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"Even if you define RPG by story and choice, ME2 still falls short. The lions share of the games story is made up doing shooter driven side missions for recruiting and gaining the loyalty of your squadmates. The only “major” choice you make is the end game one, and the ones in-between are railroaded by Biowares new “streamlined” take on its alignment system, where if you want a persuasive protagonist, rather than applying the points like you would in ME1, you now bow to Bioware forcing you into choosing one or the other. Gone are the days of “paragades” or “renegones” as the ME forum lingo called them I believe. I myself played a heavy paragon player who could still execute the occasional bad guy if he thought it necessary. In ME2, I couldn’t bring myself to do this, as I thought it would jeopardise my ability to pass some of those all important “persuasion” checks.
People who try and dismiss the calling out of ME2s failings as an RPG as being “complaints by those obsessed with number crunching” is a simple dodge of the issue.
Why is it that nothing you visit, both in terms of scale, dialogue and side missions come close to the citadel of ME1? Why is it that they are simply small locales designed for little more than directing the player to the aforementioned shooter missions? Side quests themselves have become shallower. It seems like in ME2 they were afraid of taking a breath from the combat and letting the RPG slip in, almost like their new shooter fanbase couldn’t hold their attention.
ME2 fails as an RPG in more than just the “number crunching”. It’s a devious little cover up to disguise the fact that for all the claims that ME2 is an RPG, its paper thin plot and “gather the squad” mission set up seem to just bring to one disposable shooting gallery after the other, packed to the rafters with waist high cover.
If the marketing itself wasn’t proof enough, the gameplay is: ME2 is nothing but a mass market TPS and Biowares attempt to snare the shooter fanbase. As Ive already said, if you compare it to the game it so clearly wants to take off – Gears of War – its not even in the same league. Its not doing much better than ME1 did, and if you ask me is still being pushed forward more by Biowares “old faithfuls” than “new shooter players”. With that in mind, my purchase of ME3 depends solely on whether or not Biowares takes the (growing) gripe of it being a lacklustre RPG to heart.
I wont be buying another attempt to bring in new shooter fans. Ive bought Bioware games for over ten years because I (until Mass Effect 2) thought they made only quality games. I don’t by them to line EAs pockets with their desire to reel in MW2 and GoW players."
People who try and dismiss the calling out of ME2s failings as an RPG as being “complaints by those obsessed with number crunching” is a simple dodge of the issue.
Why is it that nothing you visit, both in terms of scale, dialogue and side missions come close to the citadel of ME1? Why is it that they are simply small locales designed for little more than directing the player to the aforementioned shooter missions? Side quests themselves have become shallower. It seems like in ME2 they were afraid of taking a breath from the combat and letting the RPG slip in, almost like their new shooter fanbase couldn’t hold their attention.
ME2 fails as an RPG in more than just the “number crunching”. It’s a devious little cover up to disguise the fact that for all the claims that ME2 is an RPG, its paper thin plot and “gather the squad” mission set up seem to just bring to one disposable shooting gallery after the other, packed to the rafters with waist high cover.
If the marketing itself wasn’t proof enough, the gameplay is: ME2 is nothing but a mass market TPS and Biowares attempt to snare the shooter fanbase. As Ive already said, if you compare it to the game it so clearly wants to take off – Gears of War – its not even in the same league. Its not doing much better than ME1 did, and if you ask me is still being pushed forward more by Biowares “old faithfuls” than “new shooter players”. With that in mind, my purchase of ME3 depends solely on whether or not Biowares takes the (growing) gripe of it being a lacklustre RPG to heart.
I wont be buying another attempt to bring in new shooter fans. Ive bought Bioware games for over ten years because I (until Mass Effect 2) thought they made only quality games. I don’t by them to line EAs pockets with their desire to reel in MW2 and GoW players."
Wednesday, June 09, 2010
"I don’t get this “character driven” view of ME2.
What did you get for all of this exactly? A brief cutscene of their death which is quickly tossed aside? A coffin in the end scene? Nothing really unique or important to the character.
Given how little impact their death, or survival for that matter, actually has on the plot other than “if you let too many die, YOU die too!” I cant see the point in them. Add in the fact that with the exception of two characters loyalty missions, I spent more time shooting than interacting with them, I didn’t like ME2s take on characters.
