Thursday, October 23, 2014

Bioshock Infinite Review (PS3)

A Thrill-ride of a Game
Bioshock Infinite is the third installment of the Bioshock game series and set before the events of the first Bioshock. This game received a lot of awards and hype from critics and gamers. I picked up this game really late and it's now cheaper. Sometimes it's good to wait for the game's price to drop.


STORY
The year is 1912, Booker DeWitt (a talking protagonist) is tasked to go to the floating city, Columbia to retrieve a girl, named Elizabeth, and bring her to New York. This will clear DeWitt from his debt. Everything seems fine after arriving then suddenly everything gets messed up after the authorities saw Booker's scar on his hand. During his stay in Columbia, Booker will encounter a Prophet named Comstock, his religious fanatics and the city's mostly racist citizens. He will also meet the city's rebels, the Vox Populi that's at war with Comstock and his racist minions.

GAMEPLAY
Bioshock Infinite is a first-person shooter. The game introduces new gameplay mechanics/elements like the shield gauge that depletes first before your health gauge. The shield regenerates so you can hide behind covers while outgunned, this can save you when your non-regenarating health is low.

Gone is your stack of health kits and mana. When you pick up a health kit/salt, they're automatically consumed, just like the variety of foods found in the game. Pick them up if you really need it.

Plasmids are now Vigors that uses Salts as your mana. Some Vigor types works just the same as some Plasmids but with different look and trapping function.

Also new in the game is the Sky Hook. Using this thing is pure joy. It's very usefull for aerial combat and transportation via sky lines. You can use the hook as a melee weapon. Melee combat is more brutal with the Sky Hook Execution mechanic (appears as a skull on top of the enemy's head) that breaks the enemy's neck and destroy guts for example.

There are no penalties when falling off from Columbia.

You can now sprint and only use two guns just like in military FPS'es, but you can take down large enemies just by using any weapon if you're skilled enough. There are lots of weapons scattered in the game for you to use.

Vending machines are present in the game. There are 3 kinds: Item shop, weapon upgrade shop and Vigor upgrade shop. You can't hack them but you can use the Possession Vigor to posses these vending machines to make them chuck up some Silver Eagles (money).

You can find Gears lying around Columbia. Gears gives you passive abilities/upgrades and some of them activates on certain conditions. There are 4 kinds of gear to equip: Head, Shirt, Pants and Shoes. They are acquired at random so if you don't like the Gear you have, just load the last checkpoint and pick up the gear again, you'll see that it's different now. You can switch gears anytime in the Gear section when you press [Select].

This game doesn't have Vita Chambers, but you can revive with 50% health and salts everytime you die but you will loose some money and your damaged enemies will regain health as a penalty. In 1999 mode it's game over when you die with no money and you will be taken back to the main menu to load your last checkpoint again.

Elizabeth is not your typical damsel-in-distress but your formidable ally. She can provide health, salts, ammo and coins when she feels you need it. Realistically, assisting takes time, so Elizabeth doesn't always have anything to give especially after you received something from her and she'll try to find supplies. Elizabeth is overpowered if she can provide stuff everytime. She will also help you find important items like Voxophones, Infusions (Health/Salt/Shield upgrade) and lockpicks which she can use to unlock doors.

Elizabeth have special powers, she can open up Tears (portals in another parrallel dimention or different timeline). Tears are scattered everywhere and contains aerial hooks, cover to shield yourself from gunfire, supplies, turrets and mechanical allies. This encourages exploration for secret items and strategy when in combat. When you see a Tear, just press and hold [Square] to open it. Tears also serves as your early combat warning, making enemy encouters a little predictable.

You don't have to protect Elizabeth, she's fine on her own, in fact, she will take care of you when you're in a pinch and will revive you when you die (money penalties still remain the same).

GRAPHICS
The game uses Unreal Engine just like the previous Bioshock games. In the first two games, you are thrown in dark and ruined underwater city of Rapture. in Bioshock Infinite, you are sent to a very bright and peaceful looking sky city of Columbia.

Columbia is like a theme park with lots of attractions and minigames (serves as weapon firing and Vigor using tutorial) in the start of the game. The sky lines serves as your extreme roller coaster. Everything in this game is very beautiful, detailed and runs at 30 frames per second and 60 frames per second (with occational framerate drops) if you turn off the Lock Framerate option. The lighting/particle effects are great, and there are lots of moving objects and stuff happening everywhere.

Character models is a mixed bag. Important characters only (and those that are involved in set pieces) have the best detail. The civilians are detailed too but they don't look good, some of them are glitched like the uneven eyes of the girl that hands raffle balls to the people in line. Enemy designs though, they all look great.

I encountered a clipping glitch during my chaotic high-speed battle with a Handyman and lots of soldiers, I was riding on the sky line, then I got off, while landing I got hit by a rocket midair and got thrown through a human sized box wall. I think you can get out by using the classic rocket jump, but I didn't have the chance to do it because I ran out of RPG ammo.

MUSIC/AUDIO
Bioshock Infinite's great music only plays when you reach a certain place, when in combat, or during the important events in the game. They're well composed and fits the tone and every mood in the game.

Voice work is superb. The voice actors did a good job on bringing up the main characters and their personalities to life. Same with the NPC voices, they all talk and sound like those folks that lived 100 years ago.

REPLAY VALUE
Bioshock Infinite's playthrough lasts for about 12 to 20 hours. The game is single player only and encourages two or more playthroughs. Completing the game on hard mode will unlock the 1999 mode (hardest difficulty) that doesn't hold your hand when exploring Columbia. You can also unlock 1999 mode by using the Konami code.

DLC episodes is worth buying if you're a Bioshock fan. The two DLC expansion episodes are set on the glory days of Rapture.

CLOSING REMARKS
Well, Bioshock Infinite is worthy of the hype and praise it received from critics and gamers. The story, new thrilling gameplay mechanics, awesome audio/graphics/voice acting, and your ally, Elizabeth makes this game great. You don't need to play the first two Bioshock games to know it's lore and story, because the game's story is set before the events of the first Bioshock.

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