Mass Effect Series

glad your enjoying yourself, I'm playing another great RPG atm, the Witcher 2. Waiting for the dlc of ME3 before I get back into it on a regular basis.

I need to finish my renegade vanguard in ME2 so i can play him in ME3 but multiplayer has been sucking all the time I put into the game. I hate the internet at my dorms though because I've been kicked out of the server so much in the past 3 weeks so I can only get into like one or two matches before it crashes.


The ending DLC will come out in the summer right? Predictions? Bioware just said they're summing things up but I feel they'll do something about the indoctrination theory.

Yes summer, Predictions= I have no idea. I actually like the indoctrination theory, although if thats the case, I made the wrong choice by choosing sy..... oh wait SPOILER





Synthesis

It's tough to stab Wrex in the back twice isn't it?

no, but he does. Considering we destroyed the facility that would have cured the genophage. He will gladly give his life away for it.

you've gotta watch this, hilarious https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fp1H-FYPmY

Well, Erel, I did it. I got the chance to play ME3 a little a couple days ago, and I have a mixed opinion on it. To be fair, I played as much of the combat as I could before thinking too much on it. About an hour and a half of gameplay, excluding character creation.

Looking at it from an RPG standpoint, I fail to see what makes it so great. All I saw was a shooter mixed with an MMO, complete with RPG elements, and I think there's a large difference. I believe RPGs require more strategy than just shooting things, and I noticed it included a level up system, and even enemy health bars, along with comrade control, but enemies still fall after so many hits with a gun. Granted, the game takes more strategy than one would assume since it IS a shooter, and ammo, health and enemy placement are all large factors that one needs to look out for, but I think an RPG takes more strategy than mindlessly blasting away at enemies.

Now, I want to try and word this correctly, cause I kept confusing myself when trying to build an opinion on what exactly classifies an RPG to me. I feel RPGs require lots of trial and error before discovering the true way to overcome obstacles. I don't feel shooters really deserve the right to be called RPG since all you would need to do is fire away at an enemy until it falls, but that's my opinion. Now, if I went by that definition, then what game COULD be classified as an RPG? Kingdom Hearts would be taken away since all you really have to do is whale on an enemy and not get hit, same as a shooter. Final Fantasy, Castlevania, Star Ocean, Persona, etc. all would be considered just casual games if I said all RPGs required trial and error instead of mindlessly chomping away at enemies. So, my definition of an RPG has now been rendered useless.

Instead, the actual meaning of an RPG to the general populace seems to meet three criteria. Level ups, shops, and various ways to overcome a battle. ME3 seems to fall into this criteria, but take a step back and try to decide what game DOESN'T meet this demographic.

Anyway, back to ME3. Looking at it from a shooter's standpoint, I thought it surpassed other titles such as Halo, Call of Duty, and zombie survival games. I thought the gameplay was simple and easy to learn, the graphics were great to look at, and I found the option for difficulty to be particularly amusing. I have to say that the story that I got to sample was something I'd seen far too many times, and was disappointed to be introduced to another "save the human race" game. I know FF suffers from this in every title, but I've accepted all the cliches. lol

All in all, I don't think it stands out too far as an RPG, but as a shooter, I'd definitely play it and enjoy it. Hell, I thought CoD was lots of fun on single player.

I have to agree with Erel in almost every sense here. First all of you say the combat is simple and just shooting. I dare to ask what difficulty you were playing on, and which class you were using. Soldiers are really the only class that you blast away at enemies continuously. I find that on harder levels, there is a ton of strategy that is placed into combat, and it is very rewarding, when you combine the skills of a biotic and those of a soldier together to shred an enemy apart while holding them in mid-air. But thats just me.

To say Mass Effect is not an RPG is short-sighted. You are only looking at the surface of the game. Following your theory, most RPGs wouldn't be RPGs. Like erel said, turn based RPGs are the same thing, just replace bullets with magic spells. All of you Action RPGs are basically hack n slash against most enemies, and even games like FF12, you set up gambits, and the characters do the fighting for you. You fail to realize the choices that you have to make in ME, the customization, and the social interactions that make up ME.

Like Erel, I have been playing games for close to 20 yrs now, and I like to think that I play a wide breadth of genres. I can honestly say that the Mass Effect series is the best thing I have ever played, with Mass Effect 3 probably being my favorite game EVER. Regardless of the ending.

To say that the story is cookie cutter is once again premature. You failed to play previous games, and recognize previous consequences associated with past decisions. It's not just about saving the human race, it's about saving civilization, and all of the side notes in the series are the real beauty of the story. Civil rights between races, prejudices, relationships with your crew, what would you do type of moments. So many things make up Mass Effect, "saving humanity" is just the tip of the iceberg and the most visible concept to the naked eye.

So in conclusion, I'm glad you played the game, albeit briefly, but I think your judgement as a gamer is misguided in this case. YOU NEED to play the previous two games to respect the series.

I think I can tell where my misdirection is coming from, based on the passion from your posts. The first being that as a gamer, I'm pretty much just that, a gamer. Meaning I look at a game as a game nowadays, instead of trying to appreciate it. Probably because I'm a biased ass that takes Western games as obstacles instead of a chance to have fun (I'm not being dramatic, I think that's honestly how I view games), but you can ask Zane the pure when I say that I tried to put off playing ME3 as long as I could after renting it because I was afraid I might like it. So, when I fired it up, I was instantly looking for flaws instead of what people loved about it. I looked at it as a bad game instead of an adventure. I apologize for that, and I'm not sure why I can never appreciate a Western game even a little, but I'm getting away from the topic.

