Wednesday 10 April 2013

PS3 Review: BioShock Infinite


Many big budget games rely on the player overcoming violent opposition to progress. Taking place in the floating city of Columbia during its yearly fair, BioShock Infinite’s first hour makes a compelling argument that this needn’t be the case. Columbia is mysterious. Posters bear cryptic references to prophecies you don’t yet understand; ambient dialogue and seemingly innocuous fairground games hint at a culture where racism is rife; stalls show off curiously advanced technology for a game set in 1912. Everywhere you look in BioShock Infinite, scraps of Columbia’s backstory are incorporated organically into the landscape, and each one you discover pulls the curtain back a little further. This process of discovery is so tantalising that you’ll never find your trigger finger itching. When the curtain comes all the way back and the extent of Columbia’s prejudice is laid bare, it’s one of the most incredible scenes in gaming to date.

Beautiful but oppressive, Columbia is a utopia to its inhabitants but a dystopia to us, which makes exploring it a fascinatingly conflicted experience. While playing BioShock Infinite, I began my  exploration of new areas by checking where my next objective was before immediately setting off in the opposite direction. This was always rewarded with something interesting: a sinister statue here, an explanatory voice recording there. The sense of curiosity is emphasised through Elizabeth, the woman the player character, Booker DeWitt, has been sent Columbia to rescue. Held captive since birth, Elizabeth is endlessly inquisitive, and her excitement at seeing the outside world for the first time mirrors our own at exploring Columbia. It’s a shame, though, that combat is so pervasive that Infinite’s exploration and discovery never  again feels as pure as it does during the first hour.

This isn’t to say that combat isn’t enjoyable. There are plenty unique features that set BioShock Infinite apart from other shooters. Most interesting are the vigors, supernatural abilities similar to BioShock’s plasmids. Vigors have been designed with plenty of imagination, and it’s always a pleasure to deploy them in battle. Bucking Bronco, for example, catapults enemies into the air to the sounds of horses whinnying, while Possession takes the form of a ghostly woman whispering in your target’s ear. Infinite’s gunplay is also an improvement over BioShock’s, though for all their period stylings, its firearms feel dull in comparison to the vigors. You can also use zip lines to get the jump on enemies, or have Elizabeth conjure cover, supplies, and allies into the fray, meaning you’re never short of options in battle. There are problems with the enemies, though. Lacking the unhinged menace of the original BioShock’s splicers, the interchangeable canon fodder is instantly forgettable. More powerful foes such as Handymen and Motorised Patriots have clearly had more attention lavished on them, but they appear too often and are dispatched too easily to capture your imagination and instil fear in the same way that Big Daddies did.

"Tale as old as time, song as old as ..." oh, wait (Picture: BioShock Infinite)
Booker and Elizabeth’s story is initially intertwined with the the civil war brewing  in Columbia between the Founders and the Vox Populi (usually shorted to ‘the Vox’). The Vox are a group of rebels made up mostly of disenfranchised black and Irish workers, and early in the game it seems clear that you’re supposed to sympathise with them. However, around the game’s midpoint, the Vox are abruptly written off as extremists, apparently to justify deemphasizing the racial conflict and foregrounding the story’s more fantastical elements. Not only is it disappointing that a potentially impactful topic is squandered, it’s offensive to see an issue as repellent as racism used frivolously as set dressing. Infinite goes on to explore Elizabeth’s ability to open ‘tears’ in space and time. These science fiction elements are well thought out, but they tread familiar ground, and it feels like a miscalculation on Irrational’s part that they end up so prominent in the narrative.

However, while BioShock Infinite’s plot doesn’t live up to its initial promise, the characters it creates are strong enough to carry it through. Booker initially seems generic, but he becomes more interesting as his past comes into focus. Elizabeth is more immediately appealing. Drawn as a Disney princess and animated just as smoothly, she is an unforgettable companion, and the relationship she and Booker share is touching, unforced, and well written. Their story features as many understated moments as it does moments of high drama. When Elizabeth finds a guitar in a backroom, for example, she complains that she can’t play. You can choose to have Booker pick it up and strum a few chords,  and Elizabeth responds by singing Will The Circle Be Unbroken. Little touches like this linger long in the memory.

BioShock Infinite is a brilliant, but self-contradictory game. It’s a solid shooter, but its non-violent exploration is so memorable that it would have been just as compelling if you never fired a shot. It tells a competent science fiction story set to a backdrop of racially charged conflict when it could have delivered a devastating critique of racism with science fiction elements. The high points in BioShock Infinite will rightly take their place alongside the defining moments in gaming, but Irrational fail to capitalise on them, meaning BioShock Infinite falls just short of being the generation defining experience that many had hoped for.

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