That was a pretty good review. The first page and a half was pretty much a rehashing of his previous statements on the game, as well as a lot of plugs seen around the internet, but regardless, it had to be said.
Quick note about the review: I'm incredibly pleased by the fact that the author (rob) included a section at the end that tells the reader what frame of mind he is coming from. I've felt that this is probably the most important thing left out of nearly EVERY review I've seen. If you're coming into a review w/some sort of bias/mindset... let the reader know! That section was perfect.
As for the game (I bought it on my lunch break the day it was released): I'm not that far through it (I don't think?) but I have put quite a few hours into it. Absolutely beautiful game. Like I said, the first page and a half of this review was a rehashing of all the praise said for the game... but it deserves every bit. The gameplay is simply amazing and creates an intensely detailed experience; from common navigation though the levels, to the reaction of your character when you're hit, to the detail of things like the camera (focusing and unfocusing)... etc. It's just amazing to be immersed in the world of Rapture.
One thing that I felt was a bit underplayed in the review was just HOW intelligent the AI is. Yes, they make intelligent reactions to your actions towards them, but the pathing/fighting AI is also top notch! I've been able to bug enemies in literally every game I've played up until this game. I can still bug a few.. but those big daddys especially are incredibly intelligent! I remember fighting one of them where there were stairs and a middle platform. I tried jumping across railings thinking that I would bug him to a point where it was hard for him to follow me, but he sure kept up! Every time I jumped across places that I thought would mess up his pathing, he adjusted quickly and accordingly to a point that I could hardly gain any distance between him and myself. This made the fight MUCH more exhilarating than your average "drag them to a spot, jump on a perch and shoot them" type of fight. The AI in this game is by far the best I've ever experienced. Now I'm not saying that it's impossible to bug any of the enemies, but it's much much harder and makes for a much more challenging experience... which is refreshing in my opinion.
I definitely agree with Rob's initial nonpluses to the game. I REALLY wanted to play this game multiplayer. I've been looking for something to replace CS/CS:S for quite sometime, and if this game was mutliplayer, it would definitely be the one. Also, the Vita Chamber debacle amazed me as well. I'm one of those "save every 5 steps, re-load the game if you lose more than 5 HP, never use heal kits" type of people... but when I finally did die, I just kind of went, "um, are you serious?" I had adam, eve, and the enemy I had been fighting was damaged. I had no penalties to my movement/damage/strength... no counters were recording my deaths... not even any sort of "slap on the wrist" for dying. This allowed me to very easily slip into the habit of not caring how much damage I took and simply standing in the face of big daddys while I fired at them.
The destructible glass would be an interesting idea, but I think that the reason the developers left it out (and probably will in the future as well) is because A) it would be incredibly hard to code the flow of water through an entire level (I highly doubt it would be confined to the size of the room as Rob suggested), and B) it would be VERY easy for players to get themselves stuck, or for enemies to break the glass and cause the player to be stuck at a point to which they could not advance. Cue the fact that the Vita chamber takes out the "level restart" factor, the water would never be removed, and the player would never be able to stay alive long enough to complete the level. One possible solution might be that there are maintenance bots that respond to hull breaches, patch them, and drain the water (or something along those lines).
One thing that wasn't mentioned that I found rather odd was the limited threads of speech that existed for the enemies. I understood the vending machines all sounding the same... which definitely added to the experience, but personally I feel that games these days should be spending a bit more time creating color for the enemies you have... especially w/such a limited selection of enemies to begin with. I don't know though, like I said I haven't finished the game (I'm only in the Neptune area) so perhaps there's a reason for this.
EDIT: as for my own bias, I came into this game wanting to like it, and dreading that it would be like STALKER. I found none of the gameplay issues I had with STALKER (which is a different discussion entirely) and found Bioshock to be quite a bit above my expectations.
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