Excelsior

See Also Little_Pony_Haven_Safehouse
== LOTSA GOOD FUN / AMUSING / IMAGINITIVE IDEAS AND TALK AND HUMOR == 
== *WARNING* - FANBOIS SHOULD NOT READ ANY OF THE FOLLOWING LEST THEIR HEADS EXPLODE IN THEIR USUAL ATTENTION-WHORE OFFENDEDNESS. THEY HAVE BEEN WARNED ==
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Rapture Wasn't Supposed To Be Lala-Land : 
It all depends. IF you make your game world/universe too "Fantasy", THEN your claimed attempts to make the story relatable/relevant to aspects/issues of the Real World will be problematic. It is disconcerting when objects don't work normally as expected, or happenings lack logic (It is distracting to second guess everything constantly). When you start demonstrating that the Laws of Physics and Common Sense no longer apply, you suddenly are off into some strange Lala-land.
Example - Infinite BS lost most real world plausibility (made believed it was based on Real Science, but didn't adhere to Real Science), and EVEN DIDN'T have any consistency within the 'Way the game said things magically worked'. SteamPunk is one thing, with its Retro Terminology, but it doesn't get all Explainy about how its fantasy elements work utilizing modern science terminology/theory. 
(( Candyland doesn't try to EXPLAIN how tree-sized Candy Canes came to exist ))
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== Images of the Real 1893 Exposition : ==
Websearch "www.bing.com/images/search?q=1893+exposition"  will turn up numerous interesting images of that event.
See also Real_1893_Chicago_Exposition
Nostalgia can be a very convenient element for a game, as it eliminates alot of Gamemaker work/creativity/skill in creating the game content.
That 1890's period in History was also the era of the new Electric Lights, which with the MASS USE of them made the 1893 Exposition even more amazing to the people of the time.
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== Anachronism of Columbia (In More Ways Than One) ==
I was watching the recent PBS documentary about the Roosevelts (Teddy in particular).  It struck me that much of the 'hype' this (Infinite BS) game had from the Promotional Trailers and the endless Interviews about it (supposedly reflecting the social ills of 1912 - which they eventually largely discarded/diminished, or turned into a caricature in favor of all the QuantumBS) was itself a big distortion, because Columbia was largely locked into (mutated from) an earlier period (1893 - almost 20 years before) when it was 'launched', and America had changed significantly in that interval.   
So the story missed/ignored alot of the social reforms which happened in America, and the game's setting no longer reflected what America was changing into.   Major changes were happening that Columbia would not have been a part of (it became an "Anachronism"),  thus making all the writer's finger pointing about all America's alleged  'evils' and issues largely irrelevant.  I've seen various forum people say that all the game's exaggerations of American society (for example like what was shown of religion -- a kind which virtually had nothing to do with American reality) supposedly served to make a point ... as some illustrative device ( ?? EXCEPT, How do you show the Truth through Lies?? ) 
But even as produced, the Infinite BS game was already warped out of any semblance to what the producers was repeatedly 'talked-up' to represent.
Rapture had some aspects like that too, except that the story DID state that it was intentionally founded (and its society built around) moving backwards (and sideways) away from the post-WW2 American society.
If "The Way The World Works" Prevailed :
Another idea : That on seeing Floating Columbia at the 1893 Exposition, many of the Great Minds of that period would begin work on similar (and further better) versions of that technology. In that task they would have far greater (1000 X) genius/resources/money, and would soon outdistance Comstock's little Sideshow. Columbia would soon be a pathetic backwater. To construct Columbia, workers and observers (and spies) would have been all over it, looking at every aspect/technology/etc ... - particularly if Government(tax-payer) or Industrialist's money was involved in building it. Foreign Powers would of course be VERY interested.
SO - When Comstock started to make trouble, President Teddy Roosevelt would simply press a button at his desk in the White House and the USA's Tesla-built Phasers would disintegrate Columbia into vapor in a second, and Americans living on the Moon would watch the spectacle on TV and then go back to eating their cornflakes.
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== A Game Too Far ==
Really there should have been a moment when Booker steps back and thinks "I am really laying on the floor in my own vomit having a Fever Dream from that bad Patent Toothache medicine I took ? "
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EightDeadlyWords
Amusing and informative  :
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/WMG/Bioshock
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Absurd Scene :
Yes, lets turn up the heat and see if burning up Sally will drive her out of the vents ( that scream is priceless ).
Almost as good as the plotline of we have to kill Booker to 'save' him ( again - or is it just revenge by Elizabeth now ?? ).
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== Gratuitous Violence ==
http://bioshock.wikia.com/wiki/File:Bioshock_Infinite_-_Booker_The_Psychopath_%28Death_Scenes,_Finishing_Moves%29
You mean they changed the Skyhook from something that actually looked like it might have worked, to THAT -- Just so they could make this strange weapon kind of thing (and that Bloody Violence seen in the video) possible ???
Oh yeah, 'Social Issues' ...  'Historic Social Issues' ... Yeah that's it, it'll be social issues that will set this game apart ... 
== Quantum Physics - Mysterious and Little Known/Understood - It is why they picked it as their Story Crutch : ==
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/QuantumMechanicsCanDoAnything
If played as a dark comedy farce, Would it have worked MUCH better ? (Ex - would have made more sense, be more consistent with itself ...)
?? You mean that wasn't what it was ?? 
Didn't the third game start out as HotAirPunk with Vampires ?  (Probably then it would have sold Twice as many copies ($$$) if they had stayed with that theme ...) Keep the Victoria Frankenstein-ish stuff, add some Werewolves ....
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== Here's Something Else Created in 1893 ==
BoilerPlate
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4x06FnP1OQ
Actually has a still of the 1893 Exposition ( and I don't see Columbia floating overhead... )
And while we are on SteamPunky stuff    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R77aVipcDt8
Makes me think that 'Columbia Infinite BS' twist should have been that 'the Holy City of Columbia, the New Eden' was actually perched on a Mesa Top in Utah, and everyone there was just on some kind of hallucinogenic vapor (a Fink Mfg. product) -   A result of grand promises being made, but the Luteces (a brother-sister 'grifter' pair) 'took off' with all the Money Comstock had raised (... B T Barnum was right after all)  resulting in their deaths and the creation of   The Big Scam   (Coloombiah' in Ancient Anasazi language is 'Big Cheat' ).
You wonder why you need to take a 'rocket' to get there - well a vapor chamber acclimation and then bundled off to Utah in a  freight box to awaken in 'the New Eden'....
=====(seriously you cannot help but to come up with better alternate plots than the one they delivered...)=====
== Andrew Ryan hates poor people ... ==
A good question might be : Of all the 'poor' people that Fontaine and Lamb and Atlas preyed upon, selling them their parasitic ideals, How many were ADAM-addicts or common-drug or alcohol ruined people ? Suddenly, a possible reason for most everyone else in Rapture not being 'humanitarian' towards them makes a bit more sense.
Personal Responsibility IS part of the Philosophy Rapture was founded upon.
Consider the possibility of people who are mental , and are told they deserve everything to be given to them, and then get armed with Combat Plasmids (like by Atlas) - What they might do ? What likely would Andrew Ryan do to someone arming these crazy people and inciting them ? What would the People of Rapture DEMAND that Ryan do to such a person who threatened their safety and livelihoods ? The BioShock story seems to ignore this.
