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So for all the talk about this being an unprecedented ending....it's a pretty obvious twist to make if you absolutely have to make a twist and your main character has time/dimensional travel powers. I don't understand how it took them 4 months to come up with it, or why they'd claim it was like nothing in any game ever. If they really want to see mindfuckery they should try Pathologic.
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Mar 21, 2013 00:21
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I think many, many game companies would benefit from editors outside the project that could check in from time and time and say "Yeah, about that - it seems pretty stupid to me." I doubt that will happen for a myriad of reasons, but game development tends to be very insular and groupthinky that a lot of stupid poo poo ends up in products. I also get the feeling that people are falling over themselves to praise Levine a bit more than he's earned. I mean, Bioshock was good and all and the twist was interesting in a visceral sense, but the game falls apart afterward and the game is too chicken to really render a judgement on objectivism or the philosophies in Rapture. And it really doesn't do anything with what the twist presents: Bioshock 1 spoiler if anyone still hasn't played it: You are doing all these linear things because you are hypnotized! See, it's a commentary on all games! And I think it would be really hard to implement this twist well without making it feel like "whelp, I just did a bunch of stuff for nothing" - not to render final judgement, but I'm not too hopeful. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ That summary doesn't sound too bad. Fits with the quantum mechanics theme as understood by a lit major theme they seem to be going with. Still seems like there's a lot of holes though - why would Elizabeth wait until the end? ~~~Hero's journey~~~ bullshit? Also an exposition dump, really? Spite fucked around with this message at 00:40 on Mar 21, 2013 |
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Mar 21, 2013 00:36
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It also really changes the dynamic if Elizabeth knew all this all along, because she's then using him all along. Which is kind of odd considering they've been playing up the "these two learn to trust each other" angle for the entire ad campaign. I suppose it could work if she doesn't realize it until the end.
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Mar 21, 2013 01:30
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Yeah, that doesn't make sense. Something I don't get: does Elizabeth know all this going in? Is she the best actress ever and is using Booker? Or does she somehow realize it all at the end? Also, is she born before the baptism? If so, why does Comstock need to kidnap her - wouldn't she already be her daughter. If she's only born to Booker, then the ending also must kill her, right? And why does Booker even need to die? Where does the time loop come in? I can see multiple dimensions happening at the same time, but the events are linear and are pretty completed by the time you finish the game. So how does it restart?
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Mar 21, 2013 15:18
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I think the ending would be much, much more effective if they didn't throw the "By the way: YOU ARE COMSTOCK" thing at you right at the very end. I mean, it's pretty sloppy to drop like 10 reveals on you in a 15 minute exposition dump. But the twist of Booker giving away Elizabeth is good enough on its own - though they probably need to reveal it differently. Making Booker become Comstock is an interesting idea but it kind of cheapens everything you went through beforehand. And it doesn't answer the question of why you want to go back in time to prevent it. Sure, Booker messed up his daughter's life but at the end of the game they can at least move on. It's not a time loop, it's the same pattern happening simultaneously. Booker initially thinks killing Comstock will mean he never sells his daughter so they she can actually grow up. But the reveal throws that away and means that neither of them exist, which isn't really what they want. I do like loops and cycles generally, but this seems kind of sloppy. Do they ever explain why Elizabeth has her powers? And Comstock losing his daughter is a big, big plothole. Which will probably be addressed in DLC? I dunno. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ So there's a problem with what you said: if Comstock steals the daughter before the baptism, then that's the branching point, not the baptism. Since we know that Booker has his daughter and Comstock does not. Spite fucked around with this message at 20:01 on Mar 21, 2013 |
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Mar 21, 2013 19:57
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Wait, so Booker sells Elizabeth/Anna to Comstock before the baptism? Where is that made clear? The ending I watched made it seem like that occurs after the baptism, when Booker refuses it. Though the entire loop makes more sense if it occurs afterward - if he thinks he's buying his daughter from his earlier self. That's really not clear from the presentation though. And Booker is never offered a chance to go to Columbia and save Elizabeth to erase his sins - he makes that up himself. Also, the Rapture connection seems really, really tenuous. It could just be some other reality unrelated to this story.
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Mar 21, 2013 21:46
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And it needs to be definitive otherwise it doesn't work. If Booker sells his daughter before the baptism it kind of makes sense. Otherwise it all falls apart. Unfortunately the ending doesn't make this clear. Maybe the full game does? Still doesn't fix the time loop issue, but if Bookers sells his daughter before he gets baptised/becomes Comstock the story makes a lot more sense.
