Jean-Luc
February 15th, 2010, 07:51 PM
http://i46.tinypic.com/154vhn8.jpg
When the first Mass Effect was announced, I was very skeptical of what it promised. It wasn't the story or the gameplay that caused the doubt, it was how the game presented itself. The innovative conversation system looked and sounded great in teasers and tech demos, but I honestly couldn't see such an ambitious effort succeeding so I relegated the game to the bin of obscurity (obviously, I wasn't familiar with Bioware at this time). After hearing the onslaught of positive reviews praising Bioware's success with the dialogue system, I decided to pick it up. My expectations weren't very high when I began; I was fully expecting that the game would be a decent RPG with unfulfilled promises of grandeur. A week later, I sat slack-jawed in front of my TV, completely awestruck at what I had just experienced. At the end of the game, I had only one question in my mind: “How in the hell is Bioware going to top this?”
You can imagine my excitement when Mass Effect 2 was officially announced. After the first teaser, I eagerly ingested every scrap of information I could find. It wasn't until I watched the impossibly epic launch trailer that I thought about what I was doing; I was setting myself up to be disappointed. There was no possible way Bioware could live up to the massive amounts of hype they had produced. Well, to my (pleasant) surprise, they succeeded...for the most part.
For those unfamiliar with the game's premise:
Mass Effect 2 once again puts you in the boots of Commander Shepard of the Alliance Navy. An action-packed introduction sequence sets the scene as your ship, the Normandy, is destroyed by an identified vessel and Shepard is killed in action. Shepard is resurrected by Cerberus, a human-supremacist group, who ask only that Shepard use his skills to eliminate the threat of the Collectors who have been harvesting hundreds of thousands of human colonists for some unknown purpose. Shepard must gain the trust of his allies if he wishes to survive passing through the Omega 4 relay and eliminate the Collector threat once and for all.
Unlike the original, Mass Effect 2 starts with a bang. The first ten minutes are pure cinematic genius and it does a great job of drawing the player in quickly. Shepard's immediate death and subsequent resurrection felt somewhat contrived, almost an excuse to change your class or facial appearance, but it ended up working surprisingly well as a device to drive the plot, so I won't bash it too much. Much like its predecessor, Mass Effect 2's main threat (The Collectors) has the tendency to go walkabout and this is simultaneously the storyline's biggest strength and most obvious weakness. For those who haven't played Mass Effect, the main villain appeared at the start of the game and, for all intensive purposes, disappeared about 2 hours in and returned about 8-15 hours later (depending on how thorough you were). Mass Effect 2 has better pacing, occasionally throwing in a Collector-specific mission at crucial points in your overall progress, but the urgency is substantially brought down when you realize you can easily spend as much time as you want exploring the galaxy and performing side-quests.
http://i47.tinypic.com/ogjsxz.jpg
And this is just the introduction sequence.
This “fault” is fortunately overshadowed by the benefits of making Mass Effect 2 a much more personal story for Commander Shepard. About 70% of the storyline is devoted to recruiting your squadmates and getting to know them, and this is where the game really shines. Old faces Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, Garrus Vakarian, Jeff “Joker” Moreau and Doctor Chakwas make welcome returns and the new arrivals fit in nicely. Mass Effect 2 puts a much heavier emphasis on character development this time around and it really pays off on the loyalty missions you have to complete in order to gain their trust. All of them are incredibly well written and brilliantly voice-acted but the two standout performances came from Tali'Zorah and Mordin Solus. In my 14 years of gaming, I have never seen characters more interesting than these two, and certainly none that have had such an emotional impact on me. Most games tend not to elicit much emotion from me and the few that have done so happened quite a few years back...yet I'll be damned if I wasn't in tears several times on Tali's mission and greatly moved by the somber, yet contemplative atmosphere on Mordin's.
Unfortunately, not all of the characters are quite so well-written. Miranda Lawson and Jacob Taylor, the two Cerberus operatives on your squad, are three-dimensional characters in their own right but they unfortunately fall into rather obvious cliché at times. Miranda is the tough femme-fatale with the soft core buried underneath and Jacob is your typical “bro” character (no that's not a reference to his skin color), the kind you might go drinking with a few times but never really get intrigued by. The DLC character, Zaeed, is regrettably one-dimensional and it's especially disappointing because there was so much more they could have done with him. Instead, he ends up being the generic “veteran” who regales you with stories of his exploits but never really develops as a person. Fortunately, these three relatively weak characters didn't really detract from my experience and are offset by the remaining crewmates.
http://i47.tinypic.com/34j2gkh.jpg
You'll be spending a lot of time getting to know these guys.
