Not really sure what's going on with that trophy...

It’s that time of year again; that wonderful time when we place an arbitrary crown on a single video game for rising above all the rest and demonstrating what video games should be. But before we recap the year that was 2010, I’d first like to continue an InsaneBear tradition and re-evaluate 2009′s Game of the Year…Alright, and with that re-evaluation process completed, I’ve decided to amend the scores of Batman: Arkham Asylum and Borderlands from Good to Great and Great to Good, respectively. That said, Dragon Age: Origins retains the honors of GotY. It certainly has some interface problems and the combat is a little clunky, but the world and cast of characters are sublimely rich and the Origin stories are a thing of beauty. Few games have allowed me to embrace real role-playing so readily, and for that, Dragon Age: Origins lives on in my mind. Let’s just hope the sequel is as good.

With that out of the way, we can move on to the lineup of 2010 contenders. Once again, I’m ashamed to have no insights on the many great PS3 and Wii titles that came out this year, but I am what we would call a poor college kid. Feel free to dig into those deep pockets of yours and make a donation. And yes, if I had any faith that any of you would actually make a donation I’d totally go through the effort of putting a fancy link on “donation” that would allow direct deposits into my the InsaneBear bank account. Hmm, I wonder if I can write this site off as a business expense? I really just want to say that I’m writing things off…

Alan Wake – This game makes a pretty bold move in casting a washed-up writer as the protagonist, but those elbow patches on Mr. Wake’s jacket grew into my heart and convinced me that Remedy has created one of the most interesting new characters of the year in Alan Wake. The supporting cast is equally strong, and the story is a unique one for video games. The cinematic presentation really allows for the game’s interesting light mechanics to shine (get it?) and the atmosphere is startlingly alive.

BioShock 2 – This game takes all the mechanical aspects an all-time classic in BioShock and makes them better. More weapons, more plasmids, and more enemies combine with smoother combat for some truly intense and unique FPS action, and it’s all brought to life by phenomenal art direction, graphics, and sound design. Against all odds, Rapture manages to maintain its mysterious allure and keeps players coming back to explore more of the seafloor city’s ecology. Plus, 2K Marin provides a fun multiplayer offering full of unique BioShock twists.

Costume Quest – Double Fine’s first stab at the downloadable market rode its adorable visual design and Halloween theme all the way from my hard-drive to my heart and I can’t wait to see what the studio brings to the table next. A quirky story infused with plenty of laughs is the main draw, but the turn-based combat is a blast too. I’m still in awe of the snazzy costume design; I mean, that french-fry arachnid thing is a thing of terrifying beauty.

Fable III – Lionhead’s third entry in the Fable series maintains the charming audio and visual direction of the franchise while amping up its signature humor to side-splitting magnitudes. The combat is super smooth and the story is probably the most interesting Lionhead has produced so far. Oh, and co-op is fully functional this time around.

Halo: Reach – The Halo formula has defined FPS gaming for the better part of a decade and is still just as addictive today as it was in 2001. What makes Reach so exceptional is that it dares to build on that formula in a meaningful way with the concept of armor abilities, which really allow you to approach combat however you choose. Beautiful visuals and sound complement an infinitely replayable collection of game-modes that accommodate loners, competitive types, co-operative buddies, level-builders, and machinama-makers. Each mode is further enhanced by dozens of customizable modifiers which are contained within amazingly simple and intuitive menus. From a gameplay and value perspective, Bungie’s final Halo effort is the pinnacle of a series that many consider to be the greatest FPS franchise of all time.

Mass Effect 2 – Without a doubt the most polished game BioWare has ever put out, Mass Effect 2 is a game that transcends genre. While the choice-driven dialogue trees scream of WRPGs, the shooting is so astonishingly smooth and intense that it can compete with any Third-Person Shooter on the market. The cast of wonderfully voiced characters occupy a distinct universe which is inspired by the classic aesthetic of sci-fi giants like Blade Runner, and the narrative is good enough to go toe to toe with most sci-fi greats. But what’s most impressive is to see the grand scope of the franchise when your choices from Mass Effect 1 show up in this greatly improved sequel. If Mass Effect 3 can rope it all together, then Commander Shephard’s space-faring trilogy will go down as one of the greatest in the history of video games.

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit – 2010 could go down as the best year ever for the Racing genre, what with titles like Gran Turismo 5, Split/Second, Blur, and more. But in my mind, this Hot Pursuit reboot is the best of them all (keeping in mind that I haven’t actually played any of the others…I just like cop-chases). Whether you’re racing the computer, talking trash online, or desperately trying to top your friend’s best time, drifting through a corner at high speeds in a $2,000,000 Bugatti is immensely satisfying.

