intensely dislike the level structure, lack of hub area.

half star on principle. this game caters to annoying Twitterites who've burned out their brains with porn

Unfortunately gets boring quite quickly due to not being that scary.

Replayability is less about having an interesting experience and more about optimising your runs. Personally I don't find that kind of gameplay very fun unless it's more action oriented.

Technically out of EA but still feels like it's lacking.

1993

THIS IS A BANGER, AND I KNOW BANGERS

played this on the Nintendo DS and I'm intrigued that the DS version might've been one of the better iterations? For some reason my mum really loved this game and we helped each other out through some of the difficult puzzle sections. Fond memories

undeniably ambitious to make an FPS for a war that was considered "too boring" by board directors for decades. Let's not delve deeper into the ethics of considering one of the most taxing human conflicts boring, not now at least.

Incredibly immersive even in multiplayer, DICE really outdid themselves with the sheer vibes. The variety of guns is cool, seeing prototypes and concepts take on some life is quite novel considering the last game I remember doing such was the G11 being in Black Ops.

Multiplayer is much better with friends but the highlight maps are Verdun Heights, Forte De Vaux, and Zeebrugge

one to keep an eye on. really love what this is presenting so far

when you buy a game to play with your friends and they play for 3 days without you this is the kind of shit they afflict you with

it's good slop, but is still slop

when there's lawsuits about your game you can tell you've fucked up

Hi if you know the cool mods for this game that allow hundreds of starfighters and add weird ships from the lore, please point me in their direction. thanks

Creating a new log to track my progress of my new Legendary Edition run & also feeling cheeky.

I think the black sheep of the trilogy may secretly be the best one? Possibly. I think the sheer saturation of colour and raw creativity gel well to make an enthralling galaxy to engage with and shoot things in. The interrelationships with various species across the galaxy and the radical positions within them make the politics one of the developed of any game of this calibre.

Paragon is popular but playing Renegade doesn't feel awful, I think the latter two entries play a little too far into being evil and cruel rather than just having a certain attitude about getting the task done efficientl.

The only noticeably bad thing is the samey planets, the Mako being either amazing or awful to drive, and the interiors of most non-main quest areas being quite obviously reused. I get it though, the concessions made were worth it but made getting Completionist a bit duller than it needed to be.

I really like that you gain XP for talking to people and exploring dialogue options. I love the exploration and the music. Mass Effect 2 might be the favourite but this one still feels really special to me.

I remember reading Xbox Magazine gushing about how awesome this game was gonna be and being overjoyed to play it back then. The emotion has mellowed to a deep understanding and appreciation of this iconic entry.

Saren and Sovereign are great too.

Rating based on the experience of an Insanity playthrough.

EA really said let's strip everything that made Mass Effect a pretty engrossing and fun RPG and make the sequel a Gears of War clone with some real "what the fuck were they thinking?" levels of game design.

Biotics are basically neutered unless Warp is part of their kit. AI hacking requiring the shields or armour to be stripped first is also nonsensical, basically makes the primary strategy to be "load up your team with evolved debuffs and forget about having fun for 10 hours. Woe betide anyone who chooses to play Infiltrator above Normal or Veteran.

The game improves greatly in terms of combat dfifficulty once you've got some upgrades in the tank but being shot to death in .3 seconds is still galling, especially when ordering around your stiff teammates is ridiculously difficult. Kasumi and her flashbang proved to be a powerful piece of kit by virtue of the fact that it stops the tanky enemies from shooting at you for a few seconds. Unfortunately, combat becomes predictable but no less frustrating

Still, this probably has the best cast and storyline of any Mass Effect trilogy title but past Normal the gaps begin to show. Considering you can roll around like Sonic in Mass Effect 3, dying simply because I couldn't bind to cover quickly enough grew to be quite tiresome.

This review contains spoilers

Rating based on my Insanity run.

Thankfully ME3 walked back on some of the absolutely horrid changes to difficulty made in 2, namely every enemy in the game having an extra meter of shield or armour. Being able to roll around to dodge fire also makes it so being out of position doesn't mean you're instantly dead like it did in the previous game.

Enemies are generally quite spongy but the grunts just have health, you can throw them around with Biotics and focus on the shielded commanders. So overall a good gameplay loop exists, juggle the fodder and focus on the big baddies.

Unfortunately save for few exceptions the forces of the Reapers and Cerberus are almost entirely identical in their enemy types, to the extent that the Geth (that were ubiquitous in Mass Effect 1) almost feel like a breath of fresh air when you run through Rannoch.

So yeah, ultimately less of a hair pulling experience than ME2 on such a high difficulty, so that's a win.

I had relatively low EMS but still just above minimum as I just wanted to get through to the ending, turns out keeping the Collector Base and doing Control is one of the better endings you can get below 6k. Renegade Shep talking about how he's going to lead the galaxy through the Reapers really does feel like A Bad Sign but I enjoy it as a portrayal of an ultimately flawed man who still saved the galaxy.

Palpable sense of relief knowing I've 100%ed the achievements on Steam and can go back to playing on Normal from here on out.

I really truly adore these micro-games David Szymanski makes. Squirrel Stapler is still his apex but this is fun. Incredibly well thought out for a game made in a week.

As always, check out the Local Files for some fun surprises