Review: Mass Effect 2

A Note: I only played through this game once, which took 30 hours. To cover every type of gender, character type, and morality style, I would have had to play the game at least three times. This review is my experience playing a Male Soldier Shepard who mostly makes good decisions.

Mass Effect 2 is an action RPG/third-person shooter for the PlayStation 3, PC, and Xbox 360. It was developed by Bioware.

Commander Shepard shooting a large mech. The bottom icon shows how much shield Shepard and his/her crewmates have; the top icon is the enemy health bar; and the bottom left shows what weapon Shepard is using and how much ammo it has.

Two years after the events of Mass Effect, Alliance hero Commander Shepard has been killed and resurrected by the morally dubious organization Cerberus. With Cerberus’ backing, Shepard is tasked with finding out why the mysterious alien race known as the Collectors are abducting human colonies around the galaxy. Shepard has to put together a crew that can find out the connection between the Collectors and the galaxy-threatening race known as the Reapers, and stop them.

Mass Effect 2 focuses on Shepard and to build a crew for his/her spaceship, the Normandy, and completing missions. The main complicated missions are about recruiting new crewmembers, with about three focusing on dealing with the Collectors. There are also plenty of side missions that Shepard can complete for experience and money.

Missions come in two parts. In the first part, Shepard and two crewmates travel to a planet and walk around, talking to people until someone can point them in the direction of the second part. This part is really dialogue heavily. Areas can have many people with conversations that several minutes long and cover both the current mission and lots of back story about the area and people.

Mass Effect 2 uses a morality system in its dialogue. When Shepard is talking to someone he or she will have several choices in dialogue options, either finding out more non-essential information or making the mission move forward. The game considers most dialogue good or evil, or “Paragon” or “Renegade” as the game puts it; when the player chooses a good or evil dialogue option, the game gives the player good or evil points that fill up a bar. Filling up either bar unlocks more dialogue options that sometimes makes completing the mission easier or have a better reward. It also opens up additional actions Shepard can do during cut scenes; for example, if the player has accumulated enough Renegade points, Shepard regularly has the option of shooting or punching someone who is talking too much.

The writers for Mass Effect 2 did a really good job. The conversations are always informative and really flesh out the universe; they are easily the best part of the game. Characters actually talk like real people and do not come off as tools the developers use to move the game forward. Dialogue is presented as simple when the player has to choose what to say, but what Shepard says is more complicated.

Speaking of the writing, the Mass Effect universe is one of the most thought out sc-fi universes ever created. All the aliens have complex, interesting, well thought out civilizations and histories. Their histories and interactions with each other are similarly complex, and it is fun to see how they are weaved effectively into game. The massive backstory is found on the ingame encyclopedia, which can take a couple of hours to read, but it is totally worth it to feel more a part of the game and see why different characters act the way they do towards each other. Anyone who does not like science fiction will not find the story interesting, but they should not be playing this game anyway.

The main story with the Collectors is pretty short; it only lasts about three missions which are a couple hours total. Most of the game is padded out with recruiting crew members by fixing whatever personal problems they are dealing with. The crewmate’s stories come off as trivial compared to the galaxy wide threat the Collectors present, but the characters are so interesting that it is easy to ignore.

The morality system is a double-edged sword. It is nice that the player has multiple ways of dealing with a situation and that being good or evil has different outcomes. But it is not fair that the player can only access certain dialogue if they are good or evil enough. There is no benefit from restricting the player like that. More importantly, Bioware is not the end all authority for what is right and wrong. I personally disagreed several times with what Bioware designated the “evil” choice and do not like being penalized for not agreeing with them.

In the other, smaller part of the game, Shepard and two crewmates go to travel to someplace and shoot up the place. These parts play like a regular third-person shooter; one button aims, the other button shoots, and another reloads. Pressing a different button makes Shepard take cover behind an object, and then pressing the aim button makes Shepard peak out behind the object. Shepard and his/her crewmates also have special powers like special ammo that damages shields. These powers are leveled up with experience Shepard and co. gain from completing missions. Shepard has five types of weapons he/she can use, which all use the same ammo found lying around. Shepard has a regenerating shield and health bar.

Combat areas are not bad, but they are not particularly memorable either. It can get difficult sometimes when there are lots of enemies, but it is way too easy to just duck behind something and wait for the shields to regenerate. Having a variety of weapons is nice, but there is no reason to switch between them unless one runs out of ammo, or the enemies are too close to use the sniper rifle, which is not often. The special powers Shepard and crew have to do not help that much in a fight, nor do the crewmates themselves, who at best are useful for distracting the enemies. The enemies themselves may differ in their appearance (humans, aliens, robots), but they all play the same, except for the occasional giant mech. And, except for the levels involving the Controllers, most of the levels have a similar chrome-and-boxes-everywhere look, whether it is on a spaceship, or a prison, or an apartment; the only difference being how derelict the place looks. Still, even with all this flaws it is fun to pick off enemies while they try to gun down Shepard, like a shooting gallery, it is just a flawed system.

Big missions contain both parts. Shepard will walk around until he/she talks to the right person who tells them where the fight is. Shepard then goes to that area and fights. Some missions only have the second fighting part, but no missions have only talking.

During missions Shepard can find weapon upgrades and money to buy weapon upgrades. Missions can only be played through once, which is a pain since it is possible to miss upgrades and money is in limited supply.

The game has several small technical problems as well. There are several long loading times; character models look stiff, and faces can look unsettling; the written text has a tiny hard to read font; and sometimes the game glitches, like Shepard getting stuck in one area.

Mass Effect 2 is not a great game. The combat is average; the morality system is limiting; missions can only be played once; and the graphics have problems. But the world and the characters are so cool and immersive that it is impossible to care. It is a joy just to walk around and talk to everyone in this game that many of its problems are easily ignored, at least for the first playthrough.