Mass Effect 2 is the best one. It improved massively on all the flaws that the first game had, and it had a great atmosphere. I loved walking into the bar on Omega or traveling the streets of Ilium. The Suicide Mission is the best mission of the entire series, and I am disappointed there wasn't anything like that in the third game.

Mass Effect 3 was pretty good until the ending. Bioware had an excellent way of solving the ending controversy by making the Indoctrination Theory canon, but instead they opted on polishing the turd. In fact, the new Refusal ending seems like a giant middle finger to the fans. At least the multiplayer was fun.

/Kelly Chambers is indeed where it is at

Summoner101: Imperious Rex!: Myria: Bhruic: And yes, probably the saddest moment for me in the whole series.

Yeah, that was sad. Only certain choices lead to that, albeit common ones.

I was also sad when Liara put Shepard's name on the memorial at the end of ME3.

/Liara fangirl

Pshaw. Miranda Tali is where it's at.

FTFY



/Hot, like Miranda

So for those who are asking which is better, I'm going to split it into 2.

Story: ME1 > ME3 > ME2 > The last hour of ME3.

ME1 was a fantastic story. ME3 was the big setpiece payoffs. ME2 was neither, and was constrained against anything useful happening (because you had to be in a similar spot for ME3's start no matter what happened).

Gameplay: ME3 > ME2 > ME1.

Sadly, replaying ME1 is a terrible chore. Mako, 67 levels of everything that made no difference whatsoever in your stats, no way to respec leveling, boring overly long combat (especially on higher difficulties where taking down 1 enemy could take 30 seconds, and you would be in no danger during that time period). ME2 respun combat as shooty, and gave us Charge, the single greatest ability ever. ME3 found that happy sweet spot, and made Charge even more awesome and broken.

So overall, ME3 > ME2 > ME1. (Though ME1 should definitely be experienced, even if it's not played. Seriously, that story is fantastic). ME1 is an utter chore, where ME2 and 3 are enjoyable to play, even if there are major plotholes.

/With that said, if the extended cut had been the original ending, it would have been merely bad, and I think ME3 would rank a lot higher in people's books.
//Also, Vanguard is fastest class. Charging is faster than walking, and there are a LOT of areas that are "Advance through waves, and punch the button" that can be quickly beaten by Charging a nearby enemy, and punching the button just before dying.

Dingleberry Dickwad: TheZorker: I'm the rare bird. I liked all three games except (you guessed it!) the ending of the Third.

Not being able to explore? Well, no, there's a War going on.

The fact that every choice in the game was invalidated by a whiny little VI (and an inconsistent one at that) killed the entire story for me. Which I'd REALLY liked until then.

(Ok. The Journal sucked, too. I admit it.)

Yeah, I'm with you there, although I wasn't the greatest fan of 2, I still enjoyed it, and enjoyed 3 more except for the gaping plot singularity that kicks in at the end.

On a sidenote, I just recently found out that the the new DLC "Omega" is coming out for ME3 later this month where you go with Aria to take back Omega. Not sure if I'm going to get it or not, I haven't touched the game since trying out the free "here's our failed attempt at making the ending better." DLC.

/Liara or Yeoman Kelly Chambers is where it's at.
//Jack would likely be crazy awesome in bed, but end up killing you in your sleep.
///Miranda is a biatch and her daddy issues aren't the ones that lend to happy fun time in the sack.
//Ashley Williams just seemed too boring.
/Space Snooki ... less said the better

I hated that biatchy little space racist. Couldn't wait to let her die on every single one of my ME1 playthroughs.

/played FemShep
//Garrus is where it's at.

Solon Isonomia: Bhruic: Myria: Bhruic: And yes, probably the saddest moment for me in the whole series.

Yeah, that was sad. Only certain choices lead to that, albeit common ones.

I was also sad when Liara put Shepard's name on the memorial at the end of ME3.

/Liara fangirl

Ha, it's hard not to appreciate Liara.

My second playthrough was the "asshole choices" one, and when I got to that scene... Man, I had a hard time with Mordin. I mean, I knew it was just a computer game, but still.

The Renegade interrupt on the Xbox is the right trigger button. The nature of that little design element really slams home the betrayal you as the player himself/herself commit against the character - I did the same thing on my second play through (asshole Shepard) and it was hard to literally pull the trigger on him.

