Was bioshock infinite the worst AAA FPS ever made?

MysticSlayer

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LetalisK said:
It felt like I had to will myself through it and you nailed why. The only other complaint I'd have is I had problems with part of the ending, specifically the debt and how Booker paid it. I found it to be a stretch that made me roll my eyes and that's saying something since I deal with parents in real life that are of the lowest caliber.
I'm guessing that you're talking about Booker giving away Elizabeth. Yeah, that seemed pretty contrived, but given some of the messed-up stuff I've heard parents do, not entirely unbelievable.

I guess, to me, BioShock Infinite works better as a commentary piece than an actual story. For all the time they spent making the unbelievable world of Colombia come alive, that didn't seem to translate that well to characters and story. I know the BioShock games all had pretty whacky characters, but whereas characters like Dr. Steinmann and Sander Cohen felt like they belonged in Rapture and were believably insane, most of the major characters in Infinite felt...fake and unconvincing. Maybe it was the often-times cringe-worthy dialogue. Maybe it was the contrived power fantasy behind so many of the characters. Maybe it is all the time the game spent masquerading as one story while telling a completely different one.

Whatever the case, I've played BioShock Infinite a few times, and I've never really felt a strong connection to the characters and story that they get caught up in. Sure, I love the commentary it offers on storytelling in video games, but it is a shame that the story it tells isn't that great. I can't deny, though, that the world, commentary, and flying around the sky rail keeps me coming back every once in a while.
 

Trunkage

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Lightspeaker said:
Johnny Novgorod said:
I think it's one of the best, actually.
Agreed. Personally I found it funny that the OP said it scored better than Half Life 2 (to paraphrase) as if that was shocking in some way. It IS better than Half Life 2. Half Life 2 is not a particularly impressive game, and it wasn't at the time that it launched either (I bought it a little after launch to see what the hype was all about). It was an impressive tech demo for its time, but as a game its pretty unremarkable.


IceForce said:
Looks like someone's never played Aliens: Colonial Marines.
A:CM gets way more criticism than it deserves. Its not brilliant, and it was apparently a bit buggy at launch, but the way people talk about it you'd think that it actually murdered their family. Seemingly mainly because it didn't match up to the trailer that was shown.

There are way, way worse shooters around. By far.
Yeah, I was not that impressed with Half-Life. Good game but not our Lord and Saviour like most people think. I remember multiplayer in (I think) HL2 where you could shoot a rocket and then move the reticule, which the rocket tracks. Shooting people around the corner was awesome.

But then everyone thinks Witcher 3 is our Lord and Saviour. Don't get me wrong, still the best game of last year, but there is so much that could have been improved. It had so many flaws and bugs its pretty aggravating. I got the season pass but I just cant get to it because of this (same with Fallout 4 actually).
 

Chester Rabbit

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*Rolls eyes* Jesus christ, you people. Not even in the slightest. It's not even anywhere near a bad game.
 

Post Tenebrae Morte

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G00N3R7883 said:
No. /thread

More detailed answer? The graphics were colourful, the story was interesting (although the ending was a bit confusing), Elizabeth was an NPC who actually helped instead of getting in the way, voice acting was amazing, the combination of guns and vigors allowed for some creative tactical gameplay.

All of those points elevate it above CoD and all the other super serious boring as hell real world military shooters.

Heck, its not even the worst Bioshock game, because that award goes to #2.
While I do think the author of this thread is speaking in hyperbole, I have to agree in one thing: infinite wasn't as good as it could've been and is, in all honesty, the worst bioshock game.
The graphics were undeniably beautiful, but the story was half-baked and not fully realized. Instead of focusing on Booker and Elizabeth's connection, developing it more before the big twist, they just spring it on you with no real buildup. There should've been more moments like the beach segment after rescuing Elizabeth, so that when the twist came, it was actually impactful. Then the ending came, which was a mediocre attempt to explore the infinite realities theory, trying to recapture the feelings that the objectivist stylings of the first bioshock made gamers feel. People rag on 2 for exploring rapture again, but it did so in areas not seen before both in environment and story terms, with the theme being collectivist in nature, which provided a great opposite to the objectivist theme of 1.

I played infinite directly after a playthrough of 1 and 2, and a lot of things were different and not in a good way. The gunplay actually improved from 1 to 2, it became even smoother and worked far better in Union with the plasmids than infinite. In infinite, the vigors were, honestly, lackluster variations based on the typical stuff from the previous two bioshock games, none of them felt unique enough to truly necessitate some sort of usage and in the end, only the fire and kicking vigor saw extensive use. That is nothing compared to how stiff the gun controls were and how the enemies had too much hp, yes the skyhook was fun to use and remained useful to quickly traverse the areas during a fight, but that isn't enough to make up for the mediocre gunplay that was comparable to call of duty 3 at best.

