Poll: Bioshock Infinite Gameplay trailer contains WEIRD STUFF - discussion :

[Laerid]

Having watched the 10 minute gameplay trailer several times, I have pierced the secret of Bioshock Infinite's city, Columbia.

It's a matrix-like virtual world.
The girl is somehow very special, a chosen one, like Neo - defying the world's rules - and being very good at it, thus treated as a threat by the world itself, thus changing itself (in real-time) to fend off any threatening anomaly.

There are several visual and sound queues throughout the gameplay trailer (http://www.gametrailers.com/video/ten-minute-demo-bioshock-infinite/704932) that prove my theory (I recommend you to read the following lines side by side with the trailer):

ar 01:45 look at the banner on the ground ; there is some sort of veil passing through it as if reality is being changed (especially the sound cue got my attention)

at 03:22 (another GT user pointed this out) the angry guy's badge turns briefly into a communist hammer and sickle badge, again, as if reality is being altered because of your presence. I think that the guy and his crow-wielding lackey act as a sort of antiviral program, to fend off unwelcomed 'foreigners' also a synonim for a foreign viral body, or virus.

at 05:56, that's the weirdest one ... look closely at the painting above the couch in the pub. The landscape painting of the statue of liberty becomes a portrait of a black haired man (06:02 we precisely see the morph), just before he gets attacked by a customer.

WEIRD STUFF and terribly exciting. Can't wait for the game! What do you guys think about this??

EDIT :

In Bioshock 1 some of the paintings would switch from a fairly unremarkable painting to a real picture of Ayn Rand if you looked at them from a certain angle. I just hope that they don't try to pull some bullshit like telling us that everything from Bioshock 1 and 2 was also in some sort of virtual-reality thing in addition to this new cannon.

Wow, even though I've beaten Bioshock, I didn't notice any weird stuff like that.
For me, the best way they could integrate the 'virtual world twist' would be (brace yourself) if at the end of it all, it is revealed to the player that Shodan, the evil supercomputer from System Shock, is behind it all.
Like, if they lifted the veil that is Rapture/Columbia and behind it, we get to see Shodan's ugly face.

that would be amazingly cool, and would actually work in system shock's amazing sci-fi world.

I don't buy the theory that Elizabeth will turn out to be some sort of Neo-like character because they all have powers within the normal plot structure anyway. The only power that is exclusive to her, as far as we can tell, is having catoonishly large breasts.

But you can't deny that she has some kind of higher purpose... and every Columbian authority wants her emprisoned/dead. I think she is a Neo-like character that hasn't fully developped her powers, yet.
She needs the player for that, and the system (systemshoooock!) knows it and wants to kill her while still in an 'infant' state.

 

[Rusty Bucket]

Put on your tin foil hats everyone!

Hopefully you're wrong, because that sounds boring as fuck. Why can't it just be a floating city?

Anyway, that trailer is absolutely amazing. I'm considering getting it now, instead of the general 'meh' reaction I gave it before. I'm also scared of heights, so that trailer made me cringe so many times.

 

[Starke]

That might explain the woman sweeping up in front of an inferno. I'm less inclined to buy into the Matrix theory. But, it wouldn't surprise me if something there IS warping reality somehow. What's really weird though is: Soviet Iconography would be anachronistic in this setting.

 

[teh_Canape]

anyways, I'm with this guy here, a flying city with a huge ass metallic raven chasing you is waaay more interesting than being trapped in a computer world

 

[dududf]

Well you all seem to be missing the logical explanation

Pixie Magic.

 

[Laerid]

Crap, the poll thing is broken.

I really don't know WHAT to think ; the visual anomalies are there, apparently random stuff changing in real-time. Maybe this kind of discussion is EXACTLY what the devs were hoping for, and I just sprang the proverbial vira-trap.

Maaaaaaaaybe there is some kind of twist ending, where you actually find out you're still in Rapture at the bottom of the ocean, Columbia being a virtual reality created for counter-balancing the oppresiveness of underwater living (the drastic change of scenery - bottom of the ocean/above the clouds, might be indicative of this).... AAAAH I can't stop overanalysing this damn you Bioshock !

 

[Brazilianpeanutwar]

I just think the sweeping woman was a mechanical robot or something......

 

[Irony's Acolyte]

We are talking about people who can shoot lighting out of their hands, use telekinetic powers, control ravens, are fighting proto-cyborgs, and are in a floating city of balloon suspended buildings. In the early 1900's. Maybe, just maybe, some odd things that can't be explained right away can happen.

 

[Jedamethis]

Or maybe Whatsisface created this dream world.

 

[Gigaguy64]

I say rapture was found, and the technological breakthroughs have been absorbed into the larger world...

But this game takes place BEFORE Bioshock 1&2.

 

[martin's a madman]

I say rapture was found, and the technological breakthroughs have been absorbed into the larger world...

Happened before Rapture.

Perhaps they'll explain it as Colombia being the inspiration for Ryan's Rapture. Or Colombia was a "prototype" in a way, of Rapture.

Or what if we're made to believe it's the early 1900s when really they're floating above in their own little world around the 1940s or even later?

 

[Gigaguy64]

I say rapture was found, and the technological breakthroughs have been absorbed into the larger world...

But this game takes place BEFORE Bioshock 1&2.

Is that right?

Its late here, I clearly don't have my thinking cap on.

Fuck it then, this is just some straight tripped out shit. It feels almost a shame to call it Bioshock though now that I think about it... Rapture as a whole was always the best thing about the game and thats clearly out. A talking protagonist, imo, is also less impressive as a story telling device as with Jack/Daddy we found out things through them, we WERE the main character, watching this drama. If the main character speaks and has his own views and actions we stop being the main character and go back to being someone playing the main character...

Lol, yea this one takes place in the 20's.

But anyway, what if the main character is great?
What if the world turns out to be amazing?

And Jack did talk in the first game, not very much, and Adding a voice doesn't necessarily mean that their views and Actions aside from the main objective are set in stone.
Could be that we still shape the character, he just talks.

And i felt that while Rapture was an amazing Atmosphere the Bioshock series is MORE than Rapture.
Hell, the series is called Bioshock, not Rapture.
So just because its not Rapture doesn't mean that it shouldn't get a chance to prove that it can be just as amazing a setting.
If all you want is Rapture then the series will stagnate and Die.

 

[Last Valiance]

The game takes place before the russian revolution and possibly before the formation of the bolshevik movement in itself.

Unless the hammer and sickle predate communism, it doesn't make much sense.


Even still, that is some creepy shit, and it's awesome.

 

[Last Valiance]

Also, by the looks of it, Ryan's rapture and Columbia seem to have very different political ideas, which seems to be the thing that drives the series (super-capitalism in 1, communism in 2), so the question is, what political idea hasn't been used yet?

It seems to me that the poster saying "burden ... not with your chaff" says they will only let the very best come to columbia because of how precious the space up there is, but that doesn't sound too different from ryan's rapture... gaah... my head. NVM.


It really doesn't make any sense that a city that Ken Levine has openly said is not a secret in any way could have invented plasmids (without adam, most likely), not to mention giant flying robots, and not have those things spread to other areas.


One other thing:

Why is it called Bioshock: Infinite? Infinite what?

 

[Legendairy314]

To me it just looks like advertisements changing/malfunctioning. Makes sense in an idealized mechanical world.

 

[RatRace123]

I didn't notice those things, but I don't know.
I like to think it works out better by just being a floating city in the sky.

Unless, those things were part of a conspiracy. QUICK! What day is it?!
Is JFK still alive? Where's Bigfoot right now? Someone call Dan Brown and Stanley Kubrick, they need to know about this.