The other reason I feel a little backwards is, once again, I'm a lazy gamer. I hate, with a passion, games that incorporate character creation/customization, especially if it alters the story. So, Fable, MMOs, Infamous, Soul Calibur, etc., are all games I try to avoid, because I know exactly what kind of person I am. I'm the kind of person who will let his personality keep him from achieving more than one ending. I'll generally make a saint of a character and only achieve what is normally a good ending, because I hate to piss people off, even if they're not real. So, giving me a decision that alters the course of the story is really pointless since I couldn't bear to make a moral mistake, even if it's only a game. Once I started ME3, I put all the decision making on Auto, because I didn't wanna deal with that crap, and just let Shepard be the bad guy when it came to it. Maybe I just hate feeling like I'm making my own story instead of listening to another's tale, or I'm just lazy. But like Erel said, most JRPGs don't do the character customization, and I'm very okay with that.

Anyway, I apologize for being so harsh to the game, since you guys are obviously passionate about it and don't see it as "just a game". I think the only game I've felt that way about was FFX, but I don't think I'm as appreciative of it as you guys are for Mass Effect. That being said, as just a game it was fun to play, but I don't think it'll be AS fun to play as others, for me.

Both Zack and erel, please do remember the posts you just made. They are beautifully worded and passionate. Please remember those words when you disagree with someone else on why "they" like the game, as affection and affectation with gaming [now that it has become so wide-spread] is no longer uniform. Please remember that passion and try to be mindful if someone feels similarly towards another game-that in all other ways could be garbage.

What makes a game good anymore is completely subjective. All opinions are valid and so are criticisms.

This post is not in any way to rebuke your passionate defense of a what I'm personally aware is a spectacular game, nor is it to say you can't rag on a bad game, only to say that someone who likes said bad game is just as validated as you are. (I'm also sure you are both already know this)
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I sifted through a pretty broad and vast collection of materials that recount all of the codecs on this game, as well as a thorough synopsis of the plot, and I would say it alone would have been a great game on its own. But the game's real point of genius is the fact that every little minute detail of your choices in game affect the story in various ways. For a plot to be so specific "and" be flexible enough to alter to the player's whim is a sign of "smart" writing. What it may lack ever so slightly in originality it fills in with DETAIL and care to keep everything together regardless of alteration.

I personally give it a 9.5 on a critical scale merely because I have yet to have a personal experience with it.

well I hope you get the chance to play it zane, bc it is a classic that everyone should play through at least once. I am not trying to say that nemo's taste in games is bad, I was merely stating that he was doing an injustice to the game by not 1. playing it for more than a few hours, and 2. not starting from the beginning of the series. This game moreso than any ever game needs to be experienced as a package, and I can't stress that enough.

I believe that if a game requires more than at least 2 or 3 hours of gameplay to get interesting, then it has failed miserably. Of course, that is the half empty glass talking.

Now that I got that out, I'd like to say something. I recognize JRPGs for the flaws they have the same way I view any other game. Some of them are guilty pleasures, to be honest, but there are JRPGs in existence that I simply couldn't get into because they failed to amaze me within my 2 hour quota. I have played every 'Tales of' game available to the US, and they're all supposed to be a "magical journey of wondrous proportion from beginning to end". I have shot down every single one of them because all of them have the same three flaws for me. Combat is repetitive and far too basic, using the same fucking combo 500 times in a single round with common enemies. The animation looks childish for a story that is supposedly as dark as it is. And the conveyance as to where the hell you're supposed to be going is vague, sometimes unexplained. Every JRPG lover I've met has played and fallen head over heels in love with this series, and I fail to see what makes it "the JRPG that wins the race".

Not to say I hate all games that make it to the top of the list, seeing that I praise FFVII for a few things, but to make a game the top of the list is simply a popularity thing, and I make it a rule to at least play the game before making a judgment call. And I can't defend any recent games, because most of them either bore the shit out of me within the 2 hour quota, piss me off and confuse me (looking at you FFXIII), or they simply didn't have anything that truly impressed me, like Mass Effect did. Once again, this is all opinion since I started out hating character customization bullshit that every western game demands to have nowadays, and I am not saying that Mass Effect is a bad game. It just isn't the game for me, and I accept that. I don't feel like exploring the rest of the series if it all involves a story I have control over, so this ends my involvement in this topic.

@nemo, like Erel said, you could use the default shepherd or femShep. Yet you CHOSE to customize, so down deep you must secretly want to do it.

If you don't like making choices, stop playing ME series now, bc that is what it is all about. Putting you in control, and making you feel like a part of the world, not just a mindless sprite mashing buttons.

Also with your criteria for gameplay and a 2 hr quota, it doesn't surprise me that the fighting genre seems to be your favorite.

nope. Just summer release, which basically means anywhere from June to September, so probably.....September lol

Zack'sCloud wrote:@nemo, like Erel said, you could use the default shepherd or femShep. Yet you CHOSE to customize, so down deep you must secretly want to do it.

If you don't like making choices, stop playing ME series now, bc that is what it is all about. Putting you in control, and making you feel like a part of the world, not just a mindless sprite mashing buttons.

Also with your criteria for gameplay and a 2 hr quota, it doesn't surprise me that the fighting genre seems to be your favorite.

Like he said, it wasn't the game for him and he's done talking about it. Customization is a core feature of the game, and he tested the game as it would be meant to be played (though pessimistically) and formed an opinion. And let's please not drop into unpleasantness again.

no offense zane, but nemo can speak for himself