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Mar 22, 2013 03:18
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Nakar posted:Well if he does it after, and only has his daughter as Booker (that is, the circumstances that lead to her birth never happen to Comstock), then Comstock wouldn't already have a daughter and so he'd have to go get one. But he also wouldn't realize a daughter even exists unless one of the Luteces told him so, because that's in a parallel dimension. It makes waaay more sense to me if Booker sells Anna before the baptism. If it's before, the ending kills Elizabeth/Anna as well and like you said, Comstock wouldn't know he has a daughter. It would also imply Comstock knows the two are the same person - which Comstock's last conversation kind of implies but I'm not totally sure. If it's before there wouldn't be a daughter in Comstock's reality. If Booker always sells Anna before the baptism, she's always taken from all realities. Comstock later on can discover dimension travel and probably thinks "Hey, I can go back in time and both rescue my daughter and fix my debt and everything will be perfect." But Comstock doesn't realize the baptism is a branching point that creates him and Booker. When Comstock goes back, he affects two dimensions. There's what I guess would be a stable loop in one, where he buys Anna from Booker-who-will-become-Comstock. There's also a dimension where he buys from Booker-who-will-stay-Booker, which creates miserable Booker. Does Comstock have AD on his hand like Booker does?
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Mar 22, 2013 18:31
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Is there something else after the credits? The clip I saw ends with the drowning and the piano notes. People are mentioning the timelines collapsing and returning back to the point before Booker gives up Anna, but I didn't see that. And yeah, it's a LOT of info dumped on the player all at once. Which is poor storytelling in any medium, even if the ideas are interesting.
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Mar 22, 2013 20:37
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Merry Magpie posted:Deus ex machina. This must occur during the game I guess? An older Elizabeth in a tear? That's actually a pretty sloppy way to resolve it; time loop stories lend themselves to deus ex machina but that seems like a cop out. There's a lot of interesting stuff that they drop in favor of the twist, but that's really not unexpected because Bioshock 1 does it as well. You can argue Ryan's obsession with objectivism and the fact that he associates it with freedom has some thematic relation to the twist. But here it looks like Columbia is just a backdrop really. Which is too bad because you could bring in themes of fatherhood and doing horrible poo poo in the past and hoping for redemption into American History quite easily if you wanted to.
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Mar 23, 2013 13:08
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Somethings I missed: Elizabeth's finger is missing because it gets caught when the gate closes as Booker tries to grab her back from Comstock right? Does Comstock have AD on his hand? Also it seems odd that Booker would chose to name himself Comstock if he knows that's the name of the person he sold his baby to. But then again, if he's a guilty mess (which he clearly is) maybe he thinks it's apt somehow.
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Mar 23, 2013 15:50
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Thinking about it, it seems like the sale must happen after the baptism, which kind of breaks the ending for me. Wounded Knee was in 1890 and the game is like 1913. Elizabeth is like 20. Booker says the baptism is immediately after he gets back, so he has to have her after it. Also Booker has his office which it seems he wouldn't have until afterward. Is there a calendar in there somewhere? Which means Comstock wouldn't know about her unless one of the Luteces told him. Or they are somehow doing experiments and discover it, which is a bit too convenient. Also it means that Elizabeth killing Booker before the baptism kills her as well. I guess they are going for "timelines collapse so everything is good now," but that seems like a cop out. I also feel personally that undoing a bunch of stuff the player just did (or everything, in this case) in a cutscene they have no control over is horrible storytelling for games. Removing all the agency from the player because you want to push your plot forward is the weakest way to progress your story. I think the biggest issue is there's no emotion in the ending. It's very mechanical. Elizabeth turns into a plot robot. She's also discovering all this stuff herself - wouldn't she react to the news that this person she's been fighting alongside is also her father who sold her to Comstock to get out of a gambling debt? She doesn't react to any of it at all, which is incredibly sloppy. Bioshock's always gone for the idea of emotion more than actual emotion (I thought Bioshock 2 was better at eliciting emotion from the player than 1). Another plot hole I just thought of: Elizabeth kills the player Booker in the ending. But this shouldn't affect the timeline since he's already made the choice to be baptized or not (he obviously chose no). The whole ending should be Booker watching another version of himself; it doesn't make sense to remain in the first person viewpoint. This is probably just a bit of sloppy direction or they didn't want to make a 3rd person model for Booker. Spite fucked around with this message at 20:29 on Mar 24, 2013 |
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Mar 24, 2013 20:07
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drat. And here I was, hoping for something less ridiculous than Johnny 5 Aces. How long until someone mods him into the game?
