BioShock Infinite's floating city of Columbia. Photo: AFP
Rock outfit Nico Vega provide the pounding, powerful chorus, while the action moves
from dark and stormy night to Infinite's suspended skyworld and its strange inhabitants, both man and machine.
The series has made a habit of repackaging grand ideas, presenting them within the bounds of an action game: BioShock took on Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, while its 2010 sequel grappled with the collectivist views of John Stuart Mill.
BioShock Infinite takes place aboard a giant floating city in the early 1900s, identifying ideas of American exceptionalism as its totem, setting its skydives, gun battles, rampaging robots and daring rescues among nationalistic and revolutionary themes.
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It'll be one of a number of upcoming games to deal with America's place in history and current role -- among them, Call of Duty: Black Ops II plunges players into the midst of a West Coast invasion, while Assassin's Creed III proposes the American Revolution as the front for a more sinister battleground.