Like an attractive girl whom you really don't ike - and who doesn't like you either.
I've just completed Bioshock Infinite. I stuck it to the end, in hope, and that's how I feel – but as I start to write, I'm not really sure why.
Many, as the ratings reflect, have played it and loved it. Indeed, it surpasses even the production values of recent heavyweights such as Dishonored, Far Cry 3, and Tomb Raider. It is, in a word, sumptuous.
But it's in the promise of its gorgeous graphics and atmosphere that the feeling upon completion, of 'what the hell just happened?' emerges: the visuals are tantalising, and its story immersive, but someone, along the way, forgot to do the 'game' part.
Bioshock Infinite only barely manages to pay lip service to the definition of the word, so much so, that at one point, I wondered if, amid all the production, and character believability, its developers got irritated with the idea and just decided to ditch it, and instead concentrate on making a Disney film, with some gore.
Of course, in fairness, it's billed as an action game, and it has action a-plenty – my argument doesn't lie there. Where it does lie, is (apart from with regard to its dubious political stance), in the main, here: it's just so linear.
It's not just linear, it's a linear conveyor belt, set at one speed, with the occasional ramp up to 'holy *&#t, what's going on?' I'm no slouch when it comes to FPS games, nor any other kind, for that matter, but for all the lauding placed up on this game for its story telling, it just doesn't ever seem to stop. I couldn't help wanting it, just for a few minutes, to stop telling me the bl#$dy story. There was nowhere to go, in the big, expansive city in the clouds, of Columbia, to avoid it. At every turn, there was a 'kinetescope', filling me in on back story, or a billboard referencing some significant character or part of the gameworld.
Many will applaud this as 'attention to detail', or mise en scene, but to me, they just diminish my agency in the game. There's nothing to figure out for myself – the game keeps shouting everything at me. No-one else in Columbia is seen to use kinetescopes. Or vending machines. Just me, and as such, it divorces me from the gameworld.
At no point is there any recess, for any reason – you're either fighting enemies, or you're walking towards the next bit where you're going to fight some more enemies. Between those parts is a kind of non-part, where you loot corpses and rummage in boxes. This is repeated, ad infinitum. There is very little light and shade to the gameplay.
Ok, hear me out: I know – it's an action game. This is what tends to happen in action games. But it's so puzzling that the game emphasises so much the beauty of the environment, the depth of the atmosphere, and the complexity of the characters and story, and all the player does is shuffle around with their head down, scavenging in containers. You might say that Call of Duty, for example, spends much of its effort on its visuals, and is similarly 'on rails'. True, I would reply, but I would add that the world that is created in those games is supposed to be realistic: it could be argued that its way of immersing you is that you're not supposed to notice it. When you see a realistic soldier fighting realistic enemies in a game trailer, you know what you're in for. But I digress.
There is no way to interact with anything in the game, other than shooting, and the big, stupid, 'interact' button. This does everything, from opening boxes, looting bodies, accepting money and aid from Elisabeth, instructing Elisabeth (your AI sidekick) to open doors, jumping insane distances to Skylines (suspended, metal tracks for cargo and transport) with zero risk, and so on.
This kind of interface is often used, and can be ok if there are other devices to immerse the player in the world, such a physical objects that can picked up (or even just tripped over, e.g. Fallout 3), that, well, just…move. The main character having legs, and not being totally non-corporeal, would have been another one. Footprints in sand, dust, water. Persistant dead bodies. Bullet holes in walls.
None of that here: everything is static, and nailed down, and this is what 'pops the bubble', for me. Bioshock Infinite relies entirely on two things to draw you in – its look and feel, and its story – and you can't change either of them. At all.
The omission of such devices as mentioned above feels like a retrograde step. One could argue, a cynical one. A trick missed, I couldn't help feeling, would have been the addition of some small risk or skill, in mounting and dismounting the skylines – but no. Even that, is as easy as opening a box.
Weird…
This might all seem overly negative – but hey, it's only a game - if you don't like it, don't play it?
Wrong.
This is a phrase that is used very often, but is also a false argument on many levels. Responsibility is a key word here, that conversely, is not used often enough. If developers see that they can profit from making cynical, interactive cartoons such as Bioshock Infinite (as they have done), there will be more and more of them, and pretty soon, the market will be flooded. There will be a whole generation of kids who grow up thinking that this is a game. Just like what has happened to kids' view of music because of X-Factor, and other shows of its type.
Yes – it's a game. But it's a triumph of style over content, and invites the player to do absolutely no thinking for themselves. In the original Doom, for heaven's sake, you at least had to remember where to go with the blue key.
More disturbing though, than any of this, is the game's dalliance with subject matter that it doesn't really understand, or care about.
The inclusion in the game of themes such as racism, slavery, jingoism, nationalism, and American Exceptionalism, present the idea of 'worthiness', as if the developers are making some kind of comment. By his own admission, Ken Levine has said that no comment is being made, just that the setting, alternative and fantastical as it is, provides a backdrop to 'help along the story'.
This is dangerous nonsense. Fitzroy, the black, rebel leader of the 'vox populi' (voice of the people), is portrayed to be 'no better' than the right wing, oppressive Comstock. As a device, that's ok as far as it goes, providing, with a sense of responsibility in mind, that some resolution is going to be made, in terms of political comment. The story sidesteps this completely – or does it?
It's impossible to set a story with such sensitive, real-world comparisons apart from its real-world events. Despite the game's PEGI rating, younger players will play this game. In fact, scratch that, I can't help thinking that the game's message, intended or otherwise, is dangerous for anyone, of any age.
What it seems to be saying is 'Rebellion, however righteous, makes you as bad as your oppressor, so there's no point. Here, look at this arbitrary, fantasy story…'
The use of these themes in the game has caused worryingly little controversy. Tellingly, I spotted an in-game graffito, the perjorative 'yid'. Noteworthy, as there are no discernibly Jewish characters in the game. However, the thrust of the racism 'dealt with' seems to be toward blacks and Irish. We hear a character say the made-up phrase 'potato eater', but at no point does the 'N word' appear.
Why is it ok to illustrate some perjorative racist terms, but not others? Too sensitive? Then why tackle the subject, if indeed this was the aim?
Because it's not the aim. It is simply cynical, sensational use of themes.
What Bioshock Infinite is, is an interactive cartoon, liberally interspersed with some shooting. The story is good, there is no question of that, but it is arbitrary when juxtaposed with its quasi-political setting. It's certainly memorable: despite all the negative criticism, certain situations remain in the memory, long after playing.
The 'twist' in the finale is nice, if somewhat predictable, but the bottom line is that as an experience, it is ultimately hollow.
It's a game – what did I expect - Shakespeare?
No, but games are at a point now where there can be as poignant as literature. What is disappointing about this game is that it could have been, but failed miserably.
In short, you can't lose a game of Bioshock Infinite – you can only give up. It's not difficult – 'If you keep going, you will succeed' - it's the common fallacy taught to children. And when they don't succeed in life, they keep going. That's what's clever about the fallacy, and that's that cynical about this game.
As an effort, and out of respect for the work and talent of the people who made it, I'm giving it a 5.
If it wasn't for that, despite all its flash and glamour, my final thought is that this kind of interactive product can harm not only the industry creatively, but those who buy it as well.
This is X-Factor in computer game form.
We know what you like, here's some more of it. No, no, no – thinking is bad.
Ssssh – go back to sleep.