Lightning strikes twice
When BioShock 2 was announced, I was optimistic. It was cautious optimism, but I was excited to hear that we would soon be returning to Rapture. As the release date drew closer and more details emerged I was leaning more and more towards being cautious. How could it live up to, what I think is, the greatest game to come out since this generation started. The original BioShock was the first and only game where, once I finished it, I immediately started it again. Needless to say, it was hard for me to believe that lightning could strike twice.
Lightning did strike twice. However, the second strike wasn't in the exact same spot as the first, but rather off by a few feet. The main reason for this misguided strike falls in the story. Don't get me wrong, BioShock 2's story is stellar. It sets itself apart from many other games that have come out since it's father back in 2007. It seems to falter more due to the fact that it's too much like it's predecessor and doesn't take any big risks. The story unfolds in pretty much the same way. The main antagonist is an ideological snob who has a "my way or the highway" mentality even if it's the polar opposite view set by Andrew Ryan in his original view for what Rapture would be. You'll take the roll of the first ever Big Daddy who goes by the name "subject Delta". This time, instead of being lead astray by someone akin to Atlas in the first, you'll be on a mission to find your original Little Sister who was bound to you when you first became a walking museum piece with an appetite for death. This little on happens to be Elanor, the daughter of the main antagonist, Sophia Lamb.
The redundancy of the original story to the first is in how it's played out. You're being led, by radio chatter, by Augustus Sinclair. Like Atlus before him, he'll guide you along your path to find out what wrong and ultimately leading you in the right direction for the story. He also rides along with you in the train, but stays in it as to not interfere with the gameplay, I guess. These trains are what link each section to the other and unlike the Bathospheres of last time you can't backtrack, so make sure you've covered all of the area, picking up all the little sisters along the way because you can't go back.
The improvements over the first game start with the gameplay. Being a Big Daddy brings certain skills that weren't in the first game. Instead of getting Adam solely by rescuing or harvesting the little sisters, they'll harvest Adam for you. Each sister has a total of two bodies in which they can gorge themselves on. Obtaining the sisters hasn't changed from the first go around. Each of them are still being protected by their Big Daddies and you must take them out before you can adopt their little ones. The fights this time are a little easier than before, you are a Big Daddy yourself after all. The splicers seem to think you're still a regular Joe, though. For some reason they can take you out rather quickly, maybe they've just been spliced-up more in the 10 years since the first game. Doesn't really make sense, but I understand now allowing the main character to be too overpowered is important to for making the game more enjoyable and challenging.
These Big Daddies and Splicers aren't the biggest fight this time around. BioShock 2 introduces us to the Big Sisters. These enemies are the grown-up versions of the little sisters from the original game. This time they're all cracked out on Adam and very powerful. They utilize plasmids over rivet guns or drills, and their master of the plasmid arts is in the "Jedi Knight" category. Each Big Sister fight comes after you've rescued the last little sister in the stage. You'll hear a few ear piercing screams to warn you of her arrival. If you've not prepared beforehand by filling up your health and eve, then you're in for a hard fight. These sisters are faster, and more agile than their Big Daddy predecessors and spend a lot of time running around or straight at you. Good use of cover, plasmids and high powered ammo is essential for bringing down these new powerful enemies.
Speaking of plasmids and high powered ammo, BioShock 2 greatly improves your abilities with this over the first game. The weapons are different but still fill the same roles. You'll have your drill for melee attacks, this will later upgrade with a dash ability much like your kind had in the original. Other weapons include a machine gun, rivet gun, shotgun, launcher, and spear gun. Each of these weapons have 3 upgrades that can enhance their damage, accuracy, or carrying capacity to name a few. One new addition is the Hack Tool. You'll no longer be playing the pipes mini-game to hack your turrets and cameras. This gun allows you to fire a dart at you target and hack from a safe distance or around the corner. The hacking game itself is different too. Now you'll have a needle that move back and forth along a colored field. You have to stop it in either the green or blue areas, white or red will cause an alarm to sound, or will shock some health out of you.
Perhaps the largest change from BioShock is the addition of multiplayer. When BioShock was released many people were angry that it didn't include a multiplayer function. When BioShock 2 was announced other people said that multiplayer was unnecessary. Clearly you can't make everybody happy but the added mode does make for fun times, and it also allows you to stay in rapture even after the campaign is complete. All the staples from the campaign are here. You'll be wielding plasmids and weapons, each of which have upgrades. The structure of multiplayer is similar to that of the Modern Warfare series. You'll have ranks and unlocks and the more you play the more stuff you get to play with. It also has challenges to complete known as tasks. Completing these will allow you to level a little faster. The game modes aren't anything special. They're just basic re-skins of deathmatch, team deathmatch, capture the flag, etc... There's nothing wrong with these, though. Games haven't really improved upon these features for over a decade. Over all the multiplayer adds variety and is different enough from what else is out there to have a strong community over the next year or so until BioShock 3 inevitably comes out.
BioShock 2 is amazing. Every aspect from the original has been improved. The story (at times), gameplay, weapons and plasmids are all better. Granted, the original BioShock wasn't in need of a sequel but the four separate developers who but time, money and resources into this game really did a great job at returning us to that underwater, former utopia. The addition of multiplayer, while unnecessary, is a welcome change of pace and will allow us all to be in Rapture a little longer than the singleplayer could really allow. To say that this one is a better experience than the original is a misnomer. I don't care who's in charge of the development, they'd never be able to capture the magic that was the first game. Being the sequel is both the best and worst thing about this release.
