I’ve been powering away at Mass Effect 2 since receiving my review copy late last week, logging ~15 hours over the weekend alone (I’m around 22 hours total), but from my quest journal it still looks like there’s a ways to go before my mission to save the galaxy (again) is over. So, while I continue plugging away towards a full review I’d first like to check in with some early impressions, presented in an expanded pros (+) / cons (-) format.
Continue reading for my initial thoughts on Mass Effect 2!
+ To infinity … and beyond!: Mass Effect 2 is a much beefier game than its predecessor, as its two-disc capacity suggests. My 22 hours with the game thus far have already surpassed my entire sub-14-hour completion time for the original. Granted, with the first game the optional activities seemed so pointless I’m sure I cut out many hours by skipping many of the dull side quests and the uneventful galaxy exploration. But in Mass Effect 2, the side quests are incredibly well integrated, so much so that it’s been hard for me to even differentiate what’s a side quest and what’s mandatory for driving the main plot forward. Except for silly little fetch-type quests you pick up while walking around cities, everything you do in the game fleshes out the narrative in a meaningful way.
+ More Shooter, Less RPG: To those expecting a deep RPG typical of BioWare this may not sound like a good thing, but even more so than the original, Mass Effect 2 is a squad-based third-person shooter above all else. The RPG elements (skill advancement, equipment customization/upgrades, weapon management, etc.) are still in place and really just as satisfying if you ask me, but they have been streamlined to be a more effective companion to the core shooter gameplay rather than a deterrent from the action. Subtle tweaks to the gunplay, ammo system, squad control mechanics and overall pacing also help promote this gameplay shift, and the game is much better for it.
+ Interface Overhaul: The first game’s interface was a clusterfuck of unintuitive inventory and party management menus, but not so in Mass Effect 2. The main Power Wheel interface returns for mid-action pausing, strategizing, weapon selection and power usage, and is just as effective. But pretty much everything else has been completely reworked. So, as an example, you no longer have to dig through clumsy menus to equip upgrade parts and different ammo types. Ammo types now fall under class-specific skills you can activate from within the Power Wheel, and weapon upgrades are now researched and automatically applied to entire weapon sets rather than having to be equipped and micro-managed on each individual weapon.
+ Beautifully Polished: On the Xbox 360, the first game was hurt by a lot of little texture glitches, frame rate hitches and general engine inconsistencies. But with the sequel, BioWare has done an amazing job polishing the experience to near perfection. I have encountered one extremely bizarre bug — after I resurrected a fallen comrade he came back to life walking on an invisible plane floating the middle of the air, and did so through the level I was on until I quit back to the main menu and reloaded my save — but the game as a whole runs at a silky-smooth frame rate and the awful texture load-in from the original is virtually nonexistent. Oh, and it looks absolutely stunning!
+ Character Imports: For me, one of the best features in Mass Effect 2 is the ability to import completion data from the first game. You gain instant starting bonuses based on the level of your imported character (your character starts over at level 1 though), and decisions you made before carry over, so be prepared to bump into characters you may have rescued or crossed paths with in other ways on your first adventure.
+ Compelling Dialogue: After the bloated, oftentimes dull dialogue of Dragon Age, I have a newfound appreciation for Mass Effect‘s dialogue system. Except for new paragon/renegade-based interrupt actions, the interface is the same as before, with up to six response options mapped to a radial selection menu during a given conversation. Conversations flow so naturally, even when choosing responses and questions somewhat out of order, and the writing is sharp and concise. The voice acting and facial animations evoke a greater sense of emotion too.
+ No More Vehicles!: Up to now, there hasn’t been a single vehicle section, and that’s a very good thing if you ask me. Instead, all vehicular travel takes place via loading screen or cutscene. Vehicle control in the original was more frustrating than fun, and, like other parts of the game, the vehicular missions only seemed to detract from the core experience. So I say good riddance!
+ Unexpectedly Addictive Galaxy Exploration: OK, so my statement above about a complete lack of vehicles isn’t entirely true. Now when navigating the Galaxy Map you actually get to manually fly the Normandy around like a little top-down shooter (though there is no shooting) and explore the galaxy as you see fit. As you discover new planets you can scan them for anomalies which lead to side missions and resources which you can gather by launching probes into areas of high-density concentration (indicated by controller rumble and spikes on the scan meter). Upgrading weapons and equipment requires a lot of resources, so if you happen to become addicted to scanning planets and launching probes like I have, your time will definitely be rewarded.