Most erroneously however, was just how irking the dlc was for infinite. I was expecting further exploration into Columbia. It was a beautiful, fascinating environment that, though the logs and main story failed to capitalize on it, was still open for further exploration into the culture and other environments that likely existed. Instead, they retreated back to bioshock 1's environment and repeated rapture, trying to mix infinite with the original as to tie them together in someway, but still failing and making it all just reek of the developers not caring about how legitimate the new additions felt. I played through infinite once and that was more than enough, compared to the five plus times I've played bioshock 1 and 2.

Bioshocks infinite will always remain my most disappointing preorder.
 

Sniper Team 4

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Honestly, just reading the title of this thread made me question your tastes in games, and whether you've played some other FPS. I see someone has already brought up Warfighter, so there's that. It's not even close to being bad. Is it not to your tastes? Apparently yes, by several hundred miles. But to say that is the worst triple-A FPS ever, out of all the garbage that has been put out? No, just no.
 

Zombie Proof

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I found the perfect allegory for Brain-Cell's threads.
I mean, he's gotta be sitting back, chuckling in the bushes as people try to put out the flaming poop he left on The Escapists stoop.

...and no, I don't think Bioshock Infinite is the worst AAA game ever and and I don't think you do either to be honest. Well played though, you've managed to flame bait at least one person into a warning so far (hell, this post might make it two lol). Keep em coming Bumbling-Cell :D
 

Vinsin

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... I just bought Bioshock Infinite yesterday to play in VR and now it's being rated the worst FPS ever?! Bah. Just my luck :p I knew I should have waited for the way-late reviews to come in!

But in all seriousness, borrowed it from a friend shortly after it came out and thought it was a blast, not 10/10 but it was fun. Best of the bioshocks, but by no means perfect; I wouldn't have praised it as much as reviewers did when it was released. So far the VR aspect of things though is making my opinion sway, but I know that's more the VR aspect than the game itself.
 

Hawki

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Vinsin said:
... I just bought Bioshock Infinite yesterday to play in VR and now it's being rated the worst FPS ever?! Bah. Just my luck :p I knew I should have waited for the way-late reviews to come in!

But in all seriousness, borrowed it from a friend shortly after it came out and thought it was a blast, not 10/10 but it was fun. Best of the bioshocks, but by no means perfect; I wouldn't have praised it as much as reviewers did when it was released. So far the VR aspect of things though is making my opinion sway, but I know that's more the VR aspect than the game itself.
If you don't mind me asking, how would you rate the VR in of itself? I ask because I actually took part in a VR trial when I was at university (hour of playing games for $10-20, good times),* and can't say it was my cup of tea. And looking at VR games now, the only one that seems to be more than a gimmick is Bridge Command. But happy to hear an opinion to the contrary.

*Other trials including games such as Total War and Myst.
 

Vinsin

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Hawki said:

Well I don't want to commandeer the thread. So I'm going to preface this with "MY OPINION" in nifty quotes as well as try to keep this as on topic as possible;

*pray I get the tagging right*
For VR in general, we're past 'gimmick' at this point; if -nothing- else it's taking a solid spot in 3D design assistance; creating models in virtual reality is vastly easier and it'll only improve as the programs (and hacked modifications) that support it improve, Tilt Brush showed the potential, the ease, now it's just being put into real application. The usefulness there is enough to concrete it's existence alone ; and 360 Videos? I watched a skydiving one and enjoyed the experience, another one underwater swimming with sharks and found it compelling; entertaining, truly wanted to reach out and touch things they felt so close at points in some 360 Video's I've watched, a level of enjoyment you'll never find no matter how much you try with a 4K TV; now we just need professional adopters to make use of that amazing technology.


I'm replaying all my old titles in VR (VorpX) and enjoying them more now than I did originally and that's *with* the hassle of setting them up. It takes 15-45 minutes per game, yeah, it can be bad; but I always find myself grinning big when I'm done with setup, I was finding The Long Dark especially compelling, but decided I'd go ahead and setup Bioshock Inf. just so 'when I was ready to play it' I'd have that done..... well, setup took .. 10 minutes; three hours later of playing I finally took a break.)

Can't wait to see VR when it's streamlined for the average non-techy no-patience person. That's not even playing to VR's strengths of 'made for VR' titles that utilize the full roomscale experience; or that it's taken over as my primary monitor in it's current state and I will bask in the resolution upgrade of CV2 someday which will just make it even better.

