Aliens and space have always been a fascination with Humans, we long to know if were not alone in this big place. Mass Effect is a bit of a difficult game to review, RPG's normally are but this is a task that is incredibly hard to fathom. In Mass Effect you play as Alliance Military Commander Shepard, you are either Male or Female, you choose your first name and your appearance. You are aboard the SSV Normandy heading towards the planet of Eden Prime. On arrival you find all is not a it seems and the planet is under siege from mechanical beings known as Geth. Rapidly you find that the Geth are not the real threat and that something much greater is coming.
Your job as Commander Shepard is to round up a team of specialists and confront this threat before it is too late.
The game as mentioned before is an RPG, it is presented more in the style of a third person shooter however. The combat is great and the levelling system is even better, you can choose to put your skill points towards certain attributes or spread them making the game flow better. Bioware are renowned for their amazing game making skills, you just have to look at Star Wars: Knights of the old republic to see that these guys know what they are doing. Throughout the game you will come across a range of different alien races, all of these have back stories which can be accessed in the codex in game. Nearly everything in the game is in the codex, you just have to find it. The amount of back story the game has is phenomenal, books, comics, codex and online wiki pages stuffed with information about the Mass Effect universe before the game takes place. This information is not needed and therefore only for people who want a real in depth experience.
The game itself can be challenging and looks beautiful. It runs on the Unreal Engine 3 and pushes it to its limits. The game does sometimes have problems loading textures but it usual behaves rather well. Gunplay is smooth and satisfying and the talking sections are some of the best I’ve ever seen. Choices you make throughout the game affect the whole storyline itself and could make sections of the game easier, harder or not even playable depending on what choice you pick. You can be a Paragon (good) or a Renegade (bad) but the ending stays relativity the same no matter what you choose.
Mass Effect tries to give you as much freedom as possible but in doing so also restricts itself a lot in other areas.
The game gives you the opportunity to have relationships with crew members, whether your hated by them, good buddies or even lovers its all possible.
The game will last you around 6 hours for the main story but another 20 odd for all the side quest and exploration possibilities, sadly one you reach the final boss fight the game finishes meaning you cannot return to finish off jobs you have started.
This does mean that the game is cut short but it just means that you need to do a bit more exploring than you normally would and avoid the planets which the main quests take place on.
Overall Mass Effect is a finely tuned RPG/Third Person Shooter experience which caters for all tastes. The game is satisfyingly long, has an excellent graphical quality and provides you with one of the best stories told in recent years.
Mass Effect – 8/10
+ Simply Amazing Story
+A Brilliant RPG & TPS
- Combat Isn't For Everyone
