Irrational may be "winding down", but they still have one final flourish before bowing out. Burial at Sea: Episode 2 is the final piece of Bioshock Infinite DLC, and will give players the chance to inhabit the tear-opening, coin-tossing Elizabeth.

As an example of how differently the game's new protagonist will play, Irrational have also announced a new mode for the game. 1998 mode, like BInfinite's 1999 mode before it, is a "classic" difficulty designed to recapture the spirit of late '90s challenge. Rather than 1999's System Shock 2, 1998 mode is referencing the original Thief: The Dark Project. It will require players to complete the episode through entirely non-lethal methods. It will also replace the entirety of the soundtrack with Will Smith's Just The Two of Us, and Aerosmith's I Don't Wanna Miss a Thing.

Okay, so it won't really do that last thing.

"In Burial at Sea Episode Two we put a focus on balance and stealth mechanics," wrote Ken Levine, on the Irrational blog. "As we were developing this new style of gameplay, we started to see people self-impose non-lethal playthrough s. Given the fan reception of 1999 Mode, we thought it would be cool to give them another way to play Burial at Sea that challenged their mastery of stealth tools."

That sounds like an interesting departure for Bioshock combat. Stealth has never been a focus of the series, and a non-violent option has never before been possible. Especially in 2K Marin's Bioshock 2, where you had a massive drill attached to one of your arms.

In recognition of the mode, Irrational have produced a Thief-like mock box, from back in the days when game packaging could be a weird shape.



For our reactions to Irrational's closure, head over to our collective fond farewell.

Last week Ken Levine announced that Irrational Games as we know it is coming to an end. Most of the team are to be laid off as the studio that gave us System Shock 2, SWAT 4, Freedom Force and Bioshock shuts its doors. The world knows them as the Bioshock developers, but for PC players, they've offered much more. We gather to reflect on the end of a great studio and celebrate their output.

Tim Clark
Group senior editor

Having experienced several redundancies firsthand, I feel beholden to say that it will be a hugely traumatic time for those involved and that our first thoughts should be with them. Equally, having been there, I know that those sort of public expressions of sympathy, however well meaning, ultimately feel hollow and don t help you make the rent. But completely selfishly, as someone who plays and writes about videogames, who loved the original BioShock and with minor caveats also loved Infinite, I feel a sadness that we won t be any more visiting worlds cut from Irrational s cloth.

Whatever your issues with those games themes and mechanics, in terms of pure art design there are few destinations in the canon as startling and memorable as Rapture s watery mausoleum and Columbia s star-spangled inferno. If you believe, as I at least partially do, Kieron Gillen s idea that games writing makes us travel journalists reporting from imaginary places, then it s hard not to (selfishly) see the closure of Irrational as also being the destruction of worlds we ll now never get to explore.

Sam Roberts
Editor, PC Gamer UK

I think BioShock popularised the first-person shooter/RPG hybrid, non-cutscene storytelling and moral choices in games that, to me, is Irrational s legacy, getting developers to rethink the presentation of story or the depth of their combat systems. System Shock 2 introduced much of what made BioShock special, but for many of those millions of players entering Rapture, this was an entirely new phenomenon that broadened their perception of what interactive narrative could achieve.

Infinite continued that, for me, and like BioShock explored the kind of mature subject matter that is rarely touched upon by triple-A games. That Infinite was contentious is fine with me it s big, beautiful and incomprehensible, but worth talking about in a way that games so rarely are.

The people at Irrational have changed immeasurably over the years, of course, but what a legacy to have every one of its seven titles be lauded by players and the press. That moniker will always stand for quality. If you re mourning the studio, I recommend listening to the Irrational podcasts, which offer a fascinating cross-section of a studio loaded with talented people it s a real sadness that this culture no longer exists, and I wish the very best to those affected by the closure.



Tom Senior
Web editor

"I am winding down Irrational Games as you know it," Ken Levine wrote last Tuesday. Whether or not the Irrational name lives on in Levine's new small new endeavour seems moot. This will be the end of Irrational's output as we know it. Console players will know Irrational as the BioShock developers, but we knew them first as the team behind System Shock 2 and SWAT 4. Their first game a cyberpunk horror set in a drifting space hulk, complete with a manic rogue AI. Their last a blitz through a collapsing society in a floating city. In between they made a great co-op friend-tasering sim called SWAT 4, and a superb superhero adventure Freedom Force. And Tribes Vengeance. Man. It s painful to lose a studio with the imagination and boldness to build those worlds.

