Mass Effect 3 – choose your own review (PS3)

Over the last few weeks the Interwebs has become packed to bursting point with Mass Effect 3 reviews, trailers, videos, message board discussions and general fanboy nerdgasms about one of the most acclaimed games of all time.

So, instead of regurgitating easily-Googled facts or bowing to developer BioWare like so many over-hyped reviews, we at MyGaming present to you the Choose Your Own Mass Effect 3 Review!

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1

You walk into your local game store. It’s Mass Effect 3 release day, and the excited gamers surrounding you are practically wading in their own saliva. Cut-out Shepard’s and FemShep’s alike adorn every free inch of wall space and every trembling store clerk’s T-shirt. One of these salespeople approaches you.

If you demand your pre-order copy be handed over immediately because you’re a gamer who’s played a Mass Effect game before, snatch your beloved prize and head to 2.

If you point to the game’s poster and say, “Hey, that space adventure game looks alright” because this is your first attempt at the series (or you’ve only just got electricity in your cave), head to 3.

Mass Effect 3

2

Reaching home, you tear the plastic from the box and insert the disc. You dislocate three knuckles wringing your hands in eager anticipation as the game installs – you have good reason to, as what you’re about to play is one of the most epic and remarkable conclusions to a trilogy ever seen. Poring over the box art as the installation progress bar drags along, you can practically taste the mammoth task that BioWare shouldered and ultimately achieved to create a very special piece of gaming history.

Finally, the ME3 intro rolls and you’re ready to play. Before you get into some intergalactic action though, you’re faced with an option to choose one of three play styles.

If you played either ME or ME2 seriously and plan on continuing to do so, make your choice at 4.

If you played the previous games for other reasons, go to 7.

3

You get home, casually remove the game’s plastic wrapper, but decide to watch a bit of reality TV first. After three back-to-back episodes of fisherman swearing at each other, you install Mass Effect 3 and begin to play.

Sadly, you’re quickly overwhelmed and confused by the feeling that you’ve just been dropped into a story that’s already almost over. You’re met with character after character who you think should seem familiar to you, but you honestly have no idea why this Miranda tart is flirting with you or why this Salamander guy (or was that Salarian?) knows more about your past than you do.

The shooty-shooty part of the game seems decent though, but without any understanding of why you’re doing any of it you just end up detached and rather bored.

Yes, even the catastrophic destruction of Earth bears little weight on your soul, as does the monument you discover aboard the Normandy, engraved with the names of some random strangers. Feeling cheated by what you’re sure is misplaced fanboy-ism and game reviewers who were clearly bribed, you assign Mass Effect 3 your own review score of 5/10 in your head and go back to the TV just in time for an infomercial you surprisingly haven’t seen yet.

Mass Effect 3

4

You’re pleased to see that Mass Effect 3 has incorporated choices into the overarching way you play the game as a whole. This is thanks to three different play styles you’re offered to choose from at the start: Action Mode features nothing but combat with dialogue choices chosen and dictated to you during cutscenes; Story Mode focuses purely on the narrative with combat aimed at the niche “Ages 4 and up” market; and RPG Mode is the traditional Mass Effect experience with full combat and maximum chattiness.

If you want what you paid for and choose RPG Mode, go to 5.

If you decide you’re going to play the game in either of the other two modes the Mass Effect games are not at all known for, go to 6.

5

Deciding to play the game with a balance of the story and action that brought the series this far, you choose RPG Mode. You’re then presented with the option of importing your old character from a previous savegame, a choice you gladly take in excited anticipation as to how your own personal Shepard will evolve. (You do however make a mental note to play as a new Shepard on your next playthrough: that whole business with letting Ashley die has been keeping you up at night and you’d like a chance to spare her so you can get into her p… um, good books).

Boy-oh-boy; you’re not disappointed that you played the previous games and did your homework. The opening cinematic of Earth under siege from Reaper forces is gut-wrenching, and although it’s the beginning of Mass Effect 3 you can already feel that this is very clearly the end of the trilogy.

What follows is a story filled with difficult decisions as you lead the galaxy to achieve a state of readiness before confronting the Reapers in the final battle. Each mission you complete increases this rating as you gain the support of various races and factions, though when you’re making decisions in a game with such choice, control and consequence there’s often two sides to every call: save an entire species from extinction and you earn their help along with some Paragon points to make you a more pleasant Shepard, but choose to do the opposite and you find a whole different set of results with both positive and negative repercussions along with some evil Renegade points.

What you eventually realise is that what makes these choices (and the game at large) so great is that such weighty decisions end up changing the entire galaxy, and therefore the outcome of the entire game. This is something BioWare has done with aplomb and remarkable forethought, and when you begin to discover that such choices affect the people you meet in the same way, you really begin to understand what an absolute masterpiece Mass Effect 3 really is. That favour you did for the ugly Krogan warrior Wrex not only altered the game but your friendship with him too, and opting to have an affair on the sly with that hot new character was more than just a booty call: it was for the good of the galaxy.

After being absorbed into the marvellous story long enough, if you decide it’s time to put some more gaming time into the cover-based shooting part of the game, visit 8.

If you’d rather find out more about the ‘Thousand Mile High Club’, visit 7.

Mass Effect 3

6

After choosing to play Mass Effect 3 in either Story Mode or Action Mode you find it takes a remarkably short amount of time before you end up kicking yourself for such a bad call. While there is something to be said for allowing players to choose a play style that suits them, it becomes all too apparent that neither the narrative nor the combat aspects of the game are meant to be enjoyed in a vacuum: dialogue on its own eventually becomes tiresome and occasionally vacuous without being broken up by blowing things up. Similarly, simply blowing things up feels a bit pointless when you’re doing it without having made the decision yourself (and never mind that the combat is neither strong enough nor glitch-free enough to carry the entire game).

Regretting your poor taste in game modes, you restart your journey and head to 5.

7

There’s no better way to explain the level of maturity or the impact of your decisions than the outcomes of your efforts at having a bit of an orbital orgy. Romance has become a signature feature in the Mass Effect games, and the third title in the series offers more options than ever for probing all the galaxy’s inviting nooks with your Omni-tool.

Being the thorough player you are, you have a couple of Shepard’s (and even a FemShep) with which to enjoy multiple playthroughs, and therefore multiple shots at finding love. Your brand new Shepard finds out the true definition of “blue in the face” as he woos the exotic Liara; while the character you meticulously crafted from the first and second game is a much smoother playboy, having exclusive access to Miranda or Garrus.

Your inquisitive nature also leads your bi-curious FemShep into a same-sex tryst with newcomer Samantha Traynor, a bold move on your part as well as BioWare’s for including relationships for any sexual preference.

While not necessary to complete the game, the option to explore and capitalise on all of the emotions swirled up by the impending destruction of most of the universe is an honest and welcome one.

There are many relationships to be had in Mass Effect 3, and if you’re keen on trying them all, go to 9.

If you’d prefer to delve a little further into what makes the whole package so brilliant, go to 8.

Mass Effect 3

8

By now you’ve got a good grasp of how your dialogue and relationship decisions have directed the outcome of your fight to beat the Reapers, so it’s time to focus on levelling your Shepard and his squad into a proper band of alien-ass-kickers.

The skill trees are still not particularly “branchy”, but you enjoy formulating a basic combat strategy with your Infiltrator build, choosing cloaking and sniping to work optimally with James, your tank mercenary, and EDI, your biotic superhuman.

It does take a number of battles for you to get your builds to a really interesting level, and by this time you’ve forgiven Mass Effect 3 for its occasionally shabby gameplay flaws. You’ve learned to ignore Shepard’s annoying stickiness as he tries to move around cover; you’ve made peace with the fact that you can’t turn properly while roadie running; and you’re not even fazed that your supposed increased manoeuvrability on the battlefield doesn’t really make much difference to the action at all.

There’s also this pervasive feeling that all of this gunplay is far clunkier than it should be: the finesse of Gears of War isn’t here; dishing out squad-mate commands is cumbersome through the hefty radial menu (The voice command option doesn’t count unless you own a Kinect).

However, the environments are well structured and detailed, and your crew moves effectively (albeit clumsily) despite the whole thing feeling like it could’ve spent a little more time in development.

On the upside, you’re happier than a Geth sniper in a cloaking shield factory to discover that the dull planet-scanning nonsense from Mass Effect 2 has been abandoned for a far simpler and less important system of goodie collecting. Side missions also feel less important to you as you prefer to continue your journey to become the saviour of the galaxies, as the few you do play seem drastically insignificant in comparison to the obviously-better storyline missions.

Finally, after a good 30 or so hours of play, you start to near the end.

Yes, it’s been an emotional, turbulent journey, and as you prepare to face the grim Reapers and wrap up the tale of Shepard and his crew, you pause to summarise your thoughts in a useful concluding paragraph by going to 10.

9

You begin to get concerned about the fact that you’ve had more relationships in Mass Effect 3 than you’ve had in real life, and not all of them have been with your usual sex (or even species) of choice.

You briefly hang your head in shame before heading to 8.

Mass Effect 3

10

Overall, you found Mass Effect 3 to be a game that combines a huge number of elements into a staggeringly impressive work of modern video game art.

While it wouldn’t work as either a standalone shooter or a piece of sci-fi literature, the combination of decision-based narrative and action-oriented gameplay makes it a perfectly worthy finale to a game series that had you enchanted since you first set out in Mass Effect to make the universe a better place.

As with any one of your playthroughs of the game, Mass Effect 3 is definitely not perfect, but no matter which path you’ve chosen to take you’ll always come away feeling like you’ve been a real part in something truly epic.

The are some serious downsides such as the lack of appeal to complete newcomers, and a fair number of glitches being reported on various platforms. However, when you stack them up against a ridiculously thorough story, superb voice acting and plenty of replayability, the minor issues are ones that most gamers probably won’t even notice because the overall package is sublime.

Oh, and then there’s the small issue of the game’s ending.

If you’re not entirely happy with the way things turned out, go to 11.

If you’re not impressed with the way this review turned out, go to 12.

11

Your sense of overwhelming self-entitlement starts an Internet petition to BioWare to change the game’s ending. Eventually you realise that demanding a new ending that requires hundreds of hours of development time is completely unreasonable, and you vow to behave more maturely and wait to see what unfolds in the upcoming DLCs.