Mass Effect: Waste of Money?

[fletchbren]

Mass Effect: Waste of Money?

I have heard many disturbing rumors and gossip regarding the upcoming RPG, Mass Effect. Apparently the game is unbelievably short, and although some people tell me "Theres up to 50 hours of gameplay!", others say that 40 of those hours are spent wasting your time with pointless and tedious side quests that don't actually enhance your game experience at all. The actual main quest is supposedly only 10 hours max. I have been waiting a long, long time for this game because I have always been a fan of Sci-fi third person RPG's (Like Anarchy). But if the game is as bad as I have heard then I think I might just save my money. One of my biggest pet peeves is a video game that only takes me a weekend or two to complete. Also apparently Mass Effect has that Inspector Gadget style DRM protecting the game from people who, (oh no think of the children!) want to install it more than 3 whole times! Oh no! I'm so glad those evil bastards who want to install a game more than 3 times are being taken care of! They're a menace to society! Back to my original point, if anyone can give me some opinions on Mass Effect that would be great.P.S: I'm all for reasonable copyright protection but these DRM's are jokes...~Fletch

 

[mobidoy]

Cant help you on that, i don't know the game but look out at review sites, look for gamers reviews... But your choice of asking here is a good one, the audience here is mature and helpful, i am sure that members here will give you an unbiased opinion

 

[fletchbren]

Thats good too know, thanks anyways.P.S I generally don't trust game review sites all that much because I'm pretty sure all those reviews are based mostly on hype~Fletch

 

[chrisso]

Well, I'm looking forward to buy and play it. First of all, it's a Bioware game. Bioware games have never disappointed me, pretty much all those guys do and did has some serious substance and a good story. I don't believe they could ever make a really bad game. Nope, not them. Badur's Gate is the mother of all RPGs, I stilll play Neverwinter Nights 6 years after it came to the shelves, KOTOR is also one of those "Hall of Fame" games (I'm personaly not a huge Star Wars fan, but it was really good), and if the Witcher hadn't interrupted me, I'd play my copy of Jade Empire now. Oh, and of course the Witcher is also bsed on Bioware's work, and if it's just the old engine. The Bioware guys even had huge advertisements on their site for The Witcher, so go give them something back. Anywy... what you might expect is a little much text. Bioware games are text heavy. They have very good storytelling, but some people who prefer more action might be tempted to click through the dialogues a little faster. The rest of the game sounds just good. It got much praise already for the console version, and from what I've read, the PC version will see some good enhancements and be optimized for a good PC experience - not just a lazy port. Jade Empire wasn't a lazy port either, I'm sure they'll do it right. And even if it's not as long as the Witcher, it will be longer than your average game really. And I'm sure it will also have some replay value, all the other Bioware games have. As for the DRM, yes, it will have some new DRM apparently, but it's not all bad. One of the good things is that you can activate the game on, I believe, 5 computers and don't need the DVD in the drive. A wish has come true, I totally hate having to carry my DVDs with me and having to listen to the annoying whine of the drive all the time I play on my laptop. Let's see how it turns out, at least that part sounds much better than the DVD check of the Witcher.

 

[Daerdin.435]

The only thing I'm afraid of is the length. Jade Empire, was soooooooo short. Hope they didn't do the same mistake with Mass Effect. Polish language version will appear a bit later than the original one, so I think I'll wait for your opinions on that matter.

 

[chrisso]

It was? Oh dammit... see, if the Witcher hadn't kept me from playing it, I would've known.... :angel:

 

[dadam]

So far the only issue i've heard are those dull sub-quests, general opinions are positive. However i havn't chance too check the game by myself yet so be aware that those are only rumors

 

[Licaon_Kter]

given that it will not have a demo, it will have some dumb DRM scheme and the "dumbed down collar-grabbing shoot-fest with 2 dimensional characters and stereotypical dialogues" feeling this game gave me reading reviews and players opinions... I would rather wait for some reviews from sites that i trust like RPGWatch.com and RPGCodex.net

 

[writerx]

