Mass Effect 3 Multiplayer Demo
Posted by brandon in Reviews on Feb 19th, 2012 | 0 comments
This past Friday, the Mass Effect 3 demo’s multiplayer mode opened up to everyone. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, and I wasn’t expecting to like it as much as I do. Mass Effect has never had any sort of multiplayer before and I didn’t think it would be very good. The key thing to keep in mind is that Mass Effect 3‘s multiplayer is co-op, not competitive. The same night that I started playing ME3 multiplayer, I also played some competitive Halo: Reach as well. While Reach looks and handles great, getting your ass handed to you by a 13-year old kid with a gamer tag like, “Whompcha(1)” is…disheartening. However, teaming up with three other people and maybe getting your ass handed to you by the CPU is slightly less embarrassing.
The MP plays pretty much like the SP. You pick a class and race, and depending on the combination, you get three possible abilities. I started off with a Vanguard and my only choice was a human female (for that class). It gave me Shockwave, Nova, and Biotic Charge. The Asari Vanguard will give you the Charge, but your other two powers would be Lift Grenades and Stasis. Great thing is, you can maintain all combinations of classes and races. You can switch out your character at the start of every mission. So, depending on what kind of characters your party members bring to the mission, you could choose a character that compliments their abilities (if you have a worthy character available.) Also, I could see bringing a low-level character along with three high-level characters and getting serious amounts of experiments really fast.
If you haven’t played any of the MP demo, I suggest you do so. It’s a lot of fun, and even though I know the levels I build and items I earn in the demo won’t carry over to the retail game, I still keep wanting to jump back into the demo. And if nothing else, it’s a great chance to try out all the different classes before you decide which class to take into your first solo playthrough.
Snatchcast 057: I Wish Voyager Never Existed
Posted by brandon in podcast on Jan 27th, 2012 | 2 comments
Whatcha Been Play?
- Gears of War 3
- Ico
- Shadow of the Colossus
- Burnout Paradise
- The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
- Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood
- Mighty Switch Force
- Club Nintendo Points (not a game)
- Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
- Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune
- Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Doctor Who Podcast
Mass Effect Series
Spoiler Alert
If you haven’t finished the Mass Effect games and don’t want the story ruined, you probably don’t want to listen to this part of the show.
Mass Effect Novels
Mass Effect
The first Mass Effect had some frustrating side missions and the Mako was a horrible experience for the most part. The story was great though and the characters that were born in Mass Effect are the series most memorable so far.
Mass Effect 2
Mass Effect 2 is a fantastic game. It’s more playable than Mass Effect but it lacks the depth of character creation of the first game and the story isn’t anywhere near as engrossing as that of the first game.
Mass Effect 3
Everyone’s going to have wildly different stories in Mass Effect 3. There are tons of decisions from Mass Effect that affected decisions in Mass Effect 2 and this is going to be all over the place in Mass Effect 3. It will be interesting to see what happens in the end for all our friends’ games.
The multiplayer, because it isn’t required to fully experience the single player story, is a welcomed addition. The fiction of the Mass Effect universe makes it clear that Shepard isn’t the only person in the galaxy getting in trouble, so the multiplayer is a chance to be someone other than Shepard for once!
Music
This piece is a tune that was originally recorded for the first Mass Effect but wasn’t used in the game. It was released separately in 2011 by Mass Effect composer, Sam Hulick.
Just a little bit of the main Mass Effect theme to set the mood.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
You Can Can’t Go Home Again (to Mass Effect)
Posted by brandon in Editorial on Jan 27th, 2012 | 0 commentsI just finished a “perfect” run-through of Mass Effect 2, and I got a wild hair up my ass to go back and do a super quick, critical path run though of Mass Effect and make some choices I didn’t make before to see how they play out. I guess it didn’t hit me quite the same way the first time I played Mass Effect (even though I played Mass Effect 2 before it then as well), but Mass Effect looks and feels awfully dated.
Visuals
- The textures don’t hold up well when compared to those in Mass Effect 2. The non-human characters look good, but the skin tones of Shepard and Ashley look awful. The layout of off-world buildings were always generic, but even places like the Citadel and Noveria are looking way too generic to me now too. There’s a motif that you can see in front of the hotel on Noveria and in the Council chamber on the Citadel. When you’re on the side and look down to the floor below, it looks almost identical. The walkways and lighting fixtures are eerily similar.
- There’s also a lot of slow down when you’re running around, especially in hub worlds like the Citadel and Noveria. It doesn’t impact your enjoyment of the game, but it shows how polished Mass Effect 2 is in comparison.
- The Normandy feels small and empty in the first game when you compare it to the second’s SR-2.
Gameplay
- Unless you have much more upgraded weapons, you’ll wind up pumping bullets into enemies and thus overheating your gun. I almost prefer the heat clips from Mass Effect 2 in that regard.
- The decryption mini game in Mass Effect is very primitive and not at all forgiving compared to the hacking in Mass Effect 2. There are also way more decryption instances in Mass Effect and while you wind up with lots of credits and gear, you probably wind up spending more than an hour of your total game time doing decryption if you do them all.
