Friday, August 27

Mission Complete? (You're doing it wrong)

My resistance to Mass Effect 2 has softened somewhat. Shepard is still unable to engage in a conversation without my attention wandering, but the other characters are sometimes able to bring me back; Garrus in particular. I loved him in the first game, and his devil may care attitude and convincing animation often steal the show. Carly has made the observation that the alien characters are animated to a much higher standard than that of the human characters. What I would argue however is that we know how humans should move, and in most cases with Mass Effect 2, it is slightly off the mark. Particularly eye movements. Shepard moves just about right, but characters like Jacob and Miranda sometimes look as though they are about to pass out or are in dire need of an exorcist. Garrus, Mordin and Grunt are a joy to behold though, and I relish the opportunity to converse with them.

Then there is Jack. What an offensively cliched character they have proven to be. I won't go into any more detail for fear of spoiling the plot, but I've skipped through some of the more tiresome dialogue they have spouted on my ship. Zaeed is also unworthy of the Normandy's oxygen as far as I am concerned. Imagine if a member of the Barmy Army became a space pirate and you have him in a nutshell. He has however presented one of the more interesting quandaries on his character specific, loyalty mission. In my relentless quest to be the most vanilla flavoured space commander of all time, my purely Paragon (read: goody goody) actions actually resulted in what I would conclude to be failure. Yet still the story progresses, the mission was deemed to be "complete," and the Normandy sped off into the great expanse of space. It was refreshing for heroic choices to have negative consequences, as you can't save the day with great intentions. Sometimes it would seem, good people have to die for the job to get done.

The combat is still a bit awkward for my tastes. My brother insists that it is because I am going about it wrong way, considering my choice of class rather than any fault on the part of the developers. I understand his argument, but I still reject that the gunplay is anything other than competent. The boss fights are repetitive, my biotic powers (still in their infancy) are not the game changers I perceived them to be, worst of all, the AI is pretty woeful. Harbingers, pirates and other galactic purveyors of evil are more than happy for you to litter them with bullets provided that they can not see you. With some effective camera movements, you can shoot your opponents with little fear of reprisal.

There is a good game to play here, and hopefully the PS3 version will address some of the niggling issues I have encountered. Despite all my complaints, it can easily steal 3 or 4 hours from you, if you aren't watching the clock.

What are you guys playing this weekend? I'm in Brisbane this weekend, so that means portables. Whatever you are up to, enjoy it and stay safe.

5 comments:

  1. Post from "When Hype Atatcks":

    Firstly after our discussion, your a re playing it wrong lol. Vanguards are for run and gunning not hiding then rushing for ammo thats wasting the class.

    Secondly, never had any texture load issues as it was a huge problem in me1.

    Thirdly, Bioware make the best RPG's ever square enix got nothing on them. Sure its my bias coming through becuase they have made most of my most loved games in recent memory. Hell im even playing KOTOR at present. But Shepard isnt supposed to be all cheery and exciting hes a war hardened vet who has very little emotion, and for your info readers tristan over played the garrus whats up dog bit, it is his most cheery line in the game but nothing over the top as implied.

    In all everyone is entitled to their opinion but their is a flaw and its tristans way of using the classes lol.

    In closing, tristan you are playing it wrong. I love the fact that Bioware has given each class a different distinct feel.

    While playing the vanguard class (if you do it as intended) it is a tonne of rush and gun fun. The soldier is and everyman class, all out assualt is their specialty. Adept is the class you should have chosen if you wanted to see the new effects and effort they placed into the use of biotics.

    I will give you one thing sure I put forward the point that you werent playing as intended but in saying that the game if the absolute best should be rad no matter how gumby you are!

    In short, yes it has some flaws but none that take away best of 2010 from it. If anyone is interested I have recently picked up Star Wars battlefront 1 & 2 and republic commandos and would like to MP it up tomorrow let me know! thats mainly aimed at you T-Shane.

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  2. There are many grammatical errors in my previous entry, as well as missing words. In my defence I was rage dumping. I shall not fix said errors.

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  3. Hahaha Ah, I love it. Do people still play Battlefront on-line?! That game was awesome fun!

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  4. I'm pretty much just hangin out for Mafia II. I LOVED the original!

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  5. Will - I was hanging out Mafia 2 until I started reading the reviews. The idea of a linear sandbox game has me perplexed, but still slightly intrigued.

    You can't play original Xbox games over Live anymore. The service was discontinued earlier this year.

    Reuben your post reminds me of an epsiode of Futurama. "Take a rage dump man, he's no worse than Bender," and then "Rrrraaaaaagggggggggeeeeee dump!"

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