Poll: Bioshock Infinite: Two Weapon Restriction

[Jimmy T. Malice]

I'm not that bothered by it, there's always weapons lying around if you need to switch, and Lizzie usually throws in some useful little things to help. Makes you think about the tactical use of Vigor's more though, noticing more situations to use them in recently.

One thing I'm not happy about is these damn George Washington Terminators. Now THEY are a pain in the arse.

Yeah, the motorised patriots are annoying, especially since they take more damage in the back but it's almost impossible to reach it. At least you can use Posession to turn them to your side for a bit.

 

[immortalfrieza]

I hope some clever modder will find a way to remove the restriction. It's a U3 engine game after all. I may try to do something when my game arrives.

I'd bet money that one of the first things that modders do is remove the 2 weapon limit. Personally, I don't mind the 2 weapon limit in games that much since there are really only 2 or 3 weapons tops that I end up using all the time in most shooters anyway, but I still don't care for it. The 2 weapon limit is just an arbitrary limit the developers put on weapons for no real reason, plenty of games from both previous generations and the current one have proven it's more than possible for the player to have half a dozen weapons or more at their disposal, and all others should be no different.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I don't really have a problem with the two weapon limit, because you're never actually limited to two weapons. Sure, you only have two "guns" but you also have your vigors, which are definitely weapons, and you have the hook, which gets upgraded with various effects, and is also a very usable weapon.

I do think it would be nice if there wasn't a weapon limit for 1999 mode, since it would be truer to the kinds of shooters that existed in 1999, but the fact that a weapon limit was included really doesn't upset me.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I hope some clever modder will find a way to remove the restriction. It's a U3 engine game after all. I may try to do something when my game arrives.

I'd bet money that one of the first things that modders do is remove the 2 weapon limit. Personally, I don't mind the 2 weapon limit in games that much since there are really only 2 or 3 weapons tops that I end up using all the time in most shooters anyway, but I still don't care for it. The 2 weapon limit is just an arbitrary limit the developers put on weapons for no real reason, plenty of games from both previous generations and the current one have proven it's more than possible for the player to have half a dozen weapons or more at their disposal, and all others should be no different.

Well most of the time developers do it for a sense of "realism" because in reality no one would be walking around with 10 different guns strapped to them. Then again, the more realistic a game is the less fun it tends to be a lot of the time, so who cares if having 2 pistols, a shotgun, a couple of rifles, and a rocket-launcher isn't a realistic amount of weapons for someone to carry, it's fun.

 

[Krantos]

I like the restriction. That mixed with the fact that you can stock up on ammo for guns you don't have encourages you to scrounge around the battlefield for replacement weapons in the middle of the fight. It makes you think more about the situational uses for each weapon.

That said, more options are always good, so if the option to increase the restriction was there, I wouldn't mind. I wouldn't use it, but I wouldn't begrudge others that do.

 

[sumanoskae]

I find it overly limiting, I already have to upgrade my weapon, so when one runs out of ammo and I have to switch to save my life, I lose the weapon I spent all my money on.

 

[immortalfrieza]

Well most of the time developers do it for a sense of "realism" because in reality no one would be walking around with 10 different guns strapped to them. Then again, the more realistic a game is the less fun it tends to be a lot of the time, so who cares if having 2 pistols, a shotgun, a couple of rifles, and a rocket-launcher isn't a realistic amount of weapons for someone to carry, it's fun.

Exactly. Realism isn't really that fun most of the time, and in games like Bioshock Infinite, which isn't a particularly realistic universe to begin with, it makes even less sense. Besides, I'm pretty out of shape and even I could carry more than a shotgun and a pistol around if I needed to, at least for a while. A detective like Booker should be able to carry at least somewhat more than I could.

 

[Christopher Fisher]

I dislike the two weapon limit, but removing it would make the game considerably easier.

 

[ZehMadScientist]

Should I keep the shotgun... or should I go for the revolver? Decisions decisions~

^ How I've spent a large portion of the game looting after combat.

Eeeh I thought it was pretty annoying at first, but I ended up using only the shotgun/revolver and sniper anyway. Volley gun is useless, Rpg isn't worth the small amounts of ammo (and isnt that good anyway), the Heater makes my blood boil because of one shot reloads etc etc.

Besides, Elizabeth kept throwing ammo at me all the way through so nah, I did'nt mind the two weapon restriction that much. That said, it would have been fun if I could just go gunblazing with three thousand weapons in my inventory.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Well most of the time developers do it for a sense of "realism" because in reality no one would be walking around with 10 different guns strapped to them. Then again, the more realistic a game is the less fun it tends to be a lot of the time, so who cares if having 2 pistols, a shotgun, a couple of rifles, and a rocket-launcher isn't a realistic amount of weapons for someone to carry, it's fun.