Perfect Dark – An HD face-lift and online capabilities for one of the best games of all time? It’s hard to imagine Perfect Dark for Xbox Live Arcade being anything but good. Sure enough, the core gameplay is just as fun now as it was in standard definition ten years ago. The ridiculous number of weapons, all with secondary functions, the superb enemy animations, the programmable multiplayer bots, the insane amount of stat-tracking, the plethora of different game-types, all of that makes for one of the deepest and most fully realized FPSs of all time. Add in an unforgettable soundtrack and a really good story, and you have to wonder why more developers aren’t copying Perfect Dark. Oh, and did I forget to mention the local split-screen options? Thank the gaming gods for allowing this remake to be made.

Red Dead Redemption – What can I say? Rockstar’s take on the wild west successfully creates the single most organic game-world I’ve ever experienced. When you’re purposefully ignoring fast-travel just so you can take in the awesome beauty of the world around you, you know the developers are doing something right. Add in a cast of supremely written characters, a classic Western tale, an innovative and daring ending, great graphics and sound, as well as a robust multiplayer feature, and you’ve got the ingredients for one hell of a game.

Splinter Cell: Conviction – Sam Fisher’s latest tale of espionage boldly goes where no stealth game has gone before and rewards players for being aggressive “predators” instead of the ghosts of the past. The innovative “Mark and Execute” system keeps the pace charging ahead on all cylinders and consistently has you feeling like a bad ass. The dedicated co-op campaign is a welcome addition too.

Honorable Mentions – Games that I should have played but didn’t…

Civilization V – It’s supposed to be the most accessible Civ game yet but it doesn’t sacrifice any depth to achieve that. I’m almost afraid to play it for fear of becoming addicted.

Donkey Kong Country Returns – Classic Platforming at its finest and a great aesthetic to go with it. And I hear that the challenge certainly gives you your money’s worth.

God of War III – There’s never been a game with such visual scale as this grandiose beauty. The seamless zooms from the back of a Titan to the mountain he is climbing and back again are astonishing. Kratos’ third bloody adventure is undoubtedly one of the best looking games of all time.

Heavy Rain – Quantic Dream’s daring interactive thriller is unquestionably the most unique AAA title of 2010 and is worth playing simply to experience something different. Everybody who’s played it seems to say that it’s got some of the most memorable moments of the year.

Kirby’s Epic Yarn – Is it possible for something to be so cute that it locks you into a permanent smile? Probably not, but Kirby’s fabric-fueled adventure can’t be accused of not trying. This title definitely has the most appealing art style of any game I’ve seen this year.

Limbo – Looking back, I’m sort of surprised I didn’t get this game. I’m thinking I’ll probably correct that situation over the next few days, because countless critics have cited this as the most emotionally engaging and thought-provoking game of 2010. But forgetting all of that artsy stuff and looking at it from a practical standpoint, those puzzles are supposed to be devilishly satisfying.

Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker – Dude, it’s MGS. Does anything more need to be said?

Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty – I’ve never been one to go nuts over RTSs, but I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that Blizzard’s sequel to one of the all-time greats looks really fun.

Super Mario Galaxy 2 – This follow up to Mario’s Wii Debut essentially takes everything that made that game a GotY contender (in 2007!) and makes it better. Miyamoto-san knows how to do one thing above all else and that’s how to make fun video games. SMG2 is supposed to be the pinnacle of 3D Platformers.

Vanquish – This futuristic Third-Person Shooter from the creator of Resident Evil has been winning a lot of “Best Game Nobody Played” awards for its ultra-intense shooting and jet-sliding mechanic that always has you on the offensive. There might not be much more to it than shooting, but that shooting is supposed to be some of the best this year.

And now for the awards…

Best Biceps – I really wanted to pick Clay Matthews III here, because, well, the man looks like he could murder you with his bare hands. But Madden NFL 11 doesn’t quite do my favorite Green Bay Packer justice, so I decided to give it to a fictional character who does murder people with his bare hands, Kratos.

Look at those things bulge!

Mass Effect 2‘s Grunt and the really big bandit who smokes cigars in Fable III were also in the running.

Game of the Year Runner-Up – Mass Effect 2.

2010 Game of the Year – Halo: Reach. In a three-way race between Reach, Mass Effect 2, and Red Dead Redemption, Bungie’s final effort on the series that made them a house-hold name emerges as the all-around best game. RDR‘s game-world is more technically astounding, and ME2‘s story and characters are far more memorable, but Reach has the least flaws while managing to still be innovative. It doesn’t hurt that this game is more fundamentally fun and has more value than anything else that came out this year.