I had the chance of playing it on the X-Box 360, and it was fun. If I had only said that I would had already been run over by a train... it has its good and bad sides. First of all the face/body customisation is nice. You can do anything with your character, though no matter how truely ugly your are your appearance does not affect your diplomacy (it's all in the skill-points, just in case you wondered). Combat on the 360 was not difficult, anybody who has played any other action shooter on the 360 can find the controls intuitive, though not always helpful... Together with combat come weapons, and there is a suitable choice of weapons (though for some reason people complained that "Mods" for weapons are hard to install... which is a lie, according to me. A poodle would learn how to install weapon Mods in Mass Effect, not that I have anything against poddle, mind you.) and every given moment you will always have a pistol, shotgun, Assault Rifle and Sniper Rifle with you, so no "I did not take the right gun." situations. On the other hand the ammount of stuff you can take is ridiculous, you can have 500 items with you... which also mean that somewhere mid-game you do run out of space. Fortunately you can turn any item you have into Nanites (if I recall correctly) which then may be used for... something... >.> The story might appear a bit like that of KotoR, but it is simply a similar system, and although an easy going one, I could not help but think "It's the same game, with better graphics.". What really made me smile is how people behave toward you. Everybody on your ship calls you captain, which built up my self-esteem to criticaly high levels, and most of the other times you are capable of doing a lot of goodlyness or mischief (depending what you want, and a bit like in KotoR, naturaly). What really pulled me shoes (yes, I wrote me, not my) were certain fights and boss-fights you had to handle. I don't know if I explored the planets in the wrong order but my first boss fight took much too many retries, mainly because of unfair A.I., and a tad incompetent friendlies... also on that level the enemy 'psycher' lifted (literaly) all out cover so we were exposed to open enemy fire, and could do nothing about it. Sometimes you will find the battles much too easy, only to halt at a wall made of solid concrete because what you thought would be easy turns out terribly hard. (in a wrong way). Also, some levels repeat themselves. When you attack your first Merc base, you might think it is spacious and tacticaly good, when you play the same base over and over again (for the fourth or fifth time) you get bored of it easily. The enemies will, most of the time, end up in the same positions and you automaticaly know where the loot is hidden (not that that is a bad thing), and sometimes, yes the explosive 'barrels' will be hidden in different places... joy... Now, a bit of pure personal opinion, although I enjoyed the game greatly I would not play it a second time, not because I hate the 360, but because the game lacks the motivation (for me) to do so. I played it once and I was happy. Also, a note of a warning, if you complete the game you do not go into sandbox mode, you cannot finish the sidequests you started previously, because once the game finishes, it's the end, you have to start from the very beginning. Sad realy because I wanted to finish a numbers of tasks given to me previously... -.-

 

[fletchbren]

Hmm thank you all for your opinions. I have another question, is there a demo I can get to at least try the game?

 

[Licaon_Kter]

Hmm thank you all for your opinions. I have another question, is there a demo I can get to at least try the game?

according to the devs ( scroll down to see the 9th post ) there will not be a demo

 

[fletchbren]

Ok if there is no demo I'm not going to bother buying the game...I don't want to spend my money just to find out that the game sucks

 

[crucios]

the game had high scores on Xbox 360...so i can't wait to buy it for pc... it's a sort of star wars and i'm a huge fan ;D

 

[chrisso]

I just finished installing it, now let's see... if I'm disappointed I'll let you know, if not, too. 8)

 

[Licaon_Kter]

it's pretty cheap anyway, around 31euros, strange

 

[chrisso]

Okay, mildly spoilerish first thoughts down there.

Spoiler

For those 30 Euros I'd recommend it (maybe), but not for the 40 and something I bought it for. It's a good game and highly entertaining... if it's your taste I guess. It somewhat disappoints me personally, but that might be because I'm no great fan of Roland Emmerich movies. And as much as I hate to admit it, ME reminded me of that. Why? The whole honorable soldier thing, the clichées (not one left out!) that made me cringe more than one time... storywise it's just another "Join the Army" advertisement, and I really thought Bioware would've done better than that. Furthermore, it's really just another Bioware game. Okay, admitted, I praised Bioware high a few posts earlier, but shit, the whole interaction, the squad members... if you played KOTOR you know it, and after the 5th game or so it's getting boring. Actually, this game could just be another KOTOR in a different setting.The romance is silly. Romances in The Witcher are silly too, but on the other side of the axxis. While in TW a romance is mainly a dialogue option that lays a girl on her back and gives you a nicely drawn sex card with some boobs on it, Mass Effect makes such a big deal out of nothing that it's almost as silly. "oh, this is my first time, let's make that very special and wait until the end of the game"... well, I romanced the alien and she's more like a 15 year old teenager who dreams of living on a pony farm, and not in Shephard's bed... anti-climatic, nice cutscene though. TW should have some like that. Which brings me to the strenght of the game: Presentation. With all it's flaws, totally predictable storyline and silly roleplay, it still creates a great atmosphere that sucks you in. The cutscenes (and this game is almost one huge cutscene) are absolutely cinematic. Voice acting, animations, character design is just wonderful. Graphics-wise it might not be state of the art anymore, but they used a lot of nice tricks to make it still very realistic. That's why it took me a while to learn about the flaws - the first hour or so is just great, the setting is nice, and there's a lot of potential. Where it stops being great is when you start the sidequests... as much effort they put into the main storyline, as much did they leave out there. After a few missions it's just annoying. The vehicle is annoying, all the places look the same, you always have to do the same stuff over and over again. Blech.The main storyline, as predictable and clichée-loaded as it is, is still entertaining. If it wasn't for all those "holier than a saint", "brave soldier doing his duty" dialogues. Oh, of course you have the option to play stupid evil, like in a DnD game, but who wants to go through all those ridiculous "Let them die", "I don't care" options... nevertheless, main storyline is entertaining, but without all the stupid sidequests it will be over very soon. Otherwise I wouldn't already post here, would I?Meh, anyway. Get it when the price is lower... 20, maybe 30 Euros is a good deal for a few days of entertainment, but if you pay more (like I did) you might be too disappointed about some flaws and ask yourself if it was worth it.

