Mass Effect?

(More like "Half-Assed" Effect, actually.)

Has anyone else played BioWare's latest "epic" RPG? I've been (somewhat) enjoying it for the past week, but I'd like to get some opinions from others.
Oh, and I'm going to hold out to see if Yahtzee at The Escapist reviews it on Wednesday. If he doesn't, I'm going to take a crack at it. I might post a review anyway.

I've already heard some complaints. This is what happens when a smart company that makes smart games continually dumbs it down.

I've still got hope for Dragon Age. Made for the PC. They better not f*** up when they know they'll have a big hit that will fly off the shelves if it's done right...

Give us the HKC review. I'll appreceate it. So will KGF no doubt.

And while I won't try to emulate Yahtzee's acid wit, I've come to the realization that there's a lot of crap out there.
And even the good games that pop up from time to time are simply not that good anymore.

Someone even wrote an article asking if we were in video games' "Golden Age".
Golden age? What the fuck?

No, the golden age of video games has come and gone. It happened at the end of the 1990s.
To wit, I give you: Thief. Thief II. Half-Life. Deus Ex. System Shock 2. Bauldur's Gate (and part II, too)
Okay, so they're almost all FPS games. (You can tell what I like in games) But they're all incredible experiences. I've played through Deus Ex five times.

Mass (Half-Assed) Effect review will be coming tonight.

You aught to make more reviews.

He did say "Mine" before anyone else did.
Actually, it was his mention of wanting to write the review that reminded me I still needed to grab that game.
Any suggestions on what I could do next? I realize that compared to the "professional" game web pages, I'm in the vast minority about Mass Effect.
They're all saying it's "perfect". I think it's far, far from that. The story's a practical photocopy of Knights of the Old Republic, the graphical engine chunks along too many times for my liking, and, well...you've read the thread.

Useless fact: this is my longest thread ever. Even with me replying to most of the comments. Thanks for everyone who participated in it. :hi:

Total War: Empire, & Jagged Alliance 3 (although I think I'll be the only one here for the fanbase.)

While I’d been considering purchase of an Xbox 360 for some time, the nifty preview videos I was seeing about Bioware’s latest epic rpg called “Mass Effect” got my attention in a big way. It was their own universe, and their own roleplaying engine. And it looked neat. So I took the plunge and got one.

Well, here I am, about 15 hours into the game, and I’m completely torn between loving the game and banging my head against the wall in repetition. I’m not done with it yet, so perhaps this isn’t a completely fair review, but right now, I don’t think any amount of polish or nifty, frame rate-eating “film grain” and “motion blur” effects could make me think this game is anywhere near the “game of the year” numerous gaming mags are touting it as.

The story.
The universe is our own, but a few hundred years into the future. Humanity’s gotten off to a rocky start, getting involved in some ugly wars, and, as one character in the game nicely put it, got to the final frontier and found it already occupied.
We’re struggling, but we’ve discovered our first ancient artifact and suddenly there’s an explosion of coolness, a ticket that allows us to ride the galaxy with the big kids. Yay. So now we’re in space, and this alien council on this mysterious ancient space station have special operatives that run all their errands. These Jedi Knights, I mean, Specters, run around the galaxy doing all the dirty work for the council.
Humanity gets involved, and they want to send a human to join the Specters. But Specters are “chosen, not made,” and it looks like we’re not going to get our chance any time soon.
That is, until you play for a few hours. Then you get to be one.
Now you’re racing around the galaxy, chasing after all these wonderful clues this pre-cursor race has left behind, racing an evil specter named Saren to find this ancient technology. Saren either wants to conquer the universe, or destroy it. Or even perhaps both.
It seems like I’ve played this somewhere before…

The graphics.
Well, there’s good news and there’s bad news. The good news is the game looks wonderful. If you play it, just sit on a bridge in the Citadel spanning the lake and look out over the station. Neat, huh?
The aliens also look fantastic, too. And the detail is amazing, too. Oh, wait, that’s also the bad news. There’s too much of it, honestly. The graphical engine suffers, as does the framerate and texture quality. In fact, most of the time when you enter a new scene, you’re treated to a low-quality version of the scene while your Xbox labors to load the high-quality textures. Hey, Bioware: if you’re debated between showing me crappy textures or showing a simply loading screen for an extra five to ten seconds, you picked the wrong choice. Even in your inventory, when the only 3D that’s being rendered is YOUR CHARACTER MODEL, this blurry texture thing makes no sense.

