I never once saw the Collectors Edition available for online pre-order here in the UK (in hindsight, I'd have just gone into Game and pre-ordered it instore had I known then what I know now). Took a last shot at extra copies coming in this morning but no, no CE for me.
<bitterness>
Fortunately, being a single player game, I have more power over when I purchase a game than say, a Halo multiplayer game. Soooo, I can happily sit on my arse for a few months for the price to come down significantly, or if I spot a new collectors edition cheap on ebay, I'll grab that. Consider that my big "fuck you" to biowares overly-complex-pre-order-who-get's-what-ingame-if-you-get-anything-at-all mess
</bitterness>
The Game store I visited actually had 5 more pre-orders for the collectors edition than they had copies sent to them to sell! I've never seen this happen to a collectors edition of a game before. However, it isn't called 'limited' edition, so there's no reason not to print more to meet the quite obvious demand for it.
My inner loot-monger feels disappointed. I miss the insane numbers of mods and weapons, even if they did become useless once you unlocked the master specter equipment.
My inner psychopathic-sniper feels elated. Using an anti-material rifle to headshot a YIMR Mec and using the resulting nuclear explosion to kill off most of the other enemies is three kinds of awesome.
So, who thinks they have the best face for Shepard?
So, who thinks they have the best face for Shepard?
I imported mine from the first game and didn't recognize him at all. there's been too much marketing with the other shepard so I just used the default lol. Was so used to him that he became the shepard
I imported mine from the first game and didn't recognize him at all. there's been too much marketing with the other shepard so I just used the default lol. Was so used to him that he became the shepard
Honestly, I hate the 'iconic' Shepard look; it doesn't fit the way I play the character. It might work for some goody-goody paragon, but not a space pirate in training.
Only if I could create the face in a separate program and use a tablet, like I did for all of my faces in Oblivion.
24 hours in and loving it... The inventory issues do still hurt me But everything else is fantastic. I've NEARLY got Maranda into bed with me, christ it was so close... lol... So sad But I've already had dinner with the shrink in my quaters Damn shame you can't do threesomes...
I haven't put it to the test, but I'm pretty sure I read that certain decisions made in ME1 will influence the playthrough of ME2. Seemed interesting to me, and from what I read, the execution is pretty flawless.
The most important part of importing a character is that a number of major decisions you made in the first game carry over, which significantly changes many scenes (things are different when people are dead!) and is just cool in general. Personally, I lost my old saves, but this site has a repository of all sorts of saves which go pretty in-depth so you can pick and choose.
I have a lot of complaints about the game. I mean, it's awesome and I love it, but there's a ton of room left for improvement. It's hard to say whether it's a better game than the first. It lost just as much as it gained and didn't gain things I thought it would.
Typical "second game in trilogy" syndrome. Let's make it 'edgy' and forget about doing things like, oh I don't know, giving me a new SMG sometime in the first 20 hours? Basics, guys. Basics.
They need to take both games and smash them together to create the third. Don't take out anything, just add. Add refine improve expand. No more subtractions.
WOW. I am retarded. I sided with Jack in an argument and lost Miranda's loyalty! She is who I've been romancing the whole time! And after that I kept playing, instead of reloading. Fail x2. And the internets says there's no way to get it back, however there are some greyed out chat options which might resolve the situation. Unfortunately, they are greyed out, so I will have to grind my paragon score. I'm already at 50%, how much more do they seriously want before the options open?:(
WOW. I am retarded. I sided with Jack in an argument and lost Miranda's loyalty! She is who I've been romancing the whole time! And after that I kept playing, instead of reloading. ..... I'm already at 50%, how much more do they seriously want before the options open?:(
My main playthrough file, ruined.
Well, I am going through ME1 now and more options are open for conversations now that I am higher level. ME2 begs for a second play-through.
I sided with Jack in that argument too since she was the one I was romancing. Finished the game last night and still couldn't romance Miranda even with full Paragon. You probably have to use the Charm dialogue in to resolve that argument to romance both. You can continue playing after you finish the game to continue the other romance options though I had to break up with Jack to romance
...Tali...
.
Played through as the default male Shepard.
