Review: Mass Effect 2

The first Mass Effect was a major turn off to me. Why was there so much hype around the sequel? In fact, the hype was so big, I decided to borrow my friend's copy of ME1 in order to have a save file ready to import to Mass Effect 2.

Mass Effect 2 continues the story of Alliance space marine, Commander Sheperd. In the first Mass Effect, he finds out that a race of hyper advance, sentient machines, The Reapers, will someday return from the void beyond the galaxy to wipe out all life as we know it. I steer away from mentioning story elements to spoil the game, but as soon as you boot the game up, Sheperd is killed in action five minutes into the opening cinematic. He's brought back to life however by the mysterious Cerberus group, a pro-human radical organization who truly believes in the threat of the Reapers unlike the majority of the population who dismiss them as a myth. Sheperd continues his quest under a tense truce with Cerberus knowing something bad is going down in the galaxy.


After a quick weekend through ME1, I bought ME2 ready to import my version of Commander Sheperd, “Tai” Sheperd. An all around nice guy who can't help but fall into the good guy role. However, he responds badly to people who don't show him any respect, so he won't think twice about putting people in their place. So after building this character in ME1, I import him to ME2.

And boy ever was I glad I took a chance on ME2. Everything I griped about in ME1 was tightened up to make a faster, more enjoyable experience. If ME1 was an role playing game first and a shooting game second, ME2 is a shooter first and an RPG second but absolutely does not sacrifice story to get to where it is now. It feels less like a sequel and more like a solid continuation of the story of my version of Commander Sheperd. Everything notable I did made a lasting impact that came back to remind me that my decisions did have an affect in this universe.

Places to see, things to shoot

Exploration has been toned down to simply traveling to a planet and scanning it while the diversity of the level design is much better (unlike the same ten designs being used over and over again on redundant planets). In a nut shell, instead of exploring vast empty expanses and looking for action in ME1, ME2 distills it to an exciting tram ride straight to the fire fights.

RPG elements have been underplayed to focus on straight up aim and shoot efficiency. No more training skills to make your aim good or to increase your shield strength. All RPG training elements are limited to the actual powers you use in battle and a single skill that relates to health and passive buffs. In ME1, you had a healthy amount of auto-aim to compensate for the loose controls. Now it's pure aim and strategy with your squad mates. If you're familiar with Gears of War, you'll immediately be at home with the controls, from taking cover to taking shots.

They're not the smartest guys around, but now that you can order your two squad mates to individual way points, you can pull off really interesting strategies. Put the tough-as-nails Grunt on point while Mordin supports him from the side all while you flank them with an invisibility cloak and snipe high priority targets. Plenty of times my mates would just stand out of cover and eat lasers for breakfast, but there are missions where the level design allows for really interesting maneuvers.

Who knew the galaxy was so diverse?

And speaking of level design, experiencing the story is a separate beast from playing through a mission. You don't need to wander around looking for things to shoot while making conversation. Instead as soon as Sheperd pulls out his weapon, you know you're in for some action, which will be often. Not like wandering around barren planets from ME1 looking for a fight. Many missions also have interesting hooks or catch-22s that shook things up. One planet had a dying sun that shredded the atmosphere, making it dangerous to stand in direct sun light due to the solar radiation pouring through.

Make friends with Grunt or you'll be making friends with the business end of his gun.

Then of course we get into the characters themselves and the missions that involve them. Your ultimate goal is to take the fight to the bad guys but doing so would be suicide for lesser soldiers. Each team mate however has a personal mission you can undertake to gain their loyalty. Gaining their loyalty along with some other choices involved with the story increases your chances of returning from your suicide mission alive. This creates an incredible emotional attachment that's quite rare. Grunt is by far one of my favorite characters, especially after his personal mission. When we went on the suicide mission, he managed to come through for me in the end blasting enemies and surviving the death traps that awaited us.

The story is engrossing and I invested a great deal of myself into the decisions I made. Mass Effect is a planned trilogy so I look forward to continuing the story of my Commander Sheperd in ME3 seeing as I got him to survive the supposed suicide mission from the final moments of the game.