Oh, dear god YES!

I found 5 dollars in a suit pocket.

Also Mass Effect 3 is good.

Also, my ferret has developed this nasty habit of tackling my legs, I think my socks may smell like his treats.

Also, I lied. Mass Effect 3 isn’t good, it’s fantastic.

Now I know that I give away story details through these reviews and that there are people out there who picked up this game having not played the previous two. For those of you looking for a recap: to hell with you, those games were great and deserve to be played. Stop reading, bookmark this page and get them, do a full playthrough of both games then come back. I’ll wait.

So here’s the breakdown. Giant, alien, squid robots are attacking the galaxy and all the races that exist therein. Since you are the only person who seems to have their head screwed on right through the first two games you are the only one who can save the Earth now that the Reapers have finally arrived. Fleeing the Earth to get help from the other races Shepherd has to try to unite the various interests throughout the galaxy while overcoming generations of hatred between species for past wrongs. Except the Batarians. Yeah, the Reapers entered the galaxy along their boarders so their empire is essentially gone, the survivors now refugees and the majority of their race transformed into the Reaper’s servants.

The game has a lot going for it. Gameplay is a nice mix between ME1 and ME2 and still leans more to a third person shooter than an RPG shooter. Leveling your powers has become fleshed out in the form of branching abilities after the third power upgrade giving you the choice between upgrading the tactical viability of a power or strengthening the hitting power of that power. For example, the choice between a faster recharge or an increase to damage dealt.

Almost all of the weapons feel unique with varying degrees of firing rate, recoil and damage and the weapon options have been massively expanded incorporating the DLC weapons from ME2 and adding some new firepower into the mix with charge shot weapons. Grenades are available again but unlike ME1 only certain classes unlock their use.

You will see a truly MASSIVE amount of old characters, and not only your surviving crew members. If you did perfect playthroughs of the first two games you can expect to meet pretty well anyone and everyone you ever held a conversation with. Remember the doctor on the Citadel in ME1? She makes a cameo, as does just about every member of your squad from ME2 and while some stay to fight as part of the crew there are others who either go their own way, or sacrifice themselves for the greater good. Not one character death was poorly written or poorly executed. If you got to know these characters in the previous games, their deaths will sting.

The character roster is mercifully smaller than it was in ME2 and it’s rare that you’ll find that you have multiple characters that are filling the same role. Character abilities give each of them a defined space within which they are effective and with a nerfing of several powers you end up with characters that have defined enemies that they are effective against.

The mining for resources is gone and scanning planets has been simplified, even adding the pervasive Reaper threat into the mix.
Scripting and voice acting is on par with the very best that Bioware has to offer with just about all of the original character voice actors reprising their roles.

The atmosphere of the game makes you feel the war. You hear constant reports of missing ships, dead soldiers and suffering refugees and often find yourself working alongside or for these groups as you attempt to save them all. The best part is, you often fail. I always hated how the first two games claimed to have major decisions where people’s lives were on the line but when playing you could save everyone. There were very few instances where people would die despite your best efforts. That is no longer the case. Most main story missions result in the sacrifice of either people you are trying to save or the people trying to save them.

The set pieces are fantastic and must be seen to be believed. There’s a lot of love that went into the main story of this game and it shows.

The problems? Well it’s mostly technical stuff.

The game looks dated. Even with the better texture resolution the models move strangely and have very flat facial expressions. The environments are much improved but seeing the admiral in front of you run like he has hemorrhoids takes away from the view.

Through the beginning of the game I was doing secondary missions as well as main story ones and ended up having to change disks constantly. It really broke up the flow of the first little bit of the game for me. Additionally the first half hour of the game is horrifyingly linear taking away any ability to forge your own way until the total situation for the narrative has been established. I understand why they did this but it is very frustrating especially in light of how ME 2 started and how quickly it gave the reigns over to the player.

Various game bugs pop up now and again

Getting pissed off at the pressure. Every time I walk by an EB games they keep telling me to take back Earth and I’m getting tired of screaming into the store that "I’m working on it!"

Loading screens all over the place. While I am reasonably patient and I have no issues with loadings during missions I hate the loading screens as you use the elevator in the Citadel. Citadel is your main hub and its internal missions often have you going between various levels leading to dozens of loading screens and not nearly enough shooting.

All in all, a great way to end the story of Shepherd and if you honestly think that this is the last Mass Effect game, you are dead wrong. There is just too much set up for another story in the mythos to leave the Mass Effect universe with this installment.

Score: 4.8/5