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[mjack234]

 After playing all the way through Mass Effect 2, I figured I'd share my opinion with the masses (not that any of you really care, but what the hey? I got some free time.  :-) )

First of all, I was a ginormous fan of Mass Effect 1.  It's my favorite XBox game of all time.  I'm a casual gamer because of my job, but when I popped the first Mass Effect into my XBox, I spent an entire three day weekend doing nothing but play that game until I beat it.  I was obsessed with it, and engrossed in the story.  In fact, the final battle with Saren and Sovreign sent chills up my spine, and I felt like I was in my very own space opera.  It was truly a magical experience.

I did have a few gripes with ME1 that I think everyone else had.  The Inventory system and the Mako missions drove me a bit mad, and who can forget the never ending elevator rides?  But I was willing to look past those flaws in what was, in my mind at least, an otherwise perfect game.

So I was super pumped when ME2 came out.  I bought it the first day, and didn't stop playing until I'd explored every planet, done every side quest, and defeated the Collectors once and for all.

However, though I think ME2 is a good game, it in no way lived up to the standard of ME1.  Maybe I was expecting more than just a "Dirty Dozen in Outer Space" deal, but regardless, by hour 27 I was getting really bored with the game, whereas I never experienced that feeling in ME1.

So here's my ultimate breakdown of Mass Effect 2 (again, for those who care):

What I Liked

First of all, combat was much more improved in this game.  I found it to be a huge improvement over the first game and it actually played like Gears of War, which is one of my favorite shooters, so the combat was really more intuitive than the first game.

I also thought the side quests were much better than in the first game.  Exploring the different worlds gave you a great feeling of variety in terms of the quests you found than the first one did, and none of those annoying Thresher Maws to blast your Mako cannon at!

I loved the design of the new Normandy, and the characters were all great.  Each one was unique and had his or her own character arc which I enjoyed playing through.  I also enjoyed the new elevator system.  Sure, it wasn't seamless like the first one, but the loading screens were better than the slow elevator ride.  lol.

I also thought the design work was much better.  The levels were all different, the characters were all unique, and the whole game just looked beautiful.

I also liked the Shield/Heal system here better.  Getting rid of the medigels was a great move.  Made things much more fast paced and easier on the whole than micromanaging healing.

Also, the hacking minigames were FAR better than the first Mass Effect.  I really hated those twitch based button pushing things you had to do in ME1.  I guess my fingers just aren't that fast.

Finally, getting to play as Joker for a level!  It was really fun to step outside of Shepherd's skin for a bit and play as a different character.  I was kinda hoping I'd get to play as every one of my team during the suicide mission because it was refreshing to have a different POV in the Mass Effect Universe.

What I Didn't Like

Even though I enjoyed the game as a whole and would still recommend it to friends, there was a lot of stuff in it that I did not like - more than what I did, unfortunately.

First, my biggest gripe was scanning planets for minerals.  I think from reading the boards here there's a consensus for that.  It was just tedious, mind numbing work.  I wouldn't have minded it if there was a reticle pointing me in the direction of a mineral deposit, or simply a quick planet-wide scan function that automatically collected all the minerals for you.  But in order to get all the upgrades (which, for a dumb RPGer like me is an obsession) I really had to waste valuable time sitting there, bored, while scanning planet after planet.  It might have even have been nice to have some function that told you the minerals present on the planet, because I always ended up needing more Platinum than I had, compared to all the other minerals.

Second, I really hated that I had to buy fuel for my ship to travel around a star system.  Did this really add anything to the game other than as a way to waste money?  Fuel was cheap, so it wasn't like you really had to work to explore the galaxy and find all the side quests.  And if you ran out of fuel, you just automatically went back to a system with a fuel station, so it wasn't a big deal if you used it all up!  I could understand having a fuel gage if you really had to manage your exploration, and if you had to find a planet that had fuel on it when you ran out, but as of now, it just seems like an annoying gimmick that never really served any use.

