BioShock 2 Special Edition
- A wide range of multiplayer options, including team-based options, the ability to play as different characters and experience points used for new weapons, plasmids and tonics.
- BioShock 2 Special Edition bonus items including: an art book, posters, audio recording and more.
- All-new BioShock release player adventure, set 10 years after the first game featuring play as the prototype Huge Daddy and a new Powerful opponent in the Huge Sisters, a Huge Daddy/Small Sister hybrid.
- New plasmids such as “Aero Dash” allowing for bursts of alacrity over small distances, and “Geyser Trap” a stream of water used as a jump pad and electrical conductor, join the ample list of Plasmids from the original game.
- New game mechanics including the ability to dual wield plasmids and weapons; flashback missions detailing how you became the Huge Daddy; the ability to walk outside the airlocks of Rapture to learn new play areas, and many more.
Product Description
The BioShock 2 Special Edition will celebrate the game’s unique music and art with contents inspired by the time cycle and the fantastic undersea world of Rapture.Amazon.com Product Description
Follow-up to BioShock, 2K Sports meeting’ analytically acclaimed and commercially flourishing 2007 release, BioShock 2 is a first-person shooter set in the fictional underwater city of Rapture. As in the original game, BioShock 2 features a blend of quick-paced action, exploration and puzzle-solving as players follow varying paths owing to the overarching storyline based on the decisions that they are mandatory to make at points in the game. In addition to a further fleshing out of the franchise’s well loved storyline, players can look forward to new characters, game mechanics, weapons, locations and a series first, multiplayer game options. Finally, bonus items included with the BioShock 2 Special Edition (see contents list not more than), grant the most complete BioShock 2 experience available and are destined to become collectors items.
The Tale In BioShock 2 players will take on the role of the original Huge Daddy, not that of game one protagonist, Jack. As a Huge Daddy you will have access to all the strengths and weapons of a standard Huge Daddy, including the drill and rivet gun. More importantly you also possess free will and the ability to use plasmids and gene tonics ? genetic modifications allowed for owing to ADAM, a stem cell harvested from conquered enemies, or sea slugs outside the Rapture air lock, and powered by the in-game injectable serum known as EVE, which can be found, captured or bought. Plasmids and gene tonics grant a wide range of aggressive and passive abilities which can be upgraded and arranged for quick use. The ability to use plasmids and tonics gives you a chose edge over other Huge Daddies and most other denizens of Rapture, excluding the powerful Huge Sisters. In addition, due to their role as a Huge Daddy, players will experience a new relation to the Small Sisters. Upon defeating standard Huge Daddys you are given the familiar choice as to whether to harvest or adopt them. Harvesting gains you ADAM immediately, but could alter your path owing to the game, while adopting makes you responsible for Small Sisters, who then accompany you owing to Rapture, but also grant aid and warning in times of danger. Additional gameplay features include: new plasmids, weapons and the ability to combine these two. The game also features the anticipated multiplayer modes. Several of these are team-based, allowing up to 10 players. Within these players are provided with a rich prequel experience that expands the origins of the BioShock fiction, and allows you to play as one of several characters pulled from Rapture’s history before the events of the first game. Key Features
The BioShock 2 Special Edition for Xbox 360 Includes:
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I just wanted to say the Special Edition is really worth it. Splendid art book… a 180 gram LP… The box it’s stored in is awesome! And the CD is a nice bonus.
Rating: 5 / 5
My verdict: If you’re here for gameplay and atmosphere, and like excellent FPSes and excellent survival horror, you’ll be pleased. If you’re here for a tale as powerful and incredible as the first Bioshock, you’ll be disappointed.
If you are currently playing owing to Bioshock 2 and want to go in blind, you might not want to read the rest of this (that said, I don’t give any spoilers for either 1 or 2).
Special Edition
Loved it all, especially the art book, the record, and the soundtrack. Splendid swag, very much worth it. The art of Bioshock is incredible and fun and oh-so-inspiring, and Garry Schyman’s unique, gorgeous orchestrations do not disappoint. (Check out “Pairbond,” which is fabulous in particular.)
Gameplay
Is awesome. In fact, the only reason that I didn’t throw down my controller with rage by the end of the game is because it’s so fun to protect Small Sisters and kill Splicers in inventive ways. Also, unlike the first Bioshock, where it seemed EVE hypos and ammo were in endless supply, in Bioshock 2 it’s harder to find resources. In a few levels you’re simply scraping by — which is exciting in its own right. It mandatory me to adapt and increase. I was dreadful in the first few levels; by the end I was in fact pulling off gifted kills.
I’m sorry to say that the Huge Sisters don’t live up to the hype. They’re just a nimble, plasmid-wielding Huge Daddy who shows up after you Rescue or Harvest the first Small Sister of every level. Look. I am an dreadful FPS player. I played owing to on Medium. At one point, when I had to fight two Huge Sisters at the same time, I ruined them handily. Yikes.
There are also plenty of bugs. The most noticeable one for me was in Pauper’s Drop, wherein the Huge Sister song started to play over and over and over for no discernible reason, until I finally had to turn off the music entirely. Also: the Bouncer just standing beside my trap wires and letting me shoot him from afar was too much.
The Tale
I don’t care for survival horror or FPSes. I never play these things unless there’s a excellent tale to go by the side of with them. So I was not playing this game to shoot things up. I was playing this game to experience some Grade A storytelling. Needless to say, I came away from the tale feeling disappointed and mildly place off. I felt like there was this huge setup and then no equally huge payoff. At every plot point, I found myself saying, “Really? That’s all?”
The saddest thing is that it’s not that it’s a terrible tale as much as it has so much potential and does not anything with it. I mean, just try to get over that SWEET opening movie. I reflect that’s the best beginning to a game I’ve ever seen. The writers of this tale dreamed up all of these COOL things, and they hooked me from page one. I was ready to rock and roll.
Then, what do they do? The vast possibilities just hamstring them. They apparently just looked at the basic thoughts for their tale and froze in place and didn’t know where to go. “What do we do with this character? OH GEEZ I could do this or this or… ahhhh there’s so many possibilities and so much backstory and… oh screw it I’ll just turn Subject Delta into a conductor!” (toot toot!) Yes, did I mention you’re ferrying Sinclair all over creation while he yaks commands at you? Not to mention, you could see the storywriters wildly trying to reflect of what the heck they were supposed to do with all of the characters. Their solution is to… well… you’ll see. Three people: You, Meltzer, Sinclair. It just gets goofy after a while.
You do get small payoffs that make it somewhat worthwhile. Unfortunately, for the most part, what you see is what you get. Sometimes the game goes, “OOOOH! MAYBE SOMETHING IS GOING TO HAPPEN!” and you’re like “OHHHHH SNAAAAAP HERE COMES THE TWIST!” Then no twist comes and you feel rather let down, and you reflect: “Well, maybe a excellent twist will come up later!” Meanwhile, the tale giggles nastily in a dark corner somewhere and traipses off to… do not anything!
I kept hoping for huge twists, memorable villains and heroes and incredible characterization. None, really. Grace Holloway and Alex the Splendid were the only characters who really stood out. The radio diaries were splendid, but didn’t escalate the feelings of tension and horror or enhance the tale as the game went on. Tenenbaum only has a bit part — and she is promptly swallowed by a Plot Hole, so that you never figure out what happens to her. All in all, there was something huge missing and I couldn’t place a finger on what it was. I don’t know that I ever will. It’s amusing how some sports meeting get all of the technical things right and just don’t seem to have a “soul,” for lack of a better word.
As for the Best ending, which I played for… oh, it was so unsatisfying. Really, 2K? Really? That’s all? And why is it the Worst Ending is far cooler? Not right.
The Villain
So how about our villain? In Bioshock 1, it was zillionaire and Rapture founder Andrew Ryan. And what a foe he was! But in Bioshock 2, our enemy is… A PSYCHIATRIST.
Initially, I had a terrible feeling about this. I’m sure you can see why.
Psychiatrist and cult leader Sophia Lamb, although the exact picture of a holier-than-thou, cold-fish English madam, inspires dread only at first. Later, she just becomes the equivalent of an evil Mary Poppins. She’s irritating, and her voice becomes an incessant drone, and you keep hoping that by the end of the game, you can just punch her in the face. Compare her to Andrew Ryan, who was terrifying and awe-inspiring throughout Bioshock 1, whose upper class bearing in fact managed to make you feel lacking and ashamed of yourself, and whose intelligence and potential were frightening because he could do so much with them. Even weirder, you could really know his point of view, and even felt sorry for him when you saw his lofty ideals crumbling all around him. He was an incredible character. When Jack finally meets him… it’s the exact climax. In fact, when I selected up Ryan’s diaries in Bioshock 2, I nearly always found myself shivering. He’s a scary mofo, you get me?! A scary freaking mofo.
On the other hand, when I selected up Lamb’s diaries, I gritted my teeth. I HATE HER VOICE. And I despise her. I didn’t despise her because she was a excellent villain; I despised her because she was dull and irritating. And I really couldn’t tell you why, because she’s just the female version of Ryan. Upper class? Check. Arrogant? Check. Intellectual? Check. Powerful? Check. She’s everything Ryan is. So why is she a dud and Ryan so SCARY? I mean, he is scary without any effort at all. The first time I heard his voice I was frightened of him.
