Mass Effect 2

Comments

1. Big Al says:

   June 30, 2010 at 8:26 am

   INTRODUCTION
   
   Mass Effect, by Electronic Arts (EA), sets the benchmark for third person role playing actions games. It is as close to a DVD movie as a video game can get, because, unlike most first person games, players can see and hear the player character as well as the non-player characters (NPCs). This movie-like quality greatly enhances the compelling story, which is the hallmark of the Mass Effect Trilogy.

   THE PLOT
   
   **Spoiler Alert**
   
   This second episode of the Mass Effect Trilogy begins with the death (yes, DEATH) of Commander Shepard, in a fiery ambush of the Normandy, two years after he/she defeated the traitorous Saren Arterius in the battle of the Citadel. But, thank the goddess, he/she is later resurrected in Project Lazarus by the Illusive Man, leader of Cerberus, a shadowy and ruthless “human supremacist” organization, for the sole purpose of sending the legendary commander to investigate a new cataclysmic event in the Galaxy: entire human colonies have been vanishing without a trace, leaving behind empty buildings. To confront the threat, Shepard travels across the Galaxy to recruit up to a dozen of the most dangerous characters to his/her elite team, at locations including Illium, an asari colony, and Omega, a lawless mining station built on a hollowed out asteroid in the Terminus Systems, for a mission from which every member of the team, including Commander Shepard, may never return.
   
   **End of Possible Spoilers**

   THE CHARACTERS
   
   Players who had completed Mass Effect 1 (ME1) can import a Save Game from the list of Character Saves into Mass Effect 2 (ME2). During the file transfer, they have the option of changing the class of Commander Shepard, for example, from adept to vanguard, as well as his/her physical characteristics. This is possible in the storyline on account of Project Lazarus–a very clever way of putting Shepard on reset. If Shepard was imported at a high level in ME1, players will be awarded with bonus squad points and research metals at the start. (See my comment below.) All the NPCs who were alive at the end of the ME1 are transferred. Furthermore, the story in ME2 unfolds in accordance with the decisions made by the players in ME1, for example, whether Shepard set the Rachni queen free in Noveria, whether he/she resolved the conflict with Wrex on Virmire peacefully, or whether he/she called in the human fleet to save the Council in the battle of the Citadel. For those who never play ME1, ME2 can be played stand-alone with new characters and certain pre-set assumptions on events in ME1. New characters in ME2 include Thane, a drell master assassin, Legion, a free-thinking geth, who is stalking Commander Shepard, and Subject Zero, a female human biotic gang and cult member, with head-to-toe tattoos. Other than the geth and the Reapers, new enemies emerge in ME2. They include the Collectors, a winged insect-like species who are suspected to be working for the Reapers, and Scions, which are grotesque experiments of the Reaper, as well as monstrous beings created by the Reapers out of other species they abducted.

   THE GAME/COMBAT SYSTEM
   
   The Artificial Intelligence (AI) and combat system have been vastly improved in ME2. Gone are those annoying texture pop-ups in ME1. So are those long elevator rides–they are replaced with loading screens. Battle scenes are more realistic: enemies are thrown against walls, limbs are blown off, and wounded fighters continue to fight by crawling on the ground. Players can hit the enemies where they place the reticles, like in a shooter. (This is not so in ME1, where hits are calculated based on the number of skill points assigned by the players to the characters.) Players can now issue attack orders to Shepard’s squad mates by using the directional-pad of the controller (of the Xbox 360), and manually prompt Commander Shepard to duck behind covers. The limitless ammo is no more in ME2. It is replaced with removable “thermal clips”. When a clip is spent, it must be ejected and replaced with a new one. Players are therefore advised to take note of the amount of thermo clips available during battles. Instead of only four weapon types as in ME1, there are nineteen in ME2. One of my gripes with ME1 was the lack of heavy hand-held weapons. In ME2, they are available to the soldier class player character (as well as Commander Shepard of all classes). These heavy weapons knock down multiple enemies in one gigantic blast. A sentinel class player character now dons an ablation tactical armor, which makes him/her very tough to kill. An engineer class player character can launch a drone to aid him/her in battle. An adept class player character can spawn micro-singularities around the enemies, annihilating them en masse. Tactical cloak, which renders a combatant invisible briefly, is available to an infiltrator class player character. A vanguard class player character can dash around the battlefield with a new biotic power–the “biotic charge”, which propels him/her forward at tremendous speed and force, to attack or evade the enemies. There is no longer any class restriction in armor. Medi-gel, used in the ME1 to regenerate health, is replaced with auto-regeneration, although the players still need it to cast the Unity reviving power. (Note: auto-regeneration is also available in ME1, but only as an upgrade to the armors.)

