Snow1Wolf wrote:
So Comstock and Dewitt is the same person. I really don't know how's that possible though. Here's why I don't understand:
He's born on 1875, and he steps on the Columbia on 1912, at least according to every source I can find. The way I understand the story Dewitt who steps on Columbia is the one who recently gives away Anna/Elizabeth. So he's actually not 37, but the difference that I don't understand is that. Elizabeth is 21 when he step on Columbia, so he got Anna/Elizabeth when he's 1891 when he's only 16? What? How could he be at every place at once? O_O
Ok that's Elizabeth's age, how about his own age. Comstock is only 37, but look way younger than my parents! And they are at their 50s.
I think that's the biggest thing and I don't understand.
The developers were quite loose on how they used time dimensional tears and time travel. According to the Bioshock wiki, Elizabeth was born in 1892 but didn't arrive in Columbia until 1897. However, she was taken to Columbia as an infant so she had to have been taken before 1894 or so. That means in 1912, she is actually somewhere between 15 and 19 years old depending on the date she arrived in Comstock's world. I've seen a few places online that say she is 19 which matches some of the in game charts that I remember seeing. Regardless, she was born 1892 which means that Booker was around 17 when she was born which is perfectly reasonable, especially for the time period. Birth control was virtually non-existant at the time.
I don't think we know the exact age of the Booker we play as. He could have been contacted any time between 1892, directly after Ana's birth/capture, to 1912 when BS:Infinite takes place or perhaps even later. So he's between 17 and 37 and looks to be at least 30. The random time travelling when jumping between dimensions in the game makes it very difficult to track the dates. We see some dates on his desk in his dreams, but I don't recall if they had a year and they may not have been showing the year he actually left for Columbia. I may play the game again and try to keep track of the years shown. You initially think he left for Columbia in 1912 since he isn't surprised by the date on the newspapers which would make him 37, but because his memories were compromised before the game started, we don't know for sure.
Again for Comstock, I don't think we can know exactly how old he is other than "very". He's at least 37 but because he has been playing with tears and dimensional jumping/time travel, he could either just be showing the signs of exposure to tears for long periods (the same reason he became sterile) or he may have actually spent some time in alternate timelines which would have added years to his age. Remember that he has made tonnes of prophecies which netted him so many followers which would have required at least some interaction with the future. It's a whole lot easier to travel to the future, gather intel, and return than to simply watch through a tear and try to make prophecies by watching.
I had the same feeling. I didn't mind the sad ending, but I was hoping that there would be a "good" alternate ending that you could reach by making the right choices in the game, but apparently there is only that one ending where Elizabeth kills Booker when he is baptized. Since the Wounded Knee massacre too place on Dec 29, 1890, he would have been baptized sometime in the year 1891 which is before Elizabeth's birth in 1892. That means killing Booker during the baptism would stop Elizabeth from being born. This is the same old "grandfather paradox" that the writers just kind of ignore for the sake of the story. By killing Booker, Comstock, Columbia, Elizabeth and the entire game of Infinity cease to exist. Some have theorized that she only killed the Comstock version of Booker who was going to be baptized which explains why, after the credits, we see Booker in his office hearing Ana (baby Elizabeth) crying in the other room. Killing Comstock would mean the entire Columbia time line wouldn't exist so neither would Elizabeth, so the paradox is still there. But she would instead grow up as Booker's daughter Ana. If this is true, it's not quite as sad as it first appears.
Interesting note about the single ending, the writers comment about it throughout the game. The characters keep talking about "constants" that remain unchanged even with other variables occuring. Elizabeth talks about how she has to stop the course of events before they were set in motion. Even the title, Bioshock: Infinite, makes sense when you think about how the game deals with an infinite number of parallel dimensions. We only see a handful of Elizabeth's at the end, but I think they were symbolic for Elizabeth from every path that could have been taken all going to Comstock's origin and stopping him before he existed.
Snow1Wolf wrote:Zorplex, on the side note without spoiler for Infinite, why did you like Bioshock 1? I actually didn't like either 1 or 2.
I never played 2 since it was by a different developer. I love the original mainly for its story and art direction. Even with it's stylized characters, Bioshock has some of the most stunning visuals of any game I've ever played. It may not be the most technically advanced, but the reimagined 1920s decor underwater is simply beautiful.
Then you have the story which, even without the amazingly well designed twist in the middle, is a solid sci fi story that is presented well with the voice recordings. (I've always been a fan of radio dramas, and the recordings you find in the Bioshock games are a good parallel to those. Instead of having to read flavor text, you get to know characters through these audio diaries. There have been a few other games that have copied the idea and I don't know which one was first, but I think Bioshock was the first game I played that had such a deep back story using them.) The amount of foreshadowing is a bit overkill, but in the end it all makes sense. And the way they reveal the twists during the game were pure genius. If you HAVEN'T had Bioshock spoiled for you, it can contain some of the most memorable moments in video games. And even if you have had it spoiled, exploring the city and revealing the subplots on your own can still be incredibly rewarding for people who like a good story.
Bioshock also introduced me and many others to Objectivism. While Ayn Rand doesn't have many fans, and those she has are often almost as crazy as Andrew Ryan, the way they took Objectivism and creating the city of Rapture was brilliant. I'm not usually a fan of horror, but they showed how philosophy, when taken to an extreme, can create a hell on Earth. I read a few of Rand's works after playing the game, and the added context just makes the game better. Not many games so willingly and successfully integrate topics worth talking about. Bioshock has philosophy taken to an extreme, class warfare, moral ambiguity, corruption through the pursuit of beauty, and on and on. These topics are usually reserved for high literature but Bioshock manages to incorporate them into a cohesive plot that is both fun as it is enlightening.
Bioshock is still an FPS, and a bit of a shallow one at that. Using plasmids, while fun at first, can start to become repetitive by the end of the game. And the ending itself was rather bland compared to the rest of the game. But taken as a whole, Bioshock presents a story that could
only be fully realized as a video game. The way they comment on player choice and the results of their actions wouldn't work in any other medium. Aspects would be lost if the game were turned into a movie or book. While I think Bioshock is objectively great, for that reason alone, Bioshock is among my favorites of all time. I'm still contemplating Infinite, but the more I think about it, the more I'm seeing it as at least Bioshock 1's equal if not its better.