This Mass Effect had a lot more humor in it than the last. Joker has some great lines.
All the major decisions felt like they had weight to them, if not immediately then for Mass Effect 3 (can't imagine how agonizing Star Wars: The Old Republic will be since you won't be able to load your last save and redo a choice there). That's the fault I found with the game though: there are time when it feels like a just a transitional chapter in the story rather than its own story. It's not a major fault but it's there.
The last character you recruit was a nice surprise addition to the cast as was Joker's response to him.
There also appears to be space for one more character to the right of Jack on the squad selection screen. Maybe another DLC character soon? Hopefully more interesting than Sayid Fett, I mean Zaeed.
Started a second play through last night with an imported ME1 female Adept and wow do you start with a lot of cash and resources for importing a character and doing a second playthrough.
I'm only a few hours in, but maybe someone can confirm: the character of 'Jack' on the prison or Purgatory is a total rip of the character from Pitch Black/Chronicles of Riddick? That was the first thing I thought of when I read the Illusive Man's dossier on her (Jack being a girl is pretty much a give away anyhow.)
I'm only a few hours in, but maybe someone can confirm: the character of 'Jack' on the prison or Purgatory is a total rip of the character from Pitch Black/Chronicles of Riddick? That was the first thing I thought of when I read the Illusive Man's dossier on her (Jack being a girl is pretty much a give away anyhow.)
I never saw chronicles of Riddick but in pitch black he's a killer with surgically altered eyes (voluntary I believe) who seems to follow some sort of honorable code - so I don't really see the similarity except that they both have shaved heads.
In Pitch Black "Jack" was the young boy that shaved his head to be more like Riddick, until later on Riddick informs everybody that "shes" bleeding... Because "Jack" was actually a girl.
She was also a total hottie in the Chronicals Of Riddick, and TBH I enjoyed that film a lot... Sure it wasn't anywhere near as good as Pitch Black but more Riddick = WIN in my book...
I'm only a few hours in, but maybe someone can confirm: the character of 'Jack' on the prison or Purgatory is a total rip of the character from Pitch Black/Chronicles of Riddick? That was the first thing I thought of when I read the Illusive Man's dossier on her (Jack being a girl is pretty much a give away anyhow.)
Whoa... I didn't even catch that to be honest, but yuh man, I can see the connection.
I never saw chronicles of Riddick but in pitch black he's a killer with surgically altered eyes (voluntary I believe) who seems to follow some sort of honorable code - so I don't really see the similarity except that they both have shaved heads.
Sorry - like Odium mentioned, I was talking about the supporting character from those films. ME2 seems to have a couple of things like this, taken from recent sci-fi (the Blue Sun's name has gotta be a Firefly reference) and I was just wondering about Jack as well.
Really enjoyed it. Sure the inventory issues made it WORSE than the original, but hell, I'm sticking this as Game Of The Year. I don't care what month we are in, theres gonna have to be some pretty epic games out to top this!
15 hours in and I'm not even halfway done with the game.. it's fucking great still. I also have to get four more cast members as well. I beat the entire first game in under 15 hours!
When you get to the part where you have to find the IFF thingy, STOP. Do everything else you want to do, get all your other members (Except Legion) and stop the main quest line. i.e. upgrade your ship to max, and make sure everybody is loyal. Once your ready, carry on, get Legion and do his loyalty quest.
The ending goes a bit silly in that once you install the IFF thingy to theships computer, you have no time and suddenly you MUST carry on the story. If you don't, people die... Also, the whole end mission is about keeping your squad alive, so make the right calls... Send a biotic to do a techs job, for example...
Follwo those simple rules and you can get a perfect ending... But don't and you, well, won't I got mega lucky in that I only had one more upgrade for my ship to get, so I quickly mined a near by planet for a few extra bits. But don't land... That messes up the time line...
Awesome game, been palying since friday and been doin every liitle mission, pretty much like a bee, jumping from mission to mission. Stuff that I specially liked in this sequel:
+The freaking crew and ship. The crew you gather on your way and how you prepare for the last mission is a nice devolpment of the story.