   THE DIALOGUE
   
   The dialogue wheel in ME1 is the most innovative dialogue system in all the games I have ever played. When used probably, it delivers a continuous and seamless dialogue, and hence the movie-like quality of the game. In ME2, the dialogue wheel is further improved. A new “interrupt” system is introduced. When prompted by the players with the left or right trigger of the controller (of the Xbox 360), Commander Shepard can interrupt the dialogue with “heroic” or “hostile” action to get the answer he/she wants. Furthermore, instead of the previous static camera position in ME1, the camera moves around during conversations in ME2, adding further cinematic effect to the game.

   THE CHOICES
   
   Like in ME1, choices made by the players influence the outcome of the game in ME2. For example, in ME1, on the planet Virmire, Commander Shepard (and hence the players), was called upon to decide which of the two squad mates he/she would rescue; the one left behind was consumed in a subsequent nuclear blast. In the same manner, decisions of the players in ME2 throughout the game may eventually lead to the annihilation of the entire ground team in the final mission, including Commander Shepard, or the survival of every team member, or something in between. Players with a “dead” Shepard will not be able to import him/her into ME3. The same thing is true with a “dead” teammate. They can play ME3 with a generic Shepard, but not “their” Shepard. Furthermore, with Shepard killed, players can’t return to the game world after the final mission and continue to play, for example, to complete a side quest, or to explore a new locale. They will have to start a new game or reload with a previous save-file and replay part of the game for a different outcome. This gives incentive to players to make sound decisions throughout the game, before heading into the final mission.

   THE CERBERUS NETWORK
   
   The Cerberus Network is a cleverly designed in-game portal through which players can access “Downloadable Contents (DLCs)” from EA. Players activate this network with a one-time access code, which is included in every new game purchase. Game renters and used game buyers will have to pay for the code. This arrangement is apparently a ploy by EA to combat the rental and used game market, which has been undermining retail sales of new games. Players who access the network will receive the first DLC pack on January 26, 2010, the date on which the game is released in North America. This first DLC introduces Zaeed, a rough and tumble mercenary who will join Shepard’s elite team. A future DLC will introduce the Hammerhead, a hover tank to replace the much-maligned Mako in ME1. (Note: There is no driveable vehicle in the core game.) In addition, new missions and in-game items will be released to gamers by EA through this network.

   CONCLUSION
   
   ME2 comes with 2 discs. Players have to swap discs (twice per game) at some points. There are 90 voice actors playing 546 characters with over 30,000 lines of dialogue. New voice actors in ME2 include D.C. Douglas, Martin Sheen and Adam Baldwin. In conclusion, ME2 is a role-playing game with the look and feel of a shooter. It is a must-have game of the year.
   
   Rating: 5 / 5
2. M. Squires says:

   June 30, 2010 at 10:45 am

   Did you want better graphics? Did you want a better shooter interface? Well, Bioware delivered…no question.
   
   So Bioware has made a lot of changes to the game (too many to count perhaps), but one things for sure, they created a winner.

   NEW COMBAT SYSTEM:

   Much more like a first person shooter now; defiantly fun to shoot people and pop the head off of someone. Also doesn’t matter as much what abilities you upgrade or what weapons you have; if you can aim then you can kill a bad guy.

