Mass Effect 3 - Page 4

Just read it. God help us all if they can deliver on even half the amount of Holy Shit that when off in my brain when they mention a Reaper wrestling a fucking Thresher Maw into the sand .

That was the biggest "HOLYSHITWHATTHEFUCK" for me.  I can't even imagine it.  I look forward greatly to it.

Are they still claiming it's out this year?  Because I am EXTREMELY skeptical of that.

Also, I'm already fucking buying like Skyrim at the end of the year.  I don't need more soul-sucking RPGs in my life.

Yes you do.

It won't be anything like Skyrim though. They seem to want to complete turning ME into a third person shooter with this.

Open-world Tetris is the future of gaming.

Quote:

Originally Posted by stelios 

It won't be anything like Skyrim though. They seem to want to complete turning ME into a third person shooter with this.

Well, it's more of a move to a functioning third person shooter. Mass Effect 1 was just a bad third person shooter, which people seemed to not mind because having stats gave them the illusion of choice.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spike Marshall 

Well, it's more of a move to a functioning third person shooter. Mass Effect 1 was just a bad third person shooter, which people seemed to not mind because having stats gave them the illusion of choice.

Oh, don't mistake me. I agree fully with that move.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trevor 

If anything, I'll be relieved when they announce the move to 2012 Q1.

Yes. Please.  I mean, I already feel like this has happened.  It should. Just say it, Bioware!  Say it!  

I'm pretty sure last time I was in this thread, Spike was calling Trevor out for being an endlessly negative, whiny grouch about games and Bioware.  Did I imagine that?

Yes, you're just crazy.

And damn, this game better not be delayed, I'm looking forward to this game so bad, much more so than Skyrim (couldn't get into Oblivion).

Anyone else having flashbacks to the fall of 2009? Tons of huge games scheduled to come out. One by one they get delayed until the first half of 2010, including Mass Effect 2. I fully expect something of the sort to happen again this year.

Haven't read Game Informer.  Has the Illusive Man been indoctrinated by Harbinger?  That'd explain Cerberus having a hard-on for killing Shepard.

Sweet fat baby Jesus.

I'm praying they'll let us switch classes. Praying and sacrificing goats now.

You could switch classes in Mass Effect 2, even with an import character -- I imagine it'll probably stay the same in Part 3.

Also, that's some major "holy shit" right there.

Nevermind then. Now I'll have to find something else for that sacrificial goat.

I've always played the Vanguard as closely to a melee class as possible before, and paid for it. This is amazing news for my stupid head long charges into covered enemies.

Oh, this is sounding goood.

Now give me one last feature - the ability to shoot Jack's whingeing arse out the airlock - and I'll be good to go.

Technically-speaking, if you failed to invest in the upgraded Normandy armor, you already kinda DO have that ability.

Two new images from IGN...evidently those "Cerberus Cyber-Ninjas" we've been hearing about:

I'm sure they'll be looking forward to getting acquainted with my Mattock rifle. It's going to be a good couple of months with this and Skyrim.

Just got word from Bioware's Facebook: Game's been pushed back to Q1 2012. Somebody had to flinch from the holiday. I'm cool with it being them if it means more polish/more time with Arkham City.

Thank fuck, now I can enjoy Battlefield 3, Arkham City, Assassin's Creed 3, Gears of War 3, Skyrim, Resi 4 HD, in peace.

Personally I think this is great news. Not because of it's moving out of the overcrowded fall, but because it gives Bioware a little more time to finish it.

Great news -- the PlayStation network may be back up by then. Smirk.

In the meantime, I'll play out the events of what I think will occur in Mass Effect 3 with the Shepard, Tali, Grunt, and Thane figurines that have FINALLY been released.

Right now I'm really hoping that Mass Effect 3 allows you to finish the job on either Kaiden or Ashley.

As in "Shoved in airlock"

Mordin and Legion are must haves, the former because he's so goddamn awesome and the latter because you get him so late in the game you only scratch the surface of the character's possibilities. 

Glad to hear about the melee abilities.  One of my gripes with ME2 is that on the higher difficulties, close combat always meant near-instant death.  I'll still probably stick to a more sniper-ish role, but more variety is welcome.

According to an interview with Casey Hudson and co in Xbox World, the man, the myth, the guddamn legend that is The Massani is BACK. Here's to destroying the Reapers and making out like a guddamn bandit. And, er, killing off everyone else in the galaxy in the process. Omelettes and all that.

Apparently Thane, Jack and Mordin are definitely around too, along with the rest of the gang in some form or another (survival status depending). However, they've said there were probably too many squadmates last time around so we're most likely looking at 10 regular squadmates tops and only a couple of new faces among that. Reading between the lines, I'd guess it'll be:

Definites

* Kaiden/Ash

* Liara

* Garrus, if alive (though there are ominous whisperings he may not be around for long..!)

* Tali, if alive

* James Vega

ME2 Survivors

* Jack

* Thane

* Miranda

* Zaeed

With Mordin on hand as science officer/STG liason; Legion and Wrex/Wreav/Grunt appearing for one off missions/chapters or something, cameos from Kasumi and Samara, and Jacob disappearing down the back of the sofa and no one noticing or caring.

As for locations, the following are actually confirmed:

* Palaven (Turians)

* Rannoch (Quarians, albeit occupied by Geth)

* Thessia (Asari)

* Tuchanka (Krogan)

* Salarian world

* Seattle-Vancouver megacity

* Mars

Oh yeah, and here's some boss battle info which may thrill/depress some of you:

Thank the gods this has been pushed back. Between Skyrim, Arkham City, and the next Assassins Creed I get the feeling the latter part of this year will be busy enough game-wise

     Quote:

Wha -??

Space MILF only rates a "cameo" now? Goddammit.

Great to hear Zaeed and Mordin are both back, though. Those two are total no-brainers.

I think cutting down on the potential squadmates is a great idea. It should allow there to be more story space and interactions with the ones you get. Speaking for myself, I'm not gonna replay a title to see what sort of different quips I get from taking Garrus on a mission as opposed to Zaeed. And other than the final missions in ME2, it never seemed to make much difference who I took on a mission, barring character-related quests.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Leto II 

     Quote:

Wha -??

 

Space MILF only rates a "cameo" now? Goddammit.

 

Great to hear Zaeed and Mordin are both back, though. Those two are total no-brainers.

Bear in mind I'm just guessing about the cameo thing, based on that neither of them were explicitly mentioned the way Thane, Zaeed, Mordin and Jack have been and that neither could be seen as strictly important in the grand scheme of things. Thane and Jack are possible love interests*, Mordin's Professor Awesome and Zaeed...well, Zaeed's not strictly important either but he's guddamn great, really grew on the fans and probably has nothing better to do than blow shit up anyway.
 

I mean, I'd miss Samara as she was actually my favourite character along with Zaeed but her story's done. Morinth's dead, her oath to Shep's fulfilled, time to go back to justicaring. As for Kasumi, she's a thief, not much call for that when Mecha-Cthulhu and chums are tearing up 8th Avenue, is there?

Other things of note: squad banter ala the elevator conversations is back in, hopefully it'll be the only feature the game will take from Dragon Age 2 as it was the one thing it did actually do well. Oh and there are not going to be any new romances available, so that Legion-Shep interface will just have to stay in the realm of TERRIBLE fan fiction thankfully.

* Speaking of which, there's been no mention of Miranda yet at all, which is kind of strange. There's a quote doing the rounds that Jacob is definitely out and won't be returning, which seems pretty harsh to say the least if true but maybe they're just dispensing with the two Cerberus guys entirely as part of the okay, yes they really are bad guys after all U-turn.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trevor 

I think the dynamic quips are cool - they make it seem like your choice to bring along a squadmate is important in a very immediate context - but yeah, they're not as big of a story draw as, say, a loyalty mission.

 

That being said, I really liked the idea of ME2 being a "building a team" game that runs up to the climax in ME3. I think it was Devin who said that ME2 was like Seven Samurai minus the last act, and I think that's a valid assessment. Blowing away Shepard's team in favor of a subset makes ME2's team building seem a little like spinning wheels.

I would've thought The Dirty Dozen would be the more obvious touchstone, but as you wish.

Some of the team should carry over, but there's something of a Catch-22 in that it takes a lot of the uniqueness and drama out of ME2's climax if the default requires that everyone survived to get ME3 tolling.  But really, are people really clamoring for more Zaeed and Samara?  That confounds me.  I figure the squad to be an even split between Essentials, Take or Leave, and Good Riddance:

Tali/Garrus - Essential, as you've had the most time to grow attached to them.

Mordin - Essential on account of raging awesomeness.

Legion - Essential on account of barely touching on the character's potential.

Miranda/Jacob/Jack - Take or leave.  I can see being annoyed that they don't come back if you chose to bone them, but the first two were pretty boring and Jack took some effort to get to know before she got interesting.

Kasumi - Take or leave.  I never found much use for her outside of her somewhat annoying loyalty quest.

Thane - Cool, but since that he was terminal anyhow, letting him take the loss in the climax felt wholly appropriate.

Samara - Snooze.

Grunt - Wrex was better anyway.

Zaeed - One-dimensional asshat

I wound up liking Zaeed based entirely on my inability to get him killed during the final mission more than anything else.

Though if I'm honest, I'll cop to totally liking the second team more than the first team. I mean, Garrus, Tali, and Wrex are teh shit, but I could have gladly left Kaidan and Ashley both to die. And I'm pretty sure I'm the only lesbian gamer on the planet who's kinda tepid about Liara(Yes even after the excellent Shadow Broker expansion) so I had no problem with most of the squad in the second game.

I dunno, maybe it's just the tone. The second batch seemed to be the type of characters you'd WANT if you happened to be a shady intergalactic James Bond/Special Forces type..just wished they'd have left some family issues out of it.

I really liked Kasumi, and brought her along on many a mission. She's the standard sneaky assassin type who's been done many times before, but unlike so many of the others she's not dark and brooding. She's practical, well-adjusted, and has a wry sense of humor. I loved her Shadow Strike and Flashbang grenade.

Grunt was ok, and handy to have on tough missions, but I got sick of listening to him. Ok, ok, 'you...are...Krogan.' We get it.

People who hate Zaeed are terrible people with terrible opinions about things.  So it's obvious why Trevor and Schwartz were destined to hate him I KEED I KEED

Thank god this is in 2012 now.  Between Batman, SR3 and Uncharted 3, this winter is going to kick my wallet right in the soul.

Holy crap, E3 just demonstrated Kinect functionality with Mass Effect 3:  Not motion controls (at least not any that were shown), but you can literally give voice commands to your squad, and can "speak" your dialogue options to select them.

That's pretty freaking cool.

Credit to Polygon Wizard who mentioned this before me over in the E3 Discussion thread.

Being able to issue voice commands to your squad is cool.

"Speaking" the dialogue, only to then have Shepard also speak dialogue that you just triggered, is incredibly stupid.

I think it would be completely stupid if he was saying the exact same thing, but since Shepard doesn't say the exact same thing, it's only somewhat goofy. I think this system would work great in an RPG like the first Dragon Age where your character doesn't speak.

Unless the voice commands work with a headset, I'm not really going to care. They're neat and all, but not enough to make me wish I had a Kinect to get them to work.

It's a neat feature for those that have the Kinect (though why it couldn't work on a headset I have no idea...maybe it will), but it's not designed to be "critical" to the gameplay, which is good.

"Meaning" is derived from from the gamer in this instance.  Some might find it a far more immersive experience with vocal commands and prefer playing the game that way.  Others might think it's dumb/pointless and ignore it altogether, but ehn...gamers.  You'll never please them all.