I played BioShock on my PS3. In terms of graphical fidelity and hardware limits, well, this is the game that has fully demonstrated how old these consoles really are. The art style and graphical direction of the game are magnificent. The bland and at times simplistic textures are not. There are moments of clipping and pop-in as well. At times the animations can get a bit choppy and there can be framerate slow down when there are multiple enemies on the screen. Basically, Columbia is a very bright and colourful world that seems vast and really exudes a spirit of openness (quite the opposite of Rapture, by the way). It’s when you look closer that all of the cracks and flaws in the visual execution of this world become hard not to notice. The PC version blows the consoles out of the water, but that version was held back so that it could be developed inline with the console version. The good news is that even though certain moments of the game lack visual polish, it doesn’t detract from the immersion of the environment. You will almost certainly get lost in the clouds of Columbia.

Booker’s companion Elizabeth makes for arguably one of the greatest AI’s ever programmed. You will never have to worry about taking care of her or about her getting in your way during intense firefights. She will often assist you during combat by tossing you ammo, health and salts. She can also alter the layout of a combat area to your will using her dimensional portal-opening abilities. She can create a flying gun turret or a wall of cover. Perhaps, you’d rather have a powerful weapon, or a stash of medkits or salts.

Once Elizabeth was established at my side, any period of separation from her was noticeable. Over our time together, Elizabeth’s expressive performances elicited everything from fear to sympathy and even guilt. I was compelled to protect her because of the emotional depth she provided and the fact that she was always helpful to the quest. Elizabeth always added something by her presence, and she never took anything away.

I actually don’t want to get into the technical mechanics of the game much more than that. I could talk about the controls or the quality of the sound effects and the score but those topics have been covered on all the reviews. This isn’t a review piece; it’s just my thoughts and opinions of the game. Most importantly, it is my interpretation of the culmination of the plot. I do plan to spoil pretty much everything because the game has been out long enough now. If you have not yet finished the game then READ NO FURTHER. Please, for your own good, not mine. You will not want to have any portion of this game ruined for you.

I’m going to jump right to the end of the game since that’s where much of the story finally takes some concrete shape. There are three major reveals at the end of the game. The first being that there are an infinite number of universes that exist or a multi-verse if you prefer. The second revelation is that your character, Booker DeWitt, is in actuality also the main antagonist of the game, Zachary Comstock. The final revelation is that Elizabeth is actually Booker’s daughter and her real name is Anna DeWitt.

Now there are many questions created by these revelations and much of it is open to interpretation. That is what I truly love about the way this ending was done. It expected a lot out of you as the player. It didn’t spoon-feed you any information and I must say I found that to be so very refreshing. It is wonderful when a game challenges you to think about the actions that led up to the consequences in an ending. I love how much of the story was weaved throughout the game in the form of Voxophones or simple NPC interactions. How much or how little of the story you discovered was entirely up to you. If you spent your time going through every nook and cranny of Columbia, then you might have found the culmination of the plot rewarding. Or you might not have. I’m certainly not saying that the ending should be considered universally pleasing. Personally, I found it to be thought provoking and rewarding. I was very happy that I took my time going through the game at a slow pace. Without further adieu, here is my understanding of the ending of the game.

The primary theme hammered home right from the beginning is, “Bring us the girl, wipe away the debt”. Now, that on its own seems benign enough at the beginning, typical videogame fare really. Search for and rescue the damsel in distress and receive your reward. It isn’t until the end that the theme becomes retroactively much more enthralling and even dark. The revelation that Elizabeth is actually your own daughter, Anna DeWitt, gives the whole theme of the game real shape and depth. The idea that you, as Booker DeWitt, could have incurred a debt so great that you would even consider selling your own daughter?! If that isn’t the mark of a desperate man, with a twisted moral compass then I’m not sure what is. Speaking of a mark, this also explains why it is that Booker bears the mark of AD on his hand. It was an act of penance he committed on himself, branding his daughters initials on his hand, so that he would never forget. He also would never be able to forgive himself. This lack of self-forgiveness plays a key role in many of Booker’s future actions.