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Mar 25, 2013 15:57
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Kelp Plankton posted:So what's the reason for all the anachronistic music and technology and stuff? Is it just "oh this world developed differently and got the Beach Boys in the 1900s" or what? I'm guessing there's some time travel involved? There are/were experiments in Columbia involving time/dimensional travel. They sort of ended badly. Plus one of the main characters has the ability to pull things through time/dimensions and she can't really control it.
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Mar 25, 2013 19:57
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To SamBishop: I get what you are saying regarding experiencing the game passively but the ending is EXTREMELY passive. You just sit there, move forward, get more info. Move forward. It's really a bad way to express it. I like the idea of the ending. I watched the stream last week, but ow that I've played the game itself it's even more disappointing. Elizabeth loses all her character and turns into a plot robot right at the end. She doesn't react to discovering everything at all. Booker's her dad who sold her to Comstock? No reaction at all. That's really, really sloppy. It's the same problem the first Bioshock had: it thinks it has a heart but drops it at the most important part. And the more I think about the ending the more holes I find: I don't think it's internally consistent at all. I'm still unclear as to when the baptism takes place compared to Booker selling Anna. If he sells Anna before getting baptized, then the loop couldn't have started (but I'd be willing to buy "the whole thing is a paradox" explanation). If it's after, then the ending effectively means everyone dies and the post credits scene makes even less sense. It also creates another loop: Elizabeth erases herself from existence. Which means she never comes back to stop Comstock. which means Comstock IS created. Which means she IS sold to him, etc. Also, if Elizabeth can meddle with the baptism event, why can't she just prevent Booker from selling her to Lutece? There are also other inconsistencies. You see the markings for the coin toss, which seems to imply the same thing always happens. But Elizabeth directly tells you this isn't the case (a million million worlds, all slightly or largely different), and you see a different future in the game itself.
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Mar 26, 2013 12:08
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I'd guess the Bioshock segment is more a wink. This game isn't really a loop - it's a bunch of dimensions that occur simultaneously and interact with each other. And Elizabeth's powers are because she's displaced in time and space, right? I don't recall where this is said. As for constants and variables, sure. But there are some major differences that you see in game. The dimension where Booker abandons Elizabeth and she destroys the world, for example. Maybe the Luteces try different things? As for Elizabeth stopping the sale of Anna: I think Comstock is using her to power the machines. She says this in one part (the lab I think?). So if she isn't there he doesn't have any timewarping powers. I'm still unclear as to when the baptism takes place. Wounded Knee is the very end of 1890. Booker gets his Pinkerton license in 1892. Booker probably sells Elizabeth in 1892 or 1893 and she's like 1. Columbia is founded in mid-1893. Columbia flies into the sky in 1902 after the Boxer rebellion is put down by Comstock. Elizabeth is 20 or 21 in the game. Comstock telling Booker "I know all the things you did, Wounded Knee, gambling, Anna..." is kind of ambiguous. He clearly sees himself as a different (and better) person than Booker. But he includes Wounded Knee, which he was definitely at, with selling Anna, which he may or may not have done. Is there a calendar in the office when Booker sells Anna? ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I wouldn't describe the AD band as subtle in any sense. I'm not even sure the ending is supposed to be a downer with the after credits scene. But I'm also not sure it's internally consistent enough to judge.
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Mar 26, 2013 21:15
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Remf posted:If the baptism is the point where Booker and Comstock diverge it must be after. Right, but then the game collapses in on itself. That would mean the baptism is in 1891 or so, and Elizabeth/Anna is never born. Which means the after credits scene (that says it's 1893 from what i recall. the checkpoints mean i can't easily check) can't ever happen. So the game never occurs. You could also argue that means no one will kill Booker before his baptism, so Comstock will be created. And then the game will occur. But if Elizabeth is omnipotent, why would she even bother killing her dad? It could be before though: Booker could sell Anna and that could be his reason to get baptized/not and search for redemption. I seem to remember it saying Anna's mom died in childbirth somewhere, but I don't recall where that was now. That's what I meant when I said I'm not sure the ending is internally consistent. I think it simply doesn't work, unfortunately  Hopefully I'm looking at it wrong. @Winky: yeah, that was my thought too - poor Anna just wants to get home. And Paris.