Third, I was very disappointed in the type of loot you could find in ME2.  Part of exploring is finding sweet stuff to outfit your character with.  There weren't enough weapons, and the weapons had no upgrades you could mix-and-match like you could in ME1, and the armor options were very boring looking compared to the armor you could get in the first game.  But I always took time to explore every level fully and never found anything worth getting for the most part.  Maybe a couple cases of elements that didn't really contain anything substantial enough to be worth the effort of finding it.  (Speaking of weapons, not being able to change to different types of heavy weapons on the fly in the game was really frustrating at times!  Made me miss the old inventory system.)

Fourth, the lack of exploring really kinda got me down.  I can remember spending hours running around the Citadel in the first game.  I thought the levels in ME2 were a little too straight forward, and the lack of a map really irked me on some missions.  Not because I'd get lost, but just because I like to see what the level looks like.  (Yes, it's a geeky complaint, but that's how I am darn it!)  I would have liked more areas to explore without having to blast my way through generic mercenary bad guys constantly.  Also, having a radar that I didn't have to hold RB down to see would have been nice too.

Then there was the new ammo system.  The thermal clips really got annoying, especially to a casual gamer like me who can't aim to save his life.  I kept running out of "ammo" and would have to switch weapons.  I understand this can add a layer of strategy to the game for the hard core shooter fans out there, but I thought the heat system of the weapons in the first game worked just fine and wasn't too easy or challenging to manage in the big gunfights.  Not sure why this system was changed in favor of ammo clips, but I didn't think it was a smart choice.

Then there was the level up system.  i thought the system of leveling in the first Mass Effect was far better, because it was more robust.  The streamlined version in ME2 didn't make me feel like I could really tailor my characters as much as I would have liked.  This could be a small gripe to some, but I felt the dumbed-down RPG aspects kinda hurt the overall experience of playing through and leveling up.

But probably the biggest problem I had with Mass Effect 2 is the story.  Gameplay overall was great, and I really enjoyed it, but the magic of Mass Effect 1 was its layered and compelling narrative, which this game really lacked.  I know there are lots of people here who probably think the story was great, and I'm glad they enjoyed it, but I don't think it lived up to the standard the first game set and I'll tell you why...

Problems With The Story

I'm a writer by trade and have worked in the movie industry, so I'm a sucker for a great narrative.  Mass Effect 2 is basically a character drama that wants to be an Epic Space Opera.  I think they were going for more "Empire Strikes Back" which was a very character-centric movie, but they fell short in the epic-ness that made the first game so fantastic.

In Mass Effect 1, there was a mystery surrounding Saren and what his plan was.  I was curious about the questions the characters uncovered as they dug deeper into his treachery, and felt compelled to unravel the mystery.  In ME2, they tried to make a mystery out of who the Collectors were and why they were kidnapping humans, but you spent 90% of your game time doing quests that had absolutely nothing to do with that mystery!  At its core, ME2 is 3 missions worth of plot and 30 missions worth of character development.  And even though I liked the characters, there were some I just don't find interesting enough to care all that much about doing a 60 minute long loyalty quest for.

So that "propulsion system" of a building tension & drama which ME1 had in spades was nowhere to be seen, and it made ME2 a weaker game in my opinion.

Also, the lack of a major nemesis for Shepherd was a big drawback.  In ME1, we had Saren as Shepherd's nemesis.  Yes, Sovreign was the major bad guy, but Saren was the one Shepherd had to fight.  He was a real, tangible threat, and an enemy to rival Shepherd's heroics.  In ME2, Shepherd had no one to really fight against.  he had the main Prothean Overseer who took over bodies of his minions, but Shepherd never had any face-to-face time with the guy, and he was never able to mock or harm Shepherd in any way that was credible like Saren did.  This lack of a central nemesis for Shepherd to rage against made the over-all story kinda boring because I never felt anything was really at stake.  A good hero needs a good villain, and though the Collectors as a whole were a good enough "big baddie," there was nothing personalized about them to make me want to root for their defeat like I did with Saren.

Another big story gripe was that there was no clearly defined Rising Action to the main storyline.  In ME1, Saren is constantly 1-upping his plans to usher in the Reaper threat, and Shepherd is constantly racing to stop him, eventually leading to the revelations on Ios and culminating in the Battle for the Citadel.  There was a clear sense of rising action in that game.  In ME2, the rising action goes something like this:

You're told you have to go on a suicide mission.
You find out the Collectors are Protheans
You Steal an IFF from a conveniently found dead Reaper ship
Your crew is kidnapped
You go on suicide mission that you were gonna go on in the first place.

But because we never really understand what the Collector's motivation is, why they need humans, and what's at stake for the galaxy, it all falls flat, at least until its time to rescue your crew.  Then, finally, there's some sense of urgency, but until that point, the Collector threat doesn't seem very far reaching or urgent.

Which brings me to my next story nit-pick, which was I never felt there was really anything at stake for the characters or the universe as a whole.  In ME1, Sovreign was trying to usher in a fleet of reapers to destroy all life in the galaxy.  So the stakes were pretty high.  In ME2, some human colonies were disappearing, and it was suspected it has something to do with the reapers.  That's it!

Even when you finally get on the Reaper base, and you find the big human reaper that's only partially finished, you wonder to yourself: What's the big deal?  What's the big threat to the universe here?  Will this reaper try and usher in the others like Sovreign did?  It just wasn't as big a revelation as what we got in ME1.  It was small in comparison, with no real build up or payoff.  In ME1, we needed the entire human fleet to take out 1 reaper, while desperately fighting his proxy inside the Citadel, with the fate of the Galactic Council and all life in the universe in the balance.  Here, we got three guys in a remote starbase fighting a giant robot that's being pumped full of human goo for some reason.  Again, I felt like nothing big was really at stake.

There were also massive plot holes in ME2 which never got fleshed out.  I felt the story in ME1 was really tight and well written.  It gave you all you needed to know and left enough questions unanswered to get you to want to find out more.

In ME2, however, there were just too many things that didn't add up.  Why were the Protheans making a human reaper?  I got the fact that each reaper is modeled after the race it conquored, but why was it necessary to make a human one?  It was never made clear why the Protheans were doing this other than they had been "enslaved by evil."  But what was the endgame?  What would the human reaper accomplish?  And why did the Reaper require vast amounts of Human genetic material?  And if the Human Reaper was completed, what was the consequence for the galaxy?  None of these were made absolutely clear in the game.

How'd Shepherd and his team leave Omega-4?  I thought you needed a Mass Relay to get out of there, but they just seemed to shoot off using their own drive somehow, even though they were surrounded by black holes.  It might have been cooler if they were "stuck" in Omega 4 as the Reaper threat closed in from Dark Space and were unable to warn others about them coming.  But as it stands, not even Shepherd knows the Reapers are on their way.

At the end of ME1, we had a clear set up for a sequel which was dramatic, personal, and made me wanting more.  At the end of ME2, we got a cool shot of tons of Reapers heading for the galaxy, but nothing that made me go "Holy Crap I Need To Find Out What Happens Next!"  In short, the cliffhanger, while decent, wasn't as good as it could have been.

Over-all, I'd give the story of Mass Effect 2 a C+ compared to Mass Effect 1's A+.  Each mission in ME2 was, in and of itself, a good story, but I never felt like I was part of an epic galactic struggle like I did in the first one.  The more character-centric stories were good, but they weren't properly balanced with the over-all story of the Reapers and their threat to the universe.  Maybe if each story has somehow tied into the Collector's plot, it would have been better, but as it stands, it was all too episodic and disjointed.  It felt like a bunch of side-quests strung together that had no real payoff beyond character development. 

I really hope in ME3, Bioware gives us an epic conclusion to this amazing game franchise with a story that rivals or surpasses both the first and second Mass Effect.

Sorry for the long rant, but I just wanted to share my gripes with the faceless masses.  :-)

[fogofeternity]

mjack234 wrote...

 Another big story gripe was that there was no clearly defined Rising Action to the main storyline.  In ME1, Saren is constantly 1-upping his plans to usher in the Reaper threat, and Shepherd is constantly racing to stop him, eventually leading to the revelations on Ios and culminating in the Battle for the Citadel.  There was a clear sense of rising action in that game.  In ME2, the rising action goes something like this:
You're told you have to go on a suicide mission.You find out the Collectors are ProtheansYou Steal an IFF from a conveniently found dead Reaper shipYour crew is kidnappedYou go on suicide mission that you were gonna go on in the first place.
But because we never really understand what the Collector's motivation is, why they need humans, and what's at stake for the galaxy, it all falls flat, at least until its time to rescue your crew.  Then, finally, there's some sense of urgency, but until that point, the Collector threat doesn't seem very far reaching or urgent.

That's a really good point.

I understand that ME2 is the second part of a trilogy, so won't have the same kind of epic battles and finale as parts one and two. I understand that it's about developing characterization. And all of that is cool.

But I remain genuinely unsure of what they were doing to set up ME3. There's no real sense of a rising threat that Shepard and team can work to delay, but not stop, during the course of ME2. Either the Collector's actions are a vital part of the Reaper plan - in which case stopping them completely isn't entirely appropriate as a build up to an ME3 conclusion (...seeing as the Reapers have to come up with something entirely new again). Or alternatively the Collector's actions are relatively trivial, which again undermines the idea of ME2 as effective setup for ME3.

I think that's my biggest grip about the story. I really value the characterization and the idea of pulling together a team of characters who I expect to play a big role in ME3. I'm just not entirely sure what the plot progression is supposed to be, and how ME2 links into the overall storyline.

[xMister Vx]

I don't see how you could say that "we never really understand what the Collector's motivation is" - it's the whole point of the story. Yes, there is less apparent urgency for the player, but if you think from an in-game perspective, the threat strikes home. They're taking people, and more have died than during the entire story of ME1.



The only thing I agree with is that a villain always makes the game better, and Saren was quite memorable, but the nature of the enemy makes it apparent that there can't be a single villain. Quite effective in its own way.



I'm sure many people are viewing ME1 through rosy glasses - it's a natural effect - but I would like to remind you that at the time reviewers were complaining, for example, about the fact that the main villain disappears for almost the entire game, then the pacing of the story being broken by tedious MAKO sorties, and the storyline quests not being too elaborate.



In my opinion the only part of ME1 that is on par with ME2 is the very end, Virmire, not even Ilos - it's just a corridor, and the Citadel. Yes, that felt epic. But this is the middle of the story, they can't have a conclusion that is somehow more epic than the first one.



But then again, for me the main plot doesn't matter that much, as I already said somewhere else.

[vigna]

You make some great points. I love ME2, but frankly it is one of my least favorite Bioware games...only the LI/crew companion stuff seemed like Bioware to me.

[mjack234]

Yeah, it was all very unclear.



In "Empire Strikes Back," you had a lot of character development. Luke was learning to be a Jedi and come to terms with his destiny, and Han and Leia were developing their relationship. But you also had a story of how the Empire was weakening the Rebellion and how Darth Vader could influence Luke down the path of the Dark Side.



So you had a great plot interweaved with characterization. None of that was present in ME2. You had a lot of disjointed personal stories, and a very thin over-all story with no lasting impact to the over-arching plot.



Why was Shepherd so important to this mission, that he had to be brought back to life? It seems to me like Cerebus could have gotten a small army together and sent them in with the same effect. Shepherd has to be important somehow, but his importance was never really explained.



I also forgot to add, why were the Collectors seemingly obsessed with hitting colonies with his former teammates on it? And why did they feel Shepherd was "important?" If he was so important to them, why did they try to kill him at the beginning instead of boarding the ship and collecting him right off the bat like they did in the Joker quest?



A lot of things about the ME2 story just made no darn sense.

[Gabey5]

fuel was an issue. i had plenty of credits. scanning was however

[Cosmicinator]

I love both the story of ME1 and ME2, they both set out to accomplish different things, and they do their things pretty well.



I loved the epic ballad of Mass Effect 1, saving the Galaxy from a mad pawn of an un-fightable foe was as awesome entry to the saga, and I loved it!



Mass Effect 2's character-driven story was fantastic, and I felt that the missions that were to do with the Collectors were as epic as of the first game. But I do agree that compared to Mass Effect 2, the first was more grand in scope.



I really don't mind whether BioWare want to use Space-opera plots, or Character-driven ones, I'll be satisfied as long as it's intelligent, emotional, and immersive.

[Capone666]

"But because we never really understand what the Collector's motivation is, why they need humans, and what's at stake for the galaxy, it all falls flat, at least until its time to rescue your crew. Then, finally, there's some sense of urgency, but until that point, the Collector threat doesn't seem very far reaching or urgent."

The collector threat never seems urgent?
From the opening narrative there is a complete explanation of the urgency of the mission. Starting at Freedoms progress, where they are identified as faceless and mysterious entities to the culmination at Horizon when a face is truly given to this ominous evil.

Sarens motivation were never explained until it's culmination at Virmire, there were suggestions and distinctions very similar to the collectors but no specific ends mentioned.

In ME1 the old machines were a non issue until 15 hours in when they were revealed, if anything the motivation for the main character was more paramount. No more Reapers about, lets kill the people who we believe are involved with the reapers. In order to do so, gather some specialist.

Although the specialist integration was laughable, Why do we need thane? Oh because we worked hard to make a new species and listen to the EQ we did to his voice!

This all reeks of ME1 Idealism. The introduction to a mythos will always resonate more with an audience then a furtherance of said mythos.

I had similar gripes then I tried to play other games again, ME1, Dragon Age, Kotor. They all fell flat. The worlds weren't as organic. I didn't have an opportunity to listen to a krogan's discovery of a son and the pain of not knowing him. I couldn't listen to a salarian talk to his Asari daughter and wish and hope his Asari mate would remember him when he was gone.

Those moments have the kind of power that makes Mass Effect 2 alive.


Edit: As well anyone who needs to provide their resume before they give an analysis of art, does not believe their analysis has legs. BOOM System works.

Modifié par Capone666, 04 février 2010 - 07:31 .

[Lord Atlia]

I think ME2 will make a lot of sense if your crew is the same in ME3. ME2 I felt was more of assemble an A-team to save the galaxy from the reapers so that ME3 doesn't have to devote resources to character development. The collectors was just tacked on to give it a beginning, middle, and end so that ME2 just doesn't end in limbo after you recruit the last character.

[pelhikano]

Although I enjoyed the game I found the actual story in ME1 fairly trite at heart. Big evil guy Saren at first, turns out to be just a pawn, bla bla bla. ME2 wasn't as clear on who the actual threat is, but there was a slight feeling of mystery that I really enjoyed. I don't NEED a "big bad evil guy" as such, I simply want to enjoy the story and the characters. The ending of ME2 was weird frankly, but I wouldn't say it was worse than ME1.

[mjack234]

xMister Vx wrote...

I don't see how you could say that "we never really understand what the Collector's motivation is" - it's the whole point of the story. Yes, there is less apparent urgency for the player, but if you think from an in-game perspective, the threat strikes home. They're taking people, and more have died than during the entire story of ME1.

You're right, it IS the whole point of the story, which is why it irks me that it was never made clear.  Can you explain to me what their motivation is?  I get that the threat is humans are disappearing, but that's a much smaller threat than all life in the galaxy being wiped out, which was the threat from the first game.  But even so, why did they need all those humans?  What was the point of the human reaper?

The only thing I agree with is that a villain always makes the game better, and Saren was quite memorable, but the nature of the enemy makes it apparent that there can't be a single villain. Quite effective in its own way.

From a writer's perspective, a faceless villain always needs a character to embody it so the emotional pull of the story can take hold.  In Star Wars, you have Darth Vader.  In Lord of The Rings, you have Gollum.  You need a nemesis to humanize the enemy.  It just makes the story more powerful.

I'm sure many people are viewing ME1 through rosy glasses - it's a natural effect - but I would like to remind you that at the time reviewers were complaining, for example, about the fact that the main villain disappears for almost the entire game, then the pacing of the story being broken by tedious MAKO sorties, and the storyline quests not being too elaborate.

I agree with you, but even when Saren wasn't there, his presence was felt.  He was instigating all the plans that you had to fight against.  And you do fight him twice, and have a couple verbal sparring sessions with him.  In ME2, there was nothing.  And the MAKO sorties and the planet scanning are equal in my opinion, lol.

But then again, for me the main plot doesn't matter that much, as I already said somewhere else.

I think from a gameplay standpoint, ME2 is fantastic.  But from a story standpoint, which you do not seem to care about, it is seriously lacking.  ME1's story, in comparison, was amazing.

[pelhikano]

Capone666 wrote...

Edit: As well anyone who needs to provide their resume before they give an
analysis of art, does not believe their analysis has legs. BOOM System works.

Hah yeah, I found it amusing the OP said he is working in the movie industry, as if that means understanding anything about good writing. LOTS of terribly written screenplays out there.

[XFemShepX]

This is a really brilliant post.



And for the most part, I tend to agree with you. I didn't really mind the thermal clips, and the shooter action was better. The dumbed-down RPG and cruddy loot irritated me too. But really, the story in ME1 was far superior and layered, and deep. Don't get me wrong, I *liked* this game, but it just wasn't an "on the edge of your seat" game like ME1 was. Also, now that I've beat it, I don't really feel compelled to do another playthrough right away.



Everything you said towards the end of your post about the story embodies perfectly what I thought about ME2's narrative as well. Only...you put it far more eloquently than I could have. When I saw the human reaper, all I could think about was cheap JRPG elements for some reason, and I actually found the scene a little humorous than intimidating. I mean, human goo being fed to the reaper so it develops the "essence" of our species, and all that? But it also made me wonder, if reapers are created after the race they are conquering, why did the pic of the reaper fleet at the end all look like the same race? Are they more inexperienced than we think? How do they survive out there? What about indoctrination? I just think the whole plot begs far too many existential questions, and doesn't give us any truly in depth answers to push the story forward and make me squeal in anticipation for ME3.



Did Drew take part in writing any of this story? Does anyone know how that went down? Or was it all Mac? Because, y'know. If that's the case, they should consider asking Drew to kinda take the horns of ME3 and wrangle out a great story like he did for ME1. I understand, of course, that multiple writers help in the making of the game and story, but the main SL....is just too important.



And please, I really was hoping that making the shootery bits of the game better didn't mean the RPG aspects had to suffer. And before people start asking what makes an RPG great, I'm talking better loot, more options for armor and guns ( I had 2 options for all guns except the heavy, which I had like 50. Really, bioware?), and more customization. And by customization I mean either more armor or more pieces of armor, not the ability to make my armor a pretty pink with white accents. I'd take the old inventory system over what they did this time around. I'd also take the old character customizations over the ones this time around, too. Those felt equally dumbed down.



Okay, I didn't mean to rant. I just wanted to rabidly agree with the OP, sorry!

[fogofeternity]

It may simply be that ME2 will make a lot more sense in the context of ME3. ME1 works completely as a stand alone story. Not so the case in ME2. I'm at a loss as to how the story ties in, and I did feel that it failed to effectively give the impression of a mounting threat, but it may all come together effectively.

[Collider]

This is all subjective. There are no writing standards. Who says we need to have one central villain every game? Part of the great thing of creating fiction is the freedom you have. You don't need to adhere to arbitrary limits, boundaries, and quotas. You may get criticized by the so called intellectuals, but note that the self-proclaimed masters of writing aren't the majority. Mass Effect 2 was about the characters, that's obvious. And they did an amazing job there.

[MBirkhofer]

Short version.



Pacing in ME2 is off.



Pacing in 1 is done right.

You start of with intro. Then go to citidel and get all your party, learn about the world. Then opens into 3 gather info/get liara missions. During this time, you can explore the galaxy at your leisure. No mission has any real "omg needs to get done right now". So you feel ok, gallivanting around the galaxy at your own pace. You know hes out there, but no immediate threat.

until Virmire, where the game hits act 4 and races to a dramtic conclusion.



ME2 however, is constantly throwing "plot important missions" at you that seem time sensitive. Add into this, a constant barrage of loyalty missions which also all seem time sensitive(even if they arent really), and recruitment. When exactly are you supposed to explore? Gameply you do, it while, but thematically, it feels off, as you constantly have so many plot storys going on at once. That's the key. Too much going on at once. This is made worse when at the very end, the last mission really is time sensitive, when all the previous weren't really.

There really needed to be a point at which, you are given an "ALL CLEAR" go explore at your leisure fairly early on. then each loyalty mission, and any main plot missions should disable each other, so you only can get 1 or maybe 2 at a time.

[mjack234]

Capone666 wrote...

The collector threat never seems urgent?
From the opening narrative there is a complete explanation of the urgency of the mission. Starting at Freedoms progress, where they are identified as faceless and mysterious entities to the culmination at Horizon when a face is truly given to this ominous evil.

Here's what I mean when I was talking about the urgency...

It's clearly set up that humans are disappearing from across the galaxy and no one cares, yet.  That's clearly set up, and what the collectors are doing is horrible.  But what's at stake?  If they were going to destroy all of humanity, okay, I get that.  But in ME1, you always had some problem manifesting as an outgrowth to Saren's plan - the return of the arachni, the elimination of the genophage with an unstoppable krogen army, the invasion of the Citadel, etc.  Here, you have one fight in a colony that is being harvested, and that's it.

Where does this fit into the over-all picture of an oncoming Reaper invasion?  Why humans?  Why a human Reaper?  What was its purpose?  What was the threat the Collectors and the Human Reaper posed to the galaxy?

I'm not saying ME2 was bad.  I'm just saying the story isn't very clear.

This all reeks of ME1 Idealism. The introduction to a mythos will always resonate more with an audience then a furtherance of said mythos.

I liked ME2 as a game.  I'm just saying from a story perspective, there were lots of problems with it.  If you liked the game, I'm glad.  But I would have liked to have seen a better written story. 

[mjack234]

Collider wrote...

This is all subjective. There are no writing standards. Who says we need to have one central villain every game? Part of the great thing of creating fiction is the freedom you have. You don't need to adhere to arbitrary limits, boundaries, and quotas. You may get criticized by the so called intellectuals, but note that the self-proclaimed masters of writing aren't the majority. Mass Effect 2 was about the characters, that's obvious. And they did an amazing job there.

Collider - you're right.  It is subjective.  I'm not saying ME2 has a bad story, or even that its a bad game.  Like I said, i enjoyed the game.  But there are some basic story elements in epic adventure that makes these stories much better when they are present, like a central villain.

I'm all for character driven story, but here's the issue:  Shepherd is the main character.  i want HIS story.  All the other characters don't matter if their stories aren't tied into the main plot in some way.

If you look at the movie The Dirty Dozen, which its obvious this installment of Mass Effect was based on, you have a rag-tag bunch of miscreants being recruited for a suicide mission to take out the **** Leadership.  Not only do they have to learn to trust each other, they have to learn to believe in their mission and be willing to die for it.  In that movie, you had Lee Marvin as the "Shepherd" character who won the loyalty of his band of criminals and forced them to become heros, despite their nature.

In Mass Effect 2, they tried to do the same thing, but at the expense of the over-all story that Mass Effect 1 set up.  It almost feels like the second half of the game, once we got to Omega-4, should have been as long as the first half when we're recruiting and gaining loyalty.  I would have liked to have seen some of these characters pay off within the Collector base and more revelations about the Reaper threat.  As it stands, what should have been an epic space saga is just a small collection of character dramas.

Mass Effect was sold to us as an epic trilogy.  I felt ME2 was missing its epic-ness.

[keginkc]

You know the enemy as early as Freedom's Progress if you were paying any attention . On the view screens with the crazy quarian (his name escapes me...), when it's first revealed that the creatures are collectors, one of them appeared to be on fire, a creature somehow unique from the others. That was a foreshadowing, a mystery to which I wanted an answer for the remainder of the game. An answer that was teased at times through the game, as you encountered Harbinger directly, but not ultimately given until Harbinger released the Collector General and was revealed as a Reaper. The threads were there, albeit subtle, and it was clear from the opening moments of the game that there was a "Big Bad".  He just happened to spend most of his time offscreen, so to speak.

My biggest issue was that the Collectors were never mentioned in the first game (at least not that I recall), so I found the fact that everybody seemed to know they existed except for me to be a little jarring.

Modifié par keginkc, 04 février 2010 - 07:55 .

[abominare]

As much as i hate the cookie cutter movie industry, and how mind numbing it has been for the last decade, OP has a good point. ME2 just felt rushed in terms of story, like we were missing a couple story missions to explain things.

[Kalfear]

Well said OP and agree fully!



Many many many have already commented about the disjoint they feel with the story and the sence of urgency is definately not there this time around.