+Pretty much everything else from the new heavy weapons to the focus on more distinct classes.
-Things that I thought was annoying: No Mako car? The hell, I loved to do low gravity jumps over crates and mowing down geth. Now you get to scan planet after planet untill your wrist hurts(its a pain on the pc).
- Textures: I get it that the unreal engine is getting "old", and frankly Bioware got a lot of crap from fans on the texture popping issue. But dont freaking drag every texture in the game to 512*2. Really, some of the resolution on some of the stuff is "embarassing". Main characters look glorious, but npcs and other stuff looks just low. I mean the textures themselves are very detailed, its only a shame to lower them that much in resolution.
Amazing ending!
After finishing the game last night I looked around at some of the endings other people had and they have all been very interesting, and totally different.
One of the things that struck me the most was how they decide who lives and who dies. I assumed it was as simple as getting squad mates loyal, and they would live, but no. I even went so far as to only do the quests of those who I wanted to live, and I skipped out on the quests for some of the scrubs like Jacob and Garrus.
5 seconds into the warp a rogue blast on the ship kills Jack. That was the first time in awhile that I stepped back from the game and said "Wow, I didn't see that coming!". Jack was my favorite squad member and was one of the first quests I did to make her loyal, and I had also upgraded my ships shields so I'm not sure what sequence of events caused that to happen but it made for a very tense ending.
Overall I'm VERY impressed with the ending sequence and everything after the Omega 4 warp. It kicked off with romance between Shepard and Miranda then into an hour of action. Straight out of a blockbuster movie.
Beats out God of War for my favorite game experience.
Amazing ending!
After finishing the game last night I looked around at some of the endings other people had and they have all been very interesting, and totally different.
One of the things that struck me the most was how they decide who lives and who dies. I assumed it was as simple as getting squad mates loyal, and they would live, but no. I even went so far as to only do the quests of those who I wanted to live, and I skipped out on the quests for some of the scrubs like Jacob and Garrus.
5 seconds into the warp a rogue blast on the ship kills Jack. That was the first time in awhile that I stepped back from the game and said "Wow, I didn't see that coming!". Jack was my favorite squad member and was one of the first quests I did to make her loyal, and I had also upgraded my ships shields so I'm not sure what sequence of events caused that to happen but it made for a very tense ending.
Overall I'm VERY impressed with the ending sequence and everything after the Omega 4 warp. It kicked off with romance between Shepard and Miranda then into an hour of action. Straight out of a blockbuster movie.
Beats out God of War for my favorite game experience.
You probably didn't have the upgraded armor. You need all the ship upgrades except the medbay to keep everyone alive through the fight into the station.
To be honest I found the story order at the end very odd. Miranda waits until just AFTER my entire crew has been abducted and the ship ransacked, then wants to bone? Aren't you worried about them Miranda? Its one thing to take a little time for the hanky panky before we save the universe, but when all our friends have been abducted all you can think of is my hog? Couldn't that have happened beforehand?
I also thought the story wasn't anywhere near as good as the first one. Everything else about the game was better of course (although I could do with a bit more depth/complexity to the armor/weapons/inventory system... somewhere between mass 1 and mass 2 would be ideal IMO), but the story felt predictable after the Collectors = Protheans revelation. Mass 1 was full of revelations, the idea that the station was all a huge millenia-old trap, the multiple extinctions etc all felt huge. Mass 2 sets up a new badguy in the first 30 minutes, which you then knock down at the end. You've gained nothing and lost nothing (lost one team, gained a new one, lost one ship, gained a new one, gained one enemy, then killed it). It just feels like they could (if they wanted to) hammer out a half dozen of these interludes where they just make you recruit another 8 people, then nail the enemy that they introduced at the start. It's just filler in the middle of the mass 1 and mass 3, where the real story takes place.
I still loved it though. I love Bioware for everything except Neverwinter Nights.
You need all the ship upgrades (except Medbay) for everyone to survive making it to the Collector base. For everyone to make it off the base you need to make good leadership choices. I don't think loyalty matters in this cause but why wouldn't you do all the loyalty missions? more xp!
