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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby* (Gaming)

by Jillybean, Tuesday, August 06, 2013, 13:02 (3887 days ago)

I want to talk about Bioshock Infinite.

This game didn’t appeal to me when it was first being advertised. But it did come highly recommended. It’s often mentioned in the same breath as GotY. And, though let’s not mention this one too loudly, Schooly and Cody both seemed to enjoy it. This doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to be good, I still don’t understand that robot game thingy Schooly plays at LANs, but it’s still a recommendation.

It was, in fact, some judicious googling of Troy Baker after watching Last of Us playthroughs that had me deciding to pick Bioshock up a few weeks ago.

Let’s start with the good. The game is beautiful. It has some fabulous acting in it. That first long walk through Columbia, listening to anachronistic Barbershop and watching the ‘wrongness’ of a Bioshock world take shape was all wonderful. I’ve been playing that Tainted Love cover/original over and over. And I really appreciate what they tried to go through with the story. I appreciate the effort.

But let’s start with the story. Now a defence that people kept giving me while I was complaining about this game was that the story was great. I came to Bioshock completely spoiled. Not only completely spoiled, but I played Dishonored last year and watched a lot of Last of Us gameplay this year. (As an aside, I guess we’re fairly confident that gaming is reaching its middle ages as a medium). Remember that first time you see Emily draw a good Corvo? Or find the Fugue Feast book in her bedroom? How about when Joel tells Ellie “I sure as hell ain’t your dad?”

Even knowing the answer, I found a lot of Bioshock Infinite to be wilfully misleading. There was very little protectiveness in Booker, little paternal care. Maybe that’s supposed to be part of it, but it makes the big reveal feel disjointed. When Booker laces up Elizabeth’s corset after her little torture porn scene I was squirming. Even when she was revealed to be Anna in a very long walking sequence at the end, I still didn’t feel the game connecting Anna and Elizabeth. They are only the same person in a academic sense.

I did like layering Troy Baker’s voice over Comstock’s dire pronunciations, I liked the recurring misinterpretation of the baptism theme. I found “there is always a lighthouse, always a man, always a city” to be irritatingly smug, but hey, we’re using quantum physics.

But story wise I found Bioshock Infinite to fall woefully short of Dishonoured. If you want a game where a father chooses to sell his daughter, play a high chaos Dishonoured run. Even the Outsider will be surprised by you.

Bioshock also tries to couch all this in a backdrop of racial tension which I found to be laughable. Cody already linked to a very good article about that. To abandon that storyline halfway through for a half hearted “oh power corrupts” idea is just ridiculous.

There’s an additional mismatch between Booker and Comstock’s treatment of minorities which is not well explained. After all, losing a child and becoming and embittered gambler is not the usual prescribed method of dealing with deep seated prejudices, but this is a relatively small nitpick. Again, see Dishonoured for a wonderful contrast between the haves and have nots.

But lets talk about the fact this is a game. I finished it on hard mode after a week or so of playing, in between Fringe parties and impromptu DIY. I’m not that good of a player. Money is plentiful. Losing money is no big penalty (I doubt even losing 100 eagles at a time will upset me greatly if I do a 1999 playthrough) and so no horde of white or coloured bad guys will stop me from plunging onwards. I also never mastered the skyhooks it must be said, and quite often flung myself around again and again while desperately waiting for the fleeting aerial kill symbol.

When this game was fun it was aping Mass Effect. Lift, Charge, Shotgun was a favoured tactic. I also felt there were no real bosses in the game. Lady Comstock was a bit of a madam, the handy men liked to electrocute my skylines, the patriots were pretty unkillable, but all of these were neatly dispatched by random friendly version Elizabeth could call upon at will and if anything went wrong Elizabeth would throw some health kits or I’d die and be resurrected a little way away. The most frustrating part was the final zeppelin ride which relied simply on swamping you with enemies.

And if any game didn’t need choice, it was this one. And don’t give me bullshit about the futility of choice in a world of quantum physics or point at the coin toss with a smile. It’s nonsense. It has as much bearing as choosing to walk left or right out of the gate. But again, a small nitpick in comparison to endless irritation of hopping off of the world in an attempt to latch onto a skyhook.

Why is Bioshock Infinite so lauded?

But I’m still kind of excited about going back to Rapture in a few weeks.

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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by Ragashingo ⌂, Official DBO Cryptarch, Tuesday, August 06, 2013, 16:16 (3887 days ago) @ Jillybean

Well, I laud it not really for the gameplay (I never really like BioShock 1 or 2 either) but that they wrote a time travel / dimension hopping story that more or less made sense. It takes a while to follow the different timelines and story threads but in the end it almost all added up.

The only part that doesn't add up is that a Voxaphone in the Vox raging out of control universe tells of how that Booker died. Fitzory even comments that see saw her Booker die. Further listenings of Voxaphones reveal that the Booker that died had joined with the Vox in order to raid Comstock house and steal away Elizabeth. You jump into that timeline with your Elizabeth in tow, but there should have still been a second Elizabeth locked away in Comstock house. Maybe by going through a tear using Elizabeth's power resolved that by… erasing the second locked away Elizabeth with yours. Maybe there can be only one Elizabeth at any given time. But it's not really supported when every other thing was. Kinda sad after I spend days pouring over other's charts, building my own charts, and finally being satisfied that the story worked.

There was very little protectiveness in Booker, little paternal care. Maybe that’s supposed to be part of it, but it makes the big reveal feel disjointed. When Booker laces up Elizabeth’s corset after her little torture porn scene I was squirming. Even when she was revealed to be Anna in a very long walking sequence at the end, I still didn’t feel the game connecting Anna and Elizabeth. They are only the same person in a academic sense.

I don't think there was supposed to be. Booker, our Booker, went to Colombia thinking he had to kidnap a random girl to erase his debt. He was wrong on both counts since Elizabeth was his daughter and there was no longer any debt to erase, but he didn't know that and acted accordingly. Later as he understands the situation Elizabeth is in he tries to help and protect her, but only as a random young woman in a bad situation. Not as a daughter since he doesn't learn that until the lighthouses ending.

Corvo, in contrast, was Emily's father and knew it even if we the player only suspected in until the end with Pendleton revealing out loud that Corvo and the Queen were involved.

In the end I mostly agree with others who say that Bioshock Infinite's gameplay is nothing to write home about. But the acting, animation, world, and story were all top notch. I haven't played The Last of Us so I can't really comment, but I would put Bioshock Infinite a bit above Dishonored. Dishonored easily had better gameplay, but I enjoyed Bioshock's story, quantum mechanics and all, a good deal more.

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I'm a time travel junkie

by Xenos @, Shores of Time, Tuesday, August 06, 2013, 16:30 (3887 days ago) @ Ragashingo

Quantum mechanics was WHY I enjoyed it :)

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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by kanbo @, Seattle, WA, Tuesday, August 06, 2013, 17:54 (3887 days ago) @ Jillybean

I enjoyed the game while playing but kind of felt the same way as you- expecting a lot more than I got. I thought the acting was what really carried it, and I'm kind of thinking that maybe most of the reason that the story is so highly praised is because it's wrapped in some really great character performances and a pretty solid (if imperfect) setting. I didn't think that the relationship between Booker and Elizabeth was that shocking or that Comstock = Booker was a big deal- not that I had really predicted it, but it kind of seemed like 'Oh, okay. Whatever then.' The cyclical/parallel worlds idea was kinda neat, but I don't think it was done as well as other movies/books/games. I liked "always a lighthouse, always a man, always a city", but it wasn't as moving as it was in Skyward Sword, for example.

I didn't think the combat was very fun, but I loved getting lost in exploring. The atmosphere was great but I felt like I was doing the shooting and killing just to progress through the story.

Also, I felt that the idea of the plot stemming from a gambling debt to be kind of flat. It could/should have been a much more significant catalyst.

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The storytelling was somewhat jumbled.

by uberfoop @, Seattle-ish, Tuesday, August 06, 2013, 19:42 (3887 days ago) @ Jillybean

There were several things going on that could have been very poignant, but they fought each other for screen time more than they cooperated to create a greater whole.

The pacing was also pretty weak. Start and finish aside, it was less "carefully-shaped narrative" than "sequence events causally connected by a plot." And the gameplay didn't do much to help here; it didn't ebb and flow and dance and do funny business in a way which added shape to the game's progression.

Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by yakaman, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 04:35 (3887 days ago) @ Jillybean

I cannot disagree hard enough. Is it possible expectations resulted in a letdown?

I played it spoiler-free and was blown away. I found it to be heart-wrenching, melancholy, and sweet. I enjoyed it more than any other game of this generation save Skyrim, I think.

I loved Anna, and I did not want to be who Booker (I) was. I did not want my shady, tragic past. I spent the whole game trying to play away from it - sensing it was terrible - but could not escape who I was, what I had done. I had envisioned myself the hero, certain to save the day, only to find that I was the villain all along....

I'm sorry you didn't enjoy it.

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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by Jillybean, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 07:40 (3887 days ago) @ yakaman

Different strokes for different folks!

I still think Mass Effect 3 is stunning.

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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by SonofMacPhisto @, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 07:46 (3887 days ago) @ Jillybean

Different strokes for different folks!

I still think Mass Effect 3 is stunning.

Marry me!

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I liked the gameplay subthread

by SonofMacPhisto @, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 07:53 (3887 days ago) @ Jillybean

I don't know if it's anything groundbreaking or special overall, but I'll argue it's solid, fun, and the sky hooks are pretty imaginative.

The first time through I was still learning the game, so I played pretty safe. Carbine/Rocket Launcher all day long with buffs to my Vigors, which I basically used as grenades. Pretty straight forward FPS action. It was quite satisfying carpet bombing Lady Comstock and her minions, btw.

Second time through I went a bit more willy nilly, and finally took the dive (snicker) into Charge. Yeah, I know, you figure I would've busted that out a lot sooner, being the ME3 Vanguard whore that I am. I also dedicated myself to learning the sky hook system more and tweaking a bit harder and more deliberately with the upgrades and clothing.

In the end, the game rewarded me for making the effort to learn its mechanics, which I think is the sign of good game.

(I'm thinking the third and fourth times through will be a goddammed Zaeed-apocalypse.)

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I liked the gameplay subthread

by Jillybean, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 08:12 (3887 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

(I'm thinking the third and fourth times through will be a goddammed Zaeed-apocalypse.)

Only I came out alive . . .

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I liked the gameplay subthread

by SonofMacPhisto @, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 09:10 (3887 days ago) @ Jillybean

(I'm thinking the third and fourth times through will be a goddammed Zaeed-apocalypse.)


Only I came out alive . . .

This is the way the world ends, not with a bang, but a grizzled war story.

Also, regarding the final fight, I liked how it was a final exam of everything you learned up until that point, but I think it was a bit too difficult. I know at least one person that nearly refused to finish the game, which while it's only one person, it's sad something so good was almost ruined for them.

Kind of like getting killed by Marauder Shields three times in a row that one time. Total fucking bullshit.

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I liked the gameplay subthread

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 09:19 (3887 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

(I'm thinking the third and fourth times through will be a goddammed Zaeed-apocalypse.)


Only I came out alive . . .


This is the way the world ends, not with a bang, but a grizzled war story.

Also, regarding the final fight, I liked how it was a final exam of everything you learned up until that point, but I think it was a bit too difficult. I know at least one person that nearly refused to finish the game, which while it's only one person, it's sad something so good was almost ruined for them.

I know a few more casual gamers who bumped the difficulty down in order to finish. I'm having a difficult enough time with the Siren in 1999 mode. I'm not really looking forward to the finale.

I enjoyed the gameplay, and as a testament to this, I'm really enjoying the DLC. I disagree with Jilly about the story. I'll write more later.

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I liked the gameplay subthread

by SonofMacPhisto @, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 09:56 (3887 days ago) @ Kermit

I know a few more casual gamers who bumped the difficulty down in order to finish. I'm having a difficult enough time with the Siren in 1999 mode. I'm not really looking forward to the finale.

I've only done Normal difficulty, and the first time through was pretty hairy, and I like to think of myself as someone who knows what he's doing. More games should co-opt Deus Ex: HR's method of difficulty descriptions (Tell Me a Story, I'm looking at you, you wonderful blurb of communication you).

That said, I adored the juxtiposition from the final fight all the way through the ending. Good pacing is good.

I'll write more later.

Yay.

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I liked the gameplay subthread

by Jillybean, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 11:28 (3886 days ago) @ Kermit

I look forward to reading it, Kermit!

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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 11:18 (3886 days ago) @ Jillybean

And, though let’s not mention this one too loudly, Schooly and Cody both seemed to enjoy it.

There are various levels of enjoy.

Bioshock Infinite is like having sex with a perfect 10, who is prudish and just lays there doing nothing. On one hand, she is pretty to look at, and hey you're having sex, but on the other hand there's no passion and it's boring.

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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by Jillybean, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 11:28 (3886 days ago) @ Cody Miller

That's a pretty accurate, if odd, way of looking at it.

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scavenging

by kidtsunami @, Atlanta, GA, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 13:05 (3886 days ago) @ Jillybean

I found the scavenging element of the game very frustrating.

I didn't really have a hard time beating it on hard, however I began to dread each large space because I had to comb it for spare money/things I could use.

The idea that in 1999 mode, that things are more scarce and you have to make sure you hoover everything up? That sounds like the worst experience ever.

I want to run around a shoot, I want to run around and explore, but I don't want to explore for the sake of surviving while running around and shooting...

I mean I was full of praise for it by the time I finished, but now I can't imagine picking it up again. May do the waves and see if I can get into the shouty combat without cleaning up columbia in the process.

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scavenging

by Jillybean, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 13:13 (3886 days ago) @ kidtsunami

Now that you mention it - yes, that was irritating. I had already explored the entire area outside Comstock House before having to go through it twice more to do plot related things. It was irksome.

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scavenging

by SonofMacPhisto @, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 13:19 (3886 days ago) @ Jillybean

Has anyone else watched Birgirpal's 'I broke Bioshock Infinite?'

BOOKER GOTTA EAT

Yeah. 'Mechanics' like this need to go away unless you're a Bethesda open-world RPG.

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actually no

by kidtsunami @, Atlanta, GA, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 13:48 (3886 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

I find that to be one of the main reasons I gave up on Fallout 3, I was tired of being punished for picking everything up because I didn't know if it was going to be super useful or not, so I had to start leaving things behind or make constant comparisons of what I have vs what I want to pick up leaving me super frustrated with the UI and super dissatisfied by the result.

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actually no

by SonofMacPhisto @, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 14:29 (3886 days ago) @ kidtsunami

I find that to be one of the main reasons I gave up on Fallout 3, I was tired of being punished for picking everything up because I didn't know if it was going to be super useful or not, so I had to start leaving things behind or make constant comparisons of what I have vs what I want to pick up leaving me super frustrated with the UI and super dissatisfied by the result.

But the post-apocalypse. It helps support the whole survivalist vibe.

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hahaha

by kidtsunami @, Atlanta, GA, Thursday, August 08, 2013, 03:33 (3886 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

I definitely got that vibe when I was hiding tons of things in lockers throughout a super market, proudly killing any enemies harassing my new bastion of hope.

I'll say this, Bethesda gets vibe.

Finally enjoying my Skyrim play through once I discovered that I had somehow set the difficulty to the second highest. For the first dungeon I was thinking "I wonder if Bethesda bases their difficulty off of SLASO runs". Once I turned it down to somewhere in the middle and I didn't have to hit enemies 20 times for every 3 times they got me, it got a lot more interesting and fun.

Difficulty is sooo important. I am fascinated by games that are still fun on the highest levels of difficulty.

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hahaha

by SonofMacPhisto @, Thursday, August 08, 2013, 06:59 (3886 days ago) @ kidtsunami

Finally enjoying my Skyrim play through once I discovered that I had somehow set the difficulty to the second highest. For the first dungeon I was thinking "I wonder if Bethesda bases their difficulty off of SLASO runs". Once I turned it down to somewhere in the middle and I didn't have to hit enemies 20 times for every 3 times they got me, it got a lot more interesting and fun.

I'm glad you did this, and I think it helps illustrate my point about describing difficulty settings well. With Skyrim, 'easy' makes you sound like a noob and 'hard' makes you sound like a God-man. Who doesn't want to be God-man? Then you get farted on by a mudcrab and die instantly, and realize maybe God-man difficulty isn't the best place to start.

Difficulty is sooo important. I am fascinated by games that are still fun on the highest levels of difficulty.

I agree. I loved how in Mass Effect 2 the enemies got different, not just 'harder.'

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How so?

by Bones @, The Last City, Earth, Sol System, Thursday, August 08, 2013, 12:57 (3885 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

I loved how in Mass Effect 2 the enemies got different, not just 'harder.'

I demand elaboration. Also, hello.

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How so?

by SonofMacPhisto @, Saturday, August 10, 2013, 05:53 (3884 days ago) @ Bones
edited by SonofMacPhisto, Saturday, August 10, 2013, 06:02

Hi, Bones! How's tricks?

One caveat to my statement is that it seemed more applicable for biotic based players (Vanguards, Adepts). My Soldier would just shoot mans until they fell down, regardless of difficulty.

(I also know you know some of what I'm about to say, I'm going back to the beginning for the benefit of others.)

On Hardcore (hard) and Insanity (really hard), every enemy had some kind of protection - either Armor, Barriers, or Shields - not just the tougher ones. The player (biotics especially) had to deal with these defenses first before they could unleash their most effective attacks.

Different strategies worked better, as certain ammos or powers were more effective against certains defenses. It also made the two squad members you took much more important, as their powers would supplement yours.

Squad members especially become more useful, and you as the player build this kind of relationship with them, which I think ends up supporting the narrative. I can't count the number of times I'd have Garrus hit a clump of mooks with Overload, stripping their shields, while I smacked them with a Singularity, and then Miranda following up with a Warp to blow them all to kingdom come. You really felt like a team during this, so when you got back to the Normandy, the conversation had this added depth to them.

You could also use these defenses against the enemy. Case in point: a shielded/barriered/armored enemy wouldn't get knocked off their feet by a Vanguard's biotic charge; this let you nail a nearly perfect point blank shotgun blast, staight up killing them most of the time. If that failed, a little elbow to the face usually did the trick.

To compare, I think Mass Effect 3 was less fun in this regard. Now it's more about damage per second and combining effects of different powers (and basically every power combines with every other power now) regardless of what defenses the enemy has. As a Vanguard, for instance, you're not fundamentally playing super easy any differently than super hard.

In the end it was more interesting to fight enemies on higher difficulties in Mass Effect 2 because they were different. I hope I explained it well.

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How so?

by Leisandir @, Virginia, USA, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 18:31 (3878 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

Very well said. ME2 did challenge quite well.

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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by Schooly D, TSD Gaming Condo, TX, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 13:58 (3886 days ago) @ Jillybean

This game didn’t appeal to me when it was first being advertised. But it did come highly recommended. It’s often mentioned in the same breath as GotY. And, though let’s not mention this one too loudly, Schooly and Cody both seemed to enjoy it.

My opinion of the game was higher when I had just finished it. I believe this was due to a few factors:
(1) The plot twist was enjoyable
(2) I was glad to be through with it (more on this in a bit)

Looking back, however, I think my original appraisal was inflated. I won't go into any problems with the narrative or plot holes or environment since critiques of those things have been laid out in much more comprehensive fashion than I can do here. But I will say that, when I reflect on what I played, the thing I notice most is the gameplay was mediocre at best. Atmosphere and story aside, it was just another FPS with bullet sponge enemies and a couple of gimmicks (refer back to point 2). That's my biggest takeaway from the experience at this point.

This doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to be good, I still don’t understand that robot game thingy Schooly plays at LANs

I can tell you exactly why you don't understand Virtual On: Oratorio Tangram, and it all goes back to the fact that you're a female.

FACT: women don't like giant robots because giant robots are the union of two things women also don't like: machinery and war. VO:OT is a game centered around giant robots shooting at each other.

FACT: women don't like fighting. VO:OT is a fighting game. This shouldn't require any more explanation.

FACT: women don't like 1 vs 1 combat because they cannot grasp the concept of manly honor that is internal to men. They cannot appreciate the (b)romantic struggle of a pure contest to see who is the better man. VO:OT is a 1v1 game (the sequel was 2v2 and was so bad it killed the franchise) and completely lacks any hair-pulling moves because (1) such moves would be dis-manly-honorable and (2) they're robots and they don't have hair.

FACT: women love stories and thus hate games with poor or paper-thin stories. VO:OT literally has no story, it's just giant robots fighting each other.

FACT: maid outfits

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Let's talk about Bioshock Infinite *long and spoilery baby*

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 14:14 (3886 days ago) @ Schooly D

FACT: women don't like 1 vs 1 combat because they cannot grasp the concept of manly honor that is internal to men. They cannot appreciate the (b)romantic struggle of a pure contest to see who is the better man. VO:OT is a 1v1 game (the sequel was 2v2 and was so bad it killed the franchise) and completely lacks any hair-pulling moves because (1) such moves would be dis-manly-honorable and (2) they're robots and they don't have hair.

To make this clear for the ladies:

A man can go through life pretending or putting on a front to people, telling them what kind of man he is. He can't do that in a fight. Who you are is revealed, and the results are always authentic. This is why fighting is valued as validation and display of masculinity: it is irrefutable.

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I can leave you two alone if it helps.

by Jillybean, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 14:29 (3886 days ago) @ Schooly D

- No text -

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I wonder

by ZackDark @, Not behind you. NO! Don't look., Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 17:39 (3886 days ago) @ Schooly D

Does it play like the arcade version (like Katamari, both stick same direction, it goes that direction; stick up/down, turn; stick left/right, jumpjets)?

If so, WHERE CAN I BUY IT NAO?!

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I wonder

by Schooly D, TSD Gaming Condo, TX, Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 17:52 (3886 days ago) @ ZackDark

Does it play like the arcade version (like Katamari, both stick same direction, it goes that direction; stick up/down, turn; stick left/right, jumpjets)?

You did not play the arcade version of this game. You played the arcade version of its predecessor. Something like 10 or 15 VO:OT arcade cabinets made it outside Japan and they've long since been out of circulation.

That aside, if you have the very expensive, Japan-only Xbox 360 Twin Stick controller, yes it controls like the arcade. If you have the normal X360 pad it doesn't. But true champions win regardless of controller.

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I wonder

by ZackDark @, Not behind you. NO! Don't look., Wednesday, August 07, 2013, 18:02 (3886 days ago) @ Schooly D

You're right about which game I have played.

Still, that is the only way to play, no matter how easy it might be to play in other ways.

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Super run-on sentences FTW.

by Chewbaccawakka @, The Great Green Pacific Northwest!, Friday, August 09, 2013, 10:51 (3884 days ago) @ Jillybean

I wanted to read this post, so I actually went back and finished B:Infinite. I had stopped my first playthrough (on hard) after dying a dozen times trying to beat Lady Comstock (I, admittedly, am not the best at shooters). Up to that point, the game looked good and played okay, and the plot wasn't terrible. So I was mostly enjoying it, but a lot of the fights, for me, were just plain not fun. But after pushing through that boss fight, I keep plugging away, after all this was a Bioshock game, and I rather enjoyed the first (heh) one, ridiculous boss battle with Atlas notwithstanding.

Overall, Infinite let me down. The gameplay was, in some cases literally, nearly six years old and, for me, not much fun. Normally I would enjoy a plot citing factors like Quantum Locking and interdimensionality, in this instance though, I had guessed most of the key plot twists about a third of the way through (unlike the original Bioshock, which I most certainly did not see coming). Lastly that leaves the art and sound design. In all fairness, Infinite looks and sounds pretty darn good, and the only real problem I have with it is that I went and played The Last of Us during that boss hiatus. TLoU is probably the best game I've ever played (that's not hyperbole, I've given it a lot of thought), I enjoyed every facet of that game. So coming back to Infinite, it just felt a little tired and worn down by the time I finished it.

I guess by the time it was all said and done, I'd give Infinite 7 of 10. A good solid entry in the Bioshock franchise, but plagued by boring gunplay and a predictable plot. I probably won't play it again, or at least not for a long time.

This kinda reads funny, but I'm not going to fix it. :P

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Super run-on sentences FTW.

by Jillybean, Friday, August 09, 2013, 10:59 (3884 days ago) @ Chewbaccawakka

It's interesting that you hadn't even finished it!

You're probably more favourable towards the game than I am.

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Super run-on sentences FTW.

by Chewbaccawakka @, The Great Green Pacific Northwest!, Friday, August 09, 2013, 12:57 (3884 days ago) @ Jillybean

I was excited for Infinite because I rather enjoyed the first Bioshock. So maybe I am a little willing to give it a pass, for the love I bore it's father.

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Super run-on sentences FTW.

by Jillybean, Friday, August 09, 2013, 13:29 (3884 days ago) @ Chewbaccawakka

This path leads to the dark side!

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Super run-on sentences FTW.

by Chewbaccawakka @, The Great Green Pacific Northwest!, Friday, August 09, 2013, 13:55 (3884 days ago) @ Jillybean

But, but, the cookies!

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Bioshock makes me appreciate Halo more

by davidfuchs ⌂, USA, Monday, August 12, 2013, 19:59 (3881 days ago) @ Jillybean

I want to talk about Bioshock Infinite.

This game didn’t appeal to me when it was first being advertised. But it did come highly recommended. It’s often mentioned in the same breath as GotY. And, though let’s not mention this one too loudly, Schooly and Cody both seemed to enjoy it. This doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to be good, I still don’t understand that robot game thingy Schooly plays at LANs, but it’s still a recommendation.

It was, in fact, some judicious googling of Troy Baker after watching Last of Us playthroughs that had me deciding to pick Bioshock up a few weeks ago.

Let’s start with the good. The game is beautiful. It has some fabulous acting in it. That first long walk through Columbia, listening to anachronistic Barbershop and watching the ‘wrongness’ of a Bioshock world take shape was all wonderful. I’ve been playing that Tainted Love cover/original over and over. And I really appreciate what they tried to go through with the story. I appreciate the effort.

But let’s start with the story. Now a defence that people kept giving me while I was complaining about this game was that the story was great. I came to Bioshock completely spoiled. Not only completely spoiled, but I played Dishonored last year and watched a lot of Last of Us gameplay this year. (As an aside, I guess we’re fairly confident that gaming is reaching its middle ages as a medium). Remember that first time you see Emily draw a good Corvo? Or find the Fugue Feast book in her bedroom? How about when Joel tells Ellie “I sure as hell ain’t your dad?”

Even knowing the answer, I found a lot of Bioshock Infinite to be wilfully misleading. There was very little protectiveness in Booker, little paternal care. Maybe that’s supposed to be part of it, but it makes the big reveal feel disjointed. When Booker laces up Elizabeth’s corset after her little torture porn scene I was squirming. Even when she was revealed to be Anna in a very long walking sequence at the end, I still didn’t feel the game connecting Anna and Elizabeth. They are only the same person in a academic sense.

I did like layering Troy Baker’s voice over Comstock’s dire pronunciations, I liked the recurring misinterpretation of the baptism theme. I found “there is always a lighthouse, always a man, always a city” to be irritatingly smug, but hey, we’re using quantum physics.

But story wise I found Bioshock Infinite to fall woefully short of Dishonoured. If you want a game where a father chooses to sell his daughter, play a high chaos Dishonoured run. Even the Outsider will be surprised by you.

Bioshock also tries to couch all this in a backdrop of racial tension which I found to be laughable. Cody already linked to a very good article about that. To abandon that storyline halfway through for a half hearted “oh power corrupts” idea is just ridiculous.

There’s an additional mismatch between Booker and Comstock’s treatment of minorities which is not well explained. After all, losing a child and becoming and embittered gambler is not the usual prescribed method of dealing with deep seated prejudices, but this is a relatively small nitpick. Again, see Dishonoured for a wonderful contrast between the haves and have nots.

But lets talk about the fact this is a game. I finished it on hard mode after a week or so of playing, in between Fringe parties and impromptu DIY. I’m not that good of a player. Money is plentiful. Losing money is no big penalty (I doubt even losing 100 eagles at a time will upset me greatly if I do a 1999 playthrough) and so no horde of white or coloured bad guys will stop me from plunging onwards. I also never mastered the skyhooks it must be said, and quite often flung myself around again and again while desperately waiting for the fleeting aerial kill symbol.

When this game was fun it was aping Mass Effect. Lift, Charge, Shotgun was a favoured tactic. I also felt there were no real bosses in the game. Lady Comstock was a bit of a madam, the handy men liked to electrocute my skylines, the patriots were pretty unkillable, but all of these were neatly dispatched by random friendly version Elizabeth could call upon at will and if anything went wrong Elizabeth would throw some health kits or I’d die and be resurrected a little way away. The most frustrating part was the final zeppelin ride which relied simply on swamping you with enemies.

And if any game didn’t need choice, it was this one. And don’t give me bullshit about the futility of choice in a world of quantum physics or point at the coin toss with a smile. It’s nonsense. It has as much bearing as choosing to walk left or right out of the gate. But again, a small nitpick in comparison to endless irritation of hopping off of the world in an attempt to latch onto a skyhook.

Why is Bioshock Infinite so lauded?

But I’m still kind of excited about going back to Rapture in a few weeks.

I know tons of people who bemoaned the simplified gameplay of Bioshock 1 and even more sore the further reduced options of Infinite, but I mightily preferred playing Infinite compared to the first game, which I found an absolute chore. The vigors have a standard feel to them so you can intuitively pick up how to use them, you only have two weapons at a time so there's not as much of the "OH GOD AN ENEMY IS CHARGING ME I NEED ROCKETS CRUD I HAVE THE WRONG AMMO TYPE SO JUST FIRE EVERYTHING" crap that made firefights in Bioshock 1 a massive chore. You have actual sights, so you can approach enemies at range, and while Columbia is still pretty claustrophobic its leagues more open (see what I did there) than Rapture.

However...

the essential fun just wasn't there. The enemies become more bullet spongy and samey over time. The Heavy Hitters really didn't feel like they broke up gameplay or forced you to change tactics. Your screen is obnoxiously covered by the shield break effect (which happens all the time because your shields are so weak, even with infusions) and Booker is screaming from pain all the time that it's frankly awful to play through in instances. Even the weaknesses of previous Halo's sandbox or enemies were as nothing to what I felt playing Bioshock Infinite.

But I stuck with it, and that's because the story was good. Sure, it was a bit pretentious in places ("Will the Circle Be Unbroken Vignette" anyone, which is more irksome because you can't pick up this one damn apple like the rest of them because Elizabeth has to be nice with other people's food, GAH) and I think the end got a bit messy and Whovian with its "wibbly wobbly" approach to alternate universes... but I was invested in the world, despite its shortcomings and sermonizing (if you're expecting a theme beyond "all strident adherents to ideology are bad... well you haven't learned from Levin's playbook.) As weak as Columbia was in establishing a world... it still put more of an attempt into it than Halo has seen, and while Elizabeth still showed her seams in spots she was a companion who I genuinely cherished having (maybe if we'd had her instead of Kat, Reach wouldn't have fallen :P )

I read a lot of articles after the game came out accusing Levine of racism, which I thought was pure bullcrap; it's people reading into the game what they've already decided they're going to see. Fitzroy is a bad person not because of her skin color but because of Levine's simple approach to zealots. Hell, that ABC story linked above completely misses the point of the Native Americans being portrayed as cartoon savages, and once again shows his hand by the end that it's just a rant about "mainstream" game devs taking over indies. I *do* think there's merit to the argument that the over-the-top violence and blood in the game detract from the message; the opening assault on the police is wrenching in its gore, but the emphasis and gleeful focus on executions every time after that dilutes any meaning it had before. So I think Bioshock Infinite is just another example of a critically-acclaimed work of media that some people glom onto because they want to see smart, some people tear at because they want to be contrary, and a few good arguments can get lost in fanboy back-and-forth.

In short: the gameplay made me appreciate what every Halo, even Halo 4, gets right consistently. The story made me think about ways Halo could improve, as well as the genre as a whole.

Avatar

...also to add to the racism thing

by davidfuchs ⌂, USA, Monday, August 12, 2013, 20:04 (3881 days ago) @ davidfuchs

I want to talk about Bioshock Infinite.

This game didn’t appeal to me when it was first being advertised. But it did come highly recommended. It’s often mentioned in the same breath as GotY. And, though let’s not mention this one too loudly, Schooly and Cody both seemed to enjoy it. This doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to be good, I still don’t understand that robot game thingy Schooly plays at LANs, but it’s still a recommendation.