As I said earlier, the Collectors are thrown into the mix at pre-determined areas and this does a good job of breaking up the storyline between your squadmates and the greater threat. All of this is leading up to the final mission which is aptly described as "suicidal" and Bioware actually means it. You need to put in a considerable effort if you want to make it through the mission, let alone come out of with with your entire squad. This preparation consists partly of upgrading your ship and your weapons and the game will severely punish you for not doing so. Even more important to the success of the mission are the decisions you make along the way and they are almost never black and white. This is one of the games main strengths because it forces you to really question what you're doing and if it's the right choice. More than once I was punished late in the game for some foolish decision I made earlier and the game isn't shy about brutalizing you for it.
For those of you with a completed Mass Effect save, you can import your character into Mass Effect 2 and every decision you made before is recognized on one level or another here. The implementation of this is thankfully not "in your face," at least not all the time. There is a lot of subtlety to be found here, whether it's a simple e-mail from a character you rescued or a conversation with a familiar face. While most of them aren't important to the main plot, this level of continuity between the two games is unprecedented and it constantly reminds you that your actions actually make a difference. It's an astonishing accomplishment and Bioware should be congratulated for keeping their promise.
Now then, I could spend this entire review talking about the storyline and characters but let's get onto the make or break portion of a game: the gameplay. Mass Effect 1 suffered from several major flaws; The AI was incredibly thick, the MAKO (your vehicle) made me want to break down and cry at times, some of the sidequests were utterly pointless, and the shooting mechanics weren't nearly as polished as the games they derived from (Gears of War being most obvious).
Mass Effect 2 does a lot to fix these problems, especially in battle. The friendly AI is much improved and this has to be one of very few games I've played in which my squadmates will actually advance on their own instead of standing around like a bunch of idiots. AI also tend to use their powers responsibly instead of waiting for me to tell them how to fight, and the enemies put up a suitable challenge. The actual gunplay is vastly improved over the first game, owing heavily to the introduction of thermal clips. While illogical, (why would anyone go from infinite ammo to finite clip-based?) the benefits to the shooting mechanics are obvious. No longer are you allowed to pick a favorite weapon and use it solely for the entire game; you actually have to think about what you're doing and make every shot count. Ammo isn't exactly sparse but if you don't place your shots properly you run the real risk of getting overwhelmed.
http://i46.tinypic.com/2j4y5wy.jpg
The revamped HUD which, unfortunately, I am not a big fan of. I hope Bioware brings back the old design.
I have a few major gripes with the combat however. For one, I've never been a fan of regenerating health in games that can't logically explain it so it's very disappointing to see it here when Mass Effect 1 had a perfectly good system. I'm also not a big fan of the new HUD as it doesn't give me the information I want. It's difficult to tell how my squadmates are doing and the new “powers” system isn't all that great. I very much miss the independent cooldown timers from Mass Effect 1 and this new system just comes across as streamlining to a fault. I also miss having a radar to tell me where the hell my enemies are but the lack of it never led to too many problems. I do like the ability to switch ammo types on the fly though, something that the original was sorely missing. Overall, the combat is substantially improved from the first game and often a lot of fun but it needs a considerable amount of work if it wants to stand up with the best.
Another portion of gameplay that you'll spend time with is resource gathering and I'm saddened to say that it's quite boring. It consists of scanning planets and launching probes when you see a particularly large spike in a certain resource. It's the same for every single planet and this grows old very, very quickly. It would be nice if Bioware could come up with a compromise between resource collection and the open-ended exploration the MAKO and have it delivered in time for Mass Effect 3 but as it stands now, mineral scanning is a necessary evil. While tedious, it's a requirement if you want to even think about surviving the final mission and the upgrade benefits you can grab for your weapons and armor are often worth the dullness. Another positive attribute to this mini-game is that you will occasionally stumble upon "anomalies" which lead to on-foot sidequests. The sidequests are generally well designed and vastly preferable to the copy-pasted missions with the MAKO in the first game.
http://i50.tinypic.com/effbwj.jpg
While occasionally addictive, resource collection quickly becomes a chore.
