Elizabeth is a fictional character in Irrational Games' BioShock Infinite. The game is set in 1912 on a floating steampunk city named Columbia which was founded on the principles of American exceptionalism. Elizabeth has been groomed in a controlled environment to take over the reins of the city once its current leader, Father Zachary Hale Comstock, dies. Elizabeth has the power to open "tears" in the fabric of reality; she is able to view remotely every event across all of the infinite timelines simultaneously and effortlessly open doorways to them, allowing her to access parallel universes. Her powers are a result of her unique nature, being simultaneously present in multiple realities, which was a consequence of Comstock's experiments.
To prevent her from leaving Columbia, her captors employ a "siphon" which drains and limits her powers, and she is locked in a tower guarded by a giant mechanical bird called the Songbird. In exchange for his gambling debts being forgiven, the main protagonist of Infinite, Booker DeWitt, enters Columbia in order to retrieve Elizabeth, unaware that she is his long lost daughter Anna DeWitt. Elizabeth also appears in Burial at Sea, a film noir-inspired episodic downloadable content story set in the underwater city of Rapture, where she takes on a femme fatale role and serves as the player character in the second episode.
The character is voiced by Courtnee Draper and her motion capture was provided by Heather Gordon. Irrational Games based Elizabeth's face on Anna Moleva, a Russian cosplayer, after the developers saw her accurate costume, and hired her to do live-action advertisements. Elizabeth's relationship with Songbird was partly based on Ken Levine's personal experiences. She is slightly naive after having lived most of her life in a tower. Developers repeatedly considered simply cutting her due to the hassle in making her "work". Great work was put into her artificial intelligence, with the developers believing there had been no real great A.I. companion in video games since Half-Life 2s Alyx Vance. The character has hyper-realistic expressions to help players see her from across the battlefield, as well as a two-tone colour scheme and unique silhouette. Elizabeth was heavily featured in news and media prior to the release of the game, and plastic figures of her have been made. She has been positively received, and Infinite reviews particularly highlighted her role. Her A.I. was praised, as was her character and narrative role.
Character Elizabeth is introduced in Infinite as a young woman that has been held captive aboard Columbia since a baby. She is claimed to be the daughter of Father Comstock, the founder of Columbia, and heralded as the proverbial Lamb that will inherit the city. She has been kept under observation in a well-furnished cell within a large statue of the female personification of Columbia, using her time in captivity to become well-read and to learn practical skills like lock-picking and cryptography. She is aware of the existence of tears in the fabric of space-time within Columbia and has limited ability to manipulate them.
Her captivity is maintained by Songbird, a mechanical robot-like bird creature. Elizabeth experiences a conflict in her feelings about Songbird, since he has been feeding, playing, etc. with her, while at the same time keeping her captive. This conflict was partly based on Ken Levine's personal experiences. Levine once knew and dated a girl that had been abused by a former partner; and she made excuses for him, and eventually went back to him. He highlighted the difference between the two, "Elizabeth is trying to get free", but still drew a connection between them.
Elizabeth is "the most critical of the game's visual icons", being constantly a companion to the protagonist.
No longer being recently out of the tower, Elizabeth's character is slightly different in Burial at Sea, being "older, wiser and more confident". The DLC, taking place in Rapture from the first BioShock games, is evocative of film noir with Booker becoming the private detective and Elizabeth the client and femme fatale. Elizabeth's arc in the DLC continues on from her one in Infinite. She is still aware of the events in the main game, and has an understanding of the various universes she can visit and the so mentioned "constants and variables" she is aware of.
Development
The idea for a character like Elizabeth came about due to both System Shock 2 and BioShock being "solitary experiences", due to other characters either being behind glass or dead. Having Elizabeth to bounce off the player helped reduce the sense of "[re]treading water". An A.I. character was decided on as the developers felt it had not been done well since Half-Life 2s Alyx Vance. Ken Levine's, creative director and lead writer on BioShock Infinite, described Elizabeth as the "emotional center" of Infinite. BioShocks Big Daddies and Little Sisters provided the groundwork for the A.I.
Earlier versions of Elizabeth were mute, in part due to anxiety in making her "work", being more of a "Gibson Girl". The player character, Booker DeWitt, would also be mute, and so conversations between them would be non-existent. One of the reasons this was changed was to allow more freedom to the player (rather than having her grab Booker to point at things) and to allow her to have a presence even when off-screen, in addition to giving her more personality. Another change made was to Infinites beach scene, due to negative reactions to the character. Originally, she just left Booker after the crash, but this made her seem like a "flighty nutjob" and parts with Elizabeth trying to resuscitate Booker before getting permission to leave were added.
