It's not. In the first game, you didn't get punished at all, aside from losing like 50 feet of progress. In this game, you actually do get punished by losing money and enemies get some health back.
I think it was a victim of TLoU, trying to do so many similar things, and just paling in comparison. It was still a great game, but one that will certainly be forgotten.
Bioshock Infinite was picked apart unmercifully far before The Last of Us came out though. And the things in Infinite people don't like, mainly gameplay, weren't even rivaled by The Last of Us.
Infinite needs to be remembered as a game with superficially similar gameplay mechanics with its predecessor that failed to preserve any of the magic that made it work before.
I guess I'm a weirdo because I thought the gameplay was the best part of it. I loved mixing up my Vigors and guns and just going crazy with them. The combat is great. Scrounging around for ammo and money and stuff is also something I enjoy, so that part of the game was fun for me too.
The story was good, but had some pretty cheesy lines and quite a lot of plot convenience in the middle. Plus the storytelling, while good, had some audio logs that didn't seem like things people would actually record. They didn't feel as natural as say the audio logs from System Shock 2 or the notes and letters you find in The Last of Us.
I don't understand the love for this title since as a game it failed on so many levels. The gunplay was poor, the level design was awful, and the story was B grade sci-fi. The art design and characters were good but almost everything else was a serious step backward from the greatness of Bioshock 1.
I had to force myself to finish Infinite since every time I walked from a corridor to a larger room with "tears" I knew I was in for another uninspired battle.
Let people forget Infinite, but don't let them forget games like System Shock 2 or Bioshock 1.
Infinite needs to be remembered as a game with superficially similar gameplay mechanics with its predecessor that failed to preserve any of the magic that made it work before.
I'm shocked to find that this game is such a divisive one here at GAF. The portion of fans that think the title was a disappointment is staggering to me, but I have to admit right here that I'm not an FPS connoisseur. What many people seem to think was lacking gameplay is gameplay I found perfectly serviceable, though I wish they'd have gone further with notions like vigors.
I thought the game was excellent and thought provoking, not to mention unlike anything else on the market. The story stuck with me, and I really admire the title for doing more than just trying to ape its predecessor and instead offering something unique. I don't think it's a perfect game, but it's definitely a game I consider great.
I was really sorry to hear that the studio was shut down. I've never played a game quite like Infinite, it's a crying shame.
TLoU had fully competent gameplay but its gets really boring the more you play.
Its basically either shooting (I didn't like the aiming system) or stealth(the better way to play but sometimes the game forces all out fights)
The environments were visually impressive and cohesive (almost flawless art direction) but they WERE shallow.
All you gotta do is find random loot.When the game introduces varied interaction it becomes a lot more interesting but it doesn't always do that.The ladder "puzzles" were really pointless and repetitive.
No choices in the story or deep NPC interaction was annoying especially when the game constantly teases you with morality and what if scenarios.
Yeah I think gameplay in last of us wasn't that special either, at points it felt quite repetitive
The storytelling really made the game though. Outside of the cutscenes just scripted moments too were good like when he's waiting for Ellie to boost up to the ladder and he notices her feeling depressed. Great facial animation
The three boss fights with Lady Comstock becomes incredibly tedious on higher difficulties because every time you die, she regains a ton of health while you don't regain your ammo. Since she's already a bullet sponge, it just makes the fights drag on and on.
Admittedly, that's the only time I felt it was worse. Otherewise, it felt like Bioshock 1 and 2 where I didn't feel penalized, since dead enemies stay dead and the money payment is hilariously low.
Plus the storytelling, while good, had some audio logs that didn't seem like things people would actually record. They didn't feel as natural as say the audio logs from System Shock 2 or the notes and letters you find in The Last of Us.
I had this thought too. The content of the audio logs basically went against the grain of what audio logs are supposed to be (actual artifacts recorded/written by people who existed in that world in that specific location). It was borderline nonsensical.
Why do we need a thread about not forgetting Infinite? We won't forget it.
It'll always be a good educational example of a game with a legendary art style and sound design marred by a unique but incomplete story and frustrating gameplay due to years of development hell.
As a person who cares about shooting mechanics and the like... the combat was alright on hard. The only thing I was focused on was the mixture of Vigors in battle and how I could use the rail in order to perform different executions, but I could see how it could get stale for others. I mean, people like Spec Ops, so it goes to show that some people prefer story and more over the actual gameplay itself when it comes to shooters.
LADY COMSTOCK FIGHT WHEN YOU HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO AMMO LEFT IS A GODDAMN NIGHTMARE BEYOND THOSE WHO JUST THOUGHT IT WAS DIFFICULT
The experience however was one of the best gaming experiences I've ever had in my life. I thoroughly each and every other aspect of it and it has the honor for being the only game which I actually had to think about the story afterwords and actually examine what really happened. The interactive storytelling experience it offered is something that you can't just experience in a book, which I really liked.
I had this thought too. The content of the audio logs basically went against the grain of what audio logs are supposed to be (actual artifacts recorded/written by people who existed in that world in that specific location). It was borderline nonsensical.
I did enjoy it but it pissed me off to no end that they decided to limit the amount of guns you can carry to...two!! wtf. it makes no sense the first two games you carried all of the weapons you collect during your playthrough. hell even the DLC for infinite lets you hold every weapon. and it doesnt make the game anything but annoying. most, if not all of the weapons are on the ground around you anyway, why the fuck are you going to make me pick and choose which ones I want to hold!? its nut. those assholes made me think this game could have been damn near perfect.
The game is utterly forgettable to me. Only thing that sticks out was that "twist" ending. Gameplay was boring and so was the interaction with the environment. The story fell flat too.
Objectively the best? No, probably not. But it's stuck with me more than any other game from that gen. Beaten it 8-10 times now and will inevitably play it again.
Infinite was "okay." Pretty forgettable in all honesty. I didn't pay any attention to pre-release material and was still pretty let down. I looked at that material recently and it looks a lot better in many ways. Darker atmosphere in particular.
I had forgotten about it within a month. It was trying to have some meaningful, deep story to it, but it reeked of trying too hard. Not to mention the actual gameplay was mediocre at best.
The three boss fights with Lady Comstock becomes incredibly tedious on higher difficulties because every time you die, she regains a ton of health while you don't regain your ammo. Since she's already a bullet sponge, it just makes the fights drag on and on.
Admittedly, that's the only time I felt it was worse. Otherewise, it felt like Bioshock 1 and 2 where I didn't feel penalized, since dead enemies stay dead and the money payment is hilariously low.
Lady Comstock will absolutely be remembered as one of the worst bosses in a modern game, if not the worst.
Fuck, I'm almost surprised people can still love that game in spite of that. She was the point where I completed my turn of opinion of the game from mostly liking it to hating it. The rest of the game is generally solid enough but fuck them and fuck this obsession with this particular flavor of combat in games.
I'm shocked to find that this game is such a divisive one here at GAF. The portion of fans that think the title was a disappointment is staggering to me, but I have to admit right here that I'm not an FPS connoisseur. What many people seem to think was lacking gameplay is gameplay I found perfectly serviceable, though I wish they'd have gone further with notions like vigors.
I thought the game was excellent and thought provoking, not to mention unlike anything else on the market. The story stuck with me, and I really admire the title for doing more than just trying to ape its predecessor and instead offering something unique. I don't think it's a perfect game, but it's definitely a game I consider great.
I was really sorry to hear that the studio was shut down. I've never played a game quite like Infinite, it's a crying shame.
I actually liked the gameplay, and liked the game itself. That was my problem with it. This game was supposed to be incredible. It was supposed to be better than Bioshock, it was supposed to be better than Half-Life 2. It was not even close. The promised so much... The amazing reveal trailer, the E3 demo... The video previews about the Boys of Silence, the Sirens... All the options Elizabeth was supposed to provide. None of those things were delivered in the way we were led to believe.
I knew I shouldn't have stepped foot into this thread. Bioshock Infinite was my favorite game last year, OP, and resonated with me far more than any other title (yes, GAF, including TLoU). I loved every. single. second. Pains me to see the backlash, but then again I went in with no expectations or hype (I was new to the series). I suspect if I had played the first two I might be as letdown as others here but oh well.
And, yeah OP...the music...the music. The atmosphere. Those first few moments when you arrive in Columbia. Just so much about it blew me away.
I'd describe it that way after a second playthrough.
Two gun limit... Why.
Health packs replaced by shield... Why.
Lack of preparation before fights means enemies like Handymen feel much more unfair than the Big Daddies in the first game.
Guns are boring compared to stuff like the Chemical Thrower or Crossbow, and the two weapon limit stops you from experimenting with upgrades. Didn't help the worst guns tended to be the most common, or that there was the inexplicable idea to have two of the same kind of weapon (One Vox, one Founder), diluting the weapon pool further.
Plasmids are all too samey in the first half of the game. "Press R1 to fire, press R2 to make a trap!" Charge and Undertow needed to be earlier.
Balance is horrible among both weapons and plasmids; did they even test the Charge shield recharge? It breaks the game in half worse than even the Wrench builds in the first game.
Level design doesn't fit the gameplay at all because it surrounds you with enemies when a shield is designed to work with cover. Also battles often puts enemies at longer ranges when most guns and plasmids are designed for medium range.
Enemies are bullet sponges, especially those rocket launcher guys. Seriously, why the fuck did they have so much health?
The respawn system is somehow even worse than the first two games.