And that’s that for 2010, a relatively disappointing year for video games. But the future looks mighty bright in 2011. I’m looking forward to evaluating the ridiculous number of great looking games at the end of the year. Until then, let’s focus on more important things, like Most Serenading Voice of 2010.

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If anybody is on the fence about whether or not to spend the $5 for this new DLC, then this trailer will probably assist your decision. For me, watching this just makes me lament my experience with BioShock 2. The gun-play is clearly superior to the first game’s, but it just lacks all the heart and soul of that original masterpiece. Why won’t 2K smarten up and take the core ideals of a BioShock experience and put them in a different universe? That series doesn’t need direct sequels, but spiritual sequels could thrive. It’s not like it’s some radical idea that would risk losing sales. A little franchise by the name of Final Fantasy doth proveth that.

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In the department of news we don’t care about this week, 2K games has announced the $5 “Protector Trials” DLC for the commercially successful BioShock 2. The pack tasks players with escorting Little Sisters through six “new” maps inspired by locations from the single-player campaign. As you’ve probably predicted by now, the Sisters are harvesting ADAM, and waves of increasingly difficult splicers are attacking them. You’re in the middle. So, yeah…is 2K just trying to underline the fact that they never got what BioShock was about to begin with? I can’t wait to see what new IP Ken Levine and Irrational Games are working on right now. Maybe we’ll get another legendary experience that will eventually be monetized into an uninspired franchise getting by on name recognition alone.

BioShock 2 single-player DLC due Aug. 3 [GameSpot]

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There are so many things wrong with this.

After spending a fair amount of time with the Halo: Reach beta last week, which I had a pretty good time with, online multiplayer has been the focus of my thoughts for the first time in a while. And really, when I think about online gaming, I tend to think about how little of it I do these days. Back in the days of Halo 2 and maybe even extending into my time with Modern Warfare 1, I generally paid a visit to the virtual killing fields on a daily basis. But a lot has changed since then, both in my personal life and in the industry. Rather than wasting your time with an exploration of why I can’t seem enjoy the competitive online scene for more than a month at a time anymore, I’ll just go with the easy answer and say that all the kids I used to play with no longer play games online and that I’m not entirely interested in meeting digital friends. So for me, the novelty of a new game and primal competition can keep me satisfied for maybe month, but as soon as I pick up a newer game I have no interest in returning to the never-ending massacre that I had been contributing to. How can developers change this behavior?

Well, it’s probably a good idea to examine the online games that I’ve gotten involved with over the past couple years. I’ll only bother to list the ones that managed to draw me into public matches with the rest of you strange weirdos for more than a week–BioShock 2, Modern Warfare 2, Battlefield 1943, Left 4 Dead, and Gears of War 2. My motivations to suffer through BioShock 2‘s multiplayer were pretty much achievements and the need to properly review the game. I also enjoyed the Big Daddy twist applied to your run-of-the-mill CTF game in the “Capture the Sister” mode.

Modern Warfare 2 genuinely had me hooked for a while with its immense customization and class-balance. Not to mention, persistent leveling is always one way to keep a player going for one more session. But ultimately, I just got sick of running around and shooting things for no apparent reason other than to release stress (or build it, depending on how you’re playing).

Battlefield 1943 is a game that I enjoyed the hell out of in the down months of summer and pretty much played just for the sheer joy of it (remember when we used to do that?). I also really liked the effect vehicles had on the battlefield and how they essentially created different classes of play-style.

Left 4 Dead is probably the one game out of this bunch that I still come back to from time to time, although I haven’t bothered to touch it since Left 4 Dead 2 came out and likely destroyed the first game’s player community. But I think it’s the necessity of team-work paired with the intensity of fighting off an undead horde that makes that game so consistently fun. I actually talked to strangers when I played Left 4 Dead.

"Pills here!"

And lastly, Gears of War 2 entertained me for a good long while with one of the best online experiences of this generation. But unfortunately, Epic may have created a monster when they introduced the irresistibly fun Horde mode. They need to find a way to make the competitive element of multiplayer just as addictive as the cooperative one in Gears 3.

So the recurring theme I’m seeing here is that games which require some degree of team-work tend to last a little longer than the lone-wolf bloodsports. That’s not to say a game can’t hook me with rewarding progression systems or good old-fashioned gameplay, but I definitely feel like cooperation is the best way to get me invested in a “community” of total strangers who belittle each other like it’s their job (and considering some of the CoD players I’ve had the pleasure of gaming with, unemployment isn’t really that big of a stretch). The question now becomes, “How do developers convince gamers that we want to work together to accomplish objectives that don’t revolve around simple body counts?”