It was, in fact, some judicious googling of Troy Baker after watching Last of Us playthroughs that had me deciding to pick Bioshock up a few weeks ago.

Let’s start with the good. The game is beautiful. It has some fabulous acting in it. That first long walk through Columbia, listening to anachronistic Barbershop and watching the ‘wrongness’ of a Bioshock world take shape was all wonderful. I’ve been playing that Tainted Love cover/original over and over. And I really appreciate what they tried to go through with the story. I appreciate the effort.

But let’s start with the story. Now a defence that people kept giving me while I was complaining about this game was that the story was great. I came to Bioshock completely spoiled. Not only completely spoiled, but I played Dishonored last year and watched a lot of Last of Us gameplay this year. (As an aside, I guess we’re fairly confident that gaming is reaching its middle ages as a medium). Remember that first time you see Emily draw a good Corvo? Or find the Fugue Feast book in her bedroom? How about when Joel tells Ellie “I sure as hell ain’t your dad?”

Even knowing the answer, I found a lot of Bioshock Infinite to be wilfully misleading. There was very little protectiveness in Booker, little paternal care. Maybe that’s supposed to be part of it, but it makes the big reveal feel disjointed. When Booker laces up Elizabeth’s corset after her little torture porn scene I was squirming. Even when she was revealed to be Anna in a very long walking sequence at the end, I still didn’t feel the game connecting Anna and Elizabeth. They are only the same person in a academic sense.

I did like layering Troy Baker’s voice over Comstock’s dire pronunciations, I liked the recurring misinterpretation of the baptism theme. I found “there is always a lighthouse, always a man, always a city” to be irritatingly smug, but hey, we’re using quantum physics.

But story wise I found Bioshock Infinite to fall woefully short of Dishonoured. If you want a game where a father chooses to sell his daughter, play a high chaos Dishonoured run. Even the Outsider will be surprised by you.

Bioshock also tries to couch all this in a backdrop of racial tension which I found to be laughable. Cody already linked to a very good article about that. To abandon that storyline halfway through for a half hearted “oh power corrupts” idea is just ridiculous.

There’s an additional mismatch between Booker and Comstock’s treatment of minorities which is not well explained. After all, losing a child and becoming and embittered gambler is not the usual prescribed method of dealing with deep seated prejudices, but this is a relatively small nitpick. Again, see Dishonoured for a wonderful contrast between the haves and have nots.

But lets talk about the fact this is a game. I finished it on hard mode after a week or so of playing, in between Fringe parties and impromptu DIY. I’m not that good of a player. Money is plentiful. Losing money is no big penalty (I doubt even losing 100 eagles at a time will upset me greatly if I do a 1999 playthrough) and so no horde of white or coloured bad guys will stop me from plunging onwards. I also never mastered the skyhooks it must be said, and quite often flung myself around again and again while desperately waiting for the fleeting aerial kill symbol.

When this game was fun it was aping Mass Effect. Lift, Charge, Shotgun was a favoured tactic. I also felt there were no real bosses in the game. Lady Comstock was a bit of a madam, the handy men liked to electrocute my skylines, the patriots were pretty unkillable, but all of these were neatly dispatched by random friendly version Elizabeth could call upon at will and if anything went wrong Elizabeth would throw some health kits or I’d die and be resurrected a little way away. The most frustrating part was the final zeppelin ride which relied simply on swamping you with enemies.

And if any game didn’t need choice, it was this one. And don’t give me bullshit about the futility of choice in a world of quantum physics or point at the coin toss with a smile. It’s nonsense. It has as much bearing as choosing to walk left or right out of the gate. But again, a small nitpick in comparison to endless irritation of hopping off of the world in an attempt to latch onto a skyhook.

Why is Bioshock Infinite so lauded?

But I’m still kind of excited about going back to Rapture in a few weeks.


I know tons of people who bemoaned the simplified gameplay of Bioshock 1 and even more sore the further reduced options of Infinite, but I mightily preferred playing Infinite compared to the first game, which I found an absolute chore. The vigors have a standard feel to them so you can intuitively pick up how to use them, you only have two weapons at a time so there's not as much of the "OH GOD AN ENEMY IS CHARGING ME I NEED ROCKETS CRUD I HAVE THE WRONG AMMO TYPE SO JUST FIRE EVERYTHING" crap that made firefights in Bioshock 1 a massive chore. You have actual sights, so you can approach enemies at range, and while Columbia is still pretty claustrophobic its leagues more open (see what I did there) than Rapture.

However...

the essential fun just wasn't there. The enemies become more bullet spongy and samey over time. The Heavy Hitters really didn't feel like they broke up gameplay or forced you to change tactics. Your screen is obnoxiously covered by the shield break effect (which happens all the time because your shields are so weak, even with infusions) and Booker is screaming from pain all the time that it's frankly awful to play through in instances. Even the weaknesses of previous Halo's sandbox or enemies were as nothing to what I felt playing Bioshock Infinite.

But I stuck with it, and that's because the story was good. Sure, it was a bit pretentious in places ("Will the Circle Be Unbroken Vignette" anyone, which is more irksome because you can't pick up this one damn apple like the rest of them because Elizabeth has to be nice with other people's food, GAH) and I think the end got a bit messy and Whovian with its "wibbly wobbly" approach to alternate universes... but I was invested in the world, despite its shortcomings and sermonizing (if you're expecting a theme beyond "all strident adherents to ideology are bad... well you haven't learned from Levin's playbook.) As weak as Columbia was in establishing a world... it still put more of an attempt into it than Halo has seen, and while Elizabeth still showed her seams in spots she was a companion who I genuinely cherished having (maybe if we'd had her instead of Kat, Reach wouldn't have fallen :P )

I read a lot of articles after the game came out accusing Levine of racism, which I thought was pure bullcrap; it's people reading into the game what they've already decided they're going to see. Fitzroy is a bad person not because of her skin color but because of Levine's simple approach to zealots. Hell, that ABC story linked above completely misses the point of the Native Americans being portrayed as cartoon savages, and once again shows his hand by the end that it's just a rant about "mainstream" game devs taking over indies. I *do* think there's merit to the argument that the over-the-top violence and blood in the game detract from the message; the opening assault on the police is wrenching in its gore, but the emphasis and gleeful focus on executions every time after that dilutes any meaning it had before. So I think Bioshock Infinite is just another example of a critically-acclaimed work of media that some people glom onto because they want to see smart, some people tear at because they want to be contrary, and a few good arguments can get lost in fanboy back-and-forth.

In short: the gameplay made me appreciate what every Halo, even Halo 4, gets right consistently. The story made me think about ways Halo could improve, as well as the genre as a whole.

A lot of the arguments seem to be complaining that they didn't do more with it, but my counter-argument is that every story should not be about what we as a modern society consider objectionable. It's very high-minded of us to look back on the previous decades and pretend we're better than them, but we have had a lot of benefit of hindsight and changing times. The abolitionists might have hated slavery, but many would have been joining the lynching parties to stop miscegenation had they been transported a hundred years later.

Racism is a fact of our existence, and a part of the fabric and culture of the turn-of-the-century. But the argument that a story set in that period must make its purpose revolve around those issues is laughable. Racism isn't really the point of Infinite, which is at its core a story of a select few individuals. While I think a game exploring race issues in Columbia could have been thought-provoking and fascinating, I don't think it's fair to vilify artists for not painting the pictures you want. In the end you should choose to express yourself.

Avatar

...also to add to the racism thing

by Jillybean, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 12:57 (3880 days ago) @ davidfuchs


A lot of the arguments seem to be complaining that they didn't do more with it, but my counter-argument is that every story should not be about what we as a modern society consider objectionable. It's very high-minded of us to look back on the previous decades and pretend we're better than them, but we have had a lot of benefit of hindsight and changing times. The abolitionists might have hated slavery, but many would have been joining the lynching parties to stop miscegenation had they been transported a hundred years later.

Karen Maitland writes historical fiction, all of it very gory and horrific. At the end of one of her novels, I can't remember which one, she makes a very eloquent case for the dangers of dismissing the past for sins that we might think of ignorant. If, in a thousand years time, people look at our actions with such disdain and say we were simply living in the dark ages, would we not be ashamed?


Racism is a fact of our existence, and a part of the fabric and culture of the turn-of-the-century. But the argument that a story set in that period must make its purpose revolve around those issues is laughable. Racism isn't really the point of Infinite, which is at its core a story of a select few individuals. While I think a game exploring race issues in Columbia could have been thought-provoking and fascinating, I don't think it's fair to vilify artists for not painting the pictures you want. In the end you should choose to express yourself.

But my issue with it is that racism is held up as this card: "look at our deep story", by giving you the choices, the pieces of side dialogue where Booker is kind to the odd minority, the cliched twist of power corrupting - it's not nearly as clever as it thinks it is. In my opinion, anyway.

Avatar

My view on the racism part *spoiler*

by Xenos @, Shores of Time, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 13:13 (3880 days ago) @ Jillybean

But my issue with it is that racism is held up as this card: "look at our deep story", by giving you the choices, the pieces of side dialogue where Booker is kind to the odd minority, the cliched twist of power corrupting - it's not nearly as clever as it thinks it is. In my opinion, anyway.

I never saw the race part as being held up as the "deep" part of the story personally. It was talked about before the release of the game a lot, and I think that's why people think that, but in the story it's a side note more than it is a key plot point. If anything it is used as one of the many examples of the differences between Booker and Comstock's personalities.

Avatar

...also to add to the racism thing

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 14:20 (3880 days ago) @ Jillybean


But my issue with it is that racism is held up as this card: "look at our deep story", by giving you the choices, the pieces of side dialogue where Booker is kind to the odd minority, the cliched twist of power corrupting - it's not nearly as clever as it thinks it is. In my opinion, anyway.

I wrote pages and pages in response to your initial post. I'll edit it down and post it eventually, but I'm wondering what you're referring to when you mention the pieces of side dialogue where Booker is the odd minority.

Avatar

...also to add to the racism thing

by Jillybean, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 14:47 (3880 days ago) @ Kermit


But my issue with it is that racism is held up as this card: "look at our deep story", by giving you the choices, the pieces of side dialogue where Booker is kind to the odd minority, the cliched twist of power corrupting - it's not nearly as clever as it thinks it is. In my opinion, anyway.


I wrote pages and pages in response to your initial post. I'll edit it down and post it eventually, but I'm wondering what you're referring to when you mention the pieces of side dialogue where Booker is the odd minority.

I said where he's kind to the odd minority - at the beach front he catches a servant having a smoke and says something to the effect of "I'm not here to stop you", on the approach to Fink town he says something about starving and he makes a comment to Elizabeth in the segregated toilets.

Avatar

...also to add to the racism thing

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 15:10 (3880 days ago) @ Jillybean

I said where he's kind to the odd minority - at the beach front he catches a servant having a smoke and says something to the effect of "I'm not here to stop you", on the approach to Fink town he says something about starving and he makes a comment to Elizabeth in the segregated toilets.

