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[spekkeh]

The clever part of this game's story is the kind of meta commentary it offers on the nature of video games. The first game was basically about player agency and the ability for game designers to shuffle you down a tunnel and make you think you have choice when you don't. This game opens that up and kind of comments on the way video games do present choice in games and how player choice is accounted for and what part chance plays or the illusion of chance and randomness. My major issue with the game, is one I have with video games in general as a story telling medium and that is that the best way to leverage the advantages of the medium is through player self discovery and agency, however, this is also that one area that presents a huge risk to the narrative. In my play through, I definitely went "off the rails" and missed a few key audio logs which made the following audio logs quite confusing. I know an major element of confusion is part of the structure of the narrative and is required for the reveal at the end, however, it then made the ending more confusing than it needed to be. The catch 22 with the medium as a story telling method is that if you present the story to me in a linear scripted fashion, then I may as well be watching a movie or reading a book where there is more flexibility in perspective and agency doesn't need to be accounted for. Loved the game, but it does serve to highlight the limitations of the medium with regard to story.

Well I do feel that player agency can add something above and beyond a movie even in a largely linear expository fashion. The Walking Dead was a good example of this I thought. There are also games that give you the impression of exploration, while making sure you unconsciously go into the right direction. The problem for me with B:I is that you have to consciously go into the wrong direction to get the story.

 

[spekkeh]

So... I'm trying to clarify what happened at the end with Booker's death...

So all the versions that went to the baptism were killed by Elizabeth, regardless of whether or not they chose to accept or reject their new identity. Thus, while the 'hero' Booker that chose to reject the baptism was killed, so was the Booker that chose to become Comstock.

And so the Booker we see in the epilogue, I guess he chose to reject the baptism before he ever even went to the hill...


Right?

So the easy explanation would be there's a Booker that didn't want to be baptised in the first place.

Personally I'm going for this one:

So, but can you kill the Luteces? They're already dead, dying, will die, yet they're still there. Kind of like the Force. Or actually Dr. Manhattan from Watchmen would be a better analogy. They jumped dimensions so often that it seems like like time and space have no meaning for them anymore. Nor for Elizabeth at the end, she could see every door and be in one time zone with seven different iterations of herself without problems; the same kind of hivemind without nosebleeds that the Luteces had. Maybe the same happened to Booker, and that's the reason that post-credits scene he was alive again. On death he wasn't dead, but will die, dying, dead.

At the end of the game Booker (or Elizabeth who now controls the world) started to (or already had the innate ability to, which only came to the surface) transcend time and space, being able to exist between dimensions (the lighthouses scene). Therefore death no longer has any meaning for them, it's just one of an infinite amount of possibilities.

EDIT: allright then maybe whether this was actually the intended meaning or not, this could be the part about where Levine said that one of his religious employees was ready to up and leave because of something that happened near the end. Initially, Booker would just go coocoo due to his baptism, and turn into crazy theocrat Comstock. That's all the explanation, so a very atheist rationale to religious ideas (basically just stay away from them, they make you go carazy). But by adding the post-credits scene there's room for explanation of an afterlife, the above explanation, or simply there being 'more than is dreamt of in your philosophy'.

 

[Totalriot]

I stayed out of every Bioshock Thread until I finished the game on saturday. I was a little confused and came into this thread and all my questions have been covered and answered. Amazing!


THANK YOU, OP and all contributors for this great thread!

 

[DatDude]

I like the bottom one. Also, can I be naughty and self promote mine a bit.

incredible!

 

[kirblar]

The clever part of this game's story is the kind of meta commentary it offers on the nature of video games. The first game was basically about player agency and the ability for game designers to shuffle you down a tunnel and make you think you have choice when you don't. This game opens that up and kind of comments on the way video games do present choice in games and how player choice is accounted for and what part chance plays or the illusion of chance and randomness. My major issue with the game, is one I have with video games in general as a story telling medium and that is that the best way to leverage the advantages of the medium is through player self discovery and agency, however, this is also that one area that presents a huge risk to the narrative. In my play through, I definitely went "off the rails" and missed a few key audio logs which made the following audio logs quite confusing. I know an major element of confusion is part of the structure of the narrative and is required for the reveal at the end, however, it then made the ending more confusing than it needed to be. The catch 22 with the medium as a story telling method is that if you present the story to me in a linear scripted fashion, then I may as well be watching a movie or reading a book where there is more flexibility in perspective and agency doesn't need to be accounted for. Loved the game, but it does serve to highlight the limitations of the medium with regard to story.

