Young Writers Society

Release Date: Out now

Consoles: PC, XBOX 360, Playstation 3 ( released on 21 January 2011)

Age Rating: 15 (UK)
Mass Effect was one of the most critically acclaimed games of 2007, and combined bits of classic western role-playing games, (like Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Fallout and the Elder Scrolls series) with modern shooters such as Gears of War. The result was an epic Sci-Fi adventure with a great blend of combat and exploration, but the by far the best part about Mass Effect was the dialogue between your character (named Sheppard) and the members of your crew. Considering that Mass Effect sold really well, it was inevitable that they would make a sequel and here it is, so how good is Mass Effect 2?

The Answer? Awesome. I’ll give you a quick setup without spoiling too much of the games plot, after you defeat Saren and the Geth in Mass Effect 1, you are recruited by a mysterious figure known only as the Illusive Man, the head of the shadowy Cerberus Organization, (a pro-human dominance group you encountered in the first game) who wants you to investigate the disappearances of entire human colonies, the plot grabs you from the get-go and doesn’t let go until the nail-biting climax, but that’s not even the best bit: Mass Effect 2’s biggest innovation is the ability to import your character from Mass Effect 1 into Mass Effect 2, meaning that all the decisions you made in Mass Effect 1 will shape the world of Mass Effect 2, from the really important stuff, (Like if you were able to save a certain character from dying) to the little details. (Like deciding to threaten a guy who’s obsessed with you, or to talk him out of following you) This means that everyone of your decisions has a consequence, and it makes taking those decisions even more fun. (I can tell that I agonized for a while over what I should do on more than one occasion)

The core gameplay of Mass Effect 2 is still the combination of shooting from behind cover using your Biotics, (combat focused psychic powers, this game’s equivalent of magic in other games) and commanding two of your crew to defeat your many enemies, but the whole process has been streamlined and made much more user friendly: For example; you no longer have to go through endless equipment screens to make sure all of your character have all the gear they need and sift through all the rubbish stuff that a random crate gave you two hours ago, instead you use elements you mine from planets to research upgrades that benefits your whole squad. The Conversation mechanics have been mixed up as well, before you had to put precious talent points (experience points you get from gaining levels, every time you level up, your entire team does as well, so you don’t have to worry about getting newer characters up to scratch) into intimidate and charm slots so you could get better choices when talking to people, now your speaking abilities are directly influenced by your Paragon and Renegade scores (this game’s good and evil scales. A Paragon character will try and help as many people as possible while a Renegade will try and do the job no matter what the cost) so if you comfort the mother of a murdered girl, you earn paragon points, and if you tell someone who’s bothering you to naff off, you earn Renegade points. If you do enough of either, you will unlock more things to say while talking to people.

And you will do a lot of talking in the game, (at least 2/3rds of my 50 hour play through were spent talking to people) not that this is a bad thing, the game has 90 actors playing 546 different characters speaking in total a staggering 31 000 lines of dialogue and none of it drags, that’s a real achievement. The best and most involving conversations you are going to have are the ones with your crew. As you roam the galaxy trying to save the human colonies, you will pick up members for your elite team, all of which have different powers and abilities and have a unique back story which you can explore in that character’s side mission Also, if you play your cards right, you may be able to enter a romantic relationship with different characters depending on the gender of your Sheppard. The Characters themselves are well developed and interesting, and their side-missions fun. The exception being Jacob, a clichéd, ‘I got kicked out of the army because I wasn’t happy with what they were doing’ character that feels really underdeveloped alongside some of the other people you recruit. Another new addition to the series are the Paragon and Renegade actions, at some points during cutscenes an icon will flash in the bottom half of the screen, blue for Paragon or red for Renegade, if you press ethier the left trigger (Paragon) or the right trigger (Renegade) you will interrupt the action and do something (for example I saved someone from being shot at one point) that will change the outcome of the story, it’s a really neat addition and makes you feel powerful and in control.

The game’s graphics are incredible, the planets and ship interiors look great, and the FMVs of the Normandy docking are simply gorgeous to look at, but best of all are the characters, you can tell that Bioware did a lot of work on them, especially their faces, you can make out virtually every pore when the camera gets up close, and the lip-synch is perfect. The visuals can be buggy at times though; I definitely had a character turn around to face me while her eyes were still looking at the character through the back of her skull so it looked like her eyes were rolled back and you could only the whites.

In conclusion Mass Effect 2 could easily be game of the year, it has some great combat, some really excellent choices to fret over, and some of the best characters in a videogame ever. You should really buy this game, seriously, right now. Oh, and wait for Mass Effect 3 already in development.
Sheppard: I hope everything’s all well in the cockpit?
Joker: Yeah, I fractured my thumb on the mute button but I think I made my point…