A man is sent to the flying city of Columbia to find a missing girl. However, upon arrival he discovers that the city, its people, and his objective are all not what they seem. The year is 1912, deep in debt, ex-Pinkerton agent Booker DeWitt is sent to the mysterious flying city of Columbia to find and retrieve a young woman imprisoned in a tower since birth - Elizabeth and to "Bring us the girl and wipe away the debt". However, almost as soon as Booker arrives, he finds that Columbia and its people are not quite what they seem, and all too soon science, religion, morality, family and life all clash and spiral down into utter chaos, with Booker and Elizabeth as unlikely partners in the midst of all the action. Visuals: 10/10 Amazing and eye watering, not because it's so bright and shiny, cos it's so damn beautiful. The day's so bright, that if it were the same outside your house right now, you would most definitely SEE the daylight! Attention to details is also impressive. The reflection of various objects can be seen in the water, which also looks B-E-A-UTIFUL! The ocean has this dark blue hue which gives you the right impression of a stormy and grim scene. But up in the floating city of Columbia, the water just reflects the beautiful sky blue which makes it so mesmerizing to just stare at it for all day long. The deep red hue of blood from whenever you bleed is almost realistic, but however the blood doesn't look as realistic as it does on your enemies. Animation: 8/10 Pretty good, the animations are almost realistic, how the enemies get shot at and how the automaton reacts when it gets electrocuted, your hand movement when you use the crank gun. Elizabeth's facial expressions are also pretty realistic, plus it puts all of her emotions into you, makes you feel like you're actually in the game (not just playing it). The sky rail riding is all just simply great. Audio: 9/10 The voices of characters are great. Troy Baker does a wonderful job with the protagonist, Booker Dewitt's voice and Courtney Draper's voicing for Elizabeth is so sweet, it almost lulls you into falling in love with her(Elizabeth, but Courtney's not bad too.) Also, the sounds of the engines and machines and automatons and gunshots are pretty realistic. Music: 9/10 This game is one of the few games like Skyrim which have a brilliant and sweet Soundtrack that makes me listen to it in my own leisure. Even though I am pretty critical at music in games, i feel i can't complain at all. However, sometimes the music isn't dramatic when it needs to be like in certain combat situations unlike games like Skyrim and the Arkham Series. Gameplay: 9/10 Although First Person Action games give me a bit of a headache because of the way the camera moves when you get bumped over, this game was pretty nice to play. Barely any usability of stealth in this game. Combat is better than other Bioshocks as you can carry two guns of any type now, not just one big and one small. Also the sky-line attack is pretty cool! And when you're low on ammo, health or salts, Elizabeth will provide you with your needs during combat. You can have Elizabeth bring in some objects to help you fight from other alternate universes using tears(a magical portal to another universe) but only in set places, and only one at a time. This is really helpful. Although, i have to admit, I wasn't impressed with the different vigors. Dishonored had better magic. However some of them get better and are really Awesome when you upgrade it. Storyline: 10/10 The best part of this game. Total gameplay time is pretty short, but don't get me wrong, the story is really Interesting and Deep. But if you're the guy who just wants to finish the game and get it over with, you wouldn't be able to get all the tiny Easter egg audio files which let you in on the history and certain truths of the city, which is pretty vital for you to understand the ending. The ending, however, makes you think. With all the possibilities of various and innumerable alternate realities, it makes you wonder about alternate endings, sadly this is no Mass Effect type of storyline pattern, but is still amazing, as you can draw your own conclusions from it, like "American Psycho"'s or "Shining"'s ending. It makes you think about what could have happened or done to prevent all the wrong, what life would have been for our guilty and sad protagonist's life if he didn't do that one thing that made his life miserable and full of remorse. Also pay attention to every detail in the game, not just because it's beautiful, but because it's really important to understand the storyline, Right from the Beginning! Characters: 10/10 But Booker Dewitt is also an interesting character. He is a sad, grim and the kind of guy that would even lie to you to get his job done, but how his nature changes as the game goes on and how his bond with Elizabeth changes as well is pretty interesting. Elizabeth is also an amazing character, possibly the best in the game. She is full of emotion and filled with a sense of innocence. She is also really caring, loving and curious. She is also pretty skilled with abilities like lock picking and opening up tears. Zachary Hale Comstock is also the type of character that makes you so angry for what he has done. Yet, one will definitely feel blown away when they discover the truth about him in he ending. Other characters like Daisy Fitzroy and Fink are pretty interesting as they tell you about the backstory of the wonderful city of