I don’t like “the story” in Bioshock 2. So, I’m making up my own story, for the purposes of enjoying the game’s gameplay offerings unhindered. The story of Bioshock 2 is now that of a Big Daddy, one of the lumbering speechless antagonists of the first game, freed from a lifeless existence of doting on a little sisters, now on a joyful quest for booze, cigarettes, and cash.

Why don’t I like the story? Well, as is only typical of my writing of articles when, and only when, I have something about which to bitch, I’ll tell you. Ever hear the phrase “A story is only as good as its villain?” Well, the antagonist in Bioshock 2 is hollow – an uber-communist, and diametric opposite of Andrew Ryan’s uber-libertarian – and not a character in her own right, as Andrew Ryan was; everything she is is propped up by what he was – she’s just a bad parody.

2K Marin would have better served us had they resurrected Ryan as some horrific ultra-libertarian-cyborg juiced up on adam rather than offer up this pathetic anti-Ryan that we must endure in Bioshock 2. Yeah, I know, cyber-resurrection isn’t all that realistic, considering the ’50s time-frame in which the game takes place, but we’re dealing with a setting in which the protagonist is able to shoot bees, which emerge from little holes in his forearm, at his foes – let’s not tie our hands with realism. Hell, Ryan could’ve just made his return via vita-chamber; no cybernetics or DNA-altering required – you know, like the first game’s protagonist did HUNDREDS OF TIMES (if you managed to die hundreds of times.)

To be fair, this new development team that worked on Bioshock 2 (there was a team-switch, in case you didn’t know) couldn’t have topped Ryan. However, they could’ve went in a different direction rather then back to the ideological-extremist well. I like the first game but I played it already; if I wanted to play it again, I would do so and not play a sequel that could very easily have been released as an expansion or downloadable content.

I won’t spoil the rest story for you. I don’t like it. It sucks. The end. I will say, though, that there isn’t a whole lot to spoil. The gameplay is very solid however. I won’t go very much into it because, if you played the first game as I’m sure most of you reading this did, you probably have the cognitive capacity with which to imagine what it’s like to play as a very large man wearing an old-school diving suit who punches people with a massive drill and shoots rivets at folks who piss him off. Hell, you were probably the victim of much drill-punching and rivet-shooting whilst playing the first game – that is until you figured out, as I did, that you can kill a Big Daddy fairly easily by tripping his bulky ass down a flight of stairs using the oh-so-fun crossbow and electric-trip-wire bolts, after, of course, lighting him on fire and electrocuting him – man these guys had it rough, come to think of it.

Some other minor complaints of mine are that they took out a few of the things that gave the game some personality: no more pipe-hacking, no clowns celebrating your usage of the item vending machine, no Mexican-bandit-themed sound effects at the ammo vending machines. However, some of the cool new things like plasmid combos, the ability to lay down turrets, and the ability to drill the hell out of splicers, do some to make up for what’s missing; there’s also multiplayer, which I have not tried yet.

Buy? Rent? Destroy?

Rent this mutha’. Unless you have a hankerin’ for some plasmid-shootin’, punk-drillin’ multiplayer; in which case, buy it if you feel that aspect of the game may have some longevity.