Mass Effect

Elessar

Has anyone else finished this game? Have to say I am blown away by it. It's an extremely well produced and cinematic game. Everything from the story to the script, voice acting, characters and graphics is top notch. I bought this impulsively and was very nearly going to leave it, but I'm so glad I didn't.

I thought it had some of the most lifelike and believable characters I've ever seen in a game. Bioware completely nailed the facial expressions and character acting which made everything all the more lifelike. It's one of the few games I've ever finished to the end, and I am a very picky gamer. The graphics really pushed the xbox to the limit. Sure it wasn't really an RPG in the classic sense and the textures had an awful habit of popping up whenever they felt like it, but the depth of the well-written story, charismatic and likable characters, excellent gameplay, direction and so many other things made me overlook the negatives. It felt like an interactive movie at times.

The game is nothing short of a masterclass in storytelling in my eyes. Well done Bioware. Can't wait for the next one.

How does everyone else feel?

Darwin

I'm about 6 hours into the game and I'm completely hooked now. I found it bit of a drag at first, what with all the characters and strange placenames to get accustomed to, but yes the plot and storyline is very written and it's one game I definitely see myself finishing. Incidentally, how many hours did you put into it?

Branoic

+1 on everything in the original post.

I will generally finish any games I buy (unless I hate them and trade them in a week later), but it usually takes me months of stopping and starting. Not so with Mass Effect, I played it relentlessly over about a week and a half until i'd completed it. It totally blew me away and was my top game of 2007.

Pity about the pretty crappy DLC for it thus far.

Elessar

Darwin wrote: »

I'm about 6 hours into the game and I'm completely hooked now. I found it bit of a drag at first, what with all the characters and strange placenames to get accustomed to, but yes the plot and storyline is very written and it's one game I definitely see myself finishing. Incidentally, how many hours did you put into it?

I'm generally not one for doing side quests and mini games, so I kept all my gameplay to the main story - finished it in about 12hrs 30 mins, give or take.

RAIN

Elessar wrote: »

I'm generally not one for doing side quests and mini games, so I kept all my gameplay to the main story - finished it in about 12hrs 30 mins, give or take.

+1

Was dissapointed with how long the main quest was should have been 20 plus hours instead of the 13 it took me!!

Great time playing it. Some amazing moments in the mid section of the story.

johnny_ultimate

Had a nice long session last night which really showed the game's strengths. I'm around 20 hours in, and while there are problems, overall the game is very strong. Passed the bit last night

where you have to choose to sacrafice Kaiden or Ashley

which is one of the most interesting moral decisions I have ever had to make in a game. The micromanagement is tedious, and the combat sometimes a little irritating, but overall an excellent Western RPG - stunning technically and truly a unique take on the genre.

Fnz

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

The micromanagement is tedious, and the combat sometimes a little irritating

+1

The handling/shooting of the Mako is just plain wrong. Navigating through the buy/sell items screen is awful. Side quests feel too far removed from the main story (which is too short). The dialogue response trees are too shallow - and often the response you select and what Shepard says seem very different. The last battle is annoying. Some of the classes are nigh impossible to enjoy the game with.

The score is cool and the story is interesting. The combat, while awful at the start, improves later.

grizzly

Yeah, combat and micromanagement dragged it down for me. Lots of the battles felt the same – stand in a doorway and blast the tar out of anything that stands in the way. Managing the inventory was a chore – like doing housework. In some RPGs I can get excited when I find a new weapon, but in this I was like; right so I can afford the armour that's +10 but doesn't give me as much protection on my shields, so that's good is it?

On the plus side I loved the visuals, epic scope and characters.

Furp

Mass Effect is one of my favourite games now, I really enjoyed it with exception of the micromanagement issues. I don't normally like RPGs but I really felt the story dragged you in and it makes you feel like you are deciding the outcome, the ending of the game is amazing.

On my first time through I spent nearly 40 hours playing doing all the side missions first, I'm on my second play through now being a bad ass, and that's quite fun too. I think the levelling up could have been quicker as when you get the better weapons abilities it gets better, also I didn't realise the first time that your squad could be set to use their own powers at will or I might have turned it off but second time through with my characters at level 55 and using their own powers when they want makes it easier I also upped the difficulty to hard to make it more of a challenge.

I'm really looking forward to next one now.

Caoimhín

Thought it was over a bit soon.

bombidol

I loved it.