It's a sad fact that studios are downsized, moved and disbanded all the time, but Levine's message, in which he seems to take personal responsibility for the studio's downsizing, has made this a slightly unusual case. Overzealous corners of the internet jumped on the wording of the post in minutes. The idea of a great studio meeting its demise at the hands of an auteur gone mad is seductively simple, and travels well in 140 characters.

The real story is likely a more familiar one. The huge costs of blockbuster development continue to grow, and Infinite languished in development for many years. In the high-level staff changes, rumours of scrapped multiplayer modes and regular delays, there were hints at a fraught development process. In that scenario even millions of sales can deliver below-estimate profits. A few years back, 2K Marin were smushed into 2K Australia. Like any publisher, Take Two are happy to reform their brace of studios. But with Irrational breaking up, who will take over the Shock series?

It won't be Ken Levine. He's heading up a team of 15 to work on "highly replayable" games that are "narrative-driven." Perhaps he's taking notes from the success of former Irrational and 2K Marin designer Steve Gaynor and, formerly of 2K Marin, Karla Zimonja. With Johnnemann Nordhagen they founded the Fullbright Company, who turned around their narrative-driven debut game, Gone Home, in less than two years to critical success.

If market forces have put an end to Irrational, then the studio has suffered the same fate as Thief and System Shock developers, Looking Glass Studios. The parallels between the two stretch beyond their shared staff members. The design ethos that built System Shock has filtered into the BioShock games, and there's tremendous variety to the output of both studios. Irrational's demise is a blow, but those design ideas, and the flair and skill that went into the construction of the floating city of Columbia will continue to coarse through the industry, as the talent of Looking Glass and Ion Storm did in the 2000s. I'll remember them for the clinical blue-white corridors of the Von Braun, the disturbing scenes at the Fairfax residence in SWAT 4, and those tense first steps into Bioshock's lighthouse. We'll surely see flashes of Irrational's brilliance in many games to come.

Wes Fenlon
Features Editor

BioShock was a masterful maze of abandoned homes and once-thriving businesses, with the remnants of former lives told through scattered items and bodies and audio logs. It had personality, even when it was haunting. But nothing else in the game could compare to Fort Frolic, the weirdest, creepiest, funniest place in Rapture. It's easily my favorite level in BioShock, and one of the most evocative video game levels I've ever played. Sander Cohen's artistic presence permeates every corner of Fort Frolic he made that part of Rapture his canvas, and he painted it with madness.

Later in the game, the showdown with Andrew Ryan is BioShock's big thematic reveal. It says something very direct about how we play games, and player choice, and the dissonance between our thoughts and actions. But Fort Frolic has a subtle, perfect moment of dissonance of its own, when The Nutcracker's Waltz of the Flowers begins playing and Cohen's horribly disfigured, beautifully acrobatic Splicer ballerinas come for your life. I was in awe, and completely freaked, as I ran from the Splicers, the music crescendoed, and Cohen yelled "Smile! Smile!" in the background.

The dissonance between the Waltz's beauty and the game's horror that's the moment from BioShock that's going to stick with me forever, and it's on a shortlist of never-forget gaming memories for me. It's a shame that everyone at Irrational who collaborated to make that moment possible artists and animators and writers and sound designers won't have a chance to make another one together.


Phil Savage
Staff writer

It feels callous to look to the future when so many of the studio's staff will now be looking to secure their present. The thing I hope for is that, as Irrational's former employees move on to new things, the ideas and ambition that the studio strived to achieve will germinate throughout the industry. A lot of studios are going to be hiring some phenomenal talent, and I suspect a lot of new indie teams are about to appear as well. Both are an exciting prospect, because, while few development teams could boast the budget of late-era Irrational, the design-led philosophy has already paid dividends for smaller, more focused games.

