(Played on PS5 with Legendary Edition)
Oh man. Mass Effect 3 is a mess. I've only played through ME3 like two times in the past, and now being older, having more knowledge of this game's development and also having freshly just finished 1 and 2 before this on LE, 3 is a game that I wish I could like more. There's parts of this game that are brilliant and stand out as some of the best moments in the trilogy, but so much of this game is a clearly rushed and half-baked mess. It doesn't surprise me that this game got badly rushed out because of mandates from EA.
The combat is the best of the trilogy, but comes at the cost of everything else feeling so much more limited in scope compared to the previous two games. The Citadel is your only hub area, and it is a fucking pain in the ass to navigate for side quests. It feels like padding at its worst in every regard, combined with the Journal that now doesn't even track quest progression which utterly boggles my mind how it got screwed up for a role-playing game that didn't have any issues with this for multiple games now.
Every side quest is a fetch quest. It never stops. You get told to find something, you walk all the way to the Normandy, go fly around in space mashing a button trying not to get caught for like 15 minutes (probably with a guide handy), go back to the Citadel, walk all the way back, and then receive money and war assets. That's half the game. It's boring as sin.
The main story missions are polished for the most part and very much feels like where most of the short development time had gone towards, but some of the writing tends to be spotty every now and then especially in regards to the Geth conflict, and even more so when the game just entirely forgets how the player resolves that conflict by the ending which is so hamfisted about its message and themes, while also just... entirely forgetting about the rest of the trilogy, let alone the events of 3. A lot's been said about the ending, and to this day I still stand by saying that I think the ending is terrible even with the Extended Cut.
Frankly, if it wasn't for the DLC this time around, I probably would dislike ME3 even more. It's an okay game at best, but overall a thoroughly disappointing conclusion to the trilogy.
Oh man. Mass Effect 3 is a mess. I've only played through ME3 like two times in the past, and now being older, having more knowledge of this game's development and also having freshly just finished 1 and 2 before this on LE, 3 is a game that I wish I could like more. There's parts of this game that are brilliant and stand out as some of the best moments in the trilogy, but so much of this game is a clearly rushed and half-baked mess. It doesn't surprise me that this game got badly rushed out because of mandates from EA.
The combat is the best of the trilogy, but comes at the cost of everything else feeling so much more limited in scope compared to the previous two games. The Citadel is your only hub area, and it is a fucking pain in the ass to navigate for side quests. It feels like padding at its worst in every regard, combined with the Journal that now doesn't even track quest progression which utterly boggles my mind how it got screwed up for a role-playing game that didn't have any issues with this for multiple games now.
Every side quest is a fetch quest. It never stops. You get told to find something, you walk all the way to the Normandy, go fly around in space mashing a button trying not to get caught for like 15 minutes (probably with a guide handy), go back to the Citadel, walk all the way back, and then receive money and war assets. That's half the game. It's boring as sin.
The main story missions are polished for the most part and very much feels like where most of the short development time had gone towards, but some of the writing tends to be spotty every now and then especially in regards to the Geth conflict, and even more so when the game just entirely forgets how the player resolves that conflict by the ending which is so hamfisted about its message and themes, while also just... entirely forgetting about the rest of the trilogy, let alone the events of 3. A lot's been said about the ending, and to this day I still stand by saying that I think the ending is terrible even with the Extended Cut.
Frankly, if it wasn't for the DLC this time around, I probably would dislike ME3 even more. It's an okay game at best, but overall a thoroughly disappointing conclusion to the trilogy.