Mass Effect: Hype, Praise, Criticisms, Minor Spoilers

[dagorkan]

Xboxevolved: 9.8

Lol?

 

[Jaime Lannister]

Gamespot: http://www.gamespot.com/xbox360/rpg/mas ... lk=topslot





















8.5

 

[Deleted member 7219]

Wow... I have a lot of respect for GS now for going against the hype and not drooling all over it.

 

[Deleted member 7219]

http://uk.gamespot.com/xbox360/rpg/mass ... pid=930279


AHAHAHAHA!

*catches breath and wipes tears from eyes*

Oh, those Gamespot kids are priceless! Hahaha! Lots of people complaining about the score now in the Gamespot ME forums.

 

[Volourn]

So.. which is it? Is the combat weak or is the combat fun and exciting? please make up your mind Gamespot.

btw, While the score is 'low' (lol, since when is 8.5 low?); the actual review is mostly overall positive. *shrug*

 

[aweigh]

Gametrailers review was basically a paid Advert

 

[Volourn]

Yeah; but at least you got to see the game in motion to judge actual gameplay and such for yourself. The score was definitely most likely too high. No game is worth 9.6. NONE.

 

[Deleted member 7219]

I'd say TIE Fighter CD comes close. But even that wasn't perfect, it had Stack Overflow on most Windows PCs which made it a pain in the arse to start... basically, every time you launched it you were gambling, pretty much a 1 in 3 chance that it would load up correctly, or crash with a 'Stack Overflow' error, even when you used the Lucasarts workaround.

 

[Dark Matter]

It seems like you have the option to actually kill(or atleast attack) some of your party members(there's an option to "shoot wrex" in one of the scenes shown in the gametrailers video). Interesting.

 

[Dark Matter]

Yeah, what's up with GS? On the main page, they say "fun battles make the game worth playing" but on the actual review, they list the combat as one of the weak points of the game.

 

[Volourn]

We're doofuses. They claim actual character on character combat is fun; but it's the vehicle combat is 'weak' to them except in certain situations..

 

[MetalCraze]

Is Volourn actually a girl?

No. He's got his tag for acting like a whiny girl it seems.

also if a respected resource like IGN says that something shooter-related has issues it can only mean two things:

a) they didn't get good payment for the article
b) combat actually sucks big time

Yeah, what's up with GS? On the main page, they say "fun battles make the game worth playing" but on the actual review, they list the combat as one of the weak points of the game.

well imagine - some Microsoft/EA dude will open their front-page and see them bashing their game. the catastrophe.

 

[Volourn]

Actually, in the actual review, they say the combat is fun, It's the Mako combat that is 'weak'. GS's review is overall positive. Score is irrelevant.


edit: I got tagged because I bitched VD out for acting like a whiny girl, he banned me, others' whined for me to be unbanned, and then I got this sexy tag 'cause I'm HOT pussy that all the guys here seemingly want to bang.


R00fles!

 

[Kortalh]

"gameplay is about 20 hours". Is that supposed to be impressive? Or is that without doing any of the optional quests or exploration and just following the plot?

As I understand it, a rush-through of the main plot takes about 15-20 hours. An average play-through, where you do a decent amount of exploring and side-quests is around 30-35 hours.

Once you beat it, you unlock New Game+ mode, three extra 'hybrid' classes, and an increase in the max level cap. Presumably (hopefully) there's enough of a difference between classes and in-game decisions that you can play through it twice, bringing it up to 60-70 hours.

Take all that with a grain of salt, though. I'm only going based on hearsay, and I haven't verified any of those claims, so I could be completely wrong.

At any rate, I long for the good ol' days of 80-hour games. $50 / 80 hours = $0.63 per hour of entertainment. Nowadays, $65 / 35 hours = $1.86 per hour.

 

[Naked Ninja]

Hehe, while I'm still hopeful the dialogue system will turn out ok, this shirt from Penny Arcade is amusing :

http://us.st11.yimg.com/us.st.yimg.com/I/yhst-34640480252896_1977_1662653

 

[Draikin]

So far (6 hours into the game), I'm disapointed.

