Mass Effect

[Admiral X]

I'm not quite sure how to approach this as far as starting a topic, but I'm curious what others think.

I'm still very much a fan of the first game and feel that in spite of the sequels being more popular and better acclaimed, that the first game still represents the best of the franchise. There's a sense of wonder and exploration that I still get nostalgic over when thinking about the first game that I just don't get with the others. I also liked the RPG elements of the first game better, and feel that the story and characters were better in the first game. In the second game, I was rather disturbed at the changes to the Liara (mai waifu :p) and Garrus characters in the second game compared to the first one. Actually I suppose that change is most noticeable with Liara no matter what kind of character you play in the first game, but if you played a paragon Shepard in the first game and talked Garrus out of getting revenge on Dr. Heart, it's rather disheartening in the second game that he seems to have gone completely back on that character arch. Of course, it could be argued that this is but one of many of the first hints we got of our choices not really mattering in the long run.

Honestly the only improvement I saw between the first and second games was in the combat aspect, especially with biotic powers (vanguard in particular thanks to the charge power). True, the combat could be rather clumsy in the first game, but the customization and ability to do any number of power combo attacks, as well as the other rpg elements still make the first game better in my opinion. And then there's the lame aspect of the heat sinks, which to me represented a loss of a more unique aspect of the gameplay and turned it into an experience much like any other shooter, where I have to run around and collect ammo after a battle set piece.

I'm not saying ME2 and 3 sucked or anything - they were still fun to play - it's just that I found the experience inferior to the first game, and feel that it lost sight of its space opera roots, probably owing to EA interference.

[Rocketboy1313]

I have twice tried to get thru 1 and have stalled out. I like the story (I think we are starting too deep in the story, the opening mission has a couple of "twists" but since I do not care about the human soldier who dies and the nature of the Spectre organization is still nebulous I felt confusion but not intrigue from the betrayal/murder combo). But it was the inventory management that made me want to pull my own head off.

I love 2 and put it in my own personal top 10 of games (it is number 7).

I never played 3. I found the load times of 2 a pain and they never put 3 on Steam and I don't want to use (is it U-Play?) whatever it is, EA can fuck itself.

[Admiral X]

Origin is EA's lame attempt to have their own version of Steam. The really lame part is that it has a spyware aspect to it in that it scans your computer for pirated games in your library (or so I heard). For me, the fun part is that I still found a way to shortcut them through Steam.

I am somewhat curious, though, in how the DLC works for the first two games in Steam. "Bring Down the Sky" was a free download from EA's website back in the day, but that predates their attempt to emulate Steam. And I got all the DLC for ME2 through EA's website, and I honestly can't imagine going without Zaheed, so I'm kind of wondering if people who went through Steam have to.

[Fixer]

I loved Mass Effect. For their time ME1 and 2 were really the best examples of games that were consistently good in story telling and presentation all the way to the end.

Games had always been front heavy, where the majority of the production had been sunk into the introduction sequence to hook people in, then the ending would be a half hearted "You win!" screen. Mass Effect had an epic ending sequence where you steal a ship, go to an ancient world, learn terrible secrets. Then climb up the outside of a space station to go punch out your nemesis and the physical manifestation of space cthulu.

ME2's ending where everything was building up to that point, and your hard work paid off or your negligence and poor leadership got your people killed.

ME3's ending had such high expections on it that were built upon by the game's pre-release hype and was so poorly executed that it has soured me on the entire series. I still cannot think of any other ending to a story that has so conclusively destroyed the narrative structure of a science fiction universe. Combined with the insulting attitude of the developers and the gaming press at large in response, I'm going tgo find it hard to ever put any sort of emotional investment into a Mass Effect property ever again.

[Karha of Honor]

I loved Mass Effect. For their time ME1 and 2 were really the best examples of games that were consistently good in story telling and presentation all the way to the end.

Games had always been front heavy, where the majority of the production had been sunk into the introduction sequence to hook people in, then the ending would be a half hearted "You win!" screen. Mass Effect had an epic ending sequence where you steal a ship, go to an ancient world, learn terrible secrets. Then climb up the outside of a space station to go punch out your nemesis and the physical manifestation of space cthulu.

ME2's ending where everything was building up to that point, and your hard work paid off or your negligence and poor leadership got your people killed.

ME3's ending had such high expections on it that were built upon by the game's pre-release hype and was so poorly executed that it has soured me on the entire series. I still cannot think of any other ending to a story that has so conclusively destroyed the narrative structure of a science fiction universe. Combined with the insulting attitude of the developers and the gaming press at large in response, I'm going tgo find it hard to ever put any sort of emotional investment into a Mass Effect property ever again.

Is a bad ending really such a big deal? What's so hard about letting it slide and hoping they do better next time?

[Fixer]

Is a bad ending really such a big deal? What's so hard about letting it slide and hoping they do better next time?

The ending was bad but BioWare/EA's attempts at damage control right afterwards compounded the problem.

[Karha of Honor]

Is a bad ending really such a big deal? What's so hard about letting it slide and hoping they do better next time?

The ending was bad but BioWare/EA's attempts at damage control right afterwards compounded the problem.

There was a problem in the first place? Isn't potential plot failure a possibility in all storytelling?

[Steve]

It wasn't just the bad ending, but that the creators and the studio basically refused to accept the criticisms against it. Instead of "What did we do wrong?" it was "What's wrong with you that you didn't like this thought-provoking ending to our game?"

To be fair to them when I don't want to be... Citadel, the last DLC, was the send-off the characters deserved, and is in of itself a reason to play the game up to the beginning of the end. Actually, I'd say that the best way to play the game is to play up through the Sanctuary story mission, doing Omega and Leviathan DLCs as you please, make a special save at this point, then play the initial part of the end-run with Cronos Station so that you can gut that cyber-ninja-wannabe pansyass. in fact, play all the way up to the cutscene of the allied fleet coming through the Charon relay.

Then turn the game off, because it's all downhill from there, and you can do much better imagining Shepard and his/her big damn alliance blasting through the Reapers to take the Conduit, open the Citadel, and hook on the Crucible to flash-fry every Reaper in the galaxy, Starchild nonsense be damned.

We'll call that the Platinum Ending.

Then re-load from the save before you went to Cronos Station and do the Citadel DLC, imagining it as coming after Shepard killed the Reapers, and give the Normandy crew the send-off they deserved, not the shit that Walters and Hudson thought we should get for "art" or whatever they had in mind.

[Karha of Honor]

It wasn't just the bad ending, but that the creators and the studio basically refused to accept the criticisms against it. Instead of "What did we do wrong?" it was "What's wrong with you that you didn't like this thought-provoking ending to our game?"

In those cases movie audiences just say whatever...

[Steve]

It's a bit different for people who spent hundreds of hours playing that game and the prior two games, the people who waited years to see where the saga was going, how their choices would effect the galaxy.

To have all of that boiled down to "Red, Blue, Green, pick one, have all other choices ignored save some score-card for War Asset Points" was, yes, quite Goddamned infuriating. And I wasn't even one of them since I didn't even play Mass Effect until the summer of 2013.