August 29, 2013

BioShock: Infinite, Day 1

So my friend Tiny Hippo has started a blog. He is supposedly reviewing video games and whatever, but only made two posts and then disappeared. Sucks to suck, Tiny Hippo.

In the spirit of being a better blogger, I've decided to take you on a journey with me. A BioShock journey. Specifically BioShock: Infinite. A few things you need to know about me and gaming before we begin:

  1. I'm not really a gamer.
    The only 3 games I've completed in my entire life are: Portal, Portal 2, and Kingdom Hearts 2. I've played a lot more games, but usually lose interest before finishing them. Or they get too hard and I give up. >.< Case(s) in point: Assassin's Creed 2 and Borderlands 2. 
  2. I'm really terrible at FPS games.
    Especially when there are zombies. A roommate's brother tried to get me to play Left 4 Dead with him and it turned into him going "Okay - zombies are going to come through THAT DOOR, so stand in THIS CORNER and aim RIGHT THERE. Now don't. move. until it's over. I'll block you." Otherwise I would panic, forget how to use the analog sticks, point straight up or straight down, and spin in circles shooting the sky/ground. And then die, of course. Mr. T tried to get me to play Dead Island and I was so worked up and panicky I didn't even make it to a zombie before I tapped out.
  3. I've never played a BioShock game.
    Actually, I knew next-to-nothing about this game before I started playing it. I knew it looked kind of steampunk-y and that was cool. It seemed more cartoony than a lot of FPS games and everyone seemed to have great things to say about it. Jen, over at Epbot even reviewed it and said she enjoyed it, and it sounded like she's worse at FPS games than I am.
Oh, and one last thing ALL OF THIS WILL BE SPOILERS! As I said - not a gamer. I wouldn't even begin to know how to go about reviewing it without spoilers. I don't have anything to compare it to - plot, graphics, difficulty, nothing. So sit back and enjoy.

Day 1:
I'm not sure when I started playing, but I definitely stayed up until 11:30. For shame! I was exhausted at work the next day. >.< I think I probably started around 7:00 or 7:30, so I put at least four hours into it.

Starting out, you're on this row boat with these two people with British-y accents. They talk to each other and pretty much totally ignore you. Also, they show up a lot. There was this quote at the beginning about how inter-dimensional travelers create false memories to help them cope or something. I felt like that might be important so I tried to remember it. Not sure if it's important yet or not. Anyway, the beetchs dump you off at a lighthouse. There are all these weird Biblical-y quotes about Eden and Sodom and cleansing yourself and as you go up the staircase you eventually find this person who has been tortured and is dead. There are signs telling you you better get some girl and give her to "them" or you, too, will die. Oh, and you can flush toilets and turn sinks off and on. So far - not been useful. Go up and out to the top of the lighthouse, ring some bells and the sky goes all red and there's weird music and then the door to the light opens and inside is this chair. Sit in, get locked in, rocket ship to space. Or the clouds, at least. And you're in the magical land of Mormons!

You're in this temple kind of place and there is water and flower petals and candles everywhere. It's very strange. Lots of elaborate statues and alters and Biblical-y quotes regarding the prophet, his lady friend, and their baby - "the lamb". You end up having to get baptized before you can enter the city. The priest dude almost drowns you and you wake up in this...pond?...surrounded by statues of the Founding Fathers. Washington, Franklin, and Jefferson. Something about a key, a scroll and a sword? People are praying to them. Actually, almost everyone you meet in the first 10-20 minutes in this city is praying. Pretty sure it was some sort of holiday. Wander around for a bit and eventually see the statue/building where she's being kept. So then you have to get to it.