I dont expect Bioware to make deep RPGs but with the budget allocated to ME it should actually shows it on the screen. Framerate is around 15fps most of the time, even menu are slow, it can take 10s to load a 2D map. Everything feels empty. UI and menu looks amateurish after playing Assassin's Creed.

1 race, 2 gender, 3 character's backgroud history, 3 classes, a dozen skills, 1 body type per genre ... customization is pretty limited exept the face. Even for the face some stuff are missing: you cant have grey hairs and all haircuts make you look like an idiot.

Combat isn't interesting nor fun. I feel cheated playing as a Sentinel (mage+tech) since most combats happen after a cinematic I'm always on the first line getting shot like a rabbit. Vehicule combat is probably the worst idea Bioware ever had.

Dialogs/quests/story still feel like KOTOR. I encountered some fake choices: 3 totally differents dialog options with Shepard always saying the same stuff whatever you chose. It's also difficult to understand the Renegade/Paragon system.

 

[MetalCraze]

I encountered some fake choices: 3 totally differents dialog options with Shepard always saying the same stuff whatever you chose.

you're probably wounding Volly's fanboy heart now.

 

[WhiskeyWolf]

I encountered some fake choices: 3 totally differents dialog options with Shepard always saying the same stuff whatever you chose.

you're probably wounding Volly's fanboy heart now.

That little thing won't even scratch him.

 

[TalesfromtheCrypt]

wow, that games sure looks like a load of shit. Talk about downfall of the codex, this thread is a good example for it. A bunch of idiots getting excited about asinine IGN, Gamespot etc. reviews .

How many times have heard stuff like "OMG dude, you can totally shape the whole story" about oblivion?
The only one who has a right to defend this game is Volly, all the rest of you stfu.

The PC World review is interesting. Its appearently written by this idiot Matt Peckham, but nevertheless I've enjoyed seeing him trash this peace of overhyped garbage.

Be sure to post your impressions, this seems like a fun game.

Aren't you the furry who is constantly lamenting about how the codex changed for the worse? Well get the fuck out of here idiot, that will help very much to bring this place back on track again.

 

[Trash]

Seems like Tales has been drinking too much coffee. :wink:

The only one who has a right to defend this game is Volly, all the rest of you stfu.

Nah, I don't feel like I'm defending it. Since the xbox I have has been collecting dust for months now I'm rather interested in the game. Mostly because I'm a sf nut and haven't had a good space opera for ages. I don't expect anything more than Kotor with shit combat and some pretty graphics, but it never hurts to hope though. Even if it sucks this season has been great for both rpg's and games in general. It's been ages since I've had several games on my playlist that I all liked.

MOTB is aching for a replay. Despite the crap controlls and NWN2 engine it's easily the best traditional rpg since Torment.

The witcher is the best action rpg I've ever played and is my fav game atm. It's deep, has lots of c&c and most importantly, it's great fun to play.

COD4 has been a great ride. It's short and has the same railroaded gameplay as cod1 and 2. But it does so with so much style that I couldn't help but love it.

Crysis is great fun and perhaps the best shooter yet. It boils my poor radeon x1950 though.

All in all there are just too many good games to play with my schedule. It would be nice if I can add Mass Effect to that list. At the very least most Bioware games have been rather enjoyable, so I'm not too afraid of buying a turd.

 

[fizzelopeguss]

UE3 is SHITE, i'm sick to death of all these blurry textures popping up, it's worse than Halo 2's cutscenes. The framerate is really dodgy too (snow planets are satan)

Anyway, i finished the game. I enjoyed it, superb ending and music. but the side quests are pretty bad, the ones on citadel and the "plot planets" are decent (if very basic rpg fare) but the ones out in space and on the planets where you drive around the mako are like something out of on MMOG, bloody awful.

The witcher is superior.

 

[bluecuracao]

wow, that games sure looks like a load of shit.