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Mar 26, 2013 21:33
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Winky posted:Well, a way to take it if Anna is born after the baptism is that drowning Booker collapses the whole infinite series of timelines so they can't possibly exist: In any timeline in which Booker would go through with the baptism Elizabeth would also ultimately drown him to prevent it from happening, so it's impossible and can't happen. In no universe can Booker possibly be baptized, so he never is, and he goes on to have Anna but Anna is never taken away from him because there are no timelines in which Comstock exists. That's true. We're only shown a specific branch of the tree, so to speak: one where Booker goes off to be baptized. The act of that happening also eventually results it in getting destroyed. Personally, I think it's more interesting if the sale happens before the baptism. It provides more interesting motivation for Booker and Comstock, and makes Comstock even more entitled. It has its own mindfuck since the loop would be started by itself in that case.
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Mar 26, 2013 22:02
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AlternatePFG posted:I enjoyed the story parts of the game with Booker and Elizabeth adventuring through Columbia more than the crazy timey-wimey stuff at the end, honestly. I think the biggest problem with the ending is really that Elizaeth is the heart of the story. And she's turned into emotionless exposition robot for 15 minutes at the end. She never gives you her thoughts or reactions to any of it. And that's a huge shame, since they do such a good job earlier. I think Levine is more of a writer of the head than the heart if I can borrow a cliche. It's a problem with Bioshock 1 as well. I heard Rhianna Pratchett helped with Infinite. It would be interesting to get the breakdown of who wrote what. Also: Terbulus posted:I noticed she hits you with a book about quantum physics and this would not leave my head And for more time-fuckery, that book wasn't written until 1930. Quantum mechanics itself didn't really exist until the 1920's. Though you could argue that Planck's Law sort of kickstarted it, and that was in 1900 I believe.
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Mar 26, 2013 22:10
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Monathin posted:I believe it's said somewhere that Elizabeth is 17, which would put her being born in about 1895 - five whole years after Wounded Knee, and she gets bought sometime during her infancy, and is imprisoned in the Siphon Tower from age 5 onward. No, she's at least 20. Elizabeth says this at the end - "You sat in your office for 20 years until a man came and offered you a chance at redemption: a chance we could be together" She has to be born in 1891 or 1892, I think. Also Booker's birthday is like 1875 which means he's 15 at Wounded Knee. I wonder if that's a mistake in the loading screen art. Comstock is way too old, but that can be attributed to exposure to SCIENCE, I think. And I took the ending to mean there is no longer a man, lighthouse and city - at least as it relates to Booker. I don't think it's a loop like that image showed; it's a bunch of things proceeding simultaneously.
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Mar 26, 2013 22:20
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The Grumbles posted:The selling of the baby needs to happen before the baptism - that's why the game's called bioshock 'infinite', because baby 1 is sold to timeline 2, in which baby was sold to timeline 3, in which baby was sold to timeline 4, etc. This only works if sellin' babies happened before the 'split'. That's what I'm wondering. It makes much more sense to me if the baby is sold BEFORE. But there's really nothing in that game that indicates it is. It could be either (see my above posts). I'd actually lean more towards the game indicating that the baptism happens first after playing through it. And I get what you are saying vis a vis the game commenting on games. I just don't think there's really much there - I'd put it firmly as of those 'juvenile' games. I mean, all it's doing is pointing out that games lead you by the nose. Bioshock 1 did this as well, but then undermines its own argument because after you are free of the hypnotism you still have to follow the linear game to get Fontaine. You could argue that's a comment in and of itself. but I don't see them making that connection, personally. It's really easy to point things out ("Hey dudes, you're playing a game"), but that's not enough to really make a statement. Games are young and it's good that people even realize this stuff, but to treat this as some sort of great commentary is really overselling it, in my opinion. I'd say Dark Souls did the "many people are playing a slightly different world" in a much, much better fashion. It's coherent with the entire design and play of the game, instead of dropped on you through clumsy exposition at the end.