Baptism = choosing to play as someone else = playing the game.

In order to "beat" the game and stop the events from ever happening, you have to not play the game.

I love the metaphorical ending, but it feels like it's going over a lot of people's heads.

 

[johnnysix]

Well I do feel that player agency can add something above and beyond a movie even in a largely linear expository fashion. The Walking Dead was a good example of this I thought. There are also games that give you the impression of exploration, while making sure you unconsciously go into the right direction. The problem for me with B:I is that you have to consciously go into the wrong direction to get the story.

lol. My very next sentence was going to reference The Walking Dead, but I deleted it. Whilst I love The Walking Dead, it sits kind of strangely in the middle for me. It really kind of is the video game version of a Choose Your Own Adventure book. It's able to more easily execute on the story because it really limits what the player can do. In particular, limiting what actions the player can perform in the game world. I would argue that a film or television series could elicit the same kind of emotion from the viewer.

I really do feel like the most powerful narrative a game can deliver is the emergent narrative that arises out of player action within the environment. This is where the medium has it's advantage over others. This is why the Bioshock games are successful. They have stories directly tied to the actual mechanics of the game itself. I'm not sure how many of these stories there are to tell. I'm yet to be convinced that video games are a superior medium for telling stories outside the kind of meta stories that games like Bioshock and Braid etc. provide. One problem is that we have different expectations of what a game should be. Nobody goes to see a movie, or reads a book and then complains that it wasn't long enough. It's difficult to tell a cohesive, efficient story over 8 hours plus. Especially when most video games seem to treat their stories as a movie with 12 acts. I find most of them way too convoluted. I think one of the reasons why The Walking Dead is successful is because it gives us shorter chunks of story with individual arcs and an overarching arc, much like a season of television.

 

[King Beyond the wall]

Just realized that early in the game, that one assassin lady calls Liz Anna...

I noticed this too and am curious as to why this happened?

 

[Aaron]

I noticed this too and am curious as to why this happened?

While there's been conjecture, the game never explains who she was or why her team was out to kidnap Elizabeth.

 

[King Beyond the wall]

While there's been conjecture, the game never explains who she was or why her team was out to kidnap Elizabeth.

I think they were just a team of assassins that the founders sent after booker and liz. The real mystery is how she knew that liz's original name was anna? Comstock had protected this secret, even going so far to murder his wife and the luteces when they threatened to make it public. Why would this one assassin know her true name just like that?

 

[Aaron]

I think they were just a team of assassins that the founders sent after booker and liz. The real mystery is how she knew that liz's original name was anna? Comstock had protected this secret, even going so far to murder his wife and the luteces when they threatened to make it public. Why would this one assassin know her true name just like that?

Couldn't be sent by Comstock considering she knew the name. None of the tapes from the people who studied Elizabeth knew her as Anna. The only other people who knew are the Luteces, but they wouldn't have any reason to send this group against Booker, since he's their ace in the hole to begin with. They are also lying in wait in disguise, while Comstock always attacked with brute force.

 

[28 Posts Later]

Couldn't be sent by Comstock considering she knew the name. None of the tapes from the people who studied Elizabeth knew her as Anna.

This is the moment we trained for. The False Shepherd is here. The day was not exact, but...the Prophet's sight proves out again. The specimen must be taken alive. If she dies, I suspect they will give us to the bird, and whatever pieces it leaves behind will bear no names...That was cigarette number six. This waiting is insufferable. --Esther Mailer, July the 6th, 1912

It's heavily implied, if not out right stated, that she was sent by Comstock.

 

[King Beyond the wall]

Couldn't be sent by Comstock considering she knew the name. None of the tapes from the people who studied Elizabeth knew her as Anna. The only other people who knew are the Luteces, but they wouldn't have any reason to send this group against Booker, since he's their ace in the hole to begin with. They are also lying in wait in disguise, while Comstock always attacked with brute force.

Yes, you're right. Also, the comstock police stormed in shortly after as a reaction to the assassins shooting up the place.

Is it possible that these assassins had the ability, like Elizabeth and the Luteces, to travel through rifts? That's the only way they could have known her as annabel.

It's heavily implied she was sent by Comstock.

How could they have known her original name then?

 

[28 Posts Later]

How could they have known her original name then?

The game doesn't [to my knowledge] offer an explanation. We can speculate and say something like Comstock told her Elizabeth's name [to test how much Booker has told her - he clearly expected Booker to remember more than he does] without revealing her origins, but there's no true reasoning.

 

[Red]

what do you mean by combined?

You can like shoot of murder of crows and then immolate or electrify them with devil's kiss or shock jockey, respectively. I think you can electrify your undertow currents. One of the neatest ones is using Cecil's kiss on a possessed enemy, causing him to explode like a bomb once the possession wears off. Stuff like that... The one combo I ever performed was bucking bronco + undertow, and I don't even know if that counts.
As for the "Annabelle" thing... The assassins were clearly sent by Comstock, that much is explained in audio diaries. My guess is "Anna" was used as a clue or a point of confusion, simply to raise questions and Interest in the story.

 

[Aaron]

It's heavily implied, if not out right stated, that she was sent by Comstock.

I forgot about that tape, but it makes absolutely no sense with the rest of Comstock's actions. I'm guessing it was a clever bit that was kept in even after the gameplay shifted into throwing hordes of enemies at Booker. It feels like a slice out of a different game.

 

[ElzarTheBam]

I like the bottom one. Also, can I be naughty and self promote mine a bit.

http://a1.s6img.com/cdn/0012/p/3929640_15557891_b.jpg[IMG][/QUOTE]

Lovely, reminds me of these.

[QUOTE][IMG]http://i.imgur.com/geYuhCs.jpg?1

 

[dyergram]

I like the bottom one. Also, can I be naughty and self promote mine a bit.

Love it.

 

[EGM1966]

I forgot about that tape, but it makes absolutely no sense with the rest of Comstock's actions. I'm guessing it was a clever bit that was kept in even after the gameplay shifted into throwing hordes of enemies at Booker. It feels like a slice out of a different game.

I felt that too - the assassination team felt almost like a continuity error in a film in a way (particularly the misuse of names) - something from another cut accidently left in place. Sadly in this case the cut elements (highly motivated religious assassins) seems far more interesting than the final cut (bloated middle section with a heavily overworked angle on race and waves of enemies).

I liked Infinite and in particular the start/end but the middle just felt like commercial concerns overtook the proper shape/tone of the piece resulting in a huge section where the core narrative barely moves and everything becomes a standard FPS corridor chore. Pity. Still the ending is very good nonetheless.

 

[ScOULaris]

What's all this about an assassination team? I never caught any of that during the game.

 

[EGM1966]

What's all this about an assassination team? I never caught any of that during the game.

There's an audio log you can find after the setup in Bsttleship Bay which makes it clear that the team has been trained and made ready to assassinate the "False Prophet" when he appears. In the broader context of the game it comes across as an odd element of focus in-between simple waves of police/militia out to get you and isn't expanded upon further so far as I remember.

 

[King Beyond the wall]

There's an audio log you can find after the setup in Bsttleship Bay which makes it clear that the team has been trained and made ready to assassinate the "False Prophet" when he appears. In the broader context of the game it comes across as an odd element of focus in-between simple waves of police/militia out to get you and isn't expanded upon further so far as I remember.

I think the real issue here is that the assassins ask Elizabeth if she is Anna. There is no way that this group of assassins could have known this as it was Comstock's secret. Saying that it was left in by mistake is a cop-out - there is no way Levine would have left in such a blatant plot hole since the game has been in development for so long and polished extensively. There must be a reason for the assassins knowing her true name.

 

[EGM1966]

I think the real issue here is that the assassins ask Elizabeth if she is Anna. There is no way that this group of assassins could have known this as it was Comstock's secret. Saying that it was left in by mistake is a cop-out - there is no way Levine would have left in such a blatant plot hole since the game has been in development for so long and polished extensively. There must be a reason for the assassins knowing her true name.

My view is the use of the name in the final game is clearly an error as there is no context provided for it at all - and if films can have errors of continuity I see no reason games wouldn't either.

