Review: Mass Effect 3

Mass Effect 3

PC, Xbox 360, PS3 (reviewed)

Publisher: EA

Developer: Bioware

Release Date: 6 March 2012

The end has come for my Commander Shepard. She has fought long and hard for both the Human Alliance and the galaxy at large to slow the assault of the Reapers. She has made friends, changed lives, and above all made choices that have all come their conclusions. All but one. And that choice stands before her, with all the glorious journey behind her only one thing remains. She does what she always has done, what is going to save the most lives at the cost she can justify. She makes her choice, and the tale of my Shepard comes to a close. And what a glorious journey it has been.

Shepard and Reapers reach their final battle

Bioware has done something special. They created a living, breathing universe that I've traveled the length and breadth of for three games. The epic sci-fi story of humanity reaching for the stars and becoming part of the larger galactic community was cool enough. But then, Bioware showed us the enemies of that community, the sentient machines known as Reapers. Players created their Commander Shepard, an Alliance soldier who answers the call, and began to recruit allies to fend off the Reaper threat. Through three games he or she has made choices. Some are small, some are large, some personal, and some Sophie would have struggled to do. The great thing about this series is that all of these choices, and the characters connected with them have come home to roost. Who lived or died earlier changes entire storylines. Some choices that seemed right at the time have devastating consequences later. And sometimes, you have to take into account that choices always leave someone out in the cold. When the choice between friends and allies comes along, it's hard to decide.

And that's one thing that Mass Effect 3 does wonderfully. Choices made have consequences that you must now work through. And new choices come along that will leave you slack jawed in awe, anger, and even profound sadness. The great thing about all of the choices is that every player has a different Shepard by the end. Some may take the role of White Knight to the Galaxy (as my female Shepard did) and do what is right at any cost. Others may take a darker, cynical role in the galaxy and do things for personal gain or pleasure. They may bully allies or threaten people to get what they want instead of bartering and helping. Some still make take a path somewhere in between. What is offered is a story. And you get to direct much of how that story plays out. At the end of it all, I felt that my story had been told and I felt ownership over the state of the galaxy. Bioware has crafted an amazing work of sci-fi, and the feeling of controlling that story makes it all the stronger.

New squad-mate James is kinda a meat head, but he means well

When you are not in dialog with others, you are in a third-person shooting gallery. While the second game focused on creating a more polished action experience, it was still stilted. Mass Effect 3 does a good job of making firefights dynamic. Arenas do not always seem to be littered with chest-high pieces of debris, or have large arenas perfect for a frantic fight. New additions like multi-tiered areas and high ground help the fights feel more natural. Shepard can now climb ladders, too. A simple addition, but one that makes the world seem more real. And what a world it is! This game is gorgeous all around. Great smoke effects, wondrous colors, and sharp detail are everywhere you look. One major mission sees you fighting on a moon as the planet behind burns. Seeing this world being destroyed is one thing, but watching the aerial fight happening on the moon while you defend the grounds is something spectacular.

Movement along the battlefield is as good as ever, but overall feels ordinary. While cover is plentiful, the cover system seems a bit lacking. I consistently ran into issues where I could not get into cover, or I would immediately leave it just by nudging the stick. The melee system, while still rudimentary, has received a solid upgrade. By holding the button down, Shepard will charge up a melee attack that does much more damage. The new melee kills from cover are a welcome addition, too.

Tali, Garrus and Shepard: Friends and allies through all three games

Enemies are smart and will flank, flush, and crush you if you are not careful. In most battles, enemies will rush to advantageous positions and begin to work their way toward you. Some troops throw smoke grenades that disable targeting and allow enemies to move up easily. Others have large shields that absorb bullets and powers. While you focus on flanking the shielded ones, others have flanked you and created chaos. Brute enemies (larger foes that take combined efforts to drop) are common, and each has their own preferred strategies to best. Human enemies are tough opponents, even on Normal difficulty.

The non-human foes are tougher, too. Husks still rush in with reckless abandon, but newer Reaper units have firearms, grenades, and even biotic (read: magic) powers. Brutes, who remind me of first game final boss Saren on steroids, rush forward with menacing howls and crush unsuspecting players. The terrifying howl of the banshee will have you racing to find the creature and put it down before the powerful biotic decimates you. Reaper enemies will work together, but mostly by helping each other. While Husks keep you busy, Marauders will heal and buff their allies before shooting their rifles at any exposed bits of your team. Even the stock-standard Cannibals are a threat if you don't concentrate on fully killing each one, lest they grab armor off of their fallen comrades and become armored tanks. Coming through each battle feels like a hard-fought victory, and the moments of peace are welcome respites.

Brutes are terrifying additions to the enemies

Since fights are more strategic, smart use of your squad-mates is a must. The simple controls have your fellow fighters move into set positions and use certain powers. This swiftly becomes second nature, and that's a good thing. Previous entries in the series allowed you to ignore your partners most of the time. They would be pretty self-sufficient and helpful. They still are, but with more capable enemies, you have to be more involved. It is a great feeling to send a squad-mate forward to draw fire while you and your other partner unleash hell on the unsuspecting enemies. The teamwork aspect becomes crucial when Brutes enter the field, as all hands on deck must focus on the big threat before people start dying. Everything about the combat has been streamlined and feels very good overall.

Bioware has done much to make the daunting, but oh-so-rich universe of Mass Effect accessible. For the final entry in the trilogy, the fine folks from Vancouver have given players the option of how to play. For those that want the dialog, but combat is too daunting, there is a mode where combat is winnable as long as you try. On the opposite end of the spectrum, some players may not care to make the choices the game offers and prefer to get into the action. For them, a mode makes combat the focus and story plays out as cut-scenes where choices are made for the player. To me, that seems a silly way to play, as the series has always been about the story, but it's a nice option for newcomers to get acquainted with the universe.

It's great when old friends drop by, especially Mordin.  He's still amazing!

Where Bioware stumbles a bit again is with the RPG elements. The first game had too much loot, and a horrid management system. The second game took that too far the other way and offered little in the way of weapon customization. Now, a balance has been struck but the game still relies too heavily on action and set-piece battles. Shepard can use any weapon class and carry them all for a cost. That cost is power cool-down time. So, for Soldiers, that's not too much of a problem, but for tech using Engineers or biotic heavy Vanguards, lighter load-outs are preferred. Weapons are found often, along with mods that alter everything from weight to armor penetration. Finding the right combination to suit your playstyle is easy and fun.

Powers have received the biggest and best upgrade. Powers evolve along a set route until you reach Level 4. Starting there, powers have two upgrades per level. Players must chose one or the other to continue evolving the power. These choices usually fall into the “more damage” or “help the team” categories. What's great is that players can evolve their powers and their party's powers to create a synergy. Sure, my Shepard shared the same class as Tali (my favorite character), but we evolved our similar powers differently. While Tali's focused on damage, mine focused on helping the team with damage bonuses. Thus, we were nearly unstoppable against synthetic enemies. The new power system is wonderful and easily the best upgrade Bioware did under the hood.

Team work is what gets things done!

A complaint from Mass Effect 2 was how tedious the exploration for minerals was. The new system has you ping and if something of interest (a lost tactical team, a ship, artefacts) is there, you will receive a notice. Too many pings in hostile systems will send the Reapers after you. As tedious as the previous game's system was, it wasn't as frustrating or annoying as this. Once the Reapers are after you, they will reappear until you complete a quest. So some systems will be hostile for a long while if you are out collecting side-quest items (usually artefacts) and waiting to do the next story mission. This system just isn't any fun at all.

An odd, but welcome addition to the franchise is multiplayer. Here, Bioware has done what Naughty Dog did with Uncharted: added a fun, engrossing mode that has no bearing on the single player experience. In multiplayer, players take on the role of a soldier in the war. All six classes are offered, and players can actually help themselves in the single-player game by “promoting” a maxed out character. The promotion means that the character becomes an “asset” for the final battle and helps in preparations. Each class initially offers only Humans, but other races are available from loot chests bought between matches with in-game or real world currency. The chests also contain weapons, mods, and bonus items (like Medi-gel or rockets). Each character has three abilities, and some are racially locked. For example, the Engineer class has an Engineering Bot for the Humans, but the Quarian Engineer has a Sentry Turret. These abilities are leveled up the same as in single-player and players can chose to help the group or themselves with the upgrades.

Multiplayer features all the favorite races working together

Multiplayer consists only of a Horde Mode. Here, squads of four face off against 10 increasingly difficult waves of enemies (Cerberus, Reaper, or Geth). Sprinkled throughout the waves are challenge missions where players may have to eliminate specific enemies in a time limit, hold a point for a bit, or even activate items in sequence to proceed. After the 10^th wave is finished, players have to survive as the enemy throws everything at them as they wait for the evacuation shuttle. Since the multiplayer isn't competitive, most matches I played were fun because teams survive longer and collect better rewards. Very rarely did a “lone wolf” ruin things for the team. That said, EA's servers are still bad over a month after release. I lost connection countless times, and if you do so, you lose whatever you may have earned that match. Hopefully stability will be addressed in coming patches associated with new maps.

Your team is the most important part.  Without friends, you don't stand a chance

Mass Effect 3 is a triumph of story. It successfully brings Shepard's story to an end. I loved seeing all the threads tied up neatly. Bioware did great in bringing back characters and cameos that made sense and brought closure: from former teammates to NPCs. Everything from reading a paper and seeing the death of a friend to talking to anxious parents for the third time just brought everything around nicely. The only complaint I have on the story is the last 10 minutes of it. I won't spoil, but if the game ended 10 minutes prior, I would have been happier. Some system changes are either a wash or are boring. Also, some technical glitches caused a few issues. These were minor, like a body turned the wrong way, or a character not loading for the cutscene, but they ruined immersion. Also, for the 360 players, you will have to swap discs A LOT (like 5+ over the course of the game). Overall, this game is amazing and I cannot recommend the series enough. The Mass Effect series is one of the best sci-fi games ever created, and Mass Effect 3 does the series right. A few more tweaks, and it could have been perfect. Do yourself a favor: play Mass Effect 3!

Score: 9 out of 10

Bottom Line: A brilliant end to a massive trilogy with great additions, but an ending that stumbles

Check it out if you like: Western RPGs, third-person shooters, sci-fi, Star Trek, Star Wars, immersive games

Game of the Year Contender 2012