   NEW UPGRADE SYSTEM:

   Can’t really decide if I like this or not. There’s a part of me that enjoys how much simpler everything has become and how much time I save, but I think I kind of enjoyed the in depth upgrade and weapons in the first game. This opinion may or may not be shared. Regardless, I was a little to overwhelmed by the greatness of this game to care that much.

   INTERFACE WITH PREVIOUS GAME:

   You’ll hear little reminents of things you did in the past and you’ll definitely get the feel that you had an impact, but it’s not as dramatic I had expected. They hyped it up so much that your last game would have such a big impact on this one, but I haven’t seen much to back that up. I was a level 55 in the first game so I got to start a few levels up in this one and they gave me a little extra cash for being rich in ME1, but it wasn’t that significant. Guess I just expected a little bit more, but I have to admit that any interface with the previous game must have been hard and it’s groundbreaking, so they get my respect.

   HACKING/CODE BREAKING: The new system they designed for unlocking items and hacking systems is a lot more fun. Actually feels a little bit challenging and regardless of your level or path you’ve chosen, you’ll be able to do it.

   VEHICLE: Good news! There really isn’t a vehicle; you’ll pick where you want to go and then you’ll go there. The vehicle from ME1 felt like a shopping cart with one bad wheel to me and I’m glad to see it’s gone.

   PLANET EXPLORATION: Pretty cool system they came up with. You’ll use a radar device to explore a planets surface and then deploy pods to check for what you’re looking for. This is a much improved system from just driving around in my opinion. Be ready to spend a lot of hours looking around. There’s an amazing amount of land to cover in the universe. They really worked hard to give you a lot to explore and it shows. Doesn’t have that empty pointless feeling that the first ME had when I was checking planets. If they weren’t related to the primary objective, every planet felt the same

   THE GOOD:

   1) Story is great and managed to integrate with the first game to include your actions taken

   2) Graphics are on par with competitive titles from this gen; really stunning to just look around at your surroundings

   3) Lots of glitches fixed and too many improvements to count; some things they did were almost to small to even notice, but you can feel they’re there

   THE BAD:

   1) New dumbed down RPG elements feel easy to use but a little empty. If you hated the monotony of upgrading too many small aspects and customizing every weapon for proper ammo and best fit then maybe you’ll like it. But, I couldn’t help but feel that it was a little bit too easy and boring compared to the first game

   2) You’ll have to do a long mission to gain the loyalty of every one of your 10 squad members; it’s kind of cool at first, but it gets a little old. Really? I have to complete a mission to get Garus on my side? Pretty sure I proved my loyalty fighting the Geth and Saren already

   3) The new planet scanning system is cool and I’m glad to be rid of the vehicle, but it starts to get really old searching for minerals. After about 4 hours of it I got tired and decided I had enough uprades. Searched about 60 planets and found 6 side missions, so that feels like there’s probably a lot out there. I didn’t make it to level 30 so I must have missed a lot, but I just got so sick of scanning planets. Not a big complaint though; I don’t know how they could have done it better so I was pleased.

   OVERVIEW:

   GRAPHICS: 10/10
   
   DIALOGUE: 10/10
   
   AUDIO: 10/10
   
   COMBAT SYSTEM: 10/10
   
   UPGRADES: 8/10
   
   STORY: 10/10
   
   INTEGRATION OF PREVIOUS GAME: 7/10

   Whether you liked the first ME or you didn’t, this game is a winner. I have my share of complaints, but the game is an amazing edition to the trilogy and you can just sense the effort Bioware put into this. Everyone will have complaints, but I’ve never seen a developer listen to the feedback and put forth this much effort.

   Two days ago I would have told you ME1 was almost perfect, but this game has shown be the light and really set the bar.