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Mar 27, 2013 00:15
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Winky posted:Doing a second playthrough. Something I just caught: right after the coin flip scene you walk past a statue of Lutece as a man and it gets pulled through a tear and replaced with Lutece as a woman. Yup. And the phonograph thing there appears with it. It's dated 1902 or something. Now what I wonder is if this is the first time Rosalind has joined the experiment. Their conversation at the beginning seems to indicate so - "He DOESN'T row" but she would know that if she'd been part of the other ones. When you say the ending is an endlessly branching thing...I didn't get that from it. Say the sale happens first: Dimension 0: Booker sells Anna. Booker gets baptized. This leads to Dimension A: Booker drinks a lot until the game starts Booker goes to Dimension B to get Elizabeth Dimension B: Comstock decides to start up Columbia and experiments with dimensional travel Comstock realizes he can go back and get his daughter, and sends Lutece to do so He doesn't realize there are two of him branched at the baptism yet. He probably thinks he's creating a stable loop. The game would then take place in Dimension B for the most part. I don't see where the game creates others. And for the talk about the fixed narrative and how things don't change....like I said before there's at least one dimension where Booker leaves Columbia and Elizabeth destroys the world. So there are more variables than the ending may immediately lead us to believe. I'd assume each infinite world is each decision Booker/Comstock/whomever can make in their lives. Maybe Comstock decides he likes the ocean more than the sky one day, and that creates 2 more universes, etc. Yeah, that part is fantastic. I think she doesn't realize that until after she destroys the world, right? VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV Spite fucked around with this message at 01:07 on Mar 27, 2013 |
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Mar 27, 2013 00:57
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The Grumbles posted:I'd agree that Dark Souls is more coherent in that respect, although in Dark Souls that is actually supposed to be the case, whereas here it's just allusive to that. I guess I think Infinite is more mature than Bioshock because it's not so much pointing out 'you're playing a game and don't have a choice', but more using that stuff to make the entire thing more beautiful - it's less of a matter of fact, and those kinds of explorations feel natural and not forced, and more reflections on the narrative as opposed to the narrative itself. It's more like 'hey, quantum physics and videogames have thematic similarities' as opposed to 'This Is A Game About How Games Make You Press Buttons'. If that makes any sense. I think game mechanics can definitely make other points. For example, Bioshock 1 could have gone much further with the Little Sisters. You can harvest them, make your life easier, and be a horrible monster. That's a very "dark side is easy" statement for your game to make, but it's just a simple example. Spec Ops clumsily tries to make a point about war and killing lots of people, etc. I'd agree that Infinite is much more mature than Bioshock. And I think the "games as art" question is a tough one. I mean, generally, people still think of them as toys. And then there's the double problem of game writing being poo poo 99% of the time. But when I think of "games as art" I think they have to do something that isn't possible in another medium and strive for that. And not many do - Infinite doesn't. It's story is entirely non-interactive when you get down to it. It's one thing to allude and recognize that in your game, but that's not enough. Books, film, other linear mediums have made that point, and they did it both better and a long time ago. In the end, even the people writing the games are still generally thinking about them like writing a movie, and that has to change for them to really live up to being art. Gameplay, story, graphics all have to come together. Like you said, even in Infinite the combat doesn't really fit.
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Mar 27, 2013 01:30
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Winky posted:I think that the reason that "games as art" are so focused on themselves is because the question is often "What kind of story can games tell that no other medium can?" I like Bioshock Infinite because you can interpret it as not necessarily trying to tell a veiled story about games, but rather trying to tell a story about infinite universes through the unique properties of games. In this sense the fact that everyone else is playing the same, but different, story is part of the story itself. Ideally an effective use of games as art draws on the unique properties of games to tell a story about something else that other mediums couldn't do. Arguably the Bioshock games aren't stories about how choice in games is futile, but rather stories about the futility of choice itself communicated through the medium of games. But it's not - the game's plot is the only time Booker has succeeded. So everyone else playing is not playing in one of those multiverses. And there's nothing in either Bioshock or Infinite that ties it specifically to a game. You could make either into a movie and not lose anything at all but the combat, because it's really making a point about a linear medium.
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Mar 27, 2013 01:37
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Basic Chunnel posted:Those are all good points. Like I said upthread, I feel like the focus on Elizabeth kind of sapped the world-building in general a little too much. I definitely didn't feel like the audio diaries fleshed out concepts and story out the way they tended to in the first game (you also had fewer characters with distinctive points-of-view, relative to Bioshock and SS2). I guess I was invested enough that the ending didn't feel cumbersome to me, but you're right that there were ways that the load could've been evened out, and that there are some really weird plot holes w/r/t Comstock and his rise to power. I'm guessing the twist wasn't something they had in mind when they first built the world and the two main characters. That was probably added after, hence the abruptness of the information dump. The game's been in development for a LONG time, after all. I actually liked the focus on Elizabeth. The world is interesting but the core of the story is the relationship between Elizabeth and Booker. Which is mainly why I think the ending is disappointing: that part of the story just gets dropped on the floor.