Exactly. Realism isn't really that fun most of the time, and in games like Bioshock Infinite, which isn't a particularly realistic universe to begin with, it makes even less sense. Besides, I'm pretty out of shape and even I could carry more than a shotgun and a pistol around if I needed to, at least for a while. A detective like Booker should be able to carry at least somewhat more than I could.

You're significantly undervaluing how much ammunition weighs and how much room it takes up. Also, it's not just about being about to carry the weight, it's also about carrying around a bunch of guns being clunky and uncomfortable. If you have 3 rifles and a shotgun strapped to your back it's hard to grab the right one when you need it.

 

[Amnesiac Pigeon]

I think the two weapon limit works perfectly for Infinite.

It really seems more important to get people to mix up the Vigors they're using instead of the guns they're using.

 

[Ishal]

Frankly I don't understand the hatred of two weapon limit. Is it in CoD and BF3? I don't play those so I don't know.

It seems people always want a challenge and difficult encounters, doesn't having two weapons increase difficulty? I tend to think it does. It adds a sense of urgency to if you really need and RPG and don't have one, maybe you have to improvise. Or, dash across the level and have liz open a tear to the crank gun or a RPG.

I'm fine with it. Though thinking about it, Bioshock had you able to carry around everything, so I guess I can see a reason there. Perhaps two weapon limit is a cheap way of increasing difficulty, or maybe people don't find it difficult to need to switch/find more weapons but find it tedious instead. Different strokes I guess.

 

[x EvilErmine x]

Well it didn't really bother me but I see how it can be an issue for some with the previous games not having the same limitation.

I was too bussey owning like a boss with the Carbine and Hand Cannon/Shotgun to notice much though. Seriously with them guns and with Rising Bloodlust and Overkill gear then you can basically stun lock everything in a fairly large radius.

 

[Grampy_bone]

The two weapon limit sucks. Personally I think that's the one legacy of Halo that has done the most damage to the FPS genre. All it does is ensure you never have the gun you need when you need it. It also encourages homogenization among the weapons and discourages using anything specialized; i.e. a weapon like a grenade launcher or sniper rifle might be really useful sometimes, but is it worth taking up one of your precious weapon slots?

I've only played the first hour or so of Bioshock Infinite so I can't say for sure how it affects the game, I just know I dislike most shooters with that mechanic. Two weapons is just too limiting, at least let me have say, four. Give me enough space to carry around that specialized gun for when I need it.

 

[NightmareExpress]

It seems people always want a challenge and difficult encounters, doesn't having two weapons increase difficulty? I tend to think it does. It adds a sense of urgency to if you really need and RPG and don't have one, maybe you have to improvise. Or, dash across the level and have liz open a tear to the crank gun or a RPG.

I'm fine with it. Though thinking about it, Bioshock had you able to carry around everything, so I guess I can see a reason there. Perhaps two weapon limit is a cheap way of increasing difficulty, or maybe people don't find it difficult to need to switch/find more weapons but find it tedious instead. Different strokes I guess.

In an artificial sort of way, it does.
If the game wasn't so bloody generous with ammunition for power weapons (or ammo in general) I imagine it wouldn't be necessary in the slightest.

The way that the game appears to be designed, is that a majority of the weapons will definitely work in most situations (especially so when combined with vigors). The carbine/sniper and machine gun/shotgun prove to be workhorses that decimate a majority of the foes that the game throws at you and are the weapons you can most easily acquire ammunition for (outside of the pistol or Elizabeth).

There are very few parts of the game that I can describe as "difficult" and those aren't because of the two-weapon limit.
The parts that I'm thinking of pretty much gave me access to every weapon in the game and a gratuitous amount of ammunition for the volley gun/RPG/crank gun...the fact of the matter is that they were difficult due to attrition of resource over time and a large amount of durable enemies being thrown in. Having every weapon at once wouldn't have made much of a difference at those points.

So after playing all the way through it on "hard", I'll have to side with the needless and tedious side.

captcha: little bird told me
Well, the sucker wasn't so little.

 

[Nazulu]

Yep, hate it. It's part of my gripe with the future introducing new technology but limiting everything else. Usually in a 2 weapon only game I find myself only using the weapons that would be effective to most enemies which just makes my selection less interesting. I reckon it's good to have a big variety of weapons for different strategy's, but since they've designed it just around 2 weapons now I wouldn't change it since it could possibly suck the challenge out of the game (unless they add in more enemies or something).

 

[Sonicron]

It's annoying, and I want it gone. There's no reason for it - the realism argument that serves as the principal justification for this kind of limitation doesn't hold water here; even if I were to forget the fact that we're dealing with a game that lets you summon murderous scavenger birds from the ether to aid you in combat, any and all pretense to realism dies of a massive aneurism the moment you realize there's no inventory system and your protagonist immediately consumes any and all food and drink items he finds, thus invoking the mental image of a Sarlacc on legs.