As to why the name was used my view is the role/explanation for this team was broader and they did know her name however those elements were cut/changed to what we have in the final product. The idea Comstock would have a close circle of trusted, highly loyal and fanatic followers makes perfect sense - in fact I believe the game is weaker for relying on a ridiculously large police/militia force to fight through vs a more cat & mouse situation involving a mislead police force and an in the know secret team loyal to Comstock that could have been used to more varied effect and allowed for broader exploration of Comstock's and his religion.

Also a fair few games have elements cut/reduced with similar results - often unless you're really paying attention or search out every bit of content they can slip by without notice. I'd be willing to bet a lot of players blasted through the trap, didn't find the audiolog nor notice the use of the name Anna and simply put it down as an attempt to capture Elizabeth as a bit of variation from frontal attacks.

A massive example for me would be the removal of a sub-plot in Heavy Rain which results - in context - in a huge and unfair plot hole regarding one of the main protagonists.

EDIT : I should note I feel the use of the name isn't accidental - like say Carrie Fisher calling Luke Mark - it was clearly scripted, however in the final game it now comes across as an error in that there is no context for it and it now goes against the bulk of the situation that is in context (that Comstock has removed everyone who knows the truth about Elizabeth/Anna.

 

[mrklaw]

enjoyed it but could have done without the shooting (yes I realise it'd have been pretty short without any shooting). Loved wandering through the areas and just absorbing stuff. Also mindfuck at the end.

Also nearly shat myself after getting to the wardens office. I assumed when you pull the lever a whole bunch of enemies would suddenly be in areas I'd previously cleared, so I wearily turned around and one of those bloody weird headlight enemies that wakes the dead was RIGHT IN MY FACE. jesus. biggest jump scare since watching that new watson video

 

[King Beyond the wall]

My view is the use of the name in the final game is clearly an error as there is no context provided for it at all - and if films can have errors of continuity I see no reason games wouldn't either.

As to why the name was used my view is the role/explanation for this team was broader and they did know her name however those elements were cut/changed to what we have in the final product. The idea Comstock would have a close circle of trusted, highly loyal and fanatic followers makes perfect sense - in fact I believe the game is weaker for relying on a ridiculously large police/militia force to fight through vs a more cat & mouse situation involving a mislead police force and an in the know secret team loyal to Comstock that could have been used to more varied effect and allowed for broader exploration of Comstock's and his religion.

Also a fair few games have elements cut/reduced with similar results - often unless you're really paying attention or search out every bit of content they can slip by without notice. I'd be willing to bet a lot of players blasted through the trap, didn't find the audiolog nor notice the use of the name Anna and simply put it down as an attempt to capture Elizabeth as a bit of variation from frontal attacks.

A massive example for me would be the removal of a sub-plot in Heavy Rain which results - in context - in a huge and unfair plot hole regarding one of the main protagonists.

EDIT : I should note I feel the use of the name isn't accidental - like say Carrie Fisher calling Luke Mark - it was clearly scripted, however in the final game it now comes across as an error in that there is no context for it and it now goes against the bulk of the situation that is in context (that Comstock has removed everyone who knows the truth about Elizabeth/Anna.

The reason most people would have missed this incident is because its only near the very end of the game that we learn the true identity and name of Elizabeth. The assassin calling Elizabeth 'Anna' is therefore only noticed during a second playthrough, and can only be understood with the knowledge of what happens later, Just as the coin toss at the start can only be understood after the game's quantum mechanics element becomes evident.

Though your reasoning that this scene is just a relic of an older game code and no longer in the context of the final code is appealing, I doubt that a writer as competent as Ken Levine would accidentally leave in a single sentence. This game has been in development for many years and has been polished extensively, so such an oversight is frankly unbelievable to me. There must be a reason for these assassins knowing her name as Anna.

 

[Tricky I Shadow]

I can finally talk about this now that I’m un-banned!

When I first finished the game last week I was ready to simply post this in regards to the ending/overall plot: “That’s it? Virtue’s Last Reward did it better. ” However, after going over this thread and watching this great video explaining everything the story is much more clear and I can appreciate it a lot more. So what do I think of the narrative now? For me it sits right alongside 999 and Virtue’s Last Reward as the holy trinity of videogame narratives. I implore people who enjoyed Infinite’s story and haven’t experienced 999 and Virtue’s Last Reward to do so ASAP! They all share a very common theme and they will blow your mind just as much, and probably even more so than Infinite!

