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Mass Effect: Andromeda - EA/Origin Access trial coming March 16th - 10 hour trial
- Thread starter Theorry
- Start date
cripterion
Member
Hmmm don't know what to tell ya, I'm sure it sucks to be not being able to progress due to crashes. The game needs patches that we can all agree on.
Captain Tuttle
Member
My hour first hour or so with the game had me disappointed but I trudged through, made it to The Nexus and feel much better now. It's definitely a Mass Effect game with everything that entails. Some wonky animations and a glitch here and there but otherwise I'm digging it, glad I took Tuesday off
MagicWithEarvin
Member
8 hours with the game so far on PC (i7-4790k / GTX 1070):
4 hours of MP:
+ If you enjoyed ME3's MP, you'll enjoy it here
+ Maps are smaller, but more vertical - allowing dynamic firefights more often and matches go by quicker
- Rubber banding, lag and weird animation issues
- Sound mixing is awful and needs to be fixed
4 hours of SP:
+ It looks and plays nice on my PC at 1440p / 60 FPS with a mix of high and ultra settings
+ Gameplay gives you more variety with access to all skills
- Planet scanning is simplified, but kind of pointless and takes up time (especially if there are no anomalies to scan for)
- Some of the dialog and writing is just bad
- Just like with the MP, animations are weird and all over the place
It's Mass Effect, so the sense of wonder and planetary exploration keeps you wanting to play more. Will be another divisive game in the series, but I don't think it's terrible - there's fun to be had in MP and SP! It gets a purchase from me since I'm engrossed with the series and I want to see the story through the end to see if BioWare made any improvements.
4 hours of MP:
+ If you enjoyed ME3's MP, you'll enjoy it here
+ Maps are smaller, but more vertical - allowing dynamic firefights more often and matches go by quicker
- Rubber banding, lag and weird animation issues
- Sound mixing is awful and needs to be fixed
4 hours of SP:
+ It looks and plays nice on my PC at 1440p / 60 FPS with a mix of high and ultra settings
+ Gameplay gives you more variety with access to all skills
- Planet scanning is simplified, but kind of pointless and takes up time (especially if there are no anomalies to scan for)
- Some of the dialog and writing is just bad
- Just like with the MP, animations are weird and all over the place
It's Mass Effect, so the sense of wonder and planetary exploration keeps you wanting to play more. Will be another divisive game in the series, but I don't think it's terrible - there's fun to be had in MP and SP! It gets a purchase from me since I'm engrossed with the series and I want to see the story through the end to see if BioWare made any improvements.
oneils
Member
edit: update, I've played it on pc now and love it http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=232344044&postcount=3466
Played about 5 or 6 games in multiplayer, last night. Only extracted once. Ack.
Gripes
I have a few gripes, but my main one is the cooldowns for powers. They are really long now which is a major bummer. It made me want to go back to me3 mp. Seriously. I don't get the sense that levelling up my characters and unlocking equipment will change this.
The menus drive me crazy. Maybe I will get used to them and get along. Not sure.
The green markers for friends are annoying. I'd much rather have green dots in the compass for them. They clutter up the screen.
Auto cover is annoying. I don't really want it. Maybe this something I will adapt to though and maybe I should move it down below to "things I suck at."
Still haven't figured out to hover jump when a scope is equipped. Hover and aim are the same button and when I try to hover I aim down the sight. Either the games stupid or I'm stupid. I'm not sure which.
The old audio cues seem to be gone. The audio, in general seems worthless. But me3 mp audio was all messed up for me anyway so it's not necessarily a step backwards. The audio for guns is lacklustre which is surprising considering battlefield has probably the best audio around.
Things I suck at
I don't know what I'm doing with shotguns. I only have a katana 3 but it seems weak as hell. Maybe I need practise with headshots. I'll see if this is something I just have to get better at.