Columbia. The twins are also a pleasant surprise with their various nuances that stumble onto you in the game. Also they're dialogues are pretty important for the storyline and their sudden appearances and disappearances are pretty creepy at times. Old Elizabeth is also something dreadful, that is, when you visit the future of an ugly alternate universe, or who knows, all the universes may lead to the same ending. You feel sorry for her, and i guess she is right "Time rots hope." That's why Booker has to go back to the past and make the change to prevent it, but will he ever be able prevent it, or worse, even if he does, will it lead to a happy ending? MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD<br/><br/>Having just finished my first (and probably only) play-through I tend to agree with some of the more "negative" reviews out there:<br/><br/><ul><li>The main characters are very interesting and well written.</li></ul><br/><br/><ul><li>The story is intriguing and is told brilliantly.</li></ul><br/><br/><ul><li>At first glance, the game's universe is absolutely stunning. Well, universe may be too generous a word, since we're not talking about a whole world to explore but rather "just" a city. But I'm sure I'm not the only one to have wandered around Columbia during the first 30 minutes, just to do some "sightseeing". And I'm probably also not the only one whose jaw dropped when the city showed its true, errr, colors. </li></ul><br/><br/>But (and this is a big "but")…<br/><br/>a masterpiece it is not. <br/><br/>Just like in the first Bioshock, we get great looking levels, art direction, design, story and characters. But that's not enough to make it a masterpiece. After all: This is a *game* we're talking about, not a movie. It sorta reminds me of the better "interactive movies" from the early days of CD-ROM drives .. like "Rebel Assault". Yes: They looked and sounded incredible (for their time) … but the gameplay and interaction were nothing to write home about. Rebel Assault was not much more than a glorified shooting gallery and interaction in Bioshock is limited to a lot of presses of the "use"-button to rummage through trashcans and to advance the plot. Thus, when the novelty factor of the pretty visuals wears off, game like these lose a lot of appeal. <br/><br/>Plus: Why did they decide to punish us with that *stupid* save-point-system? I want to save whenever *I* choose in a shooter. Oh, and where's the auto-map? Those two are standard since the very first 1st person shooters (even Doom had an auto-map, IIRC). Bioshock 1 also had both, while "Infinite" has neither. Instead we get a "go this way to your current goal, stupid"-kind of arrow, which makes the game feel even more like an interactive movie/story book with limited player involvement. Like much of the levels, the game's story feels like it's running on rails.<br/><br/>And then there's the big one: The fact that the world doesn't really hold up to closer inspection. Like I said before: It all looks great at first, but when you really think about it, the city of Columbia doesn't make sense and it doesn't feel alive. Citizens will speak to you and each other, yes, but they mostly just give a quick sentence or two and after that remain silent and usually immobile. Compare that to the cities of the old "GTA San Andreas", where people were walking around, living their daily lives. Stopping at a corner for a chat with each other and actually reacting to the player character and his actions (or inaction) or even to things happening in the world that had nothing to do with the player. None of this happens in Columbia. In fact, once the shooting starts, civilians simply vanish from the area, never to return. Or what about the weird rules of what is and isn't theft? In some areas, you can simply pick up any item you can get your hands on, in others this will be judged as theft and everyone will become hostile - even if you only use the possession-vigor on a vending machine. <br/><br/>And speaking of Vigors: The game hints at why and how they came to Columbia.. but their presence doesn't make a lot of sense. Who would want to buy them in this city? Why would the authorities even allow such dangerous stuff to be sold freely? And why would a society that's obsessed with "racial purity" even want a substance that alters your DNA? Wouldn't the very narrow-mindedness and religiousness of Columbia's society mean that people who use Vigors would be regarded as freaks and abominations? Plus we don't actually see any citizens using them, the only NPCs who do are high ranking enemies. So why are these things even here? I guess because this is a Bioshock-game and we have to have superpowers in it - as a consequence, the Vigors and everything relating to them (like advertisements) felt stapled on and like a half-assed attempt to inject more Bioshock-DNA into the game (pardon the pun). <br/><br/>Don't get me wrong: I enjoyed both Bioshock and Infinite immensely. But both are by no means perfect shooters. For the next installment, maybe they should concentrate a bit more on producing memorable gameplay and a more interactive environment instead of "just" making the characters, design and story memorable. The settings of both games (Rapture and Columbia) literally scream for an open-world type of game in which we can explore those two fascinating cities with more liberty.<br/><br/>88/100 from me.<br/><br/>S.
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295 weeks ago