268 réponses à ce sujet

[Bluko]

 Well besides my strong dislike of the lack of proper combat suits, ammo, etc. (things that all I feel cheapen the credibility of Mass Effect) I don't have too much issue with ME2. Though it boggles me a bit how they can keep track of all your decisions from ME1, but apparently didn't notice that having Loki Mechs and Thermal Clips at a stranded site from 10 years ago is a problem. It's for this reason I'm strongly lead to believe they rushed out ME2 too fast for their own good. The plethora of DLC afterwards seems indicative of this and I'm fairly certain Zaeed, Kasumi, and even the Shadowbroker DLC were all intended to be a part of the original release. I'm glad they've pushed back ME3's release, hopefully they will have sufficient time to do a proper job now.

Anyways I share your sentiment OP. While I enjoy a number of the missions in the game, there's no real story to pull them together. There's so little to do with Collectors that ME2 basically feels like a collection of side missions. Nevermind the fact the ME2's actual side missions are about as unsubstantial as you can get. However unlike ME1 where you are allowed to tackle the missions in any sort of order ME2 forces you down a rather specific path. The only time the game gives you any leeway is before the Derelict Reaper mission.

And there's the other thing. ME2 really provides no further exposition on the Reapers at all. I mean I distinctly remember my Shepard saying "The Reapers are still out there. And I'm going to find a way to stop them." and I also remember the Council acknowledging their existence and being all committed to preparing for the imminent invasion. None of that happens in ME2 at all. To be honest I don't even know why there's a Non-Spoiler section to begin with, cause really if you played ME1 you'll know about as much as someone who's beat ME2. Save in regards to the Geth and Protheans perhaps.

ME2 is a fun little pit stop on the way to ME3, but that's basically it.

I honestly just can't play ME2 anymore. I have two playthroughs yet to finish and the last one I recently started has even bored me. It gets so monotonous to all do the same missions all exactly the same way . Save for the fact that you can Paragon/Renegade through them in a slightly different fashion, albeit not much. Then to top it off is planet scanning. The first time playing it's a fun little diversion. After that it just becomes a chore. You have to scan the same rich planets exactly the same way. Inventory management could be a pain in Mass Effect sometimes, though if you check through it on a regular basis it's not that hard to manage. And while driving the Mako gets a bit old hat, you are free to do as little or as much as you want on the UNC Worlds. In fact you can quite easily skip them all being no worse for wear.

I've enjoyed playing through ME1 every time and while some fights may frustrate me and I may get a tad bored with some of the repetition I'm always compelled to keep playing. ME2 just doesn't do it for me, the combat in ME2 may be more refined, but it feels more like a roller coaster ride in comparison to being an actual adventure.

[Harmless Crunch]

This is the way I look at ME1 and ME2.

ME1 is the game I always wanted. A emotinal, epic, action packed ride through space to save the galaxy. A blend of traditonal RPG elements, modern 3erd person shooter combat and my own personal veichle is a game play match in heaven. Couple that with absolutley jaw dropping atmosphere, 10/10 music and stunning locations and ME1 seemed like the perfect game for me.

But it isn't perfect. Theres the recycled enviroments, horrible menus, crappy AI and bad controls on the Mako to name just a few issues.

However as I said, everything ME1 set out to be was everything I wanted in a game. Aaaand...it didn't pull it of perfectly but give it a sequal or two and you have everything good.

But ME2 didn't do that. Instead it went in a different, less creative and smaller direction.
And for the most part ME2 came damn close to perfection for what it was trying to accopmlish.

TL;DR
ME1 was everything I wanted in a game but it didn't get everything right. However ME2 did nearly everything it wanted to do right but it didn't aim for everything I wanted in a game.

[TommyH]

I'm reading this thread with great interest.

OP, I recently finished ME1 for the first time and it left me utterly positively impressed, I guess just like you were. I'm currently on another playthrough and I'm still impressed. There are some quirks in ME1 to be sure, but it's still easily one of the very "bestest" games I ever played. The story, music and direction just blow me away. We even had a thread here about it just last week, and people said I should prepare for a quite different flavor of game with ME2.

