Mass Effect and My Frustration With It

Posted by brandon in Editorial, Reviews on May 27th, 2011 | 1 comment

Playing Mass Effect 1 after Mass Effect 2 is hard. Not that it’s really difficult, but it’s frustrating. I just spent 40 hours playing an accessible third-person shooter, and now I’m 10 hours into a deep RPG with a finicky combat system. My squadmates in ME2 rarely got themselves killed. In ME1, I’m constantly babysitting their health bars because they love to just stand there toe to toe with the enemy. I see them ignoring possible cover spots all the time. It’s frustrating when the biggest reason you’re dying is because your squad isn’t as smart as you are.

After going back to where Mass Effect began, two seems really limited in its level of customization. Mass Effect allows for a long list of abilities and talents as where Mass Effect allows at the most 5. And that’s only after you’ve paid the price in Element Zero to train one of your teammate’s special abilities that were granted after completing their loyalty mission.

Mass Effect 2 can be enjoyed and never feel frustrating even only if you just shoot your way through it. The game is at its most entertaining and fulfilling if you’re using your squad’s biotic and tech abilities as well, but you can get by without them. ME1 on the other hand really makes guns take a back seat to biotic and tech abilities. I kind of wish I hadn’t taken the default “soldier” set up into the game. I wish I had chosen a different class. While my squad is pulling out shield overloads, biotic lifts and hacking enemy AI, I’m just popping out of cover long enough to plug the enemy a couple times with my assault rifle and not get my head blown off.

The equipment managing in ME1 is a bit much too. It may be like this in all Western RPGs (I wouldn’t know having not played any until now), but managing all the different guns, armor and tech accessories for all the team members plus the upgrades on each individual piece of equipment is a headache. I was surprised the game let you transfer upgrades from one weapon to the next easily, but at least there was that.

Mass Effect 1 does a much better job at story-telling than it’s successor did. The story in ME1 feels huge and the conversations feel a little more natural. ME2′s story feels small in comparison. ME2 felt like a serious of human fetch quests until you fully stocked your party. It’s much easier to up your conversation skills in ME1 as well and the first game makes much better (and frequent) use of it.

I’m really glad I’m playing Mass Effect. I really wish I had played it before Mass Effect 2, but I’m still enjoying the game. I know almost everything that’s going to happen, but that’s okay. I wanted to see the Citadel in all its splendor and I did. I wanted to see the first Normandy, and I have. I also wanted to see the politics of Citadel space, and not just the “I can do anything because Cerberus is backing me up” way of doing things. It’s an interesting ride that isn’t even over yet. But it’s gonna be weird going back to the shootery future to play the final ME2 DLC, Arrival when PSN is back up and I can buy it.

Ni no Kuni and Its Giant Box

Posted by brandon in Uncategorized on Dec 13th, 2010 | 0 comments

I got Ni no Kuni on the day of release. Amazon Japan had it at my door on release day and I thought by now that I’d have torn into it and been well on my way into the story…when I pre-ordered four months ago. Now that it’s here though, I have just been sitting on it for four days, and I’m expecting not to touch it until next year. Ya see, the reason is…it’s just too cumbersome. What’s that mean? Well, the reason that Ni no Kuni’s packaging is so huge is that there’s a huge magical tome in there. The game comes with a hardback spell book and it’s heavy. You need this book to play, as far as I know. You have to look up all the spells so you can cast them. There are a fair number of them, and I imagine that until you’ve done them a bunch of times, you probably won’t remember how to draw them with your stylus from memory. Some of the more basic spells like ‘heal’ and ‘open the gate’ aren’t terribly difficult, but the more arcane the spell, the more involved the writing procedure.

Having to refer to this book kind of kills the portability of the game. DS games have always been my go to gaming platform for trips and commutes, but I’m pretty sure I won’t want to drag this book with me everyday on my commute. I also don’t want to drag this book back with me on my Christmas trip to America either. So, while I might still take my DS with me, I think I’ll probably just leave Ni no Kuni here in Japan. And then I can dig in in the new year.