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Mar 27, 2013 01:40
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Winky posted:I think that playing through this "exposition dump" makes all the difference in the world too. While it is just a simple progression of scenes the small level of interactivity that it does allow you changes the feeling of the ending an incredible amount compared to a cutscene. For instance: the fact that you control Booker running towards Comstock with Anna and you have to slam the F key to try to take her back is a lot different than just passively watching that scene. The same with having to be in the room with Elizabeth and Lutece silently watching you while you, yourself, have to pick up baby Anna and give her to Lutece. Something that I felt was off about that: Booker should really be watching himself doing these things, not doing them again. I do wish they made you drown yourself; that would have been more interesting and much less passive. Something funny about the subtitles: the preacher at the very beginning who nearly drowns you when you arrive has the same name as the one at the end. I didn't check the model to see if they look the same though.
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Mar 27, 2013 01:43
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TheQuad posted:I thought the part about gambling debts was just a justification Booker made up with his scrambled memories after he crossed over to the Columbia universe. Don't the Lutece's mention something about that as they're dragging him onto the boat? That's the _second_ time though. The first time we don't know. If you go through the ending, does he have the stubs on his desk there as well? And is there a calendar? There isn't a calendar that I could see at the beginning of the game, and the postcredits scene has one.
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Mar 27, 2013 01:44
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The Grumbles posted:Everyone else playing is not supposed to be in one of those multiverses, but it is arguably allusive. It's a pretty blatant image. Oh certainly. I was (poorly) trying to draw a parallel to Dark Souls, where the plot says there are multiple universes and they actually do have people playing in them. And I definitely understand why they did first person (plus that way they don't have to make/animate multiple Bookers) but drowning yourself seems like it would be an apt way to end it.
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Mar 27, 2013 01:49
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HellishWhiskers posted:Now that the framework of the baby transaction is somewhat fleshed out, although I'm sure there's much more to come on that end, I'm a bit more interested in the death mechanic that occurs prior to you meeting Elizabeth and the post-credits scene and the implication the two have for the ending. Did drowning DeWitt-Comstock fail to stop the cycle? Is he still alive? Or was the teleportation to the office upon Booker's death supposed to show that that was where that timeline ends and going through the doorway was the player shifting to a different Booker in a different timeline? When does the post-credits scene happen, anyway? Is the whole thing there just to look cool and cause speculation? The scene , to me, is the most confusing thing about the entire plot because it's quite a monkey wrench for the whole thing and I can't quite figure out what Levine is trying to do with it there. I'm not sure the framework is fleshed out. We don't know the order it occurs in. Winky had a good post about the post credits scene in the case where the sale happens after the baptism. The idea is that you are seeing a whole other timeline, where none of this happened. A timeline where Booker never even went to be baptized. Now, if the sale is before the baptism you can say it makes sense as is. If Booker dies before Comstock is created, Comstock can never go back and buy Anna. Assuming that's part of the guilt that caused him to want redemption, he'd never go get baptized and would continue his life. The post credits scene is in 1893 from what I recall. I think there was a calendar. I don't think she's _creating_ the universes. She doesn't know if she is or not because she doesn't understand what's going on yet. But I took the ending to mean they are all there already. EDIT: I should say, I took it to mean they are all there already. The ones she can open tears to have to do with her mental state. Or you could argue that the game is a universe created by Old Elizabeth so Booker could succeed! Spite fucked around with this message at 02:10 on Mar 27, 2013 |
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Mar 27, 2013 02:06
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CJ posted:What commentary is it giving on the whole american exceptionalism/communism thing though? Bioshock at least tried to tie the objectivism window dressing into the story with the 'man chooses, slave obeys' thing and the 'what if?' plasmid technology ultimately led to the downfall of Rapture when the free market couldn't cope (or Andrew Ryan lost his nerve, i forget). How does the 'what if?' technology in this game, the dimensional portals, tie into the american exceptionalism/communism that Ken kept banging on about? It doesn't. And it has the same problem as Bioshock since Daisy is terrible as well. Though Comstock is way worse than Ryan, I'd say. Ryan did some bad poo poo, but Comstock is really drat terrible. But really, both of them don't use the potential of objectivism/exceptionalism well at all. Both games are much more interested in the twist, which is a shame.
