[QUOTE=Drury;50724446]I don't remember ever being bored in the game or having trouble with vox populi, idk what you guys were doing. I do remember though watching Totalbiscuit camping behind crates with a sniper rifle, playing the game like a shooting gallery, slowly riding skylines from box to box and shittalking the gameplay for being boring. Maybe that's your problem also.[/QUOTE]
running and skylining around or standing perfectly still and plinking away wont make the enemies any less spongey
[QUOTE=salty peanut v2;50724552]running and skylining around or standing perfectly still and plinking away wont make the enemies any less spongey[/QUOTE]
Really? I never had a problem with enemies being bullet spongey in my play-through. In fact I always wanted more enemies because I had so much fun using the skylines during combat.
The thing is it's easy to forget about the vigors, especially early on, because they seem like mostly just creative ways of killing enemies. Players like myself settled into shooting things and occasionally using a vigor maybe. When upgraded, the right vigors are just pure shitwrecking, especially with the right loot combos, but those who've been focusing on shooting instead go for gun upgrades - which go for naught once the Founders start dying off and the Vox Populi weapons become prominent, forcing more upgrades. I also remember not getting much loot, or good loot at least, on my playthrough, and I searched scrupulously.
The loadout I settled on was carbine, revolver, and crows. I'd be able to headshot at range but mostly I took the the rails and jumped into the fray then hop out when things started to get too hot.
[QUOTE=salty peanut v2;50724552]running and skylining around or standing perfectly still and plinking away wont make the enemies any less spongey[/QUOTE]
Never had anyone take too long to take down with a shotgun.
I think the thing that the video made me realize when Bioshock Infinite wasn't as effective as the first game, was when I stopped and thought "If people and Critics love the hell outta Infinite at release, why isn't it easily remembered three years after it's release?".
I feel like I'm the only person who didn't mind the combat that much, I went thru the game, then 1999 mode and then the burial at sea dlcs and I had fun.
I mean the combat was kinda meh but iunno it wasn't THAT bad.
[QUOTE=salty peanut v2;50724552]running and skylining around or standing perfectly still and plinking away wont make the enemies any less spongey[/QUOTE]
Even though I didn't really find Bioshock Infinite's enemies to be very spongy, I still don't get why people hate spongy enemies in general. More sponge means more gun, and more gun means more fun.
[QUOTE=TornadoAP;50725640]Even though I didn't really find Bioshock Infinite's enemies to be very spongy, I still don't get why people hate spongy enemies in general. More sponge means more gun, and more gun means more fun.[/QUOTE]
There's only so much gun you can have before it gets repetitive, and shooting a human in the face repeatedly as they flinch but keep coming and have no clear sense of defense preventing death breaks suspension of disbelief significantly. This is why games like Borderlands and Destiny get criticized for some ridiculous enemies that take a lot more punishment than was probably necessary, and Bioshock Infinite makes it worse due to things like the Mechanized Patriots just sort of running around with a gun and soaking up damage like it's no tomorrow unless you go for their weak point. The most interesting thing about them is the design and voice lines; were it not for that, they'd be a forgotten enemy type that people would think were better suited for the trash.
It also doesn't help if you only have so much ammunition and have to scavenge for more should you run out. Borderlands and Destiny have factors to get around this by making enemies drop ammunition for you to keep you going semi-consistently; Bioshock Infinite basically makes you hope there's a vendor nearby or that at enemy in the imminent fight dropped one of your current guns to refill if you're planning to keep it, otherwise you'll run out of ammo pretty quick without upgrades. By having enemies essentially exist to eat up a rather limited supply, it becomes more risky, and extreme cases of bullet sponginess turn it into more of a chore than an actual fun fight, whether you're piling bullets into them endlessly or having to keep picking up guns to survive.
[QUOTE=TornadoAP;50725640]Even though I didn't really find Bioshock Infinite's enemies to be very spongy, I still don't get why people hate spongy enemies in general. More sponge means more gun, and more gun means more fun.[/QUOTE]
When things take too long to die, it removes any sort of visceral action or sense of momentum, and you might as well be playing some hotkey MMO.
