Painkiller: Battle out of Hell isn't just more of the same... unfortunately.
Painkiller is focused in the action sequences, which means you don't have to worry about stealth or strategy. All you must to do is to shoot legions of enemies, such as undeads, demons, soldiers etc. And Battle out of Hell isn't much different in this aspect. But some of the 10 new levels is filled with deadly traps and jumping areas, which if you do a mistake (and you'll usually do), prepare to hit the 'Quick Load' button and wait for that ****ing long loading bar to finish. Yes, they didn't fix the loading time, and even seems a little longer than it was before.
Nevertheless, this expansion isn't as bad as it sounds. There're two new great weapons, and I found both of them good additions. The Flamethrower is excellent in closed areas and against large groups of enemies. It also fires an armor-piercing bullet, which is great to take down isolated individuals. The second new weapon is the Bolt Driver, which is a bit similar to the Stake Gun, but with a sniper scope and a more precise shoot. The alternate fire launches a bunch of unpredictably bouncing explosives that can kill the player in less than a second. It's a little difficult to use, but it's extremely powerful against lots of monsters.
The 10 new maps aren't all good as the original Painkiller. Some of them, which are four or five levels, are faithful to the original maps, while the rest isn't nearly as good. I'll spoiler a little: The first map is the well-known orphanage level, which works as a purgatory for dead children. Very creepy and well-designed map, it's one of the best in the entire expansion. There're a few others which is almost equally great as the first level, but the other ones aren't very inspired. For instance, let me say that the developers seem to have a fetish for explosions. Some levels are filled with explosions from nowhere (takes a while to figure out where they came from), enemies that can explode themselves, or monsters that can fire an explosive projectile against you. And the worst: because of the ludicrous blast that all of these weapons produce on impact, dodge is almost impossible. Another flaw, in my opinion, is the soundtrack. No more rock or heavy-metal, but that isn't as relevant as the uninspired design of some maps.
However, the combats still great. There're some places that you'll be surrounded by dozens of enemies, and it does not slow down the game. The 'PAIN Engine' can handle all those enemies, as well large areas with amazing lightning effects with good frames per second. Battle out of Hell runs as good as the original Painkiller on a mid-range PC. The only problem, as I said before, is the loading times. Naturally, if you have a high-end computer, then you won't have any problems with that.
The multiplayer is enhanced with two new modes: Last Man Standing (gives limited lives for the players) and Capture the Flag. Although the new content is OK, they persist in the same mistake by not introducing a 'Cooperative mode'. It would greatly extend the life of both the expansion and the original game, as Battle out of Hell lasts only 10 hours or less in the single-player mode.
That amount of life time can be extended if you decide to unlock the new black tarot cars. These, if you don't already know, are power-ups to give a certain bonus when you go to the next level. The cards can boost speed, damage, health and so, and makes the game a little easier. Well, easier when you actually use them, because to unlock these cards you'll have to accomplish some hard objectives, such as killing a boss in a given time, kill all monsters with a particular weapon etc. The use of these cards is important, since some levels at higher difficult settings are really hard.
You can still morph into demon when you collect 66 souls from your dead opponents. In that form you can instantly kill any monster you shoot, and that's very useful is some levels. Thus, collecting souls isn't just for that, but also for adding good portions of health when you're almost dying.
So, Painkiller: Battle out of Hell isn't just more of the same. And I say that's most unfortunate, because the original game was superb, while the expansion comes with really annoying levels. But considering the new multiplayer modes, the additional weapons and a few really good maps, this expansion still worth of a try if you enjoyed the original Painkiller.