Mass Effect 2 takes the crown as the most positively reviewed piece 'o crap released on a modern console. Disagree, like 99% of people? I'll present the following before Babylon 5 fanboys start jabbing at me with pitchforks.
1.
SETTING.
Those who survived an hour of the first game will know the deal. Humans are part of a multi-species galaxy and are pretty low down the ladder. Helpfully, everyone speaks English which righteously evaporates a core principal element of authenticity. Despite the success of Star Wars, a resoultely crowd pleasing family film, Bioware decided to dismiss the opportunity to script in some excellent alien languages, which would have been easy (for their budget) to make sound convincing. Clearly this was a design choice made either through laziness or for fear of upsetting young teenagers who find reading a sentence difficult.
Whatever! There's like a bazillion races in ME2, LOL! You expect them to script them all?!!1!
Yes, actually. If you cast your mind back over this grindingly forgettable game, you'll realize that you only interact with a small number of races. There's about 12 races who speak in the game. I tried to purge ME from my cranial databank shortly after trading it in for another title, so the numbers will no doubt be slightly off, but I'm sure one of you lovely people will provide me with the correct stats. Anyway, back to burning the witch.
Having the aliens speak English is comedic gold. It renders the games denizens as laughably inept from the start, due to them sounding like villans from Power Rangers. If you want to picture Mass Effect 2 in your minds, simply picture Jabba the Hutt voiced by Richard E. Grant.
It's just not the same.
The universe consists of a breathtaking array of planets, few of which are inhabitable, and ever less of which are explorable. These planets contain key characters which you need to recruit in order to SAVE HUMANITY because humans are clearly the superior race, citizen! Unlike in now dated games such as
Oblivion, you have to br a human, and he has to have the last name Sheppard.
Of course dummy! This is a continuation of the first game!
Yes, yes, but what if I hated the first game and chose to stamp on it instead of finish it? Guess it's too late for that. I used myself as a guinea pig in order to see how a first timer would fare in the second installment of a game. In the end this turned out to be little hinderance as everything concerning the past is repeatedly extolled upon Sheppard Mk2.
2.
PLOT. CONTAINS SPOILERS (IF YOU HAVE NEVER PLAYED A BIOWARE GAME).
Here's where my teeth started to grind.
Bioware clearly went for the big entrance. It was a surprise to see what happened and did a decent job of staging the rest of the crappy story. I commend Bioware for this, as it must have caught everyone by surprise. Unfortunately my mulleted co-worker told me everything about the first 10 minutes, but in the end it was still admirably flash.
Here's the stickler.
So there we go. Due to this being science fiction, one is obliged to believe the impossible, but by this point any sense of reality had, for me, gone out of the proverbial window. Pfft, whatever. Onwards.
The rest of the story is classic Bioware. I don't think I'll piss on anyones bonfire by stating that you recruit an unlikely band of mercs, who provide you with unflinching loyalty when faced with death after a very reasonable sales pitch by yourself, the player. This precedes a climatic finale in which you do/do not save humanity, as well as the rest of the galaxy. So far, so very, very uninspiring.
Bioware were recently asked why there games are all so similar. The reply? ''Because it works''. I take some offence to this. As a gamer, I expect a healthy survival of the fittest in terms of originality. I'm not asking for MW2 to be turned into Paintball In Space (we already have Halo), but how about making ME crazy? Part of the selling point of ME was that gamers got duped into thinking it was much darker than the original. Whilst you can rough people up, it's pretty tame. Set Sheppard as an alcoholic drifter, who uses slaves to run the Normandy, and performs genocide against innocent, fluffy aliens in order to SAVE HUMANITY, and I'll believe it's a darker game. If this becomes the setting of the next ME, I will personally brofist everyone who works for Bioware in the
UK.
Now, the game is essentially extremely boring. Aside from crafting your character (more on this later), the majority of your time is spent going to area X, which is full of Y amount of enemies (normally Blue Sun mercs), hiding behind boxes made out of the hardest substance in the universe, and killing them. Throw in a couple of story line characters at the start and the end and you have a bestseller. Bland. There are a few more varied instances in which the game is moved along, some of which work, and some of which don't. I particularly liked Joker's tourettes outbreak/hobble for sanctuary, but it was drop of comedy in an ocean of banality.
I could wax and wane about the lame duck of the story, but that would take forever and the game doesn't deserve it. So, on to....
3.
Combat.
ME2 gives you the chance to create a character, which in effect does very little. The powers you choose are commonly shared with other classes, meaning overlap. There is no min/maxing here. Should you dismayed to find that you can't use biotic (magic) abilities, rest assured that you'll be able to choose a party member who can. In the end, it doesn't matter what you choose. There seem to be about four biotic abilities. Fail.
