BioShock 2: Minerva's Den DLC Preview

by Arthur Gies - IGN.com | 26 August 2010 12:00
 
Revisit Rapture at the dawn of the computer age.
 
Count me as one of the people who crossed their arms and raised their eyebrows in the wake of BioShock 2. I'm a huge fan of the original - it's smart and literary and inventive and atmospheric and... well, you get the idea. But BioShock 2 struck me as pretty unnecessary. BioShock the first's main problem was that it went on entirely too long and sort of meandered for a few hours, so why would I want more? I did end up playing through BioShock 2 in its entirety, and while it wasn't a bad game by any means, it shared the same issue the original did, dragging in the last third and feeling much longer than it actually was.
 
Given all of that, it's funny then that the upcoming singleplayer DLC, Minerva's Den, may actually address the breadth issue that both BioShock games have shared. Set in a previously unseen section of Rapture - of course - Minerva's den isn't a scenario, like the recent Protector Trials DLC. Instead, it's a sort of expansion for BioShock 2 that will see players find almost all of the plasmids and tonics from the main game as well as a few new tricks and enemies, all in a much shorter amount of time.
 

Minerva's Den tells the tale of the Rapture mainframe computer AI, The Thinker, and its creator Charles Milton Porter. The architect of the Rapture Mainframe and inventor of the robot brains behind the various robotic security measures around the underwater city, Porter worked with Alan Turing during the dawn of the computer age before leaving for Rapture with his now-deceased wife. As Rapture descended into madness, Porter's friend and colleague Reed Wahl attempted to seize The Thinker's program and triggered a war independent of the greater civil conflict in the city.
 
The new DLC places you in the role of a new Big Daddy, Sigma, from the same series of Big Daddies as Alpha from the main game. Revived by Porter, you'll explore Minerva's Den to learn exactly who Porter really is and what happened to Rapture's frighteningly advanced central computer.
 
Lead Designer Steve Gaynor sat me down to spend some time with Minerva's Den to get an inkling of how the new DLC plays, and I was actually pleasantly surprised. The combat scenarios I encountered seemed designed better than those in the game proper. While levels and areas seemed smaller than the more open areas of Rapture previously seen in Bioshock, environments have better funnels for enemies to force confrontation while including more combat options. I started with only a telekinesis plasmid and a drill, but had little trouble taking on groups of enemies, whether by directly engaging them in melee combat or finding explosive objects to hurl at groups to soften them up.
 
Minerva's Den's identity as the center for technological advancement in Rapture means other surprises too, including some brand new security bots, such as the Rocket Bot and Electro Bot. The Electro Bot in particular is interesting - while it fires out lightning similar to the Electro-bolt plasmid, this attack doesn't actually do much damage. Instead, this security bot stuns enemies for the player to take care of on their own - or perhaps for a more directly offensive security bot to take on instead.
 
There are new challenges awaiting in the DLC, such as additionally augmented splicers like flame-wielding brutes and more powerful spider splicers. Sigma will find a new weapon to handle the more evolved enemies in the form of the Ion Lance, a prototype laser weapon also wielded by the Big Daddies of Minerva's Den. I also had a chance to try the new Gravity Well plasmid, which pulls enemies and objects into a vortex, temporarily stunning them and leaving them ripe for some Ion Lance pounding.
 

I found enough downtime to appreciate other little touches in the DLC, including the new environment types and other smaller details denoting how long Minerva's Den has been cut off from the rest of Rapture - in this case, indicated by rundown vending machines that looked and sounded worse for wear. BioShock has always been about little details amidst a larger overall style, and thus far Minerva's Den looks like it has its own story to tell.
 
Of course, as I alluded to before, the greatest strength of the Minerva's Den DLC might just be its brevity. While Bioshock 2 had quite a bit to show the player, it took what felt like forever for it all to unfold. The idea of most of Bioshock 2's good bits condensed into a few intense hours in a new section of the city with interesting quirks and new characters to get to know is the first thing in months to get me interested in BioShock 2 again. Minerva's Den releases on Xbox Live and PSN on August 31st.
 
Supplied by IGN.com