So first off, the biggest difference is the location. Gone are the dark and damp underwater tunnels and buildings of Rapture, welcome to Columbia, a "floating statue of liberty." Built as a way for America to show the world what the country is capable of, Columbia is an enormous floating city in the sky. However, after discovering the city had military capabilities, and created an incident by firing on Chinese civilians, the United States disowned the city, and it's location was lost. Seemingly forgotten about, and in complete isolation, the people of Columbia have erupted into civil war.
While the original Bioshock had the player come in after the fall of Rapture, this time, the player is fighting in the middle of the war, with both sides openly fighting. Along side that, the city is still populated with normal citizens, unlike the straggling Splicers of Rapture. Also a significant change is the fact that you're no longer alone this time through...
Introducing, Elizabeth. She is a woman trapped in the city, that you are trying to save, but there is something not quite right about her. She possesses impossible power, most prominent is her ability to teleport objects and herself through "tears." She also appears to have some form of healing power, but there is a catch, she can't always control her powers. This often presents problems, ranging from being stuck in an alternate world, to having trouble making items appear at will. While she is a separate character, gameplay wise, she is more an extension of the players powers. She is capable of making everything from cover, to ammo, to special weapons appear at the players command, doing this too much however can harm her. It appears however, that she wont always be in the players company. That's not a problem though because you have enough powers and weapons to hold out on your own, which brings the next topic: combat.
First off, player weapon count seems to be restricted to two weapons at a time, having to pick up guns off of fallen enemies on the fly. Shown in a 15 minute demo, certain encounters seem to be entirely avoidable. Approaching a public execution, a prompt pops up to stop the atrocity, doing so saves the mail man, but a huge conflict ensues ending with a Zeplin bossfight. Also apparent, vigors (the replacement for plasmids), seem to have taken on more of a support role along side standard firearms, than being used on their own. One vigor shown suspends enemies and objects in the air for easier targeting. Also, the EVE system of the original Bioshock is gone, with vigors simply having a limited number of uses before the player needs to find more of the same vigor. Also, Gene Banks from Bioshock are no longer present, passive tonics are now permanent once applied.
Making a comeback from Bioshock, is the level design. It would seem once again, individual levels are open world sections of the city. This time around though, they are much bigger. With the implication of the skyline (Columbia's rail transport system) the player can cover great distances, both horizontally and vertically quickly and with ease. These railways will be invaluable when confronting "him."
With the central plot revolving around getting Elizabeth out of Columbia, inevitably there are going to be forces trying to falter your progress. The Songbird, sometimes referred to simply as "him," and the Handymen are out to stop you and retrieve Elizabeth from your possession. The Handymen seems to be Infinite's version of the iconic Big Daddy from the previous game, most likely appearing as intermediate mini boss fights to keep the action unpredictable.
Thank you for reading, I hope to post more previews and reviews very soon.
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