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Mass Effect: Andromeda |OT| Ryders on the Storm

Maybe so but the reviews really are on the dot about it being a mediocre experience with the characters being unlikable apparently. Characters are what make the game for me and the story. If those suck then I don't think I will enjoy it at all.

I think the Reviews were a mix from liked it a lot, to didn't like it a lot. I also think someone can like a character while someone else can not like the same character. The fact that someone did not like that character doesn't mean the characters suck. If you don't think you will enjoy it, then the easy thing to do is not to buy it, then there's also probably little more to discuss.
 

parabolee

Member
Mass Effect 2 had a story?

This.

I love all 3 original games (to a ridiculous amount in fact) but I do not at all understand why so many people claim that not only is 2 the best of the trilogy but that it had the best story.

I think 2 is by far the weakest story. The main plot makes little sense and in the end contributed nothing to the lore of the series (anyone remember why the Reapers were secretly harvesting Humans to pre-make a human Reaper before the real invasion?!). The internal story beats are great, I love the Illusive Man and the loyalty missions are awesome (despite being the biggest offense to the trope of wasting time on ridiculous side missions while the whole galaxy needs saving), but the main plot was flawed and the Terminator Reaper was dumb as hell and still makes no sense. Weakest point in the series IMO.

ME 1 had the best story IMO and 3 was the best all round package. Despite the stupid endings (synthesis and control) you can pick if you are indoctrinated (IT for life!), the story is great and wraps up all the best story arcs of the series in brilliant and meaningful ways. Also best combat (up until Andromeda at least).
 

sangreal

Member
Maybe so but the reviews really are on the dot about it being a mediocre experience with the characters being unlikable apparently. Characters are what make the game for me and the story. If those suck then I don't think I will enjoy it at all.

ME has always been flawed. If you're worried play the 10 hours on PC or xbox. Someone said origin access even has a free trial on pc

I wasn't planning to buy this game at all until I played it
 

The Dark Shape

Neo Member
We knew they were on their way at the end of ME1. The thing was they were in Dark Space, and didn't have a way to get into the galaxy - the collectors were their back door. There was absolutely no indication that 6 months later they would turn up.

Let's not forget, the Reapers were already *thousands* of years behind schedule - the entire Rachni war was Sovereign's attempt to backdoor the citedal because of the Prothean saboutage. The Geth were his second attempt. If the Reapers were able to just up and fly in from dark space, none of that is necessary.

The Citadel was the Reapers' tactical advantage. If galactic civilization is built around the Citadel as the seat of government, crippling it from the moment they arrive puts species in disarray and makes them easier to kill. At no point in the series did they ever say that the back door was the only way they could come. (Again, as evidenced by Mass Effect 2, which very clearly shows them moving through dark space toward our galaxy, no back door necessary.)

There was no indication in ME1 or ME2 that we'd be heading into open warfare with the entire Reaper fleet and not instantly dying. That's not what the first two games set up expectation wise - the Reapers were gods, just one almost beat the entire citadel fleet. The end result of the Mass Effect trilogy definitely didn't seem like it was heading to a "fight the reapers head on and win" scenario.

Yes there was? The games were clear that we couldn't win against the Reapers in a straight-up fight, and Mass Effect 3 bore that out. In fact, a lot of people were furious that there was no way to beat the Reapers without using the Crucible and the sacrifices that come with it.
 
I saw the reviews and
it's 75 on Metacritc
.

Does the score reflect on the quality of this game?

So even if I'm a diehard Mass Effect fan I probably won't like it? Worrying to say the least.

After playing the 10 hour demo I am more excited to go home and play the full game tomorrow than I have been for any game in a long, long time.

I can understand why the metacritic score is what it is, I guess. Personally, I don't think some of the criticism is quite warranted, but I'm also not going to say its straight up wrong. The writing is not great in some instances but it still drew me in, and I REALLY enjoyed the combat/quasi-open world questing.

There is of course that infamous neogaf groupthink thing going on right now. If you try the game without having already decided that you hate it, I think there is definitely an entertaining game under the jank.
 