This is the reason I didn't kill him. I was ready to fight him on it. I wasn't ready to shoot him in the back.

meyerkev: Story: ME1 > ME3 > ME2 > The last hour of ME3.

ME1 was a fantastic story. ME3 was the big setpiece payoffs. ME2 was neither, and was constrained against anything useful happening (because you had to be in a similar spot for ME3's start no matter what happened).

Absolutely. ME1's story was great. It felt more focused (we're after one bad guy and his minions, rather than "the Collectors" as a whole), it introduced the universe, the history, etc. I read every codex in detail because I thought it was really interesting. Every time I replay it, I discover something new (even if it's minor): the listening post missions, Geth under the skyway on Feros, etc. I still remember my being really immersed in and fascinated with ME1 the first time I played through it.

ME2 focused a lot on character development, and I found a lot of the recruitment/loyalty missions to be interesting, particularly the longer ones (Mordin in particular; I loved going through the depths of Omega.). Kasumi's was fun (oh god, they have racks of YMIR mechs. I hope I don't have to fight those!). Jacob's was short and not terribly interesting. Getting Garrus was fun, but his loyalty mission wasn't so good. Getting Grunt from Korlus was just a whole lot of confusion: you had mercs, you had a wrecking yard, you had Krogan, but I just felt they weren't really all tied together in any sort of really meaningful way.

Still, ME2 seemed "smaller" than ME1 -- while you did get off the ship for some random little missions, the levels just seemed small and relatively without purpose. Nearly all of them were "Fight through mercs, blow something up." Even though it was pretty much the same recipe, I did like the "trace the infected mecs and destroy the factory" missions. With most of the side missions, nothing really meaningful ever happened: ok, you fixed the shield generator for some planet near its sun...that's nice. You never deal with it again. You saved either a spaceport or its colonists from Batarian terrorists, but that never is mentioned by anyone.

ME2 didn't really have a definitive ending. Sure, you finish the suicide mission and, assuming you survive, that's cool. You can go around and mine more stuff, or catch up on some side missions that you didn't do before...but eventually you get to the point where you're wondering if there's anything else to do.

ME3 didn't introduce much to the story and seemed even smaller than ME2 as you barely got off the ship. Your rescuing of Elcor civilians on Dekkuna consisted of launching a probe from orbit. I would have loved to have an "away" mission for that, perhaps with certain aspects changed due to the high gravity. Something like the "save the colonists" counter on Feros, but with Elcor civilians. The side missions where you did get off the ship were all related to multiplayer maps, which I thought was a bit lame. It'd be nice to figure out what Cerberus was researching on their lab, for example.

Even the Citadel seemed smaller. It was really weird. The main plotline for ME3 was fast-paced, fun, and exciting but anything not related to it really sucked.

Gameplay: ME3 > ME2 > ME1.

Sadly, replaying ME1 is a terrible chore. Mako, 67 levels of everything that made no difference whatsoever in your stats, no way to respec leveling, boring overly long combat (especially on higher difficulties where taking down 1 enemy could take 30 seconds, and you would be in no danger during that time period). ME2 respun combat as shooty, and gave us Charge, the single greatest ability ever. ME3 found that happy sweet spot, and made Charge even more awesome and broken.

Yeah. ME1 combat is awful. The addition of "GO GO GO!" and "ENEMIES EVERYWHERE!" being spammed across the battlefield didn't help much either. (I did like how "I WILL DESTROY YOU!" was spoofed in ME3).

So overall, ME3 > ME2 > ME1. (Though ME1 should definitely be experienced, even if it's not played. Seriously, that story is fantastic). ME1 is an utter chore, where ME2 and 3 are enjoyable to play, even if there are major plotholes.

I dunno. ME3 just seemed really rushed. If they gave it an extra 6 months for development and polish (there were some really glaring bugs that even the most basic of QA should have caught), I think it would have helped out a lot. I enjoyed it as a shooter and as a story, but as a follow-on to the previous games? It just seemed lacking a bit.

/Accidentally "refused" the Catalyst as I was just running around shooting stuff for no reason and winged him. Whoops. Sorry, civilization!
//Liara gets a bit sassy in "Leviathan" if you're romancing her. ("The only tentacled creature I want you thinking about is me!")
///Big Liara fan here. I'm doing a full-series Insanity-difficulty playthrough without any LIs in the first two games (undecided on the third). It was difficult to say "no" to her. Also, Insanity can be bloody hard.

Lunchlady: This is the reason I didn't kill him. I was ready to fight him on it. I wasn't ready to shoot him in the back.

ME1 and ME2 renegade options were "badass, need-to-get-stuff-done-whatever-the-cost" decisions.

ME3 renegade interrupts were "ragings psychopath off-their-meds".

I pulled the trigger on Mordin on my renegade playthrough. It wasn't easy.

The way this thread diverted into talking about the hot old thing instead of the hot new thing tells me everything I need to know about codblops.

I suspect the Geth are behind this.

red5ish:
ME1 was a GOOD RPG while ME2 isn't a very good shooter.

Holy freaking shiatballs, why is ME1 classed into the RPG category? It's a farking shooter.

heypete: Lunchlady: This is the reason I didn't kill him. I was ready to fight him on it. I wasn't ready to shoot him in the back.

ME1 and ME2 renegade options were "badass, need-to-get-stuff-done-whatever-the-cost" decisions.

ME3 renegade interrupts were "ragings psychopath off-their-meds".

I pulled the trigger on Mordin on my renegade playthrough. It wasn't easy.

I'd never know if my next option would be "Don't make me ask again" or "Strip the flesh, salt the wound!" Shep was off his space meds for sure.

mamoru: ME2 was like, hey we've got a bunch of cool character ideas; let's make their stories. Ok, let's throw them together into a game without integrating them. Ok, now what?

Good point, and I agree. ME3 definitely improved with the inter-character interactions over the first two. It seemed like half of my ME2 crew had daddy issues which probably explains where all of renegade Shep's meds went between ME2 and ME3.

Still, I like that for a good ending, ME2 made you play at least one level with each squadmate. With ME1, I generally played the game with either Tali/Liara (if Shep wasn't biotic), Tali/Garrus (if Shep was), or if Shep was a tech character then Liara/Wrex or Liara/Garrus. The other crew didn't leave the ship at all. Tali was for opening boxes, Wrex/Garrus shot stuff, and Liara was a one-asari singularity machine. ME2 sort of made you branch out a bit and at least try the other characters which was nice for hearing their unique dialogue.

ME2 didn't really give me the sense of urgency that ME1 (Saren is going to use the conduit and allow the reapers to invade!) and ME3 (the reapers are here! Crap!) did. One could prepare for the mission at your leisure.

I think we can all agree that Udina needs a cockpunch or two.

starsrift: The way this thread diverted into talking about the hot old thing instead of the hot new thing tells me everything I need to know about codblops.

If you like COD type games, Black Ops 2 is great. I've been playin the shiat outta it

I personally enjoyed reading the linked 4chan thread
/HAHA F@&&OT
//never link a 4chan thread to your article

DD44Dostivei: ME1 is a terrible rpg with terrible shooting mechanics, a fantastic story with big options, bland protagonist options, good characters, and an ambitious universe that's poorly designed

ME2 is a functional but half-assed shooter with half-assed rpg elements, a minimal plot with incredible story elements and limited options, terrific protagonist options, incredible characters, and a incredible universe that's conservatively designed

ME3 is a pretty good shooter with some well integrated rpg elements, a disappointing but occasionally awesome story with big options (until the ending), limited protagonist options, fan-servicey characters that you've already fallen in love with, and a limited universe


it's a frustrating as hell series, and i desperately hope that it can see some sort of remake in my lifetime. but i highly recommend the entire trilogy to anyone who might be interested. i also highly, highly recommend that they be played with their additional content.

That pretty well sums it up. Honestly, what made the games so good (and I loved all three) was the story, the voice acting, and the character development. Personally, I'd love if they could take the stories as written and turn them into an HBO miniseries. Okay, that's just crazy-talk but I'd still love that.

RedPhoenix122: Sounds like an error at the disc printer.

yep. just like the N.A versions of Lord of the Rings for Xbox260. All are labelled as demo disc not for resale and are being recalled.

