Mass Effect 3's Shepard Isn't Afraid of a Good Brawl

[icyneesan]

There better be a part where Shepard kills a reaper using only his fists.

 

[Alar]

Awww yeah. My Femshep will kick some serious ass.

 

[badgersprite]

Hey, more tactical, dynamic combat is always a good thing. I like the sound of this. It sounds like there might be more of a strategy for dealing with certain opponents than there was in 1 or 2, which boiled down to "hide behind something and spam powers" ad nauseum.

 

[AnAngryMoose]

I think I might turn my soldier into a hand-to-hand combat expert.

 

[Bobbity]

I don't think so. First off, the Quarians are totally nomadic, and have colonized neither moons nor planets. Second of all, for all of those close quarters combat features to be implemented would take up precious button space on a controller which, again, I can't see happening.

Then again, I could be wrong, or the magazine could be right on some counts.

/edit

Spoiler: Oh, and this is the singularly most irrelevant post I've ever seen. Nice!

Are you trying to round about accuse me of having no friends in the real world? I'm not entirely clear about the point of that part of your response was.

Wha? No, I just meant that sometimes I make a big stink about things online, but then I just give into them anyway because no one would know, since I don't have the same conversations/debates online that I do with my friends, many of which are not avid gamers. Like how I bought Rift despite saying I wouldn't due to it being a bland WoW stepchild. I wasn't trying to insult you.

But I digress.

Well random internet people are who convinced me to begin with. I don't vote republican, I buy eggs milk and meat directly from farms who I know don't leave their animals wallowing in their on feces or sadistically cruel small cages like the way mega corporation farms do, I sure as hell don't buy from Walmart the way they treat their Chinese workers is so bad that it's illegal even in China not to mention the dozens of worker rights violations they're being sued for right here in America, and I do not buy games from EA because their marketing department is a bunch of rabid monkeys and the rest of the corporation is either too arrogant or too stupid to fire them.

I, and my friends, go against the generation x way of doing things.... which would be complaining about Walmart being evil racist, sexist, and soul crushing and how someone should do something... while shopping in a Walmart store.

Forgive me, but EA having lame marketing doesn't sound as bad as those other things. I'm not suggesting you change your stance, I'm just saying I probably would have picked some examples that made EA look worse in comparison, not better.

 

[RoyalWelsh]

November is going to be a good month. Mass Effect 3, Skyrim and Uncharted 3. [sub]*drools*[/sub]

 

[Thespian]

This all sounds amazing, but two things from the Eurogamer article that jump out at me are:

A new scanning system has been implemented, and we won't drive the vehicles of previous Mass Effect games.

The RPG elements of Mass Effect are being expanded for the third game. Skill trees will be larger, and powers can evolve several times.

SUH-weet!

And so we see what was once a promising and intelligent franchise descend into populism and stupidity. All for the "awesome", of course.

Yes, because now that we know nothing of how the game's narrative will play out, adding some movement features to the combat has forever ruined it's chances of being even remotely acceptable. Right?

The game will be out November 8th of this year for the 360 and PS3.

Excuse me?!
There is a dreadful omission in that sentence!
It should read:

The game will be out November 8th of this year for PC, 360 and PS3.

Fear not, that was just a mistake. On the site that was linked, the article includes the PC.

 

[AngryBritishAce]

Cant Wait! Though I wont get the Limited edition because the codes you get in Bioware's games are only for the computer, then you have to upload them through XBL to your XBox 360, and I've tried to do this sooo many times with Biowares games/ EA's games and failed.
Got the Dragon Armor for ME2, tried to do it online, failed, then the DA2 signature edition content, made a new account, slightly different, didn't even get the bloody soundtrack ( ) and then the Sir Isaac Armor for DA2, I just gave it to someone so they can get fustrated at it.

 

[Catchy Slogan]

Way to only say 360 and PS3. Let's forget about us folks who prefer our Mass Effect on the PC.

Hmm, whenever I see a game that doesn't have A PC version (which is a lot of them these days) it is all but guaranteed that someone will come along and say "WHY AREN'T WE GETTING A PC VERSION?!?!?!
It used to be a bit funny to watch people get in a twist about it, but now it is just seeming so damn prevalent that it is actually getting annoying, end of the day, PC isn't bringing in the money it used to, consoles are a sure bet, and a comparatively small portion of the console crowd gets in peoples face about things.

On topic, I am liking the sound of this a hell of a lot, sounds like gears of war crossed with ME 1 with more customisation, + some small TF2 bits + punching other people than khalisa al jilani
I like a lot, I just hope that they do bring back more of the old school elements of ME 1, but not enough to please the hardcore RPG fans, even if it is like 1 feature short of EXACTLY to their specifications, because part of the fun of this site is watching PC elitists, RPG purists and modern fps franchise haters get completely bent out of shape!

That's always fun to watch! I'll be sure to stock up on popcorn and pass some around!

OT: I'm glad they're making the Engineer better, it annoyed me slightly when they made my favourite class slighlty redundant. I'm glad I stuck with it now! And I never knew I needed a Female Batarian Space Ninja untill I saw those GameInformer scans.

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

I hope theres space battles that would be awesome. The way Joker flies the Normandy always gets me a bit er...nevermind.

I too was puzzled about London looking the same but then I peered into the background and saw massive skyscrapers, pretty sure they aren't there normally. Well I live up North but I'm pretty sure anyway...

I'm intrigued by this James Saunders guy. I only hope there's a Krogan because well...you have to use the Krogan in your squad. Because they rule.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Oh goodie. We get to go to another god damn New York City.

