I could spend ten hours talking about how much the Mass Effect 3 demo sucked, but I'll try to do it in nine.
[sub](Red Letter Media reference)[/sub]
First off, different play modes.
Seriously what is the point of having 3 different play modes? It's like Bioware is catering to people who don't want to play Mass Effect. Story Mode is just insulting, and pointless if Role Playing Mode has adjustable difficulties. Unless of course there's more dialog and story in Story Mode. Then in that case Why wasn't it all in RP Mode. It's like Bioware was thinking nobody would want to experience the story and the gameplay at the same time so they broke it up into 3 different sections. And that didn't even help anybody, people who didn't play the first two games because of way to much dialog aren't going to like action mode because there's the same amount of dialog they just don't get to pick the responses.
I'm willing to forgive this if every difficulty setting and conversation option is available in RP mode.
Secondly, Paragon/Renegade
Was I the only one who noticed that in the Demo the Neutral and Investigate options were suspiciously absent? Hopefully that's just to conserve space for the demo and the full release will have all the options but the talking is the biggest part of Mass Effect so not including that in the demo is just sort of fucked if you ask me. (Which you did)
Third, How it started.
Why is Shepard back on Earth? Why is Shepard back with the Alliance? Why isn't Anderson a councilor any more? Who the fuck is James Vega? Why does Kaiden outrank you? Again maybe that's just a demo problem. Perhaps that's not where the game starts or maybe once we get to import our Mass Effect 2 saves the start will be different. But seeing that was just a little unsettling.
Fourth, The run animation.
The first thing you do when you get control is follow Anderson across some Catwalks and watching him run is the most uncanny valley this series has ever been. And this is Bioware we're talking about.
Fifth, The Holographic Knife.
Just fucking NO. NO, NO, NO.
Sixth, The gameplay.
It's still a cover based shooter so even perfectly executed the gameplay would still be boring as fuck.
6.5, Grenades.
Grenades don't translate well into cover-based gameplay. You need to be able to run away from grenades and if the act of standing up puts you in grave danger running just makes it worse. Taking grenades out was the biggest improvement Mass Effect 2 made over Mass Effect 1 and now they're undoing that. It's just wrong.
Seventh, The fucking AI.
Your squad mates don't seem to understand the function of cover. They'll run around back and forth between covers or just sit down on the wrong side of it. (The same thing was the matter with Mass Effect 2 as well)
Eighth, Halo Reach called. they want their health system back.
Not really a bad thing I actually liked the health system from Reach, but It's discouraging to see even more people ripping off already uninspired shooters .
8.5, Gears of War 3 called they want their shitty multyplayer back.
This is a big problem for me. I already don't like Multyplayer on principle. Mass Effect is at heart a single player game. The head of Bioware's marketing was once quoted as saying. "Why would you want us to taint this beautiful single player experience with multyplayer." But then they went and spent valuable resources that could have been better spend literally anywhere else, ripping off the Hoard Mode from Gears of War.
Ninth, The button multiplicity effect.
Think about this for a minute. Hold the A button to sprint. Press the A button to take cover, and tap the A button to jump like an idiot. Taking cover and running are two polar opposite commands as it stands, putting them on the same button led to well over half my deaths in ME 2.(You'd want to run away from a charging enemy and you'd Velcro your self to a wall instead just because you happened to be with in ten feet of a cover-able surface when you pressed the A button.) but now they added the stupid fucking jump to the mix so now you'll be trying to take cover standing right next to a wall or a box or what ever and it's still a toss up whether your going to hide or leap like a freak out into the middle of gunfire? This is a cover based shooter. Taking cover and running to the next section of cover should be the most intuitive parts of the game. Instead those controls are the most temperamental and unreliable part of the whole game.
Tenth, I want to harp on the multyplayer some more.
So they let you pick your class but they don't let you pick your race until you unlock them through playing. Why can't any game just give you all the customization options before you start playing? Did some designer with a mental condition say that locking away all the cool shit was a good idea and everybody just went with it? I want to play as a god damn Turian, I don't want to have to unlock the god damn Turian just so I can play as him. Fuck!
I have been psyching my self up for Mass Effect 3 to suck space balls just to off set the hype, And you know Mass Effect 2 had a lot of gameplay problems that I overlooked because the writing was so good and the scope of the game was well presented, and ME 3 could potentially give off that same feeling. So I'll reserve judgement until the final release (Especially because I already payed for it) But some of those problems won't go away with wistful denial.
Oh, and here.
What I liked.
1) The level up system.
It looks like a great mix of ME 1 and 2. Upgrading powers multiple times seems like it'll work great.
2) The Fan-service.
So yeah, I am a Mass Effect Fanboy and I do appreciate the catering to. Seeing Wrex and Garrus's banter and having Mordin back, and all the other characters that I'm sure are going to make cameo's. Not to mention a Female Krogan. We'll probably get to see female Turians and Salarians too.
DON'T SHOW TALI'S FACE. or any Quarians for that matter. They had their chance last game and they chose not to. Doing so now will only serve to piss everyone off.