Unlike ME1, where they were all a part of the plot in their own unique way, I felt ME2 separated the character from the plot in all but one gimmick: “those who you recruit for this suicide mission can die and you can too”. Other than that, they were self-contained little plots of their own and while they had some individual writing that was good, there wasn’t much meat in terms of character. They felt like resources, and an excuse to take on their combat heavy missions to pad the game out.
To top it off each game is clearly claimed to be “standalone” from the developers, and weve seen what happens to potentially dead characters like Wrex in that they get a simple cameo. Can you really expect them to make much of an impact in ME3? If Bioware even releases an expansion pack, are they going to figure into that?
Regardless, I hope they return the ME1 romances as squadmates in ME3. They are the only two characters now that are certain to be alive for everyone (given that the two human love interests are now occupy the same character role, just with different personalities). Certainly from what I heard they were “saved” for ME3, and they deserve it after the cameos they were given in ME2. Ill be hoping to see ME1s take on characters, and how they are an integral part of the story of the game, rather than a gameplay gimmick.
"
What did you get for all of this exactly? A brief cutscene of their death which is quickly tossed aside? A coffin in the end scene? Nothing really unique or important to the character.
Given how little impact their death, or survival for that matter, actually has on the plot other than “if you let too many die, YOU die too!” I cant see the point in them. Add in the fact that with the exception of two characters loyalty missions, I spent more time shooting than interacting with them, I didn’t like ME2s take on characters.
Unlike ME1, where they were all a part of the plot in their own unique way, I felt ME2 separated the character from the plot in all but one gimmick: “those who you recruit for this suicide mission can die and you can too”. Other than that, they were self-contained little plots of their own and while they had some individual writing that was good, there wasn’t much meat in terms of character. They felt like resources, and an excuse to take on their combat heavy missions to pad the game out.
To top it off each game is clearly claimed to be “standalone” from the developers, and weve seen what happens to potentially dead characters like Wrex in that they get a simple cameo. Can you really expect them to make much of an impact in ME3? If Bioware even releases an expansion pack, are they going to figure into that?
Regardless, I hope they return the ME1 romances as squadmates in ME3. They are the only two characters now that are certain to be alive for everyone (given that the two human love interests are now occupy the same character role, just with different personalities). Certainly from what I heard they were “saved” for ME3, and they deserve it after the cameos they were given in ME2. Ill be hoping to see ME1s take on characters, and how they are an integral part of the story of the game, rather than a gameplay gimmick.
"
Wednesday, June 09, 2010
"A shallow Gears of War clone being touted as the "future of RPGs" with an overdone focus on TPS combat, even above the plot and characters?
Id at the very least say its done them no good. Thankfully the sales dont look quite as promising as your standard TPS like Gears just yet. Of course, they are potentially looking to add multiplayer at some stage, so it looks like their idea will be even more focused on shooter for ME3.
Still, its annoying to see all this furore of ME2 like its even still a legitimate RPG anymore. Even the first had a heavy shooter side to it (though it wasnt a central focus of the game). Its basically just a stand TPS really."
Tuesday, June 08, 2010
I think this article did a very good job of breaking things down into different parts, but personally for me the main reason above all the smaller ones as to why ME2s replayability was so non-existent is because of how the game is built. It really is about 90% just one off shooting galleries completely disconneted from any sort of gameworld.
If Im to play ME3, that is probably the foremost thing Bioware would need to remedy: the lifeless shooting gallery gameworld. Oh sure, in terms of visuals and layout it beats those damn boring prefabs of ME1, but when the cost is spending most of your gametime behind cover in shooting galleries, and you see that the "hubs" have been turned into bland little shopping malls, I think the cost was too high.
Mind you, most shooter games, which is what ME2 really is, derive their replayability from multiplayer, and since it look set for ME3 to recieve that, Im left wondering if ME3 is going to be just like ME2, and built as a shooter.
I mean after all, this article is about RPG replayability, and RPG is something that Bioware look to perhaps be moving away from. "The future of RPGs" according to some is a Gears of War clone with dialogue system you can barely influence. Im not surprised some of us are finding the replayability takes a massive nosedive."