The first thing that comes to my mind is the system in PS3 exclusive MAG, which I haven’t had the pleasure of playing myself. But from everything I’ve read and watched of the game, it seems that Zipper Interactive incentivized team-work by rewarding players with more experience for completing tasks assigned by their squad leaders and things of that nature. That is certainly a step in the right direction, but this rational-self-interest model doesn’t necessarily equate to true cooperation. In my humble opinion, voice-chat is essential to real team-work and convincing people to actually problem-solve with strangers takes more than a few stat bonuses and arbitrary experience rankings to accomplish.

So this is the part where I reveal my master plan that will surely leave you in awe. I hope you’re ready. Leagues. Allow me to elaborate. See, in my experience, when you’re split-screening on the couch with your friends or siblings, it doesn’t even matter how good the game you’re playing is because the company you’re in makes the experience fun. When you’re gaming with people you actually know, everybody’s more willing to abide crazy rules for made-up games, everybody’s slightly more competitive but never begrudgingly so, friendly rivalries develop when you’ve learned another player’s tendencies. And maybe I’m crazy, but I get the feeling that if we actually got to know who we were playing with on a first-name basis then maybe we’d show them a little respect and cut all the BS that comes with online anonymity.

...Or it could just breed more hate. At least then we'd have teams to root for.

How would these leagues work? How would they be any different from clans or dedicated servers? Well, to be perfectly honest, this idea is mainly about transferring that real sense of community found on PCs to consoles, which have struggled mightily with the concept. Even games that have introduced clan features have failed miserably in implementing them. Halo 2‘s clan playlists were so underutilized that Bungie eventually cut the content out of the game in an update. Developers need to realize that console gamers just don’t have the dedication to pursue vibrant clan communities (hooray for ignorant generalizations!).

Community needs to be forced on us. The idear is that once we get a taste of it we’ll wonder how we ever got by without it. So that whole oppressive forcing part comes into the equation as follows–the developer creates tier groupings based on skill level. And when I say skill level I mean just that–not experience level. Games have recently gotten in the habit of inflating our egos with experience-based leveling, rather than the cold, hard facts of skill-based levels. I don’t know how Bungie determined my skill in Halo 2, but it seemed like a fairly accurate gauge. Anyways, the developer makes these tiers of level 1-10 players, level 11-20 players, and so on. Within these tiers, which would likely contain tens, in not hundreds of thousands of players a piece, small leagues of maybe 100-200 players would be carved out so each tier contains hundreds of small leagues within. If you’re still following me, we now have a system that ranks a player based on performance and accordingly places them in a random league within their skill tier.

Now that we are in a league, all of our matches will be played with the 100-200 (obviously these numbers are examples that would need to be fiddled with until a proper balance of familiarity and quick match-making could be found) fellow gamers in our league. Being stuck in one league forever certainly runs the risk of getting boring, so the developer could reset the league populations every month or something like that. But for the time spent playing with the same people, we would inevitably become familiar with our peers. Deep stat-tracking and highly visible leader boards would only serve to stiffen the competition. We’d make friends and make enemies, we’d become known ourselves, classic rivalries would form and make for some legendary show-downs. And even if all that stuff didn’t happen, I think everybody would be more receptive to actually talking to each other during games. And if you’re stuck in the same community for a month then you really can’t be a jerk-face or you could get booted from every match you play.

This is pretty much how online interactions work today.

This idea that I’ve presented is very bare-bones and would require a lot of fleshing out were it to ever be applied in the real world, but I see so much potential in it. A developer could even add more depth by letting players pick filters on what types of matches they like to play, so you could join a league that focuses more on objective games than deathmatch or vice versa. I just think that if developers want us to continue playing their games and buying their DLC, and if gamers want to enjoy friendly competition in an online environment akin to your living room couch, then the only answer is to find a way to force cooperation and community on us. Games like Left 4 Dead and MAG are a start, but we need a system that makes online conversation something to look forward to, not dread. If anybody else has thoughts on how to accomplish this goal I’d love to hear them.

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Let's hope that video game blending is less catastrophic.

So I’ve purchased three full-fledged video games this year and despite the fact that they all hail from very different genres, Mass Effect 2, BioShock 2, and Splinter Cell: Conviction have more in common than one would think. How is it that the RPG, FPS, and Stealth-Action genres, as mutually exclusive as could be just a few years ago, are producing such similar content in 2010? Well, it’s an interesting trend that I intend to examine in this here article. The implications of genre blending are seriously important in regards to what we’ll be playing next year or even ten years from now, so it’s a topic worth talking about.