Vivecraft being an grand example of a game I'd never be able to return to the original Monitor verson of, not after fearing falling off a mountain I was *physically* walking on the edge of in my playspace, turned to stare down at the drop with a real sense of vertigo that was awesome just to start to walk away and be hit by a skeleton and in reality performed a jump turn and physically did a 'dash' forward within my small area and swung my controller like a real blade, impacting my sword against him and sending HIM off the mountain; no buttons pressed, just reactions. There is nothing like it, or the immersion you can get from it.

GTA IV's Roomscale likely to become one when I'm ready to try it.

Hell, Vireio offers a 'alpha' roomscale capability of Fallout 4 right now, I imagine it's got some bugs and difficulties, no doubt really, but when it's polished, kiss life goodbye on that alone =P but if Bethesa releases a true VR polished experience that's even better. Is VR stacked with huge AAA titles just yet and polished to perfection? No. If your the type that demands super 4K ultra ultra max everything and the type to nitpick every detail; or your just on a hard budget right now .. yeah pass, at least until CV2 ; but if your more of a reasonable.. maybe not the right word.. but a person that doesn't call for perfection and (in vorpx case) handle minor troubleshooting, love being immersed into your game and can handle the rough edges at the moment? Psh, no contest. It's worth it.

Again, that's not even including the 'Made specifically for VR' titles like Audioshield and Holopoint for workouts; Vanishing Realms, Hover Junkers, Brookhaven Experiment, Portal Stories, The Nest, Budget Cuts, The Gallery, Solus, Elite Dangerous; the partial ones that aren't there yet (Subnatica, Monsterum, ect) or only support Oculus (I don't support its' walled garden); but the Revive project cracks the DRM and tends to open those up; and more on the horizon.

There are warming stories spreading of those with medical vision issues being able to see 'depth' for the first time in their lives via VR Gaming; no relation to the topic just something kind of outstanding about the potential; can read star-struck owners now and again on reddit awed by what it did for them which is just.. well you don't get to say that about all that much in a gaming forum.

It has flaws while succeeding where it's meant to and it's future is set to stay; in every facet. I certainly won't be going back to a normal monitor for games I want to be immersed into, certainly not for my desktop use either save for quick ten minute sit downs to check something.

'An yeah, I enjoy it enough to write all of this while using the Vive via Virtual Desktop :3
So in regards to the topic, well, VR + Bioshock Inf. stole a chunk of my life and likely to take more. VR itself, has already taken countless hours.

TLDR/NonVR ramble: Yes..
That's it, just yes. I can't sum VR down into something short, opinions are widespread and varied, some love it, some hate it, some ramble that it's just strapping a tv to your head (hint: no.); well, my opinion is it's worth every penny right at this moment if your capable of troubleshooting and don't call for perfection; if you do, wait for CV2 then get it. But either way, VR is here to stay; it's amazing, has applications outside of gaming and movies and .. see, spark of passion hits and this ends up not being a short post. So - Yes.

More 'on topic; Bioshock's beginning scenes are breathtaking in VR o.o just saying, like, damn, my girlfriend was laughing because I was just frozen, staring at it.. all of it, the light effects, the humming birds, I never gave a crap about those things to any great degree before; but in VR? I could have stared at any part of the bioshock scenery for hours... no, not a joke or exageration, it really can be that-- well, that stunning. In the 'arriving' in the chair portion, I wanted to touch the glass.. I really felt compelled to. It's that good, when it's working and all setup right. It just.. is.
 

JohnnyDelRay

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Laggyteabag said:
A new skill that I have acquired is being able to tell a B-Cell thread from a non-B-Cell thread, only by reading the title.

So far, I have only been wrong once.

OT: No, it isn't. Don't be silly. There are much, much worse AAA FPS games out there. BioShock Infinite didn't have 10/10 great combat, but oh boy, no way is it WORST GAME EVAR. Please, B-Cell. Please. There are other colours in this world than black and white.
Not all that hard. All you have to look for is:
XXXXXX IS BEST / WORST (FPS) GAME EVARR

OT: Bioshock infinite. Right. Maybe if you presented a more compelling argument as to why it was the worst other than "worst level design" and "horrible" it might be worth arguing why it's the worst of all time. I can guarantee there's far worse, your opinion alone does not make it so.

Ok regarding level design, yes it's pretty linear. But so are games like Serious Sam and Painkiller. Not as good as the other 2 Bioshocks, but served the narrative and combat style well enough.

