Mass Effect 2 (not a review just a conversation...or is it?)

So yeah, I realised how sad i was when I bought the game on friday afternoon and completed it in the early hours of Monday morning... 37 hours of gaming time and that includes time i left it idle for various reasons.

All in all ME2 is a great game. Combining a brilliantly thought out and emersive story, with a beyond traumatisingly terrible combat system. Yes that is right, all the stuff from the original Mass Effect which made the combat enjoyable and different has been for the most part stripped away. No weapon heat overload this time (which was nice and different), now we have bullets and a lack there of. As Bullets become scarce during battles, like the holy grail you begin to think bullets are the stuff of legend because next to no enemy likes to drop ammo for u upon death. The friendly AI has been beaten with a special stick, making them pants on head retarded. You begin battles by realising that you have just walked into an area full of enemies and they are all shooting you from the start and while you stand there thinking "oh fuck!" as you notice that the battle ground is completely 1 sided in terms of cover (in favour of them ofcourse), the stupid buggars you call your allies have ran in cocks waving. This causes them to take lots of damage due to the 1 sided cover they have to run across a wide open space for and you find yourself putting bullets in the back of their heads as they constantly get in the way...

tbh there was a point where I thought to myself "By all your bodies combined, I am... CAPTAIN PLANET!!!!" (That point should be completely obvious to those who have completed it).

The ending seemed very rushed as they tried too quickly to move things along as if nothing happened, displaying no impact in the characters dialogue or body language as to what was pretty much casually touched upon. The fact that the story could all have easily been put into this game instead of trying to stretch it into a 3rd game is rather annoying, filling the gaps with side missions and making them so you have to do them for a good ending is rather irritating... There is only so many planets i am willing to scan before what seemed like a good change becomes a tedious nightmare...

It's a shame... I like the story and the depth but the combat system changes and the way it seems like they are stretching things to make more money on a 3rd game takes the piss... It prompts to change disc every so often because they put some mission on 1 disc and some on another... That just doesnt seem logical and as if there must be a lot of disc space on 1 or both of them that is wasted space.

If you forget about the shitty combat, the game is like really taking part in an interactive sci fi movie. If they managed to get ME2 out before xmas then it would have been my game of 2009 purely for story and interactive depth. But unfortunately it is only the first of many games out this year which look to have impressive blends of story, action and graphics. The game awards will be interesting this year I think.