During development, a religious developer threatened to quit because he was uncomfortable with the portrayal of Comstock, a Christian. Ken Levine decided to sit down with the developer and discuss the character; it was agreed that if the developer was not satisfied at the end of the conversation about what they would do with Comstock as a character, he would be allowed to leave without any hard feelings. In the end, the developer was pleased with the changes Levine promised to make to the character and returned to work, and the discussion encouraged Levine to write Comstock with more depth and personality than he had originally intended.
As Booker and Elizabeth walk through an arcade, they see a game and he mentions how he heard it was "delayed THREE times." Since BioShock Infinite itself was delayed several times, this is a sly wink from the writers.
At the end of the game, when Booker encounters multiple Elizabeths, one of the Elizabeths is the beta model of the character seen in the first game footage. This may be a subtle suggestion that the previously shown version of BioShock Infinite (with different gameplay mechanics and designs) is canon in another universe as well.
Near the beginning of the game, the Lutece twins approach Booker. One wears a chalkboard with no writing or tally marks, only writing. They flip a coin for him and tell him to choose one of the two; he chooses heads. They mark the call, and when Robert Lutece turns around, you can see a large number of other heads called with zero tails on the other side. This indicates that Booker is stuck in an infinite loop, showing that he has been there before and has called heads over and over, creating an infinite loop of called heads.
Whenever Elizabeth flips a coin for Booker, she always catches it. "Heads Up."
Early in the game, next to a vendor, a key identical to the one in the first BioShock can be seen.
Albert Fink "created" his music in Columbia by eavesdropping on songs through the countless random tears that appear there. For this reason, the songs you hear sung throughout the game are actually songs reworked to be period-specific from the "future." For example, at the beginning of the game a quartet sings "God Only Knows," originally sung by the Beach Boys, and in a bar in the game you can hear Gloria Jones's version of "Tainted Love."
In one of the tears Elizabeth opens, there is a Paris cinema reflecting "La Revanche du Jedi," the French title of "Revenge of the Jedi," the working title of "Return of the Jedi." This tear probably provides access to a reality in which the film's working title was kept.
The development team reportedly cut "five or six games worth" of material during development.
According to the game's official strategy guide, the animators drew inspiration from the female protagonists of Disney films for Elizabeth's emotions, traits and animations.
Near the beginning of the game, when Booker is baptized as he enters Columbia, a priest in the hall asks another priest: "Is it someone new?" This is a reference to the original BioShock, where the first splicer the player encounters outside the bathysphere asks the same question.
In the game's first teaser trailer, the buildings in Columbia were held aloft by propellers and hot air balloons. In the actual game, Columbia is suspended high among quantum particles.
Troy Baker and director Ken Levine, in order to get an emotional performance out of Courtnee Draper, at Courtnee Draper's request repeatedly said demeaning and insulting words during the recording sessions until she reached the appropriate emotion needed for the performance.
Many of the anachronistic songs in the game were arranged by Scott Bradlee, who would later found the group Postmodern Jukebox. This group focuses on performing contemporary songs in various, often older, styles. In the game he appears as Jeremiah Fink's brother, Albert Fink. His body can be found in Emporia, near a tear where Cyndi Lauper's original version of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" can be heard.
When you arrive at Monument Island, before rescuing Elizabeth, there is a projector playing several historical clips in which Elizabeth is observed carrying out various tasks. One of the film clips is dated 04/15/12, of course the day the Titanic sank.
Almost nothing from the original E3 2011 trailer appears in the final game.
Right after Booker and Elizabeth go dancing, as they walk through the streets, the melody of Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" can be heard being played by street musicians; the song also appears in its original version in one of Elizabeth's 'tears.'
If you stay through the credits, you can watch a mid-credits scene in which Troy Baker and Courtnee Draper sing.
The original conflict was to be between "tech geeks" and "luddites." Ken Levine decided this conflict was not controversial enough, so he changed the situation and added the political angle.
In BioShock, the vending machine shouted "Welcome to the circus of values!" In BioShock Infinite, they say "It's a carnival of thrift!"
In earlier builds of the game, Elizabeth had a set of psychokinetic powers that she would use alongside Booker's. In the final build of the game, Elizabeth's powers were limited to opening dimensional tears.
The game's television commercials depicted a scene in which Booker rescues Elizabeth from being hanged by a mob, and the two are then attacked by a Handyman. No such scene exists in the actual game.
The game begins at a lighthouse, just as in the original BioShock.
In the second tear Elizabeth opens, in Finkton Proper, where Booker is a revolutionary hero, you can hear a woman singing Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Fortunate Son," but neither Booker nor Elizabeth acknowledges the song.
Daisy Fitzroy was originally white.
In the game, Jeremiah Fink paid his employees in company scrip, a common practice in which workers could only buy goods from the company store. Staying true to the historical record, Fink followed the practice of raising prices at the company store without raising wages to offset labor costs.
The Xbox 360 version of BioShock: Infinite became backward compatible on Xbox One on December 13, 2016. The BioShock games were among the first announced for the backward compatibility program. It took nearly a year for them to finally arrive, and in the meantime, the BioShock remastered collection was released for Xbox One and PlayStation 4.