Great post

[FFLB]

If you really want to identify an antagonist for Shepard in ME2, I would say that the Illusive Man fits that role in a way. He goes to great lengths to help you, but his motives are unclear. You can either view him as an ally or an enemy. I personally viewed him as more of an ally than an enemy, but many others on the forum seem to view him as the enemy, even moreso than the Collectors or the Reapers. With that being left up to personal interpretation and choices in ME2, that could lead to major differences in ME3 in regards to who your allies and enemies are.



I felt that the lack of definite answers helps fans to speculate more about the game while waiting for the final chapter, rather than having all of the major questions answered with little to debate. I expect for all of the loose ends to be tied up in ME3. Only if it doesn't, then I would be somewhat disappointed.

[Garuda One]

I agree entirely with this post. Everything said is what I felt about the story. On a side note what stories has OP written, I'm intrested.

Modifié par Garuda One, 04 février 2010 - 08:02 .

[Methodjew]

Why do you expect to be given the Reapers' motivations beyond what we were given in ME1? Sovereign specifically states that organics would not be able to understand their motivations, and I think that's perfectly acceptable. When you talk with Legion, he explains the difference between the heretics and geth was simply math. 2<3 instead of 3<4. So if machines think on a different level than humans, then for one to understand the other would be difficult.



So why not speculate that the Reapers were trying to understand humanity, the race that defeated Sovereign, by creating a bridge between the two species? And how in the hell is the fact that dozens of human colonies going missing not enough of a motivation? I understand, sure, the galaxy is not specifically in danger at the moment, but the end of ME1 made it pretty clear the Reapers were coming. So if the missing colonies were linked to Reapers--something made clear very early on--why wouldn't you have the same sense of urgency that you did with Saren/Sovereign?



So you say the first had memorable moments with rachni, Citadel invasion, and "a" solution to the genophage. The first, if you let the queen go, had no real resolution. Well, let's see what ME2 had to counter those three. Geth/Quarian storylines, a resurgence of Krogan leadership, and a clear warning of what the galaxy had in store for it with the Collectors=Protheans. You might not like that ME2's main purpose was to lay the groundwork for the third game, but that's inevitably what every sequel in a trilogy does. It expands the universe/people, adds new experiences, and sets up for the grand finale.



Look at ESB: at the end you have numerous loose ends, no real idea of success at any real point (Luke fails his training, loses to Vader, Solo frozen, Rebels retreating...etc), and you're left wondering how the Rebels will win. At the very least, ME2 gave you hope by defeating at least one enemy. But ESB, largely considered the best of the SW trilogy, puts forth more questions and quandaries than it solves. This only makes the third act even better when we see everything fall into place. I really don't know what y'all expected...would you not complain if we wound up facing another Sovereign? Or, be really pissed off if the final space fight was again a fleet vs...two Sovereigns?

[Giantevilhead]

I found the first game's story to be more generic. It was basically the first three seasons of Enterprise. Humanity is new to the galactic community. They send their best and brightest, Shepard/Archer, to prove to the Council/Vulcans that humanity is worthy enough to join the galactic community. Humans get attacked by a mysterious villain, Saren/Suliban/Xindi. The Council/Vulcans don't believe that there's a problem. The heroes go into enemy territory to fight them and discover that the villains and uncover evidence of their evil plot only to discover that they're really pawns for a much more powerful villain, the Reapers/Sovereign/Temporal Cold War bad guys/Sphere Builders who have plans for galactic domination.



They at least tried something new in ME2. Although I think the biggest problem with the game is the lack of interaction with your squad. You spend all this time gathering the best team you can assemble and they each get maybe three or four lines in each of the story missions. In fact, the special skills of most of your squad never really got put to use. For example, Thane is supposed to be one of the best assassins in the galaxy but he never really got to use those skills. Pretty much the only two characters that actually used their specialized skills were Miranda and Mordin. Each character should have been given an opportunity to put their skills to use but that never happened. For example, it would have been nice if there was a point in the final mission where you find a broken Collector turret and Tali uses her engineering skills to repair it so that you could use it against the Collectors, or if during the Occulus fight, you could have Legion hack the Occulus and take it under your control to help you during the suicide mission, or maybe if you chose Jack to protect you from the swarms, she could still use some of her biotic powers to help you fight the Collectors.