It quickly becomes clear when you start playing Infinite that Columbia is both exactly the same as the original’s underwater utopia of Rapture, yet simultaneously completely different. One is underwater; claustrophobic. The other is endless; the sky is literally the limit. Both are utopias – idealistic clusters of humanity – with cracks beginning to show through beneath the magnificent facades.
Take the time to soak in the sights.
On that note, however, let me warn you console players up front: unlike its jaw-dropping-in-2007 predecessor (I’m not counting BioShock 2 here, as that wasn’t our first trip to Rapture), BioShock Infinite does not have the same technical wow-factor going for it. Yes, Columbia is stunning from a scale, scope, and art-direction perspective, but on a raw graphical level it is a bit underwhelming on the Xbox 360 version I’m starting with. Textures are muddy and low-resolution and the framerate takes regular slight-but-noticeable dips. It reminds me of the console version of Dishonored in that way.
Do these minor issues take away from your experience at all? No, but I’m very curious to check out the PC version during the course of my review. Presuming you throw a beefy enough rig at Infinite, the ol’ mouse-and-keyboard may prove to be the best way to explore Columbia, particularly since, with no multiplayer modes, you don’t have to worry about choosing your platform based on which network your friends will be playing on.