First I want to elaborate on the similarities between the aforementioned games I’ve played this year. I certainly don’t want to imply that these three games are inter-changeable, but there’s no denying common game-mechanics and gimmicks. As big as dialogue trees and player choice are to the core of Mass Effect 2, the cover-based shooting and biotic powers are arguably just as central to the experience. Not-so-coincidentally, shooting and plasmid powers happen to be the main course of the story-driven BioShock 2. And while Sam Fisher doesn’t boast any super-natural abilities in Splinter Cell: Conviction, he does forgo stealth in the name of bad ass shooting (well, it can be bad ass sometimes). So clearly, despite whatever connotations these genres may have had in the past, shooting stuff and taking on super-human abilities (biotic/plasmid powers, Mark and Execute feature in Conviction) seem to be a similarity.

Of course guns and violence have always been a part of pretty much any video game genre, but these games demonstrate a very deliberate effort to streamline the shooting mechanics and make combat flow as effortlessly as possible. They also share cover mechanics (with the exception of BioShock 2, because cover seems to be about the only difference between an FPS and TPS today), experience/leveling systems, and narratives that take themselves very seriously. It’s also worth noting that both BioShock 2 and Splinter Cell: Conviction feature multiplayer modes despite a sentiment among fans that such a component is unnecessary.

The fact is, simplistic shooters with competitive multiplayer and blockbuster stories sell well, and games like Psychonauts don’t. So naturally, as video games become more and more expensive to make, shooters are going to have more and more influence. On the one hand, this is bad because it dilutes the market into one giant Shooting genre. It’d be like if every movie Hollywood put out from now on starred Bruce Willis. Now I love me some Bruce, but can you even fathom the man in something like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind? Yeah.

Bruce Willis: Professional Bad Ass.

But there’s a silver lining to this as well. The various genres that adopt classic shooting mechanics adapt them to their own roots and make them more interesting. Few straight shooters feature the depth of combat available in Mass Effect 2‘s slick combination of real-time shooting and biotic powers. The super powers just add another layer of complexity to every combat scenario. And the cover mechanics popularized by Gears of War have helped transform the shooting genre from run-and-gun to something a little more tactical. Frankly, the more complex a given situation in a game becomes, the more interesting it is in my mind (assuming that it is streamlined and responsive enough to foster intuitive decision-making).

We can also thank genre blending for the addictive qualities that have been popping up in shooters as of late. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare truly revolutionized the shooting scene when it took the idea of RPG elements in a shooter, which games like Deus Ex had done years before, and trimmed the the concept down to a primal reward system. Modern Warfare is far from an RPG, but its persistent leveling system and the tangible rewards that come with it harness one of the core aspects of a good RPG. Since then, it seems like every game is trying to introduce some sort of RPG-like leveling system that rewards continued or creative play in both single and multiplayer modes.

Taking a step back from the few games we’ve looked at here and pondering the entire gaming landscape, it’s easy to see that this is an industry-wide trend. True, there are plenty of non-shooters out there (just look at the Wii), but it’s this concept of simplistic and accessible gameplay that’s taking the industry by storm. Publishers want games that anybody can jump into, and they want the addictive qualities (stats and leveling, a good story, multiplayer aspect) that keep the disc in a player’s system. DLC is also an extension of this mindset. The entire MMO genre is the epitome of this perspective.

Beware of the future.

We need look no further than Holiday 2010 to see some glowing examples of this commercial mindset. Microsoft’s Project Natal and Sony’s PlayStation Move are trying to appeal to the main stream masses with their (supposedly) intuitive motion control schemes. Halo: Reach is branching out from the tried and true Halo formula to offer some RPG-like class structure. Fable III is dismissing experience all together in favor of more visual and visceral representations of power. The next Assassin’s Creed is set to introduce multiplayer assassinating. And gaming executives can’t get over the fact that Farmville has more daily users than World of Warcraft. Games are becoming products that intend to bait the player with accessible and and visceral play while hooking them with addictive rewards, narratives, and social interactions.

Now when I put it that way, this all sounds pretty great, right? I mean, I used the word “visceral.” Hell, I’ll even throw “emergent” in there. And accessible games are great just as long as they don’t sacrifice depth. But that’s exactly what games like Splinter Cell: Conviction are doing. What used to be an intense tactical-stealth experience now forces the player into boring firefights. And the experience rewards in that game have little bearing on gameplay, so they may as well not be there. And I’ve been saying for years how much I hate the “modern realistic” look in games. It’s not that the art direction itself is poor, just that the market is over-saturated with it. I also think we can all agree that BioShock 2 would have benefited had the multiplayer been scrapped in favor of more single-player attention.