The gameplay
The over-the-shoulder 3rd person is great. When it works. There’s a cover system that the game brushes through, and the online guides say to not use them, but I find them somewhat useful. At least, until your target rushes your position and beats you to death with his gun. Then, not so much.
And while the main quests are entertaining, the side quests are, to put it mildly, repetitive. There’s your underground bunker, your above-ground bunker, and your basic mine. And each type of “dungeon” for lack of a better term, is the same as every other type of dungeon. The mines have the exact same layout, no matter what planet you’re on, and so do the bunkers. Bioware’s shown they’re capable of making different types of dungeons, as they demonstrated in Neverwinter Nights several years ago. So why can’t they show some variety this time?
On edit: I forgot to mention the somewhat-clunky inventory system. Unless you're equipping your characters, or at a merchant, there's no way to see what you're carrying. And apparently, Bioware thinks that any more than 150 items is too much, so if you collect over the game's limit, you have to "convert" any extra items you find into "omni-gel". Your inventory automatically sorts by level, then by type, then by name. But if you have a lot of upgrades, you can't see them all when you're selling them unless you scroll...down...your...list...of...100...plus...items. It feels like they threw this in as an afterthought, actually.

The verdict
Bioware spent the last several years on this Mass Effect, and it shows. Sort of. The game seems….half finished. Or maybe ¾ finished. If Mass Effect was a PC game, I could excuse the framerate and texture loading issues. But this is an Xbox 360, a two year old system. The specifications are well known, and since they’re only programming for one system with consistent specs, there’s no excuse for ANY kind of framerate droppage.
Ever.
The game will eat up a good amount of time, and apparently when you finish the game the first time you unlock the “hardcore” setting. Since there’s apparently a sex scene in the game, I’m looking forward to finishing the game so I can enjoy this new setting. No, seriously, the hardcore setting just makes the game more difficult, apparently.
Mass Effect is an enjoyable game, and the universe is massive and shows potential. This is supposedly the first part of trilogy, so perhaps with Mass Effect Part Deux, they’ll tweak the graphical engine so it’s not hobbling along like a kneecapped twit.

I rather liked it.

This is the line that found me nodding violently in agreement:
"Bioware spent the last several years on this Mass Effect, and it shows. Sort of. The game seems...half finished."

I just don't understand why Bioware would release such a potentially great console game at this stage of development. I hope that this is not a trend towards the PC game situation, where crap is released far too early, with the expectation that users will put up with it until a patch is released to make it playable. That awful attitude is one of the things that has pushed me from PC gaming towards console gaming over the past two years.

But what other good new RPGs are there for the Xbox360? Oh, that's right: None. *sigh*

I'm still a PC gamer. There's just some games (I'm looking at you, Portal) that are simply better on PC. And with the SDK out, there's gonna be a ton of free levels that
twisted minds will be creating for it. And Valve has a tendency to hang onto games for just a bit too long. Sure, they patch their library constantly, but I've not encountered a single product from them that wasn't playable out of the box with no problems.

Mass Effect isn't a hideous game. And there is the advantage of being able to update games for the Xbox 360, so that's good
But some of the issues I noticed, especially the framerate and textures, wouldn't have allowed the game out the door ten years ago.


I think Bioware did what Valve did, and still does: they overstretched their bounds. With Episode 2, Valve added a TON of new features to the Source engine, and it shows.
That pushed the release date back a year. Bioware didn't want to sit on this game anymore, not with the Christmas season coming up, so they rