Five Things BioWare Fixed for Mass Effect 2

[Susan Arendt]

Five Things BioWare Fixed for Mass Effect 2

So you didn't love everything about Mass Effect. That's ok. Neither did the team that made it. Here are five ways they're fixing the sequel.

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[similar.squirrel]

No mention of the planetary exploration/vehicle changes. But..FISHTANKS!
I had always dreamed of Animal Crossing as interpreted by Bioware.

 

[hazabaza1]

Yeeeeeeee...
I can't wait. Everything seems so improved.
Also... Space fish!

 

[Nerples]

I don't know what to think about the new combat because, unlike most people, I actually quite enjoyed the combat in Mass Effect. I treated it like a top-down RPG and paused the game most of the time to figure out a strategy to kick ass. Sometimes it felt a little stilted and the lack of ability to que up commands added to this but overall I found it quite satisfying. Here's hoping that the team mate AI has been improved from the wall-bumping awkwardness of the first, because if it hasn't, I don't see myself playing it as a shooter like Bioware wants me to.

 

[JediMB]

I really liked the combat system in the original, despite its flaws, so I hope they don't go and change any of the parts I liked for the worse.

*shrugs* I'll see in January, I suppose.

 

[RobotNinja]

I'm very pleased that they're taking peoples' opinions into consideration. It looks pretty good so far.

 

[geldonyetich]

I've been playing the PC version to square away a save game file for release. One thing I'm hoping they did in the sequel is not require I drag the same two crewmembers around if I want to earn their "ally" badge. It really hurt the flexibility of my crew loadout.

 

[Fightgarr]

Bioware has been working hard making sure that they will get me to buy a copy of this game, it seems. I probably would have either way, but, despite my budget, this is a sure purchase for me. I followed the original Mass Effect from its announcement right up to its release in November 2007 and was not disappointed in the least, I hope for a similar experience here.

 

[Mr.Squishy]

I remember now why I **** love Bioware - well, as if their releases this far isn't reason enough >.>

 

[CanadianWolverine]

Huh? People didn't like the combat in the first game? Sure, it was a pain in the ass to play a sniper, just ended up using a pistol almost all the time and sure, using cover just meant you would be in some awkward place when the enemy npc came running up but... but...

*shrug* Yeah, I guess it did suck and even though it was most of the friggin game, somehow I still ended up playing it to the very end, getting intimate with a blue alien along the way.

Are they going to DRM Mass Effect 2 up like they did the first? That will mean I just wait till it is ridiculously cheap on Steam again

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

I wonder what Krogan Fighting Fish look like?

I didn't mind the combat system in ME1, not nearly as bad as some people have told it.
The elevators wern't too bad, the BG music for them was annoying.
Yeah some of the sidequests felt like they were alittle tacked on.

I just hope the 3d sound issue has been looked at.

Oh, I run it on my PC.

 

[Pyotr Romanov]

I knew it! I just KNEW the damn elevators would be in that article.

 

[Internet Kraken]

From what I've read in the article, they haven't made planetary exploration any better. They just put in some minigames.


I really hope they have improved it more than that. My problems with planetary exploration was not that surveying minerals was nothing more than Simon-says, it was that almost all of the planets were massive and dull. Doing side quests was incredibly boring because it always took so long to get where you needed to go, and along the way the only things you saw were massive chunks of identical rock. It felt like a chore. Even the occasional Thresher Maw attack was dull. I know that's what exploring alien planets would be like in reality (minus the giant worms), but it doesn't make for an exciting game. Adding minigames to this sounds like it will only become even more tedious.

 

[soren7550]

"As you strolled through the decks of the Normandy in Mass Effect, you may have noticed a distinct lack of fishtanks... Hudson mentioned that you'll be able to collect fish for it, but didn't specify how In fact, he seemed a little bemused that I even wanted to know. But they're fish. In space! How could I not want to know?"
LOL, love it. So not only can I obsess about my Gaia fishtank, I can obsess about my Mass Effect 2 tank as well!

 

[Susan Arendt]

From what I've read in the article, they haven't made planetary exploration any better. They just put in some minigames.


I really hope they have improved it more than that. My problems with planetary exploration was not that surveying minerals was nothing more than Simon-says, it was that almost all of the planets were massive and dull. Doing side quests was incredibly boring because it always took so long to get where you needed to go, and along the way the only things you saw were massive chunks of identical rock. It felt like a chore. Even the occasional Thresher Maw attack was dull. I know that's what exploring alien planets would be like in reality (minus the giant worms), but it doesn't make for an exciting game. Adding minigames to this sounds like it will only become even more tedious.

Yep, there's still a lot I want to know about the exploration, too. I wish I had gotten to see any of it. But it sounds like they are aware that it's broken, at least, which gives me hope that it'll be improved in some way.

 

[Orange Monkey]

I hope they give the voice actors a bit more personality, the inventory system less of a clusterfuck, and a few more options for character customazation.

 

[tkioz]

ugg they didn't ditch the freaking minigames for lockpicking they put more in? screw that. that crap was perhaps the thing I hated most about the first game, which overall I loved, I want to be able to dump points into a skill, click the box and have the character do it for me! You know like in Dragon Age, I hate lock picking minigames.

As for the bunk... err... you're on a warship, it was suppose to look cold and Spartan, for me that enhanced the feeling of the game, this was a crew very into discipline, not the junk in the corridor / people pissing in the corner crap of BSG, or the shinny neat pleasure cruise lines of Star Trek, it was a Warship where form follows function, not the other way around.

The side-quests better be damn well more interesting then the first game, after playing Dragon Age for the last month, a game where the side-quests are done really well, I'm not going to be putting up with "go here, find this, repeat 30 times" of Mass Effect 1.

 

[Internet Kraken]

From what I've read in the article, they haven't made planetary exploration any better. They just put in some minigames.


I really hope they have improved it more than that. My problems with planetary exploration was not that surveying minerals was nothing more than Simon-says, it was that almost all of the planets were massive and dull. Doing side quests was incredibly boring because it always took so long to get where you needed to go, and along the way the only things you saw were massive chunks of identical rock. It felt like a chore. Even the occasional Thresher Maw attack was dull. I know that's what exploring alien planets would be like in reality (minus the giant worms), but it doesn't make for an exciting game. Adding minigames to this sounds like it will only become even more tedious.

Yep, there's still a lot I want to know about the exploration, too. I wish I had gotten to see any of it. But it sounds like they are aware that it's broken, at least, which gives me hope that it'll be improved in some way.

Well it's good to know that they are at least aware of it, though I already suspected that they were. Though I don't get why they're adding minigames to it. Or why they are making you control the Normandy in space. That just seems like it will waste your time.

Moving on to something else, I have to say that I am interested in the "fishtank" part of Mass Effect 2. I love collecting pointless objects in video games that do nothing but look cool. Plus I like fish. So combining the two and then putting it inside a space ship is an instant success in my book.