What?s Wrong with Mass Effect 2?

[luckshot]

cerberus kind of reminds me of the entire idea of the portal games...the only problem is the portal games are action/COMEDY/puzzle games, while mass effect is a action/DRAMA/minigame set.


it really changes things when you think about the experiments you've uncovered as read by GLADOS


and for me this has a negative impact on the railroading in ME2, as many have said it cerberus is a collection of ineptitude

 

[luckshot]

a further thought i had (even though i have not read the complete thread) is that why did they need to kill Shepard at all?

there's an unknown enemy operating outside of council/alliance control that's disappearing entire colonies. why couldn't our hero just go and investigate, either independently or on a sort of 'loan' program from either the alliance or the council.

at some point after starting the investigation of the disappearances you get contacted by Cerberus who is willing to share information with you.

need new team members? Cerberus wants reps on your ship to ensure they get some intel, others reasons were already given and killing Shepard accomplished nothing other than showing the rails

 

[Firehound]

At start of article: No, that's stupid, ME2 wasn't completely terrible.

Halfway through article: Yeah, Pretty much.

At end: OH MY GOD. THE STORY, IT IS LIKE SWISS CHEESE!

Seriously. Where's the Commander Shepard: Spawncamp that shit. option?

And no, not all reaper tech ends with indoctrination. Only the AI parts. since several upgrades to the Normandy are Reversed engineered versions of Saren's ships modules. Or designs to counter it.

 

[Firehound]

At start of article: No, that's stupid, ME2 wasn't completely terrible.

Halfway through article: Yeah, Pretty much.

At end: OH MY GOD. THE STORY, IT IS LIKE SWISS CHEESE!

Seriously. Where's the Commander Shepard: Spawncamp that shit. option?

And no, not all reaper tech ends with indoctrination. Only the AI parts. since several upgrades to the Normandy are Reversed engineered versions of Saren's ships modules. Or designs to counter it.

Not to mention... Who the fuck let George Lucas write in the ending for ME2? Seriously. It's the midiclorians all over again.

 

[bombadilillo]

I'm starting to feel like one in an extreme minority who actually liked ME2 and DA2. For this, I've been attacked as "not having standards" and being the "masses that are being pandered to". It's become fashionable as of late to hate Bioware for their latest releases and its getting old.

I'll totally agree on this. The entire "Oh, everyone who has any taste hates DA2" thing is getting really old. I get it. You didn't enjoy DA2. I did. This is really not a defining characteristic for either of us.

I don't think Shamus is in that boat, though. 1. It's kinda his thing to nitpick games. It's why many of his fans started reading him (that, or his LOTRO comic). 2. His critiques are pretty valid. 3. He's here to amuse us/make us annoyed. He sure did that.

A lot of people "enjoyed" those games while still being upset at the blatent shortcomings. You were 100% fine with the copy paste enviroments in DA2? Because everytime I went to the same stretch of land fighting scaled enemies, its just got repatitious.

You are not a martyr for being the "only one who liked the game" People saying its complete crap are on the other extreme too and equally as wrong. Both games fell short of what I expected in a sequal. (which is improvement over the original) not dumbed down everything and certainly not 5 enviroments. The first swamp area in DA was bigger then all of DA2 combined for crying out loud.

 

[Choppaduel]

I agree with Shamus, the main plot was rubbish. In particular, the final choice was such a huge disappointment. Not to mention how tedious the combat & planet scanning are. The only part of the game I actually enjoyed was developing the relationships with the characters, especially in the shadow broker dlc.

Man do I feel late to the party in this thread.

[hr]

I'm praying ME3 will be more RPG-ey than ME2. Seriously. All I'd like would for it to be more like 1 than 2. I know I'm just dreaming though.

Exactly, thats why, instead of praying, I won't be playing the third, I'm going to forget about the second, and just remember the first game.