Maybe it’s because Ryan is so much more than Lamb is. Lamb is, to use Ryan’s terminology, a “parasite.” She moseys on in to Rapture, which was built by the efforts and resources of somebody else, and takes over in the vacuum when the Huge Players exit. Not very impressive — just a vulture swooping down to take advantage of an simple meal. Furthermore, she has no foil in any character in the game — except for you as Subject Delta. That’s… not exactly a excellent sign, especially as you are a mute gun-toting idiot who can’t remember what he had for lunch the day before. In Bioshock 1, Ryan had Atlas and Fontaine, and Jack was the hapless small guy who showed up in the incorrect place at the incorrect time. It’s not akin at all.
The game tries and tries to make Lamb sound impressive, to the point that she’s practically a Mary Sue. Apparently, she engaged in several public debates with Ryan and became a large sensation with the Rapture populace, eventually instating a large cult presence. But if she was such a Huge Player herself, why is she so noticeably omitted in Bioshock 1? My friend, who played owing to the game concurrently with me, said that she thought it was because our adventures were limited to the poverty-stricken areas of Rapture, where such ideologies could take better root. This makes sense to me. Even so, Lamb is STILL not impressive. So, the only people she can sway are desperate? That’s not a excellent sign.
Perhaps it’s that she doesn’t have anything to lose. Ryan tried to save his city and vision to the end. By the same token, he had lost so much by the point you start the game — his ideals, his vision, his moral code, all of his dreams. He became what he professed to despise and he knew it — and that tragic consciousness was a huge reason for why he was so incredible as a character. What would happen if Lamb failed at her goal? Not anything. Cast off start over again, I guess. Her tale could happen anywhere, with anyone. It wasn’t specific to Rapture, in small. And she wasn’t like Ryan in that she could see her own hypocrisy. She was the same from the earliest radio diary to the last squawky monologue. Dull, dull, dull, and pretentious to boot.
So as much as the game tries to elevate her, Lamb is still a lame villain. It’s not that hard to revive the members of Rapture to your cause; they’re INSANE, for heaven’s sakes. It’s like a dork trying to come across as cool by wearing leather and sunglasses and riding a dirt bike. You can’t be cool if you try. If you’re cool, you just are. You’re defined by your actions, not by what people say about you or what you look like.
In fact, that sums up this game rather well. Stop talking — start doing.
The Way of life
The first Bioshock was brightly written and envisioned, and is, in fact, based on a philosophical treatise. So how about Bioshock 2?
The whole thought of this Bioshock was to present the extreme alternative to Ryan’s extreme individualism. Lamb believed in a Utopia achieved owing to the eradication of self consciousness and the attainment of earthly nirvana, in which each “individual” sought to increase the common excellent. Reflect a “hive mind” (to oversimplify things). It’s an fascinating thought in my opinion — seeing what would happen if the pendulum swung too far the other way. It just isn’t very striking, is all. Why? Because it’s so IMPOSSIBLE. You know she’s going to fail. Because, whereas you can visualize complete individual freedom, it’s nearly impossible to visualize complete lack of self. Ryan’s quandary was so sad because his plot had seemed to work so well, then backfired; but how can Lamb’s plot lose any “progress” when she hasn’t made any to start with? I mean, she’s failing right and left from step one. People are dying for her vision on every side. So. You can see the conundrum here.
Jack v. Subject Delta
Forgiving the fact that you start out the game as the Model T of Huge Daddies (which was extremely disappointing to me), it’s still splendid, splendid fun being a Huge Daddy. I loved reduction Small Sisters and I loved laying the smackdown on those who crossed me. By the end of the game you’re an incredible powerhouse. But maybe part of my disappointment with the game deals with Subject Delta, who had so much promise tale-wise — promise that never pays off. What does Subject Delta want? Eleanor, his Small Sister, right? And if he doesn’t find her he’s going to go kaput, right? Well… that’s… uh… rather straight-forward, don’t you reflect? The entire angle of “you’re going to die if you don’t find Eleanor” doesn’t really seem like a threat. You don’t ever “suffer” for not being close to her, except for maybe one or two “moments” per level. Eleanor tells you your heart is weakening, and Sinclair informs you of your certain demise, but words are insubstantial things.
In the first Bioshock you’re Jack, the last survivor of a plane crash, trying to escape this horrible lurid dystopia. He’s just trying to get the heck out of Dodge. The game is terrifying because in every level, you keep hoping that maybe this time, this time, you’ll find the way out… the result being, it’s an adrenaline rush from beginning to end.
