First and foremost, this is a sequel and as such can only bring limited innovation to the table, otherwise it violates the laws of sequels. As previously mentioned, you're a Big Daddy roaming the halls of Rapture 10 years after the downfall of the city and dealing with both old and familiar threats, and some new ones as well. This time around though the Little Sisters will work for you, collecting Adam from corpses while you stand guard.
The game starts with a cool cinematic which finishes with you giving yourself a bullet lobotomy at some time after the fall of Rapture, however you wake up 10 years later and begin your journey aided by a couple different guides; you even find out how you survived a bullet in the brain. Along the way you shoot Splicers, deal with Big Daddies, collect Adam, and survive Big Sisters, with the familiar voice recorders filling in many blank spots.
Speaking of recorders, I really liked the storyline with the father coming down to Rapture to find his missing daughter. Didn't just fill in the story for you, also gave it something new, although I've always wondered why most people take time to record these musings. Sure, some of them are research notes, but others are clearly left over from after the fall of Rapture; seriously, I had enough trouble staying alive, let alone taking time to record my inner feelings!
I think the highlight is indeed the new hacking system, no longer does the game stop for the hack, you instead do a real time quick time event to trigger the hack; I especially liked the way which a good hack will give you extra items, health kits from first aid machines, ammo from the Bandido machines, and so forth. Hitting a red spot will trigger the alarm and bring security on you, but starting a new hack and finishing it will send them away again.
The failing would have to be that the Big Daddy thing never really gets exploited. The Splicers and other Big Daddies have been amped up enough that you really feel like the same guy as the first game; you take the baddies down faster, but they take you down faster too. It's all fun and games until you're defending a little sister gathering Adam and you're facing 4-6 splicers, a Brute Splicer and an insane Alpha Series Big Daddy shows up! This is when you don't want, but instead NEED the Hypnotize plasmid.
Speaking of Plasmids, not much new there, freeze 'em, burn 'em, or shock 'em are still you're mainstays. You do get some new functionality with them, like the Hypnotize level 3 plasmid allows you to actually befriend a bad guy, very useful when you have a spare Elite Brute or Alpha Big Daddy doing nothing constructive. Same goes for the Tonics, not a lot new, although what is new really kicks ass, like the tonic that allows you to repair turrets and security bots, very handy of you're adopting little sisters instead of harvesting them.
Weapons are cool, I loved the Gatling Gun, the Shotgun is back, although I think it's a better used weapon this time around, the Rivet Gun is awesome, and I loved the "Spear Gun" which shoots full sized harpoons. Shoot two or three Rocket Spears into a Big Sister and she's gonna feel it, it just a matter of getting her to stand still long enough to hit her that many times. One thing to note, as I recently found out this isn't common knowledge, the Power to The People machines are FREE one use items; you seriously want to use these when you find them, especially on the Gatling Gun!
All in all this is a great game, I highly recommend it if you enjoyed Bioshock 1. It maintains the same themes and atmosphere with adding a little bit of innovation to it and it keeps it safe for people afraid of change but offers a bit of new material for those left wanting more at the end of Bioshock1.
My rating, 4 out of 5, good solid gameplay in a world I was sorry to leave, but some features could have been explored a bit more (Spoiler: the underwater exploration didn't live up to what it should have).
No comments:
Post a Comment