WHAT A FUCKING RIDE.
As a longtime Dragon Age fan, it's sort of a tragedy that I never got into Mass Effect. I'd never been all that fond of scifi stories, and the handful of times I'd tried any of the ME games I just genuinely hated the gameplay too much to even get meaningfully past the tutorials. Still, I got MELE for free for Prime Gaming day and knew they'd tightened up some combat stuff, so I figured I'd take another crack at it.
The remake cleans up a lot of the gameplay issues I found particularly frustrating, and I downloaded a few quality of life mods to make the experience smoother, and now that I've finished the trilogy...good god, what a fucking INCREDIBLE series of games.
Shepard is the nexus of the story, so we'll start with them. They're soooo fucking wonderful. I don't always love how the Paragon/Renegade thing is handled, as it sometimes feels like it's punishing you for roleplaying a nuanced character, but it also rewards creating a mostly-consistent identity for your PC. Having them start out as a famous badass is really fun, as most of this genre involves a nobody ACHIEVING fame; Shep already being a memetic murderer when the game starts is really, really unique and leads to some very fun dialogue and story options. I played femshep, so shoutout to Jennifer Hale for giving Shep so much swagger and charisma and personality. (I also quite like Mark Meer based one what I've heard of him on Youtube and the like, though his take on Shep is certainly a quite different character than femshep.) I'm one of the people who is violently against the idea of Dragon Age giving us a repeat protagonist, but it works so well with Shepard, both in terms of letting the player get attached but also in leaving room to emphasize the batshit nonsense Shepard goes through; especially in 3, it was fun to watch Shepard become visibly more traumatized and haunted, and I wish the game had leaned into that more.
The rest of the cast is also so, so lovely. Even characters I don't personally care for (Miranda how did your experience with your dad inspire in you NEGATIVE empathy for other victims of abuse...) are still mostly beautifully written, some weird moments notwithstanding (and in a game with this many entries and this many recurring characters, it's simply not possible avoid stepping on SOMEBODY'S headcanons regarding the 'correct' writing) and so much fun. I know 2 gets flak for being a rehash of 1, but that leaves so much room for so much extremely fun character stuff to happen, and I love 2's cast so much. I love ALL OF THEM so much, but 2 really nails it for me, personally.
The world the devs and writers have built is so so fun, and it's sooo beautiful, even for how old it is. It's just like, genuinely, such an incredible feat of writing and visuals. And it's so fun! The gameplay is good and tight and the Mako drives like ass which is like 70% of its charm. I adore how the series ends, that it leans into the tragedy of it all, and I grieve that the fan backlash means that Bioware will almost certainly never do anything as bold and insane again.
And it's also a Bioware game, so it's also dripping with problems. It cannot help but be deeply misogynistic, and the entire series is struck through with such irritating gender essentialism that there are times when it's genuinely nigh-insufferable. "Oh here's a race that's functionally genderless but also they're all basically sexy women and also they're wise and gentle and peacemaking because that's how women are." "Oh the Krogan should try gender equality not because equality is just good but because women are wise and even-tempered and can calm down the crazy inherently violent men." Like what are we DOING. Why do all the women's armor have boob socks. Why are all of the women's arms twig - thin. I don't even care about realism but either make the guys all twinks or let the women be buff. You can't have both. Bioware creates an incredibly cool disabled character in Joker, outright says he uses mobility aids, and then never lets him use those aids or shows him using them. The game's attempts at creating genuine conflicts between aliens with vastly different cultures often leads to outright genocide apologism; the narrative at least seems to realize that the Quarians are being insane and evil about the Geth, but it ALSO really pushes against a player that aims to cure the genophage. And worse than its fictional alien racism, it is ALSO wildly racist to its characters of color, of which there are already not that many. Jacob is such a cool guy and I love how big-hearted and supremely Normal he is, but he is also written as a giant horrible stereotype. Oh his dad's an absentee dad and a sex pest? Oh Jacob fucking CHEATS ON YOU if you romance him? COME ONNNNNN.
And yet, here we are. I finished the series for the first time and am still bawling my goddamn eyes out. Part of this is because I picked a sad ending (it was most in-character for my shep!) but most of it is because I feel so much awe at the incredible experience I just had, and so much grief that it's done. It's a wonder that I never played the original games, that I couldn't get into them — but also, I'm so glad that I get to experience this series for the first time NOW. What a wild, incredible, beautiful, often frustrating ride. What a joy to experience. I'm so incredibly grateful I got a chance to, and I can't wait to come back to it down the line with some mods that make the female armor look less...like that. Genuinely one the greatest game series ever created.