There are a lot worse sidekicks/escortees than Elizabeth in any game. Resident Evil for example (Moira and Ashley)
 

MHR

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Bioshock Infinite is a mediocre campaign shooter that somehow got massively popular due to a multiverse jackoff story. Wish I hadn't bought it for 60 dollars.

The gunplay is worse than Bioshock 2, and at least Bioshock 1 had interesting weapons. When you do things like replace a badass electrical trapping crossbow with a generic sniper rifle, and replace a large variety of weaponry with a 2 weapon limit, you've done fucked up.
 

Spider RedNight

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I like to pretend that some of the nitpicks (like the two weapon limit) was "because prequel" or something like that. But this is BEFORE you could hold all the weapons you get in the game, blah blah blah.

OT: Er... no. Good try, but no. Objectively speaking, it's not even a bad game. At worst, it's a "meh" game with a pretentious story. But it's not the worse AAA FPS ever made.
 

Maphysto

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"Hey, this game is pretty good!"

"A-HA! That's where I think you'll find you are WRONG, sir! For in fact, this game you like is actually BAD!"

In all honesty, though, can we please get over this stupid, attention-seeking bullshit of "stop liking things I don't like?"
 

Lightspeaker

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Skatalite said:
Lightspeaker said:
Personally I found it funny that the OP said it scored better than Half Life 2 (to paraphrase) as if that was shocking in some way. It IS better than Half Life 2. Half Life 2 is not a particularly impressive game, and it wasn't at the time that it launched either


This thread... You're like the opposite of B-Cell.
Nah, if I was the opposite I wouldn't agree with him that System Shock 2 is legitimately good. But I've maintained for more than ten years now that HL2 is not a particularly good game. Its really quite average.

The tech in it is impressive for its era but the story is flimsy, the level design isn't anything special and the guns are eh to use, generally pretty unsatisfying. Although I absolutely adore the source engine for shooters generally speaking and the sound work was pretty good.
 

lacktheknack

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"This is a B-Cell thread, isn't it?"



"Damn it, B-Cell."

No, no it is not. Hyperbole is not your friend in the quantities that you use it.
 

MysticSlayer

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ZombieProof said:
I mean, he's gotta be sitting back, chuckling in the bushes as people try to put out the flaming poop he left on The Escapists stoop.
I've actually suspected for a while that he does most of this for laughs. I mean, there's just no way the guy isn't getting a kick of this, right? Normally, I don't mind. Sometimes it leads to some genuinely hilarious comments. But touching any of the BioShock games crosses the fucking line! (Well, except BioShock 2. Shit on that all you want. It's the only game in the series I'm not married to[footnote]Sorry, I forgot. I'm only married to BioShock. Infinite just sort of comes around for a threesome every once in a while.[/footnote] madly in love with.)
 

Silentpony_v1legacy

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ZombieProof said:
Not so much putting out shit-fires as much as reminding B-Cell that this isn't actually a neighborhood and we can't smell a damn thing.

I mean fuck, he makes ME, SiletPony, look like a reasonable person. And I'm not! By design!
 

RedDeadFred

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Nope, but this thread's title is the biggest hyperbole I've see on this site in quite some time. Congrats on that, B-Cell.

For what it's worth, I found it to be quite an enjoyable game. The world was fantastic to explore, the combat was reasonably satisfying, and the skyhook was ridiculously fun. The story, while having some logical inconsistencies (which I honestly think are kind of inevitable in this type of story), was excellent and I found that I genuinely cared about the two main characters.

Was it overrated? Eh, maybe. I didn't really get caught up in the hype, so it's hard for me to really say. It met my expectations. I don't like a ton of FPSs, so the fact that I thoroughly enjoyed it would mean that for me, it's one of the best.
 

RJ 17

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I love how I can take one look at the "popular topics" list and say "Well, that's going to be a B-Cell topic." Lo' and behold...

:p

OT: BS:I is overrated due to bullet-sponge enemies and a pretentious story whose subject matter pretty much allows you to just make up plot-holes and they become valid. Is it the worst AAA FPS ever? No, because Colonial Marines is a thing.
 

MysticSlayer

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RJ 17 said:
due to bullet-sponge enemies
What are these "bullet-sponge" enemies you speak of? One shot from my carbine or shotgun does most of them in. A good Bucking Bronco + Devil's Kiss also always did the trick.

OK, yes, I know that, at least on Normal and Hard, the enemies were bullet sponges if you use anything other than high-damage weapons. I haven't tried Easy to see if that's better.