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New BioShock Content, BioShock 2 Rumors 55

Posted by Zonk from the no-gods-or-kings dept.
Take Two notes that there's new downloadable content on the Xbox Live service for 2K Boston/Australia's BioShock. The ability to turn off the vita-chambers, as well as new plasmids and a brand-new achievement, will be included in the free update. The update will also fix the 'widescreen issue' that caused some consternation just after the title's release. There are also some rumours going around about the future of the series, in the form of a post to the Rock, Paper, Shotgun blog. That post is in turn based on comments from games industry rumor-blog Surfer Girl Reviews Star Wars. "A good chunk of the BioShock team did not want to work with Ken [Levine] ever again, and 2K definitely understood the sentiment and let them set up a new studio so that they can make Bioshock 2, leaving Ken with Project X. A good chunk of the other senior 2K Boston people who were sick of Ken but didn't move to San Francisco ended up scattering to other AAA developers instead. In Quincy, they're essentially rebuilding a team from almost scratch again."
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New BioShock Content, BioShock 2 Rumors More

New BioShock Content, BioShock 2 Rumors

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  • For the record (Score:3, Informative)

    by Pluvius ( 734915 ) <pluvius3NO@SPAMgmail.com> on Tuesday December 04, 2007 @01:45PM (#21575009) Journal
    The Steam version also has these updates, along with the retail PC version, I imagine.

    Rob
  • Considering how genuinely good Bioshock was I'll actually be looking forward to a sequel. I just have to ask, who's this Ken fellow, and why doesn't the Bioshock team ever want to work with him again? Seems to me like that would be a much more interesting story than 'Hey a new game is coming out'

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by vimh42 ( 981236 )
      I don't know. Bioshock was definitely one of the better games out this year. Not sure yet who takes the crown, Bioshock or Mass Effect (have not beat the latter) but I'd be more interested a new story as opposed to a sequel for Bioshock. There were a few letdowns after all. Notably the ending.
      • I'm not quite sure how a "sequel" would work considering in the end <semi-spoiler alert> the game does one of those X years later here's where he is now... and you die. </semi-spoiler alert>

        It would seem to me that the best course of action would probably be along the lines of the story from a different perspective perhaps reliving the events leading up to the collapse of Rapture from the perspective of one of the citizens. The world they created in the game was far to rich and interesting to si
        • Prequel?

          • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

            by Anonymous Coward
            Yeah, I'd like a prequel. One where I can go back in time and warn myself never to play Bioshock in the first place.
            • I enjoyed the game the first time through, and recommended it to several friends, but afterwards had absolutely no desire to play it again on hard. I also felt guilty for telling people to go drop 60 bucks on it for a one-play-through experience. I forced myself to finish it on hard a month later, but it wasn't really enjoyable. I've heard plenty of people say the same thing, so why did it get such high reviews and still has people raving about it? Other games have been panned for much less, so what giv
              • Replayability is usually not a criteria for reviewers. They play the game start to finish as fast as possible and if the trip was awesome, then it gets rave reviews. In general, game reviewers don't have time to play it, let their first impression fade and then play it again. The impatient, gotta-have-it-now attitude of the public has basically forced mainstream game reviews to drop in quality.
          • Maybe, maybe not. I was thinking more along the lines of a time-line that started slightly before Bioshock 1 but eventually caught up and ran synonymously with it... Maybe such that you ran across some of the aftermath of Bioshock 1's protagonist or had your storyline otherwise effected by his actions. Just enough to intertwine the two but not enough that you felt like you were playing the fly on the wall the whole time.

            If you ever played the Blade Runner PC game it does an amazing job of this where you
          • My thought exactly. I would love to see the decline of Rapture first hand. Perhaps take a hand in the political power struggle.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by kshade ( 914666 )

          I'm not quite sure how a "sequel" would work considering in the end the game does one of those X years later here's where he is now... and you die.
          That's one of the two endings, though the other one is probably better suited for a Red Alert 2-ish RTS than a real Bioshock sequel :>
      • I felt pretty pleased about the ending of Mass Effect... Sure there's more butt kicking to be had in the sequels but it didn't leave me feeling confused or bewildered as the main mission or task at hand was more or less complete. Kinda like the end of Star Wars: A New Hope, where you know the empire's gotta go down, but the job has only just begun, as opposed to the ending of Empire Strikes Back where they leave you with a big can of worms.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Tuidjy ( 321055 )
        > Not sure yet who takes the crown, Bioshock or Mass Effect (have not beat the latter)
        > but I'd be more interested a new story as opposed to a sequel for Bioshock.

