New footage of Bioshock Infinite

[Dreddz]

Watch 15 Minutes of BioShock Infinite for PS3 – PlayStation Blog (http://blog.us.playstation.com/2011/07/08/watch-15-minutes-of-bioshock-infinite-for-ps3-now/)

The footage that wowed the press at E3 has finally be released. I don't think I've ever seen such attention to detail crammed into 15 minutes like I did with this footage. Its hard to imagine someone actually playing it. It all seems a bit overwhelming in a way.

Irrational Games have really nailed all the boxes with this game. Inspired setting, stellar graphics, great narrative focus and some kick ass action. Couldn't ask for anymore. Want!

[Pheesh]

Yeah, that's absolutely amazing. I didn't play through the whole of Bioshock 1 or 2, but this continues to blow my mind. I'll be buying this as close to release as possible.

[Pike]

Every aspect of this game has got my name scribbled all over it but I can't shake this feeling that it's going to let me down. I know, I'm terrible.

[Madame Adequate]

Looks the same as the other BioShocks.

Truly inspired setting.
Very good story that is well-told.
Thoroughly mediocre gameplay.

I'll wait for a steam sale.

[Dreddz]

Looks the same as the other BioShocks.

Truly inspired setting.
Very good story that is well-told.
Thoroughly mediocre gameplay.

I think Infinite addresses the weak gameplay of the previous two games. The action looked tight, especially when he was ziplining all over the place. My only problem is how disorientating it felt. Navigating around that map looks like a nightmare. I could see myself dying left and right during that scenario.

[KentaRawr!]

The ziplines remind me of Metroid Prime 3, in the Skytown area. :3

[Madame Adequate]

Looks the same as the other BioShocks.

Truly inspired setting.
Very good story that is well-told.
Thoroughly mediocre gameplay.

I think Infinite addresses the weak gameplay of the previous two games. The action looked tight, especially when he was ziplining all over the place. My only problem is how disorientating it felt. Navigating around that map looks like a nightmare. I could see myself dying left and right during that scenario.

It looked even more floaty, hollow, and lacking in impact than the other two. And that's saying something. It's been years since I've seen a non-BioShock game with such incredibly uninspiring combat.

[Rostum]

It looks really awesome. I love the setting of the game, and that's enough for me to play it.

[edczxcvbnm]

I was not a fan of Bioshock and thought it was a sub-par game that got undeserved praise. The story was great but I felt the rest of the game fell far short of what they were trying to do.

Infinite actually looks to have improved graphics to an acceptable level as I though Bioshock stretched textures way too much and made it a dark and creepy atmosphere to cover this up. The gameplay looks more fluid and varied thus far but that could just be the exciting opening and I will reserve judgement until I see more. The story also looks more up my ally. I liked hunting for the tape recordings in Bioshock but the story that I found was far more interesting that the one I was playing and the obvious moral choices that I was making came off as very shallow and tacked.

It is still early in many regards but this one looks like it will do the job for me.

[Slothy]

It looked even more floaty, hollow, and lacking in impact than the other two. And that's saying something. It's been years since I've seen a non-BioShock game with such incredibly uninspiring combat.

I'm going to have to agree. It definitely looked at least as floaty as the original which nine times out of ten annoys the hell out of me. I will give it credit in that it seemed to offer more opportunity to use the special abilities to interact with the environment in interesting ways than the original did (where the plasmids were such a pain to switch between and had few satisfying ways to really interact with anything aside from using them as another way to make straight forward attacks), but whether they can keep up the novelty for an entire game I can't say. I'm not going to just give them the benefit of the doubt either since they didn't pull it off at all in the original. Sure it looks cool to lift enemies and let a tram car hit them, but will there be plenty of other opportunities to interact with enemies and the environment in interesting ways? I'll likely pick it up on sale someday, but unless I have the chance to play it and see what it's like before buying it won't be a full price purchase for me.

That said, it's nice to see they at least still have the world itself nailed down. It did look great and I think would be a cool place to explore.

