Reviews for part one of BioShock Infinite: Burial at Sea, the DLC single-player expansion that sees Booker and Elizabeth exploring the underwater city of Rapture, are up and they’re middling at best. The main bone of contention for reviewers is its short length, with the DLC reportedly clocking in at around an hour.
In an interview with Eurogamer, BioShock creator Ken Levine has addressed these complaints, saying that it is quality not quantity which determines the success of a game. “If you zip through it then it’s not a hugely long experience but if you dig deep it’s probably three hours plus, if you really dig deep,” Levine said. “But it’s not the longest thing in the world.
“I think there are definitely people who are like ‘Well, I want hours and hours of gameplay’. I think if that is your primary metric, this probably isn’t the thing for you. If you want to feel like ‘Wow, I just got a whole new experience’ – that’s what you get out of this.”
He continued: “I’m very respective [sic] of people’s time and money. Journalists often ask me to tell their audience why they should buy something. I’m always very uncomfortable with that question because I don’t read people’s household budgets and I can’t tell them what they should buy. We chose quality over quantity. As a gamer that’s a choice I usually make. Very few people would judge a movie based on how long it is.”
While I agree with Levine’s assertion that a game needn’t be pointlessly lengthy in order to prove its worth, the reviews suggest that Burial at Sea is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it affair. However, I still remain optimistic that this return to Rapture will be a worthwhile trip.
