Mass Effect........

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Also, if you want to talk bad endings in otherwise fantastic games, Mass Effect still has nothing on KOTOR 2. Stupid Lucasarts, rushing Obsidian to release the game for the holidays when another 6 months or so, maybe even less, and it could have been one of the greatest RPGs ever.

I'm glad to hear that the Citadel DLC is good, I'm looking forward to playing it, in your opinion what's the best time to go into this DLC? In my actual ME3 run I just finished Priority: Citadel II and I'm planning to play it just after Thessia as Shepard is very down and could do with a "cheerful rest". Has anyone else played the ME3 citadel DLC? Any opinions on the best time to play it?

My Shepard is a spacer/sole survivor. I always play with a FemShep too, all paragon with a little renegade because some situations require it. I tried to do a renegade run and thought it would be easier if it was a male Shepard, to loose the feel of being my Shepard, but I didn't manage in the end and gave up pretty much in the beginning of the game.


In my first run I kind of felt sorry for Jack, after that she got on my nerves. I also hated Miranda at first, but now I feel sorry for her. In ME3 I just don't manage to like James Vega and I love Javik's grumpiness.

Favourite squad mates
ME1: Garrus, Wrex and Liara
ME2: Garrus, Grunt and Kasumi
ME3: Garrus, Liara and Javik

There is a restored content mod for KOTOR2 available now.

Yeah, I know of it. But its still not the same as having a proper professionally crafted ending that it should have had instead of the hastily thrown together one. For one it doesn't take away the tarnished reputation the game and developer suffered from Lucasart's meddling. Its hardly the only example where a publisher screws things over with demands from people who know nothing about developing games, but it still pisses me off.

My main playthrough was as paragon male Shepard, I basically did everything Paragon I could, and was a pure biotic, I romanced Liara because I thought she was nice, but I later romanced Tali in the following games, she is awesome. In the first game I kind of floated my team with Wrex, Liara, Tali, and sometimes Garus. Tali and Garrus were my favourite team members in the other two though, there was a very funny conversation between Garus and Tali on Citadel in the second game where they talk about elivators . It took a lot of trial and error to get no one to die in the suicide mission.

I also have a female Renegade where I try to do as much Renegade as possible without unnecessarily killing a team member (used renegade to save Wrex, chose Infiltrator for the sniper skills. Unfortuantly due to my FemShep's choices no romance popped up in the first two games, and I am only partially into the third, being renegade is emotionally draining, and I want my Shepard to go well despite doing so many things that lead to bad outcomes.

I did not have as big problem with 3's ending as others did, people are just too big whiners saying that their decisions did not change the ending.

Seriously? After three games of which most of your actions had a very definitive effect on the plot, which ultimately culminated in a measly 3 bland and boring endings? You think people were just "big whiners"? You're joking, right?

As far as your choices mattering, I never got a very strong sense of it from Mass Effect to begin with. Paragon or Renegade, you are still going to go to the same planets, fight the same bosses, slap the same reporter(Because really, who doesn't choose that option?), etc. The nature of computer-RPGs, for choice to truly matter and actual divergent story paths based on your choices would require exponentially more development time and isn't going to happen. If you want that, go play a pen and paper RPG with a flexible GM. 3 endings is still 2 more than most games.

I'm someone who doesn't slap the reporter, I stay away from that renegade option. I hit her on my first playthrough because I didn't know what the renegade option did at first, but once I've seen it, I never used it again.

If you don't hit the reporter, you get Paragon points for keeping your temper, and it makes Admiral Hackett happy. Also, in 3, talking al-Jilani down from her tirade gets her on the Citadel's side, and gets you another 5 or 10 points toward war preparations (because she's working with the military, not against them).

With the suicide mission, look to your team's strengths. Tali or Legion can go through the vents at the beginning, because they're your best engineers; the second team should be led by Garrus or Zaeed (if you have Zaeed's DLC), because they have experience in small-team tactics; the biotic shield should be provided by Jack or Samara/Morinth (sure, Miranda claims any biotic can do the job - but she's wrong), and so forth. Also, do the loyalty missions as soon as possible; if you have their loyalty, it makes it easier to keep them alive. (It's not impossible without it, but one might be "distracted" at a crucial moment and catch a bullet.)

And if you want to romance Jack in 2, keep it slow. She's waiting for you to suddenly turn into the kind of person who's made her what she is today (psychologically wounded, angry, and afraid); romance her properly, and it'll do her a world of good. (She'll still bust your chops, though. )

Yeah! Customers should be happy with what they get, good or bad, and never criticize or complain.

I admit I kind of cheered a bit when I saw al-Jilani slug Shepard in a video.

I don't punch her.

got through my first play through of ME3 as Renegade Femshep (faithful to Garrus, saved the Geth at the cost of Quarians, killed Samara, her daughter, Rachni Queen and Mordin, led Miranda to her death, faked Genophage cure) and made 95% renegade choices.

