Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
It does.
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Bioshock Infinite | Official Spoiler Thread |
- Thread starter BruceLeeRoy
- Start date
It does.
The universe isn't consciously changing sequences of events to prevent paradoxes, it just obliterates the realities in which paradoxes exist. That's why Liz needs to create the paradox by drowning Booker at the baptism.
randomengine
Banned
If it did, the game would not exist. Think about it.
Voice of Reason
Banned
Because her pinky being in another universe is not a paradox.
You act like that's the goal of the villains. It's not. Comstock was trying to bring about a certain future he saw through a tear, a future where Elizabeth was in charge of Columbia and succeeded in destroying the "Sodom Below." From his POV, he just needs to bring her into his timeline and condition her to be his successor. However, once the accident occurs and Liz starts exhibiting strange powers, they don't want her powers -- they're afraid of her powers. And so they try to control it, using the siphon to neuter her potential. They don't fully understand what she's capable of; they're researching it, trying to figure it out. But she's not inspiring anyone to think, "Gee, I should open a portal and cut off piece of myself so I can be magic!" There are too many unknown factors for anyone to be willing to do that to themselves.
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
What happens at the end of the game? Think about it.
Elizabeth isn't a living contradiction.
Jest Chillin
Member
Because Comstock wanting a seed is ingrained in who he is and what he becomes. It's a part of his personality, not a choice of yes or no. So long as he wants a seed he will seek one through the tears.
Because Liz is Anna. So long as there is an Anna and a Comstock, there will always be an eventual Liz. Anna isn't a choice but a person. The Universe doesn't prevent people from existing.. it only changes variables to constants to eliminate choices that would cause paradoxes.
randomengine
Banned
It would make sense to me if the finger were still alive, but it is dead, inert matter. What if a piece of my jacket gets cleaved, can it now allow me to jump through portals as well?
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
Is the jacket made of your flesh? Are you a potato?
Why would it need to be alive? At the atomic level, there's no difference between "dead" and "alive" organisms. Everything is made of particles of energy at the end of the day. And hers got shuffled in an unexpected way because time-space itself parted her in two.
Jest Chillin
Member
Technically the finger tip was still alive after the portal closed and only "died" awhile later.
In their system of rules, your memories become merged with the memories of the same "you" from the universe you just entered. There's a lot of magic masquerading as science, conjecture, and video game logic afoot here.
Voice of Reason
Banned
It contains her genetic material, unlike your jacket.
randomengine
Banned
Is my finger really ME or just some organic matter? That is how terribly ludicrous that explanation of her powers is. Some bad writing there.
You've gone beyond questioning the logic of the plot and now you're just critiquing the fiction of science fiction. You might as well be asking why don't any of the crows ever get shot in the crossfire.
randomengine
Banned
So space-time only pays attention to human genetic material and not bacterial or non-organic material that may have been cleaved by the same event? That is a theory I have never heard of it before. Space-time paying attention to DNA.
Jest Chillin
Member
That's more of an existential question. Your finger contains your DNA which, in theory, could be used to create a clone of you. It would be you without the same personality traits but genetically exactly the same.
Voice of Reason
Banned
Genetic material is what identifies you in the end. Stop acting like a smartass.
Again, it doesn't matter whether the pinky is alive. At the molecular level, it's all energy. But time-space separated part of her entity -- her entity is no longer complete in either timeline. In a sense, she's still in both timelines -- and in the space in-between. It's just as important to recognize not the separation, but the fact time-space literally parted her -- it's walling off one part of herself from another. Everyone else exists completely within their given timeline. She exists in the space in-between, as well.
Tummi Gummi
Member
Needs separate thread.
Let's just be glad this guy doesn't make video games.
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
I've never met you, so couldn't say. You sound like organic matter.
Thanks, I hadn't noticed before.
YOU WIN!
Incendiary
Banned
Guys, he's already decided he hates the game and everything about it is terrible, as is evidenced by his posts in the non-spoiler thread. So any explanation you give him he's just going to twist so he can make a snarky comment about how badly designed/written the game is. No reason to keep feeding him.
randomengine
Banned
I am saying it is a terribad explanation that should require a rewrite or further work on the plot in order to have it make sense. Even in science fiction terms, it makes little sense. I read the rest of the explanation and it seems to make internal narrative sense, with the alternate dimensions, Elizabeths, Comstocks and all that. That all is under the same umbrella, but that explanation for her powers does not fit well at all.
She is incomplete, part of her in one timeline, part in another, and in this game's fiction, that fucks shit up. If you're going to wonder why a piece of a jacket doesn't follow the same rules in a science fiction storyline, you're fishing for complaints.
randomengine
Banned
No I am absolutely sincere. The plot mostly makes sense except for that origin of her powers, which makes no sense at all.
Voice of Reason
Banned
You'd think Booker would keep it as a memory of her.
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
You can't complain about bad writing and then use a hideous portmanteau like "terribad". Terrible or bad, make up your mind, sir.
How so?
Yes you would. I mean he certainly saw it fall.
Please be respectful. He's free to share what he sees as a critique.
The rules of the universe as established in the game, as pertains to Liz's powers, are as simple as this:
The universe doesn't like it when the entirety of one's entity is split across timelines. Funny stuff happens when this occurs. In Liz's case, it's implied that in some way, she is stretched across the space between timelines. It's like she has her fingers in numerous doors that are nearly closed, and with time and maturity, she's able to "pry open" these doors. It's not a power that her captors understand and would try to replicate in themselves, though. She was taken to bring about the future Comstock had foreseen in a tear.
Voice of Reason
Banned
What does "science fiction terms" even mean? Is there a guideline sci-fi media must follow in order to make sense?
Within the game, Lutece hasn't actually come to a conclusion, just a theory, about the origin of her powers. So who knows? It could be something completely different, like maybe it happens when a very young person goes through a tear.
I think that a full-blown explanation breaking down Liz's powers would probably ruin the concept anyway. Like when they tried to give a scientific explanation of "The Force" in Star Wars, it just sounds ridiculous. Better to keep certain things foggy imo.
randomengine
Banned
What about a bacterium that is cleaved by the same event? That could cause all sorts of havoc....
No see this is the rule when it comes to one of a kind, ultra powerful super powers. They must come from an event that is not easily repeatable. Think Spider-Man and the radioactive spider, Captain America and the non-repeatable serum. Hulk and the non-repeatable gamma bomb. Superman the last son of Krypton. If the ability to create such a power were that easy, one single person would not have that power. It would be repeated. That does not happen here. It doesn't pass the smell test. It is bad writing.
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
It says in the top right of the screen. Also, when you quit out it will give you the time of your last autosave.
Tummi Gummi
Member
It should've told you when your last save was before you quit. It's a pretty bad system.
randomengine
Banned
Thank you. The first reasonable response. I can buy that.
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
Those are all excellent explanations for their powers... back in the 60s.
Yu Narukami
Member
Did you know that Lutece the former name of Paris was?
It is a non-repeatable event, though, or a highly improbable one, at least. We don't know the exact way in which the universe collapsed on her finger, the exact distribution of one part or another. Maybe it's the way she's taken through; maybe it's the timing with which she was parted. We can't say that simply lopping off your finger this way does the trick. There's probably more to the -way- it was lopped off than that. Again, this is phenomena no one in the game understands. All we know is that, in some way, it was linked to the moment where she was split between timelines.
Also, the explanations for Marvel superheroes are terrible. Might want to pick a better example and not point to fiction that actually is terrible.
Voice of Reason
Banned
Going by your logic, how likely is it someone will enter that machine and get a piece of their body torn apart? First of all, only a handful of people have used the machine, and it's very unlikely they're going to get torn apart while experimenting with it.
randomengine
Banned
So what we are saying is that we don't know. Seems reasonable, but unsatisfactory.
Incendiary
Banned
Enough people in the thread have given you reasonable explanations as to why it happened. The fact is, you're insistent on bringing up things like jackets and bacteria to disprove the theory. Yes, for all we know, if a cat was caught in a tear and lost its leg, the cat would be able to jump between timelines. But you're going into very nitpicky details.
The Luteces were one-of-a-kind scientists that designed the tear machine in the first place. Most of the explanations in the game (why Comstock aged faster, was sterile, why Elizabeth had powers) were Lutece's theories, not facts. The /fact/ is, Comstock killed the Luteces before they could research more with Elizabeth. The entire point of him killing Lady Comstock and the Luteces was Comstock wanted the tears and Elizabeth to himself and not for anybody else to gain her powers. He wanted to groom her to become the all-powerful God and only her, after he'd brainwashed her into believing him. He didn't care about understanding her, he only wanted to fulfill his prophecy of doom.
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
The Severed Pinkie of Power is the closest the game comes to an explanation, I'm afraid.
randomengine
Banned
The Fly.
Also imagine if the power were created by the cleaving of the finger, what you are left with is an infant, a very hurt and angry infant with the powers of a God. Logic says that wouldn't last long before the whole universe was torn apart. No, the finger is not a good explanation.
Dunno if a real/fake consensus was formed on that Songbird scream in Bioshock 1(not reading back through 30 pages) but it's in this video from 2009 so can't have been patched in recently http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJTdMx06tso