– Return of the Annoying Load Times: The somewhat annoying “stealth” elevator load times of the first game have been replaced by even longer and way more annoying traditional loading screens. Worse yet, when you’re moving around your ship or other interior environments, these load screens show animations of your elevator (or other mode of transportation) moving to the next floor/area. At least with the elevator loads you were kept immersed in the game.
– Possible Cerberus Network Intrusions: Overall, BioWare’s Cerberus Network DLC delivery system makes downloading extras quick and easy, and does so without NPC salesmen getting in your way during the actual game as was the case in Dragon Age. However, over the weekend I noticed a potential glitch in the system. In on instance, The Cerberus Network would not connect and I was left starring at the main menu screen with no way to load my data and begin playing the game, so I had to quit out to the 360 dashboard and reboot the game a couple of times before the network finally decided to connect. I’m not going to freak out since it was just one time, but the fact that you have to connect to The Cerberus Network before being able to access the game is worrying. What if something goes kooky with the servers? Will that prevent me from accessing the game?
– Basic Morality: The paragon/renegade morality system is back, and for the most part it is implemented well. However, many of the choices you have to make fall on simple good vs. bad terms, with very little middle ground. There was one side mission I completed where two missiles had been launched at civilian targets and I could only stop one, but so far that’s been the only time where I felt torn between two bad choices. I do wish there were more gray moral choices like this, not always so black and white.
– Disappearing Squad: AI of your teammates is generally pretty good, but can be a bit flaky at times. They don’t always listen when you command them to take a specific cover point, and if they do listen they’ll sometimes snap to the wrong side of the targeted cover point and leave themselves wide open to enemy gunfire. And in other instances they’ll seemingly disappear entirely — one time I was proceeding through a mission, turned around and my squad was gone, and even when I commanded them to return to my position they were nowhere to be seen even though I could hear them replying to my order. Then, a minute later after I decided to charge onward they were magically right by my side again. These issues are rare, but do stand out enough to cause an occasional failure.
I’ve said that Mass Effect is my least favorite (non DS, that is) game, but I still liked it. My problem was that it was not terribly deep as a RPG, nor terribly deep as a shooter. It was much better as an interactive ‘make your own adventure movie’ 🙂
Since they were going to keep with the interactive movie theme and also keep it an action shooter, it really makes sense that they streamlined (what some will inevitably call dumbed down) the RPG elements to flow better. Can’t wait to play to see how it all worked out!
See, I really don’t understand why Mass Effect gets dumped in with the “interactive movie” crowd – it wouldn’t be a bad thing either way, I just don’t see the comparison. It’s a gameplay-heavy shooter with a dialogue system like pretty much any RPG and very few cutscenes. Seems completely opposite from an interactive movie to me…
But that’s something we can get into more if we do a discussion review. Gotta save some ammo 😉
I played for a couple hours last night and noticed that the subtitles and dialogue options were unreadable due to bright backgrounds, have you had any issues with this? Or am I nuts?
Nope, haven’t had any issues like that here. Every piece of text that I’ve seen has been perfectly legible. The only thing I can think of is maybe you need to adjust the brightness in the graphic settings or on the screen itself. Not sure what else it could be other than a freak bug, unless you are playing the PC version which would be more susceptible to different things like that based on hardware configurations and so on.
PC version looks great as well – there is a brightness / contrast setting in the display settings screen. I tweaked mine slightly because I like things a bit brighter but in general it was a solid default setting.
Oh … um, yeah, I bought it … who was I kidding that I could wait … 😉
OK, The Cerberus Network is really pissing me off now. It seemed like a cool idea at first, but now it is becoming horribly intrusive. Why do I have to exit the game entirely to download each DLC item? What’s the point of having an in-game delivery system if you can’t actually download from within the fucking game?
“Why do I have to exit the game entirely to download each DLC item?”
You have to do that as well? I assumed that was PC implementation idiocy …
Yep, it’s a console problem too, which is even worse because almost every other game (on both 360 and PS3) allows background downloading of other content while you’re playing. I don’t recall having to quit out of the PS3 Dragon Age to download, but I’ll have to double check that.
I only had to exit Dragon Age to make sure I was logged into the Bioware site, from there all of my DLC was in-game. Seems fairly silly, especially with all the issues they appear to be having.
My issues so far:
– Steam quit the download at ~40%, and when I restarted it was pretty slow – I didn’t click ‘New Game’ until nearly midnight last night (bearing in mind I get up at 4:45AM … )
– I tend to read rather than listen to dialog so I more than once triggered a dialogue response I didn’t want as I tried to push through dialogue.