Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Mass Effect 3 PS3 Demo Impressions

Mass Effect 3 isn't coming out for another month, but that did not stop Bioware and EA to release a demo for the Xbox 360, PS3, and PC. The third game of a planned trilogy hopes to bring the conclusion of Commander  Shepard and his crew at Normandy. It's not know how long its been since the last game, but we do know that  Shepard had to pay a price for what he had done. Before you even start you are given three choices. Action, Role Playing, or Story. Each has their own way the game is played. Believe me when I say that playing all three will take a while, but it will be all worth it.



BUST YOUR KNEE CAPS


There was a choice where you can play this Shepard 
Action mode makes Mass Effect 3 play like a typical third person action game. You don't get to decide what to say or what your character will be like. Once you start this mode, it goes straight to the gameplay. The graphics are amazing, but it's not in a solid 30 Frames Per Second. Seeing that this is probably an old build, I'm willing to forgive them for now. Other than that, it looks great. The Mass Effect engine continues to impress. This was the first mode I played with and I waited til it was time to pick what I wanted to say, but it never came. The dialogue is chosen for you and the conversations will play out like cut scenes.

Once the action does start I am reminded how great the action is in this series. You pick what ammo types you can use, and you can use to control your other companions on what they can use. This is all standard for Mass Effect and it's still a lot of fun to play around with. The game in Action Mode is not very difficult, but I did die a couple of times. Another standard about Mass Effect is that if you don't mind your surroundings, you will die as you try to get to new cover. The same is implied here. Through two different scenarios, the gameplay is still just as amazing.


CONSEQUENCES
The Final Stand


Role Playing Mode makes Mass Effect 3 play like the past games. This time you can pick your dialogue and what your person will look like. The character creator is still the same as in the past games. Nothing is really changed, but why should it be? If you played the past Mass Effect games, your character from that save will import to Mass Effect 3. The gameplay is just as the same as before. Except it's a little bit more hard. Like Action, it's not all that difficult, but it is harder than Action. The enemies are faster and they have better armor. This is what the past games have played like before. The sound is amazing and the voice acting is top notch. In this mode I played a Female and Jennifer Hale did a pretty good job. Keith David as Anderson is in this demo also and, once again, David is amazing. You will meet different characters from the past games, and the voice actors are back in there respective roles.

THE LAST PAGE

The version I'm getting
Story Mode makes Mass Effect 3 painfully easy. This feels like a mix between Action mode and Role Playing Mode. You get everything you need from Role playing, and get all the difficulty of Action. The only difference is that the difficulty of this mode is non existent. You can kill a group of enemies without even knowing. This is a great way to only focus on the story, but I can't see myself playing this mode except getting trophies that I can't get in the other modes. The way the demo is split up they wisely skipped any big story spoilers to save for the full game. That is not to say there are not any spoilers at all. You play out the first 20 minutes of the game, and then about 20 minutes of something that will happen later on. The weapons in Mass Effect 3 are pretty amazing so far. There is this one weapon they give you that is quite powerful no matter what mode you played. It acts like an assault rifle, but it's single shot only. That might not sound great, but the weapon itself packs quite a punch. Especially if you have the incendiary ammo on.


This looks to be one of the best games of the year. With three different modes to play there is more freedom than ever before. One of the best things about the series seems to take place here. The choices you made in the first two games has an impact or another in this finale chapter of Mass Effect. Are we going to see more Mass Effect coming? Absolutely. Is this the finale game we see of Shepard? I don't know. What I do know is that the game is going to end in a grand bang, and I can't wait to play it.

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