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Wasn't the biggest fan of this game, but it should be interesting to see it from someone else's perspective. Will be watching this - especially for the lectures, which were probably my favorite part of your Deus Ex LP.
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May 25, 2015 21:08
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I love that information segment. And that you noticed that the main character lost his legs.Samovar posted:Uh... I'm not sure what Catholic churches are like in America, but this looks nothing - NOTHING like any Catholic church I know of, it looks a hell of a lot more like either a Protestant sect, or in my mind more like some form of Mormonism.
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May 25, 2015 21:13
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Yay another Lecture LP, anyway this should be interested one and am looking forward to the history corners since am a sucker for history.
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May 25, 2015 21:17
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The church at the beginning is interesting to me because it combines Gothic architecture, which is mostly a Catholic thing, with a lot of tent revivalist style rhetoric and ways of looking at the world, but with mythologizing of the United States founding taking the place of God. It's a mix of things that don't normally go together, but which seems pretty seamless to casual observation.
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May 25, 2015 21:17
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I love the Luteces. I'm a big fan of Aaron Sorkin's quick banter style of dialogue and they greatly remind me of that. Overall I had a blast with about 75%-80% of this game. I'm just sad it became a bit of a slog after you get to the Vox portion and the similar but not quite same weapons that go off different upgrades was really annoying.
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May 25, 2015 21:22
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Jesus, Thi4f then right into this? A couple bottles of whiskey is both an easier and healthier way of self loathing  I really didn't like this game, gunplay just didn't click with me and I saw the twist from a mile away. But I gotta admit, I love the luteces, and the pre shitstorm intro after you get in(on?) the city. And yeah, I got a big Mormon vibe from the whole thing. Gahmah posted:Hadn't noticed till now how much that room leading up to the priest is... foreshadowing? theming? With the identical men wandering down the identical pools and the seeming hall of mirrors effect going on. Only fault I had with the story was that it felt like the rules of Elizabeth's powers changed or weren't well explained. Elizabeth has a major Superman syndrome, her powers are exactly as powerful as they are needed to be in that point in time to suit the writer's narrative. Nalesh fucked around with this message at 21:34 on May 25, 2015 |
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May 25, 2015 21:27
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Nalesh posted:Jesus, Thi4f then right into this? A couple bottles of whiskey is both an easier and healthier way of self loathing I'm not sure I'd really call it superman syndrome as during most of the game she doesn't do a whole lot with her powers since most of it has been drained from her. Once that thing is destroyed she pretty much becomes a master of all time and space and they kind of show that at the end. I'm actually reinstalling it now to play before continuing watching the LP but I don't remember a lot of inconsistency as far as her powers go.
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May 25, 2015 21:35
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My own experience with the game: I had fun and there were some memorable moments along the way. "Your mother appears- to be raising the dead." The voice actor absolutely nails the delivery on that line, with just the right amount of disbelief and dread mixed together to make it authentic. EDIT: Spoiler thunderdome it is then.
Klaus88 fucked around with this message at 22:26 on May 25, 2015 |
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May 25, 2015 21:38
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I have absolutely no experience of the game. But it's a Bobbin LP, he could play Snood and I'd watch hours of it. The whole church aspect of the intro gave me a serious cult vibe for some reason, it reminds me of various stories I've read about certain Christian elements of the US, don't remember the name. And for some reason, maybe they're related, of the ACE school stuff, from that thread that was on SA a month or two ago, can't quite place why exactly. Definitely far from the Orthodoxy I'm used to, looking forward to more Corners and more talk. 
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May 25, 2015 21:45
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Klaus88 posted:My own experience with the game: I had fun and there were some memorable moments along the way. Unfortunately that is also the worst boss fight in the franchise, worse than the final boss in Bioshock 1 and that was a real letdown of an encounter.
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May 25, 2015 21:48
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Klaus88 posted:
"Elizabeeeth? Why is your mother a ghost?" I thought Booker's characterization and acting were pretty good in general. Was a bit worried about having a Shock protagonist with a voice- I'm a fan of silent protagonists that the player casts themselves onto, especially in first-person games!- but I liked him a lot as a character. Really enjoyed this game. Looking forward to the Bobbin corners!