Its just one more thing you can figure out for yourself without requiring a series of Audio Diaries to spell out (as if there ever would be for this issue, since it reasonably explains WHY Andrew Ryan did things for which the plot repeatedly lambaste him as being a 'tyrant'.)
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== Some Interesting Website about Pertinent Subjects ==
Some interesting information about the World around the time period of Infinite BS
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1893                   Economics around  Columbia's start time
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-m9A8mY-U0        1900 Berlin in Color
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHqpHf_Znzs           San Francisco 1905 (before earthquake)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtoRYmKRwIE&list=PLE14D537472ABCE68       Berlin in 20s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFCuE5rHbPA        "Just Glue Some Gears On It" amusing SteamPunk
== War of the Floating Cities ==
You think the 'Quantum' technology could have been kept secret ?
DO You think that the money to build Columbia came out of the thin air ?  You think the US Government even had the money to build it, or any desire to raise taxes to pay for it ??
Various investors would be needed from Industrialists/Banks who WOULD make sure they Got their moneys worth - particularly getting ahold of the technologies that made it possible.
Pix of Andrew Carnegie's Floating City :
== Now a Universe of Alternates ... ==
BaSXtreme  - The Story so Far ...
Elizabeth goes back to Columbia and is pointed at as "The False Shepherdess" and is chased.  She finds that it is a young Booker who is 'the Lamb of the Prophet', and HE now has the magic Tear powers.  Comstock, having gotten the Luteces to kidnap himself as a baby from an alternate Universe, was going to have Fink(Enstein),  with his 'advanced' technologies, transfer 'Father' Comstock's mind into the boy as his own body was giving out.  Fink now knowing about 'conditioning' might have other plans.
Elizabeth also hears that a Big Daddy somehow got through one of the Tears, and had terrorized Columbia for several weeks, until finally, after doing substantial damage, it ran off an edge and plunging into the Ocean below - now only 100 feet down.   This Big Daddy had also been the one, which in an earlier incident in Rapture, had during an experiment bonded with Suchong, and then gone crazy.
== Another interesting picture Website ==
Lots of interesting sets of pictures including iconic bits of history....
http://life.time.com/history/
http://life.time.com/history/lower-manhattan-before-9-11-classic-photos-of-downtown-new-york/
== Quantum Physics Can Do Anything ==
This link is quite relevant or not relevant or both at the same time  (the cat lives!!!)
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/QuantumMechanicsCanDoAnything
That wiki has all kind of neat stuff (look up 'canon' on it for example)
Heh 20 seconds and found this:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ArtisticLicensePhysics
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== You Never Saw Ryan and Atlas at the Same Time... : ==
You Never Saw Ryan and Atlas at the Same Time... :
SO what you are saying is that Atlas was actually Ryan ??
Was he tired of Sander Cohen having all the fun and wanted to slaughter people wholesale and sit back and  drink Martinis and 'Putt a golfball while Rapture Burned' ??
So Fontaine actually WAS killed ? (Easy enough actually after the fetus incident, he just had Sullivan put a  bullet in his head and ground him into 'fish food').   Rapture was getting a little boring after 10 years and  Ryan was getting antsy.    So Atlas just happens to waltz easily into that Submarine Pen in Smugglers Hideout, when there is a dragnet going on with 10 X that ADAM Bounty offered on Jack for Fontaine 'Dead or Alive??  He waltzes right back out again, escapes from a gang of Spider Splicers?    Yeah right...
Sounds pretty twisty, don't it ?? -- a heck of alot better than Ryan killing himself so pathetically.  So that  statue-like freak 'Atlas' at the end of BS1 was really Ryan all Spliced up ? (or was that some other trick ??  Maybe  Sinclair's improved version of a "Handyman" stolen BACK from some Columbia ...)
What is little known, is that on his arrival in the USA from Russia, Ryan was employed in a Vaudeville act,  where he did numerous voices including a Bronx-like one and an Irishman, and even an annoying woman in glasses (it is actually where he originally met Sander Cohen who at the time was doing a juggling act with a 'running' chainsaw, a bowling ball, and an apple).
=====Note- Splicers in Rapture have too much time, well-addled brains, and often come up with crap stories like this constantly to  while away their hours.=====
== BAS3 The Movie.... (or not) ==
Next Episode BaS3:
Next Episode BaS3 (set just before BS1) a Ryan (one of infinite ones) comes back from an alternate (pick one there are infinite ones of those) dimension (so he again isn't dead) to hunt Elizabeth, who is meddling as always, now in Rapture (now renamed "Columbia Xtreme")  -- sent by the Luteces(three of them in THAT universe)  to kill her  before she realizes THEY (Luteces) are the root cause of all the unfortunate things happening, and then will (coin flip) set out to Kill Them despite their sort-of being dead already.   Needs more twists and complications?   OK .... an alternate Fink (for some reason there is only one of him - all the (infinite) rest are named 'Funk') comes to help Elizabeth (with his own agenda of course) but this particular Booker (now in Elizabeth's head ... or is it multiple Booker's in her head now ??? infinite ones ??) warns that he (Fink) will be trouble, so they pay Sinclair(who is successful in MOST of his infinite multiple existences)  to haul him (Fink) away, to be sent to Persephone (or as it is called  "Barneys Purple Fun House", in at least one universe) to get some electroshock 'therapy' (Fink, not Sinclair).  
Though near the end, Fink appears as a Big Daddy who will pair with Sally, but eventually may or may not fall through a Tear mousehole and wind up in an episode of Lost in Space in 1965 (or Star Trek, third season).   Anyway, cameo appearances by Stanley Poole, Grace, Byron Cotswold, Eleanor, Schrodinger the Cat,  Old Man Whorthers( the creepy Lighthouse keeper) and numerous and sundry others -- including no less than 42 different Luteces.  Beside those, there is a larger role by Suchong (you get to see the scene of his demise if you have the Season Pass) and a major role by Johnny (the lame-o who got eviscerated at the beginning of BS1 by Rose The Splicer - though he might now be the guy who killed and took the place of real Fontaine and this was the way to get rid of Fontaine's body, but maybe not - all will be only vaguely hinted at in Audio Diaries).
Here is a diagram of the now complete Timeline for Columbia&Rapture&HelloKittyland-PurpleUnicornContinuum :
== The REAL ending of Infinite... ==
"shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain ..."
The one universe does NOT allow  "Do Overs" .
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== Infinitesimally Small Chance ==
Consider that Tears supposedly can open anywhere.  We are shown that in the game.
Consider that the habitable parts of the real universe are infinitesimally small compared to the uninhabitable and fatal places like the inside of stars or the vacuum of space (the vast majority being those actually).
Consider that in these infinite number of multiverses which the Luteces have come to exist in and started playing around with Quantum Physics and created that machine that creates 'Tears' how lucky a few of them are that some Tear didn't simply open their inter-dimensional opening into the vacuum of Space and they weren't instantly sucked into oblivion and subjected to a near instantaneous blood boiling death.
Consider that little coin flip game Robert is playing being only a ridiculous example compared to a REAL probability game where the vastly majority of every one of their tear experiments end in annihilation of themselves.  Any single dimension/timeline where they happen to continue on alive is a mere lucky tiny gnats worth of all the others they have destroyed themselves in.
Each 'Tear' they open is a Russian Roulette game with a gun with some horrendous number of bullets and just one empty chamber that they pull the trigger on.  The Luteces we see are just one in an infinite number of other Luteces that have destroyed themselves and these ones THIS TIME  managed to get the infinitely small chance to have survived each Tear they have opened in their lives.   Any NEXT Tear in the game would most likely be their last.  In the vacuum of space you cant hear anyone shout  "GAME OVER MAN".
