DISCLAIMER: All four authors on this mission are working on The Black Parade and are close friends of mine. I tried to review the mission with an objective mind.

The Builder's Paradise is one of the most impressive missions I've ever played, in addition to being one of the best Mechanist missions ever. It's interesting how Thief 2 doesn't have that many purely Mechanist fan missions, actually, so The Builder's Paradise fills that niche quite well.

It is a massive compound where Karras retreated to in this alternate story in which he released the Rust Gas and won. Garrett managed to find a way in and the only thing he wants is to stop Karras once and for all. People who disliked Soulforge will likely enjoy this mission; you still have to do a lot of backtracking to destroy the factory but it isn't nearly as involved as Soulforge. Gameplay department is where the mission falters in my opinion though, as it still involves too much backtracking and the mission is basically a massive key hunt, which may get boring after a while. There is also an unstoppable, unkillable AI moving around and chasing you that can get a bit annoying.

The atmosphere of this mission is immaculate, with incredible attention to detail, extremely good sound selection, great texturing and lighting. The outdoor bit at the start is insane, and is exactly how I would envision a post-Rust Gas world. Seriously, this mission just smashes through most of the competition effortlessly when it comes to that stuff.

Story is also quite good, with a schism between the followers of Karras you get to see the aftermath of, and quite good voice acting for Karras who still quips if he sees you, since it's apparently possible to finish the mission without being detected. Lots of new Mech beasts also make an appearance, including the prototype seen in The Unwelcome Guest's briefing video.

Overall, The Builder's Paradise is a highly impressive mission with crazy atmosphere that unfortunately is a bit too backtracky and too keyhunty for its own good, but is still very good and comes highly recommended. You won't see anything like it elsewhere.

Rating: 26/30