... and wow. I totally see why Brad fought so hard for this vs. shadow broker a while back.

It might totally stand toe to toe with both the original and Infinite's mad story in terms of impact. Also, it's pretty damned lengthy which was surprising. Took me around 6 hours.

If you own Bioshock 2 and didn't get around to this, I highly HIGHLY recommend it.

I agree .
Its my favorite bioshock game .

Really?

I didn't realize it was that long... Is it very combat heavy? Or would you say it's closer to the pace of Bio 1. Maybe I'm totally off about this but they marketed Bio 2 is a much more of a shooter and that always made me want to ignore it.

As I understand Minerva's Den is a totally stand alone story? Our wiki is pretty thin for it..

I got Bioshock 2 off PS+. Do I need to install it to play Minerva?

I don't know I always thought that the story was fairly predictable. Given everything else about the franchise that was really the only possible outcome in my mind. I never understood the high praise.

Me either. It wasn't bad by any means, but nothing about it seemed amazing. Not anything I think people need to go out of their way to experience

It's a stand alone story but characters from the main storyline are referenced pretty heavily in the DLC. The DLC is better then the main game but having played both Shadow Broker and this Shadow Broker just adds so much more to it's universe then Minerva's did.

Good to hear. Don't feel like paying for a retail game just so I can play a short DLC. I hate the combat of the Bioshock games, so maybe I'll just watch it on Youtube.

It is what you make of it. Put it down to easy and you don't need to do the 'protecting the Little Sister while she harvests' bits as you won't really need the upgrades.That way you cut out some of the combat (although I always quite enjoyed those sections as they mirrored the Big Daddy fights from Bio 1 in terms of you needing to be prepared. On normal, you likely won't survive any fight with a Big Daddy without laying traps and hacking the security. You can't brute force these mini arena fights either and I loved that. It gives you a great chance, as well as a real need, to experiment with all your tools).

That being said, I thought the pacing was great on normal and the game had a good sense of challenge. The pacing is great in terms of taking you through every power and weapon of Bio 2 over the course of its length so that you're never bored. Plus, the low limit on cash that you can carry means you're always forced to buy stuff if you're a hoarder like me. It was a real smart move.

Buy Bio 2 purely for this - it's totally worth it.

Yeah, I managed to work things out soon towards the end but it was still a smart and engaging story. The fact that it was well told probably didn't hurt either.

Yes, I agree. I thought it was alright but nothing as mind blowing or spectacular as Brad made it out to be. He totally suckered me into buying it. (I don't actually mean that last part; I don't regret buying it.)

Of course you need to install the game to play the add-on content.

It would have been so smart to have released Minerva's Den as a standalone though. It's big enough to justify it but it did come out before that sort of thing was as common as it is today.

I think my biggest problem which is not unique to Minerva's Den but rather to all the Bioshock games in general is that there is a strong dissonance between experiencing the world, story and characters - and then actually playing the game. The gameplay all by itself always sort of cheapened the experience for me. In between these really great story beats and spectacular level design there was always a whole buncha fighting you gotta slog through and personally the combat never really clicked with me.

The fact that the guys always bring up Minerva's Den with this great reverence kind of shows just how low the bar is set for DLC in gaming.

Wish they would of released it on PC, but I have had it on my list of things to play. Being I got BioShock 2 free on PS+ I might as well pick up this DLC. You have sold me on it!

I also played it for the first time in the last month or so, and I didn't think it was anything special. The story was way better than anything in Bioshock 2, but the gameplay was still very tedious, especially since I played it immediately after finishing the main game.

@subject2change: It is out on PC. You just buy it through the downloadable content link in the main menu for Bioshock 2. It's an unfortunate consequence of the game being a Games for Windows Live release.

Oh wow, I remember reading back in the day they didn't plan on doing a PC release. That's a game changer. Sweet thanks!

Well, I just finished Minerva's Den because it's now free on Steam if you already owned the game. I gotta say, while it's definitely great DLC, Brad really doesn't give BioShock 2 enough credit, which is even sadder since he never actually played it. I guess he's right in that it offers a typical BioShock experience in a more condensed form, but at the same time, it never offers the scope and story arc of the main games. The "reveal" at the end is not exactly shocking nor mind-bending compared to BioShock 2 and that's ignoring all the neat stuff that happens at the end of the main game.

Didn't Brad also only play like 5 minutes of an early BioShock 2 beta before he came to the conclusion that it wasn't a good game. Seems... fair?

If Brad had played through all of Bioshock 2 he wouldn't have raved about Minerva's Den so much.

I started playing it this morning, but it crashed after an hour so I stopped.
This thread has made me want to start it up again.

This is how I feel, too. I mean I liked it and all, but... I was definitely taken back a little when Brad was lavishing so much praise over it, especially when stating that it's arguably better than the actual game.

Even stranger is people that praise the combat in Bioshock Infinite by stating how much better it is than the previous two games, when in fact it is almost identical to Bioshock 2. Skyline's were hardly anything revolutionary for me, they felt like a cheap get out of jail free card. The actual combat ON the skylines was extremely simplistic and not evolved in the slightest - snap on targeting for ground enemies or simply press X to get a free kill.

But back on topic, is it really baffling how Minerva's Den could win out over Shadow Broker which is inarguably a more satisfying piece of DLC that year especially if you're a fan of Mass Effect. Opinions are a weird thing.