Bioshock Infinite
Best Games to Celebrate the Fourth of July
The floating city of Columbia from Bioshock Infinite is a dark and twisted version of America and its ideals. Here, American exceptionalism is taken to its most illogical extreme; the Founding Fathers are worshiped as if they were the Greek pantheon, and the city’s jingoistic citizens, for all their zeal and adulation of American culture, epitomize everything the Founding Fathers fought against. And that makes playing Bioshock Infinite a special level of catharsis that gamers should experience this Fourth of July.
America’s political climate may have changed a lot since Bioshock Infinite was released, but its message is as clear and topical as ever: true patriotism is the willingness to fight against oppression, especially when oppression is disguised as patriotism. The war that later embroils Columbia might resemble the Civil War more than the American Revolution, but it still is in the spirit of the Founding Fathers and the sacrifices they made to transform America into a free nation.
