Mass Effect

In prep for playing the newly released Mass Effect 2, I decided to take a step down memory lane and review the thoroughly engrossing Mass Effect 1.

You play as Commander Shepard, who, depending on your choices at the customization screen, can be: a man or a woman, a "spacer" "earthborn" or "colonist" (which serve to influence how fast you gain paragon/renegade points and offer a specific quest), a "sole survivor" "war hero" or "ruthless" psych profile, and one of 6 different classes (each of which can eventually choose between two of 6 advanced classes to specialize in). Each of the classes are either solely, or some mix of, biotics (force powers), tech powers, and combat powers. For example, the vanguard specializes in biotic and combat, while an engineer focuses solely on tech. Add all this to a comprehensive facial features builder, and the omnipresent Paragon (good guy)/Renegade (bad guy) system and you can already see that this monster is a heavy RPG.

As such, it's nearly impossible to go over every aspect in detail. So I'll try my hand at some sweeping generalizations.

As Commander Shepard you're sent on a mission to Eden Prime, a human world, which has just sent out a distress call. You're joined by Nihlus, a turian Spectre (kind of a warrior spy) to see if you qualify to become the first human Spectre. You land, action ensues, and soon you're embroiled in a galaxy-wide quest to do battle with Saren, a former Spectre, and an army of sentient machines known as the Geth.

And that's only the beginning of it. Throughout your travels you will come across what seem like hundreds of side quests, both small and large, either from exploring planets on your unwieldy Mako tank, listening to Galactic Radio at the Citadel, as part of the main quest, or as requests from your crew members. There is no lack of things to do if you truly want to delve into the experience, and trust me, you will.

Combat is divided between battles planetside on your Mako, and the largely used third person shooting. Mako battles are annoying due to the controls being so lunky, but thankfully it's easy enough to lock onto a target, blast it with rockets and be done. The third person shooting, however, is a breeze, due in no small part to the ease of pressing a button to bring up a menu that pauses the game and allows you to tell your squad what to shoot and what powers to use on any specific target. This allows for some really smooth squad tactics that allow you to effectively manage enemies that might otherwise overwhelm you.

One of the largest pieces of combat actually has nothing to do with the action itself: your equipment. As you traverse the galaxy you will find thousands upon thousands of weapons, armor, and upgrades. Each weapon and armor (including ALL of your teammates) have slots that you can fill with any upgrade available, and switch out whenever you want. For example, if you're fighting Geth you can pop in a special round that does more damage to machines. But if a big organic creature suddenly shows up, you open up the menu, switch to a round that does more damage to organics, and keep on fighting.

One of the biggest complaints against this game is that this constant micromanaging of your inventory makes the game move a lot slower, and it most assuredly does. It gets especially hard when you only take 2 teammates on a mission, and try to pop in an upgrade, only to remember that the only copy you had is currently on a teammate you didn't take with you. Then, if you're allowed to, you have to go all the way back to your ship, take the elevator down to the equipment lockers, switch equipment, take the elevator back up, then run to the airlock and get back to where you were. It takes a significant chunk of time. Ultimately, however, this is one of the key elements of Mass Effect's RPG quality, and I personally find it fun to manage who gets what as it adds a layer of personalization to the game.

Of course the biggest feature of Mass Effect is the story and the dialogue. I had never before played anything this epic when I first played this game, and even now the only real contenders it has in terms of scope are Final Fantasy, and other Bioware games. The story constantly keeps you involved, even when you're just doing a random side mission it feels like you're adding to the full story. But the real reason you'll keep coming back to this game are the dialogue trees, and the tough tough choices you have to make throughout the game. Each and every conversation brings up a little dialogue wheel at the bottom, from which you can choose what to say. Some options will further your Paragon/Renegade status, but most will just uncover extra info that's useful to know. Also, it's not just that you pick a saying on the wheel and Shepard says it. You pick something like "Go on." and Shepard says "I'd like to know more about what you're doing here." It adds some nice unpredictability to what you're going to hear, and yes it's a small thing but it's welcome. The key is that at many points, depending on what you say, your experience throughout the game is going to be completely different than someone else who picked a different option. There are vital decisions that have to be made that not only effect how your missions play out, but also how things in Mass Effect 2 play out (and it's hinted some decisions will even have repercussions in Mass Effect 3).

By the time you get a character up to level 40 or so the game starts to lag in the RPG department as you're maxing your skills, making literally millions of credits, and have the top equipment in the game for your level. However, the enemies can still be quite difficult and the game never lacks in challenge.

If you're up for hours upon hours of RPG shooter fun, pick up this game, play it, play it again in a different way, leave it for a while, then come back and play it again to remind yourself of all the awesome.

Mass Effect gets a 9.5/10.