So apparently finding it boring means you're playing it wrong? Its combat is shite because it does everything wrong that BS1&2 didn't; Regenerating shields, superfluous weapon archetypes (Pistol, revolver, shotgun, automatic gun, fast rifle, slow rifle, grenade and rocket launcher), big open combat arenas relying on waves of individually pissweak and dumb enemies, and all others enemies relying on comically high health and/or damage output to be challenging. The only memorable bits of combat in the game were the most frustrating, which obviously isn't a good thing; The graveyard fight is the first thing that comes to mind. Furthermore, it all just feels less tactile and generally way more awkward than in the first 2 games.
Conversely, the only thing that got me to keep playing was the plot, aesthetic and characters. Even if it wasn't particularly well written, its presentation was spot on. Just feels like the gameplay is a token for storyline progression rather than supporting one another. In the first game, you're basically just an ordinary dude who finds himself in this mad, hostile place. The gameplay makes it feel that way, with enemies that are varied and individually challenging; The splicers are intelligent enough to retreat and use healing stations, and most of them behave in novel ways and different tactics are required to defeat each of them, especially if you intend to do so unscathed; Furthermore certain enemies were more vulnerable to certain ammo types, and managing these adds another layer of depth. On top of it all, the environments are often cramped with blind corners everywhere, allowing your enemies to get the drop on you more often than you might expect. I first played Bioshock 1 on the 360, and even though I hate console FPS controls, I loved it because it was an additional challenge on top of all these reasons; even fighting a single thuggish splicer was challenging.
On the flipside of the coin, none of that is true of Infinite; Again the player character is presented an ordinary guy (With a history in the military, granted) who gets in way over his head; However you're breezing through the human enemies (Who lack any form of intelligence) within a few minutes, which doesn't seem right considering you're meant to be on an even playing field capability wise. Beyond them, the more challenging enemies rely on high health and gimmicky damage output to pose a challenge. Realistically, Booker wouldn't have made it more than five minutes. That's if it weren't for vigors of course, but the problem there is that if they're abundant to the degree that you keep stumbling upon them, why don't most of the human enemies use them? In BS1, the splicers are your enemies [I]because[/I] they abuse the same technology that you use to become more powerful.
In BS2, you're a big daddy, one of the most powerful enemies from the first game. You might argue that this might lead to it suffering from the same pitfalls I describe in Infinite, but on the contrary; It has all the strengths of BS1's, makes you a little less vulnerable but floods you with enemies who retain the same behaviours and dynamics.
Though I doubt many people in this thread haven't played it, on the off chance you haven't I'd recommend just putting it on easy and enjoying it for the story and worldbuilding if those elements appeal to you; If you're getting it for the gameplay, don't be fooled into thinking it's more of the same re: BS1&2. It's a poor imitation at best.
[editline]17th July 2016[/editline]
[QUOTE=TornadoAP;50725640]Even though I didn't really find Bioshock Infinite's enemies to be very spongy, I still don't get why people hate spongy enemies in general. More sponge means more gun, and more gun means more fun.[/QUOTE]
Yes, it's wonderful to pump 5 magazines into a pretty ordinary dude and have him barely flinch and take your head off in a few shots. Looking at you, Fallout NV.
Spongy enemies are a fucking poor way of compensating for a lack of intelligence. They're only good when they're handled right, and almost never appropriate for "ordinary dudes"; BS1/2's big daddies had behavioural strengths and weaknesses you had to exploit to survive against them, and your weapons & abilities powerful enough that if you took a few seconds to plan it out in your head you can take them down within seconds - provided you had enough supplies. Going toe-to-toe takes a fucklot of ammo and time, lots of time in which the single big daddy can kill you and rightfully so especially in BS1.
