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So I got Bioshock Infinite for my birthday and I was very excited! I have been looking forward to this game for more than a year, lol. I finished it in a couple of weeks, mind you I didn't have a lot of time to play as I work almost every day and I do play games slow, I explore every single inch of the game.
A little bit of background, you play a character called Booker Dewitt, and you have come to the floating city of Columbia to get a girl named Elizabeth and bring her back to your creditors in New York to pay off a mysterious debt. Of course, nothing is ever as simple as it sounds, and you are pulled into a war between the city's founder, Comstock (who is like a magnetic cult leader who fancies himself a prophet of God) and Daisy Fitzroy and her Vox Populi (the lower working class folk who want to be treated fairly).
You really have to explore this game in depth and collect all the voxophones (sorta like audio logs) and really visit every inch of territory as it brings the whole game to life and adds in so much back story.
First of all, the graphics are amazing! There are the breathtaking vista's you'd expect of a city in the clouds, and the attention to detail is stunning. I swear, I spent more than a couple of minutes just looking at the scenery, lol.
The way you travel in the game is fitting as well, you travel by floating gondola boats to other locations in the game, or you travel by Skyline, which means you have a huge hook in your hand and you latch onto the skyline and go fast along the line to another area. It's very awesome, and way more exciting than my boring description made it sound lol.
The gameplay is also very good, quite simple, you use your vigors (this game's plasmids from the original bioshock) with the Left Trigger button and you use your gun with the Right Trigger button. To melee someone with your sky hook you press Y.
One change this game made from the original bioshock games is that you can't carry around extra salts (which power your vigors) or extra first aid kits. Once you pick up food, health kit, or salt it's used right away, even if you have a full health or vigors bar. I miss being able to carry around extra supplies and use them when I need them, like in the middle of battle when my health is getting low. The good news is, you now have a shield which regenerates, so as long as you stay out of the line of fire long enough for it to come back, you shouldn't lose too much health. And once the battle's done, the bodies of your enemies lying around should carry some food, salt and ammo for you to replenish your supplies.
Another thing I like in this game is that once you find Elizabeth, she'll toss you salt, health or ammo as you need it. She is your companion, but you don't need to protect her, she can fend for herself! She also has the ability to open up tears in reality which you can bring out food, a different weapon, salt, a turret or cover to help you in battle.
I was worried when I first started following the game videos, as Skylines and Skyhooks and Elizabeth opening up tears, they look cool but they also looked really complicated! But I needn't have worried, the game teaches you how to use these new abilities very intuitively and simply so that you aren't confused.
Storyline wise, this game is wonderful. It's so layered and complicated (at times) and in depth! As I said, you really have to explore everywhere and collect every voxophone in the game to get a real sense of the story line and the back ground of the game. It will help you understand the ending, which is a tad bit confusing lol. I'm still a little bit confused and I did find out everything! Even the back ground characters in this game are fleshed out, to the characters you walk by in the street to characters you never even get to meet. Speaking of which, I would have liked to interact with the world renowned hunter Preston Downs, we only get to meet him through his voxophones in the game.
And what can I saw about the Lutece siblings! They are twins, Robert and Rosalind, who follow around your character through out the game and offer him aid. It may be confusing how they appear and reappear in different places so often but that will be explained! The dialogue between them is hilarious at times and very aggravating to your character, Booker, lol.
One thing I didn't like about the game was that you couldn't save anytime you wanted anymore, now you had to wait for an autosave. It may have been just me, but the autosaves were few and far between! And when you only want to hop on for a bit in the evening, after supper but before going to bed, that is a bit annoying. I'm not sure why they changed that, but I didn't like that about the game.
The achievements were a little bit blah as well, only 5G for killing x number of enemies with x weapon in most cases, achievements for killing people with the Skyline or Skyhook and the normal game play unmissable achievements.
All in all, it was a fabulous game, with minor annoyances, so I'm giving it a 9 out of 10. Now I need to play it again and on Normal difficulty so I can get that achievement!
Cheers, and happy gaming!
