Ken Levine explains to CVG that Bioshock Infinite bucks the trend when it comes to most shooters. How is that, you ask? Well, the ideas and historical influences that frame the game have a lot of depth to them.
At the heart of Infinite seems to be the idea of revolution, and the start of the game sees you exploring the city in the midst of a tumultuous time. Ken Levine explains that this, in some way, can be contextualized by looking at similar occurences in history.
"The world of Columbia is like the world of the riot. Think of periods of time like the LA riots or what the UK is going through right now. I don't want to make light of it, but when you normally walk down the street you don't think anybody's going to attack you, right? You don't feel that you're going to get into a conflict. In a riot, though, you don't know what's going to happen in a particular situation: you don't have confidence that you're going to be safe. At the other extreme you're not walking down the street shooting people with a machine-gun either; it's not appropriate – you're not in Stalingrad! It's a strange twilight world where you don't know what's going to set people off."
Sounds interesting, and, weirdly prescient when it comes to current happenings, right?