Bioshock Infinite - SPOILERS! You have been warned.

Comprox

So, wow. The first thing I want to put down is what the hell happened. My best understanding is that there is an 'infinite' number of universes (Hey, the name of the game!) that all start from a lighthouse (Hello Bioshock 1, very cool tie in). We play non Baptized Booker who is pulled into a universe where he did get Baptized and that Booker became Comstock. Our Booker lost all his money gambling and so he had to give up his daughter which haunted him for years.

The person who got the baby was the Comstock who had gone off and founded Colombia but his wife was sterile. He didn't want just any children, he wanted his child. So some 'lady' in that timeline was messing around with going into multiple universes and he grabbed onto that to get "his" child from our Booker. The conclusion to stop Comstock (and the potential future of New York burning) was to kill off Booker for every universe and that's what we saw at the end.

I did have some questions though:
- How did Anna gain the ability to make a tear herself? Something to do with her finger being cut off while going through?
- The whole ghost wife of Comstock I didn't really get
- Are Vigors literally just plasmids stolen from a Bioshock 1 universe tear?

On the whole, amazing setting and story. I really enjoyed the set piece battles using the rails but I found the action dragged on a little near the end. I was playing on hard and suck at FPS so that might be why.

ScardyBob

Your supposed to look at the graphics and say "ooooohhhhhhhh pretty pictures".

Comprox

100% stolen from someone else. A good rundown:

- Booker is man haunted by past deeds, whether as a pinkerton or from the war.
- Booker accepts baptism and becomes Comstock/Doesn't accept baptism and stays Booker
- In Comstocks world, he does his Columbia thing. Female Letuce creates a device that creates tears between alternate worlds, allowing Comstock's crew to learn possible futures and knowledges (Comstock thinks the futures he sees are absolute and not only possibilities). In Booker's world he carries the pain he didn't wash away with him, and it leads him into drink and gambling.
- Back in Comstock's world, its clear to F. Letuce that the device has both aged him rapidly and made him sterile. In order to acquire an heir, she decides to simply take it from a different Comstock (Booker). She facilitates this by contacting herself in Booker's world, where she is male. I'm convinced they are the same person - according to the little movie viewers the "brother" popped out of nowhere into Columbia, they finish each others sentences, talk alike, look alike, etc. We see Male Letuce went through to Comstock's world when Anna went through with Comstock.
- Anna is experimented on and integrated somehow with the device the Letuces create, being able to open tears herself on a level previously unseen. -She is raised as Elizabeth and Comstock does anything he can to make sure she fulfills the future he wants.
- Booker anguishes over the loss of his daughter, drinks and represses the memory, brands her name into his hand.
- Fink and Comstock murder off anyone who knows the truth in their world. A sabotage in the tear-creating device is used to kill the Letuces, but like they say themselves it had the side effect of scattering their "selves" or whatnot all over the worlds (Need citation and the exact quote they used).
- The Letuces go back to Booker's world and pick up Booker, who is more than happy to fabricate the necessary memories needed to join them and try to find his daughter.
- The game happens - including a couple trips to alternate worlds to get some guns. In one world Booker joined the Vox alongside Slate upon his arrival in Columbia, or perhaps traveled there with Slate in the first place. I wonder what it was like in the world between saving the gunsmith and moving his tools.
- An aged Elizabeth from another world pulls Booker into hers to show him what he needs to stop, and gives him the help to do so before kicking him back to where he was.
- Comstock is stopped, the truth about Booker/Comstock and the worlds is revealed with a nice fanservice cameo, and Booker and Elizabeth decide to go back to before the baptism and prevent it all from happening.

I also saw a theory that Booker is either "in a loop" or the Lutece's are jumping to different universes to find one where Booker actually fixes it and doesn't fail. In images like this: http://i7.minus.com/jbkEF7JuZggT2h.png it seems obvious they have been trying this for a while.

YMICrazy

Confused about the ending after the credits where it shows Booker and his daughter Anna.

At the end all the versions of his daughter start disappearing with him. I figured the last door he opened led him back into the actual time where he was about to be Baptized. The point in time where the other alternative versions of of the Booker we played as/Comstock depend on to exist. So eliminating him at that point meant eliminating both our in debt Booker and Comstock as well as possible daughters. That's why he said "No I'm both" before he went under. He knew to end the cycle completely he had to sacrifice himself because even if he said no to the Baptism, the alternative version would always say yes to the Baptism and unavoidably become Comstock.

At the end it shows a short portion where he still ends up with a *possible* kid with the same name as his old. But is in no way related to what we played through and the Elizabeth we meet correct? That would mean the alternate Bookers that never got involved in any of this Baptist business still manged to branch off far enough to have a kid with no relation to tearing or space/time powers? Please help me process this if I am wrong that ending just threw me off my boat.

Comprox

In the after-credits ending, the office you are in shows the gambling debts he had earlier in the game so that is "our" Booker. I had no idea what to make of it. Some kind of flashback? Personally, I assumed all Bookers were dead and that scene was something that happened in the past. It's the type of scene meant to be ambiguous though as I have heard many other theories.

YMICrazy

Aww man I hate ambiguous. It ruins so many theories. Either the dlc will do something with this (doubt it since the ending was pretty closed) or give us a totally different perspective.

Al_Bobo

I don't like that drowning ending. Did it really make other Comstock/Booker -universes vanish? If some Booker died in some other parallel universe, it wouldn't affect other universes. What makes our Booker so goddamn special? Elizabeth? If her powers can indeed actually create/shape universes instead of just borrowing stuff from other infinite universes, then she could choose to do anything. And she goes and drowns Booker... Or does the last ending moment, when Booker wakes up in his office and goes to look for Anna, mean that she changed her mind after drowning him and created yet another universe where Booker has Anna and kept his memories intact so that he avoids becoming Comstock in the future?

ezekel

simple version. there's two paths.

In one Booker rejected the baptism and stayed as Booker aka the one you play in the story. In the other he accepts it and becomes Comstock. But since there are millions of worlds were these two choices happen the cycle never ends. Comstock takes Ana and booker kills comstock. Alright now since Booker let Elizebeth kill him it breaks that cycle and creates one were he doesn't lose his daughter.

Also, at the start of the game you get a letter telling you not to come, because this has happened before. Also when you're asked to flip a coin, you get heads, along with the hundreds of other ticks because that's you coming from different dimensions multiple times to get elizabeth.

So you dying stops this whole cycle, and brings you back to the very start where you're at home with your daughter (aka the end credits scene)

So long story short, everything you did is worthless and you're back home with your newborn baby daughter

Svenpa

Which part did you guys find hardest? Personally it was the (TRIPLE!) ghost part and just before you save Lizzy from the chair near the end. There was so little ammo to be found and I refused to even try playing with a pistols and machineguns, neither which I had invested a dollar in. The ghost parts were just annoying as hell. She damage soaked like mad and nothing interrupted the reviving of more grunts. Once out of ammo and salts I had to try and rush an ammo shop several times (not always available to make it worse), while under fire of at least 8 people she revived, whom also rushed your butt behind any good cover. It just wasn't fun and punished you for getting close with vigor combos.

Surprisingly the final fight was complete breeze for me (on Hard). All I did was equip a some gear that gave me invulnerability jumping off a rail + overkill that stunned enemies + impact damage going off rails. Then I just jumped into their faces and blasted with the RPG until invulnerability ran out, up and down from rail, rinse repeat.

Comprox

@Svenpa Yah, the ghost fight was a bugger on hard. Sadly at the second one, I finally bumped it down to medium to get past it. I read online there were a few tactics but the easiest was: Use some kind of fire to incinerate the bodies once you killed them and then she could not revive them. Yah, I had no idea either.

ezekel

You need to use the burning thing and they stop coming back, once they're all dead she just sits there waiting to be killed. Also whenever she's making one spawn she turns dark blue and takes the most damage

Al_Bobo

I played it on hard -difficulty and my hardest fight was 2nd battle with a handyman. Died at least 5-6 times. I didn't find ghost fights very difficult. Long and exciting yes, but not difficult. I had to take cover and make quick shots from cover before I found that charging -vigor. It's ability to regen all armor every time you charge is amazing. Suddenly I wasn't stuck behind cover all the time. I could charge in the middle of enemies, shoot a head off from 2-3 enemies with my upgraded shotgun and charge again to get my armor full.
Charge worked very well in ghost fights. I unloaded my guns on that witch, charged nearby grunt to get armor back, used levitate to lift all little mobs around the witch and spammed fire -vigor until they died. Charge was very useful for staying close to witch when she flied around.

ezekel

You need to utilize the sniper and shotgun, the headshots 1 hit almost every single enemy, and for enemies who are quick, simply lifting them and getting close w/ upgraded shotgun shots OR electricuting them and headshotting them with the sniper

aka the raven guy, electricute, headshot 2x = dead with no damage taken

the shotgun does heavy damage when upgraded up close, same with the sniper; best to keep the heavy damage weapons on you, and picking up the rockets and such when they're available doesn't hurt but I'd never keep them carried

The smgs are purely worthless on hard, the damage output is too low and the ammo used is too high (again a balance issue)

Al_Bobo

I used shotgun and carbine. Carbine for peppering the baddies far away and shotty for anyone close enough. After I got charge, I dropped carbine and used rpg since cover wasn't so important than before. Rpg was great against those heavy hitters.

