This review contains spoilers
A complete disappointment in story and gameplay both. The only positives I can really give this game are:
1) The visuals and overall presentation are pretty good.
2) The music is fine. It's nothing amazing, but it fits fine.
That's the end of my praises.
My gameplay gripes? Well, you can only hold two damn guns, and most of theplasmids vigors feel really samey, and the one or two more unique ones were so situational to the point where they never really got used. Compare to previous games, you had a ton of combat options in regards to plasmid and gun choice, this is so barren by comparison. I guess the Sky Hook is kinda cool? It feels so tacked on and gimmicky though, I almost never used the thing in combat except as a melee strike for enemies who got too close.
SPOILER WARNING
So, my ultimate gripe with this game is how it butchers the established story from the previous two games. The way it implements the Many-World Interpretation is just plain-fucking-wrong. Killing Booker at the end of the game, at a certain point in the """main""" timeline doesn't mean shit, because there's still an infinite number of parallel worlds. INFINITE, ENDLESS possible worlds, which means that there are MANY, MANY, MANY worlds where Booker DOESN'T accept being drowned at the end of the game and instead continues to live and become Comstock. This means the Comstock cycle never should actually end, but the game just brushes it all under a rug as if it does. Not only that, but MINUTES before the very end, Elizabeth herself is explaining the fucking Many Worlds Interpretation, and how there is an infinite number of similar but ultimately different worlds. But yet, the game goes "Yep, all the Bookers in all the multiverses of endless possibilities are all totally dead now...except ONE :^)." Burial At Sea was the most hamfisted, clunky, story retconning I've witnessed in a long-ass time. I'm entirely convinced that this game could have very easily been a non-Bioshock title and would have been almost no different. Hell, the Bioshock series and this game BOTH would've been better for it. Bioshock Infinite, on it's own, already sucked but Burial At Sea did more damage than the entire main game. Ken Levine can fuck right off with this nonsense.
1) The visuals and overall presentation are pretty good.
2) The music is fine. It's nothing amazing, but it fits fine.
That's the end of my praises.
My gameplay gripes? Well, you can only hold two damn guns, and most of the
SPOILER WARNING
So, my ultimate gripe with this game is how it butchers the established story from the previous two games. The way it implements the Many-World Interpretation is just plain-fucking-wrong. Killing Booker at the end of the game, at a certain point in the """main""" timeline doesn't mean shit, because there's still an infinite number of parallel worlds. INFINITE, ENDLESS possible worlds, which means that there are MANY, MANY, MANY worlds where Booker DOESN'T accept being drowned at the end of the game and instead continues to live and become Comstock. This means the Comstock cycle never should actually end, but the game just brushes it all under a rug as if it does. Not only that, but MINUTES before the very end, Elizabeth herself is explaining the fucking Many Worlds Interpretation, and how there is an infinite number of similar but ultimately different worlds. But yet, the game goes "Yep, all the Bookers in all the multiverses of endless possibilities are all totally dead now...except ONE :^)." Burial At Sea was the most hamfisted, clunky, story retconning I've witnessed in a long-ass time. I'm entirely convinced that this game could have very easily been a non-Bioshock title and would have been almost no different. Hell, the Bioshock series and this game BOTH would've been better for it. Bioshock Infinite, on it's own, already sucked but Burial At Sea did more damage than the entire main game. Ken Levine can fuck right off with this nonsense.
Reviewed on Sep 15, 2020