BioShock Infinite Ending/Story Dissection

I'm going to start by stating the obvious: you should only read this if you've already finished BioShock Infinite, or if you don't mind having the plot hung in front of you in its birthday suit. If you want to experience it first, then bookmark this shizzle and come back when you have.

You're back? Good.

Another thing: if you haven't finished it, then why aren't you playing it right now? Go on, play it. Would you kindly go play it? Do you even row, bro? Do you?

Anyway, as the title helpfully suggests, there may be massive spoilers after this line break.

[da_2pacalypse]

Actually, the last part after the credits is not an open ending. it's actually quite clever and makes sense.

SPOILERS BELOW:

Since Booker kills himself at the moment of baptism, no versions of himself are born in the form of Cocmstock. Therefore Comstock ceases to exist, yet the Booker who chose not to be baptized still exists. This Booker does not lose Anna to Comstock (since he does not exist) and therefore Elizabeth never exists. Therefore the circle is broken, and the ending is indeed: a happy ending.

With the being said, that means that no Columbia will ever be made (since Cocmstock created it), meaning Andrew Ryan will not see how it failed. Therefore in all permutations of the leftover world, Rapture is still created.

Ken Levine is a genius. This game is absolute art.

[TheOneWhoIsTornApart]

Finally someone who understands the ending. I loved the ending and yes if your paying attention then yes it is absolutley a happy ending.

[skelly1331]

No. If you're paying attention you see that Elizabeth has to kill him before the baptism choice.

Elizabeth makes it clear that they have to kill Booker BEFORE the Baptism choice. She says some Bookers chose to have the baptism while others didn't and they have to prevent the choice from happening. She explicitly says this. She can't just kill Booker only if he makes the choice to be baptized.

[kneon]

SPOILERS, of course.

If I've got the timing right then Anna never exists either since he was drowned before she would have been conceived. In which case they couldn't have drowned him. But once you bring quantum physics and time/inter-dimensional travel into a story then imponderable paradoxes are inevitable.

But if you were paying attention you should have known where all this was going, the clues begin before the game even starts with the quote about trans-dimensional travel, then the discussion about how the experiment already has happened etc. There are huge number of clues in the game so most of the ending wasn't a big surprise.

[kirkules]

I always thought of the ending as open, like Shrodinger's cat. I like your theory about Andrew Ryan though, it's really provocative.

[Genuine-User]

Ken Levine and the team at irrational have done an absolutely fantastic job.
This game has had a bigger impact on my gaming experience than bioshock.

[DeleteThisxx]

I'll respectfully disagree. Although Infinite is a great game, I was more mesmerized by the world/mythos of Bioshock.

[Genuine-User]

Everyone is entitled to their opinion.

[FantasyStar]

Memories plays a key role. You can't drown the Booker that already knows of the future because that alone would've already changed the future and eliminate everything. You had to be in control of a Booker being drowned with no knowledge of the future for that part to make any logical sense. That's a plot hole because the Booker we drowned let himself be drowned for no other purpose. Whereas the Booker we want would've been ignorant to the future events.

It would've made more sense to have a 3rd person perspective of Booker being drowned while another Booker looks onward to his other self where he notices himself disappearing like the other Elizabeths because the observing Booker now doesn't exist anymore. There had to be 2 Bookers' at that moment. Overall the huge downplay of memories really hurts the ending.

[paydayp]

maybe its this:

option 1: the booker we played lost his memory again like he did in the beginning of the game by traveling tru dimensions and only we know about it because we are the observers of the game

option 2: he would only turn in to comstock because of the events of the game if he wasn´t killed and losing half of the memories to make him in the comstock we kill

[FantasyStar]

Option 1 makes the most sense at the end. We could assume that the Epilogue was DeWitt on that day before any of it happened.

Option 2 is a bit weirder because I think that's when "universes" stop existing and timelines become more appropriate. The game blurs the border between universes/timelines: how else could Elizabeth show Booker his own past?

[ladderspike]

Im going to have to disagree with your memories premise. Maybe somebody already pointed this out, but please check the inside of the game case. On the side behind the manual, as you probably knew, is a quote, "The mind of the subject will desperately struggle to create memories where none exist..." Barriers to Trans-Dimensional Travel, -R. Lutece, 1889. So what I think is that you are the booker with no memory trying to create memories. Basically the memories of playing through the game are all made by you. Just a thought, maybe I'm taking this out of context.

[FantasyStar]

That's a good point. But that would have to depend on Letuce's tear device vs Elizabeth's innate abilities affecting the memories when passing between universes. Thanks for bringing that up because I forgotten about the 'passing over' part.

[Vilnix]

I love the story and game, there are some holes, but like kneon said, once interdimentional travel get's involved it's near impossible to not have any flaws.

But I rest with 3 questions, which are possibly explained in the game that I missed:
1) Why did comstoc need to 'steel' his child from another world. I would think he needed a heir and his wife was infertile or somesting?
2)Why did the twins bring Booker to the comstoc world to interfere?

Again these questions might have been plainly explained, if so sorry.

But my main question: How did Elizabeth/Anne get her powers? If it was because she came from another world at least one of the twins should have had them to, if not the only other thing I could think of was is through experiments, but I don't think I ever heard anything about that and if that was the case there should be more people or devices with the same power.

[kirkules]

Vilnix, I attempt to answer all those questions in the article.

[MattRuthless]

Vilnix,

1) If i'm right, they mentionned in the story that Comstock got sterile from exposure to Tears. Why he wanted a child, i dunno.

But from your second question, i wonder, how has DeWitt known to go to Columbia ? Like yeah he got help from the Luteces, but who set it in motion ? His child got snatched through a tear, complete randomness ( the exchange ), no mention of Columbia or anything. From there he creates new memories and all, but, how did he know.

[Vilnix]

MattRuthless,

Right, I totally forgot about that, thanks.

I also found a possible answer for the second question I posted.
In the epilogue, I think almost right after the exchange happens, you are back in Dewitt's 'office' and there is a tear with the Luteces in raincoats on the other side. Dewitt walks through it, crashes on the ground, here he losses his memory, only remaining with 'bring the girl, whipe away the debt', the Luteces also talk about him mixing memory's and blocking others to deal with the cross world travel while they carry him to the boat. So that is how he got to colombia.
Also there was a recording to be found somewhere in the game from the female Lutece where she talked about her 'brother' wanting to undo what they have done. In my mind this refers to creating the initial contact between the worlds and allowing Comstoc to become the prophet with the knowlege of all the worlds and helping him get Anna/Elizabeth (to further his power/possibilitys?). And who better to stop Comstoc then a Comstoc from another world, being Dewitt.