When you're not shooting things or gathering resources, much of your remaining time will be spent having conversations with others and either getting to know them or doing jobs for them and this is arguably the core of the Mass Effect trilogy. More to the point, if you aren't a fan of lengthy conversations, even with interesting characters, you should probably avoid Mass Effect entirely. Fortunately, the first game made a name of itself with its innovative dialogue system and Mass Effect 2 proudly continues this to great success. Every NPC you meet has an interesting (or hilarious) story to tell and are exceedingly well written. From the bartender on Illium to the mysterious and powerful Illusive Man, there is always something new to learn or someone else to meet and you owe it to yourself to explore this as much as you can.
Mass Effect 2 expands on the conversation system by adding “interrupts” which will flash on the screen at crucial moments and you can perform an immediate Paragon (good) or Renegade (hardass/ruthless) action based on the icon displayed. Some of the coolest and most touching moments in the game occur when you take advantage of this system and Bioware should be immensely proud for implementing it so well. Mass Effect 2 makes a smart decision and ditches the old plus/minus system (where points are subtracted from Paragon if you do a Renegade action) in favor of plus/plus (points are added according to your choices). This is much more realistic in my eyes because it really allows you to be a true Paragon or Renegade without having to worry about being “punished” for going against your established character.
http://i50.tinypic.com/2vxep3k.jpg
The depth of the conversations you can have is staggering.
Of course, the incredible amounts of dialogue wouldn't be nearly as entertaining if it wasn't for the omnipresent and utterly outstanding voice acting. Mass Effect 2 contains some of the best voice work I've ever heard in a game, narrowly tied by Uncharted 2 and the Legacy of Kain series. Mark Meer (Male Shepard) and Jennifer Hale (Female Shepard) do fantastic jobs of bringing your character to life though they have different ways of approaching the role. Meer portrays Shepard as a very calm, confident individual and a lot of players have taken this to mean he's monotonous but that really isn't the case. He knows to use emotion where appropriate yet he always stays in character, making sure that Shepard maintains who he is as a person despite the occasional outbursts he may have. Hale's approach is centered around providing subtle voice inflection and emotion to nearly every line she delivers. It's a drastically different interpretation of the character and it works quite well if that's what you want from Shepard. If there's one thing Hale certainly does better than Meer, it's during the romance scenes, specifically when the relationship reaches the climax. Meer tries, I'll give him that, but too often his come-ons come across as cheesy. When it comes down to it though, both actors do an extraordinary job at bringing Shepard to life and who your prefer really comes down to who you want Shepard to be, which is exactly how it should be in a choice-driven game.
In addition to Shepard him/herself, Mass Effect 2's supporting cast are equally well voiced and some of the performances are damned Oscar-worthy. Liz Sroka (Tali'Zorah), Michael Beattie (Mordin Solus), Seth Green (Joker), Brandon Keener (Garrus Vakarian) and Martin Sheen (Illusive Man) are the standouts here and they bring their characters to a level of realism and depth that I rarely see in visual media. The other characters aren't far behind and every single actor does a great job of giving their character a memorable personality. Bioware certainly knows how to pick talent as I can't think of more than a handful of lines that were poorly delivered which is staggering when you consider the fact there is 9-12 hours of dialogue throughout the entire game. One of my personal favorite characters, Conrad Verner makes a showstopping appearance about halfway through the game and the conversation you have with him is nothing short of brilliance.
http://i48.tinypic.com/35kmsmu.jpg
One of the coolest NPC's in the game, this Illium Bartender is flat-out awesome.
In addition to the dialogue, the sound effects are done fairly well in this game. They aren't quite up to the level of the voice acting but the guns are punchy, the ambient noises are well mixed and it all fits together quite nicely. The orchestral score is appropriate throughout the game and I notice the composer took a page from the recent Star Trek movie and it paid off really well. The reveal of the Normandy is very much like the reveal of the Enterprise and it sends chills down my spine every time I see it. My big complaint with the sound comes fro-ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL...the repetition of the the phrases in combat. There are maybe 5 lines per character and you're guaranteed to hear them every single friggin battle. Honestly, I hope Bioware takes that and either tones it down or tosses it into the fiery pit from whence it came.