[Bolivar]

Wow really glad I'm not the only one who doesn't kneel before the greatness of these games. The worlds are incredibly imaginative and commendably detailed, but it's not my thing. This footage was a blast to watch, though.

[Flying Arrow]

It makes me feel so warm inside to know that there are others out there like me who don't think the original Bioshock is very good. I thought I was the only one. See, I really enjoyed the first level, but it's like the game never bothered to get any better than that and then took 20 more hours to complete.

Now, that footage looks incredible - but what game footage doesn't look incredible nowadays? Seriously. I'm really, really skeptical on this one. Holding guys up so they get hit by trolleys is great and all, but so was electrocuting them in the water. My issue is that I get the niggling impression that BI will feel as static progression-wise as Bioshock 1 did. Wide-open area after wide-open area chasing after objective markers and shooting the same guys with the same abilities over and over and over and over again.

Still, though. I got my eye on this one. That clip was just too great.

[Rostum]

The only reason I enjoyed Bioshock was because of the atmosphere of the game. Otherwise I don't really enjoy FPS that much, in general.

[DMKA]

Looks the same as the other BioShocks.

Truly inspired setting.
Very good story that is well-told.
Thoroughly mediocre gameplay.

I think Infinite addresses the weak gameplay of the previous two games. The action looked tight, especially when he was ziplining all over the place. My only problem is how disorientating it felt. Navigating around that map looks like a nightmare. I could see myself dying left and right during that scenario.

It looked even more floaty, hollow, and lacking in impact than the other two. And that's saying something. It's been years since I've seen a non-BioShock game with such incredibly uninspiring combat.

Bizarre. BioShock is hands down my favorite first person shooter ever.

I've been excited since Infinite was first revealed but holy cow that looked incredible. I can't wait.

[Dreddz]

I find it odd to see such pessimism towards a game like this. Its fair to say that the gameplay might not have the visceral feel of say a Killzone or COD game but its far from being bad. The thing is is that games like Bioshock Infinite have so much going for them that having an area or two that is weak doesn't make the game bad as a whole.

I value games that include strong stories and interesting enviorments to explore, which is why Bioshock Infinite seems like an immediate purchase. Plus ya know what, I think the gameplay looks fine. That stuff on the skylines looks awesome. Simply exploring the world looks fun as well.

Watching Bioshock Infinite reminds me of games like System Shock 2 and Deus Ex (makes sense seeing as they're all first person RPG's) in that the gameplay is notably weak but the rest of the game such as the narrative is very strong. Its a shame you lot can't appreciate games like that.

[edczxcvbnm]

I love exploring in games which is why I love metroidvania style games and open world games like Fallout 3. Bioshock wasn't all that explorative and there wasn't all that much to find. It is still a weak card in the game to me. The only thing to really find was the story that was far better than what I was currently going through.

I also don't think the gameplay is bad. I think it is boring. The same exact enemies from start to finish. The same stupid moral choice that you will choose the exact same way the whole game. The endless pointless war of attrition until you win. You could beat the whole game with the wrench if you wanted to. The plasmids felt like just another weapon that I needed to reload more often.

Sorry but I just don't think the story makes up for the rest of a game that I thought fell flat in pretty much every other area. Also I didn't like Deus Ex either. I think I just played that one well after it came out and couldn't deal with the ridgid gameplay.

[Slothy]

I find it odd to see such pessimism towards a game like this. Its fair to say that the gameplay might not have the visceral feel of say a Killzone or COD game but its far from being bad. The thing is is that games like Bioshock Infinite have so much going for them that having an area or two that is weak doesn't make the game bad as a whole.