        I played both Bioshock and Mass Effect, and think the Witcher is better than both of them. Of
        course, you may not end up thinking so, but if you're looking for a new story, you'll get one.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jandrese ( 485 )
      Also, anybody who didn't think there would be a Bioshock 2, please raise your hands so we can laugh at you. Even if the entire team quit and 2K had to hire a bunch of hacks to make it, you can count on the fact that they're going to bank on the Bioshock name.

      Actually, it is a little worrisome that so many of the developers have apparently moved on already. Gaming (and especially PC gaming) is rife with crappy sequels made by a different development group than the great original game.

    • Re:Bo-oring (Score:5, Interesting)

      by hansamurai ( 907719 ) <hansamurai@gmail.com> on Tuesday December 04, 2007 @02:24PM (#21575731) Homepage Journal
      Ken Levine was the project director on Bioshock and was also the lead designer on some of the Thief and System Shock games. I wish we knew more about what happened during development that ticked off so many developers, but at least 2K was able to recognize their talent and seemingly devotion to the series that they're letting them continue.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by happyemoticon ( 543015 )

      Ken Levine was the lead designer of System Shock 2 and Bioshock, and worked on Thief: The Dark Project and (I think) the original System Shock as well. I wouldn't liken him to Steve Jobs or something, but clearly the former two would've been significantly different if not for his input, if they'd happened at all.

      The rumor about people being fed up with Levine is probably just a couple of people with chips on their shoulders. Someone usually thinks the manager has it in for them, regardless of whether it's

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Seumas ( 6865 )
      BioShock was an enjoyable game, but what in the hell are they smoking?! I've already beat the game. Do they really think I'm going to return to play it again just because they add a few things to the game that perhaps could or should have been added in the first place, so I could have enjoyed them the first time around?

      New content (actual story, etc) is one thing. Sticking in some random crap is irrelevant. There are too many awesome games out there to play and only so much time in which to do it.
  • All the content plus the widescreen issue fixed... I'm proud of them. This is admirable. I'll have to pop the game back in just to check it out. When I'm done with Mass Effect, Assassin's Creed, and Fire Emblem...

  • Project X (Score:2, Insightful)

    by MagusZeal ( 1156955 )
    The more interesting bit to me is the project X they mention is apparently another X-com remake. So let me be the first to say, please Cthulhu don't let them fubar it!

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by forkboy ( 8644 )
      oh god oh god please let this be true. i have been waiting on a game that lives up to the original xcom forever.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by stg ( 43177 )
        Personally, I really liked Ufo:Afterlight... A few minor problems, but other than that I thought it was as good as the original X-COM.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Olix ( 812847 )

          Afterlight was cool indeed. They needed to write better fiction for it, though - one of the cool things about X-COM was all the autopsies and general creative writing of the research - Afterlight really lacked on that front.

          It was too repetitive, too - though I suppose the same could be said of X-COM to an extent. It seemed worse in afterlight somehow, though.

          Also, we need destructable terrain! The was one of the coolest things about the first game...

          • If the new X-Com game could snag the Bioware authors who wrote the "Codex" entries for Mass Effect...

            Can't wait until we see a new "football of death" weapon. (I have no recollection of what this weapon was actually called - some kind of guided rocket launcher? - just that the projectile looked like a self-guided football and had an impressively large boom.)

  • Nice boost, although it could have been better (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jandrese ( 485 ) <kensama@vt.edu> on Tuesday December 04, 2007 @02:06PM (#21575377) Homepage Journal
    I think that patch would have been an excellent time to redo the crafting system and make it interesting. The existing system is pretty halfassed. Adding a mode that penalizes you for using the Vita chambers (make them cost money!) would have been a nice touch too.

    As far as the actual improvements are concerned, the Sonic Boom will probably end up being one of those Novelty plasmids (Bees, Cyclone Trap, Security System Override) that end up being situational at best. The EVE reducer could go a long way towards letting players focus more on Plasmids than weapons though. The extra damage vs. anything hackable is pointless and even counterproductive since you usually don't want to destroy those things, you want to hack them. Cheaper stuff at the Vending Machines is ok, but I'm betting it's not a huge difference. It might be worthwhile in the early game, but later on when you're rolling in dough and full up on ammo anyway it'll probably get deslotted (I wonder when you get it?).