Kiith

Fantastic game. I must be one of the few people who really enjoyed the combat. Took a bit of getting used to, but once i did i really enjoyed it. Better then turn based any day. And the story was brilliant as well. Great voice acting, great characters (Wrex is freaken badass). Game of the year for me.

The micromanagement was stupid though, scrapping crappy mods/guns takes bloody ages. Plus most side missions were quite crap, bar the character side quests.

silvine

Hmm I was six hours in, got bored and stopped playing. I'm hoping to return soon though if COD4 ever loosens its grip.

Some of Mass Effect seemed a little rushed; popping textures, poor sound mixing, dodge AI. People here seem to love it though, and I did like the dialogue system.

So is the DLC worth getting?

koneko

+1 on everything you've said, loved the game, played through it several times already and I'm sure I'll go back to it again

D3UC3 J3

Furp wrote: »

On my first time through I spent nearly 40 hours playing doing all the side missions first, I'm on my second play through now being a bad ass, and that's quite fun too. I think the levelling up could have been quicker as when you get the better weapons abilities it gets better, also I didn't realise the first time that your squad could be set to use their own powers at will or I might have turned it off but second time through with my characters at level 55 and using their own powers when they want makes it easier I also upped the difficulty to hard to make it more of a challenge.

I'm really looking forward to next one now.

LOL practically the same story as Furp!

Only i'm on level 59 @ c.600,000xp with 250,000 xp to go to get to level 60. 250k for one level FFS!!!

Just got the best armor in the game there the other day from completing the bring down the sky DLC.

Collossus X btw!

Vic Vinegar

I had it, I really liked the cinematic feel, graphics, music etc but I found the combat woefully bad and I couldn't get past that so I traded it in without getting too far into it. Shame really!

NunianVonFuch

Agree with all that's been said! Brilliant game, one of the most enjoyable I've ever played. Went through it on Hard at first but if you use your powers right the game gets too easy just before the end. Probably be different on Hardcore though! I found I died a lot near the start but then as I leveled up it all got very easy.

Mako is awful to control, I thought I'd get used to it but that just didn't happen. Also I loved the facial animations, especially the one on (male) Shepherd's face after his love session! BIG CHEESY GRIN FTW!

Gizzle

Fnz wrote: »

The combat, while awful at the start, improves later.

You should try the combat on insanity, it's tear-jerkingly monotonous. Even the lowliest grunt takes about five explosive sniper rounds to the head to bring down...I'm still going to clear it though. Again.:o

mickoneill30

Great game. But you'd think they'd get some kind of futurisic lift technologies. I spent a lot of time listening to elevator music or newscasts

mise

Loving the game at the moment. The background story re: the mass effect universe is pretty well thought out and Im enjoying reading through it. And the character and ships all look well designed and thought out, but I didnt notice a toilet on the normandy....

thebman

mickoneill30 wrote: »

Great game. But you'd think they'd get some kind of futurisic lift technologies. I spent a lot of time listening to elevator music or newscasts

You can avoid the lifts by using the transport system which loads the next part of the city a little faster from my experience.

I really enjoyed this game and I don't really like RPG's (which tells you that it isn't a traditional RPG game).

I hate managing inventory though and even buying new weapons felt a bit too much like a chore. Since you have all that empty space on your ship, why don't you just store all your old armor in a locker on the fooking ship!

Anyway great game, great story line and fun shooter overall.

Just thought I'd add that I never really felt like I was controlling the story line too much. You basically control your characters personality not the story as in you either make him/her a hard a** or a wimp.

silvine

mise wrote: »

... but I didnt notice a toilet on the normandy....

Must be designed by the same people who built the ships in Star Trek!

grizzly

silvine wrote: »

Must be designed by the same people who built the ships in Star Trek!

Future people have evolved their bowels to a level that they can hold toilet breaks to once every 100 light years.

thebman

grizzly wrote: »

Future people have evolved their bowels to a level that they can hold toilet breaks to once every 100 light years.

I suppose it was genetic engineering so they wouldn't have to put toilets in their ships.

Makes sense, thats wasted floor space and think of all the urine floating around in space when they'd eject it. No, no you can't have that. Keep your space tidy!

Fnz

silvine wrote: »

Must be designed by the same people who built the ships in Star Trek!

*snort* according to issue 203 of Star Trek Monthly; "excrement is beamed directly out of crew members and onto the planets of pre-space-faring races".

The teleportation tech is is mostly infallible - with only 1 in every 20 billion people ever experiencing extra-bodily colon complications.

TheDonMan

I thought it was amazing but Knights of the old republic was better imo.