Bioshock Infinite

[DANGERMAN]

The downside to PC so far is that it has crashed on me about 4 or 5 times. Haven't lost much progress but it's not a good thing.

Also, yes, I've been looking at everything.

didn't see this bit before. I've not heard of it having a problem with crashing so I suspect it might be your laptop overheating. You've not had it long so it's probably not dust or anything, it's probably just the cpu/gpu getting too hot

Or apparently a few people are having problems, I found this on gaf

For those having constant freezing/crashing problems:

Download NvidiaInspector and raise the voltage by around .025 volts, or two notches. The voltage on my card was at 0.987 and I raised it two notches to 1.025. The game was crashing every 10-40 minutes for me but after doing this, I just played for three straight hours with zero issues.

[Craymen Edge]

Whenever a Handyman turns up in this game I'm reminded of just how shit gaming can be... the game degenerates into a cycle of die, respawn, die, respawn... utter frustration.

The combat in general just isn't very good.

They are a bit tough to fight because of how quickly they close you down, but no doubt someone somewhere will be boasting about destroying them without taking damage. I died a few times the first time I fought one, but after that I evolved a strategy using the the skylines to get distance and pepper him with RPGs or other heavy weapons.

The most frustrating combat for me was

the 'ghost' of Lady Comstock - basically the same fight 3 or 4 times.

Other than that, I really enjoyed the combat most of the time. I liked taking out a couple of guys, causing some havock with possession or a few traps then getting out of there via hooks and sky lines, re-stocking and going back at them from another angle.

I finished it in the early hours this morning. That ending is fucking nuts.

[DANGERMAN]

I've just done that fight, it's so out of place, which considering what else is going on is a bit of an odd thing to say I guess. Fortunately my powered up fire attack and my maxed out shotgun for the person in question were unexpectedly effective

I don't know if this an issue on the consoles or just a pc 'treat', but the depth of field effect can be a bit of a ballache in combat. I'd rather be able to see who or what is firing at me than have lots of bloom and blur tbh

[DANGERMAN]

just finished it, I think it's a better game overall than the first game, but Columbia isn't as interesting as Rapture, and there was only one area that was anything like as unsettling and creepy (which they may not have been going for tbf). It's too creaky and predictable to deserve the insane praise it's got, but what it does right is enough to make it interesting. It can get a bit bewildering at times, but no where near as confused as the trailers made it look.

When I think back to the previews and stuff, when press got an hour with it and came back creaming their pants, I'm struggling to pick out what they would have played. I don't think any of it is particularly jaw dropping, but then there's things from the trailers that aren't in the game, or have been changed, so maybe they played something that got removed. It'll be interesting to see what the dlc is going to be, I don't feel the urge to go back for more stories like I wanted from Rapture, but equally there's a fuller world to explore in Columbia

I clocked that Booker was Comstock as you get to the airship, I also guessed that the 2 scientists were involved and that he somehow knew Elizabeth (and was probably her father), but the ending few minutes was really well done. Except the very end, I didn't get why they couldn't just stop Booker from being born again, for all the good he'd done he deserved to live, and it seemed a bit weird that Elizabeth was so ready to kill him.

I guess one of the dlc could be how Booker became Comstock, I know he was baptised, but there's still a bit of a walk from there to harnessing the power of quantum physics to create a floating city and becoming a tyrant

[Craymen Edge]

I clocked that Booker was Comstock as you get to the airship, I also guessed that the 2 scientists were involved and that he somehow knew Elizabeth (and was probably her father), but the ending few minutes was really well done. Except the very end, I didn't get why they couldn't just stop Booker from being born again, for all the good he'd done he deserved to live.

It seems he might have done. If you skipped the credits, you missed this:

[DANGERMAN]

I was right near to the end or them before clicking out of boredom

[Sambob]

That ending was nuts. Im still trying to look for evidence that it means something else, and Ben I agree with what you said, just do it another way, it was all a bit muddled in the end and was so promising. Lots of misdirection with you going to that place

rapture

and im still not sure if theres more of a link with that than is initially revealed. The problem with the way its ended is that literally anything could have, and could still happen, but maybe that will be in the DLC.

As much as I loved the game, there were too many flawed moments for it to be a super duper dead cert 10, but its the same problem as the first one and its reviews, this game does a lot of exemplary things.

[Sambob]

Thinking more about the ending and reading a few things, its much more clever than I had initially spotted, although still leaves a few gaps or possibly tenuous links but again its hard to know if they are gaps or parts that are intentionally vague. Im glad I got through it all in one weekend because id like to play through it again but I know I won't get that period if time to do so. Id like to play through all three to test one or two theories of how they could fit together but im sure some internet dude will do it and clarify the links.

