20 terrible things from Mass Effect 2: the flawed writing

No matter how many 100s Mass Effect 2 received from the gaming press, it was a deeply flawed game. This post examines the abominable writing.

To prepare for the release of the demo for Mass Effect 3, I’m revisiting Mass Effect 2 in a four part series. Let’s examine 20 instances of the terrible writing in Mass Effect 2. The series will then conclude with the five worst elements of the game.

20: Don’t invent a lame excuse to take away all my stuff.

I think the only reason they killed you in the beginning was so they’d have an excuse not to transfer over your items. Being killed off and coming back to life doesn’t seem to have had any real impact past the first 30 minutes of the story. You don’t struggle with the existential crisis that should come with having been dead for two years and come back. You don’t spend more than perhaps a line or two on thoughts about the afterlife.

You were dead, then you “got better.” This should be a major plot point, in Shepard’s character arc in ME2. At the very least, there should have been more questions about the process.

Instead Shepard walks through the game like an unthinking automaton, stumbling around the edge of this enormous plot hole. They missed an amazing storytelling opportunity.

Shepard’s death in ME2 also negates anything you might have accomplished with multiple play-throughs on the same character in the first game.

As a result, Shepard’s death and unexplained recovery seem only to be an excuse to take away your stuff.

I liked my stuff.

10 terrible things from Mass Effect 2: game design hell

What makes a game good? It has to have the whole package. Sadly, Mass Effect 2 lacks in every category and the game’s design is no exception.

With Mass Effect 3’s demo coming out in less than a week, I’m revisiting Mass Effect 2 in a four part series. This second post takes a look at some of the awful choices made in the construction of the game and its mechanics. We’ll follow up with a post examining the writing and concluding with the five worst elements of Mass Effect 2.

10: Waking up in a room and fighting a bunch of robots.

So, you wake up in a room with no memory beyond the brief interactive cut-scene that failed to explain how you survived falling from orbit. Then you get the standard new game walk-through, which involves fighting a bunch of personality-free robots that have, unsurprisingly, gone rogue.

Why is there absolutely no value in the beginning of the game?

10 terrible things from Mass Effect 2: the awful characters

It would be fair to say that Mass Effect 2 received universal acclaim from critics when it was released. It didn’t deserve it. Whatever the reason, the game journalism community gave ME2 a critical pass.

With Mass Effect 3’s demo coming out in less than a week, I’m revisiting Mass Effect 2 in a four part series. This first post will look at some significant flaws with characters in the game.

10: Mordin the geeksploitation.

Mordin’s character is the geek on the team. While the rest of your team have superpowers or are action stars, Mordin’s the guy who spends the time he isn’t in your squad sitting around doing research in the lab. Mordin, “the professor,” is a stand-in for the average video-game-playing audience, or at least the type of person who’s expected to like the RPG-stylings of the original Mass Effect.

How is he characterized then?

ME3 and Amalur demos grant gamers free goodies [Update]

Kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning is about to get some well-deserved exposure when its demo is released January 17th. Completing the demo will reward you with a free weapon and suit of armor for Mass Effect 3 along with a few goodies for Amalur. Likewise, completing the ME3 demo when it releases will grant you some free gear for Amalur. Total breakdown of the items after the jump!

More Mass Effect 3 multiplayer munchables

Bioware’s Mass Effect 3 producer Jesse Houston was recently interviewed in order to answer some questions for the fans of the upcoming climax of the sci-fi trilogy. Here’s the juicy bits: You can completely ignore the multiplayer if you don’t

Mass Effect 3 to Get a Demo

The demo is set to drop in January 2012, though the exact date isn’t given. Through the demo, you’ll get a taste of the game’s single player and multi-player modes. Well, kind of. The single player will be available to

Why the Mass Effect 3 Multiplayer Might Not Suck

Bioware sure have done a hell of a lot to alienate me, the RPG fan. They’ve taken their biggest franchise and made it into a third person shooter, they’ve taken their second biggest franchise and made it into morally dual

Christina Norman, Lead Gameplay Designer of Mass Effect 2 and 3, Leaves Bioware

Talk about out of the blue–while browsing the Bioware forums today, I came across a shocking piece of information: Christina Norman, the lead gameplay designer on Mass Effect 2 and most of Mass Effect 3, has left Bioware. In a

Mass Effect 3 Live Action Trailer

Get. Hype. Bioware is getting ridiculously good at trailers, aren’t they? Things of interest: ‘real life’ omnitool, Reapers and Husks. Oh, and major cities being attacked.

Mass Effect 3 Aiming for Mass Appeal

Central to my criticism of Dragon Age 2 was that it was a game made by people who didn’t seem like they wanted to be making big Western RPGs. Rather, it felt like they would have been more comfortable making