   Thanks Bioware

   Good Gaming
   Rating: 5 / 5
3. TheRumblePack.com says:

   June 30, 2010 at 12:50 pm

   It is times like this that make me wish I had a better memory. Now, when 2011 rears its ugly head, I’m going to have to think all the way back to Jan 26 when I contemplate the games that defined 2010. Thank you, Mass Effect 2.

   As I sat down to type this review the first time, I found myself trying to go down a bullet list of pros and cons of ME2. I found myself able to list out a disturbing number of cons that I could easily put into words. The pros, however, weren’t so easily wrangled. As we’ve mentioned numerous times on the podcast, BioWare games have a knack for making you think about the whole, rather than discrete parts.

   I’ve never played a game that is so clearly disjointed. Shooting, dialogue, cut scenes – each segment is completely isolated from the rest. You’re never caught off-guard by the action, unlike in Uncharted 2, where you sometimes don’t realize when the cut-scene is done and it’s your turn to play. In ME2, the game jerks from dialogue to third-person action. The game is very clear here: now is the time to start killing things. The talkie bits are done.

   I stress this disjointed construction because it makes the ultimate impression the game leaves on you all that more impressive. As I think about the game days after completion, daydreaming while doing other things, I find all the segments of the game meld together. I’m left thinking about the experience that was the game.

   And that sums up the most compelling thing about ME2: it is an experience.

   The experience was compelling enough to zombify my girlfriend, someone who usually detests merely watching me play a game, and glue her to the couch next to me for the entire 25-hour adventure. No, she was not mistaking the game for a movie; she was caught in the same strange gravity well as me. If I neglected to visit a crew member in between missions, both my in-game personal assistant and my girlfriend were eager to hear the next dialogue.

   It’s important to point out that the game designers felt that you might want a reminder in the CIC, the bridge and information hub of ME2, of all the characters that want to talk to you. This is a feature that would have been useful in the original Mass Effect, in which I wasn’t sure when I was supposed to talk to crew members, but it is unnecessary in the sequel due to the well-defined structure of the game.

   That well defined structure is actually a point of contention; some people find it the worst part about the sequel, and others find it the strength of the game. I’m in the middle of these two camps. On one hand, I wish that the game afforded you more leeway with handling the relationships you develop with your crew. On the other hand, I understand that framing conversations in an interesting way means that the game designers could be more creative with direction during the dialogue.

   It’s very clear that the design focus of the game was altered from the first. An in-game satire of a game store makes BioWare’s direction very clear: “big decisions and visceral combat.” Everything that gets in the way of these two things was on the chopping block for ME2. Cumbersome inventory? Gone. Plodding Mako missions? Gone. Complex character statistics? Simplified. Poorly implemented cover mechanic? Overhauled.

   As a result, if anything besides dialogue scenes and decision making was your favorite part of the original Mass Effect, you will not like the direction of the sequel. This isn’t to say that you’ll dislike the game as a whole, but I just don’t think you’ll be as excited about the game as others. I was a big fan of the dialogue and story of the first game, and as a result, I couldn’t be more satisfied with the result of BioWare’s pruning.

   The variation between each player’s story becomes the most compelling discussion topic among those who’ve completed the game. I sought out message boards, an act of desperation, in order to share my experience with other players. The fact that I didn’t want to expose my fellow podcast-mates to my version of the ending, even in vague terms, is a credit to the power of the game’s narrative. Suffice to say, the game delivers the parameters of its final mission in a way that had me holding my breath every step of the way, actually afraid of the consequences of the actions built up over the course of the game.

   In the original Mass Effect, the sum total of the decisions you made in the game seemed to matter less. While there were “big” decisions to be made, the consequences weren’t represented. It was very easy to see the structure of the game – make X decision to see X cutscene; make Y decision the second time, see Y cutscene. There may be an easy explanation for how ME2 determines what your ending will be, but as the gamer, I’m completely mystified. If there is a pattern, I don’t see it.