It is my personal opinion that genre blending could turn out to be a very dangerous practice in the long-term future of video games. It is true that genre blending has produced some of my all-time favorite games, and I think it would be foolish to shun the practice, but it would also be terribly unwise to go forth without any thoughts of the consequences. The next ten years could very well kill off artistic masterpieces like Shadow of the Colossus (The Last Guardian should be a good indicator of things to come) and transform the gaming landscape into portable MMOs where achievements for walking ten steps backwards fuel harmfully addictive “gaming.” I suppose genre blending is more of a symptom of the greater problem, commercialization, but whatevs.

We may have to rely on the Indie scene for unique games before too long.

The future of video games is literally being decided as we speak. One could argue that we’ve already seen the systematic elimination of stealth and horror games and RPGs could be up next. The key is for RPG developers to find a way to make their craft commercially viable in a market that lusts after everything that critics of our industry cite when debating the artistic worth of video games. Perhaps genre blending, despite the terrifying potential of its pitfalls, is actually the key to helping this medium ascend to the realm of high art. Maybe the next few years will see a golden ratio of engaging story, visceral gameplay, and immersive worlds that could have never been created within the confines of the rigid genres of the past. Or maybe we’ve already seen that and publishers thought there wasn’t enough multiplayer…

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As if the pathetic leeching of the first game’s world/themes and the completely unnecessary (and more dishearteningly, underdeveloped) multiplayer weren’t enough to solidify BioShock 2 as a quick cash-in, then the DLC train that’s starting up should put the final nail in the coffin.

GameSpot is reporting that “Sinclair Solutions Test Pack” will be coming to the game this March for $5 (MSP400). The pack essentially ups the mutliplayer level-cap to 50 while adding “20 new trials, a third upgrade for each weapon, and five new masks.” It also introduces Louie McGraff and Oscar Calraca, two new multiplayer characters.

2K Games says that more content is planned for the coming months, both in the single-player and multiplayer arenas. Hopefully they can do better than new trials and masks next time.

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“In Rapture, a bleeding-heart tends to bring in the sharks,” says one of BioShock 2‘s more memorable characters. Well, consider this reviewer a shark then, because the bleeding-heart drivel peddled in this sequel to one of my favorite games of all time bastardizes the thought-provoking philosophical quandaries found in that ground-breaking 2007 title. And to get all poetic on you, I’m going to go ahead and label BioShock 2 a parasite–a game that hears of the wonderful world of Rapture and invades it with nothing new to offer, asking only where its share is. It isn’t necessarily a bad or broken game, and it’s actually quite fun at times. It’s just not worthy of the BioShock name.

You wouldn’t know of the disappointment to come from your first few steps in Rapture, though. Everything that made the city a marvel to behold is even better this time around. The unique art-deco setting is possessed by an unnerving atmosphere of decay and menace through heavy use of shadows and the first game’s signature horror touches. The sea’s continued reclamation of the city provides the opportunity for more of the best water in video games as well as plenty of colorful plant-life that emphasizes Rapture’s demise. Little touches like the smoke that meanders from recently fired guns or the tiny flames on each finger-tip of a plasmid-wielding hand add to the immersion. And while the character models aren’t the best by a long shot and looking at anything too closely will reveal its uglier side, any graphical problems are far out-weighed by the superb art-direction. Rapture is simply one of the most visually stimulating worlds to explore in gaming.

But the visuals are nothing compared to the sounds of BioShock 2. Without exaggeration, the audio direction in this game may be the best I’ve ever heard. The guns all erupt with fierce power (the sound effects even change depending on ammo type), the enemies casually banter to each other when they’re unaware of your presence and then proceed to insult you when alerted (they have nice screams when you set them on fire too), every audio diary is voiced with conviction, and the world in general just buzzes with minute touches of life. The first time you walk under a stream of water pouring from a broken pipe and hear a tinny dinging on your metal helmet you’ll understand. If not that, then listening to a Little Sister eagerly gulping the ADAM she’s just collected should do the trick. The score is just as creepy and down-right unsettling at times. My only quip with the audio is the occasional repeated line, which becomes especially noticeable in the final stage of the game for reasons that I cannot discuss here.

Same great look, but all grown up.

But what makes BioShock 2 tick is the same as what made the first game tick–the combination of exploration of the city and gun/plasmid fueled combat. Although, exploration isn’t quite as enthralling in the sequel. While the many audio diaries scattered throughout the city may be excellently voiced, the back-stories they tell just aren’t as interesting as those of the first game. In fact, some of them seem to go unresolved or are just entirely irrelevant to begin with. It really makes exploration less of a joy, which is a shame considering the level-design managed to keep the same mysterious veil of our first venture under the sea.