Ah, you mean where he distinguishes himself from the racist majority--got it.

Avatar

One little tweak...

by SonofMacPhisto @, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 16:06 (3880 days ago) @ Jillybean

the cliched twist of power corrupting - it's not nearly as clever as it thinks it is. In my opinion, anyway.

If they had gone for more the "Of course the Vox Populi uprising would be violent" route it would have been much more satisfying. Leave the "power corrupts" angle vague, maybe only hinted, but then the game suggesting the Vox are still right and that this violence is somehow vaguely justified.

Booker's comment on the elevator ruins it too - much like Chief's line at the end of Halo 4. NO CRAP BOOKER. I HAD NO IDEA MAN. WOW. NOW GO SHOOT SOMETHING.

Was it just there so Elizabeth has an excuse to kill someone in a very personal way? Couldn't they save that for her torture, where she murders the doctors with a tornado? It would have been very personal for her then, since she used her power to do it.

Avatar

One little tweak...

by davidfuchs ⌂, USA, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 17:16 (3880 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

the cliched twist of power corrupting - it's not nearly as clever as it thinks it is. In my opinion, anyway.


If they had gone for more the "Of course the Vox Populi uprising would be violent" route it would have been much more satisfying. Leave the "power corrupts" angle vague, maybe only hinted, but then the game suggesting the Vox are still right and that this violence is somehow vaguely justified.

Booker's comment on the elevator ruins it too - much like Chief's line at the end of Halo 4. NO CRAP BOOKER. I HAD NO IDEA MAN. WOW. NOW GO SHOOT SOMETHING.

Was it just there so Elizabeth has an excuse to kill someone in a very personal way? Couldn't they save that for her torture, where she murders the doctors with a tornado? It would have been very personal for her then, since she used her power to do it.

Sorry your verb tense is confusing me--are you saying that the game suggests the Vox are still right and the violence is justified, or that you think that would have been a more interesting angle?

Avatar

One little tweak...

by SonofMacPhisto @, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 19:45 (3880 days ago) @ davidfuchs

My bad. I'm saying that would've been more interesting than "power corrupts absolutely."

I'm paraphrasing Booker here, but it could be as simple as changing his line from, "They're as bad as Comstock" to "What did Comstock think was going to happen?"

Avatar

One little tweak...

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Tuesday, August 13, 2013, 20:38 (3880 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

My bad. I'm saying that would've been more interesting than "power corrupts absolutely."

I'm paraphrasing Booker here, but it could be as simple as changing his line from, "They're as bad as Comstock" to "What did Comstock think was going to happen?"

Power does corrupt, though. It's not like it's untrue or irrelevant nor do I think what Levine is doing is simplistic. I actually think the edgy thing to do to what Levine did--show the negative side of the Vox movement.

I really need to trim my book-length BioShock Infinite treatise.

Avatar

One little tweak...

by Jillybean, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 11:03 (3879 days ago) @ Kermit


Power does corrupt, though. It's not like it's untrue or irrelevant nor do I think what Levine is doing is simplistic. I actually think the edgy thing to do to what Levine did--show the negative side of the Vox movement.

I really need to trim my book-length BioShock Infinite treatise.

We're definitely going to have to agree to disagree on that one. I'd say Infinite's about as edgy as a marshmallow.

Avatar

One little tweak...

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 12:25 (3879 days ago) @ Jillybean


Power does corrupt, though. It's not like it's untrue or irrelevant nor do I think what Levine is doing is simplistic. I actually think the edgy thing to do to what Levine did--show the negative side of the Vox movement.

I really need to trim my book-length BioShock Infinite treatise.


We're definitely going to have to agree to disagree on that one. I'd say Infinite's about as edgy as a marshmallow.

Yeah, I say it's edgy if bitten into, and not just squeezed. :) I'll post more stuff this weekend.

Avatar

One little tweak...

by SonofMacPhisto @, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 14:53 (3879 days ago) @ Kermit


Power does corrupt, though. It's not like it's untrue or irrelevant nor do I think what Levine is doing is simplistic. I actually think the edgy thing to do to what Levine did--show the negative side of the Vox movement.

I really need to trim my book-length BioShock Infinite treatise.


We're definitely going to have to agree to disagree on that one. I'd say Infinite's about as edgy as a marshmallow.


Yeah, I say it's edgy if bitten into, and not just squeezed. :) I'll post more stuff this weekend.

I'm with Jilly, and I'm trying really hard to express why. Here's the best I've come up with.

Say you have a film like "True Grit" (the Cohen version, just for reference as to what's in my brain) and you're talking about the effect the drive for revenge can have on a person. The female protagonist (the name escapes me) pays a very clear cost for her campaign, but at the same time, you wonder if it was still worth it, at least to her.

I wish Infinite's use of the Vox uprising was more like that than what we got. Again, I refer us back to Booker's line in the elevator where we get hit over the head with it Master Chief Halo 4 style. AM I A MACHINE/THE VOX ARE BAD.

Avatar

One little tweak...

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 17:34 (3879 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto
edited by Kermit, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 17:45


I wish Infinite's use of the Vox uprising was more like that than what we got. Again, I refer us back to Booker's line in the elevator where we get hit over the head with it Master Chief Halo 4 style. AM I A MACHINE/THE VOX ARE BAD.

I totally get what you're saying about subtlety, and I'm on record for hating that line in Halo 4, and that's because it connects dots no one needs help connecting.

We're getting into sensitive territory here, but it seems that many of BioShock Infinite's critics wanted it to be a different story than it is--specifically, they wanted a morality tale about racism (the evils of white racists in particular). They wanted the dots to be connected in a very specific way. I submit that what makes the game edgy is that racism is presented as something more complicated, as something like a disease that can be spread to its victims. The danger of this presentation is that it runs the risk of removing moral judgment. Booker speaking out is a counter to that.

I'm not saying Levine was 100% successful in what he was trying to do, but racism--its sources and effects--is presented, thoughtfully and with nuance. Much more so than that Daniel Golding article suggests.

I have more to say, of course, but I haven't had dinner yet. :)

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Agreed.

by Xenos @, Shores of Time, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 17:51 (3879 days ago) @ Kermit

- No text -

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+1, or picking apart more bad arguments

by davidfuchs ⌂, USA, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 19:57 (3879 days ago) @ Kermit


I wish Infinite's use of the Vox uprising was more like that than what we got. Again, I refer us back to Booker's line in the elevator where we get hit over the head with it Master Chief Halo 4 style. AM I A MACHINE/THE VOX ARE BAD.


I totally get what you're saying about subtlety, and I'm on record for hating that line in Halo 4, and that's because it connects dots no one needs help connecting.

We're getting into sensitive territory here, but it seems that many of BioShock Infinite's critics wanted it to be a different story than it is--specifically, they wanted a morality tale about racism (the evils of white racists in particular). They wanted the dots to be connected in a very specific way. I submit that what makes the game edgy is that racism is presented as something more complicated, as something like a disease that can be spread to its victims. The danger of this presentation is that it runs the risk of removing moral judgment. Booker speaking out is a counter to that.

I'm not saying Levine was 100% successful in what he was trying to do, but racism--its sources and effects--is presented, thoughtfully and with nuance. Much more so than that Daniel Golding article suggests.

I have more to say, of course, but I haven't had dinner yet. :)

Precisely. I do think the issue of when are you being obtuse versus being over the top is a fine one--as we're citing, the Master Chief line is a perfect example of something that just wasn't necessary and cutting would have made a strong scene much stronger. But that's a matter of presentation, not the core thrust.

This critique is the poster-child for missing the point: http://superopinionated.com/2013/04/03/booker-dewitt-and-the-case-of-the-young-white-lady-feels-a-bioshock-infinite-r...

Ken Levine didn't set out to make a game about the Occupy movement and racism. He set out to tell a fantastic tale of multiverses coming together and unraveling against a rich history-inspired backdrop that, unsurprisingly enough, was very racist. Those are the terms you have to judge the game on first. While I love the "what if they had focused on this" game too, it's ignoring the fact that something can't be everything to everyone. It's like complaining that Citizen Kane was a really bad screwball comedy. It wasn't trying to be. If you can't see that, it's a failure of the viewer, not the work itself.

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Bad article is bad. *SP*

by Ragashingo ⌂, Official DBO Cryptarch, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 21:48 (3879 days ago) @ davidfuchs
edited by Ragashingo, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 22:47

Wow oh wow did that writer miss the points of the game… pretty much all of them. I may get in "trouble" for picking this article apart, but here it goes anyway…

Centering a story about people of color fighting against racist oppression on a white person and making that white person the agent of the fight’s success is racist.

Um… why? Why can't a white person be the agent of the success of oppressed black people? Ok, sure, if the game pushed the message that the blacks could only be saved by a white person, that they weren't good enough or smart enough to save themselves, then yeah. Racist. But I didn't get that message. I don't think that message was given. According to this article's author is any white person helping a black person racist? How about the reverse. Would it be racist for a black person to help a group of white people? Where does the line get drawn?

When a revolution happens, yes sometimes the leaders become corrupt with power. That usually happens AFTER the power-grab is secure, not mid-victory.

Yes, and usually we don't have our point of view being "distorted" by jumping through tears into similar but very different realities! The Fitzory that took over Booker's airship and sent him to secure the guns was not the Fitzory that was leading the violence and destruction in the later. Would the former have gotten around to the same destruction? Maybe. Perhaps even probably given her voxaphone recording about how she realized that she had a voice and could influence people to get her revenge. But this whole, "usually leaders become corrupt later" is just stupid when dimension hopping comes into play.

and it’s unfortunate that this game has no mechanics that allow for jumping forward in time…

Eh. It's unfortunate that the core gun combat wasn't better. It's unfortunate that it wasn't mind linked via Matrix style VR. The game can only be what it is. You want a game that allows you to time hop to see a slowly building story to its conclusion you go make one yourself.

It's funny, I don't actually like saying that. I usually think countering game criticism with "why don't you secure millions of dollars and hundreds of employees and produce what you want" is pretty unfair. But there's also limited development time / money and there is the validity of what a story teller wants to tell. You can want something other than you got, and sometimes you are right to want it, but there is also a hard to define point where you cross into unfair criticism. I think the above quote crossed that point.

Where was my Occupy Columbia? …Oh right, it was divided on race lines and immediately fell apart (because black women can’t lead? because a strong black woman pushing for change is “just as bad” as the regime she’s trying to topple?

No. It fell apart because THIS black woman (Fitzory) felt betrayed and cast out and trampled upon and decided to get revenge. You have to work a lot harder to go from one black woman in one story doing something to (basically) accusing the story's writer of having her do it because he thinks that's what all black women would do, or because he thinks they are incapable of leading. Asking the questions in and of itself is actually valid in my opinion, but I think if you ask (leading) questions like that you need to then go on and provide the evidence that the writer was really saying those things. I don't think the article gets anywhere close to establishing that.

I feel like if the game wasn’t so eager to immediately showcase how “bad” Columbia was, it’d have been a much more nuanced journey from judging the behavior of the rebels to understanding what actual desperation feels like.

