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Review of BioShock 2

BioShock 2 was a lot of fun. Rapture is even more artistically beautiful and intriguing than in the original. The world is full of details making for a constantly absorbing experience. The enemies are fun to fight and give you plenty of incentive and opportunity to experiment with different weapons and plasmids. Upgrading your character makes you feel powerful and the enemies make various satisfying noises as you dispatch them.

The spear gun was great. Pinning enemies to walls is a lot of fun. With upgrades, it works like a sniper rifle. However, I found that the game suffers from poor collision detection at times which results in your long shots simply disappearing along the way. You quickly get the hang of dual wielding plasmids and weapons. Certain combinations are obvious and make the game quite easy. You may find yourself varying attacks just to keep it interesting instead of just trying to stay alive.

I really liked the new research method which encourages you to try out multiple plasmids, weapons, and attacks to get the most research points. In addition, I found that upgrading was easier (i.e. there was more ADAM available and items were cheaper) making it possible to create a huge combination of tonics and plasmids.

The additional moral decisions you make along the way are a nice touch. However, they pale in comparison to the depth found in games like Mass Effect and Fable. I occasionally found myself doing things that felt morally ambiguous and wondering if it would affect the outcome. They didn't.
Xbox 360
Damon played: 30 hours
Laura played: 0 hours
Conclusion
Damon says: A great game and a lot of fun.
Laura says: Too much graphic violence to play (and this from someone who counts headshots in Call of Duty). But Rapture is beautifully rendered.
Replay Value
Damon says: I'll try the multi-player but will probably not play though the single-player again.
Laura says: I'll probably never try it.
Favorite Part
Damon says: The spear gun.
Laura says: The steampunk art.
Fun Factor
Damon says: The combat and upgrade system.
Criticisms
Damon says: Very hard was too hard at the beginning. Hard was too easy at the end. I played through on hard and found the game was fun, though not challenging.
Laura says: Damon thinks that less blood and gore would make it more accessible to me, but it's not even that. Parts that Damon likes (like the fact that when you hit someone with a speargun the spear pins them to the wall) are really just too realistic for my taste.  If I'm going to play a game with violence, it has to feel clinical.
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