Why is there so much backtracking in such a linear game? Almost as bad as Halo CE.
I am so happy someone had already listed all the points I was going to bring up
The other big thing that bugged me about the game is how unrealistic Elizabeth is as a character. With her being locked up for most of her life she adjusts to the outside very quickly and is very sociable.
Lady Comstock will absolutely be remembered as one of the worst bosses in a modern game, if not the worst.
Fuck, I'm almost surprised people can still love that game in spite of that. She was the point where I completed my turn of opinion of the game from mostly liking it to hating it. The rest of the game is generally solid enough but fuck them and fuck this obsession with this particular flavor of combat in games.
YOu know, I didn't particularly hate her that much. I didn't find her fun either. I'm just curious why people hated her more than any other part of the game (just cause she didn't really stand out to me as excessively worse than the rest of the game but honestly, I don't think I have seen any opinion that speaks well of her, I'm probably the most positive comment I've seen on her ).
Great art, game world, characters, story, presentation and ending. I didn't enjoy the core game mechanics at all though. I thought the combat was very rough, with really scrappy gunplay and the game was filled with far too much of it too. Weirdly though, I never thought there were many good places to use any of the magic (sorry, forgot the name of it, Plasmids?) that the game offered meaning it was a little underused. You just sort of spammed it and hoped for the best, it didn't feel like any strategy was required.
The last big battle at the end on the Airship was fucking annoying, but by that point I just wanted it to be over. I was so close to switching it to Easy just to make the combat go away quicker. The boss fights were shit too, that fucking ghost? Fuck you.
Rad ending though for sure.
I dunno, maybe a different team with some fresh ideas to combat and the actual game part isn't such a bad thing.
I knew I shouldn't have stepped foot into this thread. Bioshock Infinite was my favorite game last year, OP, and resonated with me far more than any other title (yes, GAF, including TLoU). I loved every. single. second. Pains me to see the backlash, but then again I went in with no expectations or hype (I was new to the series). I suspect if I had played the first two I might be as letdown as others here but oh well.
And, yeah OP...the music...the music. The atmosphere. Those first few moments when you arrive in Columbia. Just so much about it blew me away.
I agree with all this. Even with Bioshock is my favorite game of all time Infinite didn't disappoint me. It has some low points, but it's highs were not matched by any other game last year.
One more thing that pissed me off about the game, and Ken Levine in particular. We know the original art director, Nate Wells, left as part of the senior staff exodus towards the end of the game. I remember reading something about how he worked tirelessly for a ridiculous amount of time on the Shantytown area. And then one day Ken is just like nope, it's all wrong, gotta do it all over. And then the Shantytown that appears in the game is... Less than impressive. And I just thought to myself, what a dick Levine is. I don't blame the staff for leaving. Six years of revision after revision after revision. You can just tell by playing the game, it seems very stitched together. Initial gameplay trailer? None of that in the game. E3 demo? None of that in the game. The game just seemed like it was absolutely ruined from what it originally was and they had no idea what to do with it by the end of development.
That was a mayor annoyance with the game. And the only reasons I can think of was damage controls when they discovered that the battles turned out to easy, and/or as a filler, considering that the game is barely 10h long even with all unneccessary padding.
I knew I shouldn't have stepped foot into this thread. Bioshock Infinite was my favorite game last year, OP, and resonated with me far more than any other title (yes, GAF, including TLoU). I loved every. single. second. Pains me to see the backlash, but then again I went in with no expectations or hype (I was new to the series). I suspect if I had played the first two I might be as letdown as others here but oh well.
And, yeah OP...the music...the music. The atmosphere. Those first few moments when you arrive in Columbia. Just so much about it blew me away.
I don't think you would. It can definitely be said that the gameplay was simplified from the previous games, and not in a positive way, but it was still more than solid. Interesting to see how it's degenerated from a reasonable "I don't like shooters and mechanically it wasn't a great shooter" to "the gunplay was terrible and the game was terrible".
Infinite isn't without it's shortcomings, but it's definitely one of the best games released last gen. It was incredibly disappointing to see the backlash after a while, especially given TLOU had many of the same shortcomings as well as performance issues.
YOu know, I didn't particularly hate her that much. I didn't find her fun either. I'm just curious why people hated her more than any other part of the game (just cause she didn't really stand out to me as excessively worse than the rest of the game but honestly, I don't think I have seen any opinion that speaks well of her, I'm probably the most positive comment I've seen on her ).
Part of my problem was likely running with hard when people were saying that was the way to go, and it did go well for me in Metal Gear Rising. Still, that post highlighted a lot of why: she was durable as hell, summoned and resummoned enemies, you'd have your resources dwindle away, and she appeared THREE. FUCKING. TIMES. It was a cheap, stupid way to drag the game out, at least Uncharted 3's boat section was reasonably entertaining and had some great set pieces.
