I don't have a problem with an ammo system in principle but I think the balance of capacity against how much need is pretty bad. The idea was to create tension, the problem is that if there is a risk of running out ammo then the player will sometimes run out of ammo and is that really what the designers wanted to happen? I have been stuck with one enemy left, no ammo drops on the field pre placed, no random ammo drops from enemy and spent a couple of minutes whittling down their defence because I had no ammo for the right gun for the job. I was at no real danger of dying but it was boring. Combat shouldn't degenerate to busy work, scanning already has that more than covered. Ammo depletes significantly every fight but also after almost every fight fully recovers. In fairness I am playing on insanity but the ammo system is made even more of a problem than it would be just by tougher enemies. Breaking cover to grab ammo is much more hazardous.
Gears of War is clearly a major inspiration for the handling in ME2 and has a similar depletion then you get an ammo box and it's happy days again. The difference is that it's a much slower depletion over multiple encounters. Even in a big set piece you wouldn't expect ammo to be a problem if you are starting from full. It's a different dynamic because the point of the slow depletion is to force you out of your favourite load out and pick up the guns enemies are using if you don't manage your ammo well. In GoW it generates an interesting dynamic, in ME2 it just doesn't.
A relatively minor problem that could easily be fixed is having the amount of ammo you can carry limited by your total ammo, not your reserve. For example if you have a clip of one and can carry a total of ten, if you don't have a round in the rifle you can still only carry nine shots in reserve. This generates more busy work switching into every gun and checking they are loaded before collecting ammo. Not so bad in that particular case but when you can loose almost 20% of your ammo capacity on a gun by a simple "gotcha" it feels very cheap. It's especially annoying because handling ammo capacity in that way has been so ubiquitous that the ME2 way caught me out.
I think even reducing the weapon switch times and ammo powers would ease the issue some. Regularly I seem to be forced into using the wrong weapon against a defence because of the switching time, wasting ammo. With the whole dynamic of certain weapons being strong conditionally and against different defences it seems strange you are punished so much for switching.
Overall I was open to an ammo system but the mechanics of guns (though certainly not their handling) is among a bunch of gameplay elements I think were much better in ME1.
Modifié par Devos, 31 janvier 2010 - 08:42 .
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