It's telling that two of PC Gamer's favourite games of last year Gone Home and Card Hunter had former Irrational staff among their teams. One provided an engaging, character-led narrative through atmosphere and exploration, while the other deftly weaved two genres into a inventive and satisfying hybrid.

There's been plenty of speculation about whether the type of games Irrational make have a future. Really, it depends on whether you associate them with sprawling spectacle, or systemic diversity. I'd argue that Irrational's strength from System Shock 2 through to BioShock Infinite has been in the latter, and in the way their systems filtered through to the story and presentation. Those lessons can be applied whatever sized game someone's making.

Whether from Levine, his former staff, or other developers who are inspired by their games, Irrational's legacy will be felt for a long time to come.

Cory Banks
Managing Editor

I want to be angry about Irrational Games. I want someone to blame. I could be furious at Ken Levine, the studio s creative director and head honcho, who authored the press release revealing that Irrational as you know it was going away. How dare he fire 90 percent of the studio s staff, just so he can make smaller games? Because surely it was just that simple, right?

Or maybe I blame Take-Two Interactive. It s been speculated that BioShock Infinite, Irrational s final game, took so long to make and had such a troubled development period that the game s $4 million in sales isn t enough profit for the bigwigs. Maybe, says the Internet, Take-Two decided to pull the plug on the beloved studio, and kept Levine around because he s one of the few "name" developers left. Because that's what corporations do, right?

Maybe I just blame the dying Triple-A videogame, or retail shops that charge too much for games and drive customers away, or any number of other variables. Would that make me feel better?

No.

The fact that Irrational Games is gone at least as we know it is sad, as is the fact that so many talented developers, engineers, producers, quality assurance testers, and other staff now face the uncertainty of knowing where their next paycheck is coming from. And I want to yell and scream and turn on Caps Lock and launch my fury out into the ether. But it won t help.

What does help, at least for me, is believing that Levine and Take-Two are doing everything they say to help the team that made BioShock Infinite find new jobs. So does remembering that talented people can move on and continue to make their art. And what will ease the immediate pain is going back to play the games that made me love Irrational in the first place: System Shock 2, Freedom Force, SWAT 4, BioShock. Instead of raging against the machines for transgressions I neither know to be true or even understand, I choose to remember and enjoy the games that will be Irrational's legacy. It's not the act of a revolutionary, but it's the best I've got.

Today, Ken Levine announced that Irrational Games will be winding down as we know it after it releases the last piece of DLC for BioShock Infinite. Levine will be starting a smaller, "more entrepreneurial" endeavor at Take-Two, which also worked with him on the BioShock games. Unfortunately, this means Irrational will let go of all but 15 employees.

Levine co-founded Irrational Games seventeen years ago with Jon Chey and Rob Fermier. The studio has developed BioShock, BioShock Infinite, Freedom Force, SWAT 4, and others.

"Seventeen years is a long time to do any job, even the best one. And working with the incredible team at Irrational Games is indeed the best job I've ever had," Levine said in a message on Irrational's official site. "While I m deeply proud of what we've accomplished together, my passion has turned to making a different kind of game than we've done before. To meet the challenge ahead, I need to refocus my energy on a smaller team with a flatter structure and a more direct relationship with gamers. In many ways, it will be a return to how we started: a small team making games for the core gaming audience."

Levine said that in time he will announce a new endeavor, which will aim to make narrative-driven games for "core" gamers that reward multiple playthroughs, that focus on direct relationship with fans, and dedicated to delivering digital content exclusively.

The laid off members of Irrational will receive financial support, access to the office to put together their portfolios, and offered opportunities within Take-Two.

Levine also said that Irrational will do its best to update the site with an FAQ.

Ever since Irrational Games announced that its BioShock Infinite downloadable content would take place in Rapture, fans have speculated about how the worlds in the BioShock franchise could be connected. As we get ever closer to the release of Burial At Sea Episode 2, a new, very spoilery video starts to hint at answers while showing off a whole host of returning characters from both Rapture and Columbia.

Seriously, spoilers ahead. You've been warned.