The combat’s slightly smoother, as you can utilize both firearms and plasmids simultaneously, but the difference isn’t that noticeable. And while it serves the purposes of this game’s campaign well enough, any time spent in the multiplayer will force you to realize how unresponsive and imprecise it is in comparison to other FPSs like Modern Warfare 2. Still, it works in this game and always manages to be fun and hectic.

As was the case in BioShock 1, combat’s at its best when you have to plan and strategize against your enemies. BioShock 2 offers more opportunities to do this by allowing you to adopt the Little Sisters you snatch from fallen Big Daddies and put them to work harvesting ADAM from “angels.” Hordes of splicers (most of them familiar but with three new and satisfying enemy types) then charge your little girl and you have to do what daddies do best–protect their daughters.

You’re afforded a diverse and powerful arsenal to do this with. Many of the guns offered this time around are simply variations on the weapons of the last game, but they’re fun nonetheless (although a massive splicer-boring drill is considerably less awesome than you’d expect). Unfortunately, some of them do seem to be unbalanced and you’ll likely end up using the same two or three guns the entire time, especially once you’d invested upgrades into your favorites and the others suddenly seem extra weak.

The balance issues extend to the plasmid powers as well. There are even more plasmids and tonics in BioShock 2 than its predecessor, but many of them feel utterly useless or underpowered. Worse yet, the game doesn’t exactly encourage experimentation on the plasmid/tonic front like the first one did. I’d wager that a person could get through the entire game using no more than two different plasmids. I definitely feel like the developers didn’t pay equal attention to every power and wonder why they felt the need to include so many useless abilities (more specifically referring to the tonics here). If anything, I would have liked to have seen the upgrading process go in a more specialized class-like direction for the second game, forcing me to pick a path and play the game that way. At least then the developers would have had to balance every play-style.

You can upgrade plasmids for new effects and greater damage.

And this brings me to my next issue–the game is just too damn easy. Perhaps if players had been forced to specialize then certain situations would have been more difficult. As it is, I never feared death in this game (and hell, even if I did die, I’d just come back in a Vita-Chamber with no penalty whatsoever). Money is always in such lush supply that you’ll be able to afford as many med-kits and EVE hypos as you want. ADAM is just as flush, and there’s no penalty for picking every one of the best tonics or plasmids, so at higher levels, you can pretty much regain health simply by killing enemies. Even if your many foes do exercise intelligent combat tactics, they’re never much of a problem.

That lack of difficulty extends to the new hacking mini-game as well. In BioShock 2, instead of the awesome puzzler mini-game of the first, we get a quick and simple real-time game where you have to land a moving needle in the right color zone a few times in a row. It’s not a bad mini-game and probably makes more sense in keeping the pace of the action up and not alienating the mainstream audience, but I personally loved the hacking mini-game in the first BioShock. It’s more of a personal complaint, but one that underlines the ease of this game, even if it is in real time. The ability to collect junk and build special ammo was also removed, with 2K Marin instead opting to fully stock vending machines and corpses with special ammo.

Now the two paragraphs above might lead you to believe that my biggest issue with the game is its lack of difficulty (actually, it probably is towards the end, when you literally don’t even have to fight through the final level), but it’s actually the fact that BioShock 2 simply returns to BioShock 1‘s world (albeit 10 years later) with a couple of new enemies and powers and calls it quits. This game honestly does not attempt to do anything new worth mentioning. Sort of ironic given the setting. Even the narrative structure is strikingly similar to the first game, sometimes to a degree of distraction.

The fact that the developers took this lackadaisical attitude with the game’s story is the most disappointing part of it all for me. Instead of creating something as fresh and stimulating as the first game’s narrative, they simply flipped the philosophies around and had a die-hard collectivist running the show. Even more embarrassing is that they couldn’t write her philosophies in a believable, charismatic way so they just made her absolutely crazy instead. Andrew Ryan was a magnetic man who could draw you into his vision and make you understand his ambitions. Even when things went bad, he was a believable tragic figure who lost sight of his ideals in the pursuit to save them. Sophia Lamb on the other hand, continually spouts off about loving everybody and eradicating the self, even as she oppresses her own daughter for her own goals. The “family” that she leads seems to consist entirely of homicidal junkies with about as much rational thought as…well, junkies. She’s so far off the reservation that she’s willing to change what it means to be human in order to create her utopia…hell, seems more humane to just act like one of the tyrants she’s always deriding.

This is about as up-close-and-personal as you get with Ms. Lamb.

You might be wondering what on God’s green earth a woman like Lamb is doing in a city like Rapture. The game’s fiction tries to answer that with some bogus “taking down the machine from the inside” garbage that leaves you wondering why she didn’t just stay topside. But there’s no such explanation for her followers (well, at least the one sane one remaining). The audio diaries of these people painted a picture of weaklings turning to a cult to deal with their problems, in my opinion. I felt no sympathy for them. They never belonged in Rapture in the first place.

