I just finished and I thought it was goddamn incredible. I'm feeling lazy, so no deep thoughts, but I thought Burial at Sea episode 2 was absolutely fantastic, and probably the best piece of DLC I've ever played.

I thought this was amazing. Closing out both Bioshock and Irrational as we know them in a fantastic way. Gameplay-wise it's much stronger than the first episode, and is the most fun I've had playing a Bioshock game since the first one. I just LOVE how they tie the games togheter. Great job Irrational, you can be proud of the masterpiece you have spent the better part of a decade creating. Brava!

Jumping on the "just finished it" bandwagon.

I'm also incredibly surprised that there has been almost no mention of this on the site or anywhere for that matter. Burial at Sea ep.2 is an incredibly well put together DLC with some outstanding production values behind it. The sheer amount of new art assets, dialog, story - it's probably the richest piece of DLC I've ever experienced.

I have to say that I agree with the fact that it felt a little dialed back in a way compared to everything else. Maybe they were simply tired of trying to pull a fast one on the audience. For fans of the series, this is an outstanding piece of fan-service. They explore a lot of the areas that people were always curious about. I don't really care one way or another about the Daisy changes - if anything I appreciate the added depth. No reason to be screaming "holy retcon!" here in my opinion. Some of the other revelations were a bit straightforward for my liking. Showing that Songbird basically imprinted on accident rather than scientific discovery was a bit "ehhh" but I understand it was meant to tug at the heart strings. Maybe I missed some recordings, but I never did get a sense for what it ultimately was? A man? A Gorilla? Elizabeth does remark "does it matter?" when Booker asks, so maybe it's not supposed to be important.

Overall, amazing piece of content. It does somewhat circle back to the beginning without showing us anything new or introducing any mouth dropping twists, but it does close the loop in a very final way which is what they promised. Great work Irrational, good to see you guys go out on a banger. It's just sad that absolutely no one noticed.

I don't think this is really a spoiler at all, but it runs over the credits so I am disclaiming anyway.

I really really love this vocal rendition done by Elizabeth's voice actor.

I didn't really like either Burial at Sea episode, and despite all the exposition I still didn't really feel like I understood it. Who was Sally and why was I supposed to care about rescuing her? The 'Ace in the Hole' is just a code word to control some guy who for some reason has to leave rapture then come back? Who cares? Also, I wish writers would get away from the idea that every single element of a story has to be linked to something else in the story to matter.

The sequences with Elizabeth looking in the mirror were quite good, though.

Yeah the plot left me unfulfilled more than anything, but I liked the gameplay in the two DLCs more than the main game.

Sounds like you didn't play the first one

Woo, that was awesome. The stealth gameplay was really fun. Super bummed about Elizabeth though :'(. I should go back to the old plot FAQ and see if the stuff revealed in this contradicts anything we said.

Not sure I get all the people acting like Daisy's retcon was reactionary. Does Ken Levine really seem like the kind of writer who would do something like that?

Really liked the stealth parts, though you learn how to break it pretty quickly on. I feel it fit the mood of the series much better.

The story was good, but not as mindfucky as I expected. I'm not sure if the Ace in the Hole thing was supposed to be a crazy twist or something. The cutscene kind of played out that way, but it was pretty obvious what it was gonna be.

I didn't like how they ended Liz's story. It really just came down to; well she lost her powers and she died and saved no-one the end. Bioshocks universe is fucked and cruel and whatnot but I really expected something less... negative for the way it was to end. Something that was less of a "well I guess Bioshock truly is dead now".

The dlc really emphasizes Ken Levines thoughts towards ultimately closing down Irrational and abandoning AAA development I think also. It's very clear after you play that dlc that this is a universe and type of game this man has lost complete interest in but rather than see it off gracefully or put it in the hands of another more enthusiastic (more talented?) person he'd see it killed like an unwanted family pet. I dunno I just, I love the Bioshock universe and it both saddens and angers me that it had to end. Infinite was already a let down after the first Bioshock and although I enjoyed many elements of the dlcs they left a very sour taste.

I enjoyed it. The story was interesting all the way through and all the links to the first Bioshock were well done. I enjoyed the change of pace with the stealth stuff, even if I just abused the hell out of the peeping tom plasmid.

I liked how the story was explained in a completely clear way and didn't create any new mysteries, just resolved existing ones. It was a good way to conclude Ken Levine's Bioshock games. Although Elizabeth's death was kind of a sad moment to end it on. And that lobotomy scene was intense, Altus is a real jerk, but it was fun when they had flash backs(flash forwards really) of him just getting jabbed to death by little sisters.

The DLC was pretty good, but I felt a bit better about the story and how the universe wrapped after the main game. Now I don't really understand the ending. And the parts I do get seem pretty haphazard.

This just adds weird wrinkles to everything, and it's pretty depressing as well.

I was underwhelmed. The stealth gameplay was poor and it felt like it was made necessary by arbitrary ammo limits. The story's separate parts are good but it doesn't feel like it fits together all that well. I'm not sore about it, I just didn't think it was good.

I have very mixed feelings about Burial at Sea as a whole. On the one hand, I think that, on its own, it's a great piece of DLC. There is a lot of new content added to it, both in terms of acting and environments. There areAt the same time, I think BaS heavily undermines both Bioshock and Infinite by linking them in a way that was not really necessary, IMO.

