The Tech Biscuit

One of the hardest parts of being a gamer is the painstaking wait that we all have to face for our most anticipated games to be released. And I'm not talking about the not-so-agonising wait for the annual Call of Duty or FIFA games, either. Another tough thing about being a gamer is when you've waited over two years for a game, only for it to be largely disappointing and leave a sour taste on your thumb sticks.

The wait for Mass Effect 3 has definitely been one of the more difficult ones, especially if you loved the other two. Thankfully, it leaves no other taste on your thumb sticks than dried-up sweat and flavourings from the junk foods you've been eating while you couldn't put down the controller. Not that I tasted it or anything. Honest.

If you've played either of the first two games, chances are you're already pretty clued up on what to expect from this one. If you haven't, why the hell not?

The story picks up after the events of the final piece of Mass Effect 2 DLC, Arrival. Commander Shepard has been relieved from duty and detained on Earth after allowing for the destruction of an entire star system, wiping out all life within it. A large portion of the galaxy are still in denial that the rather ominous Reapers even exist, never mind about to launch a full scale attack. Those doubts are put to rest in the first five minutes though, as the invasion begins on Earth in one of the coolest and most shocking cutscenes you're ever likely to see.

It's here where you play through a mini-tutorial. You're forced to escape the Alliance headquarters with Admiral Anderson, while the Reapers effortlessly lay waste to your surroundings. At one point Anderson leads you onto some rooftops, and you get a full view of a burning, crumbling Vancouver being levelled by the gigantic Reapers. It's eerie in a story sense, but the immense level of detail is absolutely breathtaking to look at.

You're shown the basics of how to move, shoot, run and roll, as well as the new melee kills, which work incredibly well. However, you should notice a difference right away in how much combat has been refined and improved over that of Mass Effect 2. The cover system is much smoother now, allowing you to hop and slide over objects and right back into cover again. Simple things like blind-firing and grenades have also been implemented, giving you more ways to fight your way out of sticky situations. Situations which you'll find yourself in much more often thanks to the improved AI of your foes. You'll now be flanked if you stay in cover too long, and enemies will support each other and work in real teams. Luckily, you can now use Kinect voice commands to tell your squad members where to go and when to use their biotic powers. Alternatively, the D-pad still works for this. Typical run-and-gun techniques are still possible on lower difficulties, but opponents will make short work of your efforts on harder modes.

Where Mass Effect 3 really shines though is actually nothing to do with these changes. It is, once again, the incredible storytelling from Bioware that will make you fall in love with it and lose yourself when you probably should be doing something else.

In Mass Effect 2, you spent pretty much the entire game rallying up a team for yourself to stop the Collectors in preparation for a major battle at the end. This time, it's your job to rally the entire galaxy and convince them that they need to put old quarrels aside to stop the mutual threat of the Reapers. Your old team has now disbanded, moved on with their lives and are spread out across the galaxy. While a few old faces do have major roles in this game, you can expect a largely new team to be working with. Don't worry though, if you play the game thoroughly enough you'll still find out what happened to each and every person you've cared about in the series, assuming they're still alive.

What Bioware captures beautifully in Mass Effect 3 is the sense of despair and struggle amongst the citizens of the galaxy. There's a genuine threat, and there's not one character in the story who is confident of defeating the Reapers. The worlds you visit are in tatters, and are often under attack at the same time you go about your business there. There's a spooky feeling of doom throughout, and it honestly feels like a war that cannot be won. Too much can't be said for the sake of avoiding spoilers, but your main objective is to build an army as big as possible in the faint hopes of giving yourself a fighting a chance. As you'll know from previous games, the Mass Effect universe is full to the brim with lore and history. Certain species hate one another and refuse to work together, so it falls to Shepard to help them sort out their differences. In some cases this can involve making difficult decisions, because no matter what, you're going to upset people. This is why Bioware deserve all the credit they get for being brilliant storytellers, because you're basically forced to turn your back on old friends and partnerships for the sake of saving the galaxy, and it's almost always heartbreaking. It's also at these points that decisions you made in the previous games are likely to come back and haunt you.

As you form new partnerships and rally people to the cause, your Galactic Readiness meter slowly fills. How full or empty it is when you embark on the final mission to take back Earth will help define the type of ending you get. There are three main conclusions to the trilogy, but you'll have to play them all yourself to know what happens. However, I will say that all three left me feeling a little bit underwhelmed. During the final ten minutes, things get extremely confusing and you're left wondering exactly what happened. Bioware have since promised to expand on the ending in future DLC so things could possibly become clearer in time. It’s not a massive gripe, and it’s still guaranteed to blow you away.

Another minor complaint is the way in which you can pick up side missions. Often, you'll be wandering around the Citadel and realise you've overheard two people talking and picked up a new quest without even noticing. Sometimes you don't even notice until you check your mission log, by which time it could be too late. Most of these types of missions are simple and unimportant, but it can still be slightly off-putting.

New to Mass Effect 3 is the multiplayer mode, called Galaxy At War. It's essentially very similar to Horde mode from Gears of War 3, whereby four players battle constant waves of enemies. In this game, the player chooses a class and starts at level one, earning XP as they go along. There are ten waves and three difficulties to choose from, and XP varies depending how far you can get and how difficult you set it. When you reach level twenty, you can promote that character to join your campaign, raising your Galactic Readiness. It's not necessary to play the multiplayer, but it's extremely good fun, well executed and a welcome addition.

All in all, you can look to spend around 30-35 hours within Mass Effect 3 if you play through it how Bioware intended - by taking your time, exploring every corner and pacing yourself. That number can easily double if you decide to tackle the multiplayer.

At times, it seemed like it might be an impossible ask of Bioware to do a perfect job of closing and wrapping-up this massive trilogy. It's not perfect, but it's about as close as they could've got.

Overall: 9/10

by Rob Best