Here's a little hobbledehoy review of
Minerva's Den that doesn't go into detail about mechanics and such
since I'm assuming you've played Bioshock 2 (which, awkwardly, has
not been reviewed on this blog).
Quick run down of my thoughts on
Bioshock and Bioshock 2: The first Bioshock is without a doubt a tier
1 great game. It's truly a masterpiece of theme, setting,
storytelling, and gameplay, and one of the best games I've ever
played. I've heard Bioshock 2 get a bad rap to some degree for not
being as great as its predecessor, but it's a really great game that
also deserves a lot of praise. If Bioshock the first didn't exist, 2
would be the revolutionary masterpiece in its place. It's solidly a
tier 2 great game.
So, Minerva's Den is a single-player
DLC mini-campaign for Bioshock 2, and it shares all of the same basic
mechanics, although some have a few tiny little twists. Real quick
run-down of the controls: analog sticks are used to walk and look, L2
to use plasmid, L1 to switch plasmids, R2 to fire weapon, R1 to
switch weapons, triangle to jump, square to reload, cross to interact
with stuff, circle to melee attack.
I'm going to assume that you already
know quite a bit about Bioshock since you have to own Bioshock 2 to
play this DLC. You play as a different prototype Big Daddy named
Subject Sigma who's been enlisted to help one Mr. Porter, the creator
of Rapture's main computer system, The Thinker, take back the
high-tech district (Minerva's Den) that houses the system from a
super-crazy splicer and his friends who have taken it over. I'm not
going to say one more word about the story since, as you may have
heard, it's fabulous and needs to be experienced first hand and
without spoilers.
This DLC is 3 levels that play out
exactly like Bioshock 2 levels. You set out to accomplish
story-driven objectives, all the while fighting off Rapture's now
homicidal inhabitants, and planning out how to deal with the Little
Sisters and their hulking guardians, the Big Daddy's (and their crazy
counterparts, the Big Sisters). Dealing with Little Sisters is your
only significant source of Adam, a substance that allows you to
re-write your genetic code to give yourself super-human abilities.
But you already knew that if you are a Bioshock player. All of the
Big Daddy's in Minerva's Den are of a new type not seen before in the
main game. I won't spoil exactly what they do and are equipped with,
but they are cool and fun to fight, if not really all that different
then fighting some of the other types from the main game.
There are a few new abilities to play
with. From what I saw, there is one new plasmid, which can be
upgraded to level 3, and one new weapon, which has a few upgrades and
three types of ammo, just like the other weapons. I'll leave you to
find out exactly what these new toys are, but I will tell you that
they are both fun and I used them a lot.
Basically every other mechanic from
BS2 makes a return in MD, with the exception of Power to the People
weapon upgrade machines. Instead, you can find upgraded weapons
laying around every once in awhile. Basically, this is 3 brand new
levels of Bioshock 2 action with a little bit of variety on the
standard themes and a really standout story. These levels are every
bit as good as those in the main game, and building another character
up from scratch with some fresh-squeezed Adam was great fun.
There are a handful of trophies that
go along with this DLC, but nothing really of note.
I don't have a lot else to say about
this campaign, except that I highly recommend it. If you are a fan of
BS2 (or even if you didn't like it but are a big fan of the 1st),
then do yourself a favor and pick it up. It includes everything that
made BS 1 and 2 great but in a smaller package. You may want to have
some time between beating the main game and playing this DLC, since
gameplay-wise it is mostly identical, but it's well worth your time
to check it out at some point. Just like Bioshock 2 proper, Minerva's
Den is solidly in great games, tier 2.
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