To compliment the top-notch voice acting and sound design, Bioware has created a universe with some award-winningly fantastic art design. Unreal Engine 3 is hard at work here in possibly its finest implementation yet and the artists have managed to completely avoid the engine's tendency to put a bizarre and unrealistic gloss over every surface. The result is a cohesive world that continually feels simultaneously realistic and stylized and is an absolute joy to look at. Every world you visit is completely unique; Illium is especially impressive, if a bit derivative of Star Wars and it all contributes to the most fully realized video game setting I've yet experienced. The characters are no exception to these high standards as each is exquisitely modelled and textured. From the detailed cloth on Tali's bio-suit to the rough skin of the Krogans, everyone looks fantastic. Every character is animated very well and it's nice to see more activity during conversations instead of being almost completely stationary like they were in Mass Effect 1. I was also thrilled to see that Bioware has learned to take advantage of camera angles and Mass Effect 2 is much more cinematic for it. My only real gripe is that the lip-sync is occasionally a bit faulty and some of the animations where characters interact with the environment are flat-out embarrassing but these flaws are few and far between and barely detract from the overall experience.
http://i49.tinypic.com/5u4och.jpg
One of many breathtaking locales.
Whether it's the unparalleled voice acting, the phenomenal art direction, the memorable characters or the entertaining (albeit imperfect) shooting mechanics, Mass Effect 2 really is a masterpiece. It's an emotional rollercoaster and an extraordinary sci-fi epic that continues to push the industry forward with its innovative storytelling and it's a damn fine shooter in its own right. The only flaws come from what I mentioned previously and while none of them are deal breakers, they do prevent the game from reaching the borders of perfection. If there is one thing I hope they don't change though, it's the unmatched camaraderie between Commander Shepard and his crew. Honestly, the only way to top what they've done is to take the entire crew to a bar and do karaoke to 20th century classic rock...hang on I'm gonna go e-mail Bioware.
In all seriousness, Mass Effect 2 is an experience and an event, one that I highly recommend to anyone looking for a complex and original sci-fi RPG and that I strictly forbid from those who intend to breeze through the game as fast as possible. You will regret it in more ways than one and you'd be doing a disservice to yourself and the developers. Once again, I am left here thinking about what Bioware can really do to top the experience Mass Effect 2 delivers but I've grown to trust them as developers. The finale can't come soon enough.
Final Verdict: Mass Effect 2 is a must-buy.
For those who prefer a numerical score: 95%
When the first Mass Effect was announced, I was very skeptical of what it promised. It wasn't the story or the gameplay that caused the doubt, it was how the game presented itself. The innovative conversation system looked and sounded great in teasers and tech demos, but I honestly couldn't see such an ambitious effort succeeding so I relegated the game to the bin of obscurity (obviously, I wasn't familiar with Bioware at this time). After hearing the onslaught of positive reviews praising Bioware's success with the dialogue system, I decided to pick it up. My expectations weren't very high when I began; I was fully expecting that the game would be a decent RPG with unfulfilled promises of grandeur. A week later, I sat slack-jawed in front of my TV, completely awestruck at what I had just experienced. At the end of the game, I had only one question in my mind: “How in the hell is Bioware going to top this?”
You can imagine my excitement when Mass Effect 2 was officially announced. After the first teaser, I eagerly ingested every scrap of information I could find. It wasn't until I watched the impossibly epic launch trailer that I thought about what I was doing; I was setting myself up to be disappointed. There was no possible way Bioware could live up to the massive amounts of hype they had produced. Well, to my (pleasant) surprise, they succeeded...for the most part.
For those unfamiliar with the game's premise:
Mass Effect 2 once again puts you in the boots of Commander Shepard of the Alliance Navy. An action-packed introduction sequence sets the scene as your ship, the Normandy, is destroyed by an identified vessel and Shepard is killed in action. Shepard is resurrected by Cerberus, a human-supremacist group, who ask only that Shepard use his skills to eliminate the threat of the Collectors who have been harvesting hundreds of thousands of human colonists for some unknown purpose. Shepard must gain the trust of his allies if he wishes to survive passing through the Omega 4 relay and eliminate the Collector threat once and for all.
