Multiplat Mass Effect Trilogy

[NUFC Tiger]

Finished my full ME3 playthrough (with DLCs and extended cut) the other night.

For the DLCs, I think overall, they were solid but none of them were spectacular IMO. The Lair of the Shadow Broker DLC from ME2 still remains my favourite. The Citadel DLC was pretty funny (the assassination attempt in the sushi place, clone Shep and the party had some good moments) - though seemed a bit random/out of place as I did it after the 'failure' mission on Thessia lol.

Levianthan and Omega were alright but I felt they dragged on a bit after starting off well. When you have to make your choice on the citadel with the god child, I thought it was cool one of the dialogue options let you mention Levianthan (to help tie it into the lore/game).

P.S the 'logic' of the endings still annoys me

 

[NUFC Tiger]

rfctiger74 you were right about bringing Jarvik and Liara along on the Thessia mission. He gave her and the Asari a fair dressing down.

 

[Ned_Flanders]

Finished my full ME3 playthrough (with DLCs and extended cut) the other night.

For the DLCs, I think overall, they were solid but none of them were spectacular IMO. The Lair of the Shadow Broker DLC from ME2 still remains my favourite. The Citadel DLC was pretty funny (the assassination attempt in the sushi place, clone Shep and the party had some good moments) - though seemed a bit random/out of place as I did it after the 'failure' mission on Thessia lol.

Levianthan and Omega were alright but I felt they dragged on a bit after starting off well. When you have to make your choice on the citadel with the god child, I thought it was cool one of the dialogue options let you mention Levianthan (to help tie it into the lore/game).

P.S the 'logic' of the endings still annoys me

Did you shoot the kid (ending 4)?

 

[NUFC Tiger]

Did you shoot the kid (ending 4)?

Was tempted to haha. But I had read that leads to an automatic Reaper victory.

I had something like 8000 points in the war readiness thing (though was halved to about 4000 by the lack of multiplayer participation). Kind of BS as my game mentioned that allied forces were winning and pushing back the reapers lol.

I wonder if I had got my readiness rating to 100%, if that would have changed anything?

 

[Ned_Flanders]

Was tempted to haha. But I had read that leads to an automatic Reaper victory.

I had something like 8000 points in the war readiness thing (though was halved to about 4000 by the lack of multiplayer participation). Kind of BS as my game mentioned that allied forces were winning and pushing back the reapers lol.

I wonder if I had got my readiness rating to 100%, if that would have changed anything?

No, they redid the math after the modified ending

Symbiosis remains the top tier

 

[The Speaker]

I've read it before, but I've been thinking about when best to play through the trilogy again (with the modding scene for 1 especially finally starting to bear fruit - might wait a while longer though), and it reminded me of this excellent retrospective of the three games:

Mass Effect Retrospective 1: The Ages of BioWare - Twenty Sided

www.shamusyoung.com

It's worth a read. I don't agree with absolutely everything Young says, but I think his central thesis is spot on, and it's why I will always hold 1 in higher regard than 2 and 3.

 

[Gethelred]

I've read it before, but I've been thinking about when best to play through the trilogy again (with the modding scene for 1 especially finally starting to bear fruit - might wait a while longer though), and it reminded me of this excellent retrospective of the three games:

Mass Effect Retrospective 1: The Ages of BioWare - Twenty Sided

www.shamusyoung.com

It's worth a read. I don't agree with absolutely everything Young says, but I think his central thesis is spot on, and it's why I will always hold 1 in higher regard than 2 and 3.

Characters had a good deal more depth to them in 1 than they did in 2 - I'm talking about the characters that were in both, not those who were not - and the story had some serious drive.

I always liked 1 more than 2.

 

[Gethelred]

And, upon reading Young's retrospective, I don't disagree with much if anything that he says in it.

I absolutely hated the opening to ME2, and I'm one of the weirdos who actually liked the weapon customisation from ME1; I built my team and used the abilities/weapons to get them behaving how I wanted them to. I was almost always an Adept, rocking a pistol that you could only get 2-3 shots from before overheating, but explosive rounds rock.

The combat was different, not better, IMO. But then, I'm not hugely into shooters, 3rd person or otherwise.

 

[gaskin]

The story was best in 1 but I think I am in the minority when I say that gameplay and guns (man I love the Black Widow) were best in 3 which is the game I get the most enjoyment out of and revisit the most.

 

[The Speaker]

1's gameplay was imperfect, and 3's was better, but they weren't trying to do the same thing.

2 is the worst of both worlds, in that regard.

 

[scaryness]

I cant stand playing 1
Genuinely dislike playing it now.

2 is a good game but ultimately feels irrelevant because of its go nowhere plot.

3 is the best one.

If the whole collector plot in ME2 was scrapped and ME3's plot was spread across 2 games it would have been a lot better.

 

[The Speaker]

3 is the best one.

if you ignore cerberus, which is hard because two thirds of the game is spent fighting them

 

[dwwaino]

I cant stand playing 1
Genuinely dislike playing it now.

I actually went to start a full trilogy playthrough about 3 or 4 months ago and only got a few hours into 1 before it became a chore and stopped. I'm not sure if it's because I have played it a million times or if it hasn't aged that well. It's a shame because in my mind it was the start of one of my greatest gaming experiences of all time.

 

[gaskin]

if you ignore cerberus, which is hard because two thirds of the game is spent fighting them

I don't mind it to be honest. I little less would have been nice but it breaks the monotony of only fighting reaper forces.

 

[gaskin]

I actually went to start a full trilogy playthrough about 3 or 4 months ago and only got a few hours into 1 before it became a chore and stopped. I'm not sure if it's because I have played it a million times or if it hasn't aged that well. It's a shame because in my mind it was the start of one of my greatest gaming experiences of all time.

IMO it hasn't aged well. Remake it with better graphics and gameplay more like 3 and it would be streets ahead of the others.

 

[The Speaker]

I don't mind it to be honest. I little less would have been nice but it breaks the monotony of only fighting reaper forces.

Which speaks to the biggest problem of 3, and 2 as well, in that they aren't actually Mass Effect games. If 3 was some other sci-fi universe, it would be a great game (if you ignore the clunky dialogue and whoa what's going on plot). But because it's meant to be a concluding part to a trilogy, it becomes impossible (for me at least) to separate the good gameplay from the awful plot/world-building, things which 1 did so well. If 1 had the benefit of a better engine, who knows how good it could've been. The modding community appears to have finally cracked the code to get stuck into it properly, so it'll be interesting to see what they can do.

 

[Red Black and Blue]

Great universe, terrible ending. They really should attempt to make a tv series about it.