Empowering the EBA Community with a voice to collaboratively review the industry’s hottest titles, the EpicBattleAxe.com uREVIEW (about) delivers real insight from real gamers about The GOOD, The BAD, and The UGLY pertaining to the biggest games in the world. This is the EpicBattleAxe.com uREVIEW for Mass Effect 2. Let’s get started:
FACTS:
Publisher: Electronic Arts | Developer: BioWare
Genre(s): Action, Role-Playing
Players: 1
ESRB Rating: M (Mature)
Release Date: January 26, 2010
Platforms: Xbox 360, PC
Official Website
GAME SUMMARY:
The Mass Effect trilogy is a science fiction adventure set in a vast universe filled with dangerous alien life forms and mysterious uncharted planets. In this dark second chapter, Saren’s evil army of Geth soldiers has just been defeated, and humans, who are still struggling to make their mark on the galactic stage, are now faced with an even greater peril. [BioWare]
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Good: The story is as epic as its been hyped up to be for the past month or two. It has brilliant character dialogue and development that truly brings these characters past the misconception that the ads have been doing for Mass Effect 2. Combat is much better refined and improved from the first part along with the amount of options to customize from armor to upgrade and dialogue choices makes this a game worth experiencing multiple times.
Bad: Even though combat is improved, the cover system is clunky to handle along with enemies being a little too charge happy when they have multi-layered protection that can get you kill a few times even on normal. The main story has no real payoff unlike the first one which had a centralized story with a villain that was developed well enough to fear and hate him but in this one not so much. To put it simply, it was a great story revolving the team members you recruited but the central story had nothing special happening beside it being just a seg-way into Mass Effect 3.
Ugly: Is it just me or are there loads of technical glitches throughout the game? The game looks good however even though there were no texture loadings this time around, there are some apparent dialogue hiccups, audio clippings, and some transitional glitches between gameplay and cutscenes that are quite nasty to see.
This review is for the xbox 360 version.
The Good: The combat system is much improved for the second installment of this franchise, most notably IMO by the switch from a proximity based melee to a different button. It never gets tiresome and even though you become more powerful firefights never begin to seem like a hindrance as they did late in mass effect 1 when your powers just got out of control. This is complemented by the new power system, which makes playing something other that a solider a lot more fun. The story isn’t as straightforward this time around by the nature of it being a mystery story, but a few missions thrown in at certain intervals and the context of the side missions make it just as immersive. A few of these side missions divert greatly from your typical kill mercenaries, get objective formula. The best by far IMO is the final mission, which incorporates the use of more than two squadmate–a formula I hope they keep for ME3. For those who were big fans of the first game, if you take some time to poke around in different areas references are made to your character in the past game, for example my Squadmate told a certain krogan how a doctor was killed during a mission and he replied “you’re with shepard, how could he be alive”. Squad micromanagement is down big time, the only time you really need to tell them anything is when you want them to change weapons, or move them (which you can do individually now). A final major improvement to combat this time around is the class system, not the abilities but the variability in it. As you progress through the story you have the option to develop your character further, which I won’t spoil since it’s so awesome when it happens.
The Level design is absolutely fantastic, I never found myself getting lost as I did in ME1. Also, I would feel amiss if I didn’t mention the writing, becomes it is all wonderfully done and complemented beautifully by the score, voice acting and sound effects. For those like me who are interested in the universe and fiction therein, the jokes are spot on and the “investigate” option in the conversations has gotten much more treatment. On that subject, ME2′s cast of characters is sufficiently unique, and seeking out your old squadmates is a ton of fun. The AI is much better, where enemies will act different depending on how many are against you, and provide suppressing fire for each other as they move. Other than this the detail is absolutely astounding in everything from graphics to the fiction.
The Bad: Some of these may be personal gripes, but nonetheless I believe they detracted from the experience. First off, there isn’t much in the way of weapons or armor pieces (not the paint job), generally with 2 options for any basic weapon type and 5 or so heavy weapons. Take this with a grain of salt however, as I only explored about half of the star clusters. A possible saving grace here is that the upgrade system is quite extensive. You cannot however sell items to merchants, so you’ll spend much more time doing side quests and scavenging for resources if you want to upgrade many items.
Since the new cover system is more like gears of war, the action is much more explosive and a better shooter experience, but it is not without it’s faults. Sometimes switching weapons forces you out of cover, and the transition in and out of cover is a little clunky in tense fights. There is also no mechanic for switching between cover points, which can make transitions hard in tight spots. I wasn’t happy with the lack of a ground vehicle, but from what I understand that may come with DLC. Finally, while most animations are quite good and NPCs don’t usually just stand still and move their arms during conversation, some of the gestures seem odd for the dialogue, and i’ve yet to meet someone who raises their hand front of their face and balls it into a fist when trying to make a point.
The Ugly: the texture load times are nowhere near where they were in the first game, but every now and then you see one load in for a second or two, even with the game installed to the hard drive. Another thing i’ve noticed is that squad members while mostly competent tend to float in mid air or somehow end up on top of a building, generally not attacking when this happens. The targeting system is somewhat problematic, where a rocket will be heading straight for a heavy enemy, the suddenly pull a 90 degree turn to smack one of the underlings.
As you may have noticed the bad and ugly sections are somewhat petty gripes, and the “good” section is much longer than the others. the game’s breadth, narrative, combat and RPG elements are very well done and I imagine that I will complete at least a few more playthroughs and never expect the same experience–there is that much content. While some things hardcore RPG fans love have been removed, the game strikes a nice balance between personal upgrades (armor, weapons, etc) and keeping the gameplay challenging until the end. The RPG aspects of ME2 lie more in the choices you make than the loot you collect. Overall ME2 is an evolution of ME1, and as a result feels like a shooter with RPG elements as opposed to the other way around. This is a definite buy for shooter and RPG fans alike.
THE GOOD: Story, characters, better missions, combat
THE BAD: Assault Rifle limited to one class, problems with special armor
THE UGLY: Death: not just in game death, but death all the time. Seems to be the main topic. Also When is class customization coming. And no BLIND FIRE!
The game is roooockolockin!!
Dk you better tell me where those jammies came from
I know it’s a little late but…
THE GOOD: Improved visuals. More intense combat system, though I think thermal clips are a step back in the technology of the Mass Effect universe. Melee is now a viable form of attack now that it’s mapped to a button. Diverse locations and many of them. The space exploration system is improved tenfold. Not just driving around desolate planets anymore. Customizable armor is a great touch. Great new characters and really engaging story… and characters. Phenomenal attention to detail. Oh and the new interrupt system is intuitive and rewarding.
THE BAD: The classes I think are a little too shallow. There are no real specializations within the class you choose, you can pretty much max out all of your abilities. Also, even though the stories of your former crew are played out well, your interactions with them are limited. You cannot sell to vendors. Only buy. So you may only obtain money through missions which is a slight hindrance.
THE UGLY: The game’s decision system still feels a little too black and white to me. In my two playthroughs, it seemed you are never really given a gray decision to make, you are usually just given the choice to achieve the next goal being nice about it or aggressive and a little shady. More, heavy consequences would be an improvement for the third installment.
Definitely an improvement upon the first game and a great leap forward for the franchise. Mass Effect 2 is a reason to buy a 360. And there is no reason to not even rent it if you own a 360, (well, unless you’re entirely uninterested in the shooter RPG). Nothing is really bad or ugly about the game. Just minor annoyances for me. It’s a phenomenal experience that will have you begging for DLC after you finish the campaign.
You do know that you do have an opportunity to pick up an assault rifle in game. I did pick up and i was underwhelm at the puny power compared to my sniper rifle.
The Good: Great story, great characters, great writing, visually impressive. The vanguard’s charge is awesome. Mordin’s Guilbert and Sullivan routine was classic. The feeling of responsibility over your team as you lead them on a suicide mission. The opportunity of DLC to further the story.
The Bad: Whilst ammending the sequel in beneficial ways. I couldn’t help but feel that the scale of the game was toned down. The lack of planet exploration and compact nature of the hub planets all made the game feel less like an epic space opera RPG. Also, the moral choices are still fairly black and white, there is not much grey area, which I thought the story should have demanded. I think Mass Effect 3 could benefit from shirking off more of the RPG elements that linger like a bad smell in this game.
The Ugly: Whilst improved, combat/cover system is still a bit behind the times. When playing the game on the hardest difficulty you realise the discrepancies of the action, when your team mates suddenly keel over when running to cover. A bioware sex scene is never cool.
The Good:
A fantastic story with multiple paths and in depth characters with their own personalities that are actually believable. The combat has been completely revamped and is easily comparable to other third-person-shooters such as Gears except it has a ton of different enemy classes with their own behavior on the battlefield and the crazy biotic and tech powers give the combat its own feel. The graphics are also good, easily being one of the best on the 360. The facial animations are fantastically done making not only the humans but the aliens fell real. The soundtrack is great giving a feeling of both epic and ambiance.
The Bad:
While the game is considered an epic Action-RPG the RPG elements are much less in depth. The skill tree is minuscule compared to the first game also you only collect around 20 weapons for all the classes collectively. You also can’t equip upgrades for your weapons you just use minerals to give your weapons permanent stat boosts.
The Ugly:
There is nothing to bad but the mini games used to hack different objects are lackluster and scanning planets for minerals is tedious but unexpectedly addicting, you will find yourself continuing to scan planets to get to minerals that upgrade your weapons and armor even though you are hating every minute of it.
Closing:
If you are evenly remotely interested in this game you should definitely pick it up and if you have played the first game and you enjoyed it this is a must buy. It is an overall upgrade from the first game even though the RPG elements aren’t as in depth.
THE GOOD:
The presentation is simply awesome. One of the most immersive game worlds I’ve ever played. The graphics are spectacular with great art direction, level design and some of the best character models to date. And I have to give a BIG shout out to the voice acting, it’s truly some of the best ever done for a video game and really makes the characters feel real and believable and brings them to life. The game run’s smooth as silk on PC and Bioware did a great job at optimising the game.
The music is a nice mix of Techno and Orchestral compositions that do a good job of conveying certain emotions while playing the game. The Orchestral themes really make some of the moments in the game feel intense and epic and some of the techno themes really give a sense of mystery and intrigue like most quality sci-fi compositions do.
Some of the key improvements Bioware made with the gameplay is getting rid of the heat system. This was great because I felt in the first game you we’re taken out of combat at times just waiting for guns to cool down (It was especially bad with the Sniper Rifle) and overall the gameplay is alot more faster paced and plays better as a shooter compared to the first.
Bioware also removed the cumbersome inventory system that I felt I spent too much time fiddling around with the in first game and less time playing the game. It was really annoying equipping different things every 5 minutes.
The story and writing is simply top notch as Bioware always prove themselves to be some of the best writers in the industry. This game also has a great sense of humour and I sometimes found myself laughing at some of the party banter. If you are a fan sci-fi shows like Stargate, Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek, Farscape, Firefly etc you will feel right at home with Mass Effect 2′s story and characters.
THE BAD:
I don’t really see it as a bad point but the game is simplified in some ways and shorter than the first. Mass Effect was longer but only because you spent more time fiddling around with the inventory and driving the Mako around empty planets.
The item arsenal is a little too small and I thought they could of added at least 2-3x more weapons and armors to choose from. What about dual wielding? miniguns? Being a sci-fi game as well Bioware could of added more alien type weaponry and used their imagination more with some weapon designs.
THE UGLY:
The minigames especially the scanner one gets repetitive after a few times and starts to feel like a chore.
As some people mentioned some of the texture loading times can be bad at times.
CLOSING:
There seems to be people saying this plays less like an RPG this time. Mass Effect 1 and 2 in general don’t play like a traditional RPG like Fallout/Baldur’s Gate/Final Fantasy. But I have to add that RPG stands for ‘role playing game’ and I have to emphasize the words ‘role playing’. This game does a tremendous job at placing you in the role of John/Jane Shepard.
I believe Bioware wanted to take loot out of the equation this time so the player can be more involved in the story/game world/characters and playing the role of Shepard and spend less time comparing gear and fiddling around with items. True, they could of at least given players a bit more options when it comes to items but overall I think Mass Effect doesn’t need loot as most Bioware games put story first and loot can just distract you from that, as much as I love loot in some games.
Overall if you are a fan of sci-fi in general this is a MUST BUY. You simply won’t find a more immersive sci-fi video game world as shown in the Mass Effect series.