While a sequel to 2007's wondrous shooter may seem wholly unnecessary, the astoundingly alluring city of Rapture welcomes you home with plasmid-enhanced open arms, mere moments into its twisting tale. Unfurling ten years after the events of the original, BioShock 2's big narrative spin is placing you in the cast iron boots of the original's most fearsome foe, the Big Daddy, pitting you against an onslaught of twisted enemies and something much more menacing than you: the Big Sister.
With four studios at the wheel BioShock 2 could easily have been crippled by a developer overdose, yet that's not the case; the game has surfaced from the watery depths unscathed by the abundance of input. Mechanics that worked best in the original - combat and linear gameplay - haven't been tampered with, rather enhanced. And with the addition of a deftly tuned multiplayer experience (nestled during the events of the civil war that decimated Rapture and lead into the first game) built by Canadian coders, Digital Extremes, the team behind 2008's PS3 port of BioShock and Unreal Tournament, Rapture has never offered more. Whether or not it bests the original gong-sweeper is simply a matter of opinion.