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Mar 27, 2013 02:44
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Something that's unclear to me is the limit of the vision Lutece, Comstock and Elizabeth at the end have. They can clearly see possibilities that have been impacted by trans-dimensional travel. Comstock's vision is the one where Elizabeth destroys the world, for example, and he also sees Booker coming for him. So they can see timelines that are changed because of interaction with other timelines. So Lutece and Elizabeth should be able to see the game's timeline - which is the timeline that destroys all the timelines where Comstock fucks with reality. That in and of itself seems like a paradox. Or at least a narrative version of "the uncertainty principle as understood by a lit major." It seems like they are unaware of the successful timeline - the Luteces seem like they expect failure. And Comstock clearly thinks he's going to win. As other people have said though: the problem with the ending isn't the too-clever time fuckery, it's that the story loses its emotional core. In fact, she turns into an exposition plot robot for 15 minutes and that's quite disappointing. Elizabeth's finger is because it gets cut off from the closing tear right? In the really early previews she had them all, so I wonder if you can figure out when they decided on this ending.
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Mar 27, 2013 14:58
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KiddieGrinder posted:Can anyone explain where the loop comes from? I guess I'm dumb. I don't see a loop either. The events and motivations are different depending on whether Booker sells Anna before the baptism. But it's still Comstock crossing over to Booker's universe and taking the baby. Then Booker crosses over to Comstock and tries to get her back. Booker and Anna are from universe A. Comstock is from B. The game (mainly) takes place in B.
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Mar 27, 2013 15:00
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DatonKallandor posted:I don't think the Luteces except failure - they are scattered across "probability space", they've become unstuck in Time, Space and Dimension, so they see the possibilities like Elizabeth does. They just understand the whole thing better than Elizabeth - because they know that there's realities in which the whole thing works out and there's realities in which it doesn't. With infinite universes "failure" of a specific plan is relative - there's always going to be versions for success and failure. One of the first things Rosalind says is "You don't undertake an experiment KNOWING you are going to fail" Which is either there to freak the player out or establish she expects to fail at changing things. Or both, most likely. She's not the one that wants to fix it because she thinks everything has already been fixed in place But like I said before, if they can see all threads then they should be able to see the thread that erases Comstock. Which would cause them to disappear as soon as they see it. Kind of an interesting interpretation. I'm actually very disappointed there were no Kurt Vonnegut references regarding being unstuck in time (or I missed them if there were).
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Mar 27, 2013 15:10
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Dragoon Knight posted:I still have a lot of questions, but most of them revolve around this one: did Booker have Anna before or after the baptism? Because a lot of things don't make sense either way, unless we guess a few things. It's not clear, and is one of the major logical problems I have with the ending. I think the case where he sells her BEFORE the baptism makes more sense. It gives better motivation for the baptism and sidesteps Booker becoming and insane racist out of...guilt for murdering indians? Comstock in that case can think he's creating a stable loop by buying Anna from himself. It would fit his own delusions of grandeur to think he'd be helping both himself and Anna. He clearly thinks of himself as a different man than Booker so he'd rename her. The start of this loop is its own paradox though. That would also mean the after-credits sequence fits better. Anna would never be sold because Comstock never exists, so they just go on with their life. Now, I think the game leans more toward the sale being AFTER, but it's not clear. If it takes place afterward, then the ending kills Elizabeth and Booker both because she'd never be born. If that's the case, then the only interpretation of the after-credits scene that makes sense to me is what Winky mentioned a few pages ago: that scene is a completely different reality where Booker never even thought about getting baptized. All realities where he did get baptized are/were forever wiped out or never existed. I like this interpretation a lot actually, it's a cool way of looking at things. Especially with what Winky mentioned about the Lucteces knowing this is a failure because they know this branch of reality can't exist - it will always destroy itself. Now, neither really make sense if you think about them. I think it was brave of them to try this type of ending in the internet age, which is basically asking people to rip your work to shreds. I do think Levine should not have hyped it up so much, because I don't see how it can be internally consistent really. I would guess the twist that Booker is Comstock was added late in development and it's weaker for it. The twist that Elizabeth is Booker's sold daughter is much more in touch with the heart of the story and characters and would work very well on its own. And I took it to be the game is the only path where Booker "succeeds." In the others, Booker dies, or takes control of the Vox, etc. Comstock sees a vision of himself creating a city, having an heir and destroying the world and is trying to make that come to pass. Old Elizabeth (in that reality, or one similar) ends up being the one that foils him.