 

[starslasher]

1. i think the death of commander Shepard was a GOOD plot point because it shows how powerful his enemies are and how hard the people of the galaxy work against them. it was really meant to hit people emotionally who spent a lot of time with their Shepard from ME1. it also served as a great spring board for the people who just started the story, specifically on ps3

....

all in all i agree with you in how bioware forces Shepard what to do. it takes so much away from the already fantastic immersion. but sometimes you need to read into the game a little more than just take everything at face value.

I think that those are great points, mschweiz.

Shamus does make some good points about the plot holes, but some of them can be answered/surmised logically, as some of the posters before me has done. Nonetheless, i enjoyed the game alot. I played it more times than ME1. Sure, I am a bit apprehensive about ME3 and hope that it won't disappoint me, but that worries me is not so much the plot as it is the gameplay. the previous two had their flaws for me, ME1 with its repetitve sidequests and piling of the same weapons over and over again, and ME2 for mainly that grinding planet-probing business. Hopefully, the developers will work out something that wouldn't require the redundancy, repetition and grinding that I gone through with the first two games.

 

[Vect]

I guess I can see his points. Still, I enjoyed the Character parts specifically. Couldn't care less for Miranda and Jacob though.

On the ending, I always insisted that while it would be great to hold onto the tech and give it to someone who would make use of it, Cerberus is NOT that someone. Almost all Cerberus projects tend to be experiments of Aperture-level stupidity without any of the lulz (at least Cave Johnson's honest about having no idea what he's doing). The Rogue Cell excuse is just TIM's way of covering his ass since he wants to look good for Shep (not that it matters since you're stuck with them).


Of course, they're back to being the villain so any attempt at making them sympathetic is sorta moot.

 

[Atmos Duality]

The other game I thought of while reading through is Fallout 3.
Grossly overhyped title that won GotY? Check.
But more importantly: Main plotline that makes no sense at all? Oh you better believe it.

Mass Effect 2 was filibustering to be sure, but at the same time, it was aping the old 1970s sci-fi shows; perhaps a bit more than Bioware intended (where the Ranking Officers go on obviously-dangerous Sorties).

Hell, the ending for ME2 made no sense in the grand scheme of things even without that silly choice at the end:

Spoiler

You destroyed the collector ship, thus eliminating the collector's ability to harvest humans. Mission accomplished; there is no logical reason to actually destroy the collector facility apart from pissing in the Illusive Man's cheerios. Besides, if he starts to really fuck with the tech, you call on the Alliance/Citadel to intervene.

What is he going to do? He can't relocate the entire facility, and if he kills you, he won't be getting back in without another Reaper IFF device. EDI has been unshackled, so he can't commandeer the ship from you that way, nevermind that the Normandy is a sophisticated stealth vessel. Shepard could easily be back at the Citadel with proof before Cerberus could do much.

Of course, if we're going the "logic doesn't matter" route, then you can Deus Ex Machina away any of those possibilities; which sadly seems to be the same vein in which the plot was written.

 

[drivel]

Man, I'm not nearly as observant/analytical as I thought. While I was playing, I didn't notice the plot holes at all. I don't know if that says more about me, or about the experience BioWare created in ME2. The plot-holes are all legitimate concerns. But, they're easy to miss when you're enthralled by the game itself.

Writing an airtight plot is very difficult, especially when you're expected to churn out games that are both epic in scale and wild commercial successes. I understand Shamus' concerns, and I hope ME3 doesn't suck. I've decided to play back through both ME1 and ME2 in advance of its release Q1 2012 - hopefully the culmination of the series will be worth it!

 

[Crazy Zaul]

While they were all legitimate criticisms that I never thought about before, you make yourself seem like a rather depressing person that you actually looked for them in so much detail. When I finished ME2 story I thought its better than most games but sucks compared to other bioware games (-1), its kinda self destructive to dig deep into why it sucks. The Cerberus stuff was funny though.
Anyway, despite the before I read this lackluster, after I read this terrible, story it was still fun to play.

 

[Quorothorn]

Going back to look at this article and the comments thereon after ME3 came out and quite possibly 90% of its fanbase disliked the ending is rather interesting.