Anyway I bought ME2 and currently await delivery, the guy from auction has some problems. I'll be really curious how I will like it... I guess in all fairness (even though I have not yet seen ME2) ANY sequel to ME1 would have had a hard time to be as satisfactory in terms of story, music and direction. The bar for ME3 is also set EXTREMELY high, and that will be very hard to satisfy for Bioware. If they can pull "it" off with ME3 they really are the greatest! I'm positive though.

[Whereto]

Mass effect 2 was by far a better game, but mass effect 1 just had this thing which I still can't put my finger on, that made it such a good game. In the end mass effect 2 is far more refined and overall enjoyable, but mass effect stomps on it and has it breakfast as far as story goes.

[Phaedon]

Story is a very relative term.

ME1's plot, was far more powerful's than ME2's, but that can be attributed to it being the second chapter.

ME1's storytelling is no match to ME2's, due to two factors:
a) Cinematic design
The obvious plot devices are a problem with both ME2 and ME1, but they are much more evident *cough, Tali, Wrex, Garrus, Vigil, Conduit, Shiala cough* in ME1.

As for the story itself, I would have to strongly disagree. ME2 is a character-driven tale, and while ME1's characters are some of the best in recent gaming history, ME2 are far more interesting, both on a concept and actual level. The Collector missions are "okay", but they are not main plot, after all (try comparing the amount of character-related missions to collector-related ones), so that doesn't really matter.

ME2 was rushed? I think I saw someone mention that.
Well....that's a new one. Especially when you realize that ME1 is made up of two maps for assignments, has a main campaign that is shorter than many recent shooting games (7 missions, really?!), can't hold a decent FPS no matter the situation you are in, and can actually randomly crash for no reason. Not to mention the bad programming concerning seamless loading and well, other bugs, especially the texture loading one. Did I mention that it's development window is ridiculous when you look at the final product?

Anyway, if you want to speak "academically", ME2 was close to a perfect textbook second act. They maintained the overreaching threat, and went with it even further (although Harbinger in combat, kind of ruined it.), introduced and analyzed 4+ storylines that have already been confirmed to play a vital role in ME3, introduced and developed 10+ characters, all of which have been confirmed to return in ME3 in some way, as well. It also collected necessary resources and information for the final battle. (Normandy, Crew, Squad, Information, etc.)

Overall, I'd give ME1 a 9.0, and ME2 a 9.5.

Both games had major and minor flaws, but both are diamonds. ME2 for example, had to lose the blue-ish classic atmosphere that ME1 had. Sure, it had to do that, for the locations in the Terminus Systems and the Collector Ships/Base, but I'd much rather they replaced the 'clean' Cerberus art style (Cerberus bases, Normandy, uniforms and Kodiak shuttle) with the blue-ish tone that ME1 had.

Modifié par Phaedon, 01 juin 2011 - 09:12 .

[marshalleck]

ME1 had better story and character customization, i.e. what really matters in an RPG. ME2 streamlined the crap out of character builds and equipment. Pretty much all it got right was all the under-the-hood technical improvements--which in the interest of fairness, were excellent improvements. But it fell short everywhere else, especially in showing the results of previous decisions. I'd actually rate DA2 higher than ME2.

Modifié par marshalleck, 01 juin 2011 - 09:16 .

[JeffZero]

Ugh, Phaedon, I am so frelling glad you're here.

[Ghost Warrior]

Phaedon,I completely agree. Very good post.

[JeffZero]

To me it boils down to this: ME2 is, as Phaedon said, a textbook second act. If you were looking for something else, sorry-dorry to you. Myself, it gave me a strong version of exactly what I was expecting.

[Vez04]

Phaedon wrote...

Story is a very relative term.

ME1's plot, was far more powerful's than ME2's, but that can be attributed to it being the second chapter.

ME1's storytelling is no match to ME2's, due to two factors:
a) Cinematic design
The obvious plot devices are a problem with both ME2 and ME1, but they are much more evident *cough, Tali, Wrex, Garrus, Vigil, Conduit, Shiala cough* in ME1.