As a longtime Dragon Age fan, it's sort of a tragedy that I never got into Mass Effect. I'd never been all that fond of scifi stories, and the handful of times I'd tried any of the ME games I just genuinely hated the gameplay too much to even get meaningfully past the tutorials. Still, I got MELE for free for Prime Gaming day and knew they'd tightened up some combat stuff, so I figured I'd take another crack at it.
The remake cleans up a lot of the gameplay issues I found particularly frustrating, and I downloaded a few quality of life mods to make the experience smoother, and now that I've finished the trilogy...good god, what a fucking INCREDIBLE series of games.
Shepard is the nexus of the story, so we'll start with them. They're soooo fucking wonderful. I don't always love how the Paragon/Renegade thing is handled, as it sometimes feels like it's punishing you for roleplaying a nuanced character, but it also rewards creating a mostly-consistent identity for your PC. Having them start out as a famous badass is really fun, as most of this genre involves a nobody ACHIEVING fame; Shep already being a memetic murderer when the game starts is really, really unique and leads to some very fun dialogue and story options. I played femshep, so shoutout to Jennifer Hale for giving Shep so much swagger and charisma and personality. (I also quite like Mark Meer based one what I've heard of him on Youtube and the like, though his take on Shep is certainly a quite different character than femshep.) I'm one of the people who is violently against the idea of Dragon Age giving us a repeat protagonist, but it works so well with Shepard, both in terms of letting the player get attached but also in leaving room to emphasize the batshit nonsense Shepard goes through; especially in 3, it was fun to watch Shepard become visibly more traumatized and haunted, and I wish the game had leaned into that more.
The rest of the cast is also so, so lovely. Even characters I don't personally care for (Miranda how did your experience with your dad inspire in you NEGATIVE empathy for other victims of abuse...) are still mostly beautifully written, some weird moments notwithstanding (and in a game with this many entries and this many recurring characters, it's simply not possible avoid stepping on SOMEBODY'S headcanons regarding the 'correct' writing) and so much fun. I know 2 gets flak for being a rehash of 1, but that leaves so much room for so much extremely fun character stuff to happen, and I love 2's cast so much. I love ALL OF THEM so much, but 2 really nails it for me, personally.
The world the devs and writers have built is so so fun, and it's sooo beautiful, even for how old it is. It's just like, genuinely, such an incredible feat of writing and visuals. And it's so fun! The gameplay is good and tight and the Mako drives like ass which is like 70% of its charm. I adore how the series ends, that it leans into the tragedy of it all, and I grieve that the fan backlash means that Bioware will almost certainly never do anything as bold and insane again.
And it's also a Bioware game, so it's also dripping with problems. It cannot help but be deeply misogynistic, and the entire series is struck through with such irritating gender essentialism that there are times when it's genuinely nigh-insufferable. "Oh here's a race that's functionally genderless but also they're all basically sexy women and also they're wise and gentle and peacemaking because that's how women are." "Oh the Krogan should try gender equality not because equality is just good but because women are wise and even-tempered and can calm down the crazy inherently violent men." Like what are we DOING. Why do all the women's armor have boob socks. Why are all of the women's arms twig - thin. I don't even care about realism but either make the guys all twinks or let the women be buff. You can't have both. Bioware creates an incredibly cool disabled character in Joker, outright says he uses mobility aids, and then never lets him use those aids or shows him using them. The game's attempts at creating genuine conflicts between aliens with vastly different cultures often leads to outright genocide apologism; the narrative at least seems to realize that the Quarians are being insane and evil about the Geth, but it ALSO really pushes against a player that aims to cure the genophage. And worse than its fictional alien racism, it is ALSO wildly racist to its characters of color, of which there are already not that many. Jacob is such a cool guy and I love how big-hearted and supremely Normal he is, but he is also written as a giant horrible stereotype. Oh his dad's an absentee dad and a sex pest? Oh Jacob fucking CHEATS ON YOU if you romance him? COME ONNNNNN.
And yet, here we are. I finished the series for the first time and am still bawling my goddamn eyes out. Part of this is because I picked a sad ending (it was most in-character for my shep!) but most of it is because I feel so much awe at the incredible experience I just had, and so much grief that it's done. It's a wonder that I never played the original games, that I couldn't get into them — but also, I'm so glad that I get to experience this series for the first time NOW. What a wild, incredible, beautiful, often frustrating ride. What a joy to experience. I'm so incredibly grateful I got a chance to, and I can't wait to come back to it down the line with some mods that make the female armor look less...like that. Genuinely one the greatest game series ever created.