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May 25, 2015 21:51
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Judge Tesla posted:Unfortunately that is also the worst boss fight in the franchise, worse than the final boss in Bioshock 1 and that was a real letdown of an encounter. It's also very easy to completely cheese it but hey, that's another matter. As far as I'm concerned, any bossfight that can make me consistently panic did at least something right. I agree on Booker's voice being spot-on. Troy Baker gets a lot of flak for voicing JRPGs of dubious quality but he really knows his job.
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May 25, 2015 21:51
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The problem is that fight had 2 settings: 1. You blitzed it down before it could do anything funky 2. You got mobbed by ghost adds and had to deal with hell on earth. There really wasn't an in between, it's kinda how most of Bioshock infinite was especially on 1999 mode: You could either utterly dominate an encounter say with the infectious crow storm buildup or you got beat down hard.
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May 25, 2015 21:59
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Serperoth posted:The whole church aspect of the intro gave me a serious cult vibe for some reason Probably because it was designed to. The whole way up the tower you have the little snippets of text on the wall preaching salvation while you walk past the dead. Then you hit the temple with it's weird lighting and flooded church. And then you hit a guy who talks about the living(?) man that led them to salvation by eliminating undesirables from their city. There is no way someone did that without the intention of setting up a creepy vibe.
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May 25, 2015 21:59
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Garrand posted:I'm not sure I'd really call it superman syndrome as during most of the game she doesn't do a whole lot with her powers since most of it has been drained from her. Once that thing is destroyed she pretty much becomes a master of all time and space and they kind of show that at the end. I'm actually reinstalling it now to play before continuing watching the LP but I don't remember a lot of inconsistency as far as her powers go. There's been a couple of bottles of whiskey between me playing it and now, might be remembering it wrong but I coulda been sure the size and importance of stuff, along with how much strain she had to go under wildy changed.
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May 25, 2015 22:13
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The two weapon limit seriously made me annoyed. Why not just keep the one from the previous two games, or at the very least make it a four weapon system, it would have made the combat and weapon choices a lot more fun.
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May 25, 2015 22:22
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I played through this game, and after it ended I could only make one serious observation. Someone was playing a lot of Marathon Infinity while making it. And it shows once things start going sideways.
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May 25, 2015 22:35
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TomViolence posted:Anybody who thinks the racism in the game is over-the-top by 1912 standards should probably open a history book.  God drat, I felt the bile well up inside me reading that, seeing the pictures. Usually, I'll take my time clicking through links, reading the related articles and so on, on a Wikipedia article that piques my interest. But I don't rightly think I could do it from there. I just...gently caress. Bobbin, you and Geopp are always amazing for your history bits, and I personally am very much looking forward to getting angry following your readings. Godspeed.
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May 25, 2015 22:46
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I'm torn between watching the entire video or just the lectures because unlike DX this game is still sorta fresh in my memory. But my own general experience with B:I was that I loved the characterization and how they worked with each other, thought the gameplay was just awful in general, and that the plot went really far up its own rear end after the halfway mark or so. I mean it's fun the first time around but it honestly doesn't hold up for a replay.
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May 25, 2015 22:54
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berryjon posted:I played through this game, and after it ended I could only make one serious observation. Perhaps they Marathoned it during development? But about the game, this opening segment is interesting and depending on your view a strength or weakness of the game. On the one hand neither Bioshock 1 or 2 before it had you explore the setting either in it's prime or in a way that wasn't wrench/drill first ask questions later and it's really neat to see people who don't want to stab you. Ooon the other hand it kinda starts to make it feel odd when these lovely streets you've been wandering about suddenly become devoid of people and filled with murderous coppers.
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May 25, 2015 22:55
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Stormgale posted:Perhaps they Marathoned it during development? Your pun hurts me physically. Really, it does. And I do agree in a way. This game could have been improved by having more points where you are walking around chatting with people and, well, meeting people, rather than fighting reskinned Splicer #287. You know, to better break up the corridor shooting sections.
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May 25, 2015 23:07
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There's some interesting stuff on racist memorabillia and media at the Jim Crow Museum if anyone feels like ruining their day.