As for the story itself, I would have to strongly disagree. ME2 is a character-driven tale, and while ME1's characters are some of the best in recent gaming history, ME2 are far more interesting, both on a concept and actual level. The Collector missions are "okay", but they are not main plot, after all (try comparing the amount of character-related missions to collector-related ones), so that doesn't really matter.

ME2 was rushed? I think I saw someone mention that.
Well....that's a new one. Especially when you realize that ME1 is made up of two maps for assignments, has a main campaign that is shorter than many recent shooting games (7 missions, really?!), can't hold a decent FPS no matter the situation you are in, and can actually randomly crash for no reason. Not to mention the bad programming concerning seamless loading and well, other bugs, especially the texture loading one. Did I mention that it's development window is ridiculous when you look at the final product?

Anyway, if you want to speak "academically", ME2 was close to a perfect textbook second act. They maintained the overreaching threat, and went with it even further (although Harbinger in combat, kind of ruined it.), introduced and analyzed 4+ storylines that have already been confirmed to play a vital role in ME3, introduced and developed 10+ characters, all of which have been confirmed to return in ME3 in some way, as well. It also collected necessary resources and information for the final battle. (Normandy, Crew, Squad, Information, etc.)

Overall, I'd give ME1 a 9.0, and ME2 a 9.5.

Both games had major and minor flaws, but both are diamonds. ME2 for example, had to lose the blue-ish classic atmosphere that ME1 had. Sure, it had to do that, for the locations in the Terminus Systems and the Collector Ships/Base, but I'd much rather they replaced the 'clean' Cerberus art style (Cerberus bases, Normandy, uniforms and Kodiak shuttle) with the blue-ish tone that ME1 had.

Pretty Much This.

[marshalleck]

JeffZero wrote...

To me it boils down to this: ME2 is, as Phaedon said, a textbook second act. If you were looking for something else, sorry-dorry to you. Myself, it gave me a strong version of exactly what I was expecting.

So expect a turd and you won't be disappointed? Can't argue with that logic, actually. 

Your "textbook second act" is a load of crap. How many "textbook second acts" kill the main protagonist, only to resurrect him later as a cheap plot device to separate him from all the characters and events of the first installment? And then go on to utterly ignore the miraculous Cure For Death? Textbook my foot. That's cheap comic book quality level writing. Thanks, Hack Walters. 

Modifié par marshalleck, 01 juin 2011 - 09:25 .

[Phaedon]

Also, I am definitely supportive of a "best of both worlds" policy on both the story and game development of ME3.

There's a very sweet spot between ME1 and ME2, and so far, Bioware seems to agree.

[JeffZero]

marshalleck wrote...

JeffZero wrote...

To me it boils down to this: ME2 is, as Phaedon said, a textbook second act. If you were looking for something else, sorry-dorry to you. Myself, it gave me a strong version of exactly what I was expecting.

So expect a turd and you won't be disappointed? Can't argue with that logic, actually. 

Your "textbook second act" is a load of crap. How many "textbook second acts" kill the main protagonist, only to resurrect him later as a cheap plot device to separate him from all the characters and events of the first installment? And then go on to utterly ignore the miraculous Cure For Death? Textbook my foot. That's cheap comic book quality level writing. Thanks, Hack Walters. 

I apologize if my personality subroutine has offended you in any way. Please contact... oh whatever, I really can't be arsed to look up Avina lines for this.

Plenty of textbook second acts separate the protagonist. Lord of the frelling Rings separated the protagonists. Resurrection issues got your tongue? Sorry 'bout that one. But separation and universe-expanding at the partial expanse of the overarching plot? Check and mate.

[Leonia]

I'm still of the opinion that the whole death-and-rebirth thing will make a lot more sense once ME3 is out and we see it within the context of the whole triology, as will a lot of smaller decisions that we haven't seen the results of yet. Remember it's ONE story, you can't really look at any one game in isolation (unless you're just talking about game mechanics, that is).

Modifié par leonia42, 01 juin 2011 - 09:37 .

[marshalleck]

JeffZero wrote...


Plenty of textbook second acts separate the protagonist. Lord of the frelling Rings separated the protagonists. Resurrection issues got your tongue? Sorry 'bout that one. But separation and universe-expanding at the partial expanse of the overarching plot? Check and mate.

Separating the protagonist is not what I said. What I said was using death and resurrection to do it, and then proceeding to completely ignore the miraculous event. You cheapen the narrative when you do that, not to mention undermine the dramatic impact of character death when they can just be magically technologically resurrected again.

leonia42 wrote...

I'm still of the opinion that the whole death-and-rebirth thing will make a lot more sense once ME3 is out and we see it within the context of the whole triology, as will a lot of smaller decisions that we haven't seen the results of yet. Remember it's ONE story, you can't really look at any one game in isolation (unless you're just talking about game mechanics, that is).

Maybe, but I'm skeptical considering how Bioware handled it. They seemed to go out of their way to reinforce again and again that Shepard is 100% Shepard, there's nothing curious or interesting about his resurrection, and we should all stop asking questions. There are only a handful of times you can ever mention it, and eachtimes you're abruptly shot down with no explanation and essentially told to mentally handwave it. 

Modifié par marshalleck, 01 juin 2011 - 09:39 .

[Phaedon]

marshalleck wrote...

JeffZero wrote...

To me it boils down to this: ME2 is, as Phaedon said, a textbook second act. If you were looking for something else, sorry-dorry to you. Myself, it gave me a strong version of exactly what I was expecting.

So expect a turd and you won't be disappointed? Can't argue with that logic, actually. 

Your "textbook second act" is a load of crap. How many "textbook second acts" kill the main protagonist, only to resurrect him later as a cheap plot device to separate him from all the characters and events of the first installment? And then go on to utterly ignore the miraculous Cure For Death? Textbook my foot. That's cheap comic book quality level writing. Thanks, Hack Walters. 

Many second acts end up as turds, but there are others who are very enjoyable, as I said, the story is not necessarilly worse than the first act (and that's not the case with ME2 as far as I am concerned), though the plot tends to be less powerful. If you compare a third act to a first act, the first act is the turd there. And you know why? Not because the writers suddenly enter a state where they start producing godly scripts (though that does apply to some ), but because the second act sets up the third act very well. 

Oh, and killing off Shepard? Tell me, how else, could he work for Cerberus? Remember, a good bunch of Shepards, if not most of them, are, wait, how does my favourite YouTube analyst call them? Oh yeah, stupid idealists. Even renegades don't have much of a reason to work with Cerberus otherwise.

It is a very usual textbook act 2 feature to vastly change the conditions that the protagonist is fighting in, and really, the Council and the Alliance don't seem to give a cr@p, Cerberus has an advantage over Shepard for rebuilding him, and this leads to a situation where s/he agrees to investigate Freedom's Progress. After that, when the threat is established, there doesn't seem to be much of room for choice. Everyone has abandoned you, and if you go 'freelance', you won't have: a) Cerberus Funding, The handpicked team, c) A ship.

So yeah, indeed, awesome writing there Mac.

EDIT: Oh, and you want to know why that happens? Because otherwise, it's boooooring. The first act always establishes the universe and includes the first clash with the overreahing threat. The second act has to set up everything for the third one, and a change of style certainly makes things more interesting than they normally would. Also, it's a nice way to move the plot forward.

Modifié par Phaedon, 01 juin 2011 - 09:41 .

[Ghost Warrior]

Once again,Phaedon nailed it. Good job!

[Tamahome560]

Phaedon always kicking ass in those ME2 I'm dissapoint threads. I agree with you. So far ME3 info we have is clearly showing that ME3 will mix best thing from ME1 and ME2 while even further improving them.

[Leonia]

marshalleck wrote...
Maybe, but I'm skeptical considering how Bioware handled it. They seemed to go out of their way to reinforce again and again that Shepard is 100% Shepard, there's nothing curious or interesting about his resurrection, and we should all stop asking questions. There are only a handful of times you can ever mention it, and eachtimes you're abruptly shot down with no explanation and essentially told to mentally handwave it. 