My issues with it stem from its connections to Bioshock Infinite as it's direct "sequel" and to the original Bioshock as its "prequel". Or as a bridge between both, really. The ending of Infinite was perfect in that sense: Columbia, Rapture, and whatever other combination of "man, city and lighthouse" were out there were just one of the infinite possibilities available. Jack was Bioshock's version of Booker, just like Ryan was Infinite's Comstock. Constants and variables and all that. It's a satisfactory way to both close Irrational's vision of the franchise as a whole while leaving it open for anyone who comes after them.

Maybe it was my fault, since I came to the DLC expecting it to be one of those "alternate histories" that used the same cloth to make a completely new dess. I thought it was going to be placed in a Rapture that was not the "main" Rapture either and that it would tell its own story, free from whatever continuity reigns over the (what-now-is-clearly-the) canonical timeline, or at least the most important one.

Oh, and that cinemascope near the end? The one that shows an experimental movie by Sander Cohen? Fuck. You.

Just finished the DLC and gotta say I really enjoyed it. Story wise there is just something about the Bioshock universe that really resonates with me on a weird level. Ken's ability to weave this bizarrely loveable twisted worlds is pretty great. My head hurt about just the same way it did after finishing Infinite so good job!? I guess!?

If I opened a tear to the moment before I bought this DLC I wouldn't change a thing. Really interested to see what Ken's new team does for future games.

After the somewhat underwhelming first episode, I was floored by the quality of this one. Had a really good time with it and felt like it was a very satisfying ending for the series.

So wait. Who was Sally? I don't think I ever found out why she was so important. Also why did they need to put Jack on a plane in the first place?

@acidbrandon18: Sally was some what the Elizabeth surrogate in that universe. Booker adopted a runaway girl, and then lost her on a race track game. She was said to be dead but only later to be found out to be put into the little sister program because all the orphans in rapture get sold out to there.

Well jack is basically to set in motions the events of Bioshock 1. Fountain has him but doesn't know how to control him. So he's probably sitting in a jail cell somewhere in Burial at Sea before the figure out the trigger words.

Amen to that. Scared the shit outta me.

I felt the connections between the two games were forced, unconvincing, and largely inconsequential. The ending of episode 2 is perhaps one of the most unsatisfying conclusions to a game I have played since Mass Effect 3.

I am a bit late to the party, was going through some backlog, but my thoughts largely echo these two quoted posts.

Even tho I have really enjoyed Episode 1, Episode 2 just didn't do anything for me. The first episode was a neat self contained narrative. The second just tried to tie in so many things together that it just felt weird. And all these explanations on how Rapture and Collumbia borrow from one another that it was beating you over the head with felt really superfluous to me, as they were already known from the main game, in a more subtle fashion too.

The Daisy retcon was not only unnecessary it was cringe worthy. So was the imprinting subplot considering Big Daddies were supposed to have been protecting sisters for a while now from all the bits we got from the first two games, shit even in episode 1, now they have not even imprinted before the fall of Rapture apparently, suuuure ... and you imprint 1 of them ... and Suchong the main scientist dude dies right there ... it's just silly. To get the "Ace" you literally had to walk down a short corridor from Atlas and push 1 button, there was 1 security camera ... jesus fuck.

Elizabeth going through the motions and killing off 2 versions of herself (one of them an omniscient Beth - lolwut) to help kick start Bioshock 1 (in only one universe instance no less!) felt completely unnecessary and plain dumb, it didn't need to be done at all, the stories were fine as they were. So in the end while I got a neat little story from episode one, naratively I got nothing from episode 2.

Visually at least in episode 1 we got to see a cool part of a still active and functioning Rapture before the fall, which was awesome, here it was just a retread of the same ground.

Gameplay wise episode 2 was simply the worst too imo. The stealth is so basic and incredibly easy, it was all trivial, with no need to use any extra tools, just infinite stealth that made you immediately invisible right in front of enemies faces and able pummel them at will. It was plain boring.

@tennmuerti: I remember really liking the first episode of Burial at Sea as well.

I just beat the DLC after having played like the first 1/3 when it originally came out in March. After seeing the ending it became apparent to me that I had forgotten too much of the beginning so I couldn't understand why Elizabeth would sacrifice herself to save some random Little Sister that would eventually be saved by Jack in Bioshock 1.

I looked up a youtube explanation video and remembered that she felt bad about leaving Little Sister Sally to die for her Comstock revenge so she was willing to give up her Omniscience and existence for that. I don't know how I feel about the ending yet and the revelation that Elizabeth is 100% dead for going into a universe where she had previously died and dying again with no powers to bring her back.

There have only been two works of art that I felt the need to discuss and get other peoples opinion. BioShock and The Dark Tower from Stephen King. Both deal with the multiverse, but in very different ways, and I don't personally know anyone who has experienced either one to discuss with. This last chapter of the BioShock universe really affected me. BioShock 1 did in an ideological way but infinite brought me to tears when baby Elizabeth's pinky was explained. From the gameplay perspective, bioshock 2 was probably the best, but the story is irrelevant to me. Infinite's gameplay sucks, I just wanted to hurry up and kill the people lined up so I could further the story. And oh, what a story it was. I am a bit of a physics buff so maybe it was a little less confusing to me, but I probably see more flaws. In a universe with infinite universes, there would be many in which Booker never became Comstock. Why did all the Bookers have to die, even when he was trying to "repay a debt." What really tied Burial at Sea together, to me, was that it was the same Elizabeth who helped me through Infinite that died in Rapture. Or at least she thought she was and had the same memories, despite her loss of "seeing all the doors." I still don't understand why the ace in the hole was created in the first place. Shouldn't Su Chong be the real hero for implanting the whole thing? Why did he do it? I probably missed something and would love some further commentary on it.

nice necro