The video, billed as a "behind the scenes" look at Episode 2, shows the sheer number of characters and returning voice actors we can look forward to. Courtnee Draper returns as Elizabeth, this time as the lead protagonist that players will control. Troy Baker is also back, as Infinite anti-hero Booker DeWitt. But many of the original actors from BioShock 1 will return as well, which means you can expect to see Andrew Ryan and Atlas in your adventures through Rapture.

Most interestingly, actress Kimberly Brooks will return in Episode Two as BioShock Infinite's Daisy Fitzroy. How Fitzroy makes it from Columbia's reality to Rapture isn't shown, but it's big news that she factors into the game.

We also get our first glimpse of the first-person view for Elizabeth, specifically in a shot of her watching an Andrew Ryan video while holding a pistol.

Irrational Creative Director Ken Levine says at the end of the video that fans will feel a "sense of completeness" at the end of Episode 2. Will this be the end of the BioShock story? We'll have to wait until March 25, when Episode 2 of Burial at Sea is available, before we can know for sure.

Has the desire for hats, hats, delicious TF2 hats diminished over the last few years, or is the public's interest in digital head-adornment as strong as ever? I ask because Valve and Irrational are adding BioShock clobber to Team Fortress 2, and- hey, don't all load up the game at once. You'll need to buy BioShock Infinite's season pass on Steam to gain access to it, which I believe comes with a few pieces of downloadable content in addition to a very small selection of hats. Full details here.

The items are only available until the 25th of March - the date that Burial at Sea part 2 is scheduled to release - and comprise a Mister Bubbles doll, a George Washington and a Benjamin Franklin mask. It's not a whole lot of content, but if you still play TF2 and you already own a season pass, then free stuff is always nice, I guess. Here's a pic of that digital clobber, as modelled by the cast of TF2:

Bioshock Infinite: Burial at Sea - Episode 2 is an impressively long DLC name, to the point that it's almost a shame they didn't go all the way. Why not hark back to the heyday of ridiculously long PC expansions and call it Bioshock Infinite: Burial at Sea - Episode 2: Steampunk Boogaloo (This Time, It's Elizabeth)? I would happily step through into that alternate reality. Back in this one, though, Irrational have announced the release date for their second bit of BInfinite story DLC. Episode 2 will arrive on March 25th.

In Burial at Sea Episode Two, we are delivering a story that involves nearly every major character from the original BioShock and BioShock Infinite, sayeth Ken Levine in a press release. It is a story that will give gamers a new perspective on the BioShock universe and conclude the story of BioShock Infinite and Burial at Sea.

Irrational say that the episode will be built "almost entirely" from scratch, suggesting we'll get to see more new perspectives on Rapture. This time around, we'll be controlling Elizabeth, and Irrational are promising the introduction of new weapons and "stealth-oriented gameplay".

Burial at Sea - Episode 2 will be free for owners of the BInfinite Season Pass, and will cost $15 for everybody else.

Don't worry, I'm going to be very careful to avoid spoilers in this opening paragraph, just to protect those that stumbled here accidentally after a drunken night of unrestrained hyperlink clicking. I've even gone so far as to choose the least spoilerful frame of this new trailer for the above image. Even so, spoiler: Bioshock Infinite's second story DLC will contain a gun. Sorry, I know you'd have preferred to discover that for yourself.



Well ain't that a thing?

From that brief teaser, it would seem that Elizabeth will be meeting some recognisable characters from Bioshock's pre-Infinite world. Moreover, a version of Booker that only she can see and here. It's a role reversal for the pair, but given that this time we'll be controlling Elizabeth, it's one that makes sense.

I spoke to Burial at Sea's producer Don Roy before the release of Episode 1, and, while at that stage he wasn't prepared to go into detail about this second chapter, he did reveal the studio's motivation for the switch. "The one thing I will say is that she's very different from Booker," Roy said. "The exciting thing about doing that - the reason to do that - is to be able to see the world through her eyes. As we were talking through the possibilities, it became, 'well, we can't not do this'. It's what fans want, it's what we want."

Overall, I enjoyed Burial at Sea: Episode 1, mostly because I liked the scrappy, desperate combat that resulted from the lack of available resources. Despite that, it did feel lacking. It was, in all, just another fairly standard bit of Bioshock content, and, after the lavish opening third, not a particularly interesting representation of "fallen" Rapture. Hopefully the second episode, and its new protagonist, will help to liven things up, and create a compelling mystery out of its clash of characters.

