: In the mean time, someone wrote something that exactly describes how I feel
: about storytelling in games, although probably better and in a less
: inflammatory way than I ever could.

: http://criminalcrackdown.blogspot.com/2011/03/trouble-with-being-batman.html

: I leave it for folks to read, reflect on, and apply to Bioshock Infinite.

Meh. It's just a game.

Sure, it's a game with a very well developed story, and decent combat, but it's not some universe changing artistry that should be shifting anybody's views on video games themselves. I think it's getting all this attention not because it tells a good, internally consistent story, but because so few big name games do. Look at Halo 4 and it's story telling failures, for instance.

That said, I really did like it. Combat and respawning were a lot nicer to me than I remember BioShock 1 & 2 being. (In the previous games I seem to recall dieing meant I lost all the precious good ammo I used up before death, and all the enemies and scripted traps reset… Maybe I'm just misremembering as that sound brutal!) The addition of a recharging energy shield (nice mechanic, I wonder who popularized that? :p) gave me the freedom to try more things and made it feel less like I was being slowly ground down to death by low level enemies. The skyhooks and the options they give you during combat are fun once you get used to them. It also felt expansive, gameplay wise, for a UE3 game limited by what our current old consoles can do.