Warlordtrooper: Bioware is under EA. How could this even happen?

Probably the same disc printer location. Someone farked up there really good and will probably be fired.

At any rate, this is hilarious.

meanmutton: That pretty well sums it up. Honestly, what made the games so good (and I loved all three) was the story, the voice acting, and the character development. Personally, I'd love if they could take the stories as written and turn them into an HBO miniseries. Okay, that's just crazy-talk but I'd still love that.

Its funny how a very cinematic game such as ME will probably not convert well to the big screen, and everybody knows it. I would like to see the first one make it there at some point. It is good and simple sci fi that keeps the entertainment factor on high, but if it were all a movie series you're right in saying the character development would get thrown out the window.

That's why I actually like ME3 more than others. I was in it to see the conclusion for the characters which was thoroughly bittersweet.

Duck_of_Doom: Jlop985: Mass Effect 3 was pretty good until the ending. Bioware had an excellent way of solving the ending controversy by making the Indoctrination Theory canon, but instead they opted on polishing the turd. In fact, the new Refusal ending seems like a giant middle finger to the fans. At least the multiplayer was fun.

It probably was. The massive outpouring of fan hatred genuinely shocked Casey Hudson et al.

No, it was put in specifically at fan request. The whole idea is that Shepard should have an out - to refuse to play by the Space Baby's rules. It's kind of like how at the end of Fallout 1 you can just say fark it and join the Master. Freedom of choice includes the option to take shiatty choices.

Solon Isonomia: sprawl15: Duck_of_Doom: Jlop985: Mass Effect 3 was pretty good until the ending. Bioware had an excellent way of solving the ending controversy by making the Indoctrination Theory canon, but instead they opted on polishing the turd. In fact, the new Refusal ending seems like a giant middle finger to the fans. At least the multiplayer was fun.

It probably was. The massive outpouring of fan hatred genuinely shocked Casey Hudson et al.

No, it was put in specifically at fan request. The whole idea is that Shepard should have an out - to refuse to play by the Space Baby's rules. It's kind of like how at the end of Fallout 1 you can just say fark it and join the Master. Freedom of choice includes the option to take shiatty choices.

Considering that Liara's beacon helps the next cycle defeat the Reapers, I'd say Shepard has the last laugh in that situation.

Dairy King: starsrift: The way this thread diverted into talking about the hot old thing instead of the hot new thing tells me everything I need to know about codblops.

If you like COD type games, Black Ops 2 is great. I've been playin the shiat outta it

Same here. Had trouble with my Razer Blade (2nd gen) at first, but it was caused by the game not forcing a switch to the dedicated graphics. the Integrated sucked bad for load times and the multi was unplayable. Changed to use the dedicated and WOW. The best multiplayer maps and user experience I have seen in a while.

/took 6 matches to get to level 11 in bootcamp.

Duck_of_Doom: Bhruic: Ha, it's hard not to appreciate Liara.

My second playthrough was the "asshole choices" one, and when I got to that scene... Man, I had a hard time with Mordin. I mean, I knew it was just a computer game, but still.

No, it's easy to not appreciate Liara. She really needed to hook up with my friend the Airlock.

Yeah, playing asshole Shep during the Mordin part is harsh. Needed to turn game off and do something else for a while after that. Then killing Grunt and Kaidan later on... the Reapers really would be salvation in my Asshole Shep's galaxy.

Jlop985: Mass Effect 3 was pretty good until the ending. Bioware had an excellent way of solving the ending controversy by making the Indoctrination Theory canon, but instead they opted on polishing the turd. In fact, the new Refusal ending seems like a giant middle finger to the fans. At least the multiplayer was fun.

It probably was. The massive outpouring of fan hatred genuinely shocked Casey Hudson et al. IIRC their view is Synthesis is still the "correct" ending, which you aren't smart enough to grasp btw, and can't you see their genius, and how could you even think of refusing the little twerp.

Doesn't Shepard basically become 40K's Machine God if you take the control ending? I mean, shiat, as far Mary Sue endings go that seems way better than "Shepard kills himself, everybody gets robotized they hug and everything's all better."

that bosnian sniper: - Redundant powers, passive abilities, and stat bonuses removed.

