Gaming Mass Effect 3

Ark

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Anybody else play it? Mass Effect is my favorite sci-fi series since Star Wars, and the bulk of this game was the best Mass Effect experience yet. Shame the ending pretty much screwed the entire series. :facepalm:

But that said, tons of awesome moments in the game. They FINALLY deliver the massive space battles we've been wanting to see, both in prerendered cutscenes and as backdrops to gameplay segments. The sense of scale is massive and gratifying. All the favorite characters are back, and having a save from the previous games is pretty much a requirement for all the stuff you miss out on by starting from scratch.
 

Napalm42

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I am getting very tired of hearing about the ending.

I loved the endings. Absolutely. Thought nothing was wrong with it. At the end of the game is was so jarred I was in shock for two days, I loved it. I felt Commander Shepard was gonna die since the end of ME 1. This completed the story for me. Sure, the ending is just three flavors, and there are a few plotholes, but I think the ending allows you to form you own story about how Mass Effect continues. In a way, he becomes a messiah of sorts, gives his/her life to save every other species.

Jumping off my soapbox, I loved the buildup to everything else, very fun.
 
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Codz

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I love the story, but I hate all the gameplay changes and simplifications. I also really wish they hadn't dedicated resources to multiplayer. Also there should probably be some spoiler warning on this thread.
 

Napalm42

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I rather liked the changes to the combat, made it feel a bit more "organic" and felt more like you were fighting for every inch of ground gained, not just playing through typical wishy-washy RPG waves. (Let the record officially state I have not touched a Call of Duty or Battlefield game in about 2 or so years.)

Originally I was skeptical of the multiplayer, but I think they managed to pull it off well.
 

Codz

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I rather liked the changes to the combat, made it feel a bit more "organic" and felt more like you were fighting for every inch of ground gained, not just playing through typical wishy-washy RPG waves. (Let the record officially state I have not touched a Call of Duty or Battlefield game in about 2 or so years.)

Originally I was skeptical of the multiplayer, but I think they managed to pull it off well.

Except they made the horrible decision to tie it to singelplayer! Not to mention EA's typical "online pass" crap. The combat was fine except everything else is extremly simplified. No lock picking. No hacking. No resource gathering or exploring.
 

Ark

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I am getting very tired of hearing about the ending.

I loved the endings. Absolutely. Thought nothing was wrong with it. At the end of the game is was so jarred I was in shock for two days, I loved it. I felt Commander Shepard was gonna die since the end of ME 1. This completed the story for me. Sure, the ending is just three flavors, and there are a few plotholes, but I think the ending allows you to form you own story about how Mass Effect continues. In a way, he becomes a messiah of sorts, gives his/her life to save every other species.

Jumping off my soapbox, I loved the buildup to everything else, very fun.

Except the whole series was about building your own story, and they ended it with forcing you to pick between 3 essentially identical endings, none of which are satisfying and all of which, spoiler warning, basically screw galactic civilization.

And yeah, the whole game has been simplified to focus on the combat, which was tons of fun. I miss the game-breaking one-shot pistols of high level ME1 characters, and I don't miss the repetitive minigames of ME2. They call it "streamlining", but I call it removing gameplay that people didn't like.

I'm a little worried about the obvious DLC gouging that's going to take place. They have day-on DLC that has been shown to already exist in large part on the disk you buy, but you can't access it without hacking the game or paying. That reeks of EA taking a chainsaw to a finished product so they could sell off bits and pieces as extra DLC, while charging the same $60 for what should have been a finished game. Plus, Bioware is hinting at possible DLC to change or expand upon the ending everyone hates. EA is going to try and turn this into a $100-per-player cash cow.
 

Napalm42

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I agree with you in most of those respects actually, but I did some of my own tests on certain things. While the multiplayer is tied, you can still beat the game with the "optimal" cutscenes with 50% Galactic Readiness, after I found that out it didn't bother me.

I agree somewhat with your idea on the removal of hacking. I miss the mechanic, but after a while of constantly having to do it in Mass Effect 2, after the initial fun, it became incredibly annoying to do it over and over. Same with resource gathering. The first playthough was fun, then I never ever wanted to do it again.

What do you mean by "online pass"? I hadn't heard of that.

EDIT: I do agree with your DLC point. The partnership with EA is corporatizing BioWare more and more, and I don't like having to shell for what I felt was an integral part of the game.

And I will give you the "Game-breaking pistols" I felt so badass when I could punch through a biotic barrier, shields, and health with one headshot from my portable man cannon.