In B:I, the spongiest enemies didn't vary their behaviour; The patriots are probably the most egregious. Stomp towards the player constantly and shoot until you or they are dead. There's no dynamic to the combat beyond "Are you taking damage at a rate such that you will die before you deal enough damage".
The more I contrast BS1&2 to Infinite, the more respect I have for it as a game. Even though I'm not the biggest fan of Rapture, even the plot or the fact that some of the gameplay elements were lost between System Shock 2 and it, it still retains more than enough to make its combat feel constantly fresh and interesting, if anything doing a better job on that side of things.
Here is how I remember bioshock infinite gameplay on normal and on the hardest difficulty mode.
Get the carbine rifle and the head master mod. Pop heads and occasionally throw a plasmid around. Whenever you are near a railway abuse winter shield.
This entire review is based on a false dichotomy. Just because the game wasn't the worst game of the year doesn't mean, or even remotely imply, that it was good. I'm so sick of hearing that strawman argument. Most people who hated it don't think that. You'd be objectively stupid to believe that when there's so many shining examples of trash that came out around that time frame. It's not like there were just a couple of bad games in a specific genre either.
The combat was typical arena crap. Oh look another wave of bullet sponges. The only thing it was missing to be 100% generic was chest high walls and a fleshed out cover system. You had standard guns, an unnecessary regenerating shield, and various lunge/movement magic gimmicks. The plot was nonsensical, shallow, and came across as trying to be edgy. So much of the environment was just political cheap shots. The racism was twisted to the point of caricature. The world wasn't believable, and felt like a parody.
Special awards for stupidity go to this puzzle in particular. They could have introduced a hint or something to look at a journal if you struggled. They could have taught you mechanics, and trained you to listen to things, which was actually useful in bioshock 1. Instead they coddled you. Why even have a puzzle at that point?
[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_u18_BKczg[/media]
I would agree with you Zephyrs if you weren't pointing to the lighthouse scene as a puzzle. It's not supposed to be a fucking puzzle, it's just a dumb scene that's supposed to look cool. People keep bitching about such a minor thing and it's so annoying. There are tons of problems with Infinite, stop pointing to something and complaining that it isn't a puzzle when it was never supposed to be a puzzle. There's no point in any of the Bioshock game where you have to solve a puzzle similar to that.
Someone made a point back then that B:I could've been presented in a completely different medium and it wouldn't have lost anything of value along the way. I'm inclined to agree, since the combat was mostly a chore and didn't seem to integrate well with neither the story nor the setting unlike in its predecessor.
I quite liked B:I, probably because I'm a sucker for many of the tropes that the story revels in. While there are some weak aspects (such as the spectral Lady Comstock malarkey) I felt the story came together neatly enough towards the end that I felt happy with it, after going back and thinking it through some more. Personally I regard it as way a above average video game narrative despite that the presentation overall has problems.
But again, as a video game it really can't hold a candle to the previous titles.
[QUOTE=Zephyrs;50726068]-get a load of this guy-[/QUOTE]
Or it's just a good game instead of an amazing one.
It's a real good thing the Wolfenstein and Doom reboots were really good because Bioshock Infinite is awful as a shooter. It doesn't even compare with shooters like FEAR which predate it by almost a decade.
The hatedom vastly overstates how "bad" the game is. I thoroughly enjoyed almost every minute of the game bar that one boss fight everybody knows and loathes. But the game certainly does have flaws. Combat became somewhat repetitive once you'd upgraded a weapon like the carbine and found a fitting vigor to pair it with. The Big Daddy wannabes were a bit more interesting to fight seeing as they used powers outside of "shoots you with rivets" and "charges at you drill first". But their bullet sponginess didn't make anywhere near as much sense. Except for the Handymen, they were pretty much just Big Daddies with a glowing weak spot.
I just cannot understand the claims that the plot was dumb and needlessly convoluted though. I think it was perfectly understandable with just a bit of thought about what you'd seen. People will complain to high hell about games having simple plots that tell you everything, but the writers for this tried something different to varying degrees of success and it's lambasted as the worst thing ever. I felt it was a pretty neat bit of speculative sometimes-science, the explanations made a fair bit of sense to me at least.
