BioShock Infinite was a rocky release as the fanbase was essentially sold a lie and were rightly angered by this fact. I am no fan of manipulative advertisements and think that jacking up graphics for marketing and releasing the game with significantly lesser graphics is terrible and should be illegal.
Luckily enough I didn't actively follow gaming media at the time so all I knew about Infinite was the release date. So going in with zero expectations this game was really good to me. The gameplay was fun but man what a story-- I've seen some people boil this game down to escorting a Disney princess through a sky city but there's so much more going on here.
The backdrop of a city built in the sky based on American Exceptionalism and an extreme version of the "God and Country" crowd is well done. Everything seems all happy and good until those layers start getting peeled back and you see some of flaws in the system. This setting is interesting and is used to loosely explore themes of racism, patriarchy, and even the slaughter of Native Americans. This would usually annoy me as I typically hate politics in my video games, but it didn't feel like it was making a comment about today to me but rather sins of the past.
The most interesting theme to me is that of destiny, fate, or inevitability. The idea of "constants and variables" as it's put in the game where regardless of what timeline, and what choices you make differently, there are certain things that you are essentially predestined to do is an idea I found really interesting. They essentially used science to create time travel to figure out that there is a sort of master plan working in the background and even with the marvels of science we could not be the masters of our own universe, we are not gods. This is where the scientific rubber meets the religious road so to speak and I loved this concept.
The ending is also simply awesome with a heavily flawed character making the ultimate sacrifice to make right a series of wrongs. Ultimately this game didn't meet the environmental perfection of Rapture, but made up for it with a mature, deep story that asks so many questions and will leave the inquisitive mind pondering for long after the screen fades to black.
Luckily enough I didn't actively follow gaming media at the time so all I knew about Infinite was the release date. So going in with zero expectations this game was really good to me. The gameplay was fun but man what a story-- I've seen some people boil this game down to escorting a Disney princess through a sky city but there's so much more going on here.
The backdrop of a city built in the sky based on American Exceptionalism and an extreme version of the "God and Country" crowd is well done. Everything seems all happy and good until those layers start getting peeled back and you see some of flaws in the system. This setting is interesting and is used to loosely explore themes of racism, patriarchy, and even the slaughter of Native Americans. This would usually annoy me as I typically hate politics in my video games, but it didn't feel like it was making a comment about today to me but rather sins of the past.
The most interesting theme to me is that of destiny, fate, or inevitability. The idea of "constants and variables" as it's put in the game where regardless of what timeline, and what choices you make differently, there are certain things that you are essentially predestined to do is an idea I found really interesting. They essentially used science to create time travel to figure out that there is a sort of master plan working in the background and even with the marvels of science we could not be the masters of our own universe, we are not gods. This is where the scientific rubber meets the religious road so to speak and I loved this concept.
The ending is also simply awesome with a heavily flawed character making the ultimate sacrifice to make right a series of wrongs. Ultimately this game didn't meet the environmental perfection of Rapture, but made up for it with a mature, deep story that asks so many questions and will leave the inquisitive mind pondering for long after the screen fades to black.