[Hendo]

Got a couple of free days tomorrow and Friday so hope to have it finished soon.

I've just come out of the police station after it "changed".

[Sambob]

Rob Florence's thoughts on the game, in my mind perfectly sums up one of the games greatest strengths whilst at the same time justifying some of the high scores in relativity to the kind of game it is (eg linearity, FPS etc). Its got a few major plot spoilers, so dont read until youve finished the game:

http://effingarcade.tumblr.com/

[Hendo]

I have no real idea what to write here about the end, or even what I think of it. I guess the "Infinite" name is just?

I did see some of it coming. I did guess that DeWitt and Comstock were the same person but I couldn't figure out how that would work out.

As I understand it....

DeWitt fought as a soldier and to wipe away his sins (some of which for being a coward) he was "reborn" under a new name of Comstock. Rose to fame and money and built Columbia.

Because he was sterile from messing about with tears and playing games with physics, he wanted an heir so he got the female Lutece to contact the male Lutece (not actually brother and sister? Are they different versions of the same person?) who is in the same universe as a different version of Booker to take his daughter and Comstock would absolve Booker's debt.

What I don't understand is how that ended up with someone telling the Booker we start as to rescue the girl and bring her to New York. Is that a different universe again? Or is that Booker telling himself to get her back?

There's meant to be a Giant Bomb spoiler cast for this coming soon, I'd really love to hear it discussed fully.

[Hendo]

Someone on rllmuk has posted what sounds like a pretty accurate writing of events. Do not open the spoiler unless you have finished!

1. Booker participates in the massacre of the Sioux at Wounded Knee and is traumatised by the experience. He may or may not have been part-Sioux himself; we do know from Preston that he speaks Sioux, and that his commander nicknamed him the "White Indian". It seems Booker reacted by being particularly vicious at Wounded Knee in order to gain acceptance from his colleagues.

2. Booker considers baptism as a means of escaping his sin. In one universe (* Booker refuses, believing that a baptism cannot erase sin. In another universe © Booker accepts the baptism and is "born again" as Comstock. Comstock and Booker both reflect on their actions at Wounded Knee (though nobody remembers Comstock being there since he assumed a new identity, Comstock reflects on his time at Wounded Knee in one of his voice records). It is possible that in a third universe (d), Booker never even goes to a baptism.

Events occuring in each universe will be designated as (* © or (d).

3b. Without Christianity to "absolve" him, Booker continues down a "morally bankrupt" path. He works as a Pinkerton thug and private investigator. He resorts to gambling and drinking as a means to escape his past.

4b. Despite his ugly state, Booker still finds a wife. Perhaps his wife was a positive force in his life. Either way, his wife dies giving birth to their daughter Anna. His wife's death drives him into a cycle of depression, drinking, and gambling. The debt piles up quickly and the collectors demand payment. Booker is unable to pay and likely to be killed.

5b. Only one man is willing to settle Booker's debt. It is the male Lutece. He seeks an opportunity to join the female version of himself in Columbia and assisting Comstock in obtaining a genetic daughter (to fulfill the prophecy) appears to be the only way to do so. He conspires with his quantum "twin" and Comstock to obtain Booker's daughter, using Comstock's vast wealth to settle the debt and using Lutece's desire to be united in order to motivate them.

6b. "Bring us the girl and wipe away the debt." In a moment of weakness, Booker gives in and sells his daughter. He quickly regrets this act and attempts to retrieve her. He fails as Comstock makes his way back to Columbia with his daughter. However his interference results in Anna's pinky being severed as the Lutece rift closes. This "splits" Anna between two universes and appears to be the cause of her powers.

