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BioShock Infinite Writers Didn’t Fake Elizabeth’s Puzzle Solving
It would have been easy for Irrational Games writers to fake some of the storytelling in BioShock Infinite’s second Burial at Sea episode. There are moments when Elizabeth quickly solves a hidden code puzzle with a quick animation. The code is quite real and someone has solved it for themselves.
This post on Reddit was brought to our attention by former Irrational writer Drew Holmes via Twitter. “For any writer that thinks you can just make s*** up and nobody will notice... (Glad I did my homework!)” he writes.
The Reddit user who goes by the name “UpgradeTech” has posted a lengthy description of how the cypher works. It uses the periodic table to convert the symbols into their atomic numbers. After that, you need to apply a Vignère cypher.
This method changes the substitution for each letter in a coded phrase as determined by a repeating keyword. In this case, Suchong just couldn’t help but use his own name.
This is a smart bit of sleuthing. It also shows that writers will get found out if they are faking it or taking the time to do the research. For more on Burial at Sea Episode 2, check out our review.
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