Welcome to the PC Gamer Game of the Year Awards 2013. For an explanation of how the awards were decided, a round-up of all the awards and the list of judges, check here.

Sometimes great games are released to the silent enjoyment of millions, others are lightning rods for discussion. They're talked about, turned over and examined for months, even years after release. Love it or hate it, Bioshock Infinite is one of those games, a shooter with too many ideas for its own good. Confusing, spectacular, controversial, its scope and absurdity ensure that it will linger in the popular imagination longer than its competitors. What better candidate for our Event of the Year award.

CHRIS Infinite is spectacular, grotesque, violent and sentimental. It s a shooting game about racism, America, grappling hooks, time travel and gospel music. Its schizophrenia is its biggest strength and its biggest weakness I admire for it for its spectacular nonsense as much as I understand why people have a problem with it. There s been nothing like it this year, and I m glad to have taken the journey.

CORY Whether or not you enjoyed exploring Columbia and its mysteries, you were certainly talking about it. Infinite s explorations of racism and religion angered some, but I still believe they were necessary to build a world that was beautiful on the surface but ugly underneath. I know some of us found the combat to be vapid, but I loved soaring over a Handyman s head on a skyrail, firing rockets and opening rifts that brought turrets to life.

ANDY Actually, I found the combat in Infinite a bit of a chore, but I still love it for taking me somewhere so wonderfully different. Emerging into that plaza for the first time after the church scene, and hearing Garry Schyman s beautiful Lighter Than Air , was a magical, transporting moment. Columbia is one of the most memorable places I ve ever explored, and the anachronistic music one of many neat touches that punctuated the wonder with a feeling of unease; a sense of something sinister lurking beneath those cerulean skies. As a game it has a lot of problems, but as an experience it s unforgettable. And I liked the ending.

BEN Without wanting to sound overly dramatic, stepping into Columbia for the first time felt like entering heaven both kingdoms of white and gold hanging like jewels in piercing blue skies (both, incidentally, ruled by crazy old white guys with beards). Irrational s world is a monumental achievement, from its foundations to its fiction. Whether I was watching families enjoying lazy picnics on the grass, poking at oddities and antiquities in shops, or bashing the crap out of terrorists using a hook hand, BioShock Infinite took me somewhere I had never been before.

TOM What spell was I under, to think that BioShock Infinite made a lick of sense? It was wonderful nonsense, though, a moshpit of ideas that provided ammunition for lengthy, excitable discussion. In the week that followed its release, we would talk in strange code to avoid spilling spoilers. Have you reached THAT bit? one of us would ask, with an odd eyebrow waggle. Oh you mean the bit with the THING? the other would reply, forming their hands into a flapping bird shape. The imagination behind Infinite s glorious, beautiful world proved infectious, and for all its incoherence, it s a million miles away from the mundane shooters we ve grown used to.

TONY As soon as I finished, I started again. Not for myself but so that I could plonk my non-game-playing girlfriend down beside me and show her the incredible sights. The colour-saturated, carnival atmosphere of early Columbia. The terrifying attack on Elizabeth s statue. A female NPC who didn t wear hotpants or carry a gun. No other game this year made me so excited to say look at what games can be now!

The holidays are a time for family gatherings, massive dinners, mildly disappointing presents, and visitations by ghosts who show you harrowing visions of what might have been. This year, the Ghost of Video Games Past showed me what the games of 2013 would have been like if graphics cards had never been invented! I have no idea why he did that. The Ghost of Video Games Past is a little weird.

Bioshock: Infinite impressed critics with its otherworldly visuals of a city in the clouds, but strip away the sunbeams and statues, and does it hold up? Let s chug a vigor, eat a cake out of the garbage, and take a look at Bioshock Infinite: The Text Adventure!

















 

Before running away for a few days of making resolutions and breaking last year's, Evan, Cory, and Tyler gathered to talk about BioShock Infinite, and how they feel about it now that the buzzing excitement and debates have settled into a low hum. Watch the whole five-video series on the PC Gamer YouTube channel, and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more regular content, gameplay footage, and conversations.