[editline]17th July 2016[/editline]
[QUOTE=Samiam22;50726303]It's a real good thing the Wolfenstein and Doom reboots were really good because Bioshock Infinite is awful as a shooter. It doesn't even compare with shooters like FEAR which predate it by almost a decade.[/QUOTE]
The shooting wasn't really as visceral as you'd hope. But then again, I didn't find the Bioshock or Bioshock 2 shooting satisfying myself. It was serviceable and worked well, but mainly because of the emphasis on throwing plasmids around like a lunatic to force an advantage for yourself. The upgrade system essentially makes you a God, ploughing through Rapture with little regard.
And this is coming from someone who played through Survivor mode with vita-chambers off.
Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one who enjoyed Infinite thoroughly.
[QUOTE=bdd458;50726424]Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one who enjoyed Infinite thoroughly.[/QUOTE]
I'm curious as to the proportions of people who enjoyed Infinite's gameplay that also played the previous games, vs the number of people who didn't that also played the previous games.
while not an indepth critique of the game i have to say jesus christ just watching the OP's video is giving me a headache as a result of the insanely narrow FOV of this game
i remember desperately trying to get it wider and wider so that i could play it, still baffles me why FPS fovs are not simply unlocked for people who get sick as fuck trying to play them
on standard fov in B:I I genuinely couldn't look at the screen for more than 30-40 seconds without having to look away
While I had a blast playing infinite its first time through I have realized now over the years and replaying it (now that the hype has worn off on me) that it is just a decent game.
Everyone complains about the gameplay but what bothers me the most is the writing tbh. Especially in burial at sea. The whole alternative demension shit seems way too forced only for the sake of connecting the other two bioshocks...which I don't think they needed to do at all. I would rather infinite stand on its own two legs then piggyback on the prior two's success.
[QUOTE=Morbo!!!;50726449]I'm curious as to the proportions of people who enjoyed Infinite's gameplay that also played the previous games, vs the number of people who didn't that also played the previous games.[/QUOTE]
I've played both 1 and 2 to completion, and I still like Infinite the best. I never played any at release, and tbh the gameplay in 1 hasn't aged the best, 2 is leagues above it in that department, and I feel that Infinite is above 2 there.
i dont speak for everyone, but infinite is definitely my favorite in the series, even after having played 1 and 2.
[QUOTE=bdd458;50726612]I've played both 1 and 2 to completion, and I still like Infinite the best. I never played any at release, and tbh the gameplay in 1 hasn't aged the best, 2 is leagues above it in that department, and I feel that Infinite is above 2 there.
i dont speak for everyone, but infinite is definitely my favorite in the series, even after having played 1 and 2.[/QUOTE]
Can you explain why you prefer it? Speaking strictly in terms of gameplay, what do you feel it does better than the previous two?
[QUOTE=Zephyrs;50726068][media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_u18_BKczg[/media][/QUOTE]
This video is so dumb. It's acting like that's supposed to be a puzzle when it's super obviously not. It's like bitching about the "put the can in the trash" bit from the start of HL2 because "blegh the guard tells you where to put it why even have the puzzle????" It's just part of the intro.
[QUOTE=Skyward;50726672]This video is so dumb. It's acting like that's supposed to be a puzzle when it's super obviously not. It's like bitching about the "put the can in the trash" bit from the start of HL2 because "blegh the guard tells you where to put it why even have the puzzle????"[/QUOTE]
The real puzzle is as to why it's even in the game in the first place
[QUOTE=Morbo!!!;50726683]The real puzzle is as to why it's even in the game in the first place[/QUOTE]
To show that Columbia is a gated society? That you can't just rocket up and hang out and need some kind of pass? Who cares if its not some pointless puzzle 2 minutes in to the game? What would a puzzle do there besides fuck up the pacing? Its like two whole seconds of the intro and takes nothing away from the game, the fact that people get so hung up on an utterly harmless part of the game baffles me. There are [B]plenty[/B] of actual genuine complaints to have about the game, and there there's this nitpick-y horseshit. Yet that dumbass video shows up every time the game gets talked about like it's some epic zinger and ultimate indictment of the game's "awful" quality.