Elizabeth was more scripted originally. The team tried to ensure she would almost always be on screen, while at the same time ensuring she didn't get in the way of the player. The developers made a "Liz Squad" group, in charge of the character and dedicated to populating the world with objects for Elizabeth to interact with, which was claimed to be led by either Amanda Jeffrey or John Abercrombie (who also did the AIs of the first BioShock). In order to properly react to things, Elizabeth had to have emotions. Some of her scripted animations had to be cut, as they were coming off too similar to Rapunzel from Walt Disney Pictures' Tangled.
Designing Elizabeth proved very difficult, and repeatedly the team wanted to simply cut her. Troubles included expressing her childlike curiosity, making her act with a believable sense of horror to Booker's more violent actions, while keeping her out of the player's way. Similar issues were had with the Big Daddies, with the team being unsure what to do with them. Despite this, her role in Infinite "deepened" as development progressed, due to the team liking the character. This led to her becoming more of a partner, and she gained additional abilities such as being able to lockpick doors within gameplay (originally a one-time event).
In the second episode of "Burial at Sea", Elizabeth becomes the player character. Being more of a thoughtful character than Booker, her gameplay focuses more on strategy and avoidance of direct combat, more like a survival horror game. It was important that Elizabeth did not feel simply like Booker "in a dress". Jeffrey noted that Elizabeth was the main character of Infinite and Rapture the main character of the first game, and so "Burial" involved "our two leading ladies playing opposite each other". Lead animator Shawn Robertson felt that Elizabeth's presence helped tie Rapture with Infinite. In a 2016 interview, Levine contrasted Elizabeth to most of the other characters he created for the BioShock series; many of these characters had been oppressed and subsequently once freed of that oppression, became oppressors themselves, but Elizabeth was written to break this cycle of oppression.
Design
Numerous concept art was made for the character. Early sketches tried different ways to portray her personality through posture and clothes, using the "clean, bright, and iconic" costumes of comic books as inspiration. Different art explored Elizabeth at all different ages, and varied her in demeanor, disposition, and look. Artists also experimented with the design for a "more aloof, princesslike" version of the character.
Elizabeth has a "stylised and 'hyper-realistic appearance, meant to allow the player to see her body motions and expression easily from a distance. Elizabeth's original Gibson Girl appearance had a normal-looking face, having normal facial feature proportions and using motion capture for her expressions. This was changed to hand-keyed animations and a more exaggerated look when playtesters ceased to notice her over other parts of Infinite. In order to form an emotional connection with the character, players had to "see what she [was] thinking at all times". Hand-keyed animations also allowed them to change expressions to fit with changes or current ideas, rather than being stuck with motion captures shot months ago. For the exaggeration, inspiration again was taken from comic books as well as animated films, and Irrational's artists studied classic animators' works to see how they portrayed emotion.
Other elements that needed to change in order to stand out were her silhouette, and her colour scheme took on an almost two-tone look. Levine was disappointed in the online community's mainly focusing on her breast size and chest, believing people should be more interested in her as a person rather than her appearance, and considered the expressive eyes the most important part of her design. Artists such as Claire Hummel helped work on her dress, intended to look "age-appropriate" and fitting for 1912. Her choker had many variations tried before they finalised it as a "more simple, elegant" one.
Elizabeth's design was modified for Burial at Sea. Prerelease materials showcased her new more mature design, with one shot having multiple angles to help any cosplayers who wished to dress up as the character. Elizabeth's femme fatale appearance was inspired by approximately seven different people of the era, including actresses Rita Hayworth, Lauren Bacall, and Veronica Lake.
Portrayal
Courtnee Draper voices the character. Levine commented that Draper was able to both capture Elizabeth's enthusiasm and dark background. Levine, Draper, and Booker's voice actor Troy Baker worked collaboratively, and would talk about scenes and improvise new lines. Though Baker was more experienced in game acting, Draper had appeared in very few, offering a perspective Levine considered an advantage. Draper has said she would be interested in playing Elizabeth again if a BioShock film were ever made, and had talked to Levine about it.
Motion capture was done by Heather Gordon, who often had to rely on her imagination when performing, being in an almost empty room. Elizabeth had to do numerous physical acts that Gordon would not do in her everyday life.
Russian cosplayer Anna Moleva was brought on to be the "official face" of Elizabeth for the box cover, key art and an advertisement, after developers saw her dress up as the character, citing her dedication and resemblance to the character. Moleva had been a fan of the BioShock franchise, but before seeing Elizabeth's final design hadn't found many cosplaying possibilities for it. Levine contacted her on Facebook with an offer, before telling her to get in touch through e-mail. Moleva was told to sit still and pull various faces, which were then scanned into a computer.
Appearances
BioShock Infinite