Unlike the original, Mass Effect 2 starts with a bang. The first ten minutes are pure cinematic genius and it does a great job of drawing the player in quickly. Shepard's immediate death and subsequent resurrection felt somewhat contrived, almost an excuse to change your class or facial appearance, but it ended up working surprisingly well as a device to drive the plot, so I won't bash it too much. Much like its predecessor, Mass Effect 2's main threat (The Collectors) has the tendency to go walkabout and this is simultaneously the storyline's biggest strength and most obvious weakness. For those who haven't played Mass Effect, the main villain appeared at the start of the game and, for all intensive purposes, disappeared about 2 hours in and returned about 8-15 hours later (depending on how thorough you were). Mass Effect 2 has better pacing, occasionally throwing in a Collector-specific mission at crucial points in your overall progress, but the urgency is substantially brought down when you realize you can easily spend as much time as you want exploring the galaxy and performing side-quests.
http://i47.tinypic.com/ogjsxz.jpg
And this is just the introduction sequence.
This “fault” is fortunately overshadowed by the benefits of making Mass Effect 2 a much more personal story for Commander Shepard. About 70% of the storyline is devoted to recruiting your squadmates and getting to know them, and this is where the game really shines. Old faces Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, Garrus Vakarian, Jeff “Joker” Moreau and Doctor Chakwas make welcome returns and the new arrivals fit in nicely. Mass Effect 2 puts a much heavier emphasis on character development this time around and it really pays off on the loyalty missions you have to complete in order to gain their trust. All of them are incredibly well written and brilliantly voice-acted but the two standout performances came from Tali'Zorah and Mordin Solus. In my 14 years of gaming, I have never seen characters more interesting than these two, and certainly none that have had such an emotional impact on me. Most games tend not to elicit much emotion from me and the few that have done so happened quite a few years back...yet I'll be damned if I wasn't in tears several times on Tali's mission and greatly moved by the somber, yet contemplative atmosphere on Mordin's.
Unfortunately, not all of the characters are quite so well-written. Miranda Lawson and Jacob Taylor, the two Cerberus operatives on your squad, are three-dimensional characters in their own right but they unfortunately fall into rather obvious cliché at times. Miranda is the tough femme-fatale with the soft core buried underneath and Jacob is your typical “bro” character (no that's not a reference to his skin color), the kind you might go drinking with a few times but never really get intrigued by. The DLC character, Zaeed, is regrettably one-dimensional and it's especially disappointing because there was so much more they could have done with him. Instead, he ends up being the generic “veteran” who regales you with stories of his exploits but never really develops as a person. Fortunately, these three relatively weak characters didn't really detract from my experience and are offset by the remaining crewmates.
http://i47.tinypic.com/34j2gkh.jpg
You'll be spending a lot of time getting to know these guys.
As I said earlier, the Collectors are thrown into the mix at pre-determined areas and this does a good job of breaking up the storyline between your squadmates and the greater threat. All of this is leading up to the final mission which is aptly described as "suicidal" and Bioware actually means it. You need to put in a considerable effort if you want to make it through the mission, let alone come out of with with your entire squad. This preparation consists partly of upgrading your ship and your weapons and the game will severely punish you for not doing so. Even more important to the success of the mission are the decisions you make along the way and they are almost never black and white. This is one of the games main strengths because it forces you to really question what you're doing and if it's the right choice. More than once I was punished late in the game for some foolish decision I made earlier and the game isn't shy about brutalizing you for it.
For those of you with a completed Mass Effect save, you can import your character into Mass Effect 2 and every decision you made before is recognized on one level or another here. The implementation of this is thankfully not "in your face," at least not all the time. There is a lot of subtlety to be found here, whether it's a simple e-mail from a character you rescued or a conversation with a familiar face. While most of them aren't important to the main plot, this level of continuity between the two games is unprecedented and it constantly reminds you that your actions actually make a difference. It's an astonishing accomplishment and Bioware should be congratulated for keeping their promise.
Now then, I could spend this entire review talking about the storyline and characters but let's get onto the make or break portion of a game: the gameplay. Mass Effect 1 suffered from several major flaws; The AI was incredibly thick, the MAKO (your vehicle) made me want to break down and cry at times, some of the sidequests were utterly pointless, and the shooting mechanics weren't nearly as polished as the games they derived from (Gears of War being most obvious).
Mass Effect 2 does a lot to fix these problems, especially in battle. The friendly AI is much improved and this has to be one of very few games I've played in which my squadmates will actually advance on their own instead of standing around like a bunch of idiots. AI also tend to use their powers responsibly instead of waiting for me to tell them how to fight, and the enemies put up a suitable challenge. The actual gunplay is vastly improved over the first game, owing heavily to the introduction of thermal clips. While illogical, (why would anyone go from infinite ammo to finite clip-based?) the benefits to the shooting mechanics are obvious. No longer are you allowed to pick a favorite weapon and use it solely for the entire game; you actually have to think about what you're doing and make every shot count. Ammo isn't exactly sparse but if you don't place your shots properly you run the real risk of getting overwhelmed.
http://i46.tinypic.com/2j4y5wy.jpg
The revamped HUD which, unfortunately, I am not a big fan of. I hope Bioware brings back the old design.
I have a few major gripes with the combat however. For one, I've never been a fan of regenerating health in games that can't logically explain it so it's very disappointing to see it here when Mass Effect 1 had a perfectly good system. I'm also not a big fan of the new HUD as it doesn't give me the information I want. It's difficult to tell how my squadmates are doing and the new “powers” system isn't all that great. I very much miss the independent cooldown timers from Mass Effect 1 and this new system just comes across as streamlining to a fault. I also miss having a radar to tell me where the hell my enemies are but the lack of it never led to too many problems. I do like the ability to switch ammo types on the fly though, something that the original was sorely missing. Overall, the combat is substantially improved from the first game and often a lot of fun but it needs a considerable amount of work if it wants to stand up with the best.
Another portion of gameplay that you'll spend time with is resource gathering and I'm saddened to say that it's quite boring. It consists of scanning planets and launching probes when you see a particularly large spike in a certain resource. It's the same for every single planet and this grows old very, very quickly. It would be nice if Bioware could come up with a compromise between resource collection and the open-ended exploration the MAKO and have it delivered in time for Mass Effect 3 but as it stands now, mineral scanning is a necessary evil. While tedious, it's a requirement if you want to even think about surviving the final mission and the upgrade benefits you can grab for your weapons and armor are often worth the dullness. Another positive attribute to this mini-game is that you will occasionally stumble upon "anomalies" which lead to on-foot sidequests. The sidequests are generally well designed and vastly preferable to the copy-pasted missions with the MAKO in the first game.
http://i50.tinypic.com/effbwj.jpg
While occasionally addictive, resource collection quickly becomes a chore.
When you're not shooting things or gathering resources, much of your remaining time will be spent having conversations with others and either getting to know them or doing jobs for them and this is arguably the core of the Mass Effect trilogy. More to the point, if you aren't a fan of lengthy conversations, even with interesting characters, you should probably avoid Mass Effect entirely. Fortunately, the first game made a name of itself with its innovative dialogue system and Mass Effect 2 proudly continues this to great success. Every NPC you meet has an interesting (or hilarious) story to tell and are exceedingly well written. From the bartender on Illium to the mysterious and powerful Illusive Man, there is always something new to learn or someone else to meet and you owe it to yourself to explore this as much as you can.
Mass Effect 2 expands on the conversation system by adding “interrupts” which will flash on the screen at crucial moments and you can perform an immediate Paragon (good) or Renegade (hardass/ruthless) action based on the icon displayed. Some of the coolest and most touching moments in the game occur when you take advantage of this system and Bioware should be immensely proud for implementing it so well. Mass Effect 2 makes a smart decision and ditches the old plus/minus system (where points are subtracted from Paragon if you do a Renegade action) in favor of plus/plus (points are added according to your choices). This is much more realistic in my eyes because it really allows you to be a true Paragon or Renegade without having to worry about being “punished” for going against your established character.
http://i50.tinypic.com/2vxep3k.jpg
The depth of the conversations you can have is staggering.
Of course, the incredible amounts of dialogue wouldn't be nearly as entertaining if it wasn't for the omnipresent and utterly outstanding voice acting. Mass Effect 2 contains some of the best voice work I've ever heard in a game, narrowly tied by Uncharted 2 and the Legacy of Kain series. Mark Meer (Male Shepard) and Jennifer Hale (Female Shepard) do fantastic jobs of bringing your character to life though they have different ways of approaching the role. Meer portrays Shepard as a very calm, confident individual and a lot of players have taken this to mean he's monotonous but that really isn't the case. He knows to use emotion where appropriate yet he always stays in character, making sure that Shepard maintains who he is as a person despite the occasional outbursts he may have. Hale's approach is centered around providing subtle voice inflection and emotion to nearly every line she delivers. It's a drastically different interpretation of the character and it works quite well if that's what you want from Shepard. If there's one thing Hale certainly does better than Meer, it's during the romance scenes, specifically when the relationship reaches the climax. Meer tries, I'll give him that, but too often his come-ons come across as cheesy. When it comes down to it though, both actors do an extraordinary job at bringing Shepard to life and who your prefer really comes down to who you want Shepard to be, which is exactly how it should be in a choice-driven game.
In addition to Shepard him/herself, Mass Effect 2's supporting cast are equally well voiced and some of the performances are damned Oscar-worthy. Liz Sroka (Tali'Zorah), Michael Beattie (Mordin Solus), Seth Green (Joker), Brandon Keener (Garrus Vakarian) and Martin Sheen (Illusive Man) are the standouts here and they bring their characters to a level of realism and depth that I rarely see in visual media. The other characters aren't far behind and every single actor does a great job of giving their character a memorable personality. Bioware certainly knows how to pick talent as I can't think of more than a handful of lines that were poorly delivered which is staggering when you consider the fact there is 9-12 hours of dialogue throughout the entire game. One of my personal favorite characters, Conrad Verner makes a showstopping appearance about halfway through the game and the conversation you have with him is nothing short of brilliance.
http://i48.tinypic.com/35kmsmu.jpg
One of the coolest NPC's in the game, this Illium Bartender is flat-out awesome.
In addition to the dialogue, the sound effects are done fairly well in this game. They aren't quite up to the level of the voice acting but the guns are punchy, the ambient noises are well mixed and it all fits together quite nicely. The orchestral score is appropriate throughout the game and I notice the composer took a page from the recent Star Trek movie and it paid off really well. The reveal of the Normandy is very much like the reveal of the Enterprise and it sends chills down my spine every time I see it. My big complaint with the sound comes fro-ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL...the repetition of the the phrases in combat. There are maybe 5 lines per character and you're guaranteed to hear them every single friggin battle. Honestly, I hope Bioware takes that and either tones it down or tosses it into the fiery pit from whence it came.
To compliment the top-notch voice acting and sound design, Bioware has created a universe with some award-winningly fantastic art design. Unreal Engine 3 is hard at work here in possibly its finest implementation yet and the artists have managed to completely avoid the engine's tendency to put a bizarre and unrealistic gloss over every surface. The result is a cohesive world that continually feels simultaneously realistic and stylized and is an absolute joy to look at. Every world you visit is completely unique; Illium is especially impressive, if a bit derivative of Star Wars and it all contributes to the most fully realized video game setting I've yet experienced. The characters are no exception to these high standards as each is exquisitely modelled and textured. From the detailed cloth on Tali's bio-suit to the rough skin of the Krogans, everyone looks fantastic. Every character is animated very well and it's nice to see more activity during conversations instead of being almost completely stationary like they were in Mass Effect 1. I was also thrilled to see that Bioware has learned to take advantage of camera angles and Mass Effect 2 is much more cinematic for it. My only real gripe is that the lip-sync is occasionally a bit faulty and some of the animations where characters interact with the environment are flat-out embarrassing but these flaws are few and far between and barely detract from the overall experience.
http://i49.tinypic.com/5u4och.jpg
One of many breathtaking locales.
Whether it's the unparalleled voice acting, the phenomenal art direction, the memorable characters or the entertaining (albeit imperfect) shooting mechanics, Mass Effect 2 really is a masterpiece. It's an emotional rollercoaster and an extraordinary sci-fi epic that continues to push the industry forward with its innovative storytelling and it's a damn fine shooter in its own right. The only flaws come from what I mentioned previously and while none of them are deal breakers, they do prevent the game from reaching the borders of perfection. If there is one thing I hope they don't change though, it's the unmatched camaraderie between Commander Shepard and his crew. Honestly, the only way to top what they've done is to take the entire crew to a bar and do karaoke to 20th century classic rock...hang on I'm gonna go e-mail Bioware.
In all seriousness, Mass Effect 2 is an experience and an event, one that I highly recommend to anyone looking for a complex and original sci-fi RPG and that I strictly forbid from those who intend to breeze through the game as fast as possible. You will regret it in more ways than one and you'd be doing a disservice to yourself and the developers. Once again, I am left here thinking about what Bioware can really do to top the experience Mass Effect 2 delivers but I've grown to trust them as developers. The finale can't come soon enough.
Final Verdict: Mass Effect 2 is a must-buy.
For those who prefer a numerical score: 95%