Tacitus_

Member
Oh you poor fool. Sweet, innocent child.

One has perky boobies and is essentially a hot blue space babe, the other has none of that. Why would they waste the resources on something a guy can't fap to?

Why are you implying people weren't fapping to the Turians?
 

amoebae

Member
Why are you implying people weren't fapping to the Turians?

I was being sarcastic, with a heavy implication that the asari only ever received the attention they did because straight dudes need their space babes.

I'm on the side of people wanting more of everything else.
 
The original dark matter storyline sounded more interesting than the story we got with ME2 and ME3.

Do you have a link I can read up about what they were planning? I think I remember they brought that up in ME2 with Tali's mission, never to be heard about again.
 

mauaus

Member
got a PSN refund, gonna get this at a discount later after it receives a couple of patches... Im still knee deep in zelda, still not done with horizon and havent touched Nier
 

sangreal

Member
anyone remember why the Reapers were secretly harvesting Humans to pre-make a human Reaper before the real invasion?!

The answer to this is in ME3, it just doesn't make any sense and is contrary to what they actually show us

supposedly the reapers are cataloging all the knowledge of civilizations into reapers, and ME2 says reapers look like the civilizations they consume, hence the effort to consume a variety of humans and create a human reaper.... but all the reapers we see in ME3 look the same

then again its not really worth dwelling on ME3 anymore since it has been written out of the series
 

andrespi

Member
I'm on the fence on this, especially since next month there is another space exploration rpg that will be released that I'm more interested (can buy only one for the coming months). So how is the exploration on this game? How many planets are there to explore? One of the stream I saw mentioned
that there were only 5 planets on which to land
, is it correct? Are there planets to explore just for exploraiton and not tied to the main story?

Are there other things to explore in the game, like space stations, abandoned ships and anomalies in space? How many? Also are the planets large? with multiple settlements and ruins or similar things? And maybe with a lof of different scenery, biomes and landscapes?
 

Maledict

Member
The original dark matter storyline sounded more interesting than the story we got with ME2 and ME3.

Mmm, even the guy who came up with it said it was bad. I tend to agree. Making the reapers secretly a goody trying to save the universe by destroying every species, and having the end choice be to either do the same and join them, or risk the entire universe and hope humanity is special enough, isn't a great plotline either.

I think the ending to ME3 is terrible - but I think an ending where the reapers turn out to be good wouldn't have gone down well either.
 

iFirez

Member
I'm a little ways into the game and loving it, it picked up right where the trial said I couldn't go any further (outside the Vault door). The Vault its self is a roller coaster and then the missions directly after it are really enjoyable. Sure the game is a little jankey in some areas but boy is it beautiful at times and the story seems intriguing to say the least so far.

The answer to this is in ME3, it just doesn't make any sense and is contrary to what they actually show us

supposedly the reapers are cataloging all the knowledge of civilizations into reapers, and ME2 says reapers look like the civilizations they consume, hence the effort to consume a variety of humans and create a human reaper.... but all the reapers we see in ME3 look the same

then again its not really worth dwelling on ME3 anymore since it has been written out of the series

I always thought it would have been cool to see other forms of Reapers that took on the shape of even more alien and crazy civilizations from the ancient past.
 

Enduin

No bald cap? Lies!
The original dark matter storyline sounded more interesting than the story we got with ME2 and ME3.

The entire premise behind the Reapers was flawed, stupid really to put it bluntly, in either situation. Trying to attach altruistic motivations that went wrong was just dumb. Full stop. Had they simply made them out to be pure evil AI that the Leviathans had created which got out of control and took over, using organic life to propagate themselves, and they stayed away from the whole Dark Energy or Organic vs Synthetic life bullshit it would have been great.

Take out Star Child and the RGB endings and just have us blow up all the Reapers with our magic Deus Ex Machina device and it would have been fine. Trying to elevate galactic boogie men into something more nuanced was a bad idea. Being dark, mysterious monsters is a good thing, we don't always need deeper meaning to their actions. They're just giant evil dicks.
 

Lashley

Why does he wear the mask!?
I'm on the fence on this, especially since next month there is another space exploration rpg that will be released that I'm more interested (can buy only one for the coming months). So how is the exploration on this game? How many planets are there to explore? One of the stream I saw mentioned
that there were only 5 planets on which to land
, is it correct? Are there planets to explore just for exploraiton and not tied to the main story?

Are there other things to explore in the game, like space stations, abandoned ships and anomalies in space? How many? Also are the planets large? with multiple settlements and ruins or similar things? And maybe with a lof of different scenery, biomes and landscapes?
What game?
invalid code

Go to their facebook, it updates every 5 mins
 

sangreal

Member
Mmm, even the guy who came up with it said it was bad. I tend to agree. Making the reapers secretly a goody trying to save the universe by destroying every species, and having the end choice be to either do the same and join them, or risk the entire universe and hope humanity is special enough, isn't a great plotline either.

I think the ending to ME3 is terrible - but I think an ending where the reapers turn out to be good wouldn't have gone down well either.

but that pretty much is the ending of the ME3 (which makes absolutely no sense) -- the reapers are the good guys trying to save organics from being wiped out by synthetics. By wiping out everyone with their synthetic army
 

andrespi

Member
What game?

Long journey home on steam should be released in April, from what I heard from developers on steam discussion boards. Really not sure if I should buy Andromeda now, and not long journey home, or viceversa and buy ME:A on steam christmas sale at the end of year.
 

sangreal

Member
Since when? It's been a month or so that i bought Rainbow Six Siege in the sale in the USA store with a gift card and it worked fine. You mean this doesn't work anymore?

You're fine. They only made it harder by forcing you to use gift cards, and not selling giftcards on their site

It will unlock based on whatever store you bought it from
 

nOoblet16

Member
I don't know if they get harder but the one on eos in the trial takes like 30 seconds?

They give you a column 3/4 filled out and every move leaves you with another row or column with 3/4 symbols in it. There is only ever one move you can make -- just find the missing tile in the row/column missing only one
It's 5*5 actually
Yes they get harder because you start getting blocks where only 3/5 are filled at max.
I don't know if they get any harder later on but this is the 6th one I've encountered that has had this difficulty change.
 

Enduin

No bald cap? Lies!
but that pretty much is the ending of the ME3 (which makes absolutely no sense) -- the reapers are the good guys trying to save organics from being wiped out by synthetics. By wiping out everyone with their synthetic army

Yeah it's the same exact result, just different motivations. They obviously chose the Organic vs Synthetic angle because that was a premise present at least somewhat throughout the entire series, unlike the Dark Energy crap which only got a super low key name drop in that one mission to recruit Tali in ME2.
 

Jackpot

Banned
For me Mass Effect 2 was the worst entry:

  • Impact of realising all your choices from ME1 count for shit
  • Cliched "we're going dark for the sequel" direction, with space gangs making up the factions
  • Building on the above, every character has to be "damaged" or dark in some way
  • Replacing gun cooldown with bog-standard reloading so now it's like every other game
  • No exploring planets in the Mako
  • Weak antagonists in the Collectors

Can't fault them for the end mission though. Throughout the entire game it's built up as a suicide mission and I was thinking they can't make it that difficult otherwise there'll break the curve and casuals won't complete it. But they found a way to do it.

Shame the whole "Shepherd can die and it'll carry on to the next game!" feature was total bullshit.
 
The answer to this is in ME3, it just doesn't make any sense and is contrary to what they actually show us

supposedly the reapers are cataloging all the knowledge of civilizations into reapers, and ME2 says reapers look like the civilizations they consume, hence the effort to consume a variety of humans and create a human reaper.... but all the reapers we see in ME3 look the same

then again its not really worth dwelling on ME3 anymore since it has been written out of the series

They probably
consumed Cthulhu and decided a cosmic deity was the best form they could take :p
 
You're fine. They only made it harder by forcing you to use gift cards, and not selling giftcards on their site

It will unlock based on whatever store you bought it from

Great. One last thing, i have EA Access until the 22th of this month. I want to use that discount for sure if i buy the game before my sub ends. I can just buy it in the store on my console for that price, nothing else required? I'll just get my giftcard from G2A and it should be fine then.
 