One of the things that really ticks me off about the story is how much was dropped for no good reason even when it came to the personal Booker stuff.
And by that, I mean
A version of Booker is inside Songbird, Lady Comstock is Elizabeth's mother in all realities, meaning her meeting Booker is a fixed point, etc... the sort of story information that gives more power to its themes, and allows you take them to better places. Totally dropped.
I mean, how bogus was it when they danced around the Songbird/Booker issue completely in Burial at Sea 2? It's like finding a chalk outline of Frankenstein's monster at a crime scene, and the detective saying, "eh, must be some other guy."
I'd describe it that way after a second playthrough.
Two gun limit... Why.
Health packs replaced by shield... Why.
Lack of preparation before fights means enemies like Handymen feel much more unfair than the Big Daddies in the first game.
Guns are boring compared to stuff like the Chemical Thrower or Crossbow, and the two weapon limit stops you from experimenting with upgrades. Didn't help the worst guns tended to be the most common, or that there was the inexplicable idea to have two of the same kind of weapon (One Vox, one Founder), diluting the weapon pool further.
Plasmids are all too samey in the first half of the game. "Press R1 to fire, press R2 to make a trap!" Charge and Undertow needed to be earlier.
Balance is horrible among both weapons and plasmids; did they even test the Charge shield recharge? It breaks the game in half worse than even the Wrench builds in the first game.
Level design doesn't fit the gameplay at all because it surrounds you with enemies when a shield is designed to work with cover. Also battles often puts enemies at longer ranges when most guns and plasmids are designed for medium range.
Enemies are bullet sponges, especially those rocket launcher guys. Seriously, why the fuck did they have so much health?
The respawn system is somehow even worse than the first two games.
Why is there so much backtracking in such a linear game? Almost as bad as Halo CE.
The game is terrible but as it's one of the few non-steampunk games set in 1900-1915 (RDR being another), people are going to reference it constantly if they go back to the time period as a setting
I loved it. When the DLC (finally) came out I was delighted to be back in that world. Unfortunately that experience was tainted when that same DLC turned out to be wayyyyyy too short and not vfm.
I knew I shouldn't have stepped foot into this thread. Bioshock Infinite was my favorite game last year, OP, and resonated with me far more than any other title (yes, GAF, including TLoU). I loved every. single. second. Pains me to see the backlash, but then again I went in with no expectations or hype (I was new to the series). I suspect if I had played the first two I might be as letdown as others here but oh well.
It was my first Bioshock title also, and the only expectation I had was that I would be fun to play. But I guess that if I wouldn't have played any other FPS title I actually enjoyed playing, then I would have given Bioshock Infinite some slack.
To me it's legacy is part groundbreaking in terms of story, atmosphere and presentation and part tragedy in that all of that was hurt by the actual gameplay.
The first hour or so was genuinely one of the most brilliant executions of delivering a story I have ever seen. Then you started shooting, and while unlike many I enjoyed the gunplay in the game, it just was a step down from what came before it.
If the game played more as a detective game and went another route instead of a typical FPS this game could have been groundbreaking from start to finish.
It was still a great story and one of the most atmospheric games I've ever played but the gameplay itself was only above average.
I forgot about it like 10 mins after I finished it. I got the season pass for $5 and can't even be bothered to reinstall. Probably biggest disappointment of the gen for me.
Yeah...Nah. I won't go as far as to say the game was terrible or anything but I rank it as only above-average.
The story was a complete mess, told in the worst way possible through audio logs, some real hamfisted cutscenes, and an info-dump in the last 30 minutes. I left the game thinking
So Booker was Comstock...Huh
and shut it off, it had no real impact on me. And thats probably because...
The gameplay was simply "okay". Most of the guns lacked any sort of real "oomph" or..dare I say it? Visceral impact, especially the Vox Populi weapons. The big bruiser enemies (ie: Patriots and Handymen) were a real PITA to fight and were really no fun at all (I played on hard btw). BS:I also features one of the worst boss battles in a game that I've played in recent memory, and the designers had the FUCKING GALL to repeat it thrice. WHO WANTS TO FIGHT THE SAME BOSS THREEE TIMES? THREE (3!!) TIMES. And the final battle was one of the most anti-climatic final moments in a game I've ever played. Left absolutely no feeling of accomplishment.
Booker is also one of the least likeable protagonists of all time. I hated playing as him.
The scene where you finally meet Comstock and Booker smashes his face into a basin had me like "wtf dude?"
.
Hey, but it was a good looking game.
Edit: Oh and the interaction with the world was sorely lacking. You have this big beautiful environment that you're exploring and the most you can do in it is shoot people in the face and rummage through trash cans. Theres next to no exploration except a few paths leading off the main one and thats it. I wanted to experience Columbia instead of being guided through it.