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by What the Frag ( 951841 )
      > I think that patch would have been an excellent time to redo the crafting system and make it interesting. The existing system is pretty halfassed.

      I agree. It was not good for anything... Even on hard mode you have enough ammunition (and enough money), so why "invent" new ammunition? As I remember, you needed one of those stations for a quest, but there wasn't anything else.

      Maybe that was one of the early plans to make some more quests or go create a "go-back to level x scenario to get a key for a bon
  • Now, the Achievement for not dying once may get some people to play it more tactically, but Bioshock was still piss easy on "Hard". The only time I was actually worried about dying in the game (minor spoiler) was when Frank was reducing your maximum possible health. Every other time in the game, it was only a minor setback to get killed since there was a vita chamber every 10 feet (with no cost to use them). You could go through the game simply smashing people with the wrench (There's even a plasmid that gi
    • While not mentioned in the article /. linked to, the downloadable content also adds an option to the options menu to disable vita chambers.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Bugs42 ( 788576 )

      How about the Vita chambers are spread farther apart (or cut in half)? or how about a limited # of respawns... something like 10 total.
      Or maybe turning off the Vita chambers entirely, like the summary says you can do?

      Sheesh, have we really progressed from RTFA to RTFS? What's next, people blindly commenting on stories without even reading the headlines?

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by enderjsv ( 1128541 )
      Yeah, the lack of a death penalty made the game pretty easy, but what spoiled the game for me a bit was the absolute obviousness of the game's objectives. 90 percent of the time there is an arrow pointing you in the right direction, not to mention the map and the hints. The only time the arrow didn't help was during the collection-type missions, but if you were told to collect 3 of item X from some place, their would be 10 of that item in various locations. Now I know they give you the option to turn the

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by bartle ( 447377 )

      Now, the Achievement for not dying once may get some people to play it more tactically, but Bioshock was still piss easy on "Hard". The only time I was actually worried about dying in the game (minor spoiler) was when Frank was reducing your maximum possible health. Every other time in the game, it was only a minor setback to get killed since there was a vita chamber every 10 feet (with no cost to use them).

      I thought that was a brilliant twist in the game. Most first person shooters are designed to be hard and it's an uphill battle to get to the end. Not so in Bioshock; you start out playing that way but it's eventually revealed that the game's been rigged - you're a living weapon being used by someone else and losing isn't even an option for you.

      This new Brass Balls achievement is the perfect answer. The plot remains intact but the challenge is there for anyone who wants to play Bioshock as a traditio

  • Now is the perfect time to go back through on hard and play it using only plasmids and a wrench. :)
    br
  • The update will also fix the 'widescreen issue' that caused some consternation just after the title's release.

    What? The official word from 2K was that the aspect ratio was "as designed" and there was no problem to fix. What an odd backpedal to come now after all that screaming and yelling (and banning and post deleting) on the forums. I recall people were pissed, but 2K said the FOV in widescreen was as-intended, and they just chose to add "extra" vertical FOV in non-widescreen mode instead of the op

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tgibbs ( 83782 )

      What? The official word from 2K was that the aspect ratio was "as designed" and there was no problem to fix. What an odd backpedal to come now after all that screaming and yelling (and banning and post deleting) on the forums. I recall people were pissed, but 2K said the FOV in widescreen was as-intended, and they just chose to add "extra" vertical FOV in non-widescreen mode instead of the opposite (and typical) option of extending the horizontal FOV in widescreen vs. non.

      They have not changed their positio

  • You mean like a patch? Wow, you're telling me that developers sometimes release fixes and/or add small features to their games after release and that they can be obtained for free? That is awesome! I hope all companies see this interesting new business model, as I think it could really catch on!
  • If this was suppost to fix widescreen I still want to know why I'm forced to play in widescreen even after getting this update on my Xbox360? I'm using the VGA cable connected to a fullscreen LCD and using a fullscreen resolution of 1024x768 but the game is still in widescreen leaving me with big black bars on the top and bottem.... Why did they only fix the FOV for the whiny brats but not fix this. A wider FOV but still being stuck with letter boxing is going to make everything look even smaller since my L
    • Check your 360. I have a similar setup, but I have a 1680x1050 LCD. Typically, I run mine at 1380x768, but for BioShock I ran it at 1024x768 to get the vertical space back. You may have set your 360 to display in letterboxed mode, or your LCD could be adjusting to a widescreen resolution. AFAIK, BioShock doesn't have its own widescreen setting.
  • It sounds like personal politics of the the star trek cast.

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