
Originally Posted by
Korestai
I've been looking forward to this game ever since it was announced and I can say in all honesty it's the only game so far where I've ordered the Special Edition and not just bought the ordinary version. I love the city of Rapture and I just couldn't wait to get back down there again.
But now I'm here, I can't help but feel disappointed. I haven't been playing long since I haven't had time (I'm just in the Atlantic Railroad area) but it feels as though the designers have taken the original game and just built new areas and new ideas around it. I mean, in BioShock Jack gets into Rapture, wanders around, meets a Big Daddy and then is trapped, lectured by Andrew Ryan and then attacked by splicers; in BioShock 2 Delta wakes up outside a Vita-Chamber, wanders around, meets a Big Sister and then is trapped, lectured by Sofia Lamb and then attacked by splicers...
And it's not just the plot, it's the assets. Granted, the graphics are beautiful, but they're the much the same objects that were used in the original. Which is fine, since we're back in the same city. But in the scene where Lamb lectures you to which I just referred, if you look through the glass there's a board on the wall with accident statistics. It's exactly the same board that you see on the way into Neptune's Bounty in the original BioShock. Now I grant that's a measure of real geekery but to me it's frustrating: are you seriously trying to tell me that both places had the same board with the same stats written in the same handwriting? The same board, maybe, but the same stats? Unlikely.
Of course, I'm going to keep on playing through the game. It's going to be nice to meet up with some old friends and make some new ones. (Though why does Tenenbaum look different now? Her face seems thinner than it used to be. And why is Andrew Ryan dressed differently in the audio log image?) I've already sung along to the Gatherer's Garden tune (sad, I know). I want to walk around under the Atlantic and feel the ocean on my shoulders. But something's missing... the "Soul of Rapture", I think: the genius loci that made the city come alive in the first story, that made it put her arms around me, set her head on my shoulder and weep for what she had become. And that's the greatest desolation of all.
So... I'll go and give the Great Chain another tug. See if I can't shake some of the rust from its links after all.