Well your dum because bioshock 1 was fun 2nd was just going threw it while thinking about something else and 3rd was forcing myself to beat it they get way worse more they make 1 was a 10 2nd was bad and 3rd was the one with a hairy chest
This is without a doubt the most sensible review I've ever seen of Bioshock 2. I've always thought this game was rather unfairly criticized. I thoroughly enjoyed my time with this game and found myself coming back to Bioshock 2 far more than Bioshock 1 and Infinite. I've never understood why so many people shat all over this game when it refines everything that made the first game great yet offers enough little changes to make it feel like a 'new' game and not just Bioshock 1.5, especially when Infinite was treated like the second coming of Christ with it's game play that lacked options and depth in combat. Sure, infinite's story was good, but in combat it was pretty sub-par, you HAD to shoot your way out of everything. There was no sneaking around, no tactical opportunities and all of the Vigors were pretty limited in their tactical applications, they were basically the same thing just with different fancy effects. They definitely lost their way with Infinite, but redeemed themselves somewhat with Burial at Sea episodes 1 and 2 (2 especially). I really like all of the Bioshock games, but 2 might be my favorite.
I wouldn't outright say people who didn't like the game compared to the first or even infinite as unfair criticism, assuming they have reasons for said criticism of-course.
Infinite was so bad that hard is this absurd bullshit of fuck you you do no damage everything hits harder then hard from bio 1 and 2 and also you get 0 resources so your always scrapping by and to top it off normal is too easy literally the shotgun is the best weapon in the game mind you I love the shotgun it felt great but fuck man there is no variety in that long ass game
The negative comments for this game have always baffled me; after all, can you ever truly hate a game that allows you to play as an unstoppable steel behemoth roughly the size of a car?
This is easily my favourite Bioshock game, gameplay-wise. And ultimately, gameplay is the most important aspect of a game. Bs1 may have a better and obviously more original story, but the controls are very clunky and the guns feel and sound like shit
only thing that makes me hate this game is that it's a colossal pain in the ass to get it running on PC. there have been times were I haven't been able to get past the menu because it just wouldn't stop crashing for seemingly no reason. When it decides to run though whoo boy do I like it.
I believe he is referring to the HD remaster, which is a travesty on the PC. It crashes every 3-4 minutes, but thankfully it comes with the original version which runs fine.
oh actually had no issues with the HD version at all other than it runs like shit on my computer because I really need to update. It's the original that I constantly have issues with.
I gotta say if it's one thing I love about this guy it's that he is more, well, professional. I also watch reviews from Zero Punctuation and The Rageaholic. But really they are good at two things: Entertaining you, and one of two other things. If you already agree with their opinions, it is just validation. If you don't, it just pisses you off. This guy, he's much more practical. He talks about technical aspects, and actually can sway you to one way or another instead of just reinforcing your existing impression. I like all three though, don't get me wrong.
It's good to see a positive review on bioshock 2. i don't know why so many people hate on this game when it improved a lot of the problems of the original, while infinite combat felt dumbed down in comparison.
Guilty! I ignored this game, didn't even give it a try, although I enjoyed the first and last BioShock titles. I never beat any of them. Maybe I should pick up the remaster
Bioshock 2 is probably one of the most underrated games of all time. It simply was overlooked cause it had a different developer and lacks the surprise and unique settings of the other 2 bioshock games. BUT it is every bit as good as those across the board, and makes so many great little improvements on the originals gameplay and story formula that it COULD be argued that it's the best overall game in the series. I don't personally hold that opinion as the first time playing bioshock and bioshock infinite were more memorable and surprising experiences that I'll never forget. But in terms of refined, polished packages with great gameplay and tons of replayability Bioshock 2 probably holds up the best of any of the games in the series to this day
I see more people saying that reviewers underrated it than I see reviewers who rated it poorly. People just seem to say that it was reviewed poorly when it wasn’t. Just look at the original review scores for it: GamesRadar (10/10), IGN (9.1/10), GamePro (5/5), GameSpot (8.5/10), in fact the lowest score given by a major publication that I see was 8/10. It has a Metacritic score of 88. It’s not underrated.
@@MrEcted It's underrated relative to the rest of the series, I think OG Bioshock has a 96 & Infinite has a 94-95, where it could be argued that this was the highest quality product of the bunch and the scores don't reflect that. But yes, 88 is nothing to scoff at it certainly wasn't poorly received by any means
FYI an audio log explains Lamb was brought to rapture as a therapist to soothe whiny but still needed people. Ryan puts it as "quieting the rattles of the Great Chain's weakest links."
Bioshock two is definitely the best in the series. underrated as hell, idk why this game gets so much hate. it's miles ahead of the first game to me at least
Great review, underappreciated game. Even though bioshock was more memorable and had a better story, bioshock 2's gameplay was just better. Very similar in quality overall. According to steam hours bioshock 1 took me 11 hours to beat and bioshock 2 took me 8 hours, i didn't feel i was rushing either, both on hard too. Idk why bioshock 1 took you 20 hours the game would have dragged on like crazy if it was really that length.
***** Like i said i didn't feel like i rushed through it. I'm the kind of player to have a look around every area for items. 30 hours is longer than a lot of rpg's dude i don't believe you for a second lol. Were you afk for over half that time? I mean you can look up let's plays here on youtube for example and add up the times or whatever it shouldn't be any more than 15 hours max. I just searched up on google how long is bioshock 1 and looking at about 3-4 forums people had all kinds of answers from 8 hours to 20 but never 30!
Unfortunately not for me - BI had a lot more "wow" moments than BI2 and for me personally more interesting story + characters.. and the first 10 - 20 minutes of BI are still for me one of the best gaming moments of all time.. the endings are better in BI2 and the father-daughter relantionship was great and as it is know, the gameplay is better in the sequel but the game just didn't had many real big moments like BI had
Also, i have to say that the game suffered GREATLY from Levine fanboys rage at launch, who claimed that it is the worst shit ever just because someone else worked on it.
Having played a lot of Levine games and Bioshock 2, I am starting to think he games had decent gameplay despite him, and not because he was a developer.
@@Psychodegu he cut amazing enemies from the game , and kept the same generic ones over and over repetitive because he disliked that the older enemies were too scooby doo vilain like.
@@UncleDaniel Yeah I just finished playing through the remastered Bioshock and went through the museum where those enemies were showcased. A lot of those enemies would have been great additions to the gameplay and would have helped add more variety to the enemy types in my opinion. While I do see his reasoning for trying to keep the splicers as humanoid as possible, I don’t think they would have felt out of place seeing as Adam is supposed to be this very volatile substance that drastically messes with one’s genetic structure and such that I don’t feel like heavily mutated splicers would have felt that unrealistic in a place where Big Daddies, Little Sisters, etc. already exist.
It's a shame this game got blasted since it is an improvement in every way over the previous Bioshock. The only reason people hate Bioshock 2 so much is because of the little sisters "escort and protect" parts, which aren't even that many.
I remember Yahtzee's review of this game tearing it apart, but to be honest when I played it all I could think was that, gameplay-wise, I was actually having more fun than I did in Bioshock 1, and I already liked the first game. Yeah, the story didn't really need a sequel, but when I look at the combat and hacking in 2 I can't help but wish the devs thought of using similar systems in 1. I'm glad I played the first Bioshock, but if I ever decide to play the series again odds are I'm gonna go defend Little Sisters in 2 for a while. Then after that, maybe go back to 1 if I want to experience the atmosphere again (and to perhaps get away from 2's glitches for a while). And I'm sure other folks have mentioned it, but if I remember some of the tape recordings correctly, Andrew Ryan let Sofia into the city because Rapture needed a good psychiatrist. He knew she had radical and diametrically opposed ideas to his own, but he hoped it wouldn't be problem. Of course later on it turned out they *were* a problem, which led to him throwing her in prison.
Yeap. It was his own ego and philosophy that sort of gave her a lot of power. Ryan always championed the idea of freedom with no bounds.....well....his freedom of no bounds and I remember in one of the tapes, he had to let her in and do her thing, reluctantly of course but he had to if not, he probably isn't setting a good example. Not that it matters in the end anyways.
Gggmanlives is by far one of the most, if not, the most underrated review channel ever, I mean shit, look at his videos, top of the line quality, beautiful editing, and most importantly explains the games thoroughly in detail, why he has only 50k subs is beyond me, keep up the great work man, I'm a huge fan of your reviews.
You mentioned that the ending of Bioshock 2 moved you to tears.What is your opinion of the endings from the other games in the series, including the DLC Campaigns?
Just beat this game for the first time and went into having already judged it to be not that good, thanks to reading all the reviews and comments over the years. This review is exactly my reaction to playing it, I had SO much fun and didn't understand what people were complaining about. This game is a victim of Bioshock 1's greatness.
One of your best reviews! This game blew me away when i first played it and Minerva's Den gave me goosebumps. Just a heads up, if you own Bioshock 1,2 and Infinite on PC you get the remaster for free when it releases in September.
It's good to see that it's not just poisonous animals that come out of Australia but also great reviewers like Gggmanlives. Keep up the good work, sir!
Bioshock 2 is by far the underrated bunch of the 3. Fantastic narrative driven FPS, incredibly improved gameplay (in my opinion) and just has a grand story and pacing if not better than the first game. HEAPS BETTER than Infinite in certain departments for sure
Houdini Splicers don't teleport; they turn into invisible. They just give an appearance of "teleport" to fool their enemies. You can easily track them with Insect Swarm Plasmid. You can also see their footprints. On Sofia Lamb, one of the audio logs explains why Andrew Ryan invited her into Rapture.
In terms of gameplay, this is definitely my favorite Bioshock, everything works so fluid: double wielding guns and plasmids was great, defensive traps actually have a purpose due to the little sisters defense sections, and weapons like the drill and others were sooo fucking satisfying to use! (Unlike some other game aiming for the clouds) Some people consider it the black sheep of the franchise just because it was developed by a different team and because the story did not brought that hit the first game had, still, like ggman, Bio2 story managed to bring a tear to my eye during the ending.. Neither Bio1 or Infinite managed to do that.
I feel a lot of people pass over Bioshock 2 as just a cash in, but its clear that 2K really, really cared about their products. On its own, its a good game, it just lacks the twists and originality of the first game. But i have met peps who prefer Bio2 over Infinite as its far more closer to System Shocks roots.
I don’t usually comment very often on TH-cam but I Love your content man. Sometimes I’ll just go on binges and rewatch your stuff over and over. Great work!
+Farldie Manie i don't know it took me 7 hours to complete on hard difficulty. and on the first time 9 hours. unlike bioshock 1, it took me like 15 hours to complete or so.
I'm glad others also appreciate this awesome game despite its undeserved low ratings. I thought the same thing about Lamb at first, but there's an audio log where Ryan laments that Lamb somehow slipped by "the Council" upon entry into Rapture. And the further I got into the game, I started to realize that Lamb is wickedly manipulative, and probably used her psychiatric knowledge to fake-out the screening council and tell them everything they wanted to hear. If there's one person who's a natural at deception, it's her.
Couldn't agree more. Bioshock 2 is by far the best Bioshock game out there - gameplay wise. The exploration and pacing of the story and combat felt really neat. It felt like a natural progression and evolution from Bioshock, which - to be fair - probably has the more interesting story and themes, as well as the big twist everybody loves so much. The thing is though, people seem to shit on the sequel for not having such a twist and being a relatively straightforward story. They call it blander, less charming, and just all around worse. That couldn't be further from the truth. While I agree that the story and themes are better realized and more interesting in the first one, the gameplay and world design felt more fleshed out in the sequel. Let's not even talk about the pseudo-philosophical, wannabe-intellectual bullshite that is Infinite. That game has beautiful moments and wonderful art direction and overall fantastic visuals, but the gameplay is shit (the shield is required as a pseudo health-regen, but it's too weak, just one example but it has huge knock on effects), and its story is garbage in a lot of places, with brilliant parts in between the chunks of mental masturbation by Ken Levine. Lots of wasted potential and the smell of cut content (all footage of all the demos and trailers doesn't even appear in the game, not even remotely!), lots of buildup that never amounts to anything (the "choices" for example, if that isn't pseudointellectual wannabe-philosophical bullcrap, I don't know what is; Levine actually said that he wants us to waste time and nerves on those decisions, that's what matters, not what happens in the game; fact is we only think about is because we know it's a game and that there will most likely be consequences, but there aren't... whatever), and magical BS that is far beyond the cringe-line in the sand (the key just appearing in Elizabeth's hand at the end). The big "twist" could've been vey interesting and cool, but the way it's presented (basically just a huge exposition dump with extremely limited input from the player) is both uninteresting, unnecessarily confusing and not at all as clever as it wants to be. I left the game disappointed and even a bit shocked that they appearantly couldn't realize their vision, but to that degree... that shocked me. The trailers looked promising as hell, especially the gameplay demos. I still remember that Zeppelin demo vividly. That's not in the game. Heck, one simple complaint concerns Songbird: The fucking thing is clearly meant to be a bossfight, but there's no payoff. Instead, he becomes a short-lived ally to the player - press X to destroy shit. Thanks, but I guess I'd rather go back to the original, or the superior sequel, Bioshock 2. If anybody actually reads this comment: Here, have a symbolic, virtual hug and a pat on the back.
I read it. And yeah, never liked Infinite's story. As much as I like crazy plot twists, just can't imagine why Ken Levine had to try to do it again in Infinite thinking maybe the one trick pony can do more than a single trick. And with that, development suffered and the game as a whole just suffered a lot. And unfortunately, mainstream media aren't the best in reviewing games and hyped up Infinite to death. It did worked, Infinite selling a whole lot of copies but its just like a FIFA game. Sales doesn't mean quality, especially when it comes to games, its just statistics for the upper suits to see what can they do to make everything easier or maketing bs that I don't know much.
Glad you did this one. I loved Bioshock but skipped this one because I really didn't think it needed a sequel and heard a lot of negativity about it. You're a trusted reviewer, and you really sold the game. I'm going to check it out.
Bruh this is what you call a game. The levels were big. The story was very immersive for me. And the way you progress with the train through the city. Definitaly one of my favourite games
Yup, this game gets far, far more hate than it deserves. Just like another 2K Marin game: _The Bureau: XCOM Declassified_, which is great despite a few AI issues, and was played by absolutely nobody, all because XCOM fans refuse to even admit the possibility that a spinoff game can coexist with the strategy series, which is a crying shame.
Also, I agree with you that Infinite kind of lost its way. I do not like it as part of the series. As a stand alone game, I think its just OK. The creepy atmosphere of Rapture is part of what made the first two games so great.
Great video as always, Sonny Jim. I played and enjoyed all three BioShock games, but 2 kinda felt like Fan Fiction to me. I didn't really get attached to the Little Sisters as some might, and found the ending and forced attachment uncomfortable (intentionally maybe?). Which makes sense since the original creator/writer Ken Levine had nothing to do with BS2 and only worked on the original and Infinite. BS2 had solid gameplay though. Just my opinion.
Never played any other Bioshock game, but this one is pretty good. I liked the combat and atmosphere, and it was always cathartic to save the little girls.
FINALLY, I can't begin to understand how people could say they hate this game or dislike it. I've always enjoyed it and felt it was a natural sequel to the series. As for why she's there, from the way Andrew Ryan describes her and her work, I get the feeling he doesn't put much stock in mental illness or health and see's it lil more than selling someone snake oil to combat an infection. He only chooses her because she's considered an "expert" in the field, a field that he doesn't care for nor believes in.
I think the main reason for a lot of the disdain for Bioshock 2 is because of critics like Yahtzee Croshaw, who have a very narrow-minded opinion of what makes a good game, or more specifically in this case, a good sequel. Yahtzee himself called Bioshock 2 "a knock-off piece of shit" and "a bad sequel [that] merely wallows in the original". He didn't even try to judge the game on it's own benefits and essentially said that because Bioshock 2 didn't do enough different from Bioshock 1 that it's inherently a bad/inferior game.
Haha, yeah. That's never clearer than when he's recapping a game's plot. If it takes more than 3 sentences to sum it up, he automatically labels it as either "stupid and/or ridiculous" or "too complex and/or confusing".
I don't even consider that one a review. He was just using Daikatana's Steam release as an excuse to rant about John Romero's idiocy and how more people in the gaming industry need to learn from Romero's mistakes and not regard their consumers with contempt.
Actually he's a critic can does his job pretty well. I do agree that his B2 review was pretty bad, but check every reviewer, they all have at least 1 bad review. For gggmanlives it's Fistful of Frags, which is probably his most disliked review. Yahtzee has pretty good ties to the industry, actually makes games, and wrote books. If ppl like IGN exist that just go to the shitty mainstream opinion and gives only AAA, or cod, 9s. Yahtzee would be the other corner berating such games.
The most important difference is the addition of the harvesting scenes. This means you have to carefully examine your environment and see where all the chokepoints are, and place traps. Traps were useless in the first game. Having to examine the environment and plan a strategy is always great fun. The main problem with the game is that it reuses the assets and world of the first game. There is no more sense of wonder when you enter an area. And for most people that was the main attraction. I like bio shock 2 more then 1.
Watching these reviews gets me excited to play the Bioshock collection. I remembered playing this game on xbox and I had a pretty good time with it even though the multiplayer was a call of duty clone
Big Sisters are pushovers once you realize you can freeze them and use your drill to eat away at their health bar in seconds. Same goes for Big Daddies too now. I played through on the hardest difficulty using only the drill and plasmids and outside of early issues dealing with lack of money to spend, the game gets really easy because of just how incredibly OP the drill is with Winter Blast.
The first time I played Bioshock 1, I couldn't get into it. When I was deployed to Afghanistan, I was able to play Bioshock 2 in some of my down time. This is the game that made me fall in love with the Bioshock series. After playing 2, I went back and gave 1 a second chance. This time I pushed through the beginning of the game which I find somewhat boring. Glad I did, because Bioshock 1 is now one of my favorite games. Bioshock 2 will always hold a special place in my gaming memory.
Great review, as per usual. I also loved the game, but I see we disagree on one key point: My main drawback Bioshock 2 is that, quite contrary to what the game and storyline promises, you don't ever really get to play as a Big Daddy. Thing is, having played Bioshock, I was so excited to finally play as a Big Daddy, one of those big battle tanks on two feet that it took careful planning, half my arsenal and a lot of dying to defeat in the original Bioshock, and who could casually dispense of half a dozen splicers with no real trouble. Great was my disappointment when, playing as a Big Daddy in Bioshock 2, the first splicer I encountered took away half my health with a few pistol rounds. I realized that I actually was just as vulnerable as the unpowered character in Bioshock, and that I had to gain upgrades the same way as in the original game in order to become more powerful. (The only real difference from Bioshock was that I could in Bioshock 2 adopt a little sister.) This was for me a big letdown. So I strongly disagree with the basic premise of the game, and with this point in your review: No, in Bioshock 2 you don't actually get to play as a Big Daddy.
If I played Bioshock for the gameplay, this is such a better game than the first one. However, the gameplay is secondary to the experience and the story for me, so this game is kind of bland in that sense; relatively speaking. On the balance, though, Bio 1 and Bio 2 are great compliments to each other and excellent games in their own ways.
Gggmanlives, ever thought of reviewing the PS2 Terminator games and the Terminator Salvation game? It just seems like the Terminator has little success in video games.
When I played Bioshock 2 for the first time, I'll be honest, I actually kinda hated it. It was mostly the fact that doing all the harvesting with the little sisters felt tedious to me at the time, and it broke the flow of the game. After replaying it recently though, It's easily my favorite Shock-Series game. I don't know what the fuck I was thinking at the time. Minerva's den if you ask me, is better than the base game itself, with a really interesting story, and that black whole plasmid never gets old to use. There are tools out there to fix the FOV in both Bioshock 2, Bioshock 1, and an assortment of other games known as Flawless Widescreen. Anyways, are you going to take a look at the HD remasters on PC for Bioshock 1 and 2?
You should read Bioshock: Rapture, its a fairly long and well written origin story of rapture and what led to its downfall told primarily through the perspective of Bill McDonough the head of maintenance and also the perspectives of many other key characters, it even explains how Lamb got to Rapture!
The multi-player in this was actually pretty fun. Basically it like a standard multi-player for first person shooters like call of duty Except you are splicers who can use plasmids. Also there are modes where one of you can be a big daddy and he can be on your team or you can fight them. It was pretty damn cool as a change of pace for call of duty
The sound glitches are also present in the first game. From what I read up, its an issue with Windows 7 (and now 10), which is odd because the games release would suggest it should have been optimized for W7 and not XP, but w/e
+barfyman362 i will admit I enjoyed bioshock 2 more than the first but the story might not be as good as the first game....although with sequels it's hard to live up to the first in all areas.
Except.. You know, like story, atmosphere, characters, writing and art design. Gameplay was better, pretty much everything else was shamelessly piggybacking off the original.
Not sure why people rated BioShock 2 low since it is as good as the first one. As a big daddy you have to look for your little sister. On the way you may enjoy beautiful BioShock worlds and interesting stories. The shooting has improved (which was a weak point of the first edition) though it is still not on par with other fps. The DLC has also an interesting story. Highly recommended if you love BioShock 1 though the change in controls may be confusing if you play them shortly after each other. Note that 2K Games is releasing an improved BioShock collection for the new consoles this year.
Bioshock 2 is still my favorite out the three, I feel sorry for the studio 2K Australia as they were closed down last year, they truly did make a brilliant game that kept to the source material
Regarding the point about why Sofia is in Rapture, there's an explanation in the novel "Bioshock: Rapture" by John Shirley. I haven't read it in ages, and it's nigh on impossible to find a plot summary anywhere, but Andrew Ryan decides to recruit a psychologist/psychoanalyst to try and work out what people think about Rapture so he knows who's properly on board with Rapture. He ends up recruiting Lamb, who is initially sympathetic to his cause but starts to go against Ryan when she sees Rapture for herself. But yeah, the book came out after Bioshock 2, so I get the feeling Shirley was frantically stuffing plotholes shut with it. It's good, but you constantly get a feeling of Levine and Shirley just going, "Shit! Stuff all the plotholes!" and that sort of thing. Also, I thought Lamb was quite an interesting villain. Nowhere near as good as Ryan, but definitely interesting. I guess there's just something quite curious about an altruist who's willing to shoot and stab her way to the top in the name of "good" ideals.
I think this game has been recognized for what it is over the years. I think most of us can agree that its underrated when comparing it to the first game but in all honesty this game did a lot more right than wrong. I just think the first games atmosphere and story are unmatched. However slapping splicers with a drill is beyond fun and if anything this game has the best gameplay in the series and arguably has the best dlc in any game
I guess the reason why a lot of "fans" hate this game is because it reiterates a lot of the themes of the first game, while doing nothing to improve on the black and white morality system that kind of ruined some of the overall quality of the storytelling i.e. it doesn't matter what you think about the stories of the NPCs you get to either spare or kill, the game always assumes that killing is bad, sparing is good.
+Gggmanlives It does. Killing someone, in spite of what they may have done or not, is considered (by the game) as bad "karma" and it does lead to a bad ending. Same thing with the Little Sisters.
Great review, I always thought that the final level to this game was what Bioshock Infinite should have been. Instead of handicapping the player and removing mechanics, Eleanor actually fights with the player and not only that the player can control when Eleanor fights as well. Its just a better father daughter bonding story as well, Infinite was far more worried with its plot twist at the end than having a cohesive and engaging father daughter story. While I felt much more of a bond between Eleanor and Subject Delta when they just flat out say shes your little sister in the beginning and build upon that throughout the game.
In what way does Elizabeth handicap the player or remove mechanics? I also have to respectfully disagree with your opinion because Delta is pretty much a blank slate non-character and there is virtually no information on what Johny Topside was like so it's all pure projection on the player's part. Furthermore, Eleanor's actual presence in the game is pretty light as she never really directly interacts with Delta (not that there is that much interaction one could do though) and always seems to be behind a glass window in one form or another. The ending certainly packs emotion though, mostly due to the excellent music, but I still felt that whatever relationship that was there was pretty questionable. With Booker and Elizabeth, there is near constant interaction between the two and even it's at least practically undeniable that the two have a relationship to each-other and it's one that feels more natural and developed in my opinion.
Im probably gonna go on too much on the first question but here I go. In Bioshock 1 and 2, the player is allowed to carry their own health and hypos, this was a necessity since the player could not just run around and pick up health automatically in difficult situations. Infinite removes this to make Elizabeth feel useful however all it does is force the player to rely on a system that never seems to be consistent. When the player is near death or out of ammo I could mitigate this in the first 2 games but Elizabeth doesnt always throw items when I need them or if she offers a health pack but if I dont need it now then ask for it a few seconds later, she doesnt have it. Its just never clear to me if she has a cooldown timer of some sorts, some RNG system, the game never properly explains this. I find Elizabeth to be useless, she doesnt participate in combat, all the tears in situations have no trade offs so picking up a weapon in a tear is just pressing the interact button twice, its literally just picking up a weapon like any other game just with another button press. The player can still access all tears within a battlefield since tears are only temporarily turned off when one is activated and most tears are just basic pickups. Also hacking in general was removed for her lockpicking, another dumbed down system. Im disappointed by Elizabeth because they promised so much more for her, earlier builds had actual trade offs in her powers, her tears had more gameplay options as well.
+TheSulaco426 Given that Infinite gives you an energy shield, I think it would have been pretty horribly balanced if they allowed Booker to carry items for healing and restoring his salts. Besides, the levels are all littered everywhere with items that serve this purpose and especially on the game's higher difficulties, you have to rely on doing a lot more scavenging as Elizabeth won't provide items nearly as often. The tears thing is a fair point but I don't think it would have been a good idea to make Elizabeth pick up a weapon and fight alongside you as it wouldn't fit her character (until maybe towards the end of the game) and would make her more of a target which would in turn make the game feel more escort missiony. They did in fact bring back the ability to carry health packs in Burial at Sea Episode 2 but that was mainly because you don't get the magnetic repulsion field and the splicers each dealt a lot of damage.
The energy shield in the game is there to deal with the hitscan enemies that the player will fight in most of the game. The shield breaks just as easily as a Call of Duty shield and isnt useful at all until significantly upgraded. Since there's no real inventory, items are only useful once the player can pick them up in combat but most of the time the game locks the player in battlefield type arenas where the player is expected to fight off waves of bullet sponge enemies with the inability to go back and restock. I think locked arenas themselves are not an issue but if poorly handled they can be. Which is where the death system is an issue, on revival the player does not retain all of their resources yet the enemies get their health back. I find that to be very unbalanced, at this point the player has to rely more and more on Elizabeth. Not to mention the player has to first look at then interact with an item to pick it up instead of just walking over it, this was a reason why items could be held by the player in earlier games so it was an instantaneous use in a fight. As far as Elizabeth's powers, they showed off in the very first demo that she could create a tornado and the player could shoot lightning at it for a combo, this not in the game at all outside of a cutscene. They had even more than that in other demos where Elizabeth had more use but they never implemented them.
I left this BioShock to last, and for a good couple years simply due to been put off playing because of the huge negativity around it. I ended up really enjoying myself and found that most of the Rapture stuff and narrative I often remember come from this underrated sequel.
This is one of those games I did a complete 180 on. When it first came out I thought it was underwhelming because the story was not as good as the first and assumed since a different studio made it, it would not be as good, so I never replayed it after that. When Infinite came out and the story was good but the gameplay was underwhelming I went back and replayed this and liked the gameplay and setting way more because I realized it was just more of Bioshock 1 and not Infinite's setting or gameplay.
Just played 1&2 a few weeks ago... Don't know why everyone hated 2. It may not be as innovative as or have a story as good as 1... but it's still 8/10 in my books - With one of the best DLC stories ever.
Hey is there any chance that you might Redo some of your Reviews for Early Access Games and Modifications when they are Done or Fully Released, like Black Mesa & Fistful of Frags for example?
Wow! Now that a much more enjoyble game. I'm one of those people who liked Bioshock 1 for story bits only, as the gameplay bits were... underwhelming. I'll get around to play it someday. Also, just a request, while doing the review for Bioshock Infinite, please don't get influenced by the comments below, and just give an unbiased opinion on how you actually felt like playing. A lot of people feel very strongly about the changes they did in that game, and so are always tearing the game down whenever they get the chance.
I love your reviews dude. But I think the main reason people dislike Bioshock 2 is because it's a good shooting game, but it's a bad Bioshock game if that makes sense. The first one had janky shooting but the horror elements were what gave it staying power. I remember playing this as a kid and was disappointed when I didn't feel that same sense of dread and horror that gripped me so much in the first one. Doesn't make it a "bad" game though, just a strange, black-sheep member of the systemshock2 / bioshock1 style
This game is so underrated. I actually think it's my favourite entry in the series.
Well your dum because bioshock 1 was fun 2nd was just going threw it while thinking about something else and 3rd was forcing myself to beat it they get way worse more they make 1 was a 10 2nd was bad and 3rd was the one with a hairy chest
@@jchifos ok
@@jchifos This (very long) sentence was doomed from the start
@@jchifos bruh do you not understand the concept of an opinion you fucking dumbass
I agree man. I loved them all. But this one just felt so good gameplay wise.
This is without a doubt the most sensible review I've ever seen of Bioshock 2. I've always thought this game was rather unfairly criticized. I thoroughly enjoyed my time with this game and found myself coming back to Bioshock 2 far more than Bioshock 1 and Infinite. I've never understood why so many people shat all over this game when it refines everything that made the first game great yet offers enough little changes to make it feel like a 'new' game and not just Bioshock 1.5, especially when Infinite was treated like the second coming of Christ with it's game play that lacked options and depth in combat. Sure, infinite's story was good, but in combat it was pretty sub-par, you HAD to shoot your way out of everything. There was no sneaking around, no tactical opportunities and all of the Vigors were pretty limited in their tactical applications, they were basically the same thing just with different fancy effects. They definitely lost their way with Infinite, but redeemed themselves somewhat with Burial at Sea episodes 1 and 2 (2 especially). I really like all of the Bioshock games, but 2 might be my favorite.
I wouldn't outright say people who didn't like the game compared to the first or even infinite as unfair criticism, assuming they have reasons for said criticism of-course.
Aled Thomas ye my only complaint with bioshock two is that it’s too short. But it does have DLC :)
Infinite was so bad that hard is this absurd bullshit of fuck you you do no damage everything hits harder then hard from bio 1 and 2 and also you get 0 resources so your always scrapping by and to top it off normal is too easy literally the shotgun is the best weapon in the game mind you I love the shotgun it felt great but fuck man there is no variety in that long ass game
Cant stand infinite as a bioshock game. Should've just been it's own IP. Thankfully the newest bioshock is a sequel to the first 2
I personally didn't like the fact that they didn't put in a new game plus
The negative comments for this game have always baffled me; after all, can you ever truly hate a game that allows you to play as an unstoppable steel behemoth roughly the size of a car?
This is easily my favourite Bioshock game, gameplay-wise. And ultimately, gameplay is the most important aspect of a game. Bs1 may have a better and obviously more original story, but the controls are very clunky and the guns feel and sound like shit
only thing that makes me hate this game is that it's a colossal pain in the ass to get it running on PC. there have been times were I haven't been able to get past the menu because it just wouldn't stop crashing for seemingly no reason. When it decides to run though whoo boy do I like it.
I believe he is referring to the HD remaster, which is a travesty on the PC. It crashes every 3-4 minutes, but thankfully it comes with the original version which runs fine.
Then you are one of the lucky ones. Loads of people are still having issues with it even to this day.
oh actually had no issues with the HD version at all other than it runs like shit on my computer because I really need to update. It's the original that I constantly have issues with.
I gotta say if it's one thing I love about this guy it's that he is more, well, professional. I also watch reviews from Zero Punctuation and The Rageaholic. But really they are good at two things: Entertaining you, and one of two other things. If you already agree with their opinions, it is just validation. If you don't, it just pisses you off. This guy, he's much more practical. He talks about technical aspects, and actually can sway you to one way or another instead of just reinforcing your existing impression. I like all three though, don't get me wrong.
It's good to see a positive review on bioshock 2. i don't know why so many people hate on this game when it improved a lot of the problems of the original, while infinite combat felt dumbed down in comparison.
A lot of people just hate sequels that are improvements by different developers for some reason.
Guilty! I ignored this game, didn't even give it a try, although I enjoyed the first and last BioShock titles. I never beat any of them. Maybe I should pick up the remaster
it felt like bioshock 1.5
People saw it as an unnecessary sequel back in the day, but have come around to it after the travesty that was Infinite.
i quote this guy
Bioshock 2 is probably one of the most underrated games of all time. It simply was overlooked cause it had a different developer and lacks the surprise and unique settings of the other 2 bioshock games. BUT it is every bit as good as those across the board, and makes so many great little improvements on the originals gameplay and story formula that it COULD be argued that it's the best overall game in the series. I don't personally hold that opinion as the first time playing bioshock and bioshock infinite were more memorable and surprising experiences that I'll never forget. But in terms of refined, polished packages with great gameplay and tons of replayability Bioshock 2 probably holds up the best of any of the games in the series to this day
"BUT it is every bit as good as those across the board"
No, it's an order of magnitude better than Infinite.
Agreed
I see more people saying that reviewers underrated it than I see reviewers who rated it poorly. People just seem to say that it was reviewed poorly when it wasn’t. Just look at the original review scores for it: GamesRadar (10/10), IGN (9.1/10), GamePro (5/5), GameSpot (8.5/10), in fact the lowest score given by a major publication that I see was 8/10. It has a Metacritic score of 88. It’s not underrated.
@@MrEcted It's underrated relative to the rest of the series, I think OG Bioshock has a 96 & Infinite has a 94-95, where it could be argued that this was the highest quality product of the bunch and the scores don't reflect that. But yes, 88 is nothing to scoff at it certainly wasn't poorly received by any means
Does anyone else has the impression that Bioshock 2 is being more and more recognized as the better game of the series?
This game doesn't deserve the hate it got, it was a fantastic game.
FYI an audio log explains Lamb was brought to rapture as a therapist to soothe whiny but still needed people. Ryan puts it as "quieting the rattles of the Great Chain's weakest links."
I think Gman was more along the lines wondering why Andrew Ryan didn't have censors in place to avoid people like that.
Bioshock two is definitely the best in the series. underrated as hell, idk why this game gets so much hate. it's miles ahead of the first game to me at least
Great review, underappreciated game. Even though bioshock was more memorable and had a better story, bioshock 2's gameplay was just better. Very similar in quality overall. According to steam hours bioshock 1 took me 11 hours to beat and bioshock 2 took me 8 hours, i didn't feel i was rushing either, both on hard too. Idk why bioshock 1 took you 20 hours the game would have dragged on like crazy if it was really that length.
As i have ver said, BioShock 1 is the better experience and BioShock 2 is the better game...
.. and BI is the just the weakest game in the series
+Edgelord Veng 30hrs ? Both games took me about 10 hrs to beat each.
***** Like i said i didn't feel like i rushed through it. I'm the kind of player to have a look around every area for items. 30 hours is longer than a lot of rpg's dude i don't believe you for a second lol. Were you afk for over half that time? I mean you can look up let's plays here on youtube for example and add up the times or whatever it shouldn't be any more than 15 hours max. I just searched up on google how long is bioshock 1 and looking at about 3-4 forums people had all kinds of answers from 8 hours to 20 but never 30!
***** never mind just read ur last comment lol
Unfortunately not for me - BI had a lot more "wow" moments than BI2 and for me personally more interesting story + characters.. and the first 10 - 20 minutes of BI are still for me one of the best gaming moments of all time.. the endings are better in BI2 and the father-daughter relantionship was great and as it is know, the gameplay is better in the sequel but the game just didn't had many real big moments like BI had
My FAVORITE Bioshock game! Excited to learn the people who made Bioshock 2 are making Bioshock 4.
JKPRising wait what?
Lowkas It's true.
Random Apple sauce
What??
Where is BioShock 3 ?
TBH, you are probably the best TH-cam reviewer i have watched.
I mean... he's pretty good (and as an Australian I feel some kind of misplaced kinship with him) but let's not go nuts
I second that! So True! : )
yes indeed he is
And I mean the first comment not the second one!
Mjw Kim :p
7:22 "Who I really don't think holds a candrew..."
Oh no, a single mistake in a 10 minute video.
@@Gggmanlives i dont think he was hating dude. I thought it was funny. People mis speak all the time
@@damienrobbie5974 Isn't that... isn't that one of the main point of replies?
@@Gggmanlives calm down my guy he’s not saying the entire video is bad he’s just pointing out a mistake
Also, i have to say that the game suffered GREATLY from Levine fanboys rage at launch, who claimed that it is the worst shit ever just because someone else worked on it.
Having played a lot of Levine games and Bioshock 2, I am starting to think he games had decent gameplay despite him, and not because he was a developer.
@@Psychodegu he cut amazing enemies from the game , and kept the same generic ones over and over repetitive
because he disliked that the older enemies were too scooby doo vilain like.
@@UncleDaniel Yeah I just finished playing through the remastered Bioshock and went through the museum where those enemies were showcased. A lot of those enemies would have been great additions to the gameplay and would have helped add more variety to the enemy types in my opinion. While I do see his reasoning for trying to keep the splicers as humanoid as possible, I don’t think they would have felt out of place seeing as Adam is supposed to be this very volatile substance that drastically messes with one’s genetic structure and such that I don’t feel like heavily mutated splicers would have felt that unrealistic in a place where Big Daddies, Little Sisters, etc. already exist.
It's a shame this game got blasted since it is an improvement in every way over the previous Bioshock. The only reason people hate Bioshock 2 so much is because of the little sisters "escort and protect" parts, which aren't even that many.
Marius Urucu and are completely optional as I found out in my first play through
I remember Yahtzee's review of this game tearing it apart, but to be honest when I played it all I could think was that, gameplay-wise, I was actually having more fun than I did in Bioshock 1, and I already liked the first game. Yeah, the story didn't really need a sequel, but when I look at the combat and hacking in 2 I can't help but wish the devs thought of using similar systems in 1. I'm glad I played the first Bioshock, but if I ever decide to play the series again odds are I'm gonna go defend Little Sisters in 2 for a while. Then after that, maybe go back to 1 if I want to experience the atmosphere again (and to perhaps get away from 2's glitches for a while).
And I'm sure other folks have mentioned it, but if I remember some of the tape recordings correctly, Andrew Ryan let Sofia into the city because Rapture needed a good psychiatrist. He knew she had radical and diametrically opposed ideas to his own, but he hoped it wouldn't be problem. Of course later on it turned out they *were* a problem, which led to him throwing her in prison.
Yeap. It was his own ego and philosophy that sort of gave her a lot of power. Ryan always championed the idea of freedom with no bounds.....well....his freedom of no bounds and I remember in one of the tapes, he had to let her in and do her thing, reluctantly of course but he had to if not, he probably isn't setting a good example. Not that it matters in the end anyways.
I thought Minerva's end was one of the best dlc's i had ever played, the story was amazing
Fucking agreed man
It still is one of the best dlcs ever made. Hands down.
Gggmanlives is by far one of the most, if not, the most underrated review channel ever, I mean shit, look at his videos, top of the line quality, beautiful editing, and most importantly explains the games thoroughly in detail, why he has only 50k subs is beyond me, keep up the great work man, I'm a huge fan of your reviews.
Unpopular Opinion: Bioshock 2 is the best Bioshock.
I didn't like Bioshock Infinite much at all and felt it was the weakest of the series. And, ohhhh, the hate I got for that opinion!!
Another unpopular opinion:Bioshock 2 is my second favorite bioshock.
Tru
Judging by all the comments on this video you wouldn't think that at all
no
You mentioned that the ending of Bioshock 2 moved you to tears.What is your opinion of the endings from the other games in the series, including the DLC Campaigns?
Bioshock 1 was a good ending, Infinite was horrible and Minerva's Den was also quite touching.
@@Gggmanlives What about Burial at Sea?
@@THENemesisXX99 bumping this
@@putrid_tv He actually reviewed both episodes, search for them.
Best Bioshock game hands down, the story was just heartwarming and emotional.
Haters can just hate. :)
Just beat this game for the first time and went into having already judged it to be not that good, thanks to reading all the reviews and comments over the years. This review is exactly my reaction to playing it, I had SO much fun and didn't understand what people were complaining about. This game is a victim of Bioshock 1's greatness.
One of your best reviews! This game blew me away when i first played it and Minerva's Den gave me goosebumps. Just a heads up, if you own Bioshock 1,2 and Infinite on PC you get the remaster for free when it releases in September.
You have officially replaced AngryJoe as the person I come to for game reviews. Keep up the good work!
Angry Joe treats girl bad so he's a meanie butt
It's good to see that it's not just poisonous animals that come out of Australia but also great reviewers like Gggmanlives. Keep up the good work, sir!
Gggman, bioshock 2 actually also runs in unreal 2.5
I never said it didn't?
+Gggmanlives At 6:55: "The problems I had are mostly technical issues, like the texture streaming problem of the Unreal 3 engine."
Yeah step up
Daniel Learmouth
Oh right. Well, shit.
Gggmanlives
It's fine. Just a minor mess-up to an otherwise solid review. It's refreshing to hear some positive words said about it, honestly.
Glad this game is much more loved than it used to be
Bioshock 2 is by far the underrated bunch of the 3. Fantastic narrative driven FPS, incredibly improved gameplay (in my opinion) and just has a grand story and pacing if not better than the first game. HEAPS BETTER than Infinite in certain departments for sure
Houdini Splicers don't teleport; they turn into invisible. They just give an appearance of "teleport" to fool their enemies. You can easily track them with Insect Swarm Plasmid. You can also see their footprints.
On Sofia Lamb, one of the audio logs explains why Andrew Ryan invited her into Rapture.
They are disassembling themselves, not just turning invisible. So it's a bit of both really.
The twist at the end of Minerva's Den hit me like a sandbag.
In terms of gameplay, this is definitely my favorite Bioshock, everything works so fluid: double wielding guns and plasmids was great, defensive traps actually have a purpose due to the little sisters defense sections, and weapons like the drill and others were sooo fucking satisfying to use!
(Unlike some other game aiming for the clouds)
Some people consider it the black sheep of the franchise just because it was developed by a different team and because the story did not brought that hit the first game had, still, like ggman, Bio2 story managed to bring a tear to my eye during the ending..
Neither Bio1 or Infinite managed to do that.
I just started playing Bioshock 2, and I immediately agree with everything you say.
And I just started, so this ought to be fun.
I feel a lot of people pass over Bioshock 2 as just a cash in, but its clear that 2K really, really cared about their products. On its own, its a good game, it just lacks the twists and originality of the first game.
But i have met peps who prefer Bio2 over Infinite as its far more closer to System Shocks roots.
I don’t usually comment very often on TH-cam but I Love your content man. Sometimes I’ll just go on binges and rewatch your stuff over and over. Great work!
your review makes me feel like playing this game again. really enjoyed it on the xbox 360. love the Bioshock series
that's the only Problem i had with this game, that it was short.
it took me at least 15 hours to complete thus game
+Farldie Manie *this
+Farldie Manie i don't know it took me 7 hours to complete on hard difficulty. and on the first time 9 hours. unlike bioshock 1, it took me like 15 hours to complete or so.
It took me 11 hours, the longest out of the 3 games
I'm glad others also appreciate this awesome game despite its undeserved low ratings.
I thought the same thing about Lamb at first, but there's an audio log where Ryan laments that Lamb somehow slipped by "the Council" upon entry into Rapture. And the further I got into the game, I started to realize that Lamb is wickedly manipulative, and probably used her psychiatric knowledge to fake-out the screening council and tell them everything they wanted to hear. If there's one person who's a natural at deception, it's her.
Couldn't agree more. Bioshock 2 is by far the best Bioshock game out there - gameplay wise. The exploration and pacing of the story and combat felt really neat. It felt like a natural progression and evolution from Bioshock, which - to be fair - probably has the more interesting story and themes, as well as the big twist everybody loves so much.
The thing is though, people seem to shit on the sequel for not having such a twist and being a relatively straightforward story. They call it blander, less charming, and just all around worse. That couldn't be further from the truth. While I agree that the story and themes are better realized and more interesting in the first one, the gameplay and world design felt more fleshed out in the sequel.
Let's not even talk about the pseudo-philosophical, wannabe-intellectual bullshite that is Infinite. That game has beautiful moments and wonderful art direction and overall fantastic visuals, but the gameplay is shit (the shield is required as a pseudo health-regen, but it's too weak, just one example but it has huge knock on effects), and its story is garbage in a lot of places, with brilliant parts in between the chunks of mental masturbation by Ken Levine. Lots of wasted potential and the smell of cut content (all footage of all the demos and trailers doesn't even appear in the game, not even remotely!), lots of buildup that never amounts to anything (the "choices" for example, if that isn't pseudointellectual wannabe-philosophical bullcrap, I don't know what is; Levine actually said that he wants us to waste time and nerves on those decisions, that's what matters, not what happens in the game; fact is we only think about is because we know it's a game and that there will most likely be consequences, but there aren't... whatever), and magical BS that is far beyond the cringe-line in the sand (the key just appearing in Elizabeth's hand at the end). The big "twist" could've been vey interesting and cool, but the way it's presented (basically just a huge exposition dump with extremely limited input from the player) is both uninteresting, unnecessarily confusing and not at all as clever as it wants to be. I left the game disappointed and even a bit shocked that they appearantly couldn't realize their vision, but to that degree... that shocked me. The trailers looked promising as hell, especially the gameplay demos. I still remember that Zeppelin demo vividly. That's not in the game. Heck, one simple complaint concerns Songbird: The fucking thing is clearly meant to be a bossfight, but there's no payoff. Instead, he becomes a short-lived ally to the player - press X to destroy shit. Thanks, but I guess I'd rather go back to the original, or the superior sequel, Bioshock 2.
If anybody actually reads this comment: Here, have a symbolic, virtual hug and a pat on the back.
I read it. And yeah, never liked Infinite's story. As much as I like crazy plot twists, just can't imagine why Ken Levine had to try to do it again in Infinite thinking maybe the one trick pony can do more than a single trick. And with that, development suffered and the game as a whole just suffered a lot. And unfortunately, mainstream media aren't the best in reviewing games and hyped up Infinite to death. It did worked, Infinite selling a whole lot of copies but its just like a FIFA game. Sales doesn't mean quality, especially when it comes to games, its just statistics for the upper suits to see what can they do to make everything easier or maketing bs that I don't know much.
Glad you did this one. I loved Bioshock but skipped this one because I really didn't think it needed a sequel and heard a lot of negativity about it. You're a trusted reviewer, and you really sold the game. I'm going to check it out.
Bruh this is what you call a game. The levels were big. The story was very immersive for me. And the way you progress with the train through the city. Definitaly one of my favourite games
Uhh that was bioshock 1, in 2 there’s no trains
@@crazygamingyt7245 you take a railcar between levels for the first half of the game
Yup, this game gets far, far more hate than it deserves. Just like another 2K Marin game: _The Bureau: XCOM Declassified_, which is great despite a few AI issues, and was played by absolutely nobody, all because XCOM fans refuse to even admit the possibility that a spinoff game can coexist with the strategy series, which is a crying shame.
I liked Bureau a lot.
Gamers are finnicky douchebags, let's be honest.
Also, I agree with you that Infinite kind of lost its way. I do not like it as part of the series. As a stand alone game, I think its just OK. The creepy atmosphere of Rapture is part of what made the first two games so great.
Great video as always, Sonny Jim. I played and enjoyed all three BioShock games, but 2 kinda felt like Fan Fiction to me. I didn't really get attached to the Little Sisters as some might, and found the ending and forced attachment uncomfortable (intentionally maybe?). Which makes sense since the original creator/writer Ken Levine had nothing to do with BS2 and only worked on the original and Infinite. BS2 had solid gameplay though. Just my opinion.
Never played any other Bioshock game, but this one is pretty good. I liked the combat and atmosphere, and it was always cathartic to save the little girls.
FINALLY, I can't begin to understand how people could say they hate this game or dislike it. I've always enjoyed it and felt it was a natural sequel to the series.
As for why she's there, from the way Andrew Ryan describes her and her work, I get the feeling he doesn't put much stock in mental illness or health and see's it lil more than selling someone snake oil to combat an infection.
He only chooses her because she's considered an "expert" in the field, a field that he doesn't care for nor believes in.
I think the main reason for a lot of the disdain for Bioshock 2 is because of critics like Yahtzee Croshaw, who have a very narrow-minded opinion of what makes a good game, or more specifically in this case, a good sequel. Yahtzee himself called Bioshock 2 "a knock-off piece of shit" and "a bad sequel [that] merely wallows in the original". He didn't even try to judge the game on it's own benefits and essentially said that because Bioshock 2 didn't do enough different from Bioshock 1 that it's inherently a bad/inferior game.
Yahtzee is an idiot.
Haha, yeah. That's never clearer than when he's recapping a game's plot. If it takes more than 3 sentences to sum it up, he automatically labels it as either "stupid and/or ridiculous" or "too complex and/or confusing".
DarkLordTaker
His Daikatana "review" makes it obvious he hasn't even played the game past the first couple levels.
I don't even consider that one a review. He was just using Daikatana's Steam release as an excuse to rant about John Romero's idiocy and how more people in the gaming industry need to learn from Romero's mistakes and not regard their consumers with contempt.
Actually he's a critic can does his job pretty well. I do agree that his B2 review was pretty bad, but check every reviewer, they all have at least 1 bad review. For gggmanlives it's Fistful of Frags, which is probably his most disliked review. Yahtzee has pretty good ties to the industry, actually makes games, and wrote books. If ppl like IGN exist that just go to the shitty mainstream opinion and gives only AAA, or cod, 9s. Yahtzee would be the other corner berating such games.
The most important difference is the addition of the harvesting scenes. This means you have to carefully examine your environment and see where all the chokepoints are, and place traps. Traps were useless in the first game. Having to examine the environment and plan a strategy is always great fun. The main problem with the game is that it reuses the assets and world of the first game. There is no more sense of wonder when you enter an area. And for most people that was the main attraction. I like bio shock 2 more then 1.
Now “Would you kindly” keep up the good work!
Watching these reviews gets me excited to play the Bioshock collection. I remembered playing this game on xbox and I had a pretty good time with it even though the multiplayer was a call of duty clone
After watching the completionists review on bioshock 2, your's felt like a healing balm for the soul. Thank you for this.
This review about BS2 is the only one that nails it. Excellent work Gggman!
Once again another spot on informative review.Good job.
Big Sisters are pushovers once you realize you can freeze them and use your drill to eat away at their health bar in seconds. Same goes for Big Daddies too now. I played through on the hardest difficulty using only the drill and plasmids and outside of early issues dealing with lack of money to spend, the game gets really easy because of just how incredibly OP the drill is with Winter Blast.
This has gave me the motivation to play BioShock 2 all over again. Thanks GGG.
It was mostly developed by 2K Marin, in California. 2K Aus did help, along with some other studios.
The first time I played Bioshock 1, I couldn't get into it. When I was deployed to Afghanistan, I was able to play Bioshock 2 in some of my down time. This is the game that made me fall in love with the Bioshock series. After playing 2, I went back and gave 1 a second chance. This time I pushed through the beginning of the game which I find somewhat boring. Glad I did, because Bioshock 1 is now one of my favorite games. Bioshock 2 will always hold a special place in my gaming memory.
Hands down the best game reviewer on youtube.
Best game in the series IMO
I never thought i would hear atlas making a review of bioshock 2
Great review, as per usual. I also loved the game, but I see we disagree on one key point: My main drawback Bioshock 2 is that, quite contrary to what the game and storyline promises, you don't ever really get to play as a Big Daddy.
Thing is, having played Bioshock, I was so excited to finally play as a Big Daddy, one of those big battle tanks on two feet that it took careful planning, half my arsenal and a lot of dying to defeat in the original Bioshock, and who could casually dispense of half a dozen splicers with no real trouble.
Great was my disappointment when, playing as a Big Daddy in Bioshock 2, the first splicer I encountered took away half my health with a few pistol rounds. I realized that I actually was just as vulnerable as the unpowered character in Bioshock, and that I had to gain upgrades the same way as in the original game in order to become more powerful. (The only real difference from Bioshock was that I could in Bioshock 2 adopt a little sister.) This was for me a big letdown. So I strongly disagree with the basic premise of the game, and with this point in your review: No, in Bioshock 2 you don't actually get to play as a Big Daddy.
I played most of the game using melee combat, that drill omg
If I played Bioshock for the gameplay, this is such a better game than the first one. However, the gameplay is secondary to the experience and the story for me, so this game is kind of bland in that sense; relatively speaking. On the balance, though, Bio 1 and Bio 2 are great compliments to each other and excellent games in their own ways.
love you're reviews, I felt the same way when I played this game after playing the first one
looking forward to the remakes this year
And when people speak poorly of infinite I wonder if I played the same game as them, but what can you do.
Replay 'Call of Shock' and 'BioDuty'.
Heresy
It's a shit game
also heresy
They most likely didn't even play 2 or Infinite.
Bro I thought Cole Porter looked and felt like a Lawrence Fishburne
With his beard and thicker chin and neck area , that's was my first thought.
I'm guessing you'll review the remastered versions of Bioshock and Bioshock 2?
No, they're the same games just with slightly improved graphics.
Gggmanlives didn't you review hard reset redux though?
ItsCBearhere
Hard Reset Redux had numerous gameplay changes though.
Gggmanlives fair enough
Just beat it yesterday and I think it's more enjoyable than the first game.
You make great choices on which games to review, usually other channels only review new releases (which isn't bad).
Gggmanlives, ever thought of reviewing the PS2 Terminator games and the Terminator Salvation game? It just seems like the Terminator has little success in video games.
Bump
What are the PS2 terminator games?
Terminator: Dawn of Fate. Terminator 3: The Redemption and Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.
I LOVED Redemption!
When I played Bioshock 2 for the first time, I'll be honest, I actually kinda hated it. It was mostly the fact that doing all the harvesting with the little sisters felt tedious to me at the time, and it broke the flow of the game. After replaying it recently though, It's easily my favorite Shock-Series game. I don't know what the fuck I was thinking at the time. Minerva's den if you ask me, is better than the base game itself, with a really interesting story, and that black whole plasmid never gets old to use. There are tools out there to fix the FOV in both Bioshock 2, Bioshock 1, and an assortment of other games known as Flawless Widescreen. Anyways, are you going to take a look at the HD remasters on PC for Bioshock 1 and 2?
You really deserve more subs... Great reviews.
You should read Bioshock: Rapture, its a fairly long and well written origin story of rapture and what led to its downfall told primarily through the perspective of Bill McDonough the head of maintenance and also the perspectives of many other key characters, it even explains how Lamb got to Rapture!
I liked bioshock 2 way more then the first game. The combat was much faster & better
The multi-player in this was actually pretty fun. Basically it like a standard multi-player for first person shooters like call of duty Except you are splicers who can use plasmids. Also there are modes where one of you can be a big daddy and he can be on your team or you can fight them. It was pretty damn cool as a change of pace for call of duty
2 has always been my favorite, best gameplay in the series with a fantastic atmosphere and story to back it up.
Great Review. I don't understand all the bad reviews of this game either. It's my favorite of the Bioshock series by far!
The sound glitches are also present in the first game. From what I read up, its an issue with Windows 7 (and now 10), which is odd because the games release would suggest it should have been optimized for W7 and not XP, but w/e
It's not even funny how much better BioShock 2 is compared to the original un every single aspect.
even story?
+barfyman362 i will admit I enjoyed bioshock 2 more than the first but the story might not be as good as the first game....although with sequels it's hard to live up to the first in all areas.
Kain Copper
yea the twist in the original was so good
Mhm. Although I am looking forward to the Bioshock Collection
Except.. You know, like story, atmosphere, characters, writing and art design. Gameplay was better, pretty much everything else was shamelessly piggybacking off the original.
i love this game i just finished it and minervas den last week on 360
Not sure why people rated BioShock 2 low since it is as good as the first one. As a big daddy you have to look for your little sister. On the way you may enjoy beautiful BioShock worlds and interesting stories. The shooting has improved (which was a weak point of the first edition) though it is still not on par with other fps. The DLC has also an interesting story. Highly recommended if you love BioShock 1 though the change in controls may be confusing if you play them shortly after each other. Note that 2K Games is releasing an improved BioShock collection for the new consoles this year.
Bioshock 2 is still my favorite out the three, I feel sorry for the studio 2K Australia as they were closed down last year, they truly did make a brilliant game that kept to the source material
Regarding the point about why Sofia is in Rapture, there's an explanation in the novel "Bioshock: Rapture" by John Shirley. I haven't read it in ages, and it's nigh on impossible to find a plot summary anywhere, but Andrew Ryan decides to recruit a psychologist/psychoanalyst to try and work out what people think about Rapture so he knows who's properly on board with Rapture. He ends up recruiting Lamb, who is initially sympathetic to his cause but starts to go against Ryan when she sees Rapture for herself.
But yeah, the book came out after Bioshock 2, so I get the feeling Shirley was frantically stuffing plotholes shut with it. It's good, but you constantly get a feeling of Levine and Shirley just going, "Shit! Stuff all the plotholes!" and that sort of thing.
Also, I thought Lamb was quite an interesting villain. Nowhere near as good as Ryan, but definitely interesting. I guess there's just something quite curious about an altruist who's willing to shoot and stab her way to the top in the name of "good" ideals.
Are you into the fitness scene gggman? I've seen you comment on Infinite Elgintensity's videos before.
Yeah I do a fair bit of Olympic Lifting. His videos are funny.
I love Elgin tbh. What's your thoughts on Vegan gains though? Considering he is also a controversial figure in the youtube fitness scene.
Challis
From what I've seen he just makes clickbait videos to get more subscribers. He seems to do nothing but cause drama.
huh, well, thanks for replying to me dude. Keep up the good content :)
What are your lifts dude? You heard of clarence0?
I really enjoyed this one. A worthy sequel imo!
I think this game has been recognized for what it is over the years. I think most of us can agree that its underrated when comparing it to the first game but in all honesty this game did a lot more right than wrong. I just think the first games atmosphere and story are unmatched. However slapping splicers with a drill is beyond fun and if anything this game has the best gameplay in the series and arguably has the best dlc in any game
I guess the reason why a lot of "fans" hate this game is because it reiterates a lot of the themes of the first game, while doing nothing to improve on the black and white morality system that kind of ruined some of the overall quality of the storytelling i.e. it doesn't matter what you think about the stories of the NPCs you get to either spare or kill, the game always assumes that killing is bad, sparing is good.
That's not true, I think mercy killing one of the characters doesn't count as straight up murdering someone.
+Gggmanlives It does. Killing someone, in spite of what they may have done or not, is considered (by the game) as bad "karma" and it does lead to a bad ending. Same thing with the Little Sisters.
+pixl_man I don't remember if there was a set numbers of NPCs to kill to get a bad ending, though, so fair enough.
Great review, I always thought that the final level to this game was what Bioshock Infinite should have been. Instead of handicapping the player and removing mechanics, Eleanor actually fights with the player and not only that the player can control when Eleanor fights as well.
Its just a better father daughter bonding story as well, Infinite was far more worried with its plot twist at the end than having a cohesive and engaging father daughter story. While I felt much more of a bond between Eleanor and Subject Delta when they just flat out say shes your little sister in the beginning and build upon that throughout the game.
In what way does Elizabeth handicap the player or remove mechanics? I also have to respectfully disagree with your opinion because Delta is pretty much a blank slate non-character and there is virtually no information on what Johny Topside was like so it's all pure projection on the player's part. Furthermore, Eleanor's actual presence in the game is pretty light as she never really directly interacts with Delta (not that there is that much interaction one could do though) and always seems to be behind a glass window in one form or another. The ending certainly packs emotion though, mostly due to the excellent music, but I still felt that whatever relationship that was there was pretty questionable. With Booker and Elizabeth, there is near constant interaction between the two and even it's at least practically undeniable that the two have a relationship to each-other and it's one that feels more natural and developed in my opinion.
Im probably gonna go on too much on the first question but here I go. In Bioshock 1 and 2, the player is allowed to carry their own health and hypos, this was a necessity since the player could not just run around and pick up health automatically in difficult situations. Infinite removes this to make Elizabeth feel useful however all it does is force the player to rely on a system that never seems to be consistent. When the player is near death or out of ammo I could mitigate this in the first 2 games but Elizabeth doesnt always throw items when I need them or if she offers a health pack but if I dont need it now then ask for it a few seconds later, she doesnt have it. Its just never clear to me if she has a cooldown timer of some sorts, some RNG system, the game never properly explains this.
I find Elizabeth to be useless, she doesnt participate in combat, all the tears in situations have no trade offs so picking up a weapon in a tear is just pressing the interact button twice, its literally just picking up a weapon like any other game just with another button press. The player can still access all tears within a battlefield since tears are only temporarily turned off when one is activated and most tears are just basic pickups. Also hacking in general was removed for her lockpicking, another dumbed down system. Im disappointed by Elizabeth because they promised so much more for her, earlier builds had actual trade offs in her powers, her tears had more gameplay options as well.
+TheSulaco426 Given that Infinite gives you an energy shield, I think it would have been pretty horribly balanced if they allowed Booker to carry items for healing and restoring his salts. Besides, the levels are all littered everywhere with items that serve this purpose and especially on the game's higher difficulties, you have to rely on doing a lot more scavenging as Elizabeth won't provide items nearly as often. The tears thing is a fair point but I don't think it would have been a good idea to make Elizabeth pick up a weapon and fight alongside you as it wouldn't fit her character (until maybe towards the end of the game) and would make her more of a target which would in turn make the game feel more escort missiony. They did in fact bring back the ability to carry health packs in Burial at Sea Episode 2 but that was mainly because you don't get the magnetic repulsion field and the splicers each dealt a lot of damage.
The energy shield in the game is there to deal with the hitscan enemies that the player will fight in most of the game. The shield breaks just as easily as a Call of Duty shield and isnt useful at all until significantly upgraded. Since there's no real inventory, items are only useful once the player can pick them up in combat but most of the time the game locks the player in battlefield type arenas where the player is expected to fight off waves of bullet sponge enemies with the inability to go back and restock. I think locked arenas themselves are not an issue but if poorly handled they can be.
Which is where the death system is an issue, on revival the player does not retain all of their resources yet the enemies get their health back. I find that to be very unbalanced, at this point the player has to rely more and more on Elizabeth. Not to mention the player has to first look at then interact with an item to pick it up instead of just walking over it, this was a reason why items could be held by the player in earlier games so it was an instantaneous use in a fight.
As far as Elizabeth's powers, they showed off in the very first demo that she could create a tornado and the player could shoot lightning at it for a combo, this not in the game at all outside of a cutscene. They had even more than that in other demos where Elizabeth had more use but they never implemented them.
Noticed you never mentioned the Multiplayer
Wasnt Sophia Lamb's character based on actual person, Anne Hamilton-Byrne?
7:22 "Holds a 'candrew' to Andrew Ryan"
I left this BioShock to last, and for a good couple years simply due to been put off playing because of the huge negativity around it. I ended up really enjoying myself and found that most of the Rapture stuff and narrative I often remember come from this underrated sequel.
This is one of those games I did a complete 180 on. When it first came out I thought it was underwhelming because the story was not as good as the first and assumed since a different studio made it, it would not be as good, so I never replayed it after that. When Infinite came out and the story was good but the gameplay was underwhelming I went back and replayed this and liked the gameplay and setting way more because I realized it was just more of Bioshock 1 and not Infinite's setting or gameplay.
Just played 1&2 a few weeks ago... Don't know why everyone hated 2. It may not be as innovative as or have a story as good as 1... but it's still 8/10 in my books - With one of the best DLC stories ever.
Hey is there any chance that you might Redo some of your Reviews for Early Access Games and Modifications when they are Done or Fully Released, like Black Mesa & Fistful of Frags for example?
I have been meaning to play this for a long time but just haven't gotten around to it. Time to move it up near the top of my "to play" list.
Wow! Now that a much more enjoyble game. I'm one of those people who liked Bioshock 1 for story bits only, as the gameplay bits were... underwhelming. I'll get around to play it someday.
Also, just a request, while doing the review for Bioshock Infinite, please don't get influenced by the comments below, and just give an unbiased opinion on how you actually felt like playing. A lot of people feel very strongly about the changes they did in that game, and so are always tearing the game down whenever they get the chance.
I never realized how much better the gameplay was in this game than it was in Infinite until now.
I wish the research cam was in his helmet on consol and you had to push l3 to take the pic its a pain switching to your weapon and tryna take a pic
I love your reviews dude. But I think the main reason people dislike Bioshock 2 is because it's a good shooting game, but it's a bad Bioshock game if that makes sense. The first one had janky shooting but the horror elements were what gave it staying power. I remember playing this as a kid and was disappointed when I didn't feel that same sense of dread and horror that gripped me so much in the first one. Doesn't make it a "bad" game though, just a strange, black-sheep member of the systemshock2 / bioshock1 style