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May 25, 2015 23:10
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Bobbin, in the video, paraphrased posted:The game simulates rain on a camera lens when you are supposed to view the world from a first-person perspective
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May 25, 2015 23:19
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pun pundit posted:I also have a problem with this. There are other common manifestations of this in video games, like lens flares and depth-of-field. I focus where my eyes look, not straight ahead of my nose, thank you very much. It's a cinematography thing. Make the game seem like a movie by adding a magical camera lens, 'cause movies are art so doing movie things makes art.  Sometimes it makes sense in games, like in Republic Commando, but not here.
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May 25, 2015 23:33
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pun pundit posted:I also have a problem with this. There are other common manifestations of this in video games, like lens flares and depth-of-field. I focus where my eyes look, not straight ahead of my nose, thank you very much. Maybe it's just meant to simulate the rain landing on your face? Can't really represent it by splashing water on the player, so having droplets connect with the screen is as close as it can come to giving the sensation of rain landing on your face.  i guess.
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May 25, 2015 23:46
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I think it's a holdover from space marine FPS games where your first person eyes are behind a pane of glass, and then just became a genre standard.
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May 25, 2015 23:47
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Was it ever explained what happened to the guy manning the lighthouse?
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May 25, 2015 23:52
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I haven't ever played a Bioshock game, but I doubt there is anything more evil they could do to the player than giving you what looks like a C96 right at the start and then taking it away 3 minutes later. I hope Bobbin gets to kill whoever is responsible for this at some point in the story.
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May 25, 2015 23:54
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Roman Reigns posted:Was it ever explained what happened to the guy manning the lighthouse? Maybe it's a previous iteration of Booker who hosed up real bad.
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May 25, 2015 23:54
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Stormgale posted:But about the game, this opening segment is interesting and depending on your view a strength or weakness of the game. On the one hand neither Bioshock 1 or 2 before it had you explore the setting either in it's prime or in a way that wasn't wrench/drill first ask questions later and it's really neat to see people who don't want to stab you. 2 did in a way. Towards the end of the game, you see the world through the eyes of a little sister. There's also a brief segment during the opening cutscene where you charge through a party. Anyways burial at sea helps on that end.
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May 25, 2015 23:55
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Oberndorf posted:I think it's a holdover from space marine FPS games where your first person eyes are behind a pane of glass, and then just became a genre standard. It was hella' cool when metroid prime did steam and water effects on the visor back in the day. If they really wanted to do stuff like rain on the lens they should have given booker a hat and made it get wet dry off and drip and stuff. It would have been a ton of effort, but looking at how much effort they put into atmosphere so far, it probably would have paid off.
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May 26, 2015 00:02
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HopperUK posted:Maybe it's a previous iteration of Booker who hosed up real bad. That's what I figure on, personally, especially since we don't see the face. I just wonder when during the process of grabbing Bookers the Luteces decided that they needed to grab one of the mangled failures for "motivation."
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May 26, 2015 00:10
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I'm not sure if you're going to touch more on the Second Industrial Revolution in another video, but I wanted to add a couple things. Some aspects of the second industrial revolution can be considered uniquely American. Yes, progress was also happening in places like the UK and Germany with advances in railroad transportation, agriculture, chemistry and dyes, and improved steel processes. But what's worth noting is the formation of what is called the American system of manufacturing during the 19th Century which formed out of two important advances: the application of the idea of making products out of interchangeable parts rather than making each product uniquely, and the development of production machines that could make such parts consistently. Interestingly, Firearms are where the american system of manufacturing has its start. The idea of interchangeable parts in the western world is credited to a French cannon manufacturer, before its spread in the USA. Honoré Blanc, an engineer who worked on this system in France could not get support locally so he spoke to ambassador Thomas Jefferson. His ideas resulted in a contract that one Eli Whitney would take up to build muskets using the new system of interchangeable parts, after