It's a Bioshock game. Showing that the city is bad is pretty much the entire point. I don't even disagree that the game could have show more, gone more in depth, etc, but given the rest of the article I don't think the author earns the… benefit of the doubt for lack of a better term… that she is giving honest criticism of the story rather than using it to push her own agenda.

Could have stood a bit more bomb-showing throughout the rest of the game, rather than…

MEH. I spent two days following each story thread presented in dialog and cutscene and voxaphone and came to the conclusion that the story, ending and all, is very well set up and supported. It wasn't perfect. I still think there were a couple of minor plot holes, but the bomb was shown, you just had to work a good bit extra to see it.

Does imposing so much additional work on the player invalidate or at least diminish the effect? Maybe a bit. But that's a big question better left for later. I did like how the story was interesting on the surface but had that extra layer of support underneath. Should every game and story do it? Probably not. I just think that this one pulled it off.

At one point Elizabeth wonders if she’s wishing these alternate universes into being. While that turns out to be false (the truth instead being the current state of DC comics) I actually would have loved that to be true.

Hmm. I think she WAS in fact wishing them into existence. When Elizabeth opened a tear she always got what she wanted. From getting to view Paris to having the Vox succeed she always achieved her goal. The problem was she had limited ability to choose between realities and often got too much of what she wanted. At best, instead of turning out to be false, the question is left unanswered. I just think that when Elizabeth herself asks the question "Did I do this?" or some such paraphrase then we have to seriously consider that the answer might be yes.

Also I'm not much of a comic person so I fully admit not getting the reference to the current state of DC comics. Hopefully that doesn't render my whole thing here invalid…

Why do the twins care so much about saving Manhattan? I mean, I get *we* lived through 9/11 but they didn’t, so why does the bombing of a place we never go to in the game matter so much more than all of the people living in Columbia? For a game set in US history, this was the one piece of the game that actually stank of US entitlement. Who gives a shit about the city off-screen, let me save the city in front of me, yeesh.

And the final paragraph just proves to me that the writer didn't even come close to understanding the story. The goal of the Luteces wasn't to save New York. It was to set right ALL of the wrongs that sprung from helping Comstock stealing his own daughter from a different reality. This means preventing the bombing of New York, yes, but also means preventing the racism in Colombia, preventing Comstock from murdering his wife, preventing Fitzory, the innocent maid from being blamed for said murder, preventing the death and destruction Fitzory caused, preventing themselves from being "killed" and scattered across time, and preventing all the other things big and small that we learned about during the game. Yes, the attack on New York was a significant event that we got to stop, but I didn't see 9/11 or US entitlement in it.

In the end I just want to take this lady, shake her, and say "NO!" The article doesn't just miss the point of Bioshock Infinite, it doesn't even know what the points were. Instead the author pushes multiple agendas (racism, 9/11, etc) using Bioshock as a strawman of sorts. Of course then there's this:

So I watched my spouse play through BioShock Infinite over the past few days.

Next time play the game yourself before trying to tear it apart.

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by Xenos @, Shores of Time, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 22:31 (3879 days ago) @ Ragashingo
edited by Xenos, Wednesday, August 14, 2013, 23:25

The part about her thinking the game itself is racist sticks out to me as the common thing many people do which is avoid even the slightest appearance of racism rather than everyone learning to distinguish real racism. Talking about race and talking about individuals is not in itself racist. If a person of any race is a bad person is someone out there going to call that person racist for portraying their race as bad?

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by davidfuchs ⌂, USA, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 04:50 (3879 days ago) @ Xenos

The part about her thinking the game itself is racist sticks out to me as the common thing many people do which is avoid even the slightest appearance of racism rather than everyone learning to distinguish real racism. Talking about race and talking about individuals is not in itself racist. If a person of any race is a bad person is someone out there going to call that person racist for portraying their race as bad?

That's why I tend to hate political correctness, because it feels like an attempt to paper over our problems rather than confront them. Easier to be safe and never say anything that could possibly be construed as bad, right? The entire blog is full of stuff like this and seeing it come from a white woman does give me that sense of this person being terribly uncomfortable at a personal level.

I know that I've got Indian-killing, slave-owning ancestors in my family tree, and I don't fault them too much for their actions, nor do I feel that guilty about it myself. What matters is what we do in the present to right past wrongs. Overreacting to a video game is focusing on the wrong idea of what the problem is.

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by MrPadraig08 ⌂ @, Steel City, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 08:56 (3879 days ago) @ davidfuchs

The part about her thinking the game itself is racist sticks out to me as the common thing many people do which is avoid even the slightest appearance of racism rather than everyone learning to distinguish real racism. Talking about race and talking about individuals is not in itself racist. If a person of any race is a bad person is someone out there going to call that person racist for portraying their race as bad?


That's why I tend to hate political correctness, because it feels like an attempt to paper over our problems rather than confront them. Easier to be safe and never say anything that could possibly be construed as bad, right? The entire blog is full of stuff like this and seeing it come from a white woman does give me that sense of this person being terribly uncomfortable at a personal level.

I know that I've got Indian-killing, slave-owning ancestors in my family tree, and I don't fault them too much for their actions, nor do I feel that guilty about it myself. What matters is what we do in the present to right past wrongs. Overreacting to a video game is focusing on the wrong idea of what the problem is.

I hear ya, for a long time I mentally denied my ancestors could've been responsible for these types of things (and for the most part I'm off the hook, Irish immigrating into Canada then Boston and Italians that moved to Chicago in the 1930's), but when I met my great Uncle who I aptly call Colonel Sanders (white boss hogg suit and everything), it was hard to mentally deny that part of my family was deeply entrenched in the south and most likely owned slaves. I don't feel bad about it, certainly nothing I ever did or would do.

Righting the present and certainly the future is our duty, but it's difficult for me to understand how prevalent the use of past symbols and events to mean somekind of mantra.

I live in PA, a northern territory, I have seen more confederate flags in the field than in every history class I've ever taken. I don't really understand it as a symbol. It really can't be all racially based, there has to be something about government and freedom in there. But, I don't see people trying to take back swastikas from the 1940's (even if it meant something before in asian cultures.)

Something to think about.

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Hitler trivia time!

by davidfuchs ⌂, USA, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 10:06 (3879 days ago) @ MrPadraig08

The part about her thinking the game itself is racist sticks out to me as the common thing many people do which is avoid even the slightest appearance of racism rather than everyone learning to distinguish real racism. Talking about race and talking about individuals is not in itself racist. If a person of any race is a bad person is someone out there going to call that person racist for portraying their race as bad?


That's why I tend to hate political correctness, because it feels like an attempt to paper over our problems rather than confront them. Easier to be safe and never say anything that could possibly be construed as bad, right? The entire blog is full of stuff like this and seeing it come from a white woman does give me that sense of this person being terribly uncomfortable at a personal level.

I know that I've got Indian-killing, slave-owning ancestors in my family tree, and I don't fault them too much for their actions, nor do I feel that guilty about it myself. What matters is what we do in the present to right past wrongs. Overreacting to a video game is focusing on the wrong idea of what the problem is.


I hear ya, for a long time I mentally denied my ancestors could've been responsible for these types of things (and for the most part I'm off the hook, Irish immigrating into Canada then Boston and Italians that moved to Chicago in the 1930's), but when I met my great Uncle who I aptly call Colonel Sanders (white boss hogg suit and everything), it was hard to mentally deny that part of my family was deeply entrenched in the south and most likely owned slaves. I don't feel bad about it, certainly nothing I ever did or would do.

Righting the present and certainly the future is our duty, but it's difficult for me to understand how prevalent the use of past symbols and events to mean somekind of mantra.

I live in PA, a northern territory, I have seen more confederate flags in the field than in every history class I've ever taken. I don't really understand it as a symbol. It really can't be all racially based, there has to be something about government and freedom in there. But, I don't see people trying to take back swastikas from the 1940's (even if it meant something before in asian cultures.)

Something to think about.

The symbolism is a difficult issue. The swastika had (and still has) a whole of different meanings from the Nazis. It still has that meaning, but it's been tainted--the first thing anyone's going to think of when they see it is the Nazis (like how you couldn't name your kid Adolf nowadays without getting looks, although Adolf wasn't a great name to begin with.) Aesthetically, I love the German WWII uniforms, those of the SS in particular. But I have to realize that wearing such a uniform would, to a casual glance, appear to be glorifying a government that did horrible things. I think there's a balance between being mindful of other's reactions and tempering, if not censoring, your behavior, and not projecting your own biases and rationales onto other's actions. This doesn't really even have to be about racism, Nazis, or touchy topics: if I'm at the store, waiting in line with nothing to do but people-watch, I start coming up with stories. Why is that lady over there loud, fat, and obnoxious? I start thinking about them according to my own narrative, but what if she's overweight due to steroids she has to take for a medical condition? What if she's yelling at her kid because of lack of sleep and frustration about her dying family member or something just out of her control? I can't put myself in someone's head and say that they're flying a Confederate flag out of some racist impulse; I can only tell them that it gives off that impression for some legitimate reasons.*

*On the subject of Confederate flags, though, I don't like the arguments that it's about southern pride or unity. Fact is there was massive anti-war sentiment on both sides during the conflict; lots of white southerners were opposed to the war and fighting over slavery, after all they didn't have the same economic investment in it as the rich landowners did. Likewise plenty of northerners would take peace over emancipation; for all its historical flaws Spielberg's "Lincoln" showed this pretty well. A lot of those people flying the Confederate flags I think are just badly misinterpreting their own history, buying into a version peddled after defeat to add some nobility to the "lost cause" and vilify the North as the aggressors.

It's funny that you mention all this happening in PA though, just goes to show you how little geography really has to do with these sentiments. My mom's side of the family has 17th century roots in old Southern Maryland; knowing how southern that part of the state is you can see why John Wilkes Booth got a warm reception on his escape through there.

Fun aside: My grandfather's friend once had a conversation with Hitler and shook his hand. So all of you at HBOHIO who shook my hand can claim you are four degrees of separation from Hitler. :P

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by Jillybean, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 11:59 (3878 days ago) @ davidfuchs

That's why I tend to hate political correctness, because it feels like an attempt to paper over our problems rather than confront them.

Oookayyyy . . . time for me to step away from this thread.

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by Xenos @, Shores of Time, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 12:16 (3878 days ago) @ Jillybean

Oookayyyy . . . time for me to step away from this thread.

Wait, are you implying disliking the cultural construction of political correctness is somehow racist? Political correctness is not synonymous with anti-racism... I don't want to go too far into this topic, but you wrote that as if someone who dislikes political correctness is crazy or a bad person.

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by MrPadraig08 ⌂ @, Steel City, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:02 (3878 days ago) @ Xenos

I think being PC is supposed to neutralize or normalize communication so that many more people can get the most of your message without cultural stigmas, barriers, or emotional context blurring the message.

It makes a lot of sense to a business that has to deal with many different people they can't hope to communicate with all at a personalized level.