But Consider there are infinite upon infinite universes existing in this fantasy multiverse thing (if they actually stick to the system of 'how things work' they say they have used).   So we can play, but each time a Tear is opened by Elizabeth, it should usually be GAME OVER with nice special effects of a nasty death from being sucked into a vacuum  EACH TIME.  It hasn't happened yet, so she is oblivious to the highly potential death that will result.  Once in a long while you might get the Tear opening onto the inside of a star (actually MUCH more probably than on some habitable planets surface) and all of Columbia being nearly instantly incinerated by million degree plasma spewing out of the tear.  That would be exciting for the few seconds it might take.
After repeating such gameplay with such nasty results enough for the player, most will come to the conclusion that its not much of a game to play, and really isn't worth the grind of trying to get something interesting to come out of a Tear like a Purple Unicorn or an entry to the Hello-Kitty Universe or some nearly the same multiverse dimension where something interestingly different has happened (many more will be drastic changes making them unrecognizable, and others with no visible difference except some tiny invisible quark which has a slightly different state (THAT IS WHAT THE THEORY THEY HAVE CHOSEN ACTUALLY SAYS ABOUT MULTIVERSES)
SO here is a counter theory :  Any possibility of a dimension where 'Tears' could be used is overridden by the fatality of opening the 'Tear', so that by logical probability all those infinite separate dimensions will have instantly wiped out the individuals attempting  to manipulate Tears  (and any further development of  or  through them) thus resulting in a universe with no actual Tear use by Luteces or Elizabeths (or anyone else) of that technology.
If anyone wants, I can explain why even if the ludicrous Time Travel thing they have in-game (BTW - NOT supported by any real Quantum Physics or even that defrocked theory the game writers have latched onto) works through this physics system ----  the point is  -- if any Tear doesn't move, while the Universe does (earth/stars/galaxies all move at thousands of miles a second) -- AGAIN resulting in a Tear almost always  opening into vacuum and near instant death.  SO if the Tear is the same point in space  (versus all the fatal fun up above where its NOT the same spot) it still results in catastrophe almost every time.
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== TeslaPunk ??? ==
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=Teslapunk
another is Nano Punk ....
These are  getting kinda derivative now.
Seriously whats next -  Fertilizer Punk ??
Punk Punk ??
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== Braaaaaainnnnnzzzz!!!! ==
OK, not Zombies but instead Cannibals....
Its a good thing that Ryan used the Pheromone system to get control of the Splicers, who because of the disruption of supplies were starting to get rather hungry and those corpses were starting to look mighty tempting.    Imagine what it would have been like when Jack first got to Rapture.  Johnny (Atlas's rather dim/pathetic lackey) being filleted and THEN scarfed down....  Those Splicer who found Jack when he did his first Splicing ...  Imagine if they had pulled out cutlery and were starting a fire before the Big Daddy & Lil Sis showed up to break up their little cookout ...  Atlas asking Jack "Would you kindly .. come to "dinner"...   All kinds of fun scenes - less corpses and more body bits "grillin on the barbee".     Veeery interestin menu signs in the Bistro.  Ketchup being sold in the Circus of Values machines....
Hmmm, Interestin idea ... Columbia being cut off from its food supplies ... starving ...
== You did not kill Ryan in Bioshock 1 ==
Besides the test someone did by being killed where you allegedly 'brain' Ryan with the golf club and wound up being resurrected back in the Rapture Central Control area's Vita-Chamber (as Ryan would eventually have been after he was 'killed').   With the Vita Chamber in Ryan's office off, you merely get scooped up by the next nearest one (I recall jumping back to the one in Point Prometheus from the other end of the complex -- a much further distance and it worked just fine).
Anyway ...
Here's a picture ( pix ) of what can only be an Animatronic Ryan blithely playing golf while on fire in his Office.
It only makes sense that after Ryan figured out what was going on (WYK Room pix ) and who Jack was that he would turn the tables on Atlas/Fontaine and fake his own death (Animatronics from Ryan Amusements) and then launch Jack at Fontaine and follow up with 100 Splicer myrmidons and an armada of  Flybot if needed once Jack had bird-dogged Fontaine. 
You don't seriously think Ryan would botch destroying Rapture if he intended to, or having any chance of control of HIS city falling into Fontaine/Atlas's hands, do you?
No he wanted Fontaine /Atlas out of the way so that he could rebuild Rapture.
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I went back and ran thru  Rapture Central Control again and yes just like in the video the Vita-Chamber out in the entry area works fine when the one in Ryan's office is 'turned off'.  You get killed right were Ryan's body lies and you zip off to that other Vita-Chamber and emerge 'fresh as a daisy'.  As Ryan should have.
SO this is Canon evidence that Ryan wasn't really killed by Jack  (!!!)  Must've been some animatronics lying there with the Golf Club sticking out of its 'brain'  (handy Ryan-like machines existed, as we saw in Ryan Amusements - very clever for Ryan to fool Atlas/Fontaine with to make him come out of hiding for Ryan to finally nail him ) .  And with Jack all hopped up on ADAM who knows what un-reality he saw or didn't see ('Ryans boys' could just as easily re-condition Jack to then be sent on his way to kill Fontaine or at least to locate him for Ryan's forces to goosh him like a bug).  
Wait, it gets better  -- the whole Delta/Lamb thing was a setup to convince Tenenbaum to work on a Cure for ADAM Disease to save Rapture.    Seriously you are shown so little from the point of player in the game and have been  manipulated over and over,  WHAT do you really know about all else that went on??
But,but but.. Levine (or whoever) declared Ryan was dead....   But then, when it is time to make another game ($$$), anything and everything can be changed to whatever they want (look at the claptrap in Buried at Sea which likewise has been declared 'prime' -- whatever THAT is supposed to mean --  in that bizarro-land pseudo-science BS universe Infinite is made of)
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== Even the cats in Rapture started wearing masks : ==
Kitty Splicer ?
Cats on Brain Boost - oh my !!!
Hmmm
And then things just started getting weird...
Robotic Little Sister ??   McClendon's ill fated project ...
== Columbia - the pure - why let 'those others' stay ?? ==
Robot Servitor   <<< With steam powered floatiness, designed to do the bidding of The Righteous (and replacing those existing lowly bothersome servitors as fast as Fink can crank them out.  More useful work with less problems and expense.....
When this advanced Tear 'obtained' tech ( they use as an excuse for anything else that breaks physical laws and other 'wave of the hand' fantasy stuff) is available, then why not FIX something they (Comstock and his flock) think is actually important to the well-being of Columbia ??
Get rid of all those 'others' (the chaff) who are inferior and a liability.   New Eden is not supposed to be full of serpents, after that little incident with the original one.   Why tempt fate and risk continued contamination by an element that the Founders should want gone ???
Disposing of the existing problem is as simple as throwing the unholy ones off the side of Columbia and then putting the space wasted on them to better use.
== Another Term for the Rapture styling -- Streamline Style ==
Lots of examples on the image search    http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=streamline+style  linky
Overlaps significantly with Art Deco.  I only saw the term 'streamline style' recently  (was looking into atom/atomic punk to see how much was out there on that (another one I only heard recently)
 
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== Probably not seeing face was a good thing ... ==
There's a reason many games never let you see the Players avatar ( face, etc, not just armor that masks whats underneath ),  for one, it impinges on your imagining yourself to be that person
An illustrative image - assuming the devs wanted to be somewhat realistic :
http://lostro.deviantart.com/art/Delta-Unmasked-203190550
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== Rapture Ruins - real world images ==
Inspiration - Pictures
One thing about a 'Retro' theme for a game - they don't have to actually think up much that is original ideas...
Not sure why this would be on a weather site but ....
http://www.weather.com/travel/modern-ruins-abandoned-detroit-photos-20130715
Ryans nightmare or Elizabeth's future ?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2921349/posts
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2191552/Stunning-1950-images-effects-atomic-bomb-attack-New-York-City.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
Tech stuff
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kraftwerk_Heimbach
http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2009...etro-tech.html
http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2012...hip-house.html
Art Deco
http://artdecoarchitecture.deviantart.com/gallery/
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=Art+Deco+Buildings
http://www.virtualtourist.com/travel...Deco-BR-1.html
Replica models
http://www.replicabuildings.com/prodimages/cincinnati-union-terminal-building-replica.jpg
http://www.replicabuildings.com/Building-Replicas.html
Real 1905 era city  (SF before the quake)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2_4pnmcE5E&feature=player_embedded#t=2s
A good site for all kinds of ideas
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Zeerust
That thing in Disneyland
http://p8.storage.canalblog.com/88/00/671517/47251268.jpg
http://jmag77.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2007/12/16/hollywood_tower_hotel_fabuleux.jpg
real thing http://www.fivestaralliance.com/files/fivestaralliance.com/nodes/2008/17816/1202_ext_fsa-g.jpg
Steampunk goodies  (Rapture would be Dieselpunk ...)
http://www.steampunkworkshop.com/lcd.shtml
Skyline Rapture was made to resemble (outside ocean views anyway) despite the inetriors largely being shopping mall sprawls.
http://mdphd.med.nyu.edu/files/directions/images/aerial.jpg
http://www.artfire.com/uploads/product/6/756/85756/3785756/3785756/large/antique_1927_manhattan_island_new_york_usa_black_and_white_aerial_view_rotogravure_a4946972.jpg
Good thing Jack didn't get the Full treatment ...
http://lostro.deviantart.com/art/Delta-Unmasked-203190550
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== I should Find This Disturbing ... ==
http://bioshock.wikia.com/wiki/File:Bioshock_Infinite_-_Booker_The_Psychopath_%28Death_Scenes,_Finishing_Moves%29
It strikes me that they spent a great deal of time/money working on the many various animations for this violence.
The different moves simply with the Sky-Hook (though several there look like 'canned' scenes)
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== More ideas for Infinite (since the cheese is already cut) ==
Raptor Booker and Elizabeth....  
(remember -infinite possibilities....)    BTW, did you know there were no VelociRaptors during the "Jurassic"Jurrasic period is : the second period of the Mesozoic era, between the Triassic and Cretaceous periods. The Triassic Period 201.3 million years ago (Mya) to the beginning of the Cretaceous Period 145 Mya. period ?  (They lived in the Cretaceous period - well that's Hollywood and marketing for you ...) Those 'raptors'  which they showed in that movie weren't even Velociraptors (which in reality were little more than 2 foot tall feathered super chickens).    Someones got some "splainin to do" ... ( Hollywood Idiots don't care what lies they tell IF it makes things simpler for the 'Rubes' ...)
15 Channels and NOTHING good on any of them :
In Buried at Sea  Booker comments about a Rapture TV show he had seen,  with some stupid absurd plot about a flying city and some cult weirdness and some crazy antics by the main characters Fred and Jane.
Trash in the Clouds :
The story of the unsung heroes of Columbia and their trials and tribulations while disposing of the Prophet's floating city's garbage and waste.    There are many thousands of those garbage cans and piles of boxes and crates to constantly be emptied/disposed of  -- they are always so full of so much stuff people throw out, the discarded cash money alone adds upto more than a ton a day.
Duke and Dimwit : The real life story ..... 
Parallel universes --  allow untold stories to be told about catastrophic disasters caused by a single insignificant mistake  (when you live in a "floating city", what happens when that floatiness suddenly stops ???)   The sign that said "Don't Press This Red Button" ...
THE LUTECES MUST DIE :
Since the Luteces are the real cause for this whole mess (where would Comstock have been without the tech to build Columbia, etc...)     A new quick story plot is Elizabeth setting out to destroy the Luteces where ever they are in the Multiverse.   Lots of potential settings and mixes of NPCs to fight against and with.    Ever see a squadron of Handymen in an Attack Ship on fire off the Shoulder of Orion ????
Comstockland :
Comstock's original idea was to build an amusement park to present his ideology to the masses   It would have Ricky Rat, a cartoon character, as its happy mascot.   Various rides and entertainments would distract the patrons as they were propagandized.   Then he had a much better idea ... No, NOT Churros.
Picasso comes to Columbia :
Yes, a very strange portrayal of Columbia in a Cubist rendered GPU format (a little early as Cubism was 1914 - but heck this can be a different multiverse....).   A major advancement in visualization (leading to Cubization of old movies by Ted Turner 60 years later).   You want weird, you got weird.....
Superman comes to Columbia :
Why not ??  Someone who really could fly....
Columbia visits the Sun - They went at Night... :
To escape the avenging force of Teddy Roosevelt (recently out of office) and his "Wind Riders of the United States Army Air Corps", Comstock and Columbia attempts to escape to the Heavens, is imperiled by the Moon Cannon and must seek safety elsewhere....
The Scarlet Pimpernel in Rapture :
An Agent of the still alive but hidden  Ryan who, in disguise,  keeps going into Lamb-land  and rescues imperiled citizen from the evil Lambs murderous clutches.  With his sometimes sidekick Big Daddy Sancho he spirits the unfortunates out under Sofia Lambs  very nose.  A delightful tale of derring-do outwitting evil in Rapture ...
Sorry for the Inconvenience :
Booker and Elizabeth get to the Rapture Lighthouse, but down in the dock there is a sign "Sorry, Out of Order" and no bathysphere.    A Tears trying to get to another one WITH a bathysphere, takes them to a universe where an infinitely rare Brownian Motion event, where the random motion vectors of a large number of their component molecules aligns in one direction and  throws both of them over a mile away into the freezing water  (even more fun if it was a Lighthouse in an ocean of boiling water).
Gullivers Rapture :
Booker and Elizabeth and Songbird appear inside Rapture, but something is terribly terribly wrong.  In the Bathysphere dock the discarded suitcases are  20 feet tall and  everything else is in the same giant scale.  The trio are menaced by one of Rapture's rat vermin and then are  witness to the arrival of a Bathysphere and a giant human being disemboweled by a giant Spider Splicer.  Wandering thru Tears and strange Lighthouses starts to lose its desirability.
Plot Twist :
Slight change of plot with Sofia Lamb being whacked 'that night' by Delta, and that Eleanor might have been reconstituting her from 10 year-old rotted corpse tissue instead of Johnny Topside (or whoever).   Jack likely would have fried Sofia on the spot if she tried to pull her little antics on him (" Eat Wrench, crazy lady !!! ").   That's a pretty good 'alternate universe' plot with sufficient Twisty-ness, and gives the fans something they really would like to see happen.
Rapture is Ryan :
Turns out that Ryan was the actual one who kicked Fontaine's butt, while Jack was being deprogrammed after the little charade of his 'assassination' of Ryan.  Ryan puts on his Ironman power armor suit and has at Atlas, and finally does the famous   " THISSSS .. ISSSSS.. RAPTURRRRRE !!! "    scene and kicks Fontaine/Atlas down from Prometheus Tower and into the pit of 'molten magma' where he dissolves still clutching the Genetic Key.  Ryan  then sets out to resurrect his city in the name of Objectivism and Capitalists everywhere.
Rise of the Machines : Where it began...
Elizabeth and Booker arrive at Rapture to find that the Artificially Intelligent Toilet Scrubbing machines have begun to try to exterminate all humans. These feral sanitation devices are led by an entity the Splicers start to refer to as "The S.T.I.N.K.E.R.".  One specially built killing machine has come back in time from the future  to kill Booker because his daughter Sally is fated to lead the rebellion leading to the victory over The Machines...
A new Tenenbaum :
Now she is a man (Luteces aren't the only ones to use this trick...) and has a Nazi past catching up with her as Booker and Elizabeth uncover sinister goings on in Rapture.   Alternate realities clash, as across a Tear it is revealed that Tenenbaum herself years before was the "First" Little Sister .....  Elizabeth winds up drowning herself it the climactic ending.
Delta - King of Rapture :
As with other Alphas, Delta is not killed by his disconnection from his pair-bonded Little Sister, and starting in Paupers Drop, Delta seizes power and starts systematically eliminating Sofia Lamb's minions and making the remaining citizens accept his control.  Using the Security Key he took from Grace's corpse, he takes command of the security systems and starts an invasion of the rest of Lamb's little collectivist regime.  Sofia Lamb suddenly learns what fear really is.
Alternate BS1 Plotline :
Booker hears of the 1000 ADAM Bounty on the 'dangerous Surface invader', and heads out with his trusty 'M1' Rifle to deal with the miscreant.  After dispatching that threat to Rapture, Booker gets a hardy handshake from Ryan himself.  Ryan then decides that Booker is the right man to track down and finish off Atlas/Fontaine (whom Ryan has already figured out)  who is still hiding in the sewers.  That mission being the played sequence for this DLC episode.
BioCheese:
A cartoon version of Rapture with the main characters being mice in a big old rundown house...
What if :
Remember that Booker and Elizabeth skipped out of one inconvenient universe into another with a changed situation (how many times ?).   But wouldn't it be interesting to show THOSE situations continuing in a playable environment (reusing Assets already produced - the company cant hate that...)  with whole different plot results playing out - The revolution petering out a failure, the Founder forces cleaning out the Vox Populi and Daisy Fitzroy's public execution after being turned in by an informer.  Booker and Elizabeth?  Some quantum BS allows them to escape and they head for the wilds of South America or somesuch...  whatever.  Columbia sails into the sunset, its population completely wiped out by a plague virus that came thru one of the Tears, now a ghost city blowing with the wind, awaiting some other Adventurers.
Ditto ^^^^  Except its a ZOMBIE Virus !!!!
Delta is Alive ?? : 
Sigma faces a pile of 'TNT' as big as Delta had explode near him, so why wasn't he turned into hamburger ? (Why wasn't the 'Lifeboat' for that matter ?)   So Delta might still be alive ??  Sounds like an interesting mini-plot where you play Delta AFTER you fall back down to the depths,  minus a bunch of your ADAM (Eleanor didn't do the usual full Little Sister vampire act).
Where he wound up and what he did while things moved forward with New Rapture is a story waiting to be told.
Wizard of Rapture :
Little Sister Dorothy along with :
* The Tin Daddy
* The Cowardly SpiderSplicer
* Security Fly-bot #7
* and Tiddles the Cat
Are "Off to see the Wizard" of Rapture
Pursued by the Wicked Witch of Persephone
Will Dorothy 'get home', or Will it all again be an odd dream caused by severe head trauma ?? Who cares if the Munchkins elected their mayor with secret ballots and the place is run by factions of borough bosses in smoke filled rooms and some disgruntled candy-makers who blew up the guild factory last week ???  Dorothy is off on 'The Yellow Brick Road' on a collision course with evil trees, flying monkeys, dysfunctional sidekicks, and Oz's dictators, trying to metaphorically struggle her way out of un-consciousness/delirium caused by head trauma.   (DLC timed to coincide with the 75th Anniversary of the movie ...)
The Strange Place :
A twisted tale where they enter the "Harry Potteresque Purple Unicorn Continuum" and fight power-armor-equipped Hello-Kitty like beings.  Its like a bad dream where so many things are wrong and absurd .... Yes,  the P.I. DeWitt and Elizabeth go to Columbia.
What would the Alternate Rapture been like  :
If Andrew Ryan's "One Law" had been ---> "NO CLOWNS !!" ????
Booker P.I.  The case of  : The Woman Without a Face :
BaS - Elizabeth so blithely unlocks all those door locks for Booker.  But apparently one time she was a little too overconfident/cocky.  The lock was well boobytrapped ( an Ingram Industries model 56 deluxe)  and went off in her face, not just exploding, but also spraying her with acid.  Even a trip to Dr Steinman wasn't much help.  So now the psycho-drama twist of BAS Xtreme Episode 4 is the Player having to look at her mangled/melted face and seeing if they so easily interact with their speech slurring  'sidekick' ( Booker makes a comment about Elizabeth LOOKING like she had been 'side kicked' by something big ).  Will Elizabeth looking like Freddie Kruger (or rather worse) have any effect on the Playing experience ??
Early problems with Little Sisters :
Big Daddies stepping on their Little Sisters, causing the Big Daddy to pound itself into senselessness for harming a Little Sister needed correcting.
A tendency for Little Sisters to climb into garbage disposal chutes (leading to incinerators) mistakenly thinking they were 'Vents'.
Suchong initially expecting the Little Sisters to be armed with sub machine guns and knives to defend themselves.
Various mishaps with laxatives and other means to try to extract the ADAM from Little Sisters. Mechanism used to feed geese for foie gras,  also not too productive.
Tears lead to tears :
An abuse of  Tears by Elizabeth leads to her perpetually inhabiting a world of random Tears of all kinds and places and nastiness and bad smells. Constant intrusions and confusion drives her mad, until in an attempt to escape she finds herself as Comstock saying "it is ended", just as Booker drowns her, all within some kaleidoscopic manifestation of Columbia.   The Luteces appear and clap in mock ingenuous applause, and say in unison "Well, that was the best one yet".
Great Minds :
The Vita-Chambers can 'bring back the dead' ?? From DNA ?? (Well, how does the DNA get to that Vita Chamber if YOU are dead ?? Well, ignoring that little issue ...)   Someone suggested to Ryan that he send Agents on The surface to recover the DNA of the greatest minds in history (Ryan shouldn't be bothered by desecrating graves, etc..).  Sinclair's advertising BS seems to have too many dupes believing it.  Ryan himself knows it doesn't work that way, and the advanced features of the Vita-Chambers are really just sophisticated resuscitation.   Anyway, a plot by some group of Rapturites thinking that this is the answer to 'saving Rapture' and their disastrous adventures and the story for the misinformation film 'The North Atlantic Project'.   Oh and some Booker and Elizabeth (infinite multiverse ...)  happen to see the movie in a B-grade theater and call it ridiculous crap - should have seen 'Plan 9' instead ...
BBQ at Fontaine's (near the Toys department) :
Our special BBQing tube grill which can have your tasty choice of meat sizzling in just seconds, with the twist of the wrist on our patented flame broil controls.   Convenient and safe access points for delivery of our Savory BBQ'd  meats to you, our valued customers.
Don't forget to leave a tip.  For Safety, please keep small children away from the grill.
"I say. What is that thing ?"
Luteces visited Rapture, saw some little girls with strange glowing eyes, and tried to talk to one - then there was the sound of a drill spinning, some muffled screams and then silence, and later "Daddy's good, he took care of those scary people..."    
Problem solved.
Odd Splicers  for DLC :
Boss called 'Farmer John' - whose Plasmids allowed him to talk to turnips.  Unfortunately, the turnips have little to say.  So therefore he usually just throws them at you.  (Generic minion Splicers in old style farmer outfits - hmmm, reminds me of Mike the enforcer from 'A Boy and his Dog").   Farm Tractor chase scene !!! (using the new Unreal engine's vehicle capabilities).
Since Ryan wont allow a "Rapture Christmas Special" :
Why give up all that present giving stuff, after all "The Business of Rapture is Business"....  You can still have the Dr Seuss Festival Day cartoon.  Seaweed draped with ornaments with gifts underneath, Splicers in Santa Hats, Big Daddies wearing festive jingle bells and colored blinking lights, Peppermint Candy Tridents, and all the other crass commercialisms  (Removing religion from Holidays is nothing new, after all).
Burn, Baby, Burn. :
A roving gang of near-insane but fun loving Houdini Splicers go thru to Columbia(s), thru a Tear, and (using Incinerate!) burned the whole place down.  They hop (Teleport) around the City setting fire to everything and everyone in sight, with little the Security can do to stop them.  Monumental fire special effects, flaming city blocks falling to earth spectacularly (need night scenes for that), denizens running about on fire, and utter destruction.  Each playthru they go back and destroy yet another alternate Columbia and have a good time generally.  Booker and Elizabeth watch Columbia's demise over and over in horrified fascination.  The forces of Columbia might fight back, but you see there are these infinite number of Splicers from infinite different Raptures to get in on the fun.  Quote - "We saw these Tear things and on the other side some nice shiny amusement park, and you didn't expect us NOT to go through them, did you ?"
Lets Take That One Further :
Infinite possibilities .....  Fontaine/Atlas beats Jack and becomes King of Rapture.  He hears about these 'Tear' things and after seeing what they lead to (Columbia), it becomes his new goal for conquest.  After sufficient 'observing' the technology, he gets Raptures scientists to understand and duplicate it, and sends his Splicer Army through Tears to invade and pillage Columbia.   Eventually Fontaine plans to apply the 'quantum' technology to Rapture and make IT a flying City to facilitate HIS conquest of the Surface World.
Why not have 'Evil' Jack do the same thing - just another flip of that 'infinite' coin.
Booker is the only Constant :
Too bad there are hardly any details about Songbird to make a proper judgement on that subject.   Strange multiverse enabled possibility - Songbird is a further extension of Booker's existence - coming from yet another parallel universe - it is Booker yet again ( brain only this time ? or his soul inside some resonating crystal or somesuch ?)    Hmmmmmm.   Lets explore the possibility that EVERYONE you see in the game turns out to be Booker from some parallel universe -- EVEN Elizabeth !!!   Karmic wheel much ??
Quantum Physics can be such fun.  (especially if you misapply it and try to use it to justify any/all physics-breaking game mechanics you think will be new and whizzbang to sell the game ).
So 'ending' Comstock is supposed to stop it all ?? :
Unfortunately there is that 'infinite' multiverse....
Infinite number of other people are ready/were ready/did step into the "Comstock's shoes".   Mr Bigglesworth ('Whitey' to his friends) in universe 876th row 17 down got the Catatopia Columbia built and played out the same story. (Except they ate Songbird and there are giant walking Hairballs menacing the player). And so it goes ...
There are no 'Do Overs' :
Last Scene of Game - (so Elizabeth just changed some alternate universe ?? HOW DOES THAT HELP ?????)
Gravestone :
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Annabelle Elizabeth DeWitt
Age 1  RIP
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Final final final scene for the game - that gravestone.    There are no 'Do Overs'.   Even Elizabeth's attempts to change things is an illusion ... All was just a toothache medicine fed Fever Dream of Booker's, bizarrely reflecting his ruined life.
BTW, what part of 'quantum physics' deals with this alleged Time Travel stuff ?  No its just some other multiverse reality running in a different timeframe - the original Comstock is still back there doing whatever nastiness he was going to do anyway, except Elizabeth bailed and can't do anything THERE to change things.
An Infinity of Infinites :
With this multi-universe thing there will be an infinite number of Luteces (and the infinite number of time machines to send them on  their '3 hour tour') and also an infinite number of Elizabeths.  Since every quantum particle in the universe (not quite infinite number of them) can flip one way or the other (or is it they can flip to a infinite number of states ??)  every one that flips spawns a new universe (I think I'm upto Infinity cubed so far)   Its possible they can do this and continue flipping infinitely fast too (but I will ignore that for now), Now with the possibility of transferring between these infinite cubed universes and interfering/meddling with them in infinite ways, we achieve Infinity Quadruped.  How does Elizabeth pick and choose (and according to Heisenberg and Schrodinger her entering the universe instantly changes its course - or rather spawns another infinite 'realities' -- so fix as many as you like, there are infinitely more messed up you will never get to - or better yet she makes the ones she meddles with WORSE).
Infinite multi-universes averaged together equals zero - that's the effect of a supposedly 'clever' gimmick that only waters down everything in the game because nothing is significant anymore,   Everything that took place has no import in the end - it changed NOTHING -- actually it never happened, its not even that 'cliche' "It was ONLY a dream..." .   Schrodinger's Cat sits in its box munching Tuna Fish and laughs.
They only come out at night :
The dark 'Vampire' Columbia theme (they don't like immigrants because 'too much garlic') Graveyards and weird shrieker things ... While visiting Transylvania, Columbia had an unexpected visitor who never left ... New Weapons, Gear, Vigors to counter the set of new Foes.
Recycle Columbia's terrain just change the lighting and weather effects.
Cash in the Bank for 2K
Columbia Vanquished :
Flash -  News Headline : Tesla's Death Ray deployed against Columbia -- Resulting in its complete and utter destruction.
The chase - Tesla's large device was transported by a special train to put it into position for the attack.  After repeatedly  encountering contrary weather, Tesla's machine finally brought Columbia to its deserved end.
In that fateful encounter, each time Tesla's device activated or 'fired', an incredible sound of lightning thunder was heard, and then what one witnesses described as "A giant banjo being struck by a giant sledge hammer". This was heard loudly, even though the enemy was over 5 miles away.  Pieces of the pirate city were torn asunder and were soon raining earthward.  The determined work was continued until there was nothing left, despite the criminal's attempted to flee.  We congratulate our modern technical genius and hero.
The Terror of Columbia has been ended.  Church bells rang throughout the land on the news and the President  has announced a day of recognition for the great patriotic scientist and his invention.
The Two of Us :
Elizabeth runs into one of her other selves and they begin a fist (and hair pulling) fight  --  in disagreement over whether to kill this one or destroying that one, or 'leave it alone' or 'STOP MEDDLING!!'.   Soon other Elizabeths appear and start taking sides and a good ole John Wayne style bar brawl erupts, much to the condescending amusement of the Luteces (and the shadowy Cat Aliens seen eyeballing the Luteces).
