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Charge your mass effect fields, tune your omnitool, it's time for another installment of Bioware's award winning RPG franchise. It's time to end the war with the Reapers, and now, it's personal. EA kept Mass Effect 3 carefully behind closed doors at E3, only letting a select few in to see the live code demonstration they'd prepared.
Casey Hudson-left Matt Zakos-Right
Crammed into a tiny mock shuttle craft, we huddled together around the screen in anticipation of what new tricks Bioware had prepared for us. And we were not disappointed. Spending some time with Casey Hudson was also a treat. He’s a guy filled with some amazing ideas, if his complete vision for Mass Effect 3 comes to life, gamers will experience something the industry has never seen.
Well, almost not. Graphically, the game demo we saw was running on an Xbox 360, looks almost identical to Mass Effect 2 on 360. No big upgrades in texturing to be found here, and the game didn't seem to match the visuals seen on the PS3 version of Mass Effect 2; which, was rumored to be using the Mass Effect 3 engine. In Mass Effects 3's defense, the game is still in development, and a lot can be done in six months. However, what has been upgraded are the animations. Previous installments had Shepard moving stiffly around the map. His position in cover was almost always the same, his movements repetitive.
ME3 does away with that, adding dozens of new animations for Shepard. He ducks and shifts position depending on the cover, or rolls from one low barrier to another as the need arises. Speaking of cover to cover, a new helpful icon system indicates your movement action, be it hurdling the cover to charge your enemies, or diving to a better position. New animations have been included for the melee, and every class has a unique attack. Oh, before I move on, Omniblade. That's right, you turn your omnitool into a wicked arm-mounted switchblade now. I don't understand why this wasn't done sooner, but I'm glad it's been done now. That particular animation is especially brutal.
Combat has been altered so that players can adjust to several different tactical approaches to suit their play style. For those who love their Halo and Call of Duty, the run and gun approach is still viable. Our Gears and Rainbow Six fans will find that cover can and will often save their life.
And for those that believe that the key to victory is through judicious and precise use of powers and abilities, both their own and those of their team mates, that option still remains as well and will make killing some of the toughest enemies possible, if not much easier. Stealth assaults have also gotten an upgrade, and Shepard now has silent takedowns he can use on unsuspecting enemies to ensure that no alarms can be raised. Can't have any Indoctrinated warning their bosses, now can we?
Speaking of the Reapers, yes you fight them. The massive, ship-borne intelligences do appear as enemies, and it is rather impressive to see them as they demolish cities. Beyond that, their servants have increased quite a bit. Cerberus Agents now appear constantly, fighting to defend the Reapers and sabotage Shepard's attempts to unite the galaxy. Why the change of heart in the Illusive Man? There seems to be evidence that at least large parts of Ceberus have been Indoctrinated.
If the Illusive Man is one of them, then players will have to contend with his impressive and powerful intelligence network. While that is indeed daunting, it is by no means the only threat that players face. Anyone who's played Mass Effect probably remember the Husks, weak but plentiful scifi human cyber zombies.
They showed up quite a bit in both previous installments, namely when dealing with Collectors or Geth. This game, the Reapers have shown us a new trick, turning races other than humans into the mindless, drained forms, namely Krogan and Batarians. One can only imagine that no race is safe from this gruesome fate. Well, except maybe the Hannar, but that might only be because the floating jellyfish lack any sort of skeletal system. Customization options are back as well, much to the joy of the fans who loved the RPG elements of the first game.
At first glance, the new skill system looks much like Mass Effect 2, except the length of the bars seems to have doubled. With the press of a button, the skill enlarges to take up the screen and display the effects of each level of the ability, as well as the branches it can take around mid-way through.
Hybridizing the previous two games in this fashion is an excellent way to find a middle ground betweel the near-daunting wealth of variability found in the first game and the overly-streamlined simple steps in the second. Looks like armor remains customizable as it was in the previous installment, but the weapon mods from the first game have gotten an overhaul.
Instead of the simple two or three internal mod slots, weapons can now be more fully customized on weapon benches that can be found through out the world, and most likely on the Normandy as well. Players will be able to customize barrels, scopes, stocks, materials and more, and each change will alter the appearance of the weapon in some way. Now the gun
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