The Glade 4.0

And, pre-purchased on steam (with a free copy of xcom to boot!)

So is Bioshock supposed to be scary?

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Infinite has zero scary elements. More supernatural/cultish.

The first game scared the piss out of me.

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Raell Kromwell

Hard to be too scared when you're in what is basically manmade heaven. The atmosphere is great, but it's not creepy like Rapture.

I meant the first one, I picked up the Rapture Edition of Bioshock 1 & 2 and I am trying to "get it".

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Yeah, Bioshock 1 is supposed to be scary. Remember children, science needs limits! (when it comes to human testing, etc etc don't get all angry)

Seems more like a personal attack on Ayn Rand than a Frankenstein allegory.

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I don't think it was meant to be scary in the same way System Shock or Amnesia: The Dark Descent was meant to be scary. There were some very tense elements in the first Bioshock though.

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

Have you been reading old threads?


I never played the second game but the first...it was perfect. And yes, it scared the hell out of me.

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Raell Kromwell

The Second was better than the first for me. Being a Big Daddy was a neat twist.

Episode one: a man with no free will
Episode two: a monster with free will

Back to back it was cool. Makes me want three.

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Infinite is getting great reviews. Super-excited. My Ultimate Songbird Edition just shipped from Amazon. Wheeeee!

I thought seriously about taking tomorrow off, but I've got too much stuff to get done. Still...

That's awesome. This is the first game I've pre-ordered before reviews in a long, long time.

I keep playing in 45 minute spurts. I'm losing steam, but I've never finished a Bioshock game and I'm gonna change that, dammit.

Bucking Bronco vigor = overpowered as balls.

ARGH. Stuck here at school for another 2 hours.

******* game developers: create awesome game, release immediately after Spring Break.

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Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

I dunno. I'm a bit concerned that it might be too linear for my taste, based on the footage I've seen.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

No such thing.

There is, actually. The rail shooter genre of old, for instance, suffered from being too linear. The underlying objection to QuickTime Events is that it's basically a glorified cutscene that you can fail. The reason this is bad gameplay is because you're only nominally in control of your character.

I like a tight narrative as much as the next guy, but a game should allow for more creativity, exploration, and emergent gameplay than a movie. This is probably a notion that you don't struggle with as much as I do, since you're a big movie guy. But, for me, it's the crucial element that brings me back to games as my escapist immersive storytelling medium of choice.

And everything I've seen in the announcement and pre-release hype for Bioshock: Infinite has focused on set-pieces that channel you onto a path that removes a large portion of your input into how the game will unfold for you. And that's a big turnoff, for me.

The recently released Tomb Raider flirts with this line, too. And if the "press forward to advance" and QTE portions were pushed even a hair more prominently, or if their use didn't support the narrative and establish the atmosphere that they do as well as they do, I could easily have been turned off of that game entirely.

As such, I have concerns that Bioshock: Infinite will be more linear than will appeal to me. I'm happy to wait to see reviews.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Did you play and enjoy the other Bioshock titles? If the answer is yes, your concerns regarding linearity can probably be safely discarded. This one has plenty of barrels and desks to search, optional quests to do, locked doors to open.

I didn't finish either, if that's what you're asking.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

See, this is the flip side of that brain-twin coin. They're two of the only games I've ever finished.

Kaffis is the part of Farsky's brain that doesn't like Bioshock, apparently.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

I could probably get behind that.

Bioshock, to me, was dripping with atmosphere... but completely devoid of any motivation. And I wasn't really interested in jabbing genetic goop into my veins to give me magic powers. Not a compelling hook.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Well if it makes you feel any better, Infinite powers are more like getting drunk than shooting up.

It's more the presence of hand-wavy magical powers than the drug use analogues.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades