orion_star

Jack/Tali/Miranda are possible, I am not sure about Samara, and I did not know you could get Morinth initially so I am not sure about her either.

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crowTrobot

lol I have never played a male character ever since a friend told me "do you really want to stare at male ass for several hours a day" on the topic of playing female characters vs male characters on 3rd person games.

orion_star

I hardly notice my character when I am playing aside from the cutscenes. Plus I have no interest in romancing males

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crowTrobot

haha well you could have a lesbian encounter with the blue chick. lol

OmegaRED

So that's not available if you're a chick? They Bioware block same sex action?

I dunno man, it's gotta be worse playing as a female character and only having romance options with dudes! In ME1 I was trying to bed some of my female crew and the only one interested was the friggen guy. Not going through that again

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crowTrobot

YouTube - Mass Effect Lesbian Love Scene

giggity-giggity!

MythicaL

Some screens of my character. She's an Infiltrator:

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Always knew I didn't belong in this world. I wasn't made for this. But I'll never forget those who betrayed me, and those who never failed my trust.

SeraphicSorcerer

All I've got to say is having Yhvonne Stravonski, From the Chuck series make this game 10x more awesome.

I played Me for the pc, mako was much better that way and in some ways enjoyable.

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orion_star

Well I suppose it is possible that the Asari teammate might be a romance option for both, but that doesn't really count in my opinion.

They had gay/lesbian romance options in Dragon Age: Origins, maybe they got a lot of flak over it and decided to take it out of ME2.

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mkk

Only Kelly is an option for a female character. You won't have any fun until the main mission is over, but it'll be worth the wait. Promise.

Anyway now that I've finished the game with a female character I started over with a guy, but I feel the voice actor portrays a more stale and uninteresting character. Not going to play through it again soon because of that, and the fact that very few dialogue options change what happens anyway. The last part of the game was super by the way.

orion_star

I had a feeling she was lesbian

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comp_ali

I just want to add something after I read the whole review , Thanks Veridian3 for adding additional informations about PC controls and the hardware performance (FPS) which is vital for PC gamers , I also appreciated the added videos besides screenshots. I am not a fan of RPG games but I certainly liked the new way you handle the review , looking forward Bioshock 2 review.

I can say you prefer gaming on PCs

comp_ali

Sorry for double post

OmegaRED

I started hitting on Kelly and she's waaaay to easy. Since that might be all I can get on this ship of heteros I guess she'll have to do

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MythicaL

Dammit, I "gave away" Legion by accident. Oh, and Miranda hates me now! Good excuses to play it through another time.

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Always knew I didn't belong in this world. I wasn't made for this. But I'll never forget those who betrayed me, and those who never failed my trust.

OmegaRED

Anyone going to make a Mass Effect 2 thread, I'm afraid to go too deep into spoilers.

Kotaku has a great thing going on where people post their end games in this format. Here's mine:

I Knocked Boots With...

Garrus! I had more luck hitting on the aliens than anyone else and he was primed to go. No sex scene...thankfully. I had Kelly all but in the sack yet she didn't put out. What a tease. I must have screwed up somehow after rescuing her. I have no idea why she suddenly zipped up those pants.

Miranda won't talk to me ever since I sided with Jack and Jack won't sleep with women Jacob is definitely gay.

I'll Mourn the Passing of...

Geth - He died as the specialist, took a bullet in the head right as the doors were closing. I didn't want to lose him but he's definitely the most expendable. I chose to destroy the Heretics so maybe that will help with my rep with the Geths in ME3. I used Samara as my biotic shield and Zaeed as the other squad leader. No way anyone was going to drop my badass crew.

Can We Keep it?

I blew up the collector stuff. I figured if humanity possessed that kind of power the entire galaxy would go back to hating us.

Did I Make it?

Obviously! Can Sheppard even die if there's a sequel? Btw, I lol'd at the loading screws constantly referring to ME3. Never played a game so sure that a sequel was coming.

And the Illusive Man?

He seemed pissed that I blew it up but then I told him who was really in charge. I probably scored some points with the other races by telling Cerberus where to shove it.

What Happens Next?

I'm not even close to being a maxed out Paragon or Renegade; the way I play the game is to decide based on my preferences rather than what will gain me points to either side. Not sure if that was the best idea but oh well. I will probably do some side quests but I'm more interested in finding out if I can bed Miranda or is that a lost cause

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orion_star

OmagaRED it is actually possible to have your entire team die, but unless you are really just going through the game doing nothing but what is absolutely necessary (ie no ship upgrades, no loyalty missions, little to no other upgrades) at the very least Shepard survives.

And supposedly a save game where everyone dies will not import everyone's death into ME3.

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BlueMak

Is the game longer or shorter than the first one?

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The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others(Bertrand Russell)"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." - Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis
This is slavery, not to speak one's thought. [Euripides-The Phoenician Women (c.411-409 B.C.)] http://www.macedonia.info/FALLACIESANDFACTS.htm Sic semper tyrannis.

Chaos-sama

Hi guys im pretty new i would just like to know two things before i buy the game. 1: Do you need to play mass effect 1 to understand anything thats happening in this game and 2: What other gamer is similar so that i know exactly what the gamplay is like.

OmegaRED

1) No, most of ME2 is spent assembling your team and sidequests which require no knowledge of ME1 to fully understand (think Seven Samurai or Magnificent Seven). However, it won't be as enjoyable because many events and characters which have considerable depth in ME1 are glossed over in ME2. As well much of the drama, suspense,excitement and emotional investment in ME2 comes from your experiences in the first game.

2) For the combat side Gears of War is the obvious inspiration on ME2. Not sure about the RPG elements, Knights of the Old Republic perhaps. Bioware makes many highly rated RPGs but Mass Effect 1 &2 are the only ones I played.

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orion_star

Roughly the same length depending on how you play it. It took me 30-35 hours for my first playthrough in both ME1 and ME2 (doing at least 90% of the side quests)

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OmegaRED

Took me 30 hours to finish the campaign my first run through, mostly just campaign and a few side quests. It's a little longer than ME1 but there's less wasting time traveling which makes a huge difference.

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gascieus

So I just finished ME 2. I'll give it my review... because I can .

This review highlights the more critical things, but note that overall it's still a very fine game.

As far as I know I did all the quests I could find. I have to say there are definitely fewer side missions than ME 1, but for the better. ME 1 was littered with mindless fluff and generic looking places (they used like 1 or 2 room models and just vary slightly).

ME 2 did dumb down a lot of the mechanics of the system though. I can't decide if I want to applaud BioWare or condemn them lol; they listened to the fans on what they disliked from ME 1, but the bad thing is rather than tweak/fix the bad so they become good, they just remove them completely from the game. People have already highlighted the vehicle (Mako) as the primary example. I also did not like the change for the cover system. ME 1 was fun because it was fast-paced, gun 'em down style. ME 2 felt like Gears of War, and always finding places for cover.

The world felt smaller to me than ME 1. People voiced that they did not enjoy the long wait time in elevators (loading before levels/maps), like back in Citadel from ME 1. But with this new system (no loading time for any major city), the "world" was condensed. I remember Citadel was huge, with so many people to talk to and stores to visit. ME 2's Citadel felt constricted and limited. The same goes for all other places you visit.

The good things, as is usual of BioWare's games, are the storyline and character interactions. I ABSOLUTELY love Mordin, and his dialogues often crack me up. I wasn't that into Miranda until I found out who she is voiced by lol.

Overall, this game was more or less the same as ME 1. They removed things people disliked rather than change for the better, but they also added new things/kept the good to offset anything detrimental. I would still recommend this game to anyone fond of RPG and/or First person shooting. This game could have been super incredible but it just fell short of that.

orion_star

Well by reducing the number of side quests in ME2 they were able to focus more on the level design of those quests, so it makes sense with less quests that the environments are more unique.

This also ties in to the size of the levels, with fewer quests you don't need as big of an area. Although I will say (not including the mako driving parts) that ME2 is probably bigger than ME1 it is just more segmented and focused.

Also it seems they will be adding some driving quests (or at least quest) with the Hammerhead (hovering mako iirc) DLC. Hopefully it is the free DLC they are supposed to release this week.

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OmegaRED

I agree with gascieus that the "fast travel" while being a great time saver did cut back on immersion, especially in the Citadel which I remember being massive in ME1 but in ME2 it's just a series of hallways. Can you still travel over those bridges and visit areas in the first game or view damage from the attack?

I've also got to agree that we can't blame Bioware for listening to the fans. We got our designed levels rather than cookie cutter rooms but the downside of that is there's less to explore. I'm hoping ME3 finds middle ground and perhaps gives us that exploration combined with the design. That would take more time to make though and I'm sure Bioware wants to get the 3rd one wrapped up and spend more time on with the next trilogy.

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BlueMak

This doesn't make any sense.

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The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others(Bertrand Russell)"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." - Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis
This is slavery, not to speak one's thought. [Euripides-The Phoenician Women (c.411-409 B.C.)] http://www.macedonia.info/FALLACIESANDFACTS.htm Sic semper tyrannis.

orion_star

Sure it does, you don't require as many npcs and as many locales if you want some semblance of variety. Unless of course you enjoy going to the same place over and over just for the sake of having extra quests.

Also you have to remember in ME1 you only had the Citadel, in ME2 you have the citadel (not as much the focus of the second as it was the first), Omega and Illium

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BlueMak

So by area you meant the whole game world. That I can understand.
Because you can easily have fewer quests but larger areas to play them.

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The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others(Bertrand Russell)"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." - Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis
This is slavery, not to speak one's thought. [Euripides-The Phoenician Women (c.411-409 B.C.)] http://www.macedonia.info/FALLACIESANDFACTS.htm Sic semper tyrannis.

orion_star

I agree but you don't need to, and big just for the sake of making it big is not good. I was just saying that usually more quests will results in a larger game area due to diversity.

And honestly not including the mako portions of ME1, I don't think ME2 is much smaller if at all.

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BlueMak

This is what matters.

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The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others(Bertrand Russell)"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." - Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis
This is slavery, not to speak one's thought. [Euripides-The Phoenician Women (c.411-409 B.C.)] http://www.macedonia.info/FALLACIESANDFACTS.htm Sic semper tyrannis.