Eh, there were still passive abilities, and all of your active powers became redundant because of the nature of the shared cooldown system. It made characters only really want to max one offensive power except in very rare cases. The ammo powers were largely redundant as well, and they made up a massive chunk of some characters' abilities (lookin' at you, soldier).

Adding that to the rock/paper/scissors nature of the armor/barrier/shields system, and you had a serious problem in harder difficulties of being pigeonholed. Your ammo was so limited that you NEEDED to bring a diverse set of counters, which made NPCs with weak/no counters much, much weaker. Jack, for example, was totally worthless, as she had no real counters. Garrus, on the other hand, had both concussive shot (against barriers) and overload (against shields). A huge amount of your team is basically useless because of the combat system. Jack, Jacob, Legion, Morinth, Tali (until loyal), and Samara (until loyal) simply shouldn't be brought on any mission where you can help it for that reason - you're bringing the squadmates for their powers alone. Miranda (in contrast) had overload AND warp, letting her counter all three types of protection as well as fast health regen, on top of her awesome passive.

/I laugh every time I see this photo

/Sure, don't post the photo and make me look like a jerk...

Solon Isonomia: Considering that Liara's beacon helps the next cycle defeat the Reapers, I'd say Shepard has the last laugh in that situation.

I dunno, did her beacon actually help future people defeat the reapers? From what I saw, her beacon was transmitting and presumably would have helped, but I saw no evidence that the future people actually defeated them.

/that scene gave me a sad

sp86: Doesn't Shepard basically become 40K's Machine God if you take the control ending? I mean, shiat, as far Mary Sue endings go that seems way better than "Shepard kills himself, everybody gets robotized they hug and everything's all better."

The machine spirit isn't a god so much as basically an amount of self-awareness inherent to the machine, like EDI if she were devoid of personality. No thought, just doing.

that bosnian sniper: heypete: From what I saw, her beacon was transmitting and presumably would have helped, but I saw no evidence that the future people actually defeated them.

The "stargazer" epilogue is different in the refusal ending, and makes it clear the species of the next cycle found the beacons and defeated the Reapers...by using the Crucible.

Ah, thanks. I think I skipped the epilogue. It's nice to know what happens.

that bosnian sniper: In the way of passive abilities, you had class passives and that was it. Ammo powers were quite silly, I'll give you that. Though, only a couple classes really found themselves pigeonholed in terms of active powers, and for Shepard that was pretty dependent on what you elected to have as your bonus power (and, to a certain extent, bonus weapon) especially considering power combos.

The problem wasn't so much that not all powers were useful, but that they were in direct competition for your cooldown. Adepts had a serious problem with that; you generally wanted to run biotic combos or strip defenses, so you were spamming warp most of the time (I generally picked up Energy Drain as my bonus power, so I'd spam that in some cases). Then you had either lift or singularity, but you needed to dump points in singularity to get lift, and lift wasn't THAT much better than singularity to be worth splitting points in both. So in my case, I built warp, singularity, energy drain, biotic mastery, with warp and energy drain being mutually exclusive and singularity being used once at the end of fights. And that's the most power dependent class (in theory, at least, I'd argue that the Engineer is a stronger 'caster' type than the Adept by avoiding reliance on the bonus power to be able to strip all defenses, not having to worry about setting up combos, and having a pet to distract enemies). Vanguards were playing bad if they weren't spamming all charge all the time, soldiers had two actives, and infiltrators were kicked in the nuts by the ammo limitations not meshing well with their abilities' heavy preference for sniper rifles.

that bosnian sniper: Not terribly...the only thing you had to have was a squadmate for stripping barriers Shepard couldn't strip, and setting up warp explosions (if Shepard could detonate). But yeah, it was largely a matter of matching your squad to the mission at hand, and to complement Shepard's own power set...something with which I personally had no problem.

It wasn't really a problem per se, it wasn't like you weren't given the tools, but you were absolutely given a long checklist of things you Must Have on any given mission to succeed, which works in stark contrast to what you described here: "the mechanics that help you develop Shepard as a character opposed to disassociated dots on a character screen were improved and increased." The only flexibility to bring other characters came after ticking those boxes. ME1 was much more flexible in that sense; you wanted someone who could hack, but that wasn't a combat related hard requirement like stripping protection was in ME2. You could be a soldier, bring Ashley and Wrex and do nothing but punch people in the face and blast them with shotguns and do relatively fine, because the main focus was on gunplay rather than ability spamming.

