Volournian Quick & Early Mass Effect Thoughts

[Volourn]

Well, I just completed Feros. A very well done planet. The plant creature (thorian) was a site to behold though I wish it had a little more oompth to its defenses though. The thing reeked of a dark alien (lol) acient evil intelligence.

Love how you could handle the settlers. Your decision here do have consequences to be sure. To destroy or to save an entire colony. Too kewl for skewl.

I think side quests (as opposed to side planets) are underappreciated in ME. I've noticed a patter, however, that powerful beings in the ME universe really love to control others. HA! It's all about control.

Love the Skyway, and how you can actually jump/fall off and plummet. Heh.

@ buccharoo: Yeah, the Rachni seem cool. I don't think they're as evil as initially presumed (seemed to have been subtley controlled by the Reapers when they did their earl;er rampage). I'm sure we'll meet them in ME2. The krogan, on the other hand, seemed to have their ill fate destined because opf their piss poor attitude.



P.S. ME > KOTOR

 

[One-guy]

Today i had first contact with it (my colegue's console) and guess what...
...my first impression is "meh".
..Well, anyway after 2 h of gameplay it is just too quick to make clear opinion. I'll do it after longer play...if i ever do it (i'm on Motb and Witcher...and of course Freespace2)

 

[Volourn]

Update on my game.

I'm 42 hours in, and am level 46. Credits are no longer a problem; but that's to be expected at such a late stage.

I just landed on Ilos.

I have to say.. Virmire was awesome. Two rather huge decisions, and some othe rgreat stuff.

1. The scenario with Wrex is intertesing with multiple ways to do it for sure. The coldness of the characters (both Shepard and Ashley) is downright scary if you take the renegade option her. WOW! Just cold. If there's any doubt that Ashley is a racist this should squash it. Thankfully, I was just testing it out and convinced Wrex to accept the inevitable. My only wish was an option added to agree with Wrex's viewpoint and go with it. Still.. wow. Someone should videotatpe that scene renage style.

2. Another good choice was the decision to make between Ashley, and Kaiden. Tough choice, indeed.

Sorveign is impressive; but there's no doubt he's a tad full of himself. Saren is a pitiful tool. HA!

Start of Ilos is okay; but nothing special.

One thing thatc racks me up is Ashley's reaction to the Firma Terra (or whatever it's called) as she accuses them of being racist. HA! Pot. Kettle. Black.

Saw the love scene involving Ashley (I'll talk about that in the alien love thread).

The game is no Fo in terms of C&C; but that's liveable consideirng that the chocies it does have are very good, and the rest of the game is ebyond solid.


P.S. ME > KOTOR


P.S.S. Mako is fun; but it is the element that is most detrimental to ME's RPGness since it is 100% reliant on player skill. Actually person to eprson combat relies on a mixture of both player and chaarcter skill and is awesome.

 

[One-guy]

That game is not as bad as i thought at first. Anyway main plot was so unoriginal that after ending this game (my friend was angry that i taken his console for so long :D) i'm disapointed a lot. All this REAPERS stuff was exacly what i expected when i was starting this game.
Good game, but not my type.

 

[Volourn]

The main problem with ME's plot is that it is EXACTLY as BIo advertised it as - ancient machines that come every 50k years to wipe out all advanced races. If it wans't hyped; it would be better. The story itself is well done, and yes, I know it heavily borrows/is influenced by/rips off other Sci FI stuff but big whoop.

 

[One-guy]

The main problem with ME's plot is that it is EXACTLY as BIo advertised it as - ancient machines that come every 50k years to wipe out all advanced races. If it wans't hyped; it would be better.

I hadnt seen many commercials of ME (i was not interested in console games) so i didnt knew what was this all stuff about. But when i first launch it i thought something like "Hmmm...some startreckish thing. I hope there will be no bad destructive aliens, like shivans from Freespace".

...bad luck. They were.

 

[TheLostOne]

Finished the game this weekend.

There are a few major choices near/at the ending is pretty cool and there are legitimate reasons for each action so it doesn't really feel contrived at all. The Renegade choice on which order you give the alliance fleet seems like the RIGHT choice to me, which maybe makes me a bit machiavellian, but still.

Spoiler: Specifically where you have the option not to save the council and hold the fleet back for the attack on the Reaper. It makes absolutely no sense to risk your one shot at stopping the next galactic apocolypse in a rescue operation for the sake of the council. I can't imagine trying to justify it and I'm going to have a hard time convincing myself to pick this choice on my second playthrough which is with a paragon Shepard.

The uncharted worlds were a bit bland. They aren't terrible, especially on my second playthrough where I'm less concerned about seeing EVERYTHING in the game. I think Bioware knows they screwed this up a bit and it will be different (hopefully better) in ME2.

The dialogue wheel didn't bother me. I play with subtitles on and usually skip the voice acting whenever I'm done reading the lines, so it doesn't really change much for me. There are a few occaisions when you stare at your two word choices trying to decide which one conveys what you're trying to get across, and I have picked the wrong one once or twice. It's pretty uncommon though.

As a whole, I thought it was a great game. Definately felt like a blend of action and RPG without leaning too far to either. The action elements are well done as are the rpg elements, but both could be done better. The game as a whole shines, though. Great story and good characters with fun gameplay.

BTW, I totally missed this on my first playthrough, but there are many times when a character says, "Huh." when entering an area. This is a sign that you should talk to them as they'll have an interesting blurb to say about it. I just ignored it as it's not documented anywhere and missed out on lots of neat content. Really should have been mentioned in the manual.

 

[Volourn]

"BTW, I totally missed this on my first playthrough, but there are many times when a character says, "Huh." when entering an area. This is a sign that you should talk to them as they'll have an interesting blurb to say about it. I just ignored it as it's not documented anywhere and missed out on lots of neat content. Really should have been mentioned in the manual."

Why? This is an extra usually, and not needed to play the game. Plus, anyone who has played a BIo game knows that one should try talking bwith party members once, and awhile. I find it funny that one of the biggets complaints about BIO games in general is how they dumb things down yet now for ME people have been crying that BIO hasn't done much handholding and didn't have a tutorial for ME (though Eden Prime basically serves as one). I think BIo wanted people to discover these things on their own.


"The uncharted worlds were a bit bland."

The biggest problems with underchartedered worlds are the universal bumpy mountain terrain, and the repettive inner areas (one mine, one complex, one warehouse). the actual sidequests themselves were well done.


"I hope there will be no bad destructive aliens, like shivans from Freespace".

Eh? It's not like Freespace has 'bad destructive aliens like shivans' copyrighted. TONS of scifi stuff deals with that. Plenty have done so before, and after that game (which i haven't played)'s release.

 

[Norfleet]

I hadnt seen many commercials of ME (i was not interested in console games) so i didnt knew what was this all stuff about. But when i first launch it i thought something like "Hmmm...some startreckish thing. I hope there will be no bad destructive aliens, like shivans from Freespace".

...bad luck. They were.

You only wish they could be that cool. The Shivans from Freespace were just downright creepy. We never did figure out WTF they really wanted or what their goals were, or even really beat them.

 

[made]

"there are many times when a character says, "Huh." when entering an area"

Now I begin to see the alleged superiority of writing ME has over The Witcher.

 

[TheLostOne]

It wouldn't have taken much to have a blurb in the manual stating to keep an eye out for this. I've played most Bio games before, but usually anything interesting was said in dialogue trees. I wasn't expecting anything since I could never open dialogue with them except on the ship.

[qutoe=Volourn]The biggest problems with underchartedered worlds are the universal bumpy mountain terrain, and the repettive inner areas (one mine, one complex, one warehouse). the actual sidequests themselves were well done. [/quote]


It was more than terrain and repetative warehouses. The "Points of interest" were always the same unless there was a quest related to it. How many mummified Salarians, crashed probes, and matriarch writings are there in the galaxy anyway? It got extremely repetative and I only did them all the first time for completion's sake.

Second time through and I'm sticking to the quest/assignment locations and it's much more tolerable.

 

[TheLostOne]

Sorry for the double post, but...

"there are many times when a character says, "Huh." when entering an area"

Now I begin to see the alleged superiority of writing ME has over The Witcher.

Cute...

It's actually quite unobtrusive and natural sounding. You walk into an ancient ruin and see wierd alien statues everywhere and you hear your companion grunt in reaction. People don't normally just spout off long expository thoughts on everything they see, but they will generally give a grunt or whistle when impressed by something. You usually have to initiate something to get them to elaborate on those thoughts.

It's actually a neat and natural way to present your companions' thoughts to you, but I wasn't expecting it and completely overlooked it.

 

[One-guy]

"

Eh? It's not like Freespace has 'bad destructive aliens like shivans' copyrighted. TONS of scifi stuff deals with that. Plenty have done so before, and after that game (which i haven't played)'s release.

Did i say its only FS had a bad aliens? No, i didnt said. I was thinking about FS only cuz its one of the greatest game ever (and one of the most underestimated). The thing i didnt want in ME was "alien destroyers are coming and we must hold them back" syndrome.

And, yes, Shivans are one of the best and creepiest bad aliens of all franchise.

 

[Volourn]

Well.. finished the game. Took about 43 hours, and I finished at level 48.

The ending, while good, was kind of dissapointing. I expected A LOT more pizazz out of it espicially with Sorveign.

Ilos only had a couple of cool things (the mad dash to the mass relay was cool); but ultimately the Prothean hidden base was lacking.

Being able to convince real Saren to fighting the indoctrination was neat, and his eventual suicide was not expected (or wouldn't be if it wasn't for spoilers).

The final choices of saving/not saving the Council, and who to choose as the Human Council Member (if playing peragon) was neat. I *was* hoping for a much better ending cinematic though.

All in all, a fun game. I hope they do carry over certain plot points in ME2. I don't see how Shepard will be a manageable PC unless they give him a mind/level wipe with the current character system. Hmm..

Expect a full review later on. On to a Renegade playthrough.


"The "Points of interest" were always the same unless there was a quest related to it. How many mummified Salarians, crashed probes, and matriarch writings are there in the galaxy anyway? It got extremely repetative and I only did them all the first time for completion's sake."

Yeah, like I said, the sidequests themselves are solid. What you are talkin' about are fluff collect x stuff not actual quests.


"Now I begin to see the alleged superiority of writing ME has over The Witcher."

I believe TLO covered this one. I can't diretcly comapre ME's dialogue to TW since I have played TW for all of 5 minutes; but ME's dialogue is pretty good unless you have an inbuilt aversion of BIO's writing to begin with.


Overall, ME is a BIO game. It is what it is.


As for the Reapers.. we still don't what their ultimate goal really is. We don't even know if they all are like Sorveign and what not. That's what the sequels are for, I guess.

 

[buccaroobonzai]

::Spoiler warning::
Two things that stood out about the plot.
Saren had a nice twist to him where he was more a "benevolent dictator", similar to the "Master" from Fallout 1. His similarity resides in that he believes he is allying with Sovereign in order to save at least some organics, otherwise all would be destroyed. He assumes servitude under them will result in limited freedom, whereas resistance will doom all who oppose. It worked well, yet I would liked to have seen it explored more thoroughly from earlier on, with you're character having to ponder for more of the game.

Second, Sovereign hints at more information as to what their purpose for the cyclical massacres might be, hopefully giving them an interesting personality and motivations. Yet they mention they're reasoning to be beyond the lower species of the galaxy , but they should explain their motivations be it as mysterious and superior as it need be.

 

[Riso]

Saren's plot is totally Balthar's from the original Battlestar Galactica.

 

[buccaroobonzai]

Saren's plot is totally Balthar's from the original Battlestar Galactica.

Good call Riso, was a huge Battlestar galactica fan as a kid, as it appeared just after Star Wars. It would have been cool if they would have explored Saren's relationship with Sovereign and crew for several adventures/episodes like Balthar-of couse using different plots and angles on it though.

 

[Jeff Graw]

I Just finished the game. It's like a worse KOTOR mixed with a worse Gears of War, mixed with a far worse Starflight or Starcontrol 2. The setting is good, the story is average, and the main quest is pathetically short. Both the dialog and the story have their peaks and bumps -- from very cool to embarrassingly bad.

Overall, the game is more than the sum of it' parts. It's good and enjoyable, but it's also nothing special.

 

[Imbecile]

Overall, the game is more than the sum of it' parts. It's good and enjoyable, but it's also nothing special.

That sums it up pretty well. Its 8/10 fodder. The Witcher is on its way so I look forward to comparing the two.

 

[Trash]

The witcher has dialogue that's worse and it's fantasy instead of sf. It however is great gritty fantasy and as an rpg beats mass effect into the ground. But since this is the mass effect thread...


I thoroughly enjoyed mass effect, but was paradoxally rather disappointed as well. It's a sf rpg with a gripping story and a number of interesting characters, quests and gameplay elements. On the other hands many things just don't gel together that great.

The exploration is in theory great but feels rather empty. It provides a number of fun quests, but mostly consists of clicking through a solar system, checking out every planetoid. Exploring the planets isn't that fun. Mostly the same terrain with different textures and a few places of interest. Some planets have some cool things going for them, like meteorites streaking over or a huge red planet in the sky. I do enjoy the idea that bioware is paying some hommage to games like star controll 2, starflight and even moon buggy here.

Combat is very action heavy and frankly, not that fun. It feels like a rather mediocore shooter with some special abilities added. I do however have to stress that at no point did the combat became annoying or boring. It's just that I've seen so many more better shooters. I can't really complain about squad ai either. They tend to waste their powers if you let them use them themselves. However, they didn't die on me all the time and actually managed to kill more than their share of enemies. Enemy AI is not so hot. I really don't get it why many enemies either charge me or just take cover and take some potshots. It's a bit boring, though there are certain enemies (like the geth hoppers) that make combat a bit more interesting. Some more diversity in behaviour would've been nice though.

NPC's are generally quite well written. I feel like there is less conversation to the player since you can only really converse with them in your ship. What they do tend to say on mission is in character and often quite interesting. On the ship you can learn more about them and even engage in a horrible romance subplot if you want to. One more thing I need to say is that the voice acting is spot on and that I enjoy the dialogue system very much. It does feel intuitive, and characters really come to live. Try to play a renegade female, it's a blast.

Graphics are great. Nothing less than that. From the characters to the skies of planets to the different "hubs". Everything looks stunning and well designed. Don't know why some people complain about the textures loading in. It just takes a few seconds when you load a save or enter a new area. I hardly notice it myself. Also have to give big kudos for making the text readable on a non HD tv.

Music and sounds are more than adequate. The music reminds me a lot of the 80's vangelis tunes. It's nothing special though and does tend to repeat itself a bit too much for my liking. I do like how the elevators either have some party banter, some news or some horrible elevator music playing. The sound effects are very well done. The guns sound sf and meaty, some of the enemies sound rather creepy and the ambient sounds are spot on for every area.

Quests are diverse and interesting. I like it how many offer different approaches and outcomes. The main quest could've benefited from a bit more exposure from the main baddies Saren and the matriarch though. As it is, they don't build up enough animosity for my liking. The exploration quests often boil down to visiting every available object in every system to find the minerals/tags/writings or killing everything at some outpost. There are a number of great sidequests available from the main hubs or that you get as a transmission when you enter a system. All in all I found them to be quite enjoyable and was happily surprised to find out that you could often play through them in different ways.

There is plenty more to discuss. From the rather shit inventory system in shops to the different character classes, etc. I'm however getting rather tired. All in all is mas effect a solid sf rpg that I've enjoyed a lot. It's really a mixed bag and I have the feeling that it could be a lot better. Since it's the first game in a trilogy I guess we'll have to see what they'll make next. But after this first part I'm more than willing to give it a try.

 

[Jeff Graw]

I do enjoy the idea that bioware is paying some hommage to games like star controll 2, starflight and even moon buggy here.

They paid homage to them, but with absolutely no understanding of the games themselves. On one hand you have "Gotta go stop Saren! Time is running out! Go *here*!" and on the other you have "Let's go waste some time to explore the shiny planetoids!". As a result the main quest loses it's sense of urgency and the exploration it's sense of purpose. SF and SC2 were smart enough to make exploration part of completing the main quest, and used time triggered events to maintain the sense of urgency.

 

[SuicideBunny]

driving around deserts in a moon buggy tank is at best a parody of and not homage to star control 2.
if they wanted to include a proper homage, they would have put more effort into the races, instead of them being so generic, boring, and the game being so blatantly racist.

 

[Jeff Graw]

driving around deserts in a moon buggy tank is at best a parody of and not homage to star control 2.
if they wanted to include a proper homage, they would have put more effort into the races, instead of them being so generic, boring, and the game being so blatantly racist.

Don't be dense. Having racist characters in a game does *not* make the game racist.

 

[Dark Matter]

On one hand you have "Gotta go stop Saren! Time is running out! Go *here*!

Actually, the only time the game creates such a high sense of urgency is towards the end of the game(at which point, the game prevents you from exploring random worlds). For most of the game, all you know is that Saren has gone rogue, he has somehow allied himself with the geth, and that he's up to something. The whole "all life as we know it hangs in the balance" thing only becomes apparent at the end. Besides, none of the UNC side missions are trivial and silly(some of the missions on the Citadel are a completely different story though), quite the oppposite in fact, so the idea of Shepard sidetracking from his main goal doesn't feel that absurd and nonsensical.

On a related note, I think Bioware, for the most part, did a great job by providing quests that were actually important/serious enough for someone of Shepard's status, and avoiding the typically juvenile quests that plague other Bio games. There are still a few horrible exceptions though, like the one where you have to settle the dispute about whether or not a lady's son should be given a risky treatment.

 

[Jeff Graw]

On one hand you have "Gotta go stop Saren! Time is running out! Go *here*!

Actually, the only time the game creates such a high sense of urgency is towards the end of the game(at which point, the game prevents you from exploring random worlds). For most of the game, all you know is that Saren has gone rogue, he has somehow allied himself with the geth, and that he's up to something. The whole "all life as we know it hangs in the balance" thing only becomes apparent at the end.

Really? What about the entire "We need to save the Galaxy from Saren! The fate of the universe is in our hands!" Speech that Shepard gives when he takes command of the Normandy? Or how there's some sort of mention on pretty much every mission that we're racing against Saren?