A Minervas Den magnitude DLC -  Columbia, the Work of the Devil :
After Columbia's depredations across America and many other places in the World (where do you think all the stuff Columbia needs to live comes from ???), kidnapping and stealing that which 'The undeserving and impure don't deserve - by the Prophets Order" and killing people who resist,  a collection of god fearin' backwoodsmen along with their Preacherman (hmm Walter Brennan look-alike) go to Columbia to destroy it utterly ... That work of Satan ... the False Prophet, and all his evil minions including the flying bat demon.  When Booker and then the US Army had no success, these country folk with their long rifles, white lightning, dynamite, Bibles and the Wrath of God on their side will put an end to that Abomination.
Reuse all the terrain from the main game (minimize costs), battle the same collection of dastardly NPCs and characters (some new dialog and diaries illuminating the REAL story of witchcraft and satanism hiding in this great shining travesty), lots of real Bible (no Royalties) quotations hurled about (lets see Comstock compete with the real thing) , and "Open Up a Can of Whupass" (the American Way) to bring this floating City of Hypocrisy, Vanity and Corruption crashing down - a proper and final end to a great Evil afflicting the World.
Just one of an infinite number of TRUE alternate universes which will happen,  did happen, and will always happen -- GUARANTEED CANON  (don't blame me, the game developers pushed this multiverse 'theory' mechanism crutch onto us - its their doing, but its a double edged sword ...)
Epilogue chapter with the hunt for and ending of the Luteces - the Devils tools who brought this villanous monstrocity into existence  -- this time the coin comes up 'Tails'.
-
A Touch of Reality for Columbia:
Columbia was allegedly built with government money (biggest fantasy of the whole game) and if somehow true, that would mean contractors -- not all of whom were honest (this where Fink got his start??).  Columbia purpose was to be a 'show city', and like many of such constructions at expositions at best are built intended to be quite temporary (ie- cut corners, cheap work hidden by a facade, unstable and not overly durable.)  Accommodations might not be quite as pristine and proper (probably more mundane, as they were designed for herds of exhibition-goers after all).   The in-city housing was meant for 'actors' and staff (anyone who could lived on the ground during the exhibition, would want to)  and is little better than the backstage of a vaudeville theater in a third rate city.
So when Booker is there, he should fall through a few collapsing floors (jumping down from the skyline which itself should malfunction quite a number of times).   Floaty Barges engines cut out and they go drifting away with the police on them cursing and scurrying about trying to get things patched.   He walks around and notices that an awful lot of the place is pretty shoddy and incomplete and fake in general, alot is just false fronts with nothing but barewood frames and tarpaper behind the facade.  Various things are ready to fall apart if touched.   Plaster statues are starting to cave in and just about explode in white clouds of dust if fired at.  All the people who built the place are long gone and constant temporary repairs leave the whole place rather hazardous.  The Skyline ride was shutdown halfway thru the Fair itself due to the fatal accidents.   Half the lights don't work because there are no replacement bulbs and shoddy electrical work ready to shock the unwary.   Some of the buildings float upside down or at odd angles as the 'floaty' machinery involved (whatever it is) is not quite adjusted right anymore.
A good joke would be most of the 'food' is actually circus/fairgrounds fare - hotdogs, cotton candy, soda, peanuts, as the inhabitants are stuck consuming the leftovers of the stale 'show city' supplies.  People in 'Columbia' wear the souvenir clothing and items after their other clothes have worn out. 
This all is the flying city of 'Columbia' in the real world, build by the lowest bidders who pocketed more than half their supply expenses and unloaded cheap materials and used the cheapest unskilled labor available.
The people now living there in their 'New Eden' are delusional enough to not notice all this (falling for a charlatan like Comstock and getting trapped there, most would have to be pretty deluded).
-
'Tear'ing Columbia a New One :
Maybe Columbia X exists in a 'Tear' since those things are basically 'magic' and can do anything you want (do you ever see the ground when you are up in Columbia ?)   The place from the start would have to exist in 'la-la-land' and likely has something to do with Elizabeth directly ( to be disclosed at the end as the 'twist' or 'anti-twist' -- neat 3D effects as the whole place collapses and crumples up like a wad of tin foil ).
In the first 5 minutes vid Booker effectively takes off in a rocket to get to Columbia from the Lighthouse at which time there probably will be the interdimensional transition to Lala-land/transdimensional-portal whatever.
Heh, maybe Columbia is also a Flying Dutchman picking up dead people ( makes as much sense as anything else -- but would mean that Booker is already dead ).   Hmm, it is really part of Hell and Booker is sent there for all his mortal sins....
I not only SEE DEAD PEOPLE,  I also see a Gingerbread City worse than a Lewis Carrol story :
It would be weird (and twisty) to have the Audio Diaries (Voxophones) you find have virtually nothing to do with the Columbia you see (perhaps it was/is really a ship on the ocean or Rapture), but does explain piece by piece what happened to lead to the delusional state of things, and the 'imagined' Columbia and the world it exists in all just in the inhabitant's minds.
That would add importance back to the audio diaries and other backstory revelations, where now with the fantasy bizarro-land state of things, any details you SEE don't really matter because they probably are not real like the rest of the place.
A problem is that you would basically have to hit players in the face explaining this situation and outright tell them - "The audio diaries are about the real Columbia, not the delusion you see around you ... and THAT is why they don't make any sense if you try to compare them.".   Otherwise some significant number of players wont 'get it' and will just write them off as gibberish and ignore them after that.
In the end its just a nightmare for a 'mental' Splicer in the Insane Asylum in Persephone.  Fontaine who Booker is investigating uncovers him and being too closely linked to simply murder, instead pumps Booker so full of conflicting/defective Plasmids that Booker is instantly on his way to the City Loonie-bin.  Oh and 'Comstock' is the brand of fluorescent light visible in Booker's padded Cell.  Throughout the whole thing with Booker having amazing philosophical discussions plumbing the meaning of the universe with 'Elizabeth', she is really just a stain on his cell's wall.
-
Oops :
Booker and Elizabeth suddenly appear at Rapture.  Unfortunately, a slight juxtaposition leaves THEM outside in the ocean being crushed by the pressure and drowning while Songbird is inside watching.   Not a big problem for Rapture as Songbird can't fit through those Securis Doors, and can't swim (to get out thru the Bathysphere hatch).   Possibly a problem for Jack, soon to arrive.  Later Sinclair sells tickets to see "The Oddity from Otherspace" and Fontaine/Atlas with his Plan B thwarted is cornered by Ryan and turned into fishfood.  Rapture is rebuilt and flourishes.   Strange how events like this happen in the Multiverse.
-
Columbia is Actually a Giant Zeppelin  (a Sci-Fi story without all the pseudo-science BS) :
No Quantum whatnot, no Tears, no magic powers for Elizabeth, time-travel or the rest of that stuff.
All depends on how passive the lift is (assuming it was designed 'right' to even attempt it for real).   Balloons bigger than the Superdome ABOVE each 'city block' (city made of fake lightweight bricks,  honeycombed lightweight metals and guywires for structures -- NO CONCRETE) filled with hydrogen (unfortunate idea safety-wise) or less-common helium (US largely had a monopoly on that, but probably wasn't enough of it  for this monstrosity). SO hydrogen would be the practical/possible method.   Fear of Fire...