Anyway, back to Infinite. You know a story is truly great when you can’t stop thinking about it days after you finish it and when you try and explain it to heaps of other people that don’t normally play videogames. So good! And I seem to appreciate the game more as time goes on, usually it’s the opposite. The whole purpose was to simply get your daughter back from essentially yourself without even knowing it. The fact that Lutece made you sterile and helped you to steal your own baby from another time-line only for her to then make the main goal of the game to fix that very problem was a brain melter!

I totally called some of the twists – like how Booker was Comstock from another time-line and how time-line/dimension jumping was a main theme very early on in the game. I just couldn’t figure out what was trying to ultimately being achieved by jumping in and out of the dimensions. I also had a feeling that the baptism at the start was significant to the plot. With all that said, luckily the execution for all the twists at the end were handled extremely well. The music! The baby going through the rift! All the Elizabeth’s appearing! Brilliant stuff! I just wish the story sometimes didn’t drag. It needed to drop bombs more regularly instead of dumping it all at the end. Why does it take so long just to get the shock jockey? -_-

As for the game it self, the opening hour or so was flat-out amazing! Dat church singing! Dat lively atmosphere! Dat colour! Easily one of the most memorable moments from any game I’ve played! The gameplay was fairly solid, the graphics were nice and the music and quality of the sound effects was some of the best I’ve come across in a game. Everything sounded so good and clear! So yeah, as you can tell I liked the game quite a lot. The story and Columbia are the stars with the gameplay taking a backseat, but I’m fine with that. I had no intentions on buying this and mostly ignored it before it came out, but the hype got to me and I'm glad I gave in and got it!

 

[Trigger]

It's heavily implied, if not out right stated, that she was sent by Comstock.

It's pretty explicit:

This is the moment we trained for. The False Shepherd is here. The day was not exact, but...the Prophet's sight proves out again. The specimen must be taken alive. If she dies, I suspect they will give us to the bird. And whatever pieces it leaves behind will bear no names...That was cigarette number six. This waiting is insufferable.

Comstock knew Liz and Booker would pass through there and had a team in place to ambush them. People are reading too much into the Annabelle thing IMO. I still hold that the woman using the name "Annabelle" was a coincidence and that the point was to trick Elizabeth into clearly identifying herself before they spring the trap.

 

[sflufan]

People are reading too much into the Annabelle thing IMO. I still hold that the woman using the name "Annabelle" was a coincidence and that the point was to trick Elizabeth into clearly identifying herself before they spring the trap.

We have a winner folks! It was just a ruse to get Elizabeth to correctly identify herself.

 

[Pagusas]

Lovely, reminds me of these.

Those would be incredible if it weren't for the dithering Are there versions without it, or did the artist make that design choice for some reason? So distracting from the beautiful simplistic geometry and shading.

 

[ElzarTheBam]

Those would be incredible if it weren't for the dithering Are there versions without it, or did the artist make that design choice for some reason? So distracting from the beautiful simplistic geometry and shading.

Not that I know of.

They are T shirt designs, I believe.

Sorry.

 

[The Librarian]

Elzar, stop spoiling the game for people!

 

[EGM1966]

We have a winner folks! It was just a ruse to get Elizabeth to correctly identify herself.

Odd ruse since she's going around looking/sounding exactly like always did - the team should have been able to spot her and Booker no problem whatsoever at that juncture.

Although to be fair you have to overlook how implausibly the whole search/capture unfolds.

I do agree there is no real deeper meaning behind it though - either it was intended as more of a ruse/scene that it turned out to be or there was more intended for that team that got cut/changed : either way in the finished game I don't think it amounts to much of note.

 

[Toa TAK]

Man I really liked this game, thinking about getting a print/poster, so far these were the best I've found though I can't decide what to get

I love this one, and the colored one is pretty great, too.

 

[Aaron]

We have a winner folks! It was just a ruse to get Elizabeth to correctly identify herself.

Makes absolutely no sense, especially in a game which destroys the concept of coincidence.

 

[ElzarTheBam]

Elzar, stop spoiling the game for people!

Bioshock dies, in his place, master chief becomes the new bioshock.