Objective waves are a clusterfuck. I think we all have to relearn them now. I think enemies swarm objective points if we all crowd together in them. More so than in the last game. Looks like we are meant to split up.
Things I like
I think I'm just too new at this to explain what I like. I have about 215 hours into me3 mp, so it's tough. I'm finding it hard to enjoy the new multiplayer. I'm hoping it will click as I level up kits and get used to the new controls. I played most of my me3 mp on pc, and I've played this trial on Xbox. Maybe a mouse and keyboard will be easier for me.
Edit: I'm still having issues where the prompts in lobbies change. For example "press y to inspect squad" changes to "a" once you leave the inspect view. Y becomes votekick after that. It is really weird and annoying.
Gripes
I have a few gripes, but my main one is the cooldowns for powers. They are really long now which is a major bummer. It made me want to go back to me3 mp. Seriously. I don't get the sense that levelling up my characters and unlocking equipment will change this.
The menus drive me crazy. Maybe I will get used to them and get along. Not sure.
The green markers for friends are annoying. I'd much rather have green dots in the compass for them. They clutter up the screen.
Auto cover is annoying. I don't really want it. Maybe this something I will adapt to though and maybe I should move it down below to "things I suck at."
Still haven't figured out to hover jump when a scope is equipped. Hover and aim are the same button and when I try to hover I aim down the sight. Either the games stupid or I'm stupid. I'm not sure which.
The old audio cues seem to be gone. The audio, in general seems worthless. But me3 mp audio was all messed up for me anyway so it's not necessarily a step backwards. The audio for guns is lacklustre which is surprising considering battlefield has probably the best audio around.
Things I suck at
I don't know what I'm doing with shotguns. I only have a katana 3 but it seems weak as hell. Maybe I need practise with headshots. I'll see if this is something I just have to get better at.
Objective waves are a clusterfuck. I think we all have to relearn them now. I think enemies swarm objective points if we all crowd together in them. More so than in the last game. Looks like we are meant to split up.
Things I like
I think I'm just too new at this to explain what I like. I have about 215 hours into me3 mp, so it's tough. I'm finding it hard to enjoy the new multiplayer. I'm hoping it will click as I level up kits and get used to the new controls. I played most of my me3 mp on pc, and I've played this trial on Xbox. Maybe a mouse and keyboard will be easier for me.
Edit: I'm still having issues where the prompts in lobbies change. For example "press y to inspect squad" changes to "a" once you leave the inspect view. Y becomes votekick after that. It is really weird and annoying.
8 hours with the game so far on PC (i7-4790k / GTX 1070):
4 hours of MP:
+ If you enjoyed ME3's MP, you'll enjoy it here
+ Maps are smaller, but more vertical - allowing dynamic firefights more often and matches go by quicker
- Rubber banding, lag and weird animation issues
- Sound mixing is awful and needs to be fixed
4 hours of SP:
+ It looks and plays nice on my PC at 1440p / 60 FPS with a mix of high and ultra settings
+ Gameplay gives you more variety with access to all skills
- Planet scanning is simplified, but kind of pointless and takes up time (especially if there are no anomalies to scan for)
- Some of the dialog and writing is just bad
- Just like with the MP, animations are weird and all over the place
It's Mass Effect, so the sense of wonder and planetary exploration keeps you wanting to play more. Will be another divisive game in the series, but I don't think it's terrible - there's fun to be had in MP and SP! It gets a purchase from me since I'm engrossed with the series and I want to see the story through the end to see if BioWare made any improvements.
77% Halle Berry as Storm.
The only thing which has me slightly discouraged are the impressions, one from a few days ago, one from today, which mention the performance issues on the Pro. I'm still optimistic, but damn, that would be disappointing.
AgentOtaku
Member
Aaand that's basically a wrap for me. 15 minutes or so left in the trial, still stuff to do, but I'm tapping out until the full release where I fully intend to restart afresh.
Interesting experience. As a whole positive and excited to play at launch, knowing I will lose myself in the galaxy and story and likely comb over every bit of content it has to offer. Definitely a slow burn, finding myself more drawn to the premise and design towards the tail end of the trail compared to the early hours. I put this down half due to preconceptions and assumed baggage from my love and experience with the trilogy, given Andromeda shamelessly casts it all aside for what is now abundantly clear a soft reboot. It feels like Mass Effect, but a very different, new template Mass Effect. And in part due to surprising technical and production deficiencies, particularly in cutscene animation and general jank, which is not a game killer to me, but surprisingly consistent on the average-to-poor spectrum. Something clearly didn't work out there.
I'm expecting a bunch of bugs and quirks at release and the following months. That is par for course for literally every game of this scope and calibre, no matter the developers. I just hope they're not too significant. I feel, like Wild Hunt, it'll be an even better game 6 - 12 months from now with QOL patches and bug crunching, but I'm not interested in waiting. I hope the narrative and cast hold their own throughout. I don't buy the vague "It's just like Inquisition!" criticism, which rings hollow to me; exploring Eos and uncovering what happened through scanning and ambient dialogue had me intrigued and I look forward to more of that. I think ultimately much of the cast and narrative just need time to prove themselves. They've got huge shoes to fill, unfairly maybe. Getting to know and develop an entire game's worth of completely new stuff is hard to put up against characters developed over three games. But we'll see.
Multiplayer needs massive patches or at least regional filtering. It feels really good to play but it's busted as fuck in latency and audio positioning. Very disappointed there. And if Andromeda cant hold the longevity and fan legacy that ME3 had, the multiplayer will be dead pretty quickly and that'll just make me more disappointed. Big gamble there, but hoping stuff gets ironed out ASAP. Filter, BioWare. Please please please. Let met matchmake locally. Please.
My prediction is that despite the franchise legacy and huge scope of what I do feel is a good game, it'll be somewhat divisive in reviews. I'm expecting a low 80s metacritic average. Which doesn't really mean shit to me, but you know, for the sake of speculating regarding a AAA mass market game, that's where I'm going. I think fan reception will be hugely divided too. And ultimately I feel the response from across the board will have a significant impact in an Andromeda 2, much in the same way as Mass Effect transitioned to its sequel, should we ever actually see it. Worse case scenario; divisive reviews and a cynical buzz surrounding the title seriously dampen the overall sales, launching decently but having poor legs. Price gets dropped low early. EA is generally unhappy and puts the franchise on the backburner for awhile, shifting emphasis back to the next Dragon Age, a Star Wars game from BioWare, and Edmonton's Destiny.
Nevertheless; I am excited and keen to play, eager to yet again lose countless hours of myself in the franchise that just keeps abusing me. I hope it doesn't fall to pieces as the adventure goes on. I hope the multiplayer gets fixed, and is sufficiently supported. I hope patches and updates smooth out bugs and rougher content quickly. I hope the inevitable DLC is appealing and rich. And I hope EA and BioWare don't drop the series, but take lessons on storytelling, design, and technology forward to a successor.
Awesome write-up man, thanks!
Is that one of the default Ryder's btw?
I'm thinking I wanna make either an asian or black female lead
EatChildren
Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
I used one of the asian defaults and made my own tweaks to ton and face. Pretty happy with the result.
Yes. BioWare has a massive boner for comic-book-like power fantasy protagonists.
Yes, just as much Inquisitor was new 'Commander Shepard'.
Caayn
Member
People basically see you as the second coming of Christ as the pathfinder in ME:A.
You mean like a SPECTRE from the original trilogy?
Systolique
Member
And then you realise the fanbase is completely fine, and it actually is the growing culture of GAF that likes to shit on games (or consoles) they weren't going to play anyway.
FrontalMonk
Banned
No, he means like one of the Grey Wardens, or The Nameless One, or a Bhaalspawn. Keep up.
I think the whole 'Jesus'/Chosen One aspect is fine specifically for Mass Effect. Mass Effect was initially created to emulate the old 60's/70's scifi and Shepard was a stand-in for Captain Kirk.
They were trying to capture a certain feeling and the renegade Captain out to save the universe was part of that. I don't think it would be "Mass Effect" without it. Now I don't see that as being so integral to Dragon Age so they might have room for change there and who knows what they're doing with the new IP. However at the end of the day, Mass Effect is all about being a power fantasy but I feel there's nothing inherently wrong with that because that's what that type of scifi was like.http://www.ign.com/articles/2007/01/19/mass-effect-interview-2 said:
Ego-stroking design philosophy? That's a new one.
Goddamn it. Feels like such a cheap plot device.
Not exactly in my experience. You are questioned because you are young and that it was supposed to be Cara that was 2nd in command. The title does have a lot of status though.
EatChildren
Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
This is specifically the multiplayer. Single player seems fine, but multiplayer is...yeah, fuck. It's straight up busted, to the point of hearing encounters right behind you that might be on the other side of the map in front of you. There's very clearly something technically broken there.
SolicitorPirate
Member
I have wondered that myself.
I really wish DA2 was a game of comparable quality to DAO so that we could compare fan reaction to the narrative without DA2's gameplay weaknesses colouring those reactions
I have no idea where this is coming from. What does "growing shit culture on GAF" have to do with the hypothesis that a player ego-stroking approach to game design might cultivate a community with a number of expectations and constantly being catered to?
Besides, maybe it's possible to *both* ponder the question if player ego-stroking game design across several games has an impact on what type of consumers it attracts, *and* point out the toxic negativity hype culture exemplary in parts of the gaming community? It's not like one excludes the other.
Where have you been since KOTOR? It's been a stable of Bioware for long. I made a thread about it two years ago on here: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1140584
Choppymushroom
Neo Member
Got as far as the single player trial would let me. Despite some goofy animations and faces I enjoyed myself. I was genuinely disappointed when the game told me I went as far as I could go. I want to pick the game up to play more but I don't know when I will get around to it. Still in the process of Zelda and Horizon (though I enjoyed the trial of Mass Effect more than anything in Horizon so far) and also Persona 5 coming soon.
Exploratory
Banned
What I don't get is there are way more posts of people actually saying "despite blah blah blah I liked the game" yet GAF is still acting like this is going to be a 30 on MC.
FlutterPuffs
Member
Really? From what i read people are estimating a low to mid 80 on MC.
Dragon Age 2 came out 6 years ago.
Same thing here, on french forums. People are like "omg this is garbage, preorder cancelled blah blah, this is pure shit blah blah"
I really don't get it.
Systolique
Member
As it is in this thread and considering the recent bottom-tier quality of discussions in Gaming around ME:A, I was pretty sure your message referenced the recent outburst of shitposting, and implying the Bioware fanbase being responsible for it
Crimson_Echidna
Banned
I remember back when Bioware still had their forums, people were constantly complaining about how Hawke wasn't as awesome or competent as their Warden.
Oh thinking about sound, the music in this game is pretty trash. The track when the Tempest came in seemed like it was trying to be a new Normandy Reborn but it was flat as hell. I almost started laughing but it was clear at that moment that the composer wasn't capable of living up to his predecessors. This OST feels like a huge step down from Hulick and Wall. Completely unmemorable.
As someone who was quite surprised to see how rough the storytelling is in this game when streams became public and Access made available, I still think the game will do decently in terms of reviews - low 80's on Metacritic is my guess.
I assume people are stunned or surprised because the marketing has been so silent and non-existent that their expectations were simply not congruent with the final product. The lack of longer gameplay videos and the lack of longer independent previews (ones that aren't mandated by Bioware) along with some of the insider hype comments people've heard meant that this level of roughness and lack of polish swept the rug away from them.
Maybe if Bioware had been more transparent throughout and been more open about the warts and commenting on them, perhaps people would've been less surprised. But I don't know.
Gamespot, PC Gamer, RPS, Kotaku and Giant Bomb did make me think mid to high 70's and the game having a rough time on Monday, but hopefully the rest of the game isn't as rough as the first couple of hours. ME3 had the same problem of being absolutely underwhelming in the beginning ('we fight or we die', random child we don't care about dying, throwing out everything that happened in Arrival out of the window immediately, etc.), so maybe Andromeda is the same (it is Mac Walters as the creative director nonetheless). But we'll see. My money is still on low 80's unless something has gone very wrong. Gamespot really roasted the game two days ago and that made me weary.
EatChildren
Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
Playing as the chosen one is a core tenant of BioWare narrative and premise, to be honest, and has been for a long, long time. And for what it's worth, it's something I am personally not a fan of and do wish would change, because I feel more interesting, believable stories can be told with nuanced sensibility behind the protagonist's identity. But it is what it is and while I encourage change it's an odd thing to condemn at this point.
Criticise should be welcomed, but there's got to be a point where you just realise these are the kind of stories they pen. It's not like some recent revelation. These protagonists are BioWare incarnate.
I agree with some notes, but I love the subtle synth ambience on Eos and the galaxy map theme.
Criticise should be welcomed, but there's got to be a point where you just realise these are the kind of stories they pen. It's not like some recent revelation. These protagonists are BioWare incarnate.
I agree with some notes, but I love the subtle synth ambience on Eos and the galaxy map theme.
No, no, not at all what I was talking about. Just wondering if there is a correlation between a decade-long design philosophy and corporate brand that attracts certain type of people (not all, but some), who in turn also lashes back when they are challenged or their expectations are not met. Maybe this has already been answered elsewhere, but I think it's more about toxic gamer culture where player-egos are stroked across a wide variety of games, as most mainstream games are power fantasies.
The galaxy map theme is a redux of the version from the OT right? It seems like they wanted the same type of music but didn't want to get the same people back? It doesn't feel original enough that I can judge it as its own thing nor is it good enough that I think it stands next to the work in the OG trilogy.
Re: Forum chat, I don't see any weird conspiracy behind the forums closing. I was a member of the BSN since the beginning and it just wasn't a productive place for anyone. Parts of the community were excellent (mods, lore discussion) but the vast majority of posts were just overwhelmingly negative and unproductive. "F*** YOU BIOWARE", that kinda thing. It was a truly toxic place, and while I miss occasionally being able to post there, I'm glad it's gone.
Anyway, I played the multi for about three hours last night and had a lot of fun. It is very much ME3 multi with the new combat, which I appreciate. There are less waves (7 instead of 10) which I actually appreciate. The 2nd, 4th and 6th waves are objective/money waves, and probably because of the movement speed of the enemies, it feels a lot more challenging than ME3's multi.
Definitely experienced the rubber-banding and some lag, but that seemed to get a bit better the more matches I played. I worry about this though, because the four of us were UK based and I regularly play with people much much further away.
Anyway, I played the multi for about three hours last night and had a lot of fun. It is very much ME3 multi with the new combat, which I appreciate. There are less waves (7 instead of 10) which I actually appreciate. The 2nd, 4th and 6th waves are objective/money waves, and probably because of the movement speed of the enemies, it feels a lot more challenging than ME3's multi.
Definitely experienced the rubber-banding and some lag, but that seemed to get a bit better the more matches I played. I worry about this though, because the four of us were UK based and I regularly play with people much much further away.
It's just a stale formula at this point, the premise for Andromeda was a perfect opportunity for them to branch out and not tread such familiar territory. I don't know how the story ends up going, so maybe we'll be disproven, but a lot of the writing in the opening couple of hours just seems a bit uninspired, and I wonder if falling back onto the same tropes we've seen dozens of times before in their games already maybe didn't exercise the writer's creative muscles as much as it could've.