And it is supposed to assure at least a facade of mutual respect, but that's entirely up to the communicator in question and their level of respect for themselves and other people.

It is a bit of a cop-out, but the sentiment is most certainly to secure respect and neutralized communication for very different people.

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by Xenos @, Shores of Time, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:04 (3878 days ago) @ MrPadraig08

I think being PC is supposed to neutralize or normalize communication so that many more people can get the most of your message without cultural stigmas, barriers, or emotional context blurring the message.

It makes a lot of sense to a business that has to deal with many different people they can't hope to communicate with all at a personalized level.

And it is supposed to assure at least a facade of mutual respect, but that's entirely up to the communicator in question and their level of respect for themselves and other people.

It is a bit of a cop-out, but the sentiment is most certainly to secure respect and neutralized communication for very different people.

Yeah I agree with this completely. It's in everyday life that PC is more of a hindrance than a help. Communication would take a considerable bit more time (or be impossible in certain situations) if we termed everything we say in PC language. We can be respectful toward people without using PC language.

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You try to get out...

by Jillybean, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:04 (3878 days ago) @ Xenos

Ok - firstly, I suspect we're probably not using the same definition of politically correct.

Secondly, I don't think I accused Infinite of being a racist game - or if I did, what I should have said was "no more racist than any other game in the society we live in". I think it tries to do well, bringing in named black characters. It gets a star for that.

I just think that the story it tells with black characters (and white characters) is pretty shite, and in bringing up the racism card itself, it cannot then escape examination about race by saying "ah but that's not what we were going for".


And now I really will depart from this thread.

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...and I keep pulling you back in.

by Xenos @, Shores of Time, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:10 (3878 days ago) @ Jillybean
edited by Xenos, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:23

Ok - firstly, I suspect we're probably not using the same definition of politically correct.

Secondly, I don't think I accused Infinite of being a racist game - or if I did, what I should have said was "no more racist than any other game in the society we live in". I think it tries to do well, bringing in named black characters. It gets a star for that.

I just think that the story it tells with black characters (and white characters) is pretty shite, and in bringing up the racism card itself, it cannot then escape examination about race by saying "ah but that's not what we were going for".


And now I really will depart from this thread.

Okay, I understand, I wasn't trying to get offensive. The response to the article posted was pretty separate from your complaints (at least for me, can't speak for everyone). Generally I use the definition of PC from Wikipedia which tends to talk about it as Padraig did in his reply to my previous comment which is a language that is appropriate for businesses and politicians because they are a public mouth-piece, but isn't (usually) very helpful in everyday life. Just to speak for at least myself (and I assume davidfuchs too) that we weren't saying you shouldn't speak to people respectfully, but merely saying it shouldn't be an obsession and something that we dance around.

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You try to get out...

by davidfuchs ⌂, USA, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:21 (3878 days ago) @ Xenos

Ok - firstly, I suspect we're probably not using the same definition of politically correct.

Secondly, I don't think I accused Infinite of being a racist game - or if I did, what I should have said was "no more racist than any other game in the society we live in". I think it tries to do well, bringing in named black characters. It gets a star for that.

I just think that the story it tells with black characters (and white characters) is pretty shite, and in bringing up the racism card itself, it cannot then escape examination about race by saying "ah but that's not what we were going for".


And now I really will depart from this thread.


Okay, I understand, I wasn't trying to get offensive. The response to the article posted was pretty separate from your complaints (at least for me, can't speak for everyone). Generally I use the definition of PC from Wikipedia which tends to talk about it as Padraig did in his reply to my previous comment which is a language that is appropriate for businesses and politicians because they are a public mouth-piece, but isn't (usually) very helpful in everyday life. I just to speak for at least myself (and I assume davidfuchs too) that we weren't saying you shouldn't speak to people respectfully, but merely saying it shouldn't be an obsession and something that we dance around.

That's more or less my viewpoint, too. As for judging a work of art beyond its intent, we'll have to agree to disagree.

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...and I keep pulling you back in.

by MrPadraig08 ⌂ @, Steel City, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:51 (3878 days ago) @ Xenos

Just to speak for at least myself (and I assume davidfuchs too) that we weren't saying you shouldn't speak to people respectfully

I've seen plenty of people use PC talk in passive aggressive and venomous passes at other people. It's kinda hilarious to mix nuteralized speech with a toxic corporate sentiment.

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 14:34 (3878 days ago) @ Jillybean

That's why I tend to hate political correctness, because it feels like an attempt to paper over our problems rather than confront them.


Oookayyyy . . . time for me to step away from this thread.

His words are very true. Political Correctness is worse than censorship.

With censorship, you at least know who is censoring you. With political correctness, you CHOOSE to censor yourself, unaware of where the pressure actually comes from. It's a toxic sludge that must be eliminated, along with laws against hate speech, holocaust denial, and blasphemy if we are to live in a better world.

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 14:30 (3878 days ago) @ davidfuchs

I know that I've got Indian-killing, slave-owning ancestors in my family tree, and I don't fault them too much for their actions, nor do I feel that guilty about it myself. What matters is what we do in the present to right past wrongs. Overreacting to a video game is focusing on the wrong idea of what the problem is.

This is of course why the game sucks: it uses racism to make the villain seem bad. Because racist = bad.

But as you point out, 150 years ago, owning slaves was socially acceptable. I'm sure a lot of good people owned slaves. Who were they to argue with accepted social convention? Lots of people in lots of reviews of Django Unchained call Leonardo Dicaprio's character an evil slave owner. From what I can tell, he actually seemed like a pretty good one. He let the slaves live in the house, and generally was concerned for their welfare. His rationalizations for slavery based on skull bumps is just his way of justifying something that he probably has reservations about in the first place. I mean, why else would a man go to such great lengths to justify slavery?

Had you grown up in the South at that time, you probably would have owned slaves too, because it was acceptable and expected. It only seems wrong now in hindsight.

That's why hitting us over the head with how racist Comstock was in order to make us think he's a bad dude is so ridiculously cheap, and uninspired.

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Man, our culture doesn't get racism...

by SonofMacPhisto @, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 15:01 (3878 days ago) @ Xenos

The part about her thinking the game itself is racist sticks out to me as the common thing many people do which is avoid even the slightest appearance of racism rather than everyone learning to distinguish real racism. Talking about race and talking about individuals is not in itself racist. If a person of any race is a bad person is someone out there going to call that person racist for portraying their race as bad?

I wonder if they've ever read/watched The Boondocks?

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I still disagree

by Jillybean, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 11:57 (3878 days ago) @ davidfuchs

Well - firstly, didn't Levine hang around Occupy camps for a while to get a feel for them?

But I don't think I've explained my problem very well. The article you linked to makes one good point -

When a revolution happens, yes sometimes the leaders become corrupt with power. That usually happens AFTER the power-grab is secure, not mid-victory. Also nothing Daisy Fitzroy does in the game, including shooting a crying kid, is as damaging to as many people as the day-to-day oppression perpetrated by Comstock’s society. I get that given the game’s setting, it’d be kind of boring to sit around and wait 10 years to see Fitzroy’s evolution into The Godfather or whatever (side note: WOULD PLAY), and it’s unfortunate that this game has no mechanics that allow for jumping forward in time…

We see so little of the revolution - particularly because we keep using plot devices to jump into a slightly different timeline - that Daisy's turn is meaningless. She goes from slave to revolutionary to leader to villain in the space of a few jumps. Where is her journey? We're given absolutely no reason for her corruption other than the tired old saying "power corrupts".

Of course, the rich, white antagonist gets lots of development - even before you learn he is also the protagonist.

My issue is that there is a story there, a story of someone falling from grace, and more than that it is a story that deserves to be told. But it's shoved aside for a strange and creepy family drama. I've already pointed out how uncomfortable I am with a lot of the Booker-Elizabeth interactions. The reason for that is the same reason I don't like the Daisy Fitzroy storyline. Both of those could be really interesting, but they're put through a Triple A game lens, where things are sexualised or dismissed as easily as you bury a sky hook in someone's skull.

Elizabeth and Booker are probably not supposed to be sexual towards each other. I'm sure the game never meant to imply that. But it does. It does because men are sexy and women are vulnerable and those are my expectations of a game. Infinite never tries to subvert that, or play on it or do anything other than say "oh and by the way she's also his daughter."

The revolution becomes a second-act villain like it would in any game, with no more reason than because the game says "Oh and by the way, power corrupts". Infinite never pays any due to the stories it try to tell - it has no respect for those emotional journeys. It's so busy making its vulnerable, busty leading lady shed a few tears and look attractive bruised that it doesn't want to tell us why Daisy might be corruptible at all.

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I still disagree

by Ragashingo ⌂, Official DBO Cryptarch, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:02 (3878 days ago) @ Jillybean
edited by Ragashingo, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 13:10

We see so little of the revolution - particularly because we keep using plot devices to jump into a slightly different timeline - that Daisy's turn is meaningless. She goes from slave to revolutionary to leader to villain in the space of a few jumps. Where is her journey? We're given absolutely no reason for her corruption other than the tired old saying "power corrupts".

Despite the jumps I think Fitzroy's motivations remained pretty much the same throughout the entire game. She was a good maid in Comstock House, and possibly even Lady Comstock's friend, but was unfairly blamed for her murder. She ran and hid in Finkton and had her eyes opened to just how bad people of her race, those not lucky enough to be serving in high up places like Comstock House, were being treated. At that point she realizes that a revolution is possible, that it just needs a spark and a voice that she can provide. Which she does.

I put forth that Fitzory was on the path to bloody revolution from the very first time we met her. Before that even. When we arrive in Colombia the police were receiving shipments of Skyhooks not because they were standard issue, but because Vox were using the skylines to steal and (if I remember correctly) kill. An earlyish Voxaphone has Fitzory musing that Booker might be someone she can use to get her revolution started. When they first meet after Booker and Elizabeth steal the airship Fitzroy doesn't come aboard to force Booker to help in some kind of peaceful protest, she wants guns.

We go through multiple tears and see things get worse and worse from then on, but were we ever lead to believe that any version of Fitzory was going to use those guns for peaceful purposes? I say no. Where is Daisy Fitzroy's journey from slave to villain? I argue that it happened many years before Booker even arrived, and that the only Fitzroy we ever saw in game was already a villain. The only different between early game Fitzroy and late game Fitzroy was the means to get her revenge.

The revolution becomes a second-act villain like it would in any game, with no more reason than because the game says "Oh and by the way, power corrupts". Infinite never pays any due to the stories it try to tell - it has no respect for those emotional journeys. It's so busy making its vulnerable, busty leading lady shed a few tears and look attractive bruised that it doesn't want to tell us why Daisy might be corruptible at all.

Again I disagree. I see Fitzroy's story as one of oppression, of being blamed for killing one of the most important people (white people no less!) in all of Colombia, seeing the true oppression of people like her down in Finkton, and seeking bloody, revolutionary revenge. Yes, the message that power corrupts is a part of Daisy's story, but I think you're closing your eyes to her backstory and looking for a character to have a journey when she had already had it and was set on a fixed course of action by the time we meet her.