Sure, it's ok to be sceptical. Just as we have no current explanation of how to defeat the Reapers, we've been told time and time again that they are practically invinvible. That's where ME3 comes in, to answer our questions and lead us towards the dramatic conclusion where a bunch of lightbulbs will go off and we'll all be going "Ah ha that's why such and such happened!"

Modifié par leonia42, 01 juin 2011 - 09:44 .

[JeffZero]

Unfortunately, marshalleck will not have his doubts quelled by Phaedon's forum-arguing prowess. He's been a tough cookie on ME2's plot for as long as I've been around -- judging by his join date, likely far longer.

Wish him the best of luck in enjoying ME3's more, but as someone who likes both games for their storytelling, I feel a bit of pity that he cannot.

[marshalleck]

 Phaedon's forum-arguing prowess? He ignored the main thrust of my argument just like you did. And I'm quite accustomed to him offering up excuses, it gets a bit boring to converse with him. But yeah, everyone keep riding his nuts. It sure is easy when you can just quote someone and say "this!" 

[JeffZero]

marshalleck wrote...

 Phaedon's forum-arguing prowess? He ignored the main thrust of my argument just like you did. And I'm quite accustomed to him offering up excuses, it gets a bit boring to converse with him. But yeah, everyone keep riding his nuts. It sure is easy when you can just quote someone and say "this!" 

I don't get behind people I don't genuinely hold respect toward, internet or otherwise.

The main thrust of your argument is what, then, the magical cure for death? Sure, in the Mass Effect universe it's not as easy as 1-2-3 and you're as good as new. Oh, what's that? You need more money than just about anyone alive has ever even heard of and access to the most sophisticated, cutting-edge medical technology and personnel? And it takes a solid two years and even then, it's dodgy as all hell? That magical cure for death?

Sure, if you have so much problem with it then I feel for you.

[JeffZero]

Of course, if your main thrust were something else, you'll have to forgive me. I'm in the middle of eight things, all of which annoying.

[marshalleck]

JeffZero wrote...

marshalleck wrote...

 Phaedon's forum-arguing prowess? He ignored the main thrust of my argument just like you did. And I'm quite accustomed to him offering up excuses, it gets a bit boring to converse with him. But yeah, everyone keep riding his nuts. It sure is easy when you can just quote someone and say "this!" 

I don't get behind people I don't genuinely hold respect toward, internet or otherwise.

The main thrust of your argument is what, then, the magical cure for death? Sure, in the Mass Effect universe it's not as easy as 1-2-3 and you're as good as new. Oh, what's that? You need more money than just about anyone alive has ever even heard of and access to the most sophisticated, cutting-edge medical technology and personnel? And it takes a solid two years and even then, it's dodgy as all hell? That magical cure for death?

Sure, if you have so much problem with it then I feel for you.

Well let's try a new perspective. Say Shepard has to go with the 'heroic sacrifice' at the end of ME3. Do you think you could honestly say that one of the first thoughts to pop in your head, after Shepard's death, won't be "Lazarus II"?

That's what I mean by undermining the dramatic impact of character death.

And as far how to separate the group and move Shepard into a new chapter--I'm just not really seeing why he had to be killed to do that. Pretty much each character had a reason to move on. Garrus was going back to either Spectre training or C-sec, Wrex was gong to Tuchanka (if he was alive), Tali had finished her pilgrimage and was due back at the flotilla, either Ashley or Kaidan were dead and the other could have been reassigned to geth cleanup (which honestly was beneath Shepard's capabilities) and Liara had a Prothean treasure trove on Ilos to study. 

Modifié par marshalleck, 01 juin 2011 - 10:04 .

[JeffZero]

It's hard to argue with that logic; it's traced my mind before. Of the three files I've now completed, two of those Shepards would gladly sacrifice their lives in the name of just about any of the galaxy's sentient races, but it would feel a bit odd to do so after ME2's opening, sure.

That said, if there were no trace of the commander left behind in the aftermath of a stronger-than-hydrogen explosion or something, I'd still take zero issue with it. It would only bother me if it were a blaze of gunfire or a blunt-force impact or... just about anything else, really.