- I never realized how much I would miss the on-the-fly power usage from Mass Effect 2 until I remembered that it wasn’t in Mass Effect. The power wheel isn’t always super precise and the combat doesn’t keep the same quick pace that it does in the second game.
The Thing Is…
…it’s not like Mass Effect is unplayable. It’s not. It’s just that going back to it…nay, any previous game in a series is often a shock in terms of visuals and antiquated control schemes.
A Tale of Two Shepards
Posted by brandon in Editorial on Jan 20th, 2012 | 0 commentsThere are two Commander Shepards for me. It’s not just that I rolled two different characters, but I played Mass Effect 2 before I played Mass Effect and the Genesis interactive comic didn’t work as well as maybe the creators hoped it would. My first Shepard that I used in my PS3 playthrough of Mass Effect 2 killed the Rachni queen, he let Wrex live, he loved Liara, and he saved Ashely instead of Kaidan. When I eventually played Mass Effect for real on the 360 after already completing Mass Effect 2 on the PS3, I wound up making three of those four same choices. (I let the Rachni queen live on Noveria.) But it took playing through the real game to understand why those were the best decisions for me.
PS3 Playthrough
When I first played through Mass Effect 2 on PS3, I tried to make decisions that I think I would make in real life. In my dealings with scumbags on Omega, I was typically pretty Renegade in my choices. When dealing with not-so-scummy individuals on the Citadel and on Illium, I often made Paragon choices. (Except for kicking the guy out the window. That’s just fun.) My Shepard wound up being a middling mix of Paragon and Renegade, which probably shows that in most situations, I would try to do the right thing in real life, but when dealing with less than admirable people, I’d be harsh. For a video game though, this leads to less than great character building. I wound up losing the loyalty of Jack because I didn’t have either enough Paragon or Renegade points.
Mass Effect
I got really into the fiction of Mass Effect and had to play the first game. (I also read the novels.) I didn’t even own an Xbox 360, so I bought one essentially to play Mass Effect. It was totally worth it. It was so weird going back in time to the first game and playing with different character building mechanics and seeing things happen I’d already heard about. Unfortunately, all the big story points were ruined for me. I still had a great time playing though. In almost every way, the story of Mass Effect is better than that of Mass Effect 2. Saren was the face of evil in Mass Effect. Mass Effect 2 had no face. The Collectors, while formidable adversaries, were characterless and uninteresting. The story of who they used to be is far more interesting. In fact, I probably spent 20 minutes on Ilos listening to the history of the fall of the Protheans.
The Citadel of Mass Effect is a much larger and more vibrant place than the Citadel of Mass Effect 2. Sure, it was torn to bits at the end of the first game, but it was the key place in the Mass Effect universe and it’s sad that it wasn’t as well-developed in the second game.
Choices in Mass Effect
Noveria
Unlike in Mass Effect 2′s Genesis interactive comic, I saved the Rachni queen on Noveria. I was playing a mostly Renegade Shepard, but when it came down to it, and I thought about it for a good five minutes or so, I couldn’t bring myself to wipe out the Rachni race. The queen seemed genuinely peaceful and even encouraged me to wipe out her uncontrollable children. That alone showed that she wasn’t interested in harming others. Also, I fully believe that the Rachni will wind up being an ally against the Reapers in some way in Mass Effect 3.
Vimire
Wrex
I had Wrex live on the PS3. I didn’t get why he should live until playing Mass Effect. Wrex is my favorite party member. He’s powerful and his dialogue was always great. Putting him and Garrus together in the elevators on the Citadel was a treat especially. Thankfully, I had enough Renegade point to end the confrontation with Wrex on the beach without Wrex having to die. It would’ve been truly sad to lose Wrex.
Ashley/Kaidan
I let Ashely live on the PS3. I didn’t have any particular reason to let her live. I went into my playthrough on 360 thinking that I’d let her die. I was sticking with that right up until the moment came to choose who would live or die and damn it if I didn’t save her again. It wasn’t because I wanted to romance her. I didn’t. But in my head, it made sense to let her superior officer take responsibility and let him bite the bullet. It seemed like the military thing-to-do.
Mass Effect 2
Mass Effect 2′s choices are so interwoven into the game play that sometimes you’re left with only one real option. In the service of having the best gameplay experience possible, you have to keep everyone alive. In order to best to this, you have to make everyone loyal. So, you have to either swing really hard to Paragon or Renegade to build up points (possibly making decisions you normally wouldn’t to keep your conversation options open) or go along with party members’ actions even when you don’t want to to keep them happy. I want to see everyone again in Mass Effect 3 so I’ve gotta keep them all happy. That, to me, is the big flaw of Mass Effect 2. Mass Effect had the confrontation with Wrex on the beach and the Ashley/Kaidan decision, but Mass Effect 2 has many more situations like that, although not as serious in comparison.
Mass Effect 3
I’ve got a complete save from Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2. Everyone’s alive and all the side missions have been completed; hopefully giving me the opportunity to see everything that Mass Effect 3 has to offer. I’m climbing the walls in anticipation of Mass Effect 3 and January 31st (the release date for Mass Effect: Deception, the fourth novel) can’t come fast enough. Finally, it looks like there’ll be some crossover between the books and games when Kai, a Cerberus operative makes an appearance in Mass Effect 3.