he had had patent troubles with his cotton gin. He would achieve partial success - the parts were interchangeable, but handmade, so this costly. The government also invested money into pushing for better production in their Springfield and Harper's Ferry's armouries. This lead to the creation of specialized tools for making particular parts, like a lathe that would shape gun stock. The better the tools got, the more closely each part made would resemble the others of the same type. It's also partly called the American system because US rifles (probably Mississippi rifles made with interchangeable parts were sent to the 1851 Crystal Palace Exhibition - the first Worlds Fair - to display, and impressed the British so much that the gave the exhibitors a medal and contracted the manufacturers to make rifled muskets. The demands of the civil war lead to a lot of government investment into firearms manufacturing - especially with the destruction of Harper's Ferry armoury. The pressure to produce more firearms led to private contracts, and caused the surviving Springfield armoury to have to subcontract out a lot of of its work. The effect of this was to disseminate the knowledge and techniques of specialized manufacturing into other industries like clock making, sewing and textiles, agricultural machines, and bicycle manufacturing. As a result, the specialized tools got adapted to those industries and allowed the rapid adoption of the American manufacturing system - which eventually led to mass production when combined with other concepts. The social makeup of the USA resulted in less of an demand for distinctive artisan goods compared to Europe, which sped up the adoption of interchangeability. (I think this has to do with the rural makeup of the US during the 19th century putting access to dependable, replaceable goods over preference for artisan ones) The second thing is related to the labour matters that Bobbin touched on such as exploitable minorities and immigrants, which resulted in less overall resistance to the founding of factories that would require less workers than traditional goods creation. In other places the labour market saw the writing on the wall and was better equipped to protest these new systems that would threaten their jobs so they delayed its onset for a time. There's also the important topic of how scientific concepts and research became much more intertwined with the industrial and technological process during the later 19th and early 20th century, which was a marked difference from the first revolution, but that's another matter. (Hopefully posts like this are interesting and I'm not derailing too much) PlaceholderPigeon fucked around with this message at 00:39 on May 26, 2015 |
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May 26, 2015 00:17
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I think it is just a lighthouse watchman that they killed to clear the way and to put Booker on his guard.
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May 26, 2015 00:18
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Bobbin Threadbare posted:That's what I figure on, personally, especially since we don't see the face. I just wonder when during the process of grabbing Bookers the Luteces decided that they needed to grab one of the mangled failures for "motivation." They probably had an amusing argument over it.
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May 26, 2015 00:19
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PlaceholderPigeon posted:Even Eli Whitney had started out with trying to push interchangeable parts with firearms before working on the cotton gin. Small quibble, but I'm pretty sure it was the cotton gin Whitney did first, and his failure to make money at it was what led him into firearms manufacturing and replaceable parts. His patent for the gin was basically ruled unenforceable, and all happened well before the civil war, iirc.
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May 26, 2015 00:22
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paragon1 posted:Small quibble, but I'm pretty sure it was the cotton gin Whitney did first, and his failure to make money at it was what led him into firearms manufacturing and replaceable parts. His patent for the gin was basically ruled unenforceable, and all happened well before the civil war, iirc. Thanks for the correction! Yeah, it seems he did do it in that order, I'll amend things accordingly.
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May 26, 2015 00:27
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I played this game when it came out and really enjoyed it when I played it. Then when it came time for gaming sites to announce their GOTY and Jim Sterling said Bioshock: Infinite was his favourite game that year, I had forgotten that the game came out at all. Looking forward to the LP. I'm pre getting angry for the history segments.
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May 26, 2015 00:34
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NinetySevenA posted:I played this game when it came out and really enjoyed it when I played it. Then when it came time for gaming sites to announce their GOTY and Jim Sterling said Bioshock: Infinite was his favourite game that year, I had forgotten that the game came out at all. Yeah I have to agree, as much as people espoused the game's virtues after release they dropped it pretty drat quick. Which isn't that hard to imagine since it relies on the sudden plot twists to really work and once you've seen those in your first playthrough there really isn't much to the game after that. In B:I's case I just remember flashes of stuff but never anything big like I do with other games. It's just a scene there or a scene there at most.
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May 26, 2015 00:43
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 04:28 |
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Oh man, a Bioshock Infinite with Bobbin at the helm of lectures? Sign me up for more of this adventure. Especially since Infinite covers my favorite period of United States History. As a newly minted history major, world history from the end of the French Revolution to the end of the First World War was my favorite period of time to study. In my opinion, and I sure a lot of other historians will disagree with me, never has so much changed in so short a time. Technologically in this period of time we went from muskets and cannons to tanks, planes and field artillery. We went from horseback messengers to the telegraph and the telephone. Politically we went from the era of absolute monarchy and other forms of oligarchy and monarchy to the great awakenings of nationalism and the first great wave of democratization that swept the planet until the rise of fascist Italy. Economically we went for an era dominated by the agrarian economic sector to the booming industrial manufacturing sphere. Culturally we had the waves of romanticism and other forms of art meant to stir the passions of the viewers and readers as a counter to the Enlightenment which was also ongoing, and eventually the rise of other, newer bolder forms of art. All of this is merely a superficial look at the era. The main take away one must have is that this era was the great era of change. The only thing comparable to this that we might understand is those of us who lived through the initial rise of the internet as the main market of commerce, news, social interaction and all the important facets of our lives that traverse the digital highway of information that can span globally. We're still dealing with all of the transitions that the Internet and other forms of advance computing and electronics are bringing to our world. Automation, programming and a myriad of other things are changing the way we look at the world and how it affects us. For examining this era of change, we have the advantage of being able to look out more long term at how all those changes did change the world. As PlaceholderPigeon and Bobbin have both articulated very well, changes brought about by technology, culture and demographics are some of the most important things of the time we're looking at that Bioshock is set in. Bobbin was also absolutely correct in saying that the history and study of this period of time WILL make you angry. Despite all the cool high watermarks and changes just illustrated, this was one of the worse times of human existence. Those very same technologies just mentioned, not only made warfare more terrible for two major powers to fight one another, but it enabled oppression on a level never before seen. New weapons allowed European powers to also enter into regions of the world and asset control like never before. Africa was conquered via a mix of new European weapons, but also because new medicines and technologies made it possible for people not familiar with these areas to survive. Our earliest malaria medications for example were predominantly used by imperial powers to distribute to their own people to help survive in the parts of the world were it was prevalent. Hilaire Belloc described the Maxim gun as being the tool that enabled the British to slaughter untold numbers of native peoples. South Africa, The Belgian Congo, India, Sudan, to name a few of the places devastated by the European push for dominance. While the main reason for this domination was economic and political in nature (acquiring resources) , it was often sold as not naked opportunism, but rather assisting disparate and dispossessed peoples across the world, "civilizing" the savages so to speak. This was an era of optimism, in their lands of relative affluence and plenty, many were sold on the idea of exporting that prosperity and way of life to people who did not enjoy it. Opposite of colonialism, you had the rise of nationalism. Peoples who'd been controlled by others for years or even centuries were beginning to find their identities and take pride in their culture, in their language, in their people. Sadly this would also sow the seeds of destruction and horror down the line. Often these nationalists were emerging in peoples and nations under the political umbrella of larger entities, namely, the various European empires. These hegemonic bodies, uninterested in divesting their territory to these newly conscious peoples, often brutally, and violently cracked down. In places where this wasn't present, often, nationalistic and ethnic conflict still pervaded and allowed conflict to arise. Economically, this was a time of plenty, paradoxically though, only a few were really enjoying in the wealth. This was the era of the "robber barons" the wealthy plutocrats who took their wealth and hoarded it and left the average worker our to dry. In America especially, it was expected that despite its meteoric economic rise, only a few would really reap the rewards. The workers had no organization as unionism was violently suppressed, and the freedoms enjoyed by larger companies allowed them to circumnavigate many rules. In parallel, this was a time of unimaginable corruption in the political system and on many ways precipitated the rise of Progressiveness in America as a direct response to the ills that seemingly plagued to the society. Mark Twain famously called this time the Gilded Age, and it really was an apt description, despite the appearance of great wealth and civility, once the curtain was pulled back, a rotten, fester core was really what was below all of that seemingly amazing change, growth and "progress". Also, for anyone instrested more in this time, here's a really good podcast from Dan Carlin that explains a lot about the Ameircan attitudes of the time. It's four hours, but well worth it, and its free! http://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-49-the-american-peril/ Jimmy4400nav fucked around with this message at 01:09 on May 26, 2015 |
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