Who knows though, even if the main plot is predictable there are still opportunities for them to flesh out interesting side stories
I was listening to the Mirror's Edge Catalyst soundtrack earlier today and was thinking about how some of the tracks could be put straight into a Mass Effect game and fit right in. I like Catalyst more than most, a lot even, but if EA could only get the composer on board for a single game, it's a waste that it wasn't for Andromeda.
andythinkpad
Member
The companion introduction scenes are pretty meh IMO.
Also, Cora and Liam's dialogue/voice acting demonstrate no personalities, I don't know why do you want to court them. I guess staying in the outback long enough you get desperate.
Also, Cora and Liam's dialogue/voice acting demonstrate no personalities, I don't know why do you want to court them. I guess staying in the outback long enough you get desperate.
Ivory Samoan
Gold Member
Well, I don't know what to tell you...it's never been bad for me.
The facial animations, sure: they're average as they come: but the lip sync has been good enough that I have never thought "oh, that's bad lip sync right there", Horizon: I have thought that, and I can recall specific NPCs in Aloy's adventure that were the worst offenders.
I personally rate this equal (or even better in parts, like the Title theme and
Archon's angry walk
ghost town
alexanderftw
Banned
Almost finished my 10 hours so I'll just post my full impressions and I'll start with the bad things. Sound/music design is uninspiring, pretty average. It does not make me believe I'm an an epic sci fi opera. The facials...holy mother of hell. At every step, at every dialogue everyones facials just ruins the whole immersion for me. You look around you and you see these amazing graphics and effects and then theres the facials that came straight out of oblivion for 80% of the characters. It kills any sense of good mood I had. For a game that you spend half of it in dialogues, they totally and utterly failed this. The writing and the voice acting are pretty average at best. The male ryder voice sounds like a cowardly teen at times, that I simply cannot take him seriously and he even mentions at some point that he likes to joke around a lot so yeah.. Now the good thing is the overall graphics and atmosphere are good, nothing amazing or outstanding and I'll probably forget everything I saw but cant say anything bad about it, so far anyway. Gameplay is tight and fun, as a lot of folks mentioned.
Overall this does not feel like a Bioware game to me. While DAI had its issues, it had quality in it, characters, background, lore, etc. ME:A is all over the place. I am unable to give it more than a 6 or 7 so far.
Overall this does not feel like a Bioware game to me. While DAI had its issues, it had quality in it, characters, background, lore, etc. ME:A is all over the place. I am unable to give it more than a 6 or 7 so far.
The voice acting in general is kinda off. For example the
Liara voice logs sounded awful in that after every line from Liara there was this huge delay/pause
Familienoberhauptvogel
Banned
Maybe don't cheese the fight then? I did that on hard myself and it was pretty thrilling. Looked for a pocket to defend ordered my squad to stay there and then shot at the fiend after cleaning up the rest of the Kett.
JamesHolden
Banned
I saw Michael Gamble state that this issue has been found, fixed, and will be included in the next patch. But yes, very disorienting currently.
Poodlestrike
Banned
Made a little more progress. 3 hours of trial left.
I'm really impressed with the sidequest design. Mechanically, it's nothing revolutionary, but they've done an extremely good job of weaving them into the greater narrative arc. The
and
side quests were basically "go place, scan thing, maybe some fighting" but because of how they were set and presented and (in the former's case especially) concluded, they felt like they had actual narrative weight.
I'm really impressed with the sidequest design. Mechanically, it's nothing revolutionary, but they've done an extremely good job of weaving them into the greater narrative arc. The
Saboteur
Murder Mystery
JetsonIsAJet
Neo Member
I think that was done intentionally to emulate the vocal performance
she gave of Liara ala the original Mass Effect. Her sort of awkward and almost robotic demeanor was a part of her character and it's development at that stage.