 

[Joccaren]

I dislike it, but its part of the game's design so I'll accept it.

Why I dislike it is largely because I enjoyed having a gun for every situation. Rather than playing guess-who as to which enemy was coming up next, and picking my weapons according to that, being wrong, and getting my ass handed to me [Ok, Infinite's not that hard. Other than the graveyard fight I haven't had many problems playing on hard for my first runthrough. Liz keeps you so stocked up its not funny so... W/E], I get to carry all the weapons I could need to a battle, flick out the one that best suits the situation, and use it.
Also got to say I rather dislike the Infinite weapons TBH. Handcannon I love because its actually a hand held cannon, everything else is meh. The Rocket Launcher styled weapons seem to do LESS damage than the hand cannon, a bloody pistol, and outside of the carbine all your weapons run out of ammo way too fast. A crank gun lasts you 5 enemies, and when you've got 20 coming at you... You're fucked. And then ammo for the Carbine is rather rare so... Fun times. The weapons largely feel the same IMO, outside of a couple of instances. Probably because I'm playing on hard but the game would be ridiculously easy otherwise so its a double edged sword. My shotgun feels like the handcannon to use, 'cause at point blank they both do about as much damage - or at least seem to. 3 shots will kill a normal guy. Yes, I have the shotgun fully upgraded. I haven't touched the hand cannon upgrades yet. The machine gun has damage to it, but feels like every other rapid fire gun in the game - except the Burst Gun 'cause the Burst gun feels like a water pistol its that weak. All the grenade launchers feel like a weak version of the hand cannon. I want some weight to my shots. I don't care that I'm playing on hard, a shotgun headshot at point blank should kill a normal enemy, not 2, or 3 if I hit their body. I used the Carbine 90% of the time until ammo ran dry 'cause it had some kick to it - 5-6 shots would kill a normal enemy at any range, headshots it would take 2-4 - and I could fire quickly and ramp up some mean DPS with good aim.
The Vigors are good, but I'm not entirely convinced there's enough Salts around to justify their use as often as you need to be using them. Liz is good in this department, but giving me salts normally leaves me low on ammo and health - as in 0 ammo and 1 pixel of health. Thankfully I've got the clothes that when I kill someone on low health I get healed, so I just throw a Devil's Kiss out and watch someone burn and I'm all good, but that's less effective when I've got a motorized patriot, handyman and 5-6 normal enemies coming at me. Thank god for Skyrails, and even then the Handymen make that a pain.

Ideally the rocket launchers would have about as much kick as they did in Bioshock 2, and I could carry all my weapons around. I'd get to a motorized Patriot fight, and I'd be able to use a rocket launcher to 3-4 shot him on normal, 5-6 shots on hard [As opposed to the current 20+ it seems to take ATM]. I'd then be able to grab out my carbine and hunt down all the crows, firemen and normal enemies that the game throws, and pull out a sniper when there's an RPG enemy of some kind that I want dead fast. Would be nice to be able to do it, shame I can't, but W/E.

 

[Joccaren]

Frankly I don't understand the hatred of two weapon limit. Is it in CoD and BF3? I don't play those so I don't know.

Can't speak for CoD, BF3 gives you, as the engineer, a knife, pistol, rifle and Rocket Launcher, as well as a welding torch for repairs that can be used as a weapon. Total of 4 slots per character not including the knife in BF3 from memory, 1 pistol, 1 primary, 2 for class-specific gear [I.E: Assault gets medkits and Defibs or a Grenade launcher and Defibs]. Dependent on your playstyle you can have 3 weapons. In older Battlefields you got them all.

It seems people always want a challenge and difficult encounters, doesn't having two weapons increase difficulty? I tend to think it does. It adds a sense of urgency to if you really need and RPG and don't have one, maybe you have to improvise. Or, dash across the level and have liz open a tear to the crank gun or a RPG.

It increases difficulty by making you guess what's coming up as an enemy, leaving everything to chance, or to carry weapons that are effective all the time, but aren't as effective in a circumstance as a more specialised weapon. Basically, it turns it into a game of homogenisation or luck.
Ammo isn't an issue. Playing on hard, I'm at near the end of the game [I think] and I just had my first battle where I ran out of ammo, and I just blaze away in all battles.
Theoretically improvisation and having you run around the level to get your weapons is a good idea, in practice it doesn't quite work when you've got 8 people with guns and a Handyman chasing you. You don't have time to open up a tear and grab the gun, especially since about half the time the gun is way out in the open [Or in cover, but really shit cover], where you will die if you go for it.

 

[kasperbbs]

It annoyed me a couple of times when i ran out of ammo for both in dangerous situations, but that gave me a reason to try out new weapons and try to experiment with vigors so i don't really mind the limit.