Tachikoma
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Mass EffectOk so I finally got my Limited Edition of Mass Effect yesterday and waited til 8pm whent he wife got in as she wanted to follow the story.
Sat down at 8pm and started playing...
After 20 minutes of creating my character I got into the 'action'.
Here is a very minireview of what I have decided thus far.
Graphics:
This is the simplest of things to review. In an word the visuals are In-puppying-credible. The models look as real as any I have seen before. Not only are the faces extremely realistic but the character's body language is conveyed extremely well.
The Lip-Sync is also the best I have ever seen and fits the speech and tone perfectly. All in all the characters, both human and alien (my god the alien design!!) are the best I have ever beheld!
Vistas and locations, of which I have only visited 2 locales, are also perfectly realised. The lighting is amazing, buzz of activity on vista views are also on par witht he likes if Bladerunner etc.
Finally when you enter combat things continue to look amazing and the explosions look lovely too!
So graphics get a perfect 10/10.
Sound
Ok now this has to be set into 3 seperate sections, Music, Voice acting and sound effects and all shall get a mini review:
Music
Simply on par with Biowares typical skills, the music is fantastic. Rousing in the council chamber when you are promoted, exciting in combat and so pleasant when you are scouring planets seeking information.
The music is like a character in itself and would fit nicely into any Star Wars movie 
Voice Acting
Again this is where Bioware usually surpass themselves and this is no different. All the voice acting is as good as any Hollywood Blockbuster could hope for. Inflections are carried well as are the different tones of alien races and you could close your eyes and imagine a real movie taking place!
Sound Effects
Many of the sounds are general ones, like laser fire and explosions and they are standard fare, albiet good enough to get by with.
The real sound effects that catch your eye (or should that be ear?) are the ships. The throaty rumbling and explosive accelaeration are beatuiful sounds and will make all sci-fi fans creamy
Again very nice over all.
So sound gets a 9.5/10 over all (lost .5 point for the annoying 'clomp clomp clomp' of your footsteps as you run around!
Gameplay
Now as always this is what people outside of the US and primary school look for in a game (the previously mentioned just look for graphics as we know).
Again this will be seperated into 3 part: Exploration, Levelling up and Combat.
Exploration
This feels a lot like KOTOR. You run around in 3rd person and approach people to talk to them and pressing RT pulls out your currently selected gun.
Unsuprisingly, there is no jump but frankly it is not required at all and would have been a pain to code due to all the different planets you visit as they all have different gravities!
So you run around, talk to people and, when in conversation you get full audio and visual cobversations. You can press A to get up the options of responce nad (when you have Charm or Intimidate) can actually cut them short and give a quicker reply to scare or coersce them into giving you extra info.
What you see on the radial talk menu is not actually what he says so you have to read between the lines and makes it all the more enjoyable.
For instance:
Alien: I don't think you are the person I should be speaking to about this. It is a matter purely for the senate.
Reply options: 1: You can tell me. 2: Tell me more, now! 3: You're probably right.
Atualy outcomes:
1: I work for the Senate, you have nothing to fear so you may go on.
2: If you don't tell me I may be forced to take you aside, and that would be bad for your health.
3: I wouldn't want to get you into trouble so I shall leave you now.
So you can see how they match up but rest assured that dialogue was created by me, the script is no where near as bad as that!
Beyond the usual talking nad getting quests (typical Talk to this person, rescue this person, bring me this nad that etc) you can find cases litered around containing items and some are digitally locked.
What ensues (so long as you have the required skills) is a minigame or simon says where you have to quickly press the 4 face buttons ont he controller (AYXB) as they flash up on a coded screen. Simple but works well.
You then find (or can buy) new weapons and armour and they can likewise be updated with upgrades or inplants. and the weapons are arrranges as Pistols, Sniper Rifles, Assualt Rifles and Shotguns but I feel there are gonna be alien weapons added to the mix soon enough
That is basically the guts of exploration. 9/10 (the clop clop mainly occurs here)
Levelling Up
This works exactly the same as KOTOR. When you level up you get points to assignt o skills and as skills hit benchmarks new skills become available.
Stats also increase naturally and increase health etc.
Very straight forward and does the job as hoped (10/10 - does exactly what it says on the tin )
Combat
Now I had read many negative things about the combat, saying it is too easy, or generic, or slow and boring.
