The folks at Irrational Games are once again offering fame and fortune to a lucky few in a new contest, the winners of which will find their names somewhere in episode two of BioShock Infinite’s upcoming DLC, Burial at Sea.

Those interested can enter the contest by completing all 60 Blue Ribbon challenges in the recent Clash in the Clouds DLC by August 27 at 9 a.m. EDT. For those who missed our coverage of Infinite’s first piece of DLC, the Blue Ribbon challenges are optional objectives that generally restrict which weapons you use or require you to kill enemies in a certain way.

The announcement notes that you don’t have to complete all the challenges in one sitting—just be sure to have all 60 blue ribbons by that date if you want to apply. Thankfully, any of the blue ribbons you’ve collected prior to the announcement still count. According to the official rules, the three winners will be announced “on or about” August 30 but no later than September 8.

Irrational didn’t specify exactly where the winners’ names would show up, saying it will make that decision at a later date. Those lucky enough to be immortalized in the upcoming DLC will receive a hi-res screenshot of their name from Irrational, along with instructions on how to find it.

This isn’t the first time Irrational has emblazoned a fan’s name into BioShock Infinite, though the sweepstakes it held reportedly had over 100,000 submitted entries. Here’s hoping the Blue Ribbon challenge requirement cuts that number down a bit.

This week, Logan, Evan, and Cory ponder over the recent batch of game remakes, scan for inconsistencies in Papers, Please, and take an Nvidia Shield with them to the bath. The guys also make a strong case for the shopkeeper's right to bear arms in Spelunky. All this, our playlists, and more, on...

PC Gamer Podcast 360 - Drunk-lunky

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Bioshock Infinite’s first episodic DLC, Burial at Sea, is headed our way in the next few months, and the biggest news for fans of the series is that we’ll get a chance to step into Elizabeth’s shoes. Now we’re getting some new information about what designing Elizabeth has been like, and how her character will shape the game.

“Liz is such a different character to Booker, and if we were to just put Booker in a dress,” level designer Amanda Jeffrey told IGN, “then that would be the most awful betrayal of what we're doing for Liz, and players would just feel like it was a cheap way out, and that's not something that we want to do.”

Booker, of course, is a soldier, and his strategic but strong-handed approach to things informed a lot of what we saw in Infinite. “He's very much about storming the gates, or taking it head on, and he has these other tools available to him, but generally he's all about going head to head with his enemy...” Jeffrey continued. “Elizabeth was a much more thoughtful person. She would be more considerate about keeping out of danger, and assisting you with various different things, and looking for things around in the environment and keeping an eye out for stuff.”

In terms of the game, it sounds like Burial at Sea will be a much more stealth- and puzzle-based type of game. It will also be our first chance to revisit Andrew Ryan’s submerged utopia, Rapture, since Bioshock 1 and 2.

For more details, check out the full interview with Jeffrey and series creator Ken Levine.

BioShock Infinite Creative Director Ken Levine held an impromptu Q&A session over Twitter on Wednesday, handing out bits and snippets of information regarding Booker and Elizabeth’s return to Rapture in the upcoming DLC, Burial at Sea.

Levine tweeted that Burial at Sea will host “mostly tweaked Infinite gameplay systems,” but promised that there were other new systems in the pipeline. For the record Levine said those systems include weapons, plasmids, gear and enemy types, though the plasmids aren’t necessarily ones you’ll recall from the original BioShock.
There is def. SOME new systems (weapon, plasmid, gear) but the level geo almost all new assets. Objects largely new. Story all new.

— Ken Levine (@IGLevine) July 31, 2013
 

Levine also specified that most of the Rapture we see in Burial at Sea will be built with almost entirely new assets and level geometry. While the prospect of diving back to Rapture's briny depths already gives me goosebumps, it's nice to know we won't be re-treading the damp, metallic floors we covered six years ago.

But don’t worry—the most important news has yet to come. Burial at Sea won’t include the hacking minigame from the original BioShock, and the Circus of Values machine you know and either love or despise will, in fact, talk.

Will the clownish vendor utter any new phrases? That, my friend, is still a mystery.