   And that’s the beauty of the refined system in ME2, as I’m left contemplating the possibilities I skipped over. I genuinely regret some of the decisions I made in the game. Normally, I would consider reloading an old save and fixing my mistake – gaming the system. In any other game, I wouldn’t think twice about optimizing, but in ME2, I left those regrettable decisions untouched. I feel like they only add depth to the character I’m creating.

   It’s that ownership over the character who you create that cements this sequel’s status as far superior to the original. Other games allow you to customize the appearance, name and voice of the main character. Mass Effect 2 goes one beyond that – you can shape the identity of the main character, too.

   It’s been more than five years, but we’re finally seeing games that are more than just “next-generation” in graphics alone. And this one isn’t a small step – it’s a giant leap.

   –Reviewed by Nick Kosareo
   Rating: 5 / 5
4. W. A. H. says:

   June 30, 2010 at 1:56 pm

   And I use the word “Hate” the most sarcastic/ironic way possible.
   
   All I wanted to do was play this thing, and was totally engulfed in the weaving of the story.
   
   I had gotten fed up with the “shooter”. Run into a room, kill everybody, kill the boss. Run into another room, kill everybody, kill the boss. No context, no story, just BLOW THAT GUY UP!
   
   I was never big on the RPG because clicking a dialogue option, while not saying anything, only to hear a character answer me became annoying. Like listening to a one-sided conversation.
   
   Then I found Mass Effect 2, and it immediately passed one of my most important tests for video games: Does it make me forget I’m in my living room?
   
   It did all that and more. It is more like a movie than a game, and, unlike the normal shooter that just seems to drag you along for the ride this one lets YOU decide on how things unfold, for better or worse. Who lives and who dies is up to you, your decisions, and their consequences. If you want a game that gives you some semblance of what it would be like to be in command of a squad, on a mission where everything hangs on what you decide the next move is, this is it.
   
   I have never seen anything like this, and it is a consuming experience.
   
   Combined with Mass Effect 1, they throw some pretty heavy things at you, like deciding whether or not to commit genocide, whether or not to allow someone to be murdered because someone wants it, or to stop it.
   
   It’s a game that tests character as much as it tests eye/hand coordination. If you play it, “I’m gonna be all harda$$” you can do that, but it’s really intense if you sit there and actually think, “What would I really do?” and play it that way.
   
   I couldn’t believe I was sitting there having my morals and ethics challenged just as much as my skill with a sniper rifle.
   
   I loved that!
   
   DIFFERENCES:
   
   Shooters: If you get a team, they are always behind you, no matter what you do.
   
   ME1/ME2: These team members will second-guess you with reasoning that will make you second-guess yourself.
   
   Shooters: All Roads Lead To Rome. The ending is the ending, and nothing’s going to change it.
   
   ME1/ME2: I’ve played this game five different times and have gotten five different outcomes because of the choices I’ve made.
   
   Shooters: Squad members will razz each other or argue, but they all band together and get the job done in the end.
   
   ME2: You have to earn you squad’s loyalty, and they don’t always get along, some are even enemies, and if you don’t find a way to keep the delicate balance and lose one of their loyalties, chances are, they won’t make it.
   
   The graphics are stunning, and that added a lot to the “total immersion” of it. The character’s backgrounds are rich and it really brings them alive, and makes you care about whether they make it or not.
   
   The shooter parts of it are . . . well . . . fun, like a shooter should be, especially since BioWare improved the sniper rifle so it’s not drifting all over the place when you target. And it gets the heart racing, like a good shooter should.
   
   And the controls had that pick-up-and-play aspect to it so you didn’t have to concentrate on which buttons to hit.
   
   The load time is long, well, long-ER than a plain shooter’s, because of everything that a part will have in it, but it’s well worth the extra wait.
   
   The RPG dialogue is fantastic, because you pick an option, the character “talks” and doesn’t say that option, but a dialogue along that line, so it feels like you’re watching a movie you’re directing.
   
   This is what an RPG/Shooter should be.
   