Thank you man. Your comment should be post #1 and not everyone drooling about this shiny boring shooter. ME is not even a PC game, so fuck you, Codex!

 

[TheLostOne]

You kids are cute.

I don't think anyone here is arguing that this is the game that transcends the RPG genre or some shit so stop getting your panties in a bunch.

Looks like a fun game along the same vein as Deus Ex.

Also, I'd take that PC World review with a grain of salt.

A Lexical Jungle
You'll spend a remarkable amount of time just reading journal and codex (think encyclopedia) entries about people, places, and creatures (like the one in this shot) as a kind of game-within-a-game reward for chatting up NPCs or clicking on random objects and computer stations. For all the lovely optional background detail, though, it's a great example of where Mass Effect violates its own grammar by telling instead of showing. Since when did reading flat scrolling text become its own gameplay mechanics? It's even more disappointing when you're scanning non-interactive planets that amount to little more than blocks of descriptive text. It all makes Mass Effect's universe feel more like something into which BioWare simply poured its design docs for a pencil and paper RPG, where the descriptions might have actually mattered.

I love how he's offended that there's lots of OPTIONAL backstory and information on the galaxy to read. He actually seems to suggest that Bio should have showed all this information to him instead of forcing him to read it.

It's funny that you guys are taking this dude so seriously when he's known for being a complete and utter retard. Not buying the hype is one thing, but blindly clinging to any negative reviewer you can find regardless of competence is idiotic.

Looking forward to playing this game. It looks to be pretty fun.

 

[Jasede]

Aren't you the furry who is constantly lamenting about how the codex changed for the worse? Well get the fuck out of here idiot, that will help very much to bring this place back on track again.

Woah, retarded much? Sorry I think that a game looks like fun. Why don't you get the fuck off yourself you fucking asshole? Oh wait I know why, you have your head too deep in your own ass to be able to still walk away. Lick my cornhole. Leave Britney alone.

Edit: train tickets, bitch

pic unrelated

 

[Elwro]

It's funny that you guys are taking this dude so seriously when he's known for being a complete and utter retard. Not buying the hype is one thing, but blindly clinging to any negative reviewer you can find regardless of competence is idiotic.

What? Read the beginning of my newspost. Do I take the guy seriously? It's even more funny if one of the few level headed opinions of the game comes from a guy who sounded like a complete shithead before, even if some idiocy managed to creep into his ME review, too.

Anyway, this news was just meant to be a test whether the Codex would like ME news or not. Peckham's piece was certainly the most interesting review I could post about at the moment.

 

[Ivy Mike]

A Lexical Jungle
You'll spend a remarkable amount of time just reading journal and codex (think encyclopedia) entries about people, places, and creatures (like the one in this shot) as a kind of game-within-a-game reward for chatting up NPCs or clicking on random objects and computer stations. For all the lovely optional background detail, though, it's a great example of where Mass Effect violates its own grammar by telling instead of showing. Since when did reading flat scrolling text become its own gameplay mechanics? It's even more disappointing when you're scanning non-interactive planets that amount to little more than blocks of descriptive text. It all makes Mass Effect's universe feel more like something into which BioWare simply poured its design docs for a pencil and paper RPG, where the descriptions might have actually mattered.

I love how he's offended that there's lots of OPTIONAL backstory and information on the galaxy to read. He actually seems to suggest that Bio should have showed all this information to him instead of forcing him to read it.

Peckerhead or not, if it's true that most of the text in the game is optional and servers no other purpose than to be filler his assesment seems accurate. As galsiah argued in another thread, text for the sake of text isn't really good design. The text should serve a purpose in some form that relates to the player and his ability to proceed in the game. One example of this would be the hollodisk in Fallout where the PC finds out that mutants are sterile: the text serves as both a part of the puzzle of the history of the world, and as a vital part of information the player can use later in the game. The point he's trying to make, if I read him correctly, is that for all the massive ammounts of text in ME it serves no purpose other than being filler. And if that's the case, I have to agree that such design was a poor choice on Bioware's part.