and the deeper meanings Last of Us claims to ponder have all means asked and answered before.
-Though both do their atmosphere well I'm again more a fan of the colorful and fantastic imagery of Bioshock.
-I find both protagonists absolutely hateful monsters.
-I think Last of Us wins for female lead, Elizabeth's best character moments were in trailers.

 

[Casual Shinji]

What got TLOU its praise was its story, which means the best part of the game is its cutscenes, not the gameplay itself. Rip out the cutscenes, and TLOU isn't anything new or exciting.

I've heard this statement many times, and it always baffles me. The story wasn't only in the cutscenes, the cutscenes were chapter intros and closings. You watch a compilation of the cutscenes from TLoU on youtube and it'll feel like just that; a compilation of story moments.

What got TLoU its praise was its strong characters and character interaction (among other things), the majority of which was presented within the gameplay. Without the gameplay all those fancy cutscenes have exactly zero weight.

 

[sXeth]

Well, on a point by point basis

Infinite had a much more interesting world to take place us in, vs Last of Us's regurgitated zombie apocalypse world.
Last of Us probably did characters overall better, at least you got the occasional likeable person there.

Infinite's gameplay was far more consistent and less schizophrenic in the type of game it wanted to be.
Last of Us offered more depth to its mechanics, but was inconsistent in whether it wanted to be a stealth, survival, or third-person shoot-em up action piece.

They were both incredibly weak in enemy variety, and suffered from the "Grimdark" style. Infinite perhaps did better explaining the Grey on Black morality, since everyone in Columbia was specifically extracted from a population, whereas Last of Us should have a reasonable mixture of assholes and normal people, but doesnt.

 

[unstabLized]

I think they're both really, really good. Like, really good. I don't think either is overrated, and they both deserve the praise they get. Bioshock Infinite is my favorite game, but I also played TLOU with a friend. It was amazing, maybe not from the story perspective since I somewhat found it predictable, but the adventure, the connection of characters. Kind of like The Walking Dead. The game has zombies, but it's not exactly ABOUT the zombies.

I would pick Bioshock over though, just because I loved pretty much everything about it. The setting, the characters, the story, the gameplay, it was just really fulfilling to me. I finished it about 7-8 times. You could argue with me that it wasn't as great as it seemed and you'd seem like you're talking to a brick wall

 

[RaikuFA]

Infinite was just a boring game. Seriously, it was CoD with magic. I was so excited to play it but then it just bored me. Shoot guys, get ammo shoot more. Run out of salts after one vigor use.

That frat house visit ruined this game.