   If you were pulled off the street today–being who you know yourself to be– were asked to save the galaxy, and given a squad and crew that looked to you to take them into hell and get them back out again alive, could you?
   
   Play the game and find out.
   Rating: 5 / 5
5. J.S. Knapp says:

   June 30, 2010 at 3:20 pm

   Let’s get this out of the way first – I am one of the biggest Mass Effect fans in the Milky Way. I reserved this game in two different places just to get as much extra DLC as I could (more on that travesty later.) I have the Collectors Edition of both games, both novels, and 2 of the four Comic Books – the second volume just hit shelves today. I know the story like the back of my hand.

   Maybe that’s why Mass Effect 2 is such a major disappointment. BioWare allegedly spent a lot of time researching feedback from the first game, and “vastly improved” upon various aspects from Mass Effect 1. What they in-fact did was create an abstract, disjointed and frustrating combat experience, added in a slew of loading screens were there was once flow and connection between areas and missions, and used a revolutionary dialogue system on a lame excuse for a sci-fi adventure of galactic proportions.

   I’m going to hit on the most important part first – combat. There has been so much discussion on the “excellent” and “much-improved” combat system. I don’t know what these people are playing, but this combat system is laughable. For starters, we’ve lost the ability to crouch. You can no longer duck behind boxes and walls – unless you engage the cover system. In ME1, you simply pressed your character into a wall or crate and you would automatically take cover. Now you have to hit the ‘A’ button. This would work OK if the ‘A’ button didn’t also control running. So imagine this scenario: you enter a large area where you’re ambushed by enemies. You see a low wall to the side, so you run and take cover. You manage to pick off a few bad guys before catching sight of a few more baddies attempting to flank you. You turn to the side while switching guns, when suddenly your character stands up! You didn’t want to stand up, but since you can’t actively crouch, you stand up the moment you break cover. So now you’re not only vulnerable to the enemies who have flanked you, but all the remaining enemies around you. This happens often, and kills you almost just as frequently.

   To add to the frustration, you now have to manage ammo. Ammo is thoroughly covered in the first game, and also the Mass Effect novels. It doesn’t exist in this timeframe. But because people whined about the combat system from ME1, they decided to give us “heat sinks” that have to be ejected from the guns – effectively acting as ammo. BioWare tells us that ammo is abundant, but it’s anything but true. Often you’ll kill entire groups of opponents only to find 2 or 3 ammo packs – not nearly enough to refill your stash. Furthermore many of your guns have extremely limited ammo quantities, such as the Sniper Rifle which only holds 10 shots. When playing as an Infiltrator, this could be very difficult to work with. Quite frankly, I don’t know why they did it. It’s no fun, and it can become incredibly frustrating to suddenly run out of ammo mid-fight.

   Next up, the missions… I want to find out who convinced BioWare to get rid of my precious Mako. Everyone complains about the Mako – that thing was awesome! Certainly no more challenging to drive than a Warthog in Halo. With a little practice, it could dodge enemy fire in combat, and came with some pretty heavy artillery. People complain about how hard it was to get over some of the mountains on various planets. Did you ever try checking the map? The map would show you areas of transition between the elevations – showing you the clear and easy path to get to where you were going. The straight path from A to B wasn’t always the quickest. So now we sit through uninspiring loading screens – some of which are quite long – and feel much less connected to the story. We also don’t get to traverse loading docks anymore – exiting (and later reentering) the air lock of the new Normandy. What all this does is disconnect you from the story. Mass Effect 1 had a tremendous flow to it: select your destination, walk to the airlock, pick your crew, and exit the ship onto your mission. By the way, maps are all-but gone in ME2 as well – you get overly detailed maps while loitering in the various cities/space stations, but all you get during missions to help you find your way is a glitchy “go this way” objective arrow in the corner of the screen.

