So of course, in addition to its apparently soul-wrenchingly terrible box art, the other controversy of note concerning Irrational Games’ BioShock Infinite is the rather frank racism that appears in the game. Not that the game’s message is specifically a racist one; the opposite is true. But Irrational reasoned that since they were making a game set within a particular historical period, they probably should take some inspiration from the historical figures of that day and age in crafting the dialogue and attitudes of characters in BioShock Infinite’s story.

Unfortunately for modern sensibilities, even people like Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson had some…pretty unflattering things to say about Jews and African-Americans. And BioShock Infinite, it would seem, doesn’t shy away from portraying this. This is a good thing, though, and a gamble on Irrational’s part that gamers can deal with such topics maturely.

(Insert joke about how the game is being released on Xbox here.)

Rock, Paper, Shotgun got an advance look at the PC version of the game, and the first part of their write-up about it looks at the game’s fascinating setting. The first five minutes of the game were recently posted online, and would seem to reinforce the message that RPS’ writer brings: the game looks awesome, and seems quite thematically rich. The ending of the game, by the way, is apparently…something unprecedented, though I honestly can’t imagine what Ken Levine means when he describes it as such.

Also, the game’s lead writer, Drew Holmes, gave a couple of interviews recently, discussing the game’s themes and commentary on racism, and its character development…especially that of Elizabeth, the female protagonist that will be the player’s constant companion during the game.

On the Baldur’s Gate front, a few more reviews of Overhaul Games’ re-release of it have been published, most of which are positive (though not all). A new, and large, patch for the game was also released recently.

And EverQuest Next was in the news again just recently, its developers trying to explain to people that they aren’t trying to make World of Warcraft 2. I don’t know if there’s anything to it, but I can’t help but notice that Ultima Online seems to get brought up a lot when EverQuest Next is discussed, and as far as I can recall the game is intended to be an open-world, sandbox-style game…possibly in the UO vein. (The president of its developer, Sony Online Entertainment, also had some interesting things to say about free-to-play, which I believe EverQuest Next is supposed to be.)

Oh, and it’s worth noting that Gamasutra listed Project Copernicus as one of their games that defined 2012, if only because it went to show just what risks attend developing large, AAA MMORPG in today’s gaming market.