Mass Effect: Andromeda [PC]

Jupiter said:
I have not played ME1 but I informed myself about the action of ME 1 later)
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Play it!
It is arguably the reason the Mass Effect series had such a devout following, and great sales. The way you slowly gain insight into what is going on to finally be confronted with the horrifying reality of the Reapers and their intension is awesome. The encounter with Sovereign is etched into me as one of my strongest gaming moments, it had incredible density when I first experienced it.

In terms of atmosphere, setting and storytelling, it may be the best in the series.
 
So I started it yesterday. I was a big fan of the first saga despite the ending. It was epic. Now, It's too soon to say If i'll like it or not.

BUT, it seems badly optimized imo. Cut scenes are weird in that regard. Sometime I have like one character on screen, and I've 30-35 fps, some times a bunch, and 50-60fps... The most funny thing is the starting screen (with just a planet in space). I've 58-59fps (which is a joke itself) . If i push some settings to ultra (mostly effects and post process stuff), I'm 29... It just a planet ffs... (I have a 5820k@4.2ghz, Fury X, 16gb of ram, 1440p, vsync on , freesync working, 17.4.3 drivers).
 
The reason ME sells well is because there are no other Future Fantasy RPG available atm.
 
Entropy said:
Play it!
It is arguably the reason the Mass Effect series had such a devout following, and great sales. The way you slowly gain insight into what is going on to finally be confronted with the horrifying reality of the Reapers and their intension is awesome. The encounter with Sovereign is etched into me as one of my strongest gaming moments, it had incredible density when I first experienced it.

In terms of atmosphere, setting and storytelling, it may be the best in the series.
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I've should have done this in December before playing ME2 and ME3. :(

Never met Wrex but this savage guy.

Someone told me the Wrex was quite different to Wreav.
 
Davros said:
Unfortunately there is a pressure that the sequel has to sell more than the original, and this is often achieved by making the game more accessible to the casual player
which waters down the things that made the series great in the first place.
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original ME was the last great classic style Bioware RPG ( baldur's gate , KOTOR, neverwinter nights) all down hill into "casual" after that :(.
 
Yeah, the inventory system for ME1 was definitely one of the low points for an otherwise great game. PC style inventory system (FANTASTIC!) combined with a console interface (BAD!). There's multiple styles of PC inventory interfaces that would have been so much better. But considering it needed to be used on consoles, at console resolution and TV viewing distances, it ended up being pretty limited and crap.

Regards,
SB
 
Some basic sort functions plus collapsing multiple items into one would have helped regardless of origins. It was shit even for a console rpg. :p
 
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Sort by category, add a counter rather than duplicate entries...
I also think there was something wrong with equiped or not items, I don't remember what was wrong but I do remember I had to be careful not to sell something I needed/used...
 
Even Final Fantasy 6 had a sort function & counter & an interface that didn't need giant block of wasted space dedicated to a small amount of text! :runaway:

:p

Bioware UI designers are just terrible. Still terrible with DA: Inquisition (I haven't bothered with Andromeda yet).
 
Silent_Buddha said:
Yeah, the inventory system for ME1 was definitely one of the low points for an otherwise great game.
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IMO, Mass Effect 1 managed to be a great game despite the inventory system, which is more than what I can say about DA: Inquisition, for example.
And going by the general opinion out there, it looks like Andromeda is quite a bit worse.
 
I wouldn't say it was great, but it was good, there was too much graphical assets reuse making a lot of déjà-vu scenes in side missions.
Most missions were interesting, but it felt a little rough, like an unshaped diamond, a promise of what it could become...
(Sadly ME2 is nothing like what ME promised to become.)
There is that real sense of exploration and novelty that just can't be found in ME2, it was satisfyingly different.
 
Cookie-cutter pre-fabbed structures makes sense at least unless you're building a city. Maybe they should have referenced IKEA in-universe. :p Call it... BWEA now that they're owned by EA. >_>

The repetitive caves were an ugly necessity for development though.
 
It's a shame that the ME1 PC port was a bit of a mess. I remember the surround sound is screwy and it has no gamepad support. Bioware claimed to do the ME2 PC version themselves because of that.

I was quite annoyed with how there were no initial plans for a PC version, and then one came out of nowhere. I would not have bought the 360 version.

Solid game though.
 
You are critisizing a PC shooter for not supporting a controller? Drink your wine on the rocks and mixed with coke too? :D

ME1 sets the stage. Introduces the galaxy, the premises of stellar travel, the politics and the tone. And then, once the status quo is defined, it changes the premises in a way which has weight because it has immersed you in the first fantasy.
Whoaaaa.
ME2 is a middle episode. Polished gameplay, and still without the long cinematics and longwinded dialogs of ME3. It doesn't really progress the story much though, the characters provide motivation and carry the game. Might be the smoothest flowing game of the three.
ME3 wraps up the trilogy and brings closure. In terms of story telling, this tends to be satisfying. IMO the game is marred not only by the ending, but also by the long scripted sequences. Still, it has its memorable moments, such as the prayer for Thane on his death bed - that turns out to be for Shepard. And there are other.

Overall though, ME1 is my favourite. In how it sets the stage and opens up the galaxy for the player, followed by how it then directs the narrative. Inventory system sucks before you realize that you can prune it mercylessly. Mako mountain climbing sucks until you realize that it is mostly redundant and skippable. Beauty marks.
ME1 presents a setting, and when asked if you care, you answer - "Yes. Yes I care."

Which is exactly where Andromeda fails. It never really motivates you to run all those errands, so when some space goon goes on and on about his unhappy childhood, or the umpteenth time you need to blast off from a planet in your Tempest, in order to be able to read your e-mail, at some point you will just realize that you're not enjoying yourself.
 
I have generally been using HTPCs instead of silly consoles for over 10 years. ;) Gamepads and multichannel audio are nice there. I suppose that was somewhat early into the Games For Windows / 360-gamepad-for-PC era though.

Apparently ME1 PC much of the 360 version's gamepad functionality however, and somebody pieced that together for a mod.
http://www.nexusmods.com/masseffect/mods/60/?

I'm not sure I put the game on as high of a pedestal as some of you though. I remember being annoyed when I started to realize the dialog options meant little is most cases. But I did enjoy the planet surface vehicle exploration and the gun overheating approach in this one. It did have a more mysterious feel to it than the later games, but that is probably mostly because it was the first game and a new experience. I thought ME2 was an excellent successor for the most part, but by ME3 I was bored to tears with the whole formula.
 
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