McCheese

im not entirely sure why killing booker changes all the possible realities so that they can never happen.We have already seen multiple people die off in alternate realities and all that happens is they have messed up memories and a bloody nose. Why do all realities hinge on that moment? I suppose him becoming comstock is what triggered him to learn of the lutece and how he can get anna back(how would he have lost anna in the first place?)... but if that was the moment it started why would he have ever been baptized in the first place? I somewhat assumed it was the cause for him wanting to be baptized, though maybe it is really his regrets about wounded knee and his pinkerton fun, etc...

as far as the game, i used sniper rifle for the majority of the game. it is just too good considering you always have infinite ammo basically when eliz is around. Can 1 shot most enemies, and it is incredibly powerful vs everything else. this is on hard. I gave 1999 mode a try but honestly sitting through all the non-playable story + cut scene type stuff was just way too boring.

YMICrazy

It should be a crime to not have new game plus these days though. Ruined my will to replay kicking butt this time on Hard after being annoyed at the last fight.

Comprox

@mcCheese First off, when you are walking through all the lighthouses at the end you can see other Bookers being lead by other Elizabeths all around. I would assume they are being lead to their death as well killing him in all the universes. The other argument I have heard is that since tears can also include time travel (as we saw New York burning) that Elizabeth has time traveled us back to the original baptism period and killed us off there effectively negating all the timelines that came after that.

Yes, there may be some plot holes around either of those arguments but that is the general idea. Any time you deal with time travel and multiple universes these kind of arguments come up.

-Drake-

I believe that the baptizing is a point in which new multi-verses are created and branch off and in killing booker in the universe where he accepted the baptisium erased the possibility of him becoming Comstock which would eliminate all other relating timelines.

By killing himself at the point in time where he accepted the baptism, Dewitt kills off ANY universal possibilities of Comstock. By dying, Dewitt ensures that Comstock never exists. Comstock never builds Columbia. Comstock never enters Dewitt’s reality and takes Anna. In short, the events of BioShock Infinite are erased.

When Dewitt killed himself at that juncture at the baptism, he didn’t erase himself from existence – he simply killed off every version of Comstock that could exist in the other universes.

In the scene after the credits, Dewitt awakens in his apartment, and goes to check on baby Anna crying in the bedroom. This scene is the universe reacting to Dewitt’s colossal alteration of the timeline, and returning him back to the point right before any of Comstock’s tampering. As the calendar in the scene informs us, this is the day that Comstock WOULD have carried out the deal, and taken Anna. However, now, there is no Comstock. Anna will not be taken and used to carry out an apocalypse. Dewitt and his daughter finally have a reality where they get to be together, and, its implied, the Dewitt in this scene is the one who has been transformed into a better man, not the one who was so depressed and lost that he sold his daughter in the first place.

YMICrazy

^How does he not erase himself? Given that he said he was both Booker and Comstock before the Elizabeth's dipped him under, it led to believe both died.

The ending after the credits could have come from a Booker that made the decision to not even attend a Baptism so no yes or no variable could be formed. But I'd rather accept an implied explanation that try to make sense of a plot where they do got give enough information on Elizabeth's powers to determine what she is doing. I mean by the rules of what people are going by, as soon as Elizabeth made the decision to drown Booker, another universe could have branched off where she let him live. The game never says if she is immune to that kind of stuff.

-Drake-

The booker in the end after the credits is not the same booker we played, but one of the many others in the alternate universes but now that comstock has been erased from existence he would no longer have entered another universe to steal Anna thus the events of bioshock infinite would no longer occur in any of these other universes leaving these other alternate bookers free to live with their daughter.

From what I've read a lot of folk have come to conclusion that the AD brand on Bookers hand stands for Anna DeWitt.

YMICrazy

-Drake- wrote: »

The booker in the end after the credits is not the same booker we played, but one of the many others in the alternate universes

When is this stated/ what evidence is there that gives it away?

-Drake-

Constants and variables, the events of infinite have been repeated by 122 different bookers (the coin toss with the letuce's) all with varying events (joining the Vox etc) but the differing variables never resulted in Anna/Elizabeth being rescued and comstock being stopped (Elizabeth says songbird always prevented it) until the booker we play sacrifices himself to remove comstock from existence meaning that only the constants and variables of the realities that booker refused the baptism remain meaning that although some events in these worlds will be different booker will never sell his daughter which is what the end credit scene is implying.