.:be a solider. travel to far away galaxies. meet interesting new life forms. kill them:.
system: xbox 360
one sentence description: giant sprawling intergalactic RPG ala star wars: knights of the old republic game mechanics.
graphics: 9 - character details are some of the best i’ve seen. bioware really took the time to make every character believeable and life-like in both physical presence and speech. however…the only problem with this is that it makes the little flaws stand out. for example, you’ll see some lighting effects that don’t work quite right due to the fact that they don’t seem to ‘layer’ correctly. you’ll have a character speaking with a giant lens flare over their forehead from a light that is supposed to be in the background. graphic draw times are pretty slow on the details. you’ll be waiting at least 3-5 seconds for a scene to load all of the graphic elements. you’ll also notice that a lot of the character models, specifically the human females, are too similar. there’s a female dr. aboard your ship named dr. chakwas who you will absolutely swear you see all over the galaxy, the only difference being her hair color.
sound: 9 - whether it’s a ship’s engines firing up, an assault rifle spraying death at an enemy or the explosion of a fuel tank, the sound is crisp and positions well with all of the action. all of the voice acting is excellent…and it should be…seeing that this is a hugely character-driven experience. of note is the soundtrack. it’s very subtle and mood-evoking with nice transitions between sequences and scenes. on, it’s more of a background element. off, you definitely notice it’s not there. it’s not your typical ’space opera’-style track; rather, it’s used as a nice layer that adds extra dimension to what you’re experiencing at the time.
challenge: 8 - there are parts that are hard…but on the whole, it’s not that challenging. keep in mind, though, that the focus of the game isn’t necessarily completely action focused. it’s more plot focused. the secret is figuring out a good squad mix and sticking to that. you aim your gun and fire. you deploy your nifty talents. you deploy your squad talents. you work your way through very similarly setup maps and that’s about it.
value: 10 - the game is, quite frankly, one of the biggest and most ambitious that i’ve ever experienced from a scope perspective. depending on the choices you make, the game could turn out any number of ways for you. you can choose to follow the plot, or you can roam around doing little side missions for quite a bit of time. if you’re a patient person, i’d say this is a pretty darn value-packed game.
bias: 7 - while i like role playing games, i generally don’t see them all the way through because i start to get bored. this is the first one in quite a while that i think i will make it all the way through.
total 9 - the game, overall, is excellent. the characters are extremely believeable. the plot, the writing, and the overall attention to detail is astounding. the gameplay is real-time rather than turn-based like a lot of RPGs. but i have to say that for every amazing thing the game packs in, there is a minor annoyance.
the most annoying thing would be on the galactic map. the ‘zoom out’ button is mapped to ‘x’ instead of ‘b’. as you are aware, in most xbox control layouts, ‘b’ equates to ‘back’…thus the association (for me, at least) with ‘zoom out’. the result is that when you hit b, you exit out of the galactic map. you have to wait for the ship deck to load again, which takes about 5-7 seconds. then you have to re-enter the map, which takes another 5-7 seconds to load.
another glaring one is when you’re in the ground vehicle for surface exploration…the mako. first of all, steering it takes a little bit of getting used to…which is tolerable. but what’s really annoying is that sometimes when you aim the gun, it doesn’t shoot where you expect it to when you’re on an incline. you can place the reticle right on something, and it ends up overshooting your target because the trajectory is really based upon the angle your vehicle is at.
i have to say that if bioware skimped anywhere, they skimped on your squad AI. they simply do not listen to the commands you issue them. tell them to stay in a spot…and they will until you get hit by something. then they charge in like idiots. tell them to follow you, and sometimes they’re a little slow to come. tell them to take cover…and they do…but only until they don’t have a shot anymore…and then they go out into the open.
finally, if you’re not a patient person, this game is absolutely not for you. there is a lot of dialogue…so much in fact you’ll probably find yourself turning on the subtitles and skipping through a lot of it. but be careful; sometimes when you start skipping through, you’ll press the skip button at precisely the point where you get to decide what you’re going to say to the person you’re talking to. fortunatley, it defaults to a ‘neutral’ response most of the time.
let me repeat…these are minor annoyances and don’t detract enough from the experience to make it not worth buying. mass effect rates right up there with all of the other excellent games released on 2007, like bioshock and call of duty 4.
