Mass Effect: Andromeda could have been a great game. It has fun combat, looks gorgeous, and it thrives on the major missions (such as those in the main story and loyalty missions for your squadmates) where most of the writing keeps you hooked. But with some of the design choices and the plague of bugs, I just can't recommend this game.
First off, this game absolutely did not have to be open world. The 100-ish hour playtime you see? The majority is from the mindless padding introduced in these open world environments, which are pretty monotone and boring to begin with. The side quests get very repetitive very quick and it feels like they're designed to waste your time. Having only a few explorable planets also means having to constantly backtrack between environments you've already visited. Like I said, the game thrives on the linear set-piece main story stuff, just like the Mass Effect trilogy did, but the open world stuff definitely put a sour taste in my mouth.
And second, the bugs and dialogue issues. These frustrated me to no end. Infinite load screens, quest markers that don't disappear, and a ton of other minor things. But the main culprit is how ambient dialogue is handled; there were too many times where some really interesting dialogue just cuts off because I drove or walked two feet, never to be heard again unless I reload a save. Another dialogue issue is one of chronology and pacing; imagine spending time dismantling an enemy base and then hours later hearing "hey, there's a new enemy base" when it's the same one you took down hours ago, or NPCs referencing an event that hasn't happened yet. The game doesn't seem to know how to pace itself, and it really suffers for it.
This game did some cool things, like taking us to a new galaxy and coming up with a pretty interesting story, making combat pretty fun, and doing away with the paragon/renegade system to instead introduce casual/professional/logical/emotional dialogue responses to shape the personality of your character. But at the end of the day, I felt frustrated with how much of my time was wasted with the boring open world design and the frustrating bugs and dialogue issues.
First off, this game absolutely did not have to be open world. The 100-ish hour playtime you see? The majority is from the mindless padding introduced in these open world environments, which are pretty monotone and boring to begin with. The side quests get very repetitive very quick and it feels like they're designed to waste your time. Having only a few explorable planets also means having to constantly backtrack between environments you've already visited. Like I said, the game thrives on the linear set-piece main story stuff, just like the Mass Effect trilogy did, but the open world stuff definitely put a sour taste in my mouth.
And second, the bugs and dialogue issues. These frustrated me to no end. Infinite load screens, quest markers that don't disappear, and a ton of other minor things. But the main culprit is how ambient dialogue is handled; there were too many times where some really interesting dialogue just cuts off because I drove or walked two feet, never to be heard again unless I reload a save. Another dialogue issue is one of chronology and pacing; imagine spending time dismantling an enemy base and then hours later hearing "hey, there's a new enemy base" when it's the same one you took down hours ago, or NPCs referencing an event that hasn't happened yet. The game doesn't seem to know how to pace itself, and it really suffers for it.
This game did some cool things, like taking us to a new galaxy and coming up with a pretty interesting story, making combat pretty fun, and doing away with the paragon/renegade system to instead introduce casual/professional/logical/emotional dialogue responses to shape the personality of your character. But at the end of the day, I felt frustrated with how much of my time was wasted with the boring open world design and the frustrating bugs and dialogue issues.