7b. Booker carves his daughter's initials into his hand as penance for his latest sin. He spends many years riddled by guilt, hidden away in his office. Eventually a new rift is opened by the Luteces and Booker steps through into Comstock's universe at the beginning of the game.

~~~

3c. As a born-again Christian, the renamed Comstock sets about creating a city in the sky. He enlists the aid of a female physicist named Lutece to accomplish this endeavor. He quickly gains much attention and followers through his endeavors.

4c. Columbia is created and Comstock leads Columbia as American's "finest city". However, Columbia intervenes in the Boxer Rebellion and kills countless Chinese. The U.S. government attempts to "recall" the city and Comstock responds by declaring secession from the USA.

5c. Now in a heated tension with the US, Comstock believes that the US has strayed from its path/mission and become a place of great sin. Comstock receives a prophecy that it is his "seed" that will essentially bring about the next apocalypse by raining fire on the land below and having Columbia serve as the next "ark". The prophecy presumably comes from a tear, showing a vision of a future where he has a daughter who ascends his throne. However it is merely a probable version of events, not THE version of events. Similarly, at some point he sees that Booker will come to reclaim Elizabeth, and sets up the 'False Shepherd' mythos.

6c. Lutece has been using her quantum discoveries to open keep the city afloat and to open rifts to other universes. These experiments have prematurely aged Comstock and rendered him sterile, and he is unable to conceive the "prophecy child" with Lady Comstock. He turns to Lutece to find a solution. Female Lutece has been opening rifts and believes she has a solution. Perhaps as a form of "wish fulfillment", she opens a rift into Booker's universe and makes contact with a version of herself - a male Lutece. She wishes for her "brother" to join her and a solution is reached for all parties where male Lutece will retrieve a genetic child for Comstock and come to Columbia.

7c. Comstock and male Lutece bring Anna to Columbia. Male Lutece is apprehensive about travelling through the tear, but does so anyway. He subsequently suffers the same physical/mental effects that Booker does in the game, as he does not 'belong' there. Lady Comstock suspects adultery with female Lutece. Comstock declares this a "miracle" child that was conceived in just one week and christens the child "Elizabeth".Comstock has his wife killed in order to secure the secret of his child, and pins it on Daisy Fitzroy. Anna is gifted with tremendous power and sealed away until she can be bent to her father's will. Comstock also gets Fink to tamper with a tear machine in order to kill the Luteces and protect his secret. However they are not truly killed, but are instead zapped out of existence in that universe. They subsequently gain the power to move freely through space and time.

8c. 17 years pass. The Lutece "twins", have a disagreement. Perhaps feeling guilt for his role in abducting a child to another universe, or fearing for the future that will occur as a result of Elizabeth remaining in Comstock's custody (depression at Booker 'abandoning' her, burning of New York in 1984, presumed end of the world), or maybe simply recognizing that Elizabeth's rifts are the universe's way of expressing that Elizabeth doesn't belong in this universe (due to the severed finger remaining in Booker (*b)'s universe) - the male Lutece has demanded that Elizabeth be returned home.Female Lutece is sceptical it will work but eventually agrees to go along with the plan.

9c. Elizabeth is sealed away however and her powers are siphoned. The "twins" decide that the only way to bring Elizabeth home is to close the "infinite loop" that has been created by Comstock taking Booker b)'s daughter. Only Elizabeth has the power to reach the place where the loop was created (it appears to require not just a simple time travel in one universe, but a convergent time travel, bringing all the possible post-baptism universes back to the point where they split, just prior to Booker's baptism. Only the 'enlightened' Elizabeth has the power to achieve this). Booker will ultimately be needed for the closure. So, they create a rift back into Booker (b)'s universe (Columbia doesn't even exist there, which is why he's never heard of it) and bring him into Comstock's © universe. This shift into a universe with "himself" disrupts his memories, and new ones are created to make sense of the world and his new mission. Booker draws on the traumatic memory of losing his daughter to create these new memories whereby the Pinkertons have tasked him to return Elizabeth to New York. "Bring us the girl and wipe away the debt."

10c. Booker comes to Columbia and ultimately rescues Elizabeth from her fate as the "next Comstock" that will bring about the end of the world. In all alternate attempts, Songbird always stops Booker or he is killed along the way. It is only when Booker is transported into the 1980s version of that universe, meeting Old Elizabeth and subsequently warning Young Elizabeth how to control Songbird, that he manages to succeed. However, Elizabeth will never truly escape her fate as long as the "infinite" loops exists with infinite variations of her, Comstock, the city, and Songbird. They can kill Comstock in this universe, but there are still infinite other Elizabeths to suffer. The only way to close the loop is to stop the Booker/Comstock divergence from occurring. Once the siphon is destroyed and Elizabeth gains enlightenment and the power to create tears once more, the path is set: all the successful Bookers and all the Elizabeths touring the lighthouses will converge at the baptism. Some of her "infinite" copies join her (there may be so few as the chances of Booker successfully rescuing her are remote, and in most other universes he dies along the way). They join to drown Booker during the baptism. This wipes out all variants of universe © and closes the loop. It also possibly wipes out all variants of universe ( too, but this is debatable.

11b/c. Booker dies in the water at his baptism. Therefore Comstock never rises ©. The infinite cities all cease to exist, as do the Elizabeths and the Songbirds. The timeline seen post-credits is either Booker ( (having refused the baptism he still exists, but now there is no Comstock to snatch his daughter), or it is a new Booker (d) who never attended a baptism in the first place.