Really, I agree half and half with the movement. I think if they were gonna throw you for a loop, there would've been better ways to do it. But to me, the ending clicked so well with my theory of death, "You don't get to take anything with you." I'unno.
 
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n72.75

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I was going to buy it, but currently that money is allocated to food and taxes.
 

Codz

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What do you mean by "online pass"? I hadn't heard of that.
.

You can only play multiplayer with an "online pass". You get one pass with a new game, but it only works on one account. So if you are sharing the game with someone else, you're screwed. It will also mean all used games can't play online either.
 

Napalm42

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No wonder I saw that access pass in the DLC store when I went to get Javik. I had heard EA was trying to do that with the Madden games, but the reception it got basically made them take it off. They'll always be pulling for more money.
 

Ark

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No wonder I saw that access pass in the DLC store when I went to get Javik. I had heard EA was trying to do that with the Madden games, but the reception it got basically made them take it off. They'll always be pulling for more money.

Online play for games purchased used is being systematically killed by the industry. I'm not sure if EA or Activision did it first, but within the next year or two you won't be able to play any used game online without buying a pass. The whole industry is dragging us into an account-based world where all your games are permanently tied to one account that can be banned or deleted at any time for any reason with no refund.

Within 5 years they may succeed in killing the entire used games industry by simply mandating that all games be registered to one account and unplayable on any other account. It's all done in the name of "convenience" or "preventing piracy", but it's all about money. They don't want anyone to be able to enjoy their products for less than $60, or $100 in ME3's case when you pay for all the content EA hacked out of it.

ME3 is a brilliant game and I love the series so much that I had to buy it, but after this I don't want to give EA another cent of my money, they represent everything that is horribly wrong with the gaming industry. Any because they know how much the fanbase loves Mass Effect, they are using this game to roll out their new model for everything moving forward: Origin-only, tied to your account and nobody else's ever, no trade-in value, and a DLC policy that sells you the basic game at full price and the rest of it in pieces that never drop in price and will eventually push you up to the dollar value EA thinks they deserve for Bioware's efforts.
 
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Cras

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The endings were cheap, uninspired, lacking in creativity, and they were not what we were told they were going to be by Bioware themselves.

Yes, I am apart of the Re-take ME. You wanna know why I and a host of other gamers hate the endings, go to the Social Bioware forum and read up.

As for the rest of the game. The story was good, not great. Could have been epic, given the fertile ground the universe and the pervious game developed. They did not reach the full potential it could have been.

Combat is cleaned up, but the cover is buggy. The side quests of just go to a system and scan, then run from reapers got old real quick. Tons of auto dialogue compared to the conversation wheel, only one hub, lacked the character developement the previous games had, the journal is practically worthless.

With that all said, I did enjoy myself for the most part. I wish it was more, mainly because I saw so many places where they could have done better. The endings however are a joke. And it left a terrible taste in my mouth. It reminds me of a quote from Serenity, "You know, in certain older civilized cultures, when men failed as entirely as you have...." You know the rest.
 

Napalm42

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I am part of the movement as well, I know the concerns well. I spent 3 days reading articles and opinions, and while I agree with some, I still love the endings.
 

jedidia

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My rig's in Bosnia, I'm in Switzerland. my laptop's 8 years old. No ME3 for me for quite a while :(

On the other hand, my add-on project is profiting a lot of my current inability to play Mass Effect 3.
 

Polaris

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ME3 is one of the games I'm currently playing (the others being Skyrim, Arkham City, and The Orange Box). I haven't finished it yet, but it is an excellent game.
 

Cras

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ME3 is one of the games I'm currently playing (the others being Skyrim, Arkham City, and The Orange Box). I haven't finished it yet, but it is an excellent game.

When you finish it, please tell us what you thought of it.

Or head over to the Social Bioware site and chat about it. I have never seen so much activity on a forum. It is insane how many people are over there talking about it. You post something and it will be on page 4 in a minute.
 

Napalm42

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Has anyone else seen that message from BioWare's VP?
 

Cras

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yhea I caught that. More non-speak. It is like everything they put out now has to reference all their positive reviews (like anyone that is more than a casual gamer even belives a game review anymore).

I wish they would just release something definitive. This is the deal, this is how we are going forward. Instead it is all this treading water. I think they are waiting for that convention in April to announce something. A lot of press will be there, and they should have their PR hounds working overtime to spin it real good.
 

Polaris

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Current ME3 Status:

Still not at the ending

Completed Tuchanka, Citadel, Ardat-Yakshi Monastery, and Geth Dreadnought

Loving every minute of it:thumbup:

Best set pieces I have seen since L.A. Noire
 
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