Bioshock 2… not so much. It’s even SLOW in some parts. Why? Because the tale doesn’t pay off, and just kind of slopped out half-baked. Tale is everything. When will people learn this?! I don’t hold responsible those players who reflect that Bioshock 2 is just a grind, killing the same enemies over and over; without a compelling tale, that’s what most FPSes are and that’s why I don’t play them.
In Conclusion…
The magic of the first game wasn’t really here. I realized that I brought a lot of Bioshock 1’s magic with me when I played Bioshock 2, and I had ridden my combined hopes right to the end. And not anything happened of any regard whatsoever. Well, maybe-sort-of, in an awkward limping sort of way. All in all, it was very anticlimactic.
I still reflect most people will delight in it. The gameplay is solid, after all. But if you’re like me and you want a tale that rocks, this game will not deliver. That’s a tragedy.
Rating: 2 / 5
So I am not a honest gamer, but as an Art Deco fan (art/music/culture), I was addicted to Bioshock and the deeply layered tale. I found the cultural references to Ayn Rand and other cycle characters intellectually satisfying and the entire game (Bioshock 1) was simply gorgeous. When the Special Edition came out, I immediately bought it. I’m very pleased with it, so am spending time w/ the review.
First, I am impressed with Amazon’s shipment. It came exactly on Feb 9, the release date for Bioshock 2, so I had the pleasure of playing the game as soon as it arrived. For someone who is not a gamer, this was an fascinating feeling to try a new game immediately. Second, the art book. I researched the contents before buying ($100 is after all not insignificant), and more than playing the game, adored the hardcover art book. I especially liked the developer/artist comments so that you saw a small of the creative fine-tuning process. I haven’t played the record yet, but i guess it’s appropriate for Valentine’s Day weekend. (lol) The CD of Bioshock 2 was a nice touch as well. The posters are fun, if a bit disappointing– they seemed only a tad larger than your avg 8/12 x 11 page of paper, but you get 3 of them, and they will make splendid office hangings. As a bonus, the block box itself is gorgeous and significant. I have a small kid too, so while creepy in the same Bioshock aesthetic, my kid can see the box– I don’t have to agonize about gratuitous gore as I normally would on the cover of a video game.
As for the game itself, I was impressed by the affect, water treatment (graphically, it’s cool to swim underwater and then pop up), and the video logs. I can’t even start to know how the developers/artists did it– but I loved it thoroughly. I’m playing it on simple. I don’t like the new multilayered maps– since I am pretty anal about going everywhere and the multi-layered maps make it hard to know where I am. The new hacking is fascinating– I got so excellent at the ancient hacking, so was sad at first, but as a Huge Daddy you don’t seem to take much hurt. Going from 5 Eve hypos/First aid kits from 9 was also different. Not terrible or excellent, since I just started playing– but different. I don’t have much to say, since I am still playing on simple and have not yet tried multi-player, but it looks like the integrity of the original game was preserved, with new levels, some new characters. Since it’s a sequel, it doesn’t get the 5 stars I would normally give Bioshock 1.
The challenge in person for me is that I still haven’t earned all the Bioshock 1 achievements and the controls are slightly different in Bioshock 2. So I need to end Bioshock 1 first before getting too confused with 2 sports meeting.
The Special Edition is splendid. Certainly worth the $50 or so mark-up, the art book (and hopefully) record really live up to artistic expectations. If you loved the tale, sound, and visuals as much as I did, the Special Edition won’t disappoint and will leave you with real tangible experiences of the making of Bioshock. (I’m so thankful they didn’t include any asinine tchotckes, dolls, or stickers). I hope the Bioshock movie will happen and that the movie will be treated with the same aesthetic excellence as the first 2 videogames.
Rating: 4 / 5
Despite the stellar reviews this game has received, I found it to be a rather generic, by the numbers imitation of the first Bioshock. The first Bioshock game was a exact balance of substance, gameplay, and innovation. I loved playing the first game and when I wasn’t playing it,I was thinking about playing it. I couldn’t wait to see what was coming next. With this game I found that I just couldn’t wait for it to end. As much as they tried to mix things up the more it felt like I was doing the same thing over and over and over. None of it was memorable and most of it was forgettable. Of course this is one person’s opinion so you can take it with a grain of salt but for me this was a major let down. Kind of like comparing the Mona Lisa with a paint by the numbers copy of the Mona Lisa. All the elements are there just none of the magic…
Rating: 2 / 5
I really loved playing owing to this game although I wouldn’t quite say it tops the first one even with the multiplayer features. I reflect it’s safe to say if you loved the first game, you will like the second. Not a whole lot has changed in my opinion. I really loved the bonus material in the Special Edition. A vinyl record!!?? How cool is that!! I’m a sucker for soundtracks. Now I just need to pick up a record player!
Rating: 4 / 5