Typical Locue rant mode engaged. Reply "tl,dr" or "I agree, you sexy viking".
Alright, so I finished the game today. Max renegade points, of course, with a female Shepard because the male voice actor pissed me off. The fuck am I supposed to feel like Jack Bauer in space with such a pussy speaking for me? Real heroes have a sore throat, dammit! They sound like they got bottlefed Jack Daniels, rolled inside a carpet smoking a big fat blunt and suffocated and then woke up six feet under, and dug their way out using only fingernails and a positive attitude realizing that God himself resurrected them so they could keep on being a drunk motherfucker! So I picked me a Shepard of the other sex and ended up with Jennifer Hale instead, the woman who gave me orgasms playing Quest for Glory 4. Bless you, Jennifer.
So impressions! Well, ordinary Bioware game, no surprises whatsoever, although definitely one of their best. I could go on and on about the things I liked, like the blue lesbian alien species and how fun it would be to see Hamlet without emotion, but that wouldn't do much so here's what I didn't like!
Too long, didn't read: Dialogue is shit.
The conversations and the conversations system! I can't remember if Bioware ever called this thing revolutionary or hyped it's ass off, but I thought it was a big bag of shit when I played. So it helps conversations flow more naturally, fuck that. That's shit. Most of the time, the conversations won't sound good anyway with the half-assed dialogue Shepard has and even so, he only have one sentence for every topic - usually "What can you tell me about (...)?" "Well, Shepard here's what I can tell you about (...)!" I'm a fucking writer so this is what makes me tick and ultimately blow up. Bad dialogue. Send the motherfuckers to school.
I kind of see what Yahtzee meant now with his review. I still like lengty dialogue, but this kind? Not so much. In fact, it's really shit. Shepard says his opening line (what can you, yeah) and immediately he gets pissed on with information with no chance for interuption (how rude!) or inquiries. More in-depth questions about the topic will have to wait until the information has been passed on. Then, and only then, can Shepard continue his investigation about the stealth system with a sound and resolute "what can you tell me about (...)?" I know I shouldn't be frustrated, but this is not what I call good, natural well-flowing dialogue. This is just absolute shit.
Also, Bioware have done more of their trademark "extra dialogue options that lead to the exact same fucking response." At one point I had the option of answering my commanding officer with the following responses "A warning", "war" and "our destruction". All three responses are fairly different and should have been treated this way. If Bioware wants to be taken seriously as a creative force of game developer nature they insist on being called, and isn't that cute?, they need to start seizing this type of potential instead of just being lazy and give us the same fucking "I dunno what I saw. Robots killing stuff. Fucking hell, Captain Vhaillor!" for all three fucking options! As far as I'm concerned, Bioware have always been children pretending to be adults.
I'll take as much of Jennifer Hale as I can, any day of the week, but not if she comes in to work with lines like this.
Also: Grey DeLisle.
Too long didn't read: the story is entertaining, but shit.
I can imagine they watched Starship Troopers a lot making this game, because the game plays a lot like a b-movie except that it's not a good one.
Before I forget, I have to get this off my chest: riding the many fucking elevators in the game, every now and then you get to hear Cam Clarke - I think it's Cam Clarke at least, my apologies if it's some other dude with a fairly english accent - read the galactic news, often with a funny joke stuffed inside. That's good, mainly because of the voice actor (I like Cam Clarke and his soundalikes) but also because they make the fucking elevator rides go "faster".
So anyway, story: you hear a rumor that every 50,000 years a race of evil robots come back to destroy all life, so you and your multicultural crew of misfits and whiners are sent out to stop them.
I couldn't have written a more epic story. You rock, Bioware.
Too long didn't read: I know I've met these NPCs before...
Okay, seriously. I know there's only been KOTOR, Jade Empire and Mass Effect but I'm already sick of these characters.
How many more Canderous Ordo Black Whirlwind Wrex characters can I handle? Surprisingly a lot more than I can handle Carth Onasi-Raphael Sbarge Sky-voiced by dreamy Cam Clarke Kaidan Alenko-back to Raphael Sbarge characters. Sure, there's some difference but honestly, Bioware: sit your asses down somewhere and stop recycling. I don't know if sitting down actually helps this process but I like to think it does, so do it. Just do it.
Too long didn't read: planetary exploration? More like planetary exploration!
Yeah, couldn't come up with anything. You gonna hold that against me? Fucker. Planetary exploration is shit. Assignments (side quests) are fine but what the fuck, you telling me nobody's ever scouted the planet for minerals and shit but they had all the time in the world to build research labs and gunnery stations and McDonalds over the place? Bullshit. But I did it anyway with my trusty jumping space jeep.
Also: Halo.
Too long didn't read: I liked fucking the blue alien.
"But, Andy, you swedish commando, you ask. What the hell did you like about the game? You said you think it's one of Bio's best games!!"
Yeah, I know. I lied.
Mass Effect have some qualities, and it's by no means a terrible game, but as it's a Bioware-game, chances are you've probably already seen these qualities receive better execution in a better game from the same developer. But it's shinier than KOTOR and that probably means something.
FUN FACT: Mass Effect on max settings runs BETTER than KOTOR with max settings. I don't have the technical skills to understand why this is but I think it's great and I think you should too. Technical optimization, whoo-hoo!
100% of the game completed and I have some sort of stupid Xbox achievement medal to prove it even though I'm on PC. It took seventeen hours but I'm probably a bit slow. By the way, did I mention that I engaged in lesbian sexual activities with a blue hundred year old alien with hair that looks like a bicycle helmet?
That was cool, man.
LESBIANS!