That said, if you want to argue that a few hidden voxaphones aren't enough establish a character's motives I'd still probably disagree, but it would be very sympathetic disagreement. If that's even a thing.

P.S. I'm not touching the sexual argument, not because I don't want to, but because I tried and found I didn't understand enough of what you were trying to say or what you wanted to see instead.

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Here's a thought...

by SonofMacPhisto @, Friday, August 16, 2013, 10:48 (3877 days ago) @ Ragashingo

Maybe with Daisy, it wasn't "power corrupts" but that "power assists the corrupt" or "the corrupt seek power."

I mean, duh, bad person acts badly, but why do we seem to assume Daisy is good and that she only turns bad when she gets power (which I think was kind of Rashashingo's point)?

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Here's a thought...

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Friday, August 16, 2013, 11:47 (3877 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

Maybe with Daisy, it wasn't "power corrupts" but that "power assists the corrupt" or "the corrupt seek power."

I mean, duh, bad person acts badly, but why do we seem to assume Daisy is good and that she only turns bad when she gets power (which I think was kind of Rashashingo's point)?

In Daisy's case my take is that the desire for revenge corrupts.

The insistence that the story has a simple "power corrupts" theme trips us up, like with that writer Ragashingo linked to who complained that power shouldn't corrupt before power is acquired. Right, but bloodless revolutions are noteworthy only because of their bloodlessness.

Why have Americans and the British remained so chummy (other than a shared heritage)? It doesn't hurt that the Atlantic Ocean made it difficult for American forces to destroy Windsor Castle. (Let it be said they very likely couldn't have regardless, but you get my point.)

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I still disagree

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 14:22 (3878 days ago) @ Jillybean


Elizabeth and Booker are probably not supposed to be sexual towards each other. I'm sure the game never meant to imply that. But it does. It does because men are sexy and women are vulnerable and those are my expectations of a game. Infinite never tries to subvert that, or play on it or do anything other than say "oh and by the way she's also his daughter."

A missed opportunity for sure! But hey, Hideo Kojima already did that.

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I still disagree

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Friday, August 16, 2013, 21:19 (3877 days ago) @ Jillybean

...Also nothing Daisy Fitzroy does in the game, including shooting a crying kid, is as damaging to as many people as the day-to-day oppression perpetrated by Comstock’s society.

This line really bothered me, and initially it was because this writer so casually justifies the execution of a child, but I got to thinking about it, and that's exactly the kind of logic that fueled the Bolshevik revolution, and many of the other murderous political movements in human history.

"Freedom is a bourgeois prejudice. We repudiate all morality which proceeds from supernatural ideas or ideas which are outside the class conception. In our opinion, morality is entirely subordinate to the interests of the class war. Everything is moral which is necessary for the annihilation of the old exploiting order and for the uniting the proletariat. Our morality consists solely in close discipline and conscious warfare against the exploiters." -- Lenin

Hitler did something similar, reputiating all morality that didn't serve the master race.

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I still disagree

by SonofMacPhisto @, Saturday, August 17, 2013, 06:23 (3877 days ago) @ Kermit

...Also nothing Daisy Fitzroy does in the game, including shooting a crying kid, is as damaging to as many people as the day-to-day oppression perpetrated by Comstock’s society.

God forbid we call both instances bad.

This line really bothered me, and initially it was because this writer so casually justifies the execution of a child, but I got to thinking about it, and that's exactly the kind of logic that fueled the Bolshevik revolution, and many of the other murderous political movements in human history.

"Freedom is a bourgeois prejudice. We repudiate all morality which proceeds from supernatural ideas or ideas which are outside the class conception. In our opinion, morality is entirely subordinate to the interests of the class war. Everything is moral which is necessary for the annihilation of the old exploiting order and for the uniting the proletariat. Our morality consists solely in close discipline and conscious warfare against the exploiters." -- Lenin

Hitler did something similar, reputiating all morality that didn't serve the master race.

^This

Apropos of kinda related, wife and I have been gourging on M.A.S.H. lately. I never watched it until now. Hawkeye is my hero. We need more people like him.

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I still disagree

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Saturday, August 17, 2013, 11:10 (3876 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto


Apropos of kinda related, wife and I have been gourging on M.A.S.H. lately. I never watched it until now. Hawkeye is my hero. We need more people like him.

The irony of you bringing this up isn't lost on me in that the subtext of M.A.S.H. (especially the great Altman film on which the series was based) was a criticism of the Vietnam War, the last overt hot war the U.S. fought to try to stop what Lenin started. M.A.S.H. was one of my favorite shows growing up. I even had a Radar toboggan I picked up at an Army surplus store.

I suspect I might view a few episodes as a little preachy now, but Hawkeye was an undeniably great character who provided a voice of conscience, which is especially necessary during war.

Stopping barbarism is one of the few justifications for violence, but once the violence starts, there's a huge risk of becoming barbaric yourself. And that's probably an opening to reel this back in and consider Daisy. I definitely wanted more MLK and less Malcom X in Daisy, and perhaps in a different timeline there was a different kind of Daisy, or maybe she didn't have access to tears where she could see a Ghandi or a King in action. On the other hand, maybe a different Daisy did try that approach and it didn't work in Columbia. The effectiveness of Ghandi and King relied on awakening the conscience of the majority, something that might not have been possible in any 1912 reality. Given Levine's penchant for mixing up current historical trends, it makes sense that Daisy's rhetoric is reflective of the Marxist thought that was gathering steam in that timeframe.

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I still disagree

by SonofMacPhisto @, Saturday, August 17, 2013, 11:45 (3876 days ago) @ Kermit


Apropos of kinda related, wife and I have been gourging on M.A.S.H. lately. I never watched it until now. Hawkeye is my hero. We need more people like him.


The irony of you bringing this up isn't lost on me in that the subtext of M.A.S.H. (especially the great Altman film on which the series was based) was a criticism of the Vietnam War, the last overt hot war the U.S. fought to try to stop what Lenin started. M.A.S.H. was one of my favorite shows growing up. I even had a Radar toboggan I picked up at an Army surplus store.

I suspect I might view a few episodes as a little preachy now, but Hawkeye was an undeniably great character who provided a voice of conscience, which is especially necessary during war.

The other night I saw the scene where he tears into Radar for being naive. Powerful stuff, I think. Very Mal Reynolds there... which is good. Makes him human, you know?

Stopping barbarism is one of the few justifications for violence, but once the violence starts, there's a huge risk of becoming barbaric yourself. And that's probably an opening to reel this back in and consider Daisy. I definitely wanted more MLK and less Malcom X in Daisy, and perhaps in a different timeline there was a different kind of Daisy, or maybe she didn't have access to tears where she could see a Ghandi or a King in action. On the other hand, maybe a different Daisy did try that approach and it didn't work in Columbia. The effectiveness of Ghandi and King relied on awakening the conscience of the majority, something that might not have been possible in any 1912 reality. Given Levine's penchant for mixing up current historical trends, it makes sense that Daisy's rhetoric is reflective of the Marxist thought that was gathering steam in that timeframe.

Yeah, half the "fun" of justifed violence is knowing exactly when to stop - when is enough enough and your foe stopped? We certainly don't have that down yet.

I like what you said at the end there - makes Daisy a person of her time, which is really all she could be. 1912 didn't have the hindsight of two world wars and the spectre of nuclear armageddon to inspire "oh shit give peace a chance srsly guys."

Maybe Bioshock is talking more about the violence that's inherent in our world, the kinds of issues that have always been issues. I'm thinking of "No Country for Old Men" now, where that old hermit-Yoda guy tells Tommy Lee Jones' character that, "This has always been a violent area." I've never, ever thought he was just talking about that little border-town in Texas.

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One little tweak...

by SonofMacPhisto @, Thursday, August 15, 2013, 15:00 (3878 days ago) @ Kermit

I totally get what you're saying about subtlety, and I'm on record for hating that line in Halo 4, and that's because it connects dots no one needs help connecting.

I think I'm subconciously bringing this up so you'll agree with me. :P

We're getting into sensitive territory here, but it seems that many of BioShock Infinite's critics wanted it to be a different story than it is--specifically, they wanted a morality tale about racism (the evils of white racists in particular). They wanted the dots to be connected in a very specific way. I submit that what makes the game edgy is that racism is presented as something more complicated, as something like a disease that can be spread to its victims. The danger of this presentation is that it runs the risk of removing moral judgment. Booker speaking out is a counter to that.

This is an excellent point. Your argument has lessened my ignorance, sir.

I'm not saying Levine was 100% successful in what he was trying to do, but racism--its sources and effects--is presented, thoughtfully and with nuance. Much more so than that Daniel Golding article suggests.

I agree. Ragashingo's take down of it was enough for me.

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One little tweak...

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Friday, August 16, 2013, 07:45 (3878 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

I totally get what you're saying about subtlety, and I'm on record for hating that line in Halo 4, and that's because it connects dots no one needs help connecting.


I think I'm subconciously bringing this up so you'll agree with me. :P

We're getting into sensitive territory here, but it seems that many of BioShock Infinite's critics wanted it to be a different story than it is--specifically, they wanted a morality tale about racism (the evils of white racists in particular). They wanted the dots to be connected in a very specific way. I submit that what makes the game edgy is that racism is presented as something more complicated, as something like a disease that can be spread to its victims. The danger of this presentation is that it runs the risk of removing moral judgment. Booker speaking out is a counter to that.


This is an excellent point. Your argument has lessened my ignorance, sir.

I don't think you're not ignorant at all. The game inspires all kinds of thoughts and discussions, and to me THAT'S why it deserves to lauded.

I'm not saying Levine was 100% successful in what he was trying to do, but racism--its sources and effects--is presented, thoughtfully and with nuance. Much more so than that Daniel Golding article suggests.


I agree. Ragashingo's take down of it was enough for me.

Actually, I was addressing the article that Jillybean originally linked to, but both articles make some of the same points.

Hate to keep teasing, but I've got more to say. It's a rich game.

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oops

by Kermit @, Raleigh, NC, Friday, August 16, 2013, 10:19 (3878 days ago) @ Kermit


I don't think you're not ignorant at all.

That should be:

I don't think you're ignorant at all.

Me, on the other hand ....

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oops

by SonofMacPhisto @, Friday, August 16, 2013, 10:42 (3878 days ago) @ Kermit

Haha, don't get too hung up there. I meant ignorant quite literally. My horizon expanded thanks to you.

(And relatively speaking, we're all pretty ignorant. What was that Socrates' said...?)

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oops

by Xenos @, Shores of Time, Friday, August 16, 2013, 12:31 (3877 days ago) @ SonofMacPhisto

(And relatively speaking, we're all pretty ignorant. What was that Socrates' said...?)

Ignorance is bliss? :-D

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oops

by SonofMacPhisto @, Friday, August 16, 2013, 13:47 (3877 days ago) @ Xenos

I thought it was "Don't forget your towel." :P

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