I'm fucking sick of New York. Can we please explore other destroyed cities please? Like Berlin, or Paris, or Chicago, or Montreal, or anyplace else?

Yeah, NY is getting old now. We fucked it up in Crysis 2, GTA4, Prototype, Cloverfield, Mafia 2 and just about every other movie or game ever.

At least we know L.A. Noire is gonna be set in... some... other... city, somewhere.

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

Oh goodie. We get to go to another god damn New York City.

I'm fucking sick of New York. Can we please explore other destroyed cities please? Like Berlin, or Paris, or Chicago, or Montreal, or anyplace else?

Yeah, NY is getting old now. We fucked it up in Crysis 2, GTA4, Prototype, Cloverfield, Mafia 2 and just about every other movie or game ever.

At least we know L.A. Noire is gonna be set in... some... other... city, somewhere.

in L.A. in fact... I can't tell whether that was massive fail or sarcasm lucky for you. I'm assuming sarcasm

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Oh goodie. We get to go to another god damn New York City.

I'm fucking sick of New York. Can we please explore other destroyed cities please? Like Berlin, or Paris, or Chicago, or Montreal, or anyplace else?

Yeah, NY is getting old now. We fucked it up in Crysis 2, GTA4, Prototype, Cloverfield, Mafia 2 and just about every other movie or game ever.

At least we know L.A. Noire is gonna be set in... some... other... city, somewhere.

in L.A. in fact... I can't tell whether that was massive fail or sarcasm lucky for you. I'm assuming sarcasm

What! I don't believe you, how can you know that when the game isn't out yet!

[small]Yeah it was sarcasm [/small]

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

I really hope they aren't going to keep us just on earth, I have a really bad feeling about it. :<

 

[The.Bard]

You had me at "space ninjas"

I was thinking the exact same thing, but then I realized that isn't true. They had me at "Mass." I'm conditioned. Everytime I see the word, I immediately drool and have visions of punching space monkeys in the face.

 

[AMAZED]

Way to only say 360 and PS3. Let's forget about us folks who prefer our Mass Effect on the PC.

Space ninja's are cool though. I hope I get to punch Illusive Man in the face.

dear God your avatar is awesome

 

[PrinceofPersia]

So The Illusive Man is going to be pissed at you regardless?

I never choose for the "salvage the Collector base" ending, but wouldn't that choice make him all happy and squishy with Shepard, or is there something I'm missing?

Unless of course Shepard placed a little surprise inside the base and detonated later on as a middle finger to the Illusive man. Which as a renegade I can see him doing so.

Oh and the space ninja's must follow the Conservation Of Ninjutsu. Hence an army is cannon fodder while one is an elite killing machine, nuff said.

 

[Labcoat Samurai]

Hadn't really considered it from a story standpoint, though I can see that to a certain degree.

There's this idea that BioWare is removing RPG elements and "dumbing down" their games, an accusation leveled especially at DA2.

Yeah, I'm definitely not one of the people saying that. I know what you're referring to, though. Personally, I like that they're crossing genres. To me, RPG is not a game mechanic. "Menu fighter" (like Final Fantasy games) is a game mechanic. RPG is a storytelling choice. Do you make a game where a scripted story unfolds for the player or do you give the player the opportunity to put himself in the shoes of the protagonist and make choices? The latter is an RPG, regardless of the gameplay.

I do like the idea that you can also customize your character's gameplay style to an extent in an RPG, either with equipment or character advancement mechanics, but that doesn't have to be done in the traditional way. Take Lord of the Rings, for example, which is a common inspiration for fantasy RPGs. Did you see Aragorn painstakingly looting every orc so that he could go back to town to sell all of their armor? These mechanics present pacing problems that break up the story and immersion. I don't have a problem with Mass Effect removing them. In my opinion, they retained the meat of an RPG while trimming the fat.

I guess this is the result of quantifying what it means to be an RPG and then comparing the game to that criteria, rather than judging how a game works within its own established systems (i.e. going down an RPG Checklist instead of looking at ME on its own and considering what works, what doesn't, etc.).

Indeed. And the RPG checklist is largely just convention. It's a nebulously defined genre. There's no particular reason why RPGs should have the game mechanics people think they should have other than the fact that past RPGs have had those mechanics.

For example, I don't consider a simplified system of weapon upgrades to be "dumber" in the pejorative sense, nor do I think that about companion-specific armor and upgrades. I find the whole "find random stuff and put it on your party members" thing to be great for some games, but the idea that it need apply to every game is a bit narrow-minded.

It is. And there's a place for Diablo-esque loot oriented games. But I don't only like traditional RPGs. I quite like action-oriented shooters, too, and the idea of an action-oriented shooter that seamlessly integrates the essence of an RPG appeals to me. Dragon Age II strikes me a bit as an attempt to mix the action game and RPG genres. I like that idea as well, even if maybe the execution could use some refinement. The point is that mixing RPG elements into other genres is a very worthwhile endeavor. People complain that Bioware is getting away from making their traditional complex and deep RPGs, but no one else is doing what they're doing now. If they stop doing it, where will you find a game that integrates the solid gameplay of a taut triple-A action title like Gears of War with the customization and choice of an RPG? The next Deus Ex, perhaps? We'll see, I suppose.

 

[katsumoto03]

I really want to punch some mechs in the robo-mouth right now...

 

[beema]

Who gives a crap about new locations when you know they are going to all look exactly the same: cut & paste linear grey corridor with lots of jersey blocks to duck behind and invisible walls to keep you on a narrow path.

mass effect's level design is one of the weakest things in the series.