El_Chino

Member
For me Mass Effect 2 was the worst entry:

  • Impact of realising all your choices from ME1 count for shit
  • Cliched "we're going dark for the sequel" direction, with space gangs making up the factions
  • Building on the above, every character has to be "damaged" or dark in some way
  • Replacing gun cooldown with bog-standard reloading so now it's like every other game
  • No exploring planets in the Mako
  • Weak antagonists in the Collectors

Can't fault them for the end mission though. Throughout the entire game it's built up as a suicide mission and I was thinking they can't make it that difficult otherwise there'll break the curve and casuals won't complete it. But they found a way to do it.

Shame the whole "Shepherd can die and it'll carry on to the next game!" feature was total bullshit.
The Mako was the worst part of ME1....
 

Admodieus

Member
Actually Arrival has zero part of the story. It's completely removable from the plot and everything happens in exactly the same way. It makes no sense at all.

ME2 story is fine in the context of ME1, but completely falls apart and becomes gibberish in Me3 when the reapers turn up anyways despite everything you did.

My take on ME2's story is that it was another attempt by the Reapers to open the backdoor on the Citadel. They failed with the Rachni Wars, they failed with Sovereign, which was their last Reaper asset in the Milky Way. They decided to try one more thing before making the long journey from dark space - build another reaper using their assets beyond the Omega 4 relay (Collectors) and then use that Reaper to try and open the backdoor again, especially as most of the Council races still don't believe in the Reaper threat after Sovereign.

If they wanted to do ME3 the right way, they could have explained that the Reapers were not at full combat strength due to exhausting so much energy/fuel flying from dark space. If you completed ME2's Arrival DLC, that would contribute to "galactic readiness" since they would have to use even more energy/fuel to reach another relay. Therefore, your actions in ME1 and ME2 made winning a conventional battle possible in ME3. If they still wanted a Crucible type coalition-building quest, they could make it something like a tool that disrupted Reaper sensors.
 

SliChillax

Member
For me Mass Effect 2 was the worst entry:

  • Impact of realising all your choices from ME1 count for shit
  • Cliched "we're going dark for the sequel" direction, with space gangs making up the factions
  • Building on the above, every character has to be "damaged" or dark in some way
  • Replacing gun cooldown with bog-standard reloading so now it's like every other game
  • No exploring planets in the Mako
  • Weak antagonists in the Collectors

Can't fault them for the end mission though. Throughout the entire game it's built up as a suicide mission and I was thinking they can't make it that difficult otherwise there'll break the curve and casuals won't complete it. But they found a way to do it.

Shame the whole "Shepherd can die and it'll carry on to the next game!" feature was total bullshit.

The only improvement in ME2 over ME1 was the gameplay imo. It's the one that has aged the worst. I still love it though but it's not my favorite of the three games.
 

sangreal

Member
Great. One last thing, i have EA Access until the 22th of this month. I want to use that discount for sure if i buy the game before my sub ends. I can just buy it in the store on my console for that price, nothing else required? I'll just get my giftcard from G2A and it should be fine then.

I haven't tried that exact scenario but I can't see why it would be an issue -- the discount works across all stores and is applied immediately at the time of purchase
 
I did the same thing, the dutch store is crazy expensive in comparison. It should unlock at 5am i think for us.