 

[Trigger]

Makes absolutely no sense, especially in a game which destroys the concept of coincidence.

Why doesn't it make sense?

 

[dragonbane]

I can finally talk about this now that I’m un-banned!

http://i.minus.com/ibdB8xQbkewx14.gif


When I first finished the game last week I was ready to simply post this in regards to the ending/overall plot: “That’s it? Virtue’s Last Reward did it better. ” However, after going over this thread and watching this great video explaining everything the story is much more clear and I can appreciate it a lot more. So what do I think of the narrative now? For me it sits right alongside 999 and Virtue’s Last Reward as the holy trinity of videogame narratives. I implore people who enjoyed Infinite’s story and haven’t experienced 999 and Virtue’s Last Reward to do so ASAP! They all share a very common theme and they will blow your mind just as much, and probably even more so than Infinite!

Anyway, back to Infinite. You know a story is truly great when you can’t stop thinking about it days after you finish it and when you try and explain it to heaps of other people that don’t normally play videogames. So good! And I seem to appreciate the game more as time goes on, usually it’s the opposite. The whole purpose was to simply get your daughter back from essentially yourself without even knowing it. The fact that Lutece made you sterile and helped you to steal your own baby from another time-line only for her to then make the main goal of the game to fix that very problem was a brain melter!

I totally called some of the twists – like how Booker was Comstock from another time-line and how time-line/dimension jumping was a main theme very early on in the game. I just couldn’t figure out what was trying to ultimately being achieved by jumping in and out of the dimensions. I also had a feeling that the baptism at the start was significant to the plot. With all that said, luckily the execution for all the twists at the end were handled extremely well. The music! The baby going through the rift! All the Elizabeth’s appearing! Brilliant stuff! I just wish the story sometimes didn’t drag. It needed to drop bombs more regularly instead of dumping it all at the end. Why does it take so long just to get the shock jockey? -_-

As for the game it self, the opening hour or so was flat-out amazing! Dat church singing! Dat lively atmosphere! Dat colour! Easily one of the most memorable moments from any game I’ve played! The gameplay was fairly solid, the graphics were nice and the music and quality of the sound effects was some of the best I’ve come across in a game. Everything sounded so good and clear! So yeah, as you can tell I liked the game quite a lot. The story and Columbia are the stars with the gameplay taking a backseat, but I’m fine with that. I had no intentions on buying this and mostly ignored it before it came out, but the hype got to me and I'm glad I gave in and got it!

That's all fine and good, but the question that matters most is: Is it better than Tomb Raider?

 

[The Librarian]

Gotta admit, I like Elizabeth's first outfit way more than the dress she puts on after you get the First Lady's airship. It's just seems so...out of place.

 

[King Beyond the wall]

Why doesn't it make sense?

From a game design choice it's ridiculous. Levine could have had the assassin say any name to Elizabeth to prompt her to confirm her identity, but he chose to have her ask if her name was annabelle, her original name and Comstock's dark secret.

By doing this it suggests that these assassins knew more than they should have, or were told by Comstock (which is extremely doubtful).
If it is coincidence it seems like a colossal oversight from a top tier team that have been making this game and polishing it for years. I can't believe that not a single developer heard it and thought 'hmm let's change the assassin's question to 'are you Jane?' Otherwise it may sound like the assassins knew her true identity'.
And finally, my faith in Levine is such that I cannot believe that he would miss this, and it must be there for a reason.

 

[dc89]

Since finishing the game I've found myself not wanting to play other games. I look at my shelf, with tons of games I've yet to finish and I just find myself so uninspired.

There needs to be some sort of support helpline for this!

 

[EGM1966]

Completed it 2 days ago, can't stop thinking about it. Had unravelled most of the threads already, though thats only cos i'm fairly sure i found every voxphone. Man, people who rushed through the game must have just went "huh???" at the end.
So glad i avoided spoilers, it would have ruined the final 10 mins entirely.

The only low point of the game was the ghost fight.
Save your explanations of what it really was.
All of a sudden i was fighting a ghost, and what looked like ghost-nazi's, in a graveyard.

Fucking stupid.

Oh and dismayed that there was no tear-ripping that pulled in cars and stuff, like seen in the early gameplay vids. As soon as you saw the tears hovering there, it was like "heres your arena, get ready".