I chose the control ending by mistake (I was gonna be destroy) but with Shepard's narration, she seemed like she was controlled by the reapers now (I see what you did there Bioware!) and poor Garrus and crew will likely have to deal with all the bad choices I made in the game, like Krogans attacking him and people I affiliated with. I would say the game is really, really good except for the final mission. That's like, an A- or B+ in my case. I think I really like ME2 the best imho.

Now playing as paragon male shepard (loyal to Jack, gonna save Quarians and Geth, Krogan, Rachni, Queen, ect) and to be honest, I felt bad for turning down Liara when she wanted to restart the relationship. But then again, I think that she's the developers' favorite and she more relationship scenes so its kinda half and half.

Gotta try to get the Omega, Levithan and Citadel DLC sometime too. Love Javik's DLC stuff.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=2td4j3P3AxU[/youtube] funny ME3 vid.

Mass Effect 1 - Similar to Knights of the Old Republic, better exploration, the best side quests, great inventory system and role playing game mechanics, the best Citadel and a great villain Saren.

Mass Effect 2 - Three amazing populated worlds to explore, better locations, amazing graphics and a great storyline, brilliant memorable missions like the Space Prison or The Collectors homeworld.

Mass Effect 3 - Linear shooter, the multi-player was about the best part of this game in my experience but it felt too similar to Gears of War or any other corridor third person shooter.

I don't care much for the Mass Effect games today. I hate the cover mechanic in videogames in every way possible. But, there are still some things i really enjoy about the games. Story is interesting at points, some of the characters are likeable, and i've always enjoyed morality systems, even some of the bad ones. I'm looking at you Fallout 3. It's not my thing, but i can really see why people like it. Which is why i think the hatred of Mass Effect 3 is completely unjustified! Yes. The ending was bad, i even think it's the worst ending of all time, but people! Just because the final decision sucks, doesn't mean the game as a whole was bad, like Left 4 Dead 2 which sucked on both accounts. It was still the same Mass Effect game you know and love, just with a few improvements and touchups from the previous ones. Yeah, the ending is important, i even had multiple characters ready for it, but i'm pretty sure you guys had fun up UNTIL the end, right? A whole game isn't ruined just because of an ending.

In the first Mass Effect, I try to always balance out the special abilities within a squad - such that I play as an engineer and my squadmates are Ashley and Liara usually. In the second one, for all the missions except the last, I just kept Miranda along for biotics and varied the third squad member according to the mission. In the final mission, at first I'd pick Miranda to lead the second team, Tali to hack, and Thane and Legion as squadmates since they can snipe and that deals with the Collectors quickly. Then, Samara for biotic shield, Miranda for second team, Jack to bring the crew and colonists back. For the squadmates with me when dealing with the giant terminator, it varied and doesn't matter that much. Third game I've played a couple times now and squad composition doesn't seem to matter that much except for dialog. Armor piercing ammunition is excellent against those Cerberus troops with shields.

I would recommend waiting till after Tali's story arc if you want her to be present for the events of this dlc. Also, I would wait to have the party till after you help Miranda, so she can come, but I wouldn't wait any longer than that because the point of no return comes up pretty fast afterwards.

I love Mass Effect. It's kind of strange because I dislike the vast majority of 7th gen rpgs that I've played. I invested in the ME collection because it was a really good deal, and I figured I could just write off wrpgs entirely afterwards. I was wrong. One problem I've had with wrpgs is the writing. It's like they sacrifice good writing and characters for open ended and sandbox type gameplay. I often find the npcs to be bland and sometimes the voice acting is atrocious. I will admit Skyrim has good lore, but that somehow doesn't translate to a good story IMHO.

ME has good lore, a story I actually like, and characters I actually have a reason to care about. Even the main character is an actual character, yet still provides enough in the way of choices to allow people to step into his or her shoes. It's pretty much what I wish most wrpgs were. There are elements of wrpgs that I do like, such as non-linear gameplay, and some ability to choose one's path, but I wish everything else didn't have to be sacrificed most of the time. For the record, I also dislike most sci-fi, because it often takes place within a few decades of the work's release date, effectively dating the piece, and making it far less believable, but ME addresses that by taking place a good 170+ years later.

I suppose if I were to compare the ME series to another series, I would say it reminds me a little of Persona 3 and 4. Those games are also rpgs with adventures, but also feature sim elements on the side. Most games, including rpgs, are all about the adventure, and good ones make the player feel empathy for the plight of the main character, and possible his or her teammates, but games like ME and Persona allow the player to live a bit in the game's world, or in this case, universe. Players get the opportunity to interact with the npcs and get to know them on a more personal level, and a mission to save the game's world effectively becomes a mission to save a world I actually care about, because it's like I was a part of it. Also, these games have worlds that I actually wouldn't mind living in. I'm sorry, but even most games I like have worlds that I think would be incredibly boring to live in unless you're the hero, but that's not the case in Persona or ME.

I could probably go on longer about ME, but I think I'll cut myself off here. By the way, the ending dlc fixes the endings just fine IMHO. It doesn't actually change the original endings, it just expands on them. I looked up the original endings after seeing all of the updated ones, and I would have been disappointed with them. However, as it stands, I'm ok with how the games end now.