Yeah absolutely insanity the price differences. Been buying games like this since day one and let's hope it stays working. But it seems it should be fine. A ton of people do this. :)
 
The answer to this is in ME3, it just doesn't make any sense and is contrary to what they actually show us

supposedly the reapers are cataloging all the knowledge of civilizations into reapers, and ME2 says reapers look like the civilizations they consume, hence the effort to consume a variety of humans and create a human reaper.... but all the reapers we see in ME3 look the same

then again its not really worth dwelling on ME3 anymore since it has been written out of the series

Somewhere in ME3 it is also explained very briefly that
the Reaper shell we see is an exoskeleton that's based on the first race they consumed, their creators. It's like armor. Presumably the dumb terminator baby human would've been placed INSIDE the insect like shell.

This might've been in the Leviathan DLC.
 

Phamit

Member
but that pretty much is the ending of the ME3 (which makes absolutely no sense) -- the reapers are the good guys trying to save organics from being wiped out by synthetics. By wiping out everyone with their synthetic army

Well, that's why they are not the good guys.
 
This.

I love all 3 original games (to a ridiculous amount in fact) but I do not at all understand why so many people claim that not only is 2 the best of the trilogy but that it had the best story.

I think 2 is by far the weakest story. The main plot makes little sense and in the end contributed nothing to the lore of the series (anyone remember why the Reapers were secretly harvesting Humans to pre-make a human Reaper before the real invasion?!). The internal story beats are great, I love the Illusive Man and the loyalty missions are awesome (despite being the biggest offense to the trope of wasting time on ridiculous side missions while the whole galaxy needs saving), but the main plot was flawed and the Terminator Reaper was dumb as hell and still makes no sense. Weakest point in the series IMO.

ME 1 had the best story IMO and 3 was the best all round package. Despite the stupid endings (synthesis and control) you can pick if you are indoctrinated (IT for life!), the story is great and wraps up all the best story arcs of the series in brilliant and meaningful ways. Also best combat (up until Andromeda at least).

Yep, almost entirely agreed. Mass 2 is certainly the worst from a story standpoint, but I can't decide if Mass 1 has a better story than 3. Mass 1 certainly has absolutely perfect pacing, with every planet story not only being relevant to the main plot and providing exposition (amazing how rare this is in Bioware games, and the reason I hate DA:O) but also the buildup of mystery between who the Protheans and the Reapers are, and how Saren is just a pawn in a much larger game. Problem is... Saren only needs the Conduit for backdoor Citadel access because he was branded an outlaw and stripped of his Spectre title for his actions on Eden Prime while... searching for the Conduit. Hmm.

Of course Mass 3's ending looks horrendously bad at face value, but the Indoctrination Theory is pretty undeniable (the artists placed those sound effects and smoke tendrils there for a reason, and that boy only Shep can see looking identical to Space Jesus... yeah) and makes it a fantastic finale, with the caveat that you need to headcanon the closure. Everything up to that end point is incredible, seeing how Garrus and Liara react to witnessing the destruction of their home worlds, curing the Genophage, settling the Quarian/Geth conflict and restoring access to Rannoch... holy crap that was all so good. I just can't work out if the ending blunder is bigger than Mass 1's blunder of this whole trilogy-spanning story starting off with a gaping plot hole.

I think my biggest takeaway from all these reviews of Andromeda though is that this is basically Mass Effect 2... 2. All the focus on improving combat and moment to moment gameplay, no focus at all on writing. I think Mass 2 should have received a similar score, and I honestly feel like anyone worried about these scores who loved Mass 2 and didn't even notice the complete absence of story should really consider that they might end up loving this game despite the flaws.
 

sangreal

Member
Oh that reminds me. Is there such a thing as Galactic Readiness in Andromeda?

Will NEVER get it if so since that soured me so hard in ME3.

Why did that sour you in ME3? I never touched the ME3 multiplayer and the 50% readiness rating made no difference (note: I played a few days ago and apparently they lowered the thresholds for success)

They replaced the war asset system with a viability system, but I don't think MP plays into it. You do get SP rewards from MP through strike missions, but you can send AI instead like in assassins creed
 

Vamphuntr

Member
Unlocked it with a VPN on origin. Downloading the extra DLC crap and will continue my game. Touching wood so I don't get too much glitches tonight.
 
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