Normally I might agree that one or two areas where a game is weak don't necessarily ruin it, but the gameplay is one which is extremely hard to ignore. I'll give the original Bioshock credit in that I did enjoy exploring Rapture. But at the same time, combat was completely and utterly boring. Even fighting the Big Daddies which should have been an epic, nail biting, holy crap please don't kill me experience was completely boring. Even ignoring the fact that the plasmids and combining them were limited both in terms of combinations and in terms of usefulness, the simple act of running and shooting felt as floaty and unresponsive, and by extension, sluggish as most FPS games that get released these days and that turns me off of one pretty quick. I'm not saying it needed to have a fast and furious visceral feel that you get from something like COD or Killzone. That is in fact almost the polar opposite of what I want. I do want a game that doesn't feel floaty, and forces me to use my various abilities and weapons creatively to overcome obstacles. Bioshock didn't do that though, which is a shame when you consider that's what they were clearly trying to do.


I value games that include strong stories and interesting enviorments to explore, which is why Bioshock Infinite seems like an immediate purchase. Plus ya know what, I think the gameplay looks fine. That stuff on the skylines looks awesome. Simply exploring the world looks fun as well.

Again, I'm not disagreeing with this. These are actually the things Bioshock did extremely well. But the gameplay was so completely boring that it made trudging through Rapture and putting up with one boring fight after another to get to the good stuff a pain in the ass. And it got worse the longer I played. The controls and combat were literally bad enough that they got in the way of enjoying everything else for me.


Watching Bioshock Infinite reminds me of games like System Shock 2 and Deus Ex (makes sense seeing as they're all first person RPG's) in that the gameplay is notably weak but the rest of the game such as the narrative is very strong. Its a shame you lot can't appreciate games like that.

The gameplay in Deus Ex was weak? Huh? :confused:

The combat to an extent certainly hasn't aged well (though it played quite well in 2000 for a game that wasn't Half-Life), but the sheer amount of options available to the player meant that even if you didn't like combat, it was all avoidable. Hell, the gameplay literally made that game what it was.

[Rostum]

Imo, they should totally make a puzzle adventure game out of the two Bioshock worlds. Would be totally sweet.

[DMKA]

The gameplay in Deus Ex was weak?

It's wonderful to see that someone other than me realizes this after all these years.

[Dreddz]

In regards to Deus Ex I was only referring to the movement of the character and feel of combat, which edczxcvbnm described well as being rigid. The word gameplay is probably too broad to be thrown around like that. When you factor in the options available in that game the gameplay is quite satisfying as a whole, just not in the way a game like Call of Duty is.

I'm sure I've said this a million times but Deus Ex is still one of my all time favourite games. Mainly because of the story and characters (among other things). So hopefully its easy to understand why I can still be excited for a game like Bioshock Infinite.

[Slothy]

Fair enough Dreddz. I certainly agree that combat is the weaker aspect of gameplay in Deus Ex, but that sort of leads to what separates Deus Ex from Bioshock. Deus Ex had so many other ways of getting through the game that it was almost silly, while Bioshock really didn't have any other options. There was no avoiding combat really, and the few gameplay elements that weren't the combat like hacking certainly weren't enough to build a game around.

If Bioshock Infinite happens to be a huge leap forward in that sense then I will gladly play it. It's the sort of game that I definitely want to love given the world they're creating, so I'm definitely not just going out of my way to find fault and nitpick. I simply choose to remain cautious after getting burned by the original.

If we're lucky then maybe they'll put out a demo around release or shortly after so I can try at least a portion of it, and who knows, maybe they'll pull an Assassin's Creed 2 and turn a humdrum franchise into a legitimate game of the year contender. I have been surprised in the past after all.

[Flying Arrow]

Deus Ex is great, regardless of the iffiness of its controls. It just has a ton of other things going for it that almost completely eclipse the awful shooting and jumping (which isn't the focus of the game anyway). Bioshock's main gameplay element is iffy, which is a much, much worse thing. If DX's exploration and level design were sub-par, then its shortcomings as a game could be compared to Bioshock's. I would argue that despite some minor flaws, Deus Ex is objectively an excellently-designed game for its ambitions.

But I really, really don't care what any of you think on this issue. I'm posting this to give some serious kudos to Vivi for his avatar and sig. Just awesome. :cool: