TH-cam isn't time stamping the video correctly for some reason so here they are: Timestamps 00:00 Intro 01:02 Development & Technical Details 03:24 Story Set Up & Thoughts 07:02 Difficulty & NG+ 07:40 Progression Systems 10:50 Combat 15:20 World & Gameplay 18:50 DLC 20:37 Steam Deck 21:36 Positives/Negatives 22:42 Conclusion 24:05 Wrap Up
Bioshock 2 is a misunderstood and underrated game. People threw it under the bus because it wasn't trying to impress you with Shyamalan twists, imitating the original. It's way more a character-driven experience than the original, and I would say its more complex in terms of character development. Ironically, Bioshock Infinite has exactly what Bioshock 2 is lacking, but it's lacking all the other things Bioshock 2 has. You'll see what I mean when you play that game.
@@JoeEver123 oh the opposite, Infinite was touted as a masterpiece when it came out cause it was ‘so smart for a video game’ and all that artsy fartsy stuff, but over time people started thinking maybe they were just easily impressed by a story that was pulling pool over their eyes.
My thoughts exactly. I like all games in the series, but just watching this video makes me want to reinstall Bioshock 2 and play it for the umpteenth time. :)
The art style and the setting of the 1st 2 Bioshock games is timeless. Infinite for me just felt soulless.........like a Disney themepark ride or fastfood......flashy but ultimately unfulfilling. Rapture being consumed and taken over by the ocean was incredibly atmospheric and it had a very tragic story but an utterly beautiful and haunting setting.
I consider bioshock 2 to be my favourite bioshock game. I liked the whole story with eleanor a lot more then the others and the gameplay was very fun. I believe when I first played it I did two runs back to back. One where I did everything with summoning security bots, mini turrets and all the trap stuff (proximity mines, electro spears and trap rivets) and one where I just used the drill. They both felt pretty different gameplay wise and both worked just fine as well.
Minerva's den is the first dlc where after i finished it i just sat there even past the credits. I loved the story, especially because we've all in someway struggled with letting go
Honestly, my favorite of the bunch! It combines the immersiveness and exploration of the first game with the intensiveness and versatility of what would become Infinite later on, plus a pretty good story to follow.
Imo, i liked the Story more in Bioshock 2. The Ending hit me so hard, it inspired me to 1 of my only 2 Tattoos, roughly 10 Years ago. (A Big Daddy with a Little Sister on his shoulder). I loved it so much back then
YES! I’ve been sick all weekend and having such a difficult time sleeping. I spent all day yesterday in bed watching your Supercut story videos. I can’t sleep rn (4 AM where I am) and here I am, blessed with another Mortym video to watch :’) so thankful for your content. I haven’t played 90% of the games you’ve covered and it doesn’t matter! You make every video interesting!
FINALLY someone else who prefers the 2nd games story over the 1st. While I do respect everyone's preferences and opinions regarding favorite games and stories, I feel as if people often just have a one note explanation for why bioshock 1's story is this unbreaten masterpiece, namely the whole Andrew Ryan bit and twist. Don't get me wrong, those moments are awesome, bioshock 2 just has an overall higher quality story and writing, expanding on 1's message and parables in every way.
I disagree. Both can be equally great. I like very much certain novels and essays, but after playing games I feel, think and cry a lot more when living videogames world/stories and think a lot more about em when compared to books. I felt strong emotions while reading 1984, but less when compared to the first Bioshock. That probably has something to do with the fact that you 1) INTERACT and LIVE in that world 2) you can SEE every corner of it Books in general have obviosly better writing, because that's their purpouse. But that don't mean always better story.
@@TiomesTheOne Well, you essentially preempted my response with the second part of your comment. It depends on what you consider part of the quality of a story. Just because you interact and live in the world, doesn't make the story itself better, it makes your connection to the story better. I've read hundreds of books, I'd go out on a limb and say 80% of them have, to me, better stories than any of the hundreds of games I played. That doesn't mean I wasn't more invested in some games, but story wise, they're all very derivative and formulaic.
@@jesperburns everything is derivative and formulaic. We're already at that point in time where 99% of things are a remix of something old. It's just that some authors are very good at hiding it. Videogames as a medium are inherently and internally castrated in the lack of offering extensive dialogues: because most players nowadays consider reading a slog. But does dialogue and writing = story? Not always. I consider The Wizard of Oz a masterpiece and it does not feature deep dialogue, it's just "how" well something is told. Everything already exists. It's the "how" you combine the elements. And some games are unbelievable creative in combining player actions and good story. Name me 3 totally original and completely not derivative books of the last 5 years. I'll wait.
@@TiomesTheOne I believe there's games that center completely or largely around dialogue, I think TellTale games are some, but again, I play games for the gameplay, I read books for the stories. Why should I limit myself to the books I read or mention? Last book I finished (a few days ago) was Glenn Cook's The White Rose from 1985. Only recent books I read (last year) were Joe Abercrombie's second trilogy The Madness of Crowds. Either writer is not generic or tropey. Another recent book I recently read is the Three Body problem, published in English in 2014. It's not very good but it's not derivative at all. Or the Witcher books, not very well written (imo, or perhaps badly translated), but quite "subversive". Let's flip it around, what makes you think books are derivative? Name 5 books that made you roll your eyes at the tropes or devices or events/characters. EDIT: I have one. Brandon Sanderson, very formulaic writer in the sequence/paragraph/event sense, but seems to at least be aware of a lot of the fantasy tropes and is quite inventive when it comes to his magic systems and characters (settings), which somewhat makes up for it. Not my cup of tea though.
To explain for people who have never uploaded a TH-cam video before - TH-cam usually parses the time stamps from the description and then makes the timeline tags automatically. For some reason that didn’t work here.
Game felt more like a Bioshock 1.5 for me, but I remember really enjoying it at the time - it's more Bioshock, more of Rapture, more crazy people, better gunplay, better mini-games ... I do agree it stays a bit too close to the original vs Infinite which is much bolder in that regard (but that one I enjoyed less because I found the gameplay much less enjoyable at times)
This is the best game in the trilogy. It's story doesn't have the same "punch" that the first game does but it is a more nuanced and better-told one. That combined with better combat, better systems, better AI and more meaningful choices and, yeah, BioShock 2 is where it's at. While I find talking myself into playing the original Bioshock a bit of a chore these days, Bioshock 2 is one that I find a lot easier to get back into.
Really enjoyed 2 but i gotta say you don't really feel imposing or much of a threat as a big daddy. My biggest gripe is that you die so easily, a single splicer can shoot you a couple times and youre at like half health. Never made sense to me. The Big Sisters are still some of the coolest designed enemies in gaming though.
I'm probably in the minority but two is my favorite of a series I love quite a bit. The thing I enjoy the most is that the motivation of your character changes depending on the choices you make. Good choices and he's a man in a suit who cares for his adopted daughter and wants to save her. Bad choices and he's a cold hearted machine who only wants to get to her to save his own skin.
Watched this video last night while looking at the game credits. Was my first Playthrough and got the Savoir ending where you save all the lil sisters and the 3 side characters
27, didn't play these games when they released. So I don't have nostalgia goggles 2 is my favorite in terms of gameplay/mechanics. The improvements to hacking, dual wielding (plasmid in left and weapon in right= fluid combat), the camera for the enemies was VASTLY improved etc. Doesn't get enough credit for what it improved upon. Story was just serviceable, I personally love the gameplay. Sucks we didn't have new game plus AND the rivet gun is one of my favorite weapons in a game ever. BioShock 1 has much better atmosphere, scares, and stor Drill dashing will also always be fun
I honestly loved this title far more then the first game. I already knew everything about BioShock's twist, and had experienced a bit of it's world before. I wanted a difficulty on it that would challenge me while being fun, and turns out that their wasn't really an appropriate difficulty for that, so I just put it on the hardest difficulty and played through it. When I played this game, though, I got to put it on hard and that made me feel like I was really a big daddy, steamrolling through all the enemies and killing them like they were minor nuisances. It just so happened that I was also looking for something exactly like what the protector trials was providing, and that provided me quite a great deal of fun too. It's a shame how few people played this game. It honestly deserved far more, at the least the recognition that it exists, which I didn't even know until I looked at BioShock on steam.
Yea Bioshock 2 is my favorite in the series. It's fun to be the hero that saves the world sometimes but every game doesn't have to be that. This is just a story about a father trying to save his daughter and by the end of the the game inadvertently shaping her world view just like parents often do, for good or ill depending on your choices. It's just beautifully told and realized. Better gameplay than the first as well. That's the problem with both 1 and 3 though. Ken Levine is an excellent writer and world builder but he's not a very good game designer. The moment to moment gameplay and overall design in 2 is mechanically the high point of the series. While I routinely replay 2 I really have no desire to revisit the other 2. I'm obviously not saying they're bad games they're just not as good as folks make them out to be, for me anyway.
I played Bioshock 2 not too long after studying the History of Ideas at the University, a study focusing on the ideologies and how they develop. This fueling my interest in extremism. Each of the bioshock games explore one major ideology and I was pretty excited to hear how they presented the dominating ideology of 2.
Great review! Big agreement on Minvervas Den, it was an exellent story dlc. Now onto the last one. Kinda curious how you rate all 3 in comparison after playing Infinite.
I like some parts of this game, but honestly I felt the Adam system in this game was so tedious and annoying. Kill the big daddies then pick up the little sister and look for several corpses which makes you play through a horde mode while she harvests them, then do it all over again two more times then you get the big sister. After a couple of stages I was so fed up.
Exactly, my main problem with this game. Way too repetitive. In the original all you did was kill 2-3 big daddies and that was it. Now they add 2 more side objectives for no reason other than artificial game length. Don't get me wrong the gameplay is good, but it's not that good and those infamous "defend the area" objectives overstay their welcome in almost any game.
I got into Bioshock late and all I knew was that the original was regarded as this amazing masterpiece, which it certainly was in terms of world building. But Bioshock 2 genuinely impressed me as a GAME, and it offered a much better gameplay experience within this world, while expanding it in beliveable ways. I never understood why people hated it.
The big moments from the first game (meeting Cohen, the Surgeon etc.) are not quite matched and it doesn't do as good a job at introducing Rapture but... Bioshock 2 tells a more ideologically interesting story which by the end pulled on my heart strings. It has quieter big moments that usually involve walking the sea bed and Rapture is more compelling to explore. I got the good ending, very satisfying. I loved it.
Agreed. I thought 2 was, hands down, the best overall game of the three. Great mechanics, a good story (though, as you pointed out, doesn't have the same peaks as 1 did), but overall better feel.
Interesting. I passed over this when it came out, because I thought it was focused on multiplayer. Perhaps it was the marketing of the time. I quite enjoyed the first one. I didn't even finish the third one, however. It just felt like moving from one area to the next to kill the bad guys and did not disguise it at all. I'll have to give this one a shot, though. Thanks, Mort!
I probably liked the story more in Bioshock 2 because there were more choices and because I genuinely cared about rescuing Eleanor from her evil mom. Then the gameplay, especially the hacking, was better as well. That was a very nice review 👍
I think if you polled fans of the series you would be surprised most would agree 2>1 as it was what most sequels do in a lot of ways, its just better. However, it can never eclipse 1 in terms of the first time you enter Rapture and the twist, a reason its an iconic game.
I enjoyed it when it came out on the Xbox 360 in 2010. But trying to play the remastered version on the newer consoles just became a hassle with the constant crashes. Ended up giving up on it.
I love BS2, but I'd probably have loved it even more if i wasn't consuming absolutely everything behind the scenes beforehand. Seriously Persephone is the *only* level in the game the developers didn't spoil (in an environment/backstory sense; they weren't really story spoilers) in podcasts and BTS videos. It made the game seem more abruptly short and a bit less impactful having only 1 completely unspoiled environment. I am careful not to dig too deep into games I don't want spoiled now. Also BS2 had an awesome promotional ARG called Something in the Sea which is the story of Mark Meltzer tracking his daughter and discovering Rapture. He wasn't originally going to be in the game but the fan response to SotS was so positive that they added him into the game to finish out his story.
I always loved Bioshock 2, it's a great game. Most fans wanted the story to be as impactful as the first one and that's where it failed. It's story didn't blow your mind like Bioshock 1 so many fans feeled let down by it, but I still think they did a great job. Playing 2 feels like 1 but better, nothing insanely new but without many flaws the first game had. Also exploring Rapture wasn't as new and exciting as in the first time (as you said), but it was nonetheless exploring more of Rapture, something I loved doing and always will love. Part 2 is mostly overviewed because it wasn't a great impactful story as 1 and 3, but still a very good game, just in a row with 2 other very good games.
I'll be real, I enjoy Bioshock 2's story more than 3. Edit: As an aside, I've always loved the joke summary of the story "An abusive mother and a loving father get into a custody dispute" Edit 2: 13:20. For years, I shit you not years, guides for the game insisted Big Sisters spawned randomly whenever you finish up with any given Little Sister, and never acknowledged "No, they spawn when you've finished off all of them on the level"
This video made me decide to play Bioshock 2 again since it first released. One thing I've noticed since playing it again, and I think it's why I didn't enjoy it much the first time is that the level design doesn't feel as tight or as well crafted as the first game. There's a lot of empty space, apartments that don't look lived in, rooms that don't really go anywhere and don't seem to have a purpose etc. The original had so much environmental storytelling, every inch looked lived in, but for some reason 2 just doesn't seem to have that same level of atmosphere. Some of the levels even look pretty rushed in my opinion. The city of Rapture itself is like one of the main characters of the game so for me it's a big flaw that it doesn't live up to the levels of the first game in terms of level design and attention to detail.
Watching some of your gameplay, I'm reminded of the one thing I really didn't like in BioShock 1 & 2 (at least I think it was in both games) and that's taking pictures. I wish they found a different way of letting you improve your prowess against enemies.
I thought it was odd he didn't address the picture aspect whatsoever in this video. Easily my least fav part in both games. 2 improved it, but still wasn't a fan.
I finished it. Therefore, was good. I remember playing the first game and the first time seeing a splicer dodge behind a pillar to get out of danger and then peek around and cackle at me. Really great AI mechanics, especially for the time. Being the same engine and general design, all of those eye-popping, unscripted moments carried over. I really loved the first Dishonored, as well, for the same reasons, more or less.
As a person newer to the Bioshock games I prefer the originals over the remastered versions. Don't get me wrong, the remasters look GORGEOUS. But there's a kinda charm in the older graphics
Bioshock 2 is my favorite of the series. Touching story, improved gameplay, and great DLC's. Infinite was just ok. It didn't feel like a Bioshock game and just made me miss Rapture. The DLC went back to Rapture but it didn't like the story.
Amazing video as always ,and there are 2 crpg from the same developer (serpent in the staglands and Mechajmmer) but they aren't divinity original sin level so keep your expectations in check and serpent in the staglands doesn't have achievements
I actually preferred 2 in terms of gameplay to bioshock 1 and infinite. Really felt disappointed by bioshock infinite. Everything felt underbaked to me at the time.
Can't wait to hear what you think about infinite! Still one of my favorite games of all time, but I completely understand why some people might not like it.
Another very fair, balanced and interesting review of this underrated gem, thank you. So, the question remains - are you going to tackle Resident Evil 4 Remake? Would be fascinated to hear your thoughts on it.
Save for the plot twist of the original and having to return to Rapture a second time, I actually believe that Bioshock 2 is a better game In almost every way than the original. Also Minerva’s Den? One of the best story driven expansions I’ve experienced in gaming!
Interesting. I do agree too. Bioshock 1 is about Rapture, that's why the final quarter of the game, post Ryan, is a bit stilted, as we know Rapture by that point. Bioshock Infinite is about the multiverse and Columbia, and how choices make us, but sometimes we aren't really given a choice, because the world forces us to act a certain way no matter what we want. Meanwhile Bioshock 2 is a character study, for Elanor Lamb, Sophia Lamb, and the player via the skin of Delta. We are made into the mirror held up to them, and they are found out who they are from that, Elanor defining herself by our actions, Sophia defining herself in opposition to those actions. BTW, since we're below the break, spoiler question to you my good video maker. Do you consider letting Alex the Great go or ending his life the moral thing to do?
@@MortismalGaming According to the dialogue he can get out of there...somehow. That said, yeah, I feel it's probably best to not let him live, since he's clearly insane by this point, and ADAM has deleterious effects on the flesh, as we see, so it's almost like he's rotting from the inside out.
Despite the AI in the first game seeming really stupid, it had a very sophisticated system where it would try to guess if you had seen a particular enemy, and if not, that enemy would shoot near, but not at you to give the player a heads up as well as the feeling that the player got a lucky break.
Bioshock series are one of the best games I ve played. For their time they had great atmosphere and story. I guess for me the first one always going the best one because it was something truly uniuqe and new. Although the last game Infinite took the game and made it better in so many ways. Maybe it is the best game but I had very high expectations knowing the first two games. I am curious what will you have to say about the story and the gameplay elements of the last game.
I also think that BioShock 2 is underrated. Very good game indeed. But, to be honest, I love everything about this franchise, and aside from Clash in the Clouds for BioShock Infinite, which sis crappy as hell, the entire trilogy was pretty cool to complete. Some of my favourite games ever.
I think the story of Infinite is the weakest, but I do appreciate the characters in that game. Gunplay is mixed, because I really like what 2 did with combat, especially the plasmids being always on hand, as well as the shift in narrative focus. I wasn't super focused on the gunplay from Bioshock 1 so it didn't matter too much to me that it wasn't that strong in either game. Unfortunately I don't really like the changes to combat in Infinite, but it does have its moments.
Out of all the bioshock games this one I played the most , I haven't completed any of them , but I noped out of the first one , and infinite after one play session. This one I came back to multiple times , but for some reason the aesthetic and gameplay loop are not for me , felt very clunky for an FPS.
Minor comments: 1. I disliked there wasn't a NG+, at least for the photo progression system. It's been years since I played (on release xbox 360), and so if it changed then disregard this. However, like BS1 BS2 did have achievemtnts I believe for not dying and only using the drill. It was much easier than 1 for obvious reasons, and I enjoyed drill only more than actually having other weapons in 2. What made me sad is I believe if I remember correctly the final tier of the big sister line gave you vamp drill attack (life steal with melee). However, by the time you could possibly get maxed out, you maybe had 20 minutes of the game left. It made me pretty sad you only got to feel like a god briefly. 2. Isn't there only 1 big sister? And isnt that the only one we fight? (trying to avoid plot spoilers, not sure if it matters though given how old this title is). cool review though, brought back memories.
I'm curious, since your USP is you review games after 100% completion, how important is it to you, that you are enjoying yourself? I don't 100% most of my games (if any) and I find my self often thinking "Da*n, this game is really dragging."
I pretty much just cover whatever I want, so nothing really shows up on the channel that I didn't make the effort to choose. Generally I'm having a blast outside of some tedium here and there.
I always felt with this one's story, that they had just kind of gone 'hey, we did neo-liberalism in the first game, so what if the second game was about communism!' That said, apart from the story itself not being as memorable at all (I barely remember any of it to be honest), it is most certainly the better game.
I talk about that in the video I point people too at the beginning, but simple answer is most people don't care about that in a review which means I'd have a significant portion of the video that people aren't watching. The 100% before the review is more about establishing some trust that I've played the game to it's fullest in a landscape where reviewers barely touch a game before coming in with absolutist takes like what happened with Redfall recently for instance.
@@MortismalGaming I see. Could I suggest you talk about notable achievements instead? I don't mean a rundown of all of them just "this game has some really tough achievements like completing all hidden content in one max difficulty run, I especially liked this one" or "this game doesn't have any notable achievements most of them being complete X or kill X of Y". Just something quick on something you liked but not quite quick enough to just be "achievements on this one are hard/easy".
I got completely stuck a few hours into Bioshock, and eventually gave up on it after searching everywhere repeatedly for where I was supposed to go. So, the sequels were never something that I felt overly motivated to try, because why would you want to trust these people to make a competent game again, after getting burned once?
@@saltycomet Beats me, that was 6 years ago and I don't remember the details, only that I got stuck and wandered and wandered and never found a way to move on, and it greatly pissed me off. I didn't change the difficulty at all, so whatever the default is.
I replayed 1 and then played 2 for the first time a year or so back, first one left me underwhelmed (it was mostly just kinda dull to play, paying lipservice to immersive sim ideas), second one then blew me away. Similarly, i much preferred the story to 2 - i prefered the much expanded worldbuilding and getting in amongst the other inhabitants, also whilst yeah the story didn't have it's shyamalan style twists - I felt it was consistently interesting. Especially the little sister sequence - it was really neat to see through their eyes for a time.
It was fine, it was just that this game came out during Call of Duty's explosion of Modern Warfare's 1 & 2 so MP in a lot of other games were just an afterthought.
BioShock 2 is great. BioShock Infinite is mid asl. The gameplay is a massive downgrade, the story doesn’t make sense and isn’t good and the DLC for infinite’s only positives are the visuals, setting and Elizabeth 😂
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TH-cam isn't time stamping the video correctly for some reason so here they are:
Timestamps
00:00 Intro
01:02 Development & Technical Details
03:24 Story Set Up & Thoughts
07:02 Difficulty & NG+
07:40 Progression Systems
10:50 Combat
15:20 World & Gameplay
18:50 DLC
20:37 Steam Deck
21:36 Positives/Negatives
22:42 Conclusion
24:05 Wrap Up
Would you kindly review Bioshock Infinite? 😆
Bioshock 2 is a misunderstood and underrated game. People threw it under the bus because it wasn't trying to impress you with Shyamalan twists, imitating the original. It's way more a character-driven experience than the original, and I would say its more complex in terms of character development. Ironically, Bioshock Infinite has exactly what Bioshock 2 is lacking, but it's lacking all the other things Bioshock 2 has. You'll see what I mean when you play that game.
Totally agree, now if they could just combine the 2 games... :P
So that maybe why ive heard infinite was a let down when it came out
@@JoeEver123 oh the opposite, Infinite was touted as a masterpiece when it came out cause it was ‘so smart for a video game’ and all that artsy fartsy stuff, but over time people started thinking maybe they were just easily impressed by a story that was pulling pool over their eyes.
@@mr.mammuthusafricanavus8299 There is one section were they actually "combine" those 2 games ;)
My thoughts exactly. I like all games in the series, but just watching this video makes me want to reinstall Bioshock 2 and play it for the umpteenth time. :)
The art style and the setting of the 1st 2 Bioshock games is timeless.
Infinite for me just felt soulless.........like a Disney themepark ride or fastfood......flashy but ultimately unfulfilling.
Rapture being consumed and taken over by the ocean was incredibly atmospheric and it had a very tragic story but an utterly beautiful and haunting setting.
I consider bioshock 2 to be my favourite bioshock game. I liked the whole story with eleanor a lot more then the others and the gameplay was very fun. I believe when I first played it I did two runs back to back. One where I did everything with summoning security bots, mini turrets and all the trap stuff (proximity mines, electro spears and trap rivets) and one where I just used the drill. They both felt pretty different gameplay wise and both worked just fine as well.
Minerva's den is the first dlc where after i finished it i just sat there even past the credits. I loved the story, especially because we've all in someway struggled with letting go
Watch 30 minutes later this man uploads 100% Tears of the Kingdom review.
I agree. I played the 3 Bioshock games back to back a little over a year ago and my favourite was the 2nd game.
Honestly, my favorite of the bunch! It combines the immersiveness and exploration of the first game with the intensiveness and versatility of what would become Infinite later on, plus a pretty good story to follow.
Great review! Bioshock 2 was the first game in the series I played and it's by far my favorite too!
Imo, i liked the Story more in Bioshock 2. The Ending hit me so hard, it inspired me to 1 of my only 2 Tattoos, roughly 10 Years ago. (A Big Daddy with a Little Sister on his shoulder). I loved it so much back then
It's the best of the games for me definitely. I'm not sure why it doesn't have more of a stellar reputation like it should.
The proximity mines in this game we're super fun to use, in general really enjoyed this one.
YES! I’ve been sick all weekend and having such a difficult time sleeping. I spent all day yesterday in bed watching your Supercut story videos. I can’t sleep rn (4 AM where I am) and here I am, blessed with another Mortym video to watch :’) so thankful for your content. I haven’t played 90% of the games you’ve covered and it doesn’t matter! You make every video interesting!
Wish you a full recovery.
@@A_Bird23 thank you 🙏🏾 I’m already feeling better
FINALLY someone else who prefers the 2nd games story over the 1st. While I do respect everyone's preferences and opinions regarding favorite games and stories, I feel as if people often just have a one note explanation for why bioshock 1's story is this unbreaten masterpiece, namely the whole Andrew Ryan bit and twist. Don't get me wrong, those moments are awesome, bioshock 2 just has an overall higher quality story and writing, expanding on 1's message and parables in every way.
BioShock 2 is my favourite in the series. I play games for gameplay, having a nice story is secondary. Books usually have wayyyyy better stories.
💯💯💯. Have platiunumed this game and done dozens of challenge runs for BioShock 2
I disagree.
Both can be equally great.
I like very much certain novels and essays, but after playing games I feel, think and cry a lot more when living videogames world/stories and think a lot more about em when compared to books.
I felt strong emotions while reading 1984, but less when compared to the first Bioshock.
That probably has something to do with the fact that you
1) INTERACT and LIVE in that world
2) you can SEE every corner of it
Books in general have obviosly better writing, because that's their purpouse. But that don't mean always better story.
@@TiomesTheOne Well, you essentially preempted my response with the second part of your comment.
It depends on what you consider part of the quality of a story.
Just because you interact and live in the world, doesn't make the story itself better, it makes your connection to the story better.
I've read hundreds of books, I'd go out on a limb and say 80% of them have, to me, better stories than any of the hundreds of games I played.
That doesn't mean I wasn't more invested in some games, but story wise, they're all very derivative and formulaic.
@@jesperburns everything is derivative and formulaic. We're already at that point in time where 99% of things are a remix
of something old. It's just that some authors are very good at hiding it.
Videogames as a medium are inherently and internally castrated in the lack of offering extensive dialogues: because most players nowadays consider reading a slog. But does dialogue and writing = story? Not always. I consider The Wizard of Oz a masterpiece and it does not feature deep dialogue, it's just "how" well something is told.
Everything already exists. It's the "how" you combine the elements. And some games are unbelievable creative in combining player actions and good story.
Name me 3 totally original and completely not derivative books of the last 5 years. I'll wait.
@@TiomesTheOne I believe there's games that center completely or largely around dialogue, I think TellTale games are some, but again, I play games for the gameplay, I read books for the stories.
Why should I limit myself to the books I read or mention? Last book I finished (a few days ago) was Glenn Cook's The White Rose from 1985.
Only recent books I read (last year) were Joe Abercrombie's second trilogy The Madness of Crowds.
Either writer is not generic or tropey.
Another recent book I recently read is the Three Body problem, published in English in 2014. It's not very good but it's not derivative at all.
Or the Witcher books, not very well written (imo, or perhaps badly translated), but quite "subversive".
Let's flip it around, what makes you think books are derivative? Name 5 books that made you roll your eyes at the tropes or devices or events/characters.
EDIT: I have one. Brandon Sanderson, very formulaic writer in the sequence/paragraph/event sense, but seems to at least be aware of a lot of the fantasy tropes and is quite inventive when it comes to his magic systems and characters (settings), which somewhat makes up for it. Not my cup of tea though.
Hey Mortin, love your reviews! A small suggestion I would make is to add timetags on the timeline.
They're in the description for some reason TH-cam isn't marking them correctly
To explain for people who have never uploaded a TH-cam video before - TH-cam usually parses the time stamps from the description and then makes the timeline tags automatically. For some reason that didn’t work here.
Game felt more like a Bioshock 1.5 for me, but I remember really enjoying it at the time - it's more Bioshock, more of Rapture, more crazy people, better gunplay, better mini-games ... I do agree it stays a bit too close to the original vs Infinite which is much bolder in that regard (but that one I enjoyed less because I found the gameplay much less enjoyable at times)
This is the best game in the trilogy. It's story doesn't have the same "punch" that the first game does but it is a more nuanced and better-told one. That combined with better combat, better systems, better AI and more meaningful choices and, yeah, BioShock 2 is where it's at. While I find talking myself into playing the original Bioshock a bit of a chore these days, Bioshock 2 is one that I find a lot easier to get back into.
Really enjoyed 2 but i gotta say you don't really feel imposing or much of a threat as a big daddy. My biggest gripe is that you die so easily, a single splicer can shoot you a couple times and youre at like half health. Never made sense to me. The Big Sisters are still some of the coolest designed enemies in gaming though.
2 is better than 1. I’m happy that is finally being known.
YES
Bioshock 2 is my favourite game from the series. I felt infinite was a real let down.
Fuck it Imma say it, Bioshock 2 > Bioshock Infinite
I'm probably in the minority but two is my favorite of a series I love quite a bit. The thing I enjoy the most is that the motivation of your character changes depending on the choices you make. Good choices and he's a man in a suit who cares for his adopted daughter and wants to save her. Bad choices and he's a cold hearted machine who only wants to get to her to save his own skin.
Watched this video last night while looking at the game credits. Was my first Playthrough and got the Savoir ending where you save all the lil sisters and the 3 side characters
27, didn't play these games when they released. So I don't have nostalgia goggles
2 is my favorite in terms of gameplay/mechanics. The improvements to hacking, dual wielding (plasmid in left and weapon in right= fluid combat), the camera for the enemies was VASTLY improved etc. Doesn't get enough credit for what it improved upon. Story was just serviceable, I personally love the gameplay. Sucks we didn't have new game plus
AND the rivet gun is one of my favorite weapons in a game ever. BioShock 1 has much better atmosphere, scares, and stor
Drill dashing will also always be fun
I love all of the BioShock series, but Infinite is probably my favorite. You are in for a real treat playing that one.
Great review ! Playing it atm before remake system shock arrives end this month.
I honestly loved this title far more then the first game. I already knew everything about BioShock's twist, and had experienced a bit of it's world before. I wanted a difficulty on it that would challenge me while being fun, and turns out that their wasn't really an appropriate difficulty for that, so I just put it on the hardest difficulty and played through it. When I played this game, though, I got to put it on hard and that made me feel like I was really a big daddy, steamrolling through all the enemies and killing them like they were minor nuisances. It just so happened that I was also looking for something exactly like what the protector trials was providing, and that provided me quite a great deal of fun too. It's a shame how few people played this game. It honestly deserved far more, at the least the recognition that it exists, which I didn't even know until I looked at BioShock on steam.
I’m convinced that you’re an AI bc you never sleep, but I love the amount of videos that you constantly post! 😂🎉
Loved this game! I really loved the multliplayer, too. And Minervas Den is a fantastic story. One of the best DLC stories ever, I say.
💯💯. Minerva's den is legendary imo
Bioshock 2 is by far the best one for me ^^ !!! everything everyhting is great about this game ^^ !!! I will love it forever.
Yea Bioshock 2 is my favorite in the series. It's fun to be the hero that saves the world sometimes but every game doesn't have to be that. This is just a story about a father trying to save his daughter and by the end of the the game inadvertently shaping her world view just like parents often do, for good or ill depending on your choices. It's just beautifully told and realized. Better gameplay than the first as well. That's the problem with both 1 and 3 though. Ken Levine is an excellent writer and world builder but he's not a very good game designer. The moment to moment gameplay and overall design in 2 is mechanically the high point of the series. While I routinely replay 2 I really have no desire to revisit the other 2.
I'm obviously not saying they're bad games they're just not as good as folks make them out to be, for me anyway.
I played Bioshock 2 not too long after studying the History of Ideas at the University, a study focusing on the ideologies and how they develop. This fueling my interest in extremism. Each of the bioshock games explore one major ideology and I was pretty excited to hear how they presented the dominating ideology of 2.
Great review! Big agreement on Minvervas Den, it was an exellent story dlc.
Now onto the last one. Kinda curious how you rate all 3 in comparison after playing Infinite.
I like some parts of this game, but honestly I felt the Adam system in this game was so tedious and annoying. Kill the big daddies then pick up the little sister and look for several corpses which makes you play through a horde mode while she harvests them, then do it all over again two more times then you get the big sister. After a couple of stages I was so fed up.
Exactly, my main problem with this game. Way too repetitive. In the original all you did was kill 2-3 big daddies and that was it. Now they add 2 more side objectives for no reason other than artificial game length. Don't get me wrong the gameplay is good, but it's not that good and those infamous "defend the area" objectives overstay their welcome in almost any game.
Honestly, played all the Bioshock games again a couple of years ago. This was the best one, hands down.
I got into Bioshock late and all I knew was that the original was regarded as this amazing masterpiece, which it certainly was in terms of world building.
But Bioshock 2 genuinely impressed me as a GAME, and it offered a much better gameplay experience within this world, while expanding it in beliveable ways. I never understood why people hated it.
For me this game is one of the best ones I played and this will remain.
Brilliant review. This is my favorite Bioshock. Cheers.
I love the bioshock series and I always thought 2 was better than 1, both narratively and gameplay-wise. Thank you for the video.
The big moments from the first game (meeting Cohen, the Surgeon etc.) are not quite matched and it doesn't do as good a job at introducing Rapture but... Bioshock 2 tells a more ideologically interesting story which by the end pulled on my heart strings. It has quieter big moments that usually involve walking the sea bed and Rapture is more compelling to explore. I got the good ending, very satisfying. I loved it.
I have many fond memories of this game (and the whole trilogy, for that matter). Excellent review. Looking forward to last (Infinite). Good vid
Agreed. I thought 2 was, hands down, the best overall game of the three. Great mechanics, a good story (though, as you pointed out, doesn't have the same peaks as 1 did), but overall better feel.
Interesting. I passed over this when it came out, because I thought it was focused on multiplayer. Perhaps it was the marketing of the time. I quite enjoyed the first one. I didn't even finish the third one, however. It just felt like moving from one area to the next to kill the bad guys and did not disguise it at all. I'll have to give this one a shot, though. Thanks, Mort!
I probably liked the story more in Bioshock 2 because there were more choices and because I genuinely cared about rescuing Eleanor from her evil mom. Then the gameplay, especially the hacking, was better as well. That was a very nice review 👍
Thank you for your review ! :)
I think if you polled fans of the series you would be surprised most would agree 2>1 as it was what most sequels do in a lot of ways, its just better. However, it can never eclipse 1 in terms of the first time you enter Rapture and the twist, a reason its an iconic game.
I enjoyed it when it came out on the Xbox 360 in 2010. But trying to play the remastered version on the newer consoles just became a hassle with the constant crashes. Ended up giving up on it.
I love BS2, but I'd probably have loved it even more if i wasn't consuming absolutely everything behind the scenes beforehand. Seriously Persephone is the *only* level in the game the developers didn't spoil (in an environment/backstory sense; they weren't really story spoilers) in podcasts and BTS videos. It made the game seem more abruptly short and a bit less impactful having only 1 completely unspoiled environment. I am careful not to dig too deep into games I don't want spoiled now.
Also BS2 had an awesome promotional ARG called Something in the Sea which is the story of Mark Meltzer tracking his daughter and discovering Rapture. He wasn't originally going to be in the game but the fan response to SotS was so positive that they added him into the game to finish out his story.
I always loved Bioshock 2, it's a great game. Most fans wanted the story to be as impactful as the first one and that's where it failed. It's story didn't blow your mind like Bioshock 1 so many fans feeled let down by it, but I still think they did a great job. Playing 2 feels like 1 but better, nothing insanely new but without many flaws the first game had. Also exploring Rapture wasn't as new and exciting as in the first time (as you said), but it was nonetheless exploring more of Rapture, something I loved doing and always will love. Part 2 is mostly overviewed because it wasn't a great impactful story as 1 and 3, but still a very good game, just in a row with 2 other very good games.
I think my problem was that 2 didn't add anything to the story. It was more of a retread. Onward to 200k. All glory to the algorithm.
I'll be real, I enjoy Bioshock 2's story more than 3.
Edit: As an aside, I've always loved the joke summary of the story
"An abusive mother and a loving father get into a custody dispute"
Edit 2: 13:20. For years, I shit you not years, guides for the game insisted Big Sisters spawned randomly whenever you finish up with any given Little Sister, and never acknowledged "No, they spawn when you've finished off all of them on the level"
This video made me decide to play Bioshock 2 again since it first released.
One thing I've noticed since playing it again, and I think it's why I didn't enjoy it much the first time is that the level design doesn't feel as tight or as well crafted as the first game. There's a lot of empty space, apartments that don't look lived in, rooms that don't really go anywhere and don't seem to have a purpose etc.
The original had so much environmental storytelling, every inch looked lived in, but for some reason 2 just doesn't seem to have that same level of atmosphere. Some of the levels even look pretty rushed in my opinion.
The city of Rapture itself is like one of the main characters of the game so for me it's a big flaw that it doesn't live up to the levels of the first game in terms of level design and attention to detail.
Watching some of your gameplay, I'm reminded of the one thing I really didn't like in BioShock 1 & 2 (at least I think it was in both games) and that's taking pictures. I wish they found a different way of letting you improve your prowess against enemies.
The second can be done recording a video while fighting, not taking pictures
Don`t know if it still works but in bioshock 2 freezing the enemy and using a mini-turret at the same time worked wonders.
I thought it was odd he didn't address the picture aspect whatsoever in this video. Easily my least fav part in both games. 2 improved it, but still wasn't a fan.
Thanks for the video
I finished it. Therefore, was good. I remember playing the first game and the first time seeing a splicer dodge behind a pillar to get out of danger and then peek around and cackle at me. Really great AI mechanics, especially for the time. Being the same engine and general design, all of those eye-popping, unscripted moments carried over. I really loved the first Dishonored, as well, for the same reasons, more or less.
As a person newer to the Bioshock games I prefer the originals over the remastered versions. Don't get me wrong, the remasters look GORGEOUS. But there's a kinda charm in the older graphics
Are you planning on reviewing the other "Shock"-games too now that System Shock 1 remake is getting close?
Eventually
Bioshock 2 is my favorite of the series. Touching story, improved gameplay, and great DLC's.
Infinite was just ok. It didn't feel like a Bioshock game and just made me miss Rapture. The DLC went back to Rapture but it didn't like the story.
And here we go ... I knew it wouldn't last 'til next week :D
Amazing video as always ,and there are 2 crpg from the same developer (serpent in the staglands and Mechajmmer) but they aren't divinity original sin level so keep your expectations in check and serpent in the staglands doesn't have achievements
Havent messed with staglands, but I did a launch review for mechajammer but haven't gotten around to getting 100% on it
I never understood why people gave BioShock 2 such a hard time. It was, in my view at launch, an amazing follow-up to the first game.
I loved this review, thanku
I actually preferred 2 in terms of gameplay to bioshock 1 and infinite. Really felt disappointed by bioshock infinite. Everything felt underbaked to me at the time.
Can't wait to hear what you think about infinite! Still one of my favorite games of all time, but I completely understand why some people might not like it.
Another very fair, balanced and interesting review of this underrated gem, thank you.
So, the question remains - are you going to tackle Resident Evil 4 Remake? Would be fascinated to hear your thoughts on it.
Probably not, but it looks pretty good
Save for the plot twist of the original and having to return to Rapture a second time, I actually believe that Bioshock 2 is a better game In almost every way than the original. Also Minerva’s Den? One of the best story driven expansions I’ve experienced in gaming!
Interesting. I do agree too. Bioshock 1 is about Rapture, that's why the final quarter of the game, post Ryan, is a bit stilted, as we know Rapture by that point. Bioshock Infinite is about the multiverse and Columbia, and how choices make us, but sometimes we aren't really given a choice, because the world forces us to act a certain way no matter what we want.
Meanwhile Bioshock 2 is a character study, for Elanor Lamb, Sophia Lamb, and the player via the skin of Delta. We are made into the mirror held up to them, and they are found out who they are from that, Elanor defining herself by our actions, Sophia defining herself in opposition to those actions.
BTW, since we're below the break, spoiler question to you my good video maker. Do you consider letting Alex the Great go or ending his life the moral thing to do?
I'd say kill him, he's on limited time anyway given he's stuck in that chamber and clearly at a point where just being 'alive' is probably torturous.
@@MortismalGaming According to the dialogue he can get out of there...somehow. That said, yeah, I feel it's probably best to not let him live, since he's clearly insane by this point, and ADAM has deleterious effects on the flesh, as we see, so it's almost like he's rotting from the inside out.
Despite the AI in the first game seeming really stupid, it had a very sophisticated system where it would try to guess if you had seen a particular enemy, and if not, that enemy would shoot near, but not at you to give the player a heads up as well as the feeling that the player got a lucky break.
Bioshock series are one of the best games I ve played. For their time they had great atmosphere and story. I guess for me the first one always going the best one because it was something truly uniuqe and new. Although the last game Infinite took the game and made it better in so many ways. Maybe it is the best game but I had very high expectations knowing the first two games. I am curious what will you have to say about the story and the gameplay elements of the last game.
Infinite is no where near as good as the first 2
YOU ARE A MACHINE!!
Good show sir
Will you do system shocks too? I played them some years ago for the first time and loved them!
I plan on covering the upcoming remake for sure, no plan on the originals currently
@@MortismalGaming well, I'd say you'd be missing on good games =)
Which are playable today with no problem I might add.
Listening to you say you enjoyed the choices in this and then say you’re looking forward to trying Infinite... oh boy 😅
One of my faves.
Wait for sale, because I got the remastered collection on Xbox for about $15
Bioshock 2 is great. It is more fast-passed than the first one but the story is a bit weaker.
Yes
If anything, I'd say Bioshock 2's star has risen over the years where Infinite's has fallen.
I also think that BioShock 2 is underrated. Very good game indeed. But, to be honest, I love everything about this franchise, and aside from Clash in the Clouds for BioShock Infinite, which sis crappy as hell, the entire trilogy was pretty cool to complete. Some of my favourite games ever.
I enjoyed bioshock 2 though it is my least favourite though. Looking forward to see your thought on infinite
free comment.
Based Mortim
I'll admit the 2nd game wasn't the best but it is my favorite just cause it was the first game for me
I think the story of Infinite is the weakest, but I do appreciate the characters in that game. Gunplay is mixed, because I really like what 2 did with combat, especially the plasmids being always on hand, as well as the shift in narrative focus. I wasn't super focused on the gunplay from Bioshock 1 so it didn't matter too much to me that it wasn't that strong in either game. Unfortunately I don't really like the changes to combat in Infinite, but it does have its moments.
I wish infinite had better sights on some of the weapons like the carbine lol
Out of all the bioshock games this one I played the most , I haven't completed any of them , but I noped out of the first one , and infinite after one play session. This one I came back to multiple times , but for some reason the aesthetic and gameplay loop are not for me , felt very clunky for an FPS.
Bioshock: 10/10
Bioshock 2: 9.5/10
Bioshock Infinite: 9/10
Minor comments:
1. I disliked there wasn't a NG+, at least for the photo progression system. It's been years since I played (on release xbox 360), and so if it changed then disregard this. However, like BS1 BS2 did have achievemtnts I believe for not dying and only using the drill. It was much easier than 1 for obvious reasons, and I enjoyed drill only more than actually having other weapons in 2. What made me sad is I believe if I remember correctly the final tier of the big sister line gave you vamp drill attack (life steal with melee). However, by the time you could possibly get maxed out, you maybe had 20 minutes of the game left. It made me pretty sad you only got to feel like a god briefly.
2. Isn't there only 1 big sister? And isnt that the only one we fight? (trying to avoid plot spoilers, not sure if it matters though given how old this title is).
cool review though, brought back memories.
There's definitely more than one, last boss fight so to speak is against two of them
I'm curious, since your USP is you review games after 100% completion, how important is it to you, that you are enjoying yourself? I don't 100% most of my games (if any) and I find my self often thinking "Da*n, this game is really dragging."
I pretty much just cover whatever I want, so nothing really shows up on the channel that I didn't make the effort to choose. Generally I'm having a blast outside of some tedium here and there.
The dlc was awesome
I always felt with this one's story, that they had just kind of gone 'hey, we did neo-liberalism in the first game, so what if the second game was about communism!'
That said, apart from the story itself not being as memorable at all (I barely remember any of it to be honest), it is most certainly the better game.
would you kindly focus on a bioshock infinite review? ;)
Infinite has a lot of rather grindy achievements so I wonder how long it will take you to review that haha
Initial research tells me two playthroughs plus the DLC puts 100% at around 30-50 hours so we shall see
Mortismal I have to ask, since you 100% all your games, why don't you also review the achievements?
I talk about that in the video I point people too at the beginning, but simple answer is most people don't care about that in a review which means I'd have a significant portion of the video that people aren't watching. The 100% before the review is more about establishing some trust that I've played the game to it's fullest in a landscape where reviewers barely touch a game before coming in with absolutist takes like what happened with Redfall recently for instance.
@@MortismalGaming I see. Could I suggest you talk about notable achievements instead? I don't mean a rundown of all of them just "this game has some really tough achievements like completing all hidden content in one max difficulty run, I especially liked this one" or "this game doesn't have any notable achievements most of them being complete X or kill X of Y". Just something quick on something you liked but not quite quick enough to just be "achievements on this one are hard/easy".
I got completely stuck a few hours into Bioshock, and eventually gave up on it after searching everywhere repeatedly for where I was supposed to go. So, the sequels were never something that I felt overly motivated to try, because why would you want to trust these people to make a competent game again, after getting burned once?
Not being rude but what did you get stuck on? And what difficulty?
@@saltycomet Beats me, that was 6 years ago and I don't remember the details, only that I got stuck and wandered and wandered and never found a way to move on, and it greatly pissed me off. I didn't change the difficulty at all, so whatever the default is.
@@nicodimus2222 I gotcha. I play these all the time so if it was a current situation of being stuck I was gonna give a detailed explanation 😂
@@saltycomet Thanks anyhow.
I replayed 1 and then played 2 for the first time a year or so back, first one left me underwhelmed (it was mostly just kinda dull to play, paying lipservice to immersive sim ideas), second one then blew me away. Similarly, i much preferred the story to 2 - i prefered the much expanded worldbuilding and getting in amongst the other inhabitants, also whilst yeah the story didn't have it's shyamalan style twists - I felt it was consistently interesting. Especially the little sister sequence - it was really neat to see through their eyes for a time.
Bioshock 1 has different endings to
A quality game. Too bad Infinite was awful after it.
I completely forgot about the multiplayer in this. It must not have been very good 😂
It was fine, it was just that this game came out during Call of Duty's explosion of Modern Warfare's 1 & 2 so MP in a lot of other games were just an afterthought.
BioShock 2 is great. BioShock Infinite is mid asl. The gameplay is a massive downgrade, the story doesn’t make sense and isn’t good and the DLC for infinite’s only positives are the visuals, setting and Elizabeth 😂
I hope for your sanity's sake that infinite doesn't have a "finish the game on the hardest difficulty" achievement. You'll hate it after that.