A couple of things I didn't anticipate regarding this game:
  1. Superpowers?
    You drink/eat things to get "salts" and then use them to do magical things. Like control robots/people, shoot fireballs, call on crows, and throw people around (that's all I know about so far, but it looks like there's room for a lot more). So, uh, yeah. Didn't think that was going to happen.
  2. Racism??
    Yeah - everyone is suuuuuper racist. Not gonna lie - didn't notice everyone was white at first, because hey, I'm white. Yeah... Anyway, they have a statue of John Wilks Booth and hate Lincoln for his whole emancipation thing. Apparently they were part of the US and the US told them to stop being so racist so they just left the Union and went up into the clouds. Much like what Texas wants to do about half the time. I kind of feel like they created this game just to use a bunch of racial slurs that haven't been around for a hundred years or so. There is the more obvious black racism, but they are also hating on the Irish pretty hard as well.
Anyway - there is some sort of Antichrist figure and turns out it's me! Woohoo! I guess the prophet predicted someone would come and try to take away his lamb. She is supposed to bring the apocalypse down on everyone down on the ground and I'm going to stop her. I guess. Ummm...so, yeah. Lots of people try to kill me. Also, I'm really bad at the aiming and not panicking. Which is pretty much all there is to a FPS game. I died a lot. Like...a lot. And you lose money every time you die. So I never have all that much money. I also keep forgetting about my super powers, so I stick to the gun a lot. Or just melee. Which is the triangle button. And our triangle button sticks. And half the time I accidentally press the circle button, because I'm from the generation of Mortal Kombat button smashers. Circle makes you crouch. So I'm running around, crouched, firing at walls and punching ineffectively. I wish it was multiplayer so I could see myself. lol!

You also get to make decisions, which is kind of cool. I'm pretty sure I always pick the wrong ones. The first time this came up was when I finally went "YUP - RACISM" and when I figured out I was the Antichrist. Or false prophet. I forget what they call me. There is a "raffle" and it's actually throwing baseballs at an interracial couple. Oh, yeah. 'Murica. So I had to decide between throwing the baseball at them or at the guy in charge of the raffle. I chose the dude, because I felt like people would judge me if I did the other. Which, those guys ended up helping me later on! Kind of? I mean, they said they wanted to help me, but I'm not sure that the did anything. I just saw them later on and they said thanks. But by throwing it at the dude they found out who I was and I started getting shot at. Not sure what the other outcome would be.

Another decision came after I got the girl. We were trying to buy tickets and dude obviously knew who we were. It was very much a trap and I had to decide between pulling a weapon and yelling. I was like "well I'll just yell" and he stabbed me in the hand. >.< Also, I had to choose between stealing a gun and not...I stole a gun and pissed a lot of people off. I think I died once or twice in all that. The last choice I made involved picking a pendant for the chick to wear on her choker. It was the same British-y people from the beginning (this was like the 3rd or 4th time they'd shown up) and they wanted her to choose between a bird and a cage. I chose cage because why not? I'm not sure if that has affected anything yet or not.

Anyway, one you get to the girl in the tower you find out they've been monitoring her. She knows she's been locked up, but had no idea they had two-way mirrors all over the place and were watching everything she did. Which, for the record, is super creepy. Also, the whole behind-the-scenes place was destroyed, but it didn't seem to be the girl that did it. MYSTERY. She can also rip holes in space-time and reveal alternate realities. Or something. I don't know. She's also really into Paris. And music. And thanks to all her reading she can heal me. And pick locks. I don't question things, I just enjoy them. Which is the dude's outlook. It's kind of funny. He's all "Well that's weird. IGNORE!" I like that life motto.

The girl can take care of herself, thank God. Because if I had to keep her alive and also keep myself alive, pssssssssh. I debated on playing the game on easy, but I knew all my friends would be mean to me if I did, so I'm playing on medium. I probably should've done easy. Just saying. I die all the freaking time.

What else, what else.... 

So, yeah. I rescue the girl, we leave the one part of the sky island or whatever. Now we're on some sort of beach/vacation place about to get on some flying escape thing. That's when I realized how late it was and that I needed to go to bed. STAY TUNED!

source
Here are the two people that keep showing up. And another "decision" thing I forgot about. I chose "tails" like a FOOL. It's always "heads", apparently. He has the same thing on the back of his sandwich board and it's all heads over there as well. So far these guys are my favorite people in the game. So they'll probably kill me.

No comments:

Post a Comment