UrCa: sp86: Doesn't Shepard basically become 40K's Machine God if you take the control ending? I mean, shiat, as far Mary Sue endings go that seems way better than "Shepard kills himself, everybody gets robotized they hug and everything's all better."

The machine spirit isn't a god so much as basically an amount of self-awareness inherent to the machine, like EDI if she were devoid of personality. No thought, just doing.

Until the Void Dragon wakes up.

Duck_of_Doom: sp86: Doesn't Shepard basically become 40K's Machine God if you take the control ending? I mean, shiat, as far Mary Sue endings go that seems way better than "Shepard kills himself, everybody gets robotized they hug and everything's all better."

Don't know about 40K, but Control makes Shepard into a Reaper, maybe a Reaper overlord-type. Of course it could be awesome, having Reapers now rebuilding instead of killing everyone in sight, living millions of years, maybe even becoming a god in people's minds. But then, with knowledge of billions of years now in your brain, would Shepard really be the same idiot meatbag in a Reaper shell, or change perspective to reflect the new knowledge? It would also be the power trip of all power trips for Renegades.

What I saw was Shepard making the Reapers leave Earth and fixing the Citadel and the Mass Relays that were damaged destroyed by the Reapers. That seems to imply that the entire Reaper fleet is taking orders from a.) a reaper with a Shepard personality in it or b.) a Shepard Meme distributed amongst the Reapers effectively making them a gestalt with the Shepard Personality as their Hivemind. Both effectively place the largest fleet in the history of the galaxy in the hands of a human war hero.

Bhruic: Aar1012: Uzzah: So *that* explains why Mass Effect 2 sucked so much: it was actually Black Ops 2!

I thought Mass Effect 2 was the best one?

Depends on what you were looking for. ME2 took a lot of the RPG elements of ME1 out, and focused more on being a shooter. If you like shooters, then you probably thought ME2 was better. If you like RPGs, you probably thought ME1 was better.

this gives me a big hmmmmm

just picked up ME about two months ago - circling in on finishing it (already did finish the main plot, but then reloaded and old save after realizing i couldn't continue. now i'm going to do all the little side jobs before finishing the main plot)

i love love love ME - mostly cause i loved SWKOTOR - hearing that ME2 is more shooter and less RPG is not a great thing IMHO

guess i'll find out

/after i put in time with Halo 4 - getting it tonight!!!
//end csb

inner ted: just picked up ME about two months ago - circling in on finishing it (already did finish the main plot, but then reloaded and old save after realizing i couldn't continue. now i'm going to do all the little side jobs before finishing the main plot)

i love love love ME - mostly cause i loved SWKOTOR - hearing that ME2 is more shooter and less RPG is not a great thing IMHO

That's in relation to combat oriented things. Inventory management and talents/skills in particular. The non-combat gameplay is still similar to ME1.

"Someone call Garrus, clearly the CD production machines need some calibrating." - Youtube user

And I'm done here. lol

Jim from Saint Paul: "Someone call Garrus, clearly the CD production machines need some calibrating." - Youtube user

And I'm done here. lol

Hah. Indeed.

Every time I'm doing calibrations in the lab (which is pretty much every week) I complain that I'm turning into Garrus.

NickelP: I bought a xbox360 game one time (new) and there was a blank cdr in the sealed case. Just picked up my copy of this.

I have a friend who does that. He's the reason I don't buy games at Wal Mart.

Jim from Saint Paul: "Someone call Garrus, clearly the CD production machines need some calibrating." - Youtube user

And I'm done here. lol

bwahahahaha... that is classic. You sir earn +1 internets in my book.

that bosnian sniper: The "stargazer" epilogue is different in the refusal ending, and makes it clear the species of the next cycle found the beacons and defeated the Reapers...by using the Crucible.

So the not a weapon device turns out to be a Reaper killing weapon... right... ok.

So, in your opinion, exactly how few a shiats were being given during the writing of ME3's ending and it's subsequent editing?