Review: Bioshock Infinite

Bioshock Infinite

Release Date: 3.26.2013
Platforms: Windows PC, OSX, Playstation 3, Xbox 360

Bioshock Infinite is the latest creation of the team at Irrational Games and the third installment in the Bioshock franchise. Leaving the underwater city of Rapture behind, Irrational has set this game in the floating city of Columbia, circa 1912. The player takes control of Booker DeWitt, a man with a bloody past who is perpetually down on his luck, having fallen victim to drinking and gambling excesses. In order to erase his debts he's been given a task: infiltrate the sky city of Columbia and rescue a captive young woman named Elizabeth. What seems like a simple task for Booker will become an adventure full of ideological clashes and urban warfare, battles against futuristic technological and biological wonders and a journey through the very fabric of space-time and the string theory multiverse.

At it's base elements the game mechanisms present in Bioshock Infinite will be familiar to anyone who's played the previous Bioshock titles. Your arsenal includes a good number of period-specific guns and a left-hand genetically altered by interchangeable chemicals to be capable of feats that can only be described as magical, whether it's the usual fire and ice elements or the spawning of flocks of ravenous crows to hunt down and assault foes. The gunplay this time around is an improvement over the original Bioshock, but not quite as satisfying as Bioshock 2, which in my mind still has the best and most dynamic combat in the franchise. The Plasmids of the first two games are now known as Vigors, and while they offer a great number of options for the player to engage in cruel and unusual punishment against the enemy hordes, in many cases they seem to be almost unnecessary to completion of the mission. This particular element of combat, the one which defines why Bioshock differs from it's peers in the FPS genre, has been downplayed by the game design to being rather optional, and that's a shame.

The greatest addition to in-game action in Bioshock Infinite is easily the sky hook that Booker wears on his left arm. This sky hook serves the dual purposes of being a fantastically violent melee attack weapon (with some excellent executions) and a means of quickly traversing the rails which flow all around the various floating buildings which make up Columbia. As a melee weapon the sky hook is mapped to it's own button for instant activation, rather than forcing the player to scroll through their arsenal to find it like in earlier Bioshock games. This allows for seamless mixups of medium to long range gunfighting that lead to in-close melee kills, a vast improvement over previous implementations of melee combat. As a means of travel around the city the hook opens up Columbia to a good deal of vertical exploration that suits a city in the clouds perfectly. The use of the rails is intuitive and even opens up strategic options in combat scenarios, including surprise drop attacks worthy of Batman.

For most of the game you will be accompanied by Elizabeth, the young woman whom Booker is tasked with smuggling out of the city, and her unique ability to open up tears in the fabric of space-time. Opening portals to alternate realities is a great asset, as she can sense stashes of weapons or cover in alternate versions of Columbia and warp them into your present reality. She also helps scavenge for money and ammo, and unlike the horrors most associate with escort mission games, she never gets in the way or becomes a liability.

All in all the game mechanics present in Bioshock Infinite are quite good, but comparisons between the previous installments can show that each of the 3 games has it's own particular strengths and weaknesses. In particular, about 3/4 of the way though Infinite there's a rather obnoxious and unnecessary boss fight that occurs 3 times, each time following a fetch quest. While this isn't nearly as obnoxious as the unnecessary hours of padding and the awful end boss fight in the original Bioshock that occurred after the infamous plot twist, this is a disappointment in what had been up to that spot the best paced Bioshock game yet made.

Of course, when one speaks about the merits of Bioshock Infinite, the things that will most often get discussed aren't related to combat and game mechanics, but the mixture of production value, writing, character and atmosphere that define each Bioshock game. In Infinite's case, what most will likely remember is the intriguing plot that starts off with exploring themes of religion, early 20th century racism, nationalism and class warfare and ends up in a place where the very state and nature of the universe and perceptions of reality come into play.

Along the way Booker DeWitt, the first voiced protagonist in the series, and his partner Elizabeth are fully realized as well-written characters with excellent voice acting performances. Unfortunately none of the antagonist characters really fully develop to the level of Andrew Ryan from the original Bioshock, but Infinite makes up for it with the Lutece twins, who may be the most entertaining and well-written side characters in any Bioshock title.

Columbia itself is a highly stylized and beautiful piece of art. It symbolizes an idealized and fictional American dream that never actually existed on one hand, complete with all the flowers, sunshine and American flags one could ever imagine viewing in their lifetime, but on the other hand displaying all the ugliness of 1912-era segregated slums and their racial inequalities. Columbia seamlessly mixes these extremes in a way that the post-collapse chaos of Rapture never could, creating one of the most unique and memorable game settings I can recall ever seeing.

At the end of the day, Bioshock Infinite is most definitely a game anyone with an interest in the medium should play. It's not perfect and it's not the "Citizen Kane of gaming" some have referred to it as, but it is an excellent FPS-adventure set in a fascinating world with a great voice cast, well-written characters and a plot that will leave you with plenty to think about and talk about with others who have played it. I give this game my highest recommendation and suggest any and all who read this go forth and spend some time in Columbia.