...is it doesn't have a Dev Commentary mode. If any game deserves one it's this. Here is hoping they make it DLC.

No, its biggest flaw that it presents itself as open world by telling you you can go back to previous areas and unlock safes (EDIT: chests) you found there after you get the key, whereas it's totally designed as a linear gallery shooter and I don't even remember the name of the place with the safe (chest!), or the way there, and there's no map and no fast travel, and everything looks the same (and it looks ravishing I might add).

It's pissing me off that the game is giving me the impression that I can go back and use my new tools ala Arkham Asylum, while it totally progresses (level-wise) like The Darkness with a bit of backtracking.

But yeah, dev commentary sounds amazing because every minute I spend with this game my mind is blown harder, I love it.

Actually, the biggest flaw is no manual saving.

I didn't notice it ever say it was an open world or i would get the chance to revisit areas, to the point i made mental notes of the safes i couldn't unlock and came back to them earlier than i needed to because i wasn't sure i would get another chance. So i would say the flaw would be the opposite (unless i missed them hint this somehow), that they should of indicated to me that i could return to certain areas later.

I found the areas to be very individual and memorable, also named. So unless you were just breezing through to the next checkpoint without looking around a bit and exploring the world, i can't see how everything looks the same.

I feel for you because I was surprised during Bioshock 1 by the fact that it featured levels instead of an open environment. But, having played that game, I don't know how anyone would be suprised at the structure of Bioshock Ininite.

@rowr said:

After the first time you use the stationary air hooks and drop kill a guy, theres a fight with a few guards and one female guard who kept yelling, and then when you kill them and dodge/kill the machine gun robot on a floating ship, you go down a porch to the right and find a chest (it was a chest not a safe, my bad) with a voxaphone telling you that his idiot brother got a chest without a key. That's when the game told me I can find the key and return, and even though I loot literally everything and step on every square inch of the ground, I don't think I found it. If I did, I think I was already too far ahead to track back.

Funny thing is, I no longer encountered key-specific chests, just safes I can lockpick.. So that whole chest shindig, as well as the fact that you can travel between areas, gave me the impression it's like Tomb Raider or Arkham City. And if it really is, why would anyone travel back in a linear story shooter? I guess I'm just confused by how this game wants me to pace my gameplay. Another thing that ticked my completionist anxiety was the fact that after I got the electric vigor, I became able to unlock doors by shocking their electric lock station things. Does that mean if I track back I'll find more doors like that? I just don't know.

I think this has to do with my video game retardation, it takes me more than three playthroughs to start actually remember locations and names. Like, I completely immerse myself and take my time and read/watch everything, but it just doesn't stick in my memory, I beat a game and only remember specific moments and names. I look at the list of games I beat and barely remember anything from them, just the fact that I had a blast..

Yeh i'm with you on some of this stuff, it's confusing that these things are introduced and then kind of left out for the rest of the game, it feels like it could have to do with the development cycle of the game losing consistency over the course of it's development, something that also comes across with the feel of the game from the first few hours compared to say, two thirds through as far as general tone, story and gameplay consistency.

I think like you said the whole thing with the first chest (the key being in the very next section so requiring you to backtrack, also to an area you won't return to later in the game) kind of put me into the assumption i would need to be backtracking with regards to the safes. It's strange really the chest was introduced like that - tutorialised and all, i guess it was too early to introduce the lockpicks or code books but they wanted to set the example of side exploration early?

Like you said also, with the lightning vigor to open doors, i could have missed some but i only found one single side door that could be opened in the same way and then none for the rest of the game.

Yeah, it seems like a lot of these gameplay elements are leftovers from older versions of the game so that we have a lot of half-finished ideas that aren't fleshed out and utilized properly.