 

[Vargre]

I usually spend my time lurking around the boards, rarely posting. But i saw this and I had to write something. Mass Effect is the absolute BEST RPG ever. Im an avid Rpg'er, been playing table top, computer, any kind of RPG i could get my hands on. So ive a bit of experience under my belt. If any of you lot remember the Amiga? I was playing Bards Tale and Wizardry, if that tells you how long ive been around. Anyroad, the Mass Effect game is everything an RPG should and could be. Ive logged PLENTY of hours into it, and im not half done. There are entire galaxy's to explore. If your the type of player that scans over text stuff, you might shorten the gameplay, but if your not, theres so much info involved in the journals, the exploration logs, different alien races. It tells about their gov't, their culture, their warfare, sociology, biology...my gf says its like watching a Nat'l Geographic. The game play is AMAZING. Its fluid, fun (I play an Adept which is kinda like a Mage) and extremely challenging without being over the top difficult (at hard lvl. I havent unlocked the insane lvl but im looking fwd to it) Thats another thing. The unlockables. Theres all kinds of stuff you can unlock. Killing 150 aliens with a particular wpn will give you a bonus from there on out. Using an ability X amount of time unlocks that ability for your next character. Not to mention there are two additional lvls of difficulty after "hard" to unlock. NOT TO MENTION downloadable content, like Oblivion. So even when you DO get bored of the ingame content, by that time they should have released the next quest and by the time your done with THAT...well, you get the idea. From what I understand mods will be able to be done by players as well, like with the Witcher Editor. I cant say enough good about this game, for real. The Witcher is great, Jade Empire was cool. Assassins Creed is a good game. But Mass Effect is in a class all by itself. Its set the standard for all future RPG's.

 

[chrisso]

I left a longer review here. To make it short, I disagree. It has a lot of potential, but it really disappointed me - mainly the storyline.

 

[Thoric]

The game is good. The dialogue system and voice acting is awesome, combat is cool too. Skill system is good, itemization is kinda boring weaponwise there are like 2-3 models for each weapon type and some color variations. There are plenty different mods to enhance weapons and armor though. AI is good mostly. The worst thing is that side quests are boring as hell. Go to some new system -> get an urgent SOS message -> survey 1-2 planets -> land on the one hospitable planet and kill everything that moves in it discovering that the people who sent the message are either dead or geth (the bad guys) setting up an ambush. But you should try the game, it's worth the playthrough.

 

[cnd_lion_hearted]

Well, I too must chime in here. I also like RPGs, I enjoy Guild Wars, and Oblivion and the likes, but Mass Effects, kind of fell short in a few areas. All thought it looked pretty and played well, it didn't seem to do much for me. Areas of exploration seemed to be a bit short. This was also a down side for me in the Kotor series. See I like to explore I like to be able to inter act with as much of the program as possible. This is why I enjoy playing both Guild Wars and Oblivion, you get to travel and interact with the program in a very open manner. For example, in Oblivion, if I want to walk across the map to complete a Quest . . . doesn't matter what quest, I can walk across and interact with what ever I come across be it good or be it bad, and in doing so I gain experience, get my ass kicked what have you. Go back again the same way and it is a new adventure again. Guild Wars behaves in much the same way, difference its on line and you can be playing that for ever, and folks it looks a whole lot better than WOW! ; better still its FREE! as well as the areas you are search though loosely scripted can be approached several different ways.Mass Effects and the Kotor series it was sort of there but . . . I felt to much like a mouse in a maze and I wasn't to happy about that. Also the story lines were far to predictable. Most RPGs are but not as blatant as Mass Effects and the Kotor series. Although both made strong attempts at cause and effectal choices and should be and are applauded for being one of the first at making such an attempt, I think it came at the cost of a a good solid game.