Now I chose a class that means that I am more of an Psioninc and Technology expert than a weaponsmaster. Due to this I get no proficiencies in weapons at all and generally suck with them. Due tot his combat has been rather hard for me until I had a small realisation....you can use other things than guns!!!
To explain. I was on one side of a dip in the path and on the otherside were the enemies, all hiding behind boxes (you can hug cover and pop put much like in R6 and it is all 3rd person ala GoW).
I tried shooting them but I missed 90% of the times so ordered my 2 companions to target the enemy from cover (a simple press of the D-Pad) and they took one down.
One of my companoins shouted "He's in cover Shephard, I can't hit him". I then had a epiphony. I Did the GoW style combat run (yes you can do it here also) and when I got close I used my equivilent of Force Push. The big heavy cover he was using tumbled backwards crushing the enemy and killing it! YAY
Did this to the others except one who popped out and started to fire back so my cohorts took him down.
So the combat can be as dull as you make it or as clever!
You choose a gun from he radial menu (and equip collegues here also) and during this time the game pauses (you choose psionics the same way btw) and can throw times grenades by pressing BACK.
Finally, you press Y to administer a medipack to heal and can also heal your comrades (or so I have heard, haven't had to so far as the AI is cool!).
So combat is basically GoW with more options like Psionics and better graphics 9/10 (loses 1 point for Greandes being on BACK button as I keep pressing it thinking I will get my character menu and it annoys me...)
Story
I am gonna be very brief here and say the story (so far) is incredible. It has, in just 3 hours, got me totally hooked and the way it is given, both visually adn by the medium of music, is fantastically handled. 10/10 so far.
Overall
I'll start with a quote from a magazine review:
"Mass Effect is, simply and catagorically, the best game I have ever played".
It is an unbelievable game with (noted so far) 100 hours of gameplay if you take the time to visit all of it's hundreds of panets and do all of the subquests.
I can see myself being lost here for many many months and then starting afresh with a more cobat friendly character.
With what is supposed to be 5-6 different endings and the morality system meaning entire races can be wiped out by your actions it truly is a galactic adventure.
They have also hinted at DLC for hundred sof new planets and items classes to appear in the future and Bioware have never been anything if not generous with Mods on games.
I love this game and I hope everyone else at least gives it a try
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haeZen
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Me... want. *drool*
haeZen,
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Tachikoma
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| haeZen wrote: | Me... want. *drool*
haeZen, |
Poor Ben. 
I feel your pain mate, I really do
I waited months for Oblivion to be released and when it was I popped it in, got 30 mins in and got 3 red lights of death.
Was a week before I could get the console fixed.
Don't worry mate, the game will still be available when the 360 comes back and then you can join in with the war stories that I will start posting as the game goes on
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haeZen
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| Tachikoma wrote: | | haeZen wrote: | Me... want. *drool*
haeZen, |
Poor Ben.
I feel your pain mate, I really do
I waited months for Oblivion to be released and when it was I popped it in, got 30 mins in and got 3 red lights of death.
Was a week before I could get the console fixed.
Don't worry mate, the game will still be available when the 360 comes back and then you can join in with the war stories that I will start posting as the game goes on |
Yeah see there's the problem. It's been 3 weeks -21 puppying days - till it got sent off, let alone I now have to wait for it to be repaired.
Tis a cursed life.
haeZen
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Tachikoma
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| haeZen wrote: | Yeah see there's the problem. It's been 3 weeks -21 puppying days - till it got sent off, let alone I now have to wait for it to be repaired.
Tis a cursed life.
haeZen |
Why was it so long before it was sent off mate?
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Holy_Donut
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Lesbian Sex?
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Neocryptic
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| Holy_Donut wrote: | | Lesbian Sex? |
Hell Yes...
As for Mass Effect thanks for the review Tachi. Father Christmas is bringing it to me.
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Holy_Donut
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"By the Gods Commander, that was amazing!"
"Wow, that Effect sure was Massive....."
"Wow, how many!?"
"I thought in space, noone could hear you scream?"
"I just did sex with you."
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Tachikoma
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"In space no-one can hear you cream" more like.
Oh and yes, lesbian sex abound in this game.....Ooer!
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Holy_Donut
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Is it truely a uninhibited romp through the erotic adventures of the galaxy, an erotic adventure of the most deranged kind?
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