Gotta agree on the ghost - didn't make sense vs other examples of bringing someone through from another Universe timeline and was an awful combat scenario they forced you to endure not once but three times. Experience tells you to only go for the ghost and it becomes a grind to wear it down while trying not to waste ammo on the re-spawning cannon fodder.

TBH much as I like the concept/setting and the core characters this felt like an tight 8 hour game padded out with stuff like the extended ghost/revolution combat scenarios.

I wish that the tears would only appear after combat initiated - I figure you'd still suspect what was going to happen but as it stands you know every single time a big combat sequence is coming as soon as you spot them.

 

[Z_Y]

Since finishing the game I've found myself not wanting to play other games. I look at my shelf, with tons of games I've yet to finish and I just find myself so uninspired.

There needs to be some sort of support helpline for this!

Right there with you. I'm thinking about another play through on 1999 mode...and I never do things like that. The only other time I've thought about doing it was Mass Effect 1.

 

[Trigger]

From a game design choice it's ridiculous. Levine could have had the assassin say any name to Elizabeth to prompt her to confirm her identity, but he chose to have her ask if her name was annabelle, her original name and Comstock's dark secret.

If it is coincidence it seems like a colossal oversight from a top tier team that have been making this game and polishing it for years. I can't believe that not a single developer heard it and thought 'hmm let's change the assassin's question to 'are you Jane?' Otherwise it may sound like the assassins knew her true identity'.
And finally, my faith in Levine is such that I cannot believe that he would miss this, and it must be there for a reason.

It can't just be a funny in-joke to those have beaten the game? Maybe Levine intended it to be just be something we'd find as a funny coincidence on a replay.

By doing this it suggests that these assassins knew more than they should have, or were told by Comstock (which is extremely doubtful).

How in the world would they have known it if we can agree that Comstock wouldn't have told them? I think this is a case of creating a mystery where there is none.

 

[ElzarTheBam]

Since finishing the game I've found myself not wanting to play other games. I look at my shelf, with tons of games I've yet to finish and I just find myself so uninspired.

There needs to be some sort of support helpline for this!

Call me for a 'hot' chat.

 

[Patrick Bateman]

Call me for a 'hot' chat.

I like that avatar.



Oh and btw. what I realised now or might think that they got some influence from it:

The poster of German thriller "M – Eine Stadt sucht einen Mörder".

 

[HoodWinked]

why does elizabeth give booker the whistle at the end for him to destory the syphon instead of her doing it herself.

any reason? maybe she realizes its where she spent her life and doesnt feel as if she can do it herself?

 

[Aaron]

why does elizabeth give booker the whistle at the end for him to destory the syphon instead of her doing it herself.

any reason? maybe she realizes its where she spent her life and doesnt feel as if she can do it herself?

She knows he likes destroying things.

 

[King Beyond the wall]

How in the world would they have known it if we can agree that Comstock wouldn't have told them?

Precisely. However, its pretty evident that there is no answer to this question so there is little point in discussing it further.

I do have a different question, though. Am I understanding the ending correctly in that rapture and Columbia cannot co-exist in the same universe?

 

[BFIB]

Precisely. However, its pretty evident that there is no answer to this question so there is little point in discussing it further.

I do have a different question, though. Am I understanding the ending correctly in that rapture and Columbia cannot co-exist in the same universe?

I believe Elizabeth points out that the two cities cannot exist in the same universe.

 

[Salamando]

Precisely. However, its pretty evident that there is no answer to this question so there is little point in discussing it further.

I do have a different question, though. Am I understanding the ending correctly in that rapture and Columbia cannot co-exist in the same universe?

Not now, anyways. Kind of hard for them to co-exist when Columbia doesn't exist in the first place.

That answer aside, not aware of any logic preventing them from co-existing. Liz mentions something about a man, a lighthouse, and a city, but I didn't take that to mean the lighthouses, cities, and men couldn't be in the same universe. The universes where we know Columbia (used to) exist in and Rapture existed in are more similar than they are different, since Tears between the two occurred randomly and frequently enough that Big Daddy tech and Plasmid tech could be pilfered.

 

[Trigger]

I agree. A lighthouse, a man, and a city are constants, but there's no reason that a Rapture and Columbia couldn't both exist at once in some timeline.