Hot air would take constant burning (fuels add lots of weight and need constant replenishment) , but for  practicality would only be used for minor trimmings of the buoyancy. Trim Balloons to balance things temporarily while gasbags get adjusted. Big gasbag (hydrogen/helium) method that uses no energy (for lift)  thus would be most practical (for that aspect).   Lots of smaller gasbags ('cells') actually, inside the  outer skin.
Flight - Station-holding could take energy-expensive engines/propellers, but anchoring the city to the ground (a technical mess in itself) would not require alot of constant power use (moving the city against the wind of course WOULD take major energy use).   So lots of Floating WITH the wind and keen following of weather to pick favorable winds.  Sails of some kind ???  Could something so large 'tack' against the wind  ?? (hard with no keel - and water for the keel to leverage off of...)
The other issue is structural integrity for such large lightweight spindly structures- moment-arm/leverage working against you, especially during any strong gust winds. The "USS Akron" and "USS Macon"  were both torn apart in storms by wind shear, and spelled the end of the USA's rigid airship program 20 years later (Blimps with no rigid structure were substituted).  Something as large and made like fantasy Columbia would be magnitudes worse (pieces of the city ramming into each other/being torn apart).   So a more compact/solid/singular structuring is better -- no independent floaty bits.  Spherical/cylindrical/bullet shaped to minimize drag  (both body and gasbag).
Minimizing weight - so sorry no farms or large factories -- have to get alot of stuff from the ground (but didn't they have to anyway ????).   Troublesome under-class 'passengers' ? - 'dead weight' - ditch them at the next landing.   City of the Pure and Holy and Righteous (etc) NO OTHERS NEED APPLY.  Same cultist stuff can be there (sorry no ghosts unless too many inhabitants delve into hallucinogens a bit too much)
Technologies "Ahead of their time", but NO impossible "Against the laws of physics" stuff.  Labor saving  devices/automation/etc...   (This is closer to Diesel Punk level tech than Steam Punk - age of internal-combustion...)
Can actually have America 1912 issues as a game theme/plot.....
-
"Twistiness" - (twis-tee-nis)  - The state of being Twisted.
Explanation of how Vigors could be ADAM powered when there are NO Sea Slugs in Columbia :
Songbird is a giant mutant Sea Slug inside a protective encasement mechanism which maintains its required sea-water environment.  And yes, pigeons are benign by comparison, yet 'copralyphic' recovery is the source of the ADAM for Columbia.  Needless to say, Fink keeps this noisome source a secret.
-
== Here's how to justify 'Irregularities' in explanations of anachronistic technologies in Columbia : ==
Fink knows he cannot do it all himself --- he does NOT have the knowhow, tools, materials, etc. to even do the simplest things he sees in future (or even parallel era) technologies.   So still being the greedy sort, he has a bright idea:  He contacts all the other Finks in some large subset of all the infinite universes (even doing that he gets them all to help with doing that (kindof a multiverse chain letter....) and they only manage to reach a relatively small number) and they collaborate on projects.  Only an infinitely small number can be contacted  and agree or are persuaded,  but that still leaves an infinite number who do.  So they steal stuff, they grab tools and materials thru Tears and play with things to come up with how to make them work and make them as products.  Many die horribly in accidents (some entire universes explode) or are killed/eaten by others they try to steal from, but since there are infinite of them at work, some will succeed.    What we see in the game is a mere skimming of what the various infinite Finks (and whatever other names they have infinite variations of) have come up with. One useful early project was the Tear subways used to shuttle all the Finks and stuff around between the universes and multiverse-wide video email system for the infinite number of meetings they require to decide what/how/who/when/why to get things done (a majority simply argue forever but that still leaves an infinite number who cooperate).
Some Finks have taken over the Worlds they live in, in others the Comstock is just a robot they control and Elizabeth is a artificially intelligent parrot, in another the finks name is "Booker" and in another he is a sapient cat being.  One exceptional Fink creates a computer game about the infinite possibilities of himself.
"Infinite" is such a fun mechanism to play with.
There. Now we can stop worrying about it all and get back to mass slaughtering pixels.
-
== Sander Cohen King of Rapture ==
It turns out that Sander Cohen was the real mastermind behind Fontaine's and Ryan's (and even Lamb's) demise (playing them off each other).   You try to kill him, but like Dracula, he keeps coming back.  Pretty soon all of Rapture is filled with his 'Plaster-pieces' and all the Ryan Statues are now wearing bunny ears.   Gil Alexander (the not so great) is recruited to create giant rabbit splicers to be 'proper' subjects in this new Kingdom without Doubters under the sea.   TVs all suddenly show nothing but repeats of 'The Black Dream' which within it had encoded Cohen's plans for World Domination.
-
== Another Rise of the Machines - The Pneumos Revolt!!! : Pneumo Dalek ==
INNNN-SUFFFF-ICENTTTTT POSSSS-TAGGGGGE !!!!
INNNN-SUFFFF-ICENTTTTT POSSSS-TAGGGGGE !!!!
INNNN-SUFFFF-ICENTTTTT POSSSS-TAGGGGGE !!!!
-
== The Truth of the Real Columbia : ==
This story one of the power of self-delusion, greed, corruption and the seeking of prestige.  It deals with a monumental deceit, and murder.  It involves a true gang of rascals which could have fit very well into a Charles Dickens tale.
The Luteces, a brother sister team of scam artists, turned the "Columbia Gambit", as they called it, into one of their greatest criminal achievements.  They had been sniffing around the upcoming Worlds Columbia Exposition (of 1893) for some appropriate opportunity.
The man Comstock, who's previous alias was Booker DeWitt, went in with them in a game of defrauding the US Government and numerous investors.  Initiated by Comstock's 'visions' (seen in fever dreams resulting from too much bad Patent Toothache medicines) and his (what would later be called) 'used car salesman' speechifying, he fronted the scam as a Religious Prophet selling Salvation, Patriotism and Political gain.
The Lutece twins employed alot of convincing techno-gibberish, Tesla Coils and Geissler Tubes (early neon effects) to make 'wondrous devices' and various photographic tricks to fake 'floating' items (well known to Spiritual Medium scam-artists) to convince investors and politicians to ladle out public monies and legitimacy.  Private investors for the project followed.
This gang of thieves were joined by a corrupt public contractor named Fink, who knew 'more ways than anyone' how to falsify reports, bribe inspectors, and fake work progress while skimming funds and embezzling from his projects.
Comstock was eventually out-conned by the Luteces.   They left Comstock to take the blame and apparently he soon committed suicide by drowning himself.  The Luteces, as planned, faked their own deaths, skedaddled, and made their way to some destination unknown to spend their ill-gotten gains (and allegedly later they died in a kiln explosion in the middle of another scam).
Their so called 'City' had to be salvaged with whatever useful things reused to try to meet the opening day of the Exposition.  Various components were converted to barely adequate amusement rides and fair attractions.  More than one politician was publicly humiliated for falling for the hoax and sqandering the public's funds on this fiasco. 
There also was the  mystery of a decapitated corpse of a person known only as Elizabeth Comstock discovered in close proximity to the above events.  A stuntman batwings special ordered from the Paris Zeppelin Company of Hoboken New Jersey was one of many mystifying clues involved in the unsolved case.
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== --> REAL ending of Infinite ... ==
"Shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: ..."
The one real universe does NOT allow  "Do Overs" . RIP
There are Infinite possibilities, and THESE are only just a few of them.
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== Another fine website with Art Deco Architecture : ==
http://artdecoarchitecture.deviantart.com/gallery/
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