   And the story… I’ve compared the first 40 hours of gameplay to an oversized grocery shopping list. “Go get this guy. Okay, now get this guy. Get this guy too. Okay now make this guy like you better. Okay, no this guy too…” You spend a massive amount of time recruiting people for your team, then fulfill completely pointless missions to make them “loyal” – stories like, “Oh help me find my sister” or “My daddy called me!” It’s pandering, and pretty pathetic. The end warms up, but it tends to feel like too little too late. Are we saving the Galaxy here or playing some pickup B-ball…?

   On top of all this is a relatively glitchy game. My character has gotten stuck a number of times already – even in some of the DLC missions. Clipping seems to be a frequent issue – in fact, the entire time you run around you’ll see the guns on Shephard’s back clipping with each other – the gun holsters from the previous game have not been resized to fit the new “heavy weapons” which have been crammed in the middle, so you end up looking like you’re carrying around some kind of jetpack – you can’t tell where one gun ends and the next begins. Does it affect gameplay? Not at all – but it’s pretty pathetic for a game that BioWare has bragged as being “their best game ever.” Some dialogue conversations don’t flow properly, and sometimes just don’t make sense. If you put your guns away in the middle of a fight, your teammates will shout out “All enemies clear!” even while you’re still being shot at!

   The game certainly isn’t without merit. The new hack/bypass mini-games are a welcome change from the “Bop-It” button press challenges of the previous games. The diversity in weapons within a certain class (such as the Standard verses the Viper Sniper Rifles) is nice, even if you don’t get to collect dozens of weapons as you did in the first game. The new Normandy is cool, though wandering around to carry on conversations with your oversized crew gets old kinda quick. One good aspect of combat is the quick ability to change ammo types quickly. I do still wish they’d use a hotkey system more similar to Fallout or Oblivion, but I recognize the challenge of incorporating crew commands as well. The dialogue has been ramped up even further – the new “interrupt” system added to conversations is just awesome – ESPECIALLY the Renegade moments. I’m following a Paragon path, but will often follow the Renegade interrupts and then reload to the last save point – they’re worth watching THAT much. There is plenty of Nostalgia as well, both in the form of reappearing crew members from the first game (though I agree that some of these moments are underwhelming.) Still, they pull it off in a manner that waits until the last moment to surprise you. It’s a nice touch. For those buying the game new, you can also visit the Normandy crash site. It’s definitely an emotional scene – especially if you felt connected to the story and characters (of which the Normandy and Mako became their own characters) from the first game.

   But it’s hard to decide if these pros make up for the drastic oversights. The combat options have been stripped down, there’s this MIND-numbingly boring planet-scan mini-game to gather resources… Not sure what they were thinking there. I was falling asleep scanning planets today…

   I love Mass Effect – I love the story. This is the next Star Trek taking shape and it’s a phenomenal opportunity to reintroduce the current generation to good quality sci-fi. But if companies like BioWare keep pandering to the straight and narrow (minded) first-person shooter games, then it’ll never truly take hold. Mass Effect can be so much better than this, and it’s frustrating to see such a great game in Mass Effect 1 get reduced to this because they listened to too many cry-babies. ME2 fixes things that didn’t need fixed, overshadowing the handful of improvements overall.

   If you’re a die-hard fan well, you’ve probably bought it already, making this a moot point. The overall census seems to agree that if you REALLY enjoyed the first game, you’ll be disappointed – even heartbroken – by this one. If you thought the first was too frustrating/challenging/boring, then this one has been effectively dumbed down for you. Personally I’ll just have to keep my fingers crossed for Mass Effect 3, and look forward to the third and final novel arriving in July.

   P.S. And because I forgot to mention it, allow me to say briefly that the new “Cerberus Network” from EA is a total scam. They have taken a simple, streamlined process of downloading extra content for video games and made it the singularly most frustrating experience ever. It took me over 3 hours to remedy the situation – eventually having to sit online for an hour waiting for chat-based tech support. It is maddening, and an insult to serious gamers the world over. EA needs to accept their position as a valid member of the gaming industry – not as a self-proclaimed leader. Get over yourselves.
   Rating: 3 / 5