~~~

3d.

The "non baptism" universe and all its derivatives remain intact and hence we see Booker back in his office after the credits with his daughter. Now there can be no interference from the "Comstock universes" and thus at least in one universe he will be with his daughter (although whether that constitutes a happy ending is highly debatable, given his issues).

[Sambob]

In one of the vox things ( and the scene where their graves are being dug) you know that Comstock fucked the Letuce's over (has them killed) because they along with Lady comstock knew about Elizabeth not being her rightful heir. So its inferred from this and the fact that they had a big hand in taking Dewitt's daughter away, that they decide to try and put things right. Something about stopping the end of the universe or multiverse too, but im not really sure about that. Lots of theories are largely based on inference and assumption for some things. Yeah the Letuces are the same person from different universes.

[Sambob]

One of the better accounts of proceedings that Ive read, Hendo, but my biggest problem with all of it is that:

the whole point of the series is that each choice creates alternative universes, so surely another alternative one would be created where booker doesnt accept the baptism. Unless again the inference is that he always accepts it as some parts of the story are shown to always happen, like the coin you flip at the start of the game always being heads, and every universe where a comstock is created ending up with taking anna/ elizabeth.

The thing I want to have more understanding of is the link between Bioshock and Infinite. As I understand it, the idea is that they are bioth versions of the same story, a little bit like the idea is with the Legend of Zelda, with it being the same story, with certain fixed elements, like Link, and the Triforce etc. The key line in Infinite is where Elizabeth says at the end 'theres always a man, a lighthouse, and a city' but again, so many themes are flying around at the end of Infinite with very little to actually build or base the theories on.

Still, amazing game and for the way it makes you feel at the end, it has to be worthy of high praise. Things I kept noticing like the choice of song that

they choose to be in the game from the future tears. And the way that you could trace songbird to the big daddies because Fink probably saw it through a tear, each character's story and thought are so well planned out.

[Hendo]

Thinking a lot about the choice of music in the game.....

The songs they pick are genius for the way the lyrics weave with the story. God Only Knows, Mad World, Will The Circle Be Unbroken.

[Sambob]

Presumably you meant

everybody wants to rule the world, rather than mad world

. Will let you off this one, but im sure you will feel sufficiently bad in yourself so as to serve as the most severe of punishments.

[Hendo]

Bah, my choice would've made more sense.

"All around are me are familiar faces.....when people run in circles it's a very, very mad world".

[spatular]

really interesting reading all that stuff about the ending above ^. i finished it last night, and while i did guess

you might be comstock, i had no idea about Elizabeth being your daughter.

but i had no idea how it would all fit together really, just picked up on a few bits from the recordings i found.

about the music, early on i thought some of it sounded like it was from o brother where art though...

specifically the down in the river to prey music/bit which turns out to be very similar to a bit in the game

also i remember from really early in the game (so not a big spoiler):

you're told a certain number is bad luck or something like that, then you pick that number in the lottery thing, you'd think he might try to make an exit before the draw or something.

also the choice between the

bird and cage - anyone know what that was all about?

edit - seems like this ^ was mentioned on the first page and it doesn't really do anything...

really enjoyed the game overall because of the graphics and interesting story, and how that story is delivered is really good too, but thought the combat was pretty average, and the game was giving me motion sickness.

[retroed]

Just finished this. Mind blown at the ending.

[wholehole]

Loved this game, every single second of it.

I've been a little disappointed since finishing it hearing people rallying against the game and the praise that's been heaped on it. Most of the criticisms come from things that are absolutely necessary for it function as a game. One of the main gripes was how Elizabeth can go from emotional dialogue to OOH SHINY in a matter of seconds. It's a little jarring, certainly. Along the same lines, how she can suddenly appear behind you and throw you Salts or Ammo where none previously appeared. It's a game, plain and simple. I think it's a very elegant and predictable way of nudging the player down a more offensive path.

The other thing I've heard a lot about is how the enemies ignore her completely and just focus on you. This is explained in game. The guys you're fighting want to capture her for one reason or another, not kill her. You're The False Shepard, you're the big bad as far as the people of Columbia are concerned. You're Public Enemy No.1. And besides, if it weren't for that, the whole game would be one long escort quest and nobody wants that. Nobody.

Is it game of the year material? Certainly. A shoo-in? Probably not, it's only April.