I feel like I'm the only person who liked Infinite's story, it was emotional and thought provoking despite its flaws and plot holes.
[QUOTE=Skyward;50726694]To show that Columbia is a gated society? That you can't just rocket up and hang out and need some kind of pass? Its like two whole seconds of the intro, the fact that people get so hung up on an utterly harmless part of the game baffles me. There actual genuine complaints about the game, and there there's this nitpick-y horseshit.[/QUOTE]
The problem with that bit is that it's so out of character and form compared to the rest of the game, and it sets an [I]entirely[/I] different pace for the beginning compared to the previous two Bioshocks, where one crash lands you in the ocean and the other brings you back from the dead. No 'puzzle' or pretense at thought, the game delivered exactly what you were set up to expect. A descent in to a stygian abyss inhabited by the only thing that could survive there, Ayn Rand readers.
Then, after Infinite sets that slower pace, after setting up the frankly exciting and interesting "American christian zealots in their cloud mansions" society, it essentially throws all of that setting and aesthetic in the trash for some sludgy run-and-gun shootery that treats 'plot twist' and 'parallel universe' like the height of story telling.
[QUOTE=Darth Ninja;50726713]I feel like I'm the only person who liked Infinite's story, it was emotional and thought provoking despite its flaws and plot holes.[/QUOTE]
I liked Infinite when I played it. I'm an unapologetic Bioshock fan. I even [I]enjoyed[/I] Bioshock 2. However, Infinite made me mad, not because of what it delivered but because of what it failed to deliver. Does anyone remember the hype trailers, the gameplay snippets, all of that from before the game released? I wanted to play [I]that[/I] game, where you traversed the crumbling ruins of a skyborne American utopia that had been ripped apart by xenophobia and dimension hopping insanity. What I got was [B]Waifu Adventure 2016 [/B]starring Mary Sue, with all the elements of the tangentially related games that I actually loved tacked on to remind me that this was somehow the same intellectual property.
Biohshock Infinite had genuinely breathtaking, cool moments. I did get suckered in to enjoying Elizabeth's companionship and felt sad when the plot was resolved. But when I step back from the moment, now three years divorced from the release, I feel the game let me down tremendously. It would have been a better movie than a game.
When it came out I think a lot of reviewers went a bit nuts when they praised it like the second coming.
First the story. I wasn't amazed by the twists but they were fine. I was hoping to see how this game would portray extreme patriotism, religion and racism. There was some interesting ideas like a group that worshiped Lincoln's assassin but soon after the game just turned into another civil war without any strangeness/uniqueness to it.
I wasn't impressed by Elizabeth's integration either. Just because she's a dispenser/support spawner that's ignored by enemies doesn't deserve so much praise. I'm not saying I want her to be someone you need to take care of during combat, just that people again praise this gameplay feature too much. In a way her endless supply seemed a bit lazy because if the level design didn't help you, you could just wait for her to throw you some health/ammo.
Another thing was vigors and other strange beings or devices. Columbia with it's religion felt like no one would be interested in them, possibly even banned them.
That brings me to another problem. Because so very few enemies use vigors you keep fighting generic soldiers over and over with about 4 other enemy types that are very rare. Splicers were so much interesting with how mad and deformed they were from Adam usage. Also for humans, the Columbia soldiers took way too much damage for my liking.
Weapons were designed nicely but the fact you could carry only two annoyed the hell out of me because of ammo and upgrade management.
In the end, despite all these issues I have with this game I think it's still good but reviewers overblown the qualities of Infinite. Visuals were nice though.
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