December 31st, 1959. The big night. And with a noir flair, familiar faces are moved into a place we recognize. What is going on? Why are they here? And what will become of them?
If you're considering getting any of this DLC, aim for the Season Pass. Even if you don't get into anything else, the Gears are great. You probably won't swap them out for anything. I didn't. Same goes for the ones in the only you have to buy separately from the rest, Columbia's Finest. Stuff is called what it should be, looks and sounds right. And of course, we meet characters that we're already familiar with. They even look as silly when changing facial expression as before! And Atlas is rendered more racist, because if you use offensive material without meaning it, that's controversial. And not just... y'know. Crass. Immature. And far too reminiscent of how Rise of an Empire, or 300 #2, uses its few swear words.
It was clear from very early on that Irrational's latest outing, despite several delays, and a 3-year-development, had at least as many bafflingly wrongheaded decisions as good ones. I crossed my fingers that it would end there. It did not.
In this, you can carry every gun you come across. You're not limited to 2. So why are you, at all? And why can I still not scroll through them using the mouse wheel? And couldn't you at least then have let me use it for the Vigors? Why only use a toggle key? And then a wheel for the latter, again showing that you could easily have done that with the former!
Carry capacity has been appropriately lowered. And custom/alternate ammo is introduced! ...so why only here?! Instead we were stuck with bland weapons. Down from 5 different Grenade types. Resource management is vital here. Don't get me wrong, ADAM remains gone. A return to Eden, this ain't. Still, you're keeping health kits on your person. So what's Booker's problem? How did he stay alive through all those armed conflicts he excelled at, without a shield?
And, more to the point, a permanent source of safely respawning? Though she does charge for the service, apparently. Hey, if you're good at something, don't do it for free. ...of course, everything else she does, she asks for nothing in return. She'll do it with a smile on her face, even though she's just been facing the darkness inherent in the world she's in. I'm on a Hook. Are you going to stay down there? As you have to? Like you always do? And as you are sure to tell me every single time, with barely any different line reads?
Don't get me wrong, real consequences still aren't a thing. Not since the System became the Bio. Let's go through it once more, for those who weren't paying attention. When you were dealing with SHODAN, the circumstances surrounding the resurrection stations were different. There was only one to a Deck. You had to find it and activate it. It might be very far away from where you had to go, so you lost a lot of time. More of a hassle than a challenge? How about this: a bunch of the sections, did. Not. Have. Them. At all. So if you had gotten used to a do-over, boy were you in for a surprise. You'd better have saved recently. Because it doesn't just send you back to the last portion. It put you back at the menu. You may even get to see your corpse be turned into a cyborg. You will serve her well.
You get to see Rapture before the fall. And yes, it *is* by way of walking simulator! How did you know?! 20 agonizing minutes. Out of 110 total! And after that, it's a decent recreation of what we've seen before. Which we could simply go back to.
Well, that amount of time covers the first episode. The more traditionally FPS one. Dull. And then you get to the other one. The worse one. That makes you wish you were just bored. It took me a little under 3 hours. I've heard others say they did it in 5, or 6. I'm not a leet master hacker. But when the choice is between obnoxious gameplay, and Sprinting past, yeah, you can figure out what I pick, then.
Like the name of the 1998 Mode suggests, it's Thief-style stealth. Except you don't know where the enemy is before they can easily spot you, too. The amount of light you are or aren't in, not to mention the distance between you, don't make the slightest bit of difference. So it's Dishonored. You even have a crossbow! It's not useless. Bolts for knocking out with a syringe of sedative, ones that use sleeping gas and can affect several at once, and ones that give off noise to distract. Yup, Garrett should message his lawyer.
Of course, you could also draw comparison to Splinter Cell: Blacklist. It came out around the same time. And it definitely has shortcomings, problems and such. Nevertheless, it wipes the floor with this. Reminding people of better things they could be doing is always unfortunate to do in your pieces of creative expression. And given that this lets you visit a firm, propagandaistic education center, I do find myself wondering if I could go to school, instead. Maybe clean my room. I'm certain I could find some paint that would be *stunning* to watch dry, by comparison.
The Tears let you move between the two fantastical cities. You get background on Songbird, and genuinely compelling interaction with a Big Daddy. Of course, it's also eager to awkwardly, terribly retcon plot twists that some found disappointing. Sacrificing for that thematic resonance, chilling realizations and historical significance.
I recommend this only to people who insist on trying every single piece of content. Otherwise, steer clear(you're welcome). 5/10
