Game review: Mass Effect: Andromeda

in #gaming7 years ago

The game that I am going to be reviewing today comes from what was one of my favorite RPG/Sci-fi franchises in recent years, it's called Mass Effect: Andromeda. Mass Effect: Andromeda is an action roleplaying game which was developed by Bioware (Known for their Dragon Age series in addition to the Mass Effect trilogy. Oh, and of course the original KOTOR game.), and was published by Electronic Arts. You know, the microtransaction devil of the video game world. This game was released in March of 2017 for the Xbox One, Playstation 4 and Steam/Windows platform as well. 

This game was met with quite a bit of backlash upon its release for a multitude of reasons, most of which I personally agreed with. Yet, it still somehow saw great reviews from a plethora of video game websites which I just didn't understand. Don't get me wrong, this isn't the worst game out there by any means, but, it definitely isn't even close to being as good as the first 2 Mass Effect games. This game quite honestly is a Mass Effect game in title alone, and I really wouldn't even consider it to be part of the Mass Effect lore/universe. The games world looks like what we've come to expect from the Mass Effect games, but it just doesn't latch on with the player like the other games. Things are just *off*, and nothing feels quite right. While the game isn't a piece of trash or anything, I really wish they had taken more from the previous games. 

The games story begins between the events that happened in Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3, taking place in 2185. The Citadel Counsel races alongside the Quarians are planning on beginning a new mission to populate new, untouched worlds within the Andromeda Galaxy which they consider to be their new Andromeda initiative. Each of the races decides to send 20000 of their own citizens to the Andromeda Galaxy aboard an ARK with a leader being selected from the said citizens who would be appointed as a Pathfinder for the one way, 600 year long journey. 

Upon arriving, the races come together to build what is known as the Nexus, a central station in space which was made to be a focal point for government and diplomacy while also serving as an area of operations for each of the Pathfinders. Depending what the player selects, you'll be playing the role of either Scott or Sara Ryder, the twin children of humanity's pathfinder Alec Ryder. Both of the twins are inexperienced and are basically fish out of water in this new setting. Whichever Ryder twin you choose awakens on the Hyperion ARK which has struck against a dark energy cloud, knocking out central power and operations of the ship and putting your sibling into a coma. 

Shortly after, your characters father tells you that the planet you've been heading towards is no longer a viable option for colonization. You head down to the planet alongside your father and two other characters known as Cora and Liam to scout out the planet. You quickly come in contact with a hostile alien lifeform know as the Kett, as well as the remains of a synthetic alien lifeform known as the Remnant. You come across a terminal within one of the alien structures which your father then activates in an attempt to help stabilize the storm stricken planet, however this fails and the duo is blasted from the platform down. Your characters helmet becomes damaged, exposing them to the toxic atmosphere of the planet. 

This leads to your father giving you his helmet, and sacrificing himself for you. Your character is later revived and learns that upon taking your fathers helmet, you have become merged with the SAM artificial intelligence making you the new pathfinder of the mission. From here, the game gets a bit more complicated and you're tasked with trying to find a new world to colonize for your species, as well as discovering just what has happened to the other races ARKS. I won't go too far into the details of the story as I don't want to spoil anything for anyone, and this should give you an idea of the tone of the narrative. 

The main theme of this game is exploration of new, unknown planets. This unfortunately becomes quite drab and dull fairly early on, and honestly gets very tiresome to do. Upon landing on the planet, you'll clear out whatever threat there is and from there on out you can start exploring more of said planet. The game takes far too long in finding it's own pace, and doesn't set up any type of conflict early on in the game. Leaving it in a state without any real direction going on for a big chunk of the game. In the previous mass effect games, an enemy was set early on and became a constant and fast approaching threat which you had to prepare for. 

However, this game isn't even remotely in the same type of vein. The game focuses on trying to set up this big mysterious thing that it never takes the time to give us a goal for moving forward. We need some type of threat to set things into motion, but the game just never really focuses on doing this making things feel pointless and boring for a long time. I mean, what else could one expect from driving across a barren wasteland of a planet hoping to find just some modicum of interest?  How could that not just be the most boring thing after a few minutes? 

Eventually after going through a plethora of questions and answers that aren't really related to anything within your main objective, the game finally starts picking up its pace and sets things in motion for an actual game to be played within the second act, finally beginning to give us some form of actual entertainment. While this is nice, it kind of came too late in a way and the tone of the story just gets ruined in a way due to everything being so murky with mixed messages. Another annoying trait that the story has is that most of all of the characters you interact with and find are far too happy and optimistic about everything. This actually makes it hard to be immersed in the story, as it doesn't fit with the other tones of the game. Everything just shifts around too much and bleeds out onto each other. 

Remember how great the paragon and renegade system of the previous games was? How it let you decide if you were going to be a good guy or a bad guy? Yeah, this game tossed that into the rubbish bin and set it on fire. This game takes the same approach that Fallout 4 did, in that nothing that you do really feels like it makes a difference on the story or even your own character. You're given 4 options to use to respond on the dialogue wheel, and while each response has it's own tone and unique response. You can basically choose to be snarky, dopey, or just a normal person. None of which change anything. 

Yes, that's right, none of them allow you to choose whether or not you're going to be good/bad. And, unlike previous games none of your choices will make a difference to the story. Everything you do and say just goes along with the rest of the game, and it's all very linear which goes against the RPG elements of the game. It suffers from the same workings of Fallout 4, and it's very detrimental to the series in my opinion. Even when you make a choice that should affect your other characters and the relationships you have with them, it's all forgotten and forgiven within a minute or so. It just doesn't allow for a customizable experience while playing, and there is no risk that comes with your choices, only rewards. 

The only real aspect of an RPG series that is in this game is the combat elements which use a skill point system for powers and your characters attributes. There's also a crafting component to the game which is also reminiscent of RPG games. However, the crafting system within this game itself is honestly just boring and dull, much like the rest of the game. You scan environments to earn research points which can then be converted into blueprints, which then allow you to craft things. It also gets to be confusing and feels like it's slowing down the overall pace of the game eventually. As there are so many items and technologies that you can craft and you've no idea if one is better than the other that you're currently using. 

Combat is one thing that this game does right, however. The boss fights alongside just the normal fights as well are all fairly entertaining and the fighting is quite fast paced. This is thanks to the jumping jet that the game has given your character to use, giving combat a much more movement oriented style than what it used to have. The enemy will seek to flush you out of hiding by flanking you on any open side, which of course will drive you into either fleeing or fighting to your next spot of cover. You'll never find yourself sitting in one spot for too long, less you want to see the death screen and restart from your checkpoint. 

The game definitely takes a more strategic route instead of a brute force method. It takes awhile to get used to this style of combat when you've been playing the previous mass effect games, and you can expect to die at least a handful of times earlier on, if you're like me that is. The enemies that spawn in this game alongside the bosses seem to be a decent amount more difficult than what we've seen in the other Mass Effect games, which I don't mind as I prefer the game to be challenging when it comes to fighting. The combat is always intense in this game as you constantly have to keep moving and often don't get times for a breather in between downing enemies. It flows quite well, and eventually you'll get used to it and enjoy it. (More than likely.) 

In my opinion, this game feels like a knock off from the Mass Effect series due to how much time it spends dealing with objectives that aren't clear and a tone that just doesn't feel right. While it does pick up later on, nothing just feels the same from the first few games and a lot of the things I enjoyed with the narrative choices and conversation choices aren't present in this game. It's just a plain action game this time around instead of being an actual RPG/Action game like it used to be. The game itself feels like a new studio took the reigns and couldn't decide what direction it wanted to go in, and it just dampens the experience overall. While I wouldn't say this game is the worst, it's a very mediocre title and in my opinion, is a step backwards for the series overall. I'd personally give this title a 6/10, and I'd say only hardcore fans of the series should give it a try. If this is going to be your first venture into Mass Effect, please start from the first game and enjoy the trilogy instead of this. 

Thanks for checking out my review! Hope you've enjoyed it! 

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I played this game for a couple of months and stopped for a while to play Destiny 2. I agree with your review and the part where a new player need to play from the first game before playing this. But I have some friends that jump to Andromeda and never played the earlier two, they seems to enjoyed it but keep asking me questions about the previous 2 LOL... anyway I would've rate this game 6/10 as well.

it really need high specification and i cant provide that to this game ever hahahahah hope you enjoy it

Nice review. But, I suggest people skip the side quest since it's just waste of time and it doens't matter since there won't be sequel anyway.

I can't say I disagree, though there were a few side quests that brought about some fun/entertaining moments. Generally though, most of them are pointless for sure.

This post has received gratitude of 1.00 % from @jout

I believe one of the issues you touched upon has something to do with the press in general and game/film journalists specifically being not honest with their audience because they're trying to predict what the trend will be. We often see that disconnect between what the media says and what consumers say, take The Last Jedi for example. When you have to deal with a high budget product from a mega corporation that owns several huge IPs, you can't be too careful right? What if you'll be the only reporter slamming the product into dust while everybody else praises it? Some doors might end up closed for you meaning you won't be able to do your job as effectively as earlier. The general audience is inert as a rule, they don't read reviews, they buy products for their kids or to just to have a couple of hours of fun after work. So I think it's the enthusiasts who set the trend. It wasn't until the enthusiasts pushed against EA with BFII that reviewers started hastily rewriting their articles to stay with the people.
Now about MEA. You can’t spell MEA without EA. And I agree with most of what you’re saying in this review. There is one thing that sets Andromeda apart from other Mass Effect games for me and that’s gameplay. In my opinion what they did to gameplay in the new installment is miles ahead of what we had in 2 and 3. Disclaimer: I’m a huge fan of the first ME and not so much of the sequels. So they brought back the elements from the original game and made them optional so that those who liked them would be able to use them, and those who didn’t, simply didn’t have to. For instance, overheating guns instead of thermal clips, the ground transport, several worlds open for exploration, a decent inventory. They added crafting you mentioned which is again completely optional. They made the actual combat a lot more engaging and now you have to maneuver a lot more. You can still play the game ME3 style but why do that, when you can soar above the battlefield, shooting all your biotic powers at the enemies, then take cover quickly and snipe what remains of them. And you don’t even have to choose your class permanently for the rest of the game. Lots of side activities for those who like exploration with random enemy encounters. Lots of armor pieces/guns/upgrades all of which belong to their niche and are indeed needed. All of this I really liked and considered it a step in the right direction (as a ME1 fan). But.
I agree with the pacing complaint. I also would like to add that I love the general direction of the story especially at the end of the game and I absolutely despise everything character related. Those attempts at humor (sometimes the jokes are pretty good, but most of the time just awkward and lame), those vague options in the dialogue wheel that trick you into choosing the least relatable phrase possible, those faceless, flat characters most of whom we’ve seen a million times. On the plus side – you don’t have to talk to them if you don’t like them. I beat this game while completely ignoring one of the characters.
They make you deal with death of your relative early in the plot when you feel absolutely nothing towards that person and try to make up for it throughout the game. It doesn’t work this way. Actions of characters, their motivation all of that feels as if it’s some sort of a holiday cartoon, especially at the beginning. My overall impression on the plot of this game: the beginning feels as if it was written by 5 year olds, the middle portion was written by teenagers but the ending was staged by gods of screenwriting, action direction and game design. Everything about that ending was amazing in my opinion, and I believe one simply cannot judge the game without beating it first. It is especially sad as now we may never know what happens next, never meet the guys who built this amazing world. But it is what it is I guess. At least you can see the devs really wanted to make up for the poor ending of the original trilogy and turn the gameplay into something more engaging. The game should’ve just been called Andromeda and released only after all the bugs would have been fixed.
So, sorry for the wall of text, keep up the good work. I love what you’re doing.

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