The lack of variation in the enemies means that chaining attacks is a very straightforward affair. If they are made of skin and bones, you'll use something fiery. If they are machines, you use something electrical.
But I'm fighting a dude who has a shield!
Which has the same weakness to something electronic, of course. Rinse, repeat as necessary. Now, the abilities are essential. They allow you to wtfpwn enemies quicker, and save ammunition for your gun. They also speed you to the hollow feeling of completing ME2.
Backup party members are all shades of grey. For laughs, I always included the bug faced doctor, as I was sure he would struggle. In the end, he is just as effective as any other character, which is a another depressing facet of the game. It doesn't matter who you choose; they are all essentially identical.
Nearly every part of ME2 involves hiding behind indestructable crates. The majority of ME2 resembles a snowball fight in a crowded warehouse. My tactic, for every fight, was to leap into cover, shoot enemies in the face, and spam biotic powers. You will only die if you get rushed by the blue zombie types, or flanked by someone with a massive gun. These are unfortuantely rare events. Luckily, nearly every part of ME2 in which enemies reside is happily littered with massive amounts of cover, making combat a total no-brainer.
4.
TOOLS OF THE TRADE.
There are few, few weapons in ME2. I know that some of you will have explored every inch of the galaxy and found l33t gear, but this is simply not required. Using myself as a case in point; I found the only weapons I would ever need after about an hour. These were the sniper rifle and the Carnifex (no joke) hand cannon. The sniper rifle is possible the most overpowered gun in computergaming history. Not only does it slow down time, it also kills most enemies with a single shot to the head. My character instantly resembled a Vindicator assassin on speed; leaving endless trails of broken enemies in his wake, all with perfectly punctured skulls. By the end of the game, I had accrued the following:
A crappy pistol (starter weapon).
An assault rifle (which I could not use)
A sub machine gun (which gained ludicrous amounts of ammo due to lack of use)
A rocket launcher (which again I couldn't use)
And an upgrade for my sniper rifle which rendered it awful. Sweet!
To put this into perspective, I killed the final boss with a Carnifex hand cannon, which I found in the first hour. I was also wearing the exact same armour throughout the entire playthrough. An interesting game this does not make, Bioware.
5.
OTHER OBSERVATIONS.
ME2 introduced the ability to scan down planets in order to harvest their minerals. Aside from this being MOST HEINOUSLY BORING, it allows you to pimp out your ship, guns and armour with many, (ship excluded), useless upgrades.
No ability to skip the damned intro.
Choosing either to play as a renegade or paragon has little effect on your party. They will still follow you into the gates of hell. I chose the renegade option as it quickly became obvious that being nice simply creates more chores for you to plough through, and I grew fond of looking like a walking, talking volcano.
The game also rips off masses of popular media. The X Files, 24, and The Terminator, as well as most sci fi in general, are mercilessly raped of originality. This is a difficult thing to discuss as everything is inspired by what came before, but regarding the first three references in particular, play the game and see. Or don't, and save £40/sanity.
Oh, and before I forget, for all you horny nerds out there in internet land, I'll also cover
6.
SEX!
One of the funniest moments I experienced in the game came through talking to Miranda (aka Bastila/Morrigan). When asking a favour in respone to a mission, her perfect arse took up 60% of the screen, in an excellent display of femine charm!
Plus Points
If you've dragged yourself this far, I'll spare you a few positives. The graphics are
excellent throughout. I was particularly taken with the interior of the reapers vessel, when it opens up above you like a ribbed sky.
The voice acting, although limited to a human tongue, is also well done. The exception to this is Sheppard, who's favourite line is still ''
I should get going''.
Good sound; weapon(?) feels meatier.
Occasional lolz.
Thanks for reading. I hope ME2 players understand my boiling hate for this game; if not, I'll gladly debate it further. I really, really cannot understand how this game got such good scores. It feels incredibly empty and stale, and to come after the masterpiece that was
Dragon Age: Origins beggars belief. Now there was a game you could sink your teeth into. You get no sense of bonding with your team; I ended up uncaring of their fate. If you did develop feelings with these wooden folk, play
DA:O; the gulf in quality may cause you to get reality and Ferelden confused.
If nothing else, I hope some of you found the above amusing, even if you totally disagree. In which case your obviously insane
ts a brick or two. That'll make for some good lulz.
-to many points to bother to count.
3000+
Kal'reia Sept Tau - Farsight Sympathizers 
Da Great Looted Waaagh! 
The Court of the Wolf Lords 
