Maybe going to write more long form about this so I'll keep it brief, but I thought this was shockingly powerful and horrific honestly. This game really makes explicit that Samus is an arm of the state, she ensures the slow methodical death of every single living thing on this planet. I'm sure there's a backstory on the box or in the manual about why she has to hunt down these metroids, but the game itself is really bare. Which makes the final moment of kindness all the more strange and haunting. It's also just scary! Seeing the metroids' abandoned shells is such an effective signpost and a little scary treat. All the horror is helped by the surprisingly expansive areas, cut down to a small frame. Exploring is not exciting but isolating and frightening. You are not here to do good work and this abandoned world treats you in kind.

Okay so. Here's the thing.

In narrative terms, and really in terms of systemic ambition, ME2 is a worse game than ME1. Several of the loyalty missions feel wretched. From framing the wrong of genocide almost entirely through its perpetrators in Mordin's mission to the astoundingly ablest and racist "stranded" plotline of Jacob's to Samara's murder of her queer daughter who cannot help but be a sexual predator, there's a lot of really tactless ugliness in this game. Worse, it has something of a mean streak. Making fun of Krogan for wanting to go on the Citadel, or having a running gag of a biotic Volus without any power, the racial essentialism of ME1 gets turned into fodder for jokes, rather than "simply" ideological background.

This game's gets a lot of praise for its characters, which is understandable, but nobody gets room to breathe or time to really develop. There's too many cast members and you really only get one mission where they are for sure present and talking with you. I really wish the game had a little more focus, or more cross talk between members. The episodic structure almost works, but it feels so strained by the lack of contact between storylines.

It's also a bummer that ME1's most interesting edges get sanded off. Fewer sidequests with much less to them and way less of the sort of cosmic loneliness that ME1 had. It's even less of an RPG too, I don't think like Baldur's Gate or Fallout: New Vegas are particularly expansive in this regard either, but they make this feel like CoD. The suicide mission is a cool concept, but ultimately it almost entirely rewards just investing more time into the game. If you do all the loyalty missions and buy all the upgrades, you'll likely only lose one person, if that. There's just not a lot there.

All that said, I did have a better time overall with this than ME1. It helps that I like some of the characters a lot. Grunt, Thane, Legion, and even Samara (look I can't resist a space nun milf) have some interesting stuff to do. Thane in particular gets like actual writing and some real exploration of his past. It's not a revelation or anything, but it is nice!

I also played on insanity (ugh) the highest difficulty level. Which make it a compelling, if eventually kind of flat, tactical shooter. I had to think about who I would take on missions, how to use their powers, etc. I really missed the individual cooldowns from ME1, the combat is easier to manage but in exchange feels less expressive. However, I had a good time, and the upgrades all felt impactful and meaningful. I went from dying multiple times in every encounter against the collectors, to being able to wipe the floor with them in the final mission. That's just gaming baby!

Ultimately still kind of a bad game, but I can at least say that I had some fun and will look back on one or two of the quests with fondness. That's not nothing.

It took me like 3 years to actually finish this replay good god. Got a big essay about these coming... soon, so look forward to that!

I did play it on the highest difficulty, but this is a supremely cool action game. They finally figured it out. Big, expressive classes with bombastic powers that interact in simple but strategic ways. This is the least expressive ME as an RPG, which was already slim, but goddamn it feels so good! Shooting infantry with fiery ammo and then exploding with them a biotic attack... Truly never gets old.

Narratively this is. well. hmm. All of ME3's core conflicts boil down to "can't we just get along?!" Shepard as UN ambassador to the stars. Nice to have some moments where they get legitimately humbled that cannot be negotiated away, but this is as vapid a power fantasy as the series has ever been. The thing that ME1 has over all the others is tone; it's melancholy and spacious. Basically all that is evacuated here in favor of Naughty Dog blockbuster design. This is also maybe the weakest core cast of the series, which is admittedly helped a lot by the frequent cameos from previous party members.

Thane is still MVP. The only person in the franchise that really feels three-dimensional and it's nice that he just gets a lot to do. His deathbed scene is the single most moving part of the franchise to me and it's the only moment that questions Shepard in a resonant way.

The other thing that emotionally works here is despair. The flickering moments Shepard spends on the ground of massive scale conflicts underline that, no matter how "good" you are at the game or how many persuasion checks you pass, a lot of people are dying. This has some political... issues. The only thing that can defeat the reapers is throwing lives into the grinder, accelerating the war machine. There's a mission where you recruit child soldiers and then they turn into numbers in your spreadsheet! But if you can take it on its own terms (I can't personally lol) there's some legitimate melodrama!

The ending itself both tries to make you powerful and weak and therefore it doesn't really succeed at either. You HAVE to be the galaxy's most special boy or girl, but also you can't just win outright. Think the game does a fine job with that incredibly tough hand, but it would help a lot if the stakes weren't scaffolded by being the GREAT MAN who is willing to make the HARD CHOICES.

This is moment-to-moment the most successful Mass Effect I think, but it gets that through a slickness that lacks some of the last twos compelling edges. Despite it all, I thought a lot about ME1's empty spaces. Would make a big difference to have that kind of emotional room here.