It all began with the battle of Wounded Knee. Booker was wracked with guilt because of the actions he took during the battle. There was no glory in being forced to slaughter the enemy, for he was a true solider. Even though Booker did take trophies of the enemy and was given a nickname glorifying his killing prowess, his guilt was ever-present throughout his Army days. It was all simply a part of his regrettable past, a past that would foster the creation of Zachary Comstock. After the battle of Wounded Knee, Booker continued to struggle with his inner demons. It was this struggle that led him to attend a baptism. There at this baptism he was forgiven for all of his sins and he took his new Christian name, Zachary Comstock.

However, in one particular universe Booker rejected the baptism. This is the primary universe that Booker Dewitt exists in, but it is not the universe where the game occurs. Booker doesn’t see how a simple dunk in the river can absolve him of all the sins he has committed. In this universe Booker moves forward and has his child, Anna DeWitt. Tragically Booker’s wife dies during the childbirth. Now Booker is dealing with the grief over his past and the grief of loosing his wife, coupled with the stress of becoming a single father. All of these factors lead him to continue down his dark path, which ends in gambling and substance addiction. This is where the great debt that he owes is created.

In the closest alternate version of this universe, Zachary Comstock, also known as The Prophet, has created his own religion of sorts. It is in this reality that he first encounters Rosalind Lutece, a genius physicist who had been experimenting with manipulating quantum fields. Rosalind had successfully created a machine that could create tears in the universe. This led to Rosalind discovering a man named Robert Lutece, who is an alternate version of herself. He was also performing similar quantum experiments in Booker’s universe. Robert was then retrieved into Rosalind’s universe, through the use of her machine, and they started to consider themselves “twins”. Comstock believed that the machine created by the twins showed a window into the future, despite their insistence that it was not so. Comstock’s extensive use of this machine allowed him to open more tears, which he used to see even more visions of the future. He saw that in order for Columbia to continue to flourish, he would need an heir to take his place. However, due to his overuse of the machine he discovered that he had been rendered infertile.

Comstock could not fathom his life ending without an heir. In one of the tears, he saw a version of himself (Booker DeWitt) that had a daughter. He ordered Robert to return to his own reality and find Booker DeWitt. By this point in his life Booker had spiraled deep into alcoholism and gambling debt. Comstock ordered Robert to offer to wipe away Booker’s debts in exchange for Booker’s infant daughter, Anna DeWitt. Booker, seemingly with little alternative, agreed to this steepest of prices and reluctantly gave Anna to Robert.

Booker was immediately regretful of his decision, and he tracked Robert down. He found them in an alleyway preparing to pass through a tear back into Comstock’s universe. Booker tried his best to stop Comstock from taking Anna through the tear, but Comstock managed to escape with her. During the struggle, the tear closed prematurely and this caused a portion of Anna’s right pinkie finger to be sliced off. Many years of regret followed for Booker and he eventually branded his hand with AD, so as to never forget his sins.

After these events transpired, Rosalind and Robert saw the future of Columbia using their machine and what Elizabeth would become. They devised a plan to prevent this future from transpiring. They wanted to take Elizabeth from Comstock and return her to her rightful universe. However, Comstock soon discovered their treachery and ordered the sabotage of their machine. Although he believed this would kill the twins; that is not what occurred. In reality, the sabotage caused the Lutece twins to exist across all space and time. This gave them the ability to appear wherever and whenever they wanted. Still determined to stop Comstock, they devised a plan to send Booker to Columbia to retrieve his long lost daughter, as a form of redemption for both sides.