There is one catch though. I read that if you want Yeoman Kelly to survive you can't do any missions between the abduction and using the Omega 4 relay except, if I remember the order right, Legion's loyalty mission. So get Legion > abduction sequence > Legion's loyalty mission > use Omega 4 relay.
I've noticed on this second play through, this time with an imported ME1 character, that there is a lot more reference to ME1 than if you choose a premade Shepard. Though it could be that a premade assumes you killed a lot more people like
the Asari who was controlled by the Thorian on Feros and a messenger from the Rachni queen
but I also met the undercover detective from Noveria on Illium this time and she had a short quest for me. Also more messages from people I helped out in the previous game.
Replies
<bitterness>
Fortunately, being a single player game, I have more power over when I purchase a game than say, a Halo multiplayer game. Soooo, I can happily sit on my arse for a few months for the price to come down significantly, or if I spot a new collectors edition cheap on ebay, I'll grab that. Consider that my big "fuck you" to biowares overly-complex-pre-order-who-get's-what-ingame-if-you-get-anything-at-all mess
</bitterness>
The Game store I visited actually had 5 more pre-orders for the collectors edition than they had copies sent to them to sell! I've never seen this happen to a collectors edition of a game before. However, it isn't called 'limited' edition, so there's no reason not to print more to meet the quite obvious demand for it.
My inner psychopathic-sniper feels elated. Using an anti-material rifle to headshot a YIMR Mec and using the resulting nuclear explosion to kill off most of the other enemies is three kinds of awesome.
So, who thinks they have the best face for Shepard?
I imported mine from the first game and didn't recognize him at all. there's been too much marketing with the other shepard so I just used the default lol. Was so used to him that he became the shepard
yes, its just amazing what they can do in games these days, which pictures real life? like omg
Heh I did the same thing. Marketing wins!
Either way... the game is flatout amazing, and the characters are already interesting as FACK!
Only if I could create the face in a separate program and use a tablet, like I did for all of my faces in Oblivion.
Oh yeah, right, the games cool too!
You start the game with some loot and levels.
I have a lot of complaints about the game. I mean, it's awesome and I love it, but there's a ton of room left for improvement. It's hard to say whether it's a better game than the first. It lost just as much as it gained and didn't gain things I thought it would.
Typical "second game in trilogy" syndrome. Let's make it 'edgy' and forget about doing things like, oh I don't know, giving me a new SMG sometime in the first 20 hours? Basics, guys. Basics.
They need to take both games and smash them together to create the third. Don't take out anything, just add. Add refine improve expand. No more subtractions.
My main playthrough file, ruined.
Theres always Kelly. Shes hotter anyway.
Played through as the default male Shepard.
This Mass Effect had a lot more humor in it than the last. Joker has some great lines.
All the major decisions felt like they had weight to them, if not immediately then for Mass Effect 3 (can't imagine how agonizing Star Wars: The Old Republic will be since you won't be able to load your last save and redo a choice there). That's the fault I found with the game though: there are time when it feels like a just a transitional chapter in the story rather than its own story. It's not a major fault but it's there.
The last character you recruit was a nice surprise addition to the cast as was Joker's response to him.
There also appears to be space for one more character to the right of Jack on the squad selection screen. Maybe another DLC character soon?
Started a second play through last night with an imported ME1 female Adept and wow do you start with a lot of cash and resources for importing a character and doing a second playthrough.
I never saw chronicles of Riddick but in pitch black he's a killer with surgically altered eyes (voluntary I believe) who seems to follow some sort of honorable code - so I don't really see the similarity except that they both have shaved heads.
In Pitch Black "Jack" was the young boy that shaved his head to be more like Riddick, until later on Riddick informs everybody that "shes" bleeding... Because "Jack" was actually a girl.
She was also a total hottie in the Chronicals Of Riddick, and TBH I enjoyed that film a lot... Sure it wasn't anywhere near as good as Pitch Black but more Riddick = WIN in my book...
Whoa... I didn't even catch that to be honest, but yuh man, I can see the connection.
Sorry - like Odium mentioned, I was talking about the supporting character from those films. ME2 seems to have a couple of things like this, taken from recent sci-fi (the Blue Sun's name has gotta be a Firefly reference) and I was just wondering about Jack as well.
Really enjoyed it. Sure the inventory issues made it WORSE than the original, but hell, I'm sticking this as Game Of The Year. I don't care what month we are in, theres gonna have to be some pretty epic games out to top this!
The ending goes a bit silly in that once you install the IFF thingy to theships computer, you have no time and suddenly you MUST carry on the story. If you don't, people die... Also, the whole end mission is about keeping your squad alive, so make the right calls... Send a biotic to do a techs job, for example...
Follwo those simple rules and you can get a perfect ending... But don't and you, well, won't
BTW... Saren comes back from the dead and is Shepards father.
+The freaking crew and ship. The crew you gather on your way and how you prepare for the last mission is a nice devolpment of the story.
+Pretty much everything else from the new heavy weapons to the focus on more distinct classes.
-Things that I thought was annoying: No Mako car? The hell, I loved to do low gravity jumps over crates and mowing down geth. Now you get to scan planet after planet untill your wrist hurts(its a pain on the pc).
- Textures: I get it that the unreal engine is getting "old", and frankly Bioware got a lot of crap from fans on the texture popping issue. But dont freaking drag every texture in the game to 512*2. Really, some of the resolution on some of the stuff is "embarassing". Main characters look glorious, but npcs and other stuff looks just low. I mean the textures themselves are very detailed, its only a shame to lower them that much in resolution.
You fly the Normandy in the galaxy map... Maybe its that.
After finishing the game last night I looked around at some of the endings other people had and they have all been very interesting, and totally different.
5 seconds into the warp a rogue blast on the ship kills Jack. That was the first time in awhile that I stepped back from the game and said "Wow, I didn't see that coming!". Jack was my favorite squad member and was one of the first quests I did to make her loyal, and I had also upgraded my ships shields so I'm not sure what sequence of events caused that to happen but it made for a very tense ending.
Overall I'm VERY impressed with the ending sequence and everything after the Omega 4 warp. It kicked off with romance between Shepard and Miranda then into an hour of action. Straight out of a blockbuster movie.
Beats out God of War for my favorite game experience.
This is the first 'long' game in a while that has me looking to do a second play through. Very very awesome.
Also, Omega is beautiful. Love the pipes and lighting. Lighting across the whole game was pretty amazi-LENS FLAREEEEE!!!!
To be honest I found the story order at the end very odd. Miranda waits until just AFTER my entire crew has been abducted and the ship ransacked, then wants to bone? Aren't you worried about them Miranda? Its one thing to take a little time for the hanky panky before we save the universe, but when all our friends have been abducted all you can think of is my hog? Couldn't that have happened beforehand?
I also thought the story wasn't anywhere near as good as the first one. Everything else about the game was better of course (although I could do with a bit more depth/complexity to the armor/weapons/inventory system... somewhere between mass 1 and mass 2 would be ideal IMO), but the story felt predictable after the Collectors = Protheans revelation. Mass 1 was full of revelations, the idea that the station was all a huge millenia-old trap, the multiple extinctions etc all felt huge. Mass 2 sets up a new badguy in the first 30 minutes, which you then knock down at the end. You've gained nothing and lost nothing (lost one team, gained a new one, lost one ship, gained a new one, gained one enemy, then killed it). It just feels like they could (if they wanted to) hammer out a half dozen of these interludes where they just make you recruit another 8 people, then nail the enemy that they introduced at the start. It's just filler in the middle of the mass 1 and mass 3, where the real story takes place.
I still loved it though. I love Bioware for everything except Neverwinter Nights.
whelp! I'm done with this thread until I beat the game! thanks yo!
There is one catch though. I read that if you want Yeoman Kelly to survive you can't do any missions between the abduction and using the Omega 4 relay except, if I remember the order right, Legion's loyalty mission. So get Legion > abduction sequence > Legion's loyalty mission > use Omega 4 relay.
I've noticed on this second play through, this time with an imported ME1 character, that there is a lot more reference to ME1 than if you choose a premade Shepard. Though it could be that a premade assumes you killed a lot more people like
im pretty sure it cost me 900.