Bioshock Infinite gets a whole lot of things right in making a game. Not just from a video game standpoint, from an artistic standpoint. The game has a masterful story, amazing graphics and sound, a beautiful and fantastic setting, and phenomenal gameplay. The game hits quite a few right notes, but does make me wonder about some of the choices that the developer made while making the game.
The first thing that you'll notice when playing Bioshock Infinite is how similar the opening is to the original Bioshock. This didn't detract from the overall look of the game, but it's still an interesting point to think about. The second thing that you'll notice is how absolutely gorgeous the game is. Upon my first look at Columbia I actually stopped moving and just stared at what was around me. The world is incredibly detailed, with some terrific lighting work done. While I was walking through the city of Columbia, I truly felt that I was wandering through a fully developed city. It looked and felt like the utopia that it was supposed to be. The characters looked incredibly lifelike and moved very fluidly. I only noticed some slight graphical issues, such as some framerate hiccups and an occasional very odd pause to load while a lot was happening on screen towards the end of the game. The engine handles the combat and scores of action fairly well otherwise.
In the sound department, Bioshock is perfect. Character voices are incredible, with high praise to the twin characters. The back and forth between Booker and Elizabeth throughout the campaign is great and by the end I actually felt attached to Elizabeth. The voxophone recordings that you listen to during the campaign are remarkably clear, but take a backseat when more important story based dialogue starts up. Weapons sound respectably like their real world counter-parts. Even the background characters and enemies have some great voice work to them.
While not going too heavily into the story of the game, I will say that Irrational crafted an amazing narrative. I was kept guessing up to the end. The original objective takes on a whole new meaning by the time you view the ending. The middle section of the game does falter a touch, placing you at the heart of a civil war between the Founders and the Vox Populi. Some interesting themes from the early 1900's are explored, such as national pride, religion, racism, and segregation. These all come together to help move the story along, but also help the player get a glimpse into life in Columbia.
Playing through Infinite is where things got fairly interesting. First off, the powers are called vigors now, not plasmids. There are two sets of weapons to use, the Founder weapons and the Vox weapons. The mechanics work just fine; moving and shooting are very tight and the other controls are extremely responsive. You gain a shield ability, and a vigor that also acts as a shield, and you can only carry two weapons at a time. While these are standard conventions for most shooters now, they just felt a little wrong in Infinite. The weapon and vigor upgrade systems were fairly basic and while I never had enough money to fully upgrade everything (lets face it, there are way too many guns for that to happen) I did have enough to fully upgrade my favorite weapons and vigors.
Another complaint I had was the length and pacing of the game itself. The beginning and ending sections are awesome, but the middle just seems to drag on a bit. There are a lot of backtracking quest lines in the middle portion of the story, which feel like Irrational was trying to artificially inflate the length of the campaign. I managed to get the game beat in around thirteen hours or so, but I spent a lot of time exploring and backtracking to make sure I got everything I could before continuing.
Games like this shine in their replayability though, and Bioshock Infinite offers a very great replay value. Upping the difficulty will add a lot of time to your game depending on your overall skill. I played on medium and there were several sections I don't want to play on a harder difficulty because I barely made it through. There are also a number of weapons and vigors to experiment with, so if nothing else play the game again but use different equipment. Another great thing about replaying the game is that you know where the story is going. Looking at the experience a second time adds a lot of additional perspective and helps to bring some things together that were confusing the first time. Additionally, the game is entirely single player. There is no unnecessary, tacked on multiplayer suite to artificially extend the life of the game. Thank you Irrational Games!
Several new additions have been made to the combat of Bioshock Infinite. A new item called gear has been added. Gear comes in four classes (Hat, Shirt, Pants, Shoes) and each piece has a different ability. Combining these with the various upgrades you get to your abilities makes for some great combat ideas. Sky lines are another new mechanic that allow you to fly around the area at breakneck speeds and drop down on enemies, or you can choose to shoot them while moving around. There are also freight hooks to grapple onto, and inter-dimensional tears that Elizabeth can open up to call in anything from health kits to automated turrets. All of these add some very interesting dynamics to combat, but to compensate, there are a lot more enemies to fight. There were several times while playing that I actually had to pause for a second to get my bearings as to what was going on. This was especially true when Handymen were involved in the fights.
Bioshock Infinite is a fantastic, story driven game. Gameplay is great, and the story is top notch. If not for some strange design choices, I think this could have seriously been a perfect game. I definitely think that anyone who considers themselves a gamer should pick this game up and experience it. Bioshock Infinite earns a 9/10.
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