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Mar 27, 2013 22:09
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Underwhelmed posted:To me, this implies that someone is still playing with the timeline. Booker died (drowned) and was reborn into a second chance. Stories involving time travel/alternate realities are virtually impossible to conclude without a shitload of loose ends. I don't think that can be the case. If someone is still playing with the timeline then you've failed. That's why Elizabeth says it's not enough to just kill The Prophet version of Comstock. They all have to go, otherwise the timeline is still going to be trashed as they all interact/destroy each other. She should know how to fix it in the end, as she's presented as essentially omnipotent. Of course, that's its own paradox as she should see her current path will result in all the others being destroyed, which would also destroy her current path. I'm not sure they thought the whole ending through enough. Similar issue I had with Bioshock: more interested in the TWIST than the implications.
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Mar 27, 2013 22:21
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Comstar posted:Who was the angel who told Comstock what the future held, and why did they tell him any of it? I just took that as he looked in Lutece's machine, saw a future where he had a daughter (Elizabeth) and she destroyed the world. Since he'd rather style himself as a prophet than a dude dependent on Lutece's technology, he said it came to him in a vision of an angel. Almost all of Columbia is a lie or a piece of plagiarism. The technology is from them looking into the future/dimensions and stealing. Comstock's whole mythos is a lie. Elizabeth is not actually a miracle child who was born after 7 days in Lady Comstock's womb, etc. I really hope they don't have Songbird be another Booker. It's the obvious way to do it, but if they do you quickly run out of Bookers. If every Comstock reality needs 3 Bookers, where do they get the third? Infinity doesn't quite work like "well, they can just pull from one of the other infinite universes" And the comparison between what is fixed and what is not seems cheap to me. The coin flip is fixed, but why? Obviously we see that things in the multiverse can differ enough so that Booker becomes Comstock, and that Booker can decide to lead the Vox. If they are really going for multiverse theory that typically means nothing is fixed and everything is actually a new universe/branch. So there should be universes where the coin is Tails.
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Mar 28, 2013 11:16
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One other thing that bothers me: There are timelines and then there are timelines that are a result of the dimensions/timelines interacting with each other. For example, every Columbia timeline is a result of two pieces of interdimensional fuckery: Comstock purchasing Anna and the Luteces bringing Booker over to save her. The prophetic characters can clearly see timelines that involve dimension hopping. Comstock's whole prophecy requires it, for example. So as soon as they have the potential to see the game's timeline, it should collapse all the other ones. They're telling the story linearly,sure, but quantum mechanics is not a linear thing. Also, if anyone wants to read the game's text, it's in BioInfinite/XGame/Localization/INT. Interestingly, it looks like there are some variables that aren't immediately apparent. Comstock's zeppelin can have two names. The Hand of the Prophet or the Revelation. Also Elizabeth can say different things during the ending. She either says Booker lived with his 'remorse' or his 'regret' for 20 years in the office. That sort of thing. Though I'm not sure if the differences are actually in the game or what causes them.
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Mar 28, 2013 12:06
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TombstoneTromboner posted:If you don't remember, Constance Field is a little girl of who you could find recordings of. I only ever found one, but I guess my friend here found several and thinking about it, it does make a lot of sense. That's interesting, but the recordings of Constance are dated 1902 and she's a little kid then. When is Songbird made?
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Mar 28, 2013 12:07
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No, because Elizabeth directly says in the ending that Booker sat there for 20 years before Lutece dragged him to Columbia. Also the prophecy is definitely because of Lutece's machine. One of the voxophones from Lutece says: "Brother, what Comstock failed to understand is that our contraption is not a window into Prophecy, but Probability" The finger is an obvious physical thing, but I think her displacement in general has a lot to do with it. You don't see any other displaced characters except Booker. And he's only been displaced for a very short amount of time. Plus he clearly sees visions of possible futures. Spite fucked around with this message at 12:26 on Mar 28, 2013 |
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Mar 28, 2013 12:24
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Defiance Industries posted:Yeah, i think the reason Booker doesn't remember stuff is that he came through a tear and his mind is still trying to put things together in a world where his life diverged radically 20 years ago to the point he basically doesn't exist. The Twins giving Booker that box of stuff didn't just supply him with directions and a key, it also helped him form a backstory for himself. Remember that the box said he was 7th Cav, and had his gun from being a Pinkerton. They had the box for you to help you put your poo poo together. He puts it together before they hand him the box though. He starts mumbling about the stuff before the game proper starts, which is when Rosalind hands him the box. It's quite likely that they told him "Give us the girl and wipe away the debt" to kick start it. What I wonder is how Comstock and Elizabeth both know about that? Elizabeth was told and in the end can see it. But Comstock? Who left the note on the lighthouse and killed the guy inside?
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Mar 28, 2013 12:32
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