I just finished the storyline content in the MEA Demo last night (3.5 hrs) and I gotta say that I'm disappointed. Having just replayed ME1-3 in preparation, I'm shocked that MEA doesn't look as good as a five year old game. But I can live with those problems. My greater concerns is that once you get to a planet, it's basically DA:I with guns.
Feedback:
- Entire game is a reskinned DA:I. If you've replayed the other MEs recently this can be a bit jarring as the camera isn't close enough in to easily see if Ryder is in cover. The dev is obviously aware of this problem because they've added a symbol to the UI that makes it obviously when you are in cover. Having said that, the combat has really grown on me and is one of the highlights IMHO. But, I hope you enjoy fetch quests, mining, and driving around pointlessly.
- Plot is a mess. Huge holes. Khet are just generic sci-fi bad guys that show up and start shooting people. Old school tropes like "everything that can go wrong went wrong". The introduction of the Krogan squad-mate is so poorly done that I literally LOL'd where it was obviously intended to be impressive. And much of the actions of the people you run into don't make sense. You run into a scavenger who works at the Nexus on the first planet. Why does he get to take a shuttle and run around when they barely have enough power to keep the lights on? And if everyone is literally depending on you (for some godforsaken reason) to save them, why are they selling you guns? Wouldn't they give you guns in hopes that you succeed so they can do things like...breathe?
- The "untested Pathfinder" thing is laughably handled. One minute people are being mean to Rhyder because she just inherited the title, the next people are treating her like she's the messiah.
- The use of DA:I worlds as a mechanism for filler is a mistake. It made sense in that game because you were fighting a war across the world so when you came across standing around doing nothing they had a reason to be there, here it is jarringly bad. Why are the Khett just hanging out randomly in the world or flying in additional troops on transport ships when I attack one of their positions? Why haven't they scavenged everything from the bases lying around? Where are they hanging out that they show up 30 seconds after I attack? It doesn't make sense. They are just there as filler.
- Holy crap the new Mako handles like crap. They've only had, what, 12 years to fix that?
- Planet scanning has returned and if at all possible, it's worse than in ME2.
One can easily accuse me of being a fanboy as the original trilogy is among my favorite games of all time, but I'm seriously shocked at how bad this is. Sorry for the wall of text but I really needed to vent. +)
I've not cancelled my pre-order yet but I'm close. Going to give it another hour or so tonight.