And the way their history is shoe-horned into the BioShock canon seems to validate that sentiment. Apparently Lamb was Ryan’s biggest political enemy before the fall of Rapture and they had a bunch of major public debates. Apparently Lamb had a rather large following and manipulated them with her big psychological terms (because the best and brightest minds of the world are apt to blindly follow someone who can tell them about how they really feel). Apparently Ken Levine must have scripted the entire first game, because nobody on this new team knows how to write a compelling story.

The one aspect of the narrative that is engaging is the more personal side of it. Perhaps your personal Little Sister (who is coincidentally the villain’s daughter) isn’t always given the best lines to work with, but the very idea of a father-daughter relationship had a strong impact on the game for me. Where as in BioShock 1 I had no problem harvesting Little Sisters as I pleased, I legitimately felt bad about doing it this time, what with the little girls screaming, “Daddy, no!” And I really felt good when I saved them and they said things like, “I’m going to tell all the other girls that I have the best Daddy.” Of course they wrap your moral actions back to your personal Little Sister later in the game in a predictably binary and idealized way that leaves a little more to be desired. But still, despite the fact that harvesting is still presented as a screen of green smoke and not a violent and disturbing murder like I’ve always wanted, being a Big Daddy and possessing the trustworthiness that comes with it make an impact on the game.

Truth be told, with the pace losing steam towards the end, you’ll be glad to reach the end of the game and never play the campaign again. The “choices” in it are so black and white that it’s not even worth it to go back and play a second time. What does extend BioShock 2‘s value a bit is its highly controversial multiplayer mode. I won’t bother devoting a whole lot of words to it since it feels out of place to begin with, but I will say that it’s not bad. It has a different feel than most modern shooters, more akin to old N64 FPSs where zooming in wasn’t a viable course of action. It’s not at good as many of those old shooters I’m referring to, but it does feel similar, even with its in-vogue persistent leveling system. And the unique visual style actually reminded me a bit of TimeSplitters 2. They should remake that game as a downloadable title.

The multiplayer component has a much faster pace.

Anyways, every game type has a unique BioShock twist with Big Daddies and Little Sisters playing a role. You can even hack turrets (but they’re underpowered) and research enemy bodies for damage bonuses (cool idea). There are a few multiplayer-specific plasmids that make things interesting too. Still, the competitive element of BioShock 2 seems woefully underdeveloped and unbalanced (all you need’s the grenade launcher) considering what it could have been. The coolest feature is that leveling up unlocks audio diaries for each of the eight playable characters. These characters are sort of hit and miss, but some have more personality that single-player NPCs and their three-diary arcs are interesting, but probably not worth all the leveling it takes to unlock them. Ultimately, any good multiplayer does is undermined by an inexcusable glitch that freezes the game (usually in the player-lobby after a game) about 15% of the time.

So 2200 words later, I’m here to tell you that BioShock 2 is not a game worth owning. It shamelessly tries to ride the coattails of its classic precursor but fails miserably because of its lame story with unrelatable characters, lack of gameplay innovation, and indefensible ease, even on the hardest difficulty. Maybe my reverence for BioShock 1 has tainted my opinion, but I don’t think you’d find many people who’d tell you that the sequel competes on any front other than A/V and gunplay. If you want another mindless shooter with some cool powers and great atmosphere thrown in, then maybe you’ll enjoy this game. But most of us will probably feel like Tenenbaum upon returning…we’ll make up some lousy excuse for ever showing up in the first place and get the hell out of there (that probably won’t make sense if you haven’t played BioShock 2, but trust me, you’re better off not understanding).

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Ooh.

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As trailers go, that’s a pretty entertaining one. I just hate watching pre-rendered trailers because they remind me how far in-game graphics have to go.

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Now that it’s official that BioShock 2 won’t be supporting LANs (is Bungie the only studio that cares anymore?) you probably want to know what you and your friends will be missing out on. Going off of that video, I’d have to say, “not much.” How is playing as a Big Daddy any different from a regular character other than a gun that presumably does more damage? What a missed opportunity. They should have made it like one-hit kills but the player moves very slowly. Or the player can charge but only use the drill attack. I’m not really interested in a Big Daddy skin with no real gameplay differences. I don’t mean to be too harsh though…I see that things like turrets will play a role in multiplayer, which I’m assuming can be hacked and so forth. I get the feeling that BioShock 2‘s multiplayer will probably offer a different feel from most competitive shooters, but it likely won’t step too far out of the box. Too bad.

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