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Mass Effect: Andromeda | Review Thread

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sloppyjoe_gamer

Gold Member
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UglyPony

Member
I am still going to pick up the game despite all the mediocre reviews. Even if its half as good as Mass Effect 2 was to me its worth the €48 I payed. I just hope they wont shelve the series, learn from their mistakes and make a killer follow up.

Hopefully they will fix the derpy animations in a patch though. Either by a community patch or official.
 

Audioboxer

Member
As per this from GameSpot:



I'm going to have to cancel my pre-order,

What the fuck Bioware? Narrative agency was the thing that separated you from the usual AAA bullshit in terms of RPG's. It's your DEFINING feature, has been since Baldur's Gate. It could have se you apart from the boring, sit here and I'll tell you a story through 10 hours of cutscenes that will always play out the same, games like Horizon.

You got tons of shit for sabotaging that agency in the last Mass Effect, and you said you listened...

Fuck.

Sounds like they've regressed to "TellTale" levels of illusion. Except, TellTale often know their limits and still write good scripts that you accept are linear and don't really have much agency.

ME has always been propped up as one of the poster boys of choices with consequences. At this rate, a David Cage game is going to excel passed it.
 
Yeah both TNO and Alien Isolation got far worse scores than you would expect given their current reputations.
I feel like this is proof that people need to let-go.jpg of arbitrary numbers.

Alien Isolation gets a thread on here every week about how good it was. Not saying that's going to be the case with Andromeda, but there is much more to games than a number.
 
Haha! I feel bad for them though, being forced to work in a completely different engine that was originally designed for first person shooters. As much as I can appreciate the savings EA must make by using that one internal engine for absolutely everything, hopefully they'll finally take note of the shortcomings that will obviously produce, and realize that some game genres have different priorities that dedicated (or at least different) engines can better provide.

There's a very good chance that lead animator isn't at his desk but at his boss's desk yelling "I FUCKING TOLD YOU"

The engine was not very different. Bioware used it for Dragon Age Inquisition, which is even further from a shooter as Mass Effect is.
This outcome was made from incompetency, plain and simple.
 

ironcreed

Banned
Yeah both TNO and Alien Isolation got far worse scores than you would expect given their current reputations.

As I always say, that is just the way it goes sometimes. Which is why I just follow my gut. If I strictly went by reviews, I would have missed out on some amazing games. Same goes for movies, books and music.
 
I would give the original Mass Effect games a 7/10 as well. I enjoyed those enough so this game sounds pretty good.
The combat in particular looks amazing.
 

Lime

Member
Wasn't the first mass effect also received poorly? A lot of people claim it's the best one.

It has a much higher Metacritic average, it had a state-of-the-art audiovisual presentation at its time, and it had a strong plot with well-executed pacing. 360 version was more of a technical mess.
 

firelogic

Member
That's not what I said. It just makes me wonder why people are continuing with the hobby they seem to view so negatively these days?

As for reviews, some of my favorite games, like Shadow of Memories (78%), have mediocre Metacritic scores.

78% isn't mediocre. It's great.
 

Gator86

Member
Gaming culture is the worst

Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and stop you there. Getting some criticism from people suspicious of super positive impressions on a relatively average game from a dude who is neither a journalist not industry figure who just happens to get a free copy of the game straight from Bioware is far, far from the biggest issue in gaming. Its not even the worst Andromeda related thing thanks to the people harassing devs over the animations. Let's get some perspective here.
 
I'll play this game for a day to decide if I want to keep it or not. If the bugs and animation came out to be unacceptable I'll ask for a refund.
 

Lorcain

Member
Oof...I never would have imagined a ME title reviewing in the mid to low 70's. While that's technically not a terrible review score, it is when compared to the reception of the original ME trilogy.

The reviews that state it's more like DA:I than ME confirmed my biggest concerns.
 

Maledict

Member
Wasn't the first mass effect also received poorly? A lot of people claim it's the best one.

It has a 91 on metacritic, so no, it wasn't received badly at all. It had a lot of fault, but the peaks outweighed the troughs and there were some genuinely amazing moments in that game (and I'm much more critical of it than most Me fans).

Also remember, ME1 was genre defining - its was the first rpg to attempt what it did. It changed the industry (look at dialogue wheels now!). But the world has now moved on - Witcher 3 and Horizon are testament to that.
 

emag

Member
Wasn't the first mass effect also received poorly? A lot of people claim it's the best one.

No. 91 on Metacritic for the original release. It was largely praised at release, with the exception of combat (which was entirely reworked for ME2) and the empty worlds/Mako controls (which were dumped for ME2).
 
I agree with Shinobi, The Order should be closer to 7, MGS V should be closer to 8. FFXV also has insane flaws that were given a pass when in other games were severely criticized
 
D

Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
That's not what I said. It just makes me wonder why people are continuing with the hobby they seem to view so negatively these days?

It is an odd trend. It's just a small, but very vocal, minority, but there's still so many people who always seem jaded, negative and cynical about gaming. Which is a hobby that we're presumably into as it brings us fun and happiness. Otherwise why bother?

I wonder if a lot of these folks are older AND disenchanted with the direction of mainstream gaming. I'm 38, so it's not just age as I love gaming more than ever. But current trends match my shifting tastes to easier games that are more about the world, characters, story etc. That's not all I like by any means, but more often than not I just want to veg out, relax and escape into a virtual experience.

My thoughts turned to age as I was thinking that I don't recall people being so cynical and jaded on movie forums back when I was more into that hobby and posting a ton. But then rememebered a few older people who were super negative about current movies and really only liked classics so I thought maybe it's something similar with gaming. But that doens't make as much sense as even if that were true the rise of indies gives those types more new "retro" type games to play than at any time in gaming history. Though they could still be jaded about not getting big budget games in the genres/styles they like I guess.

In any case, just odd to be so negative and cynical about a hobby. If it's not bringing you joy, maybe step back from it and be less engaged. Though I suppose the sad truth is many are just miserable people that enjoy bringing others down online and derive some sad joy for themselves out of that...
 
The thing is Mass Effect 1 was the first of it's kind. It's pretty much one of the first game to meld rpg into a shooter and it came out great.
not to mention the graphics was ahead of it's time.
 
dang it, pre-order cancelled, i'm not too bummed since i do think i'll still pick it up when the price drops but with me still working on Witcher 3 and Persona 5 on the horizon, I just can't justify paying full price for this one

I'll give it a fair shot later on, but it does seem like they dropped the ball on what is my favorite franchise of games...
 

jtb

Banned
Haha! I feel bad for them though, being forced to work in a completely different engine that was originally designed for first person shooters. As much as I can appreciate the savings EA must make by using that one internal engine for absolutely everything, hopefully they'll finally take note of the shortcomings that will obviously produce, and realize that some game genres have different priorities that dedicated (or at least different) engines can better provide.

There's a very good chance that lead animator isn't at his desk but at his boss's desk yelling "I FUCKING TOLD YOU"

That's a terrible excuse. Dragon Age: Inquisition was in Frostbite also, looked great. Mass Effect is a shooter.

Also, UE3... I mean, you don't get much more "shooter-engine" than that.
 

Lime

Member
I wonder what post-launch support Bioware will provide besides the usual Multiplayer Event stuff? Will they do the bare minimum effort and simply patch the worst of the bugs? Will they fix the eye shaders on human characters? Will they fix some of the most egregious lines of dialogue sequences? Will they add alternative appearances for party members? Will they do a ME:A Enhanced Edition with tons of fixes like CDProjekt RED? Etc.

or will they simply ride the frontloaded sales, release some minor stability patches, release the planned DLC, and then move on?
 

Lothars

Member
What is this supposed to mean to me? Wasn't Shadow of Mordor top 10 that year? Do i even need to say anything else?
Both of those are great games is what it is saying to you. You may not agree but that doesn't mean that everyone feels that way about them.
 

Doran902

Member
I need more info on if it is worth it just for the MP.

From what I have played even that is lesser than ME3. The animations felt more floaty and less inpactful and I found enemies don't react like they used too. This stuff could get better with levels / gear though maybe?
 
Haha! I feel bad for them though, being forced to work in a completely different engine that was originally designed for first person shooters. As much as I can appreciate the savings EA must make by using that one internal engine for absolutely everything, hopefully they'll finally take note of the shortcomings that will obviously produce, and realize that some game genres have different priorities that dedicated (or at least different) engines can better provide.

There's a very good chance that lead animator isn't at his desk but at his boss's desk yelling "I FUCKING TOLD YOU"

DA:I used the same engine. It looked fantastic.
 
I wonder what post-launch support Bioware will provide besides the usual Multiplayer Event stuff? Will they do the bare minimum effort and simply patch the worst of the bugs? Will they fix the eye shaders on human characters? Will they fix some of the most egregious lines of dialogue sequences? Will they add alternative appearances for party members? Will they do a ME:A Enhanced Edition with tons of fixes like CDProjekt RED? Etc.
have they outlined a dlc plan?

I imagine they'll do a few fixes of bigger omissions similar to the black emporium in inquisition but not much past that.
 

Audioboxer

Member
I wonder what post-launch support Bioware will provide besides the usual Multiplayer Event stuff? Will they do the bare minimum effort and simply patch the worst of the bugs? Will they fix the eye shaders on human characters? Will they fix some of the most egregious lines of dialogue sequences? Will they add alternative appearances for party members? Will they do a ME:A Enhanced Edition with tons of fixes like CDProjekt RED? Etc.

lol.

There will be some salvage effort, but on that scale? Nah. EA are probably already planning to gut the team besides skeleton staff to keep the MP going for a year.
 
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