They chose to appear at Booker’s P.I. office and offer him a chance at redemption. Booker accepted and walked out the door of his office. As he did this, Booker traveled through the tear that Rosalind and Robert created into the other universe. Subsequently, he lost his memory, and his brain created new ones. This was due to the trauma of crossing over. Booker now believed that he was bringing Elizabeth back to New York to clear a debt that he owed to the Lutece twins. Rosalind Lutece decides to play along with Booker’s false memories, by hinting that the brain will “create new memories where none exist”. This sends Booker on his journey along with the demand, “Bring us the girl, and wipe away the debt” still in his mind from twenty years ago. However, Booker now remembers this phrase as the current job description, rather than the deal he already made with Comstock.

Finally, there are several hints made throughout the course of the game, which suggest that this isn’t the first time Booker has gone on this journey. Presumably the Lutece twins have used their power repeatedly, in order to finally achieve an outcome in which Booker is successful. At the beginning of the game, in the boat, Robert says, “He never rows”, referring to Booker. There is a part early on at the carnival, with the coin toss that always seems to come out as Heads. At one point later on in the game Elizabeth says that Booker “never finds a way through, Songbird always stops you”. It seems as though Booker has gone through this journey an infinite number of times, with this last one finally being the successful one. The infinite loop is finally closed when Booker drowns during the baptism ceremony. This stops any and all versions of Zachary Comstock from ever existing, as the baptism was Comstock’s point of origin into all of the universes.

WHEW! I will fully admit that is a whole lot of information to wrap your head around in the last fifteen minutes of the game. Admittedly, I watched the ending about 3 times just to try and grasp it all. These are some very heady concepts, with many complicated and dangling plot lines running throughout. There are also a ton of subtle and even major plot points that I intentionally left out for clarity’s sake. Any person who hated the story and / or the conclusion for its lack of cohesion is totally justified. It was not presented in an easily digestible form and that has a tendency to confuse or irritate gamers, who are used to a more cut and dry form of storytelling. As stated earlier, I found it to be very thought provoking and rewarding. I believe it was a daring chance that was taken to end the story in such a manner. I thoroughly enjoyed the payoff. There will be many new games this year that are better looking, or have a better sense of atmosphere, or fresher gameplay mechanics. Many games will be knocking on the door and on your wallet, vying for your attention. Yet, I honestly don’t believe that any of those games will tell a story as nuanced and captivating as the story told by BioShock Infinite. It is a story that will stay with me for years to come.

Oh and by the way… RAPTURE!!

One thing of note is that at the end of the trailer, Deathsrtroke is mentioned to be a playable character, with early access to him being granted for those people who pre-order the game.  We were told that he would be available as a character in the Challenge Mode game type, but not the campaign, although that’s pretty obvious.

Well I wouldn’t put it past EA to introduce some new anti-piracy or anti-used games strategy to replace this one at some point in the near future.  The phasing out of this method is only the end of ‘this’ method, with no promises not to try something new at a later date.  Even something as simple as the tried and true method of giving exclusive content to those people who purchase a game brand new goes a long way.

My rant/suggestion:
I hate paid DLC.  It’s an absurd marketing strategy that has people paying upwards of $15 for a small assortment of maps, new skins or other over priced digital goods.  I hate Seasons Passes even more, as they are just a means to get you to pre purchase a bunch of that overpriced paid DLC I just mentioned, but before you even know what it is.

Well, all of this can be undone with my following suggestion.

Go back to the way it was before where companies would put out free content in an effort to please fans and keep them playing their games.  But don’t just offer this free content to everyone, instead offer it only to those people who purchased the game new.  Almost like a sort of exclusive club for those gamers who bought the game new.  It’s incentive for the gamer to buy new, and a way for publishers to still get what they want.

Source of original story: VentureBeat

I have to say, the atmosphere that comes along with focusing on a non-comedic character this time around is a rather drastically different one.  Raphael doesn’t look like he’s having too much fun while he’s taking care of business, but he does what he needs to do either way.  This shows that Red Fly Studios seems to be taking the appropriate time to ensure that each turtle is properly represented, and not just clones of each other with different weapons and colours.