Second Opinion: Mass Effect
Editor's Note: This is the second Tom's Games review of Mass Effect (for the first review, go here). WARNING: this article contains spoilers and important plot points for Mass Effect and is intended for readers who have already played the game (or who never plan on playing it).
Sometimes, you fall under the spell of a game. You can see all of the blemishes and flaws of the game on its surface, but it doesn't matter; you get sucked in, and you fall victim to its siren song. That's the way I feel about Mass Effect, a game that has its fair share of defects
In our previous Mass Effect review, Ryan examined many of the flaws and loose ends that he felt detracted from the experience. I won't go over the same areas again in this review, other than to say that I shared almost all of Ryan's observations (though I never had a disc read error or system crash). But for some reason, the Mako's control scheme didn't bother me as much as it did other gamers. Yes, the inventory system was not up to par with previous BioWare games, and yes, you are inundated with largely useless junk throughout the game that has little effect (no pun intended) on the course of the game. They are all valid reasons to dislike Mass Effect or at the very least deem the RPG a disappointing effort from the likes of BioWare.
But I must confess that the developer won me over once again, despite a series of issues that would normally ruin a gaming experience. BioWare has done this to me before with Knights of the Old Republic; I couldn't stand the round-based combat and control system, and it made the early goings of that title very difficult for me. However, by the end of the game, I wasn't thinking about the combat or any other issue I encountered. I was so consumed by the rich narrative and story twists that my only thoughts were about KOTOR being perhaps the best Star Wars game I ever played and at the very least, one of the strongest RPG titles of the last decade.
Mass Effect's interactive story is its saving grace.
I had similar thoughts about Mass Effect, though I'm not ready to vault this title into the hallowed company of KOTOR and Baldur's Gate. I will, however, go as far as saying that Mass Effect is one of the best games of 2007 and one of the more memorable experiences I've had with any game in recent years. To understand how improbable that last statement is, I need to go back to the beginning of my experience with Mass Effect.
During last year's Game Developer Conference in San Francisco, BioWare treated the press to a preview of the new RPG. The developer showed off the introductory level of Mass Effect, and there were some noticeable graphical glitches and lags with the demo version. Apparently, some of these flaws were never ironed out; I noticed some of these same flaws as soon as I started the first mission on Eden Prime. That gave me a negative impression of Mass Effect, and I hadn't even completed the first hour of the game.
Overall, I found Mass Effect to be particularly frustrating and lifeless in the beginning. The game had a familiar look and feel (and sound, with veteran actor Keith David providing his distinctive voice) of the Halo series. The dialogue didn't seem very inspiring and after experimenting with some different options on the dialogue tree, it certainly appeared like it didn't matter what option I chose - the replies to my character seemed very generic.
The combat gameplay was frustrating early on, but I eventually leveled up and got to shoot straight with my sniper rifle.
I did enjoy crafting my character - I selected an Infiltrator class, with a "Ruthless" reputation and a Colonist background. But the Alliance Military Personnel Database interface system for character creation took too long at times, and the entire data corruption/profile reconstruction framework seemed unnecessary. Furthermore, I didn't feel like Mass Effect's facial customization features worked all that well; in fact, more of the character templates were ugly. I also learned later on that the entire background and reputation selections for characters had little impact on the game outside of a few dialogue options, and that disappointed me.
But the worst part of my first few hours with Mass Effect was the clunky combat. As an Infiltrator, it was nearly impossible to use my sniper rifle until I added some significant experience points to my sniper rifle skill. And since my class was untrained in assault rifles and shotguns, I relied on my pistol for most of the early combat sequences, which made the game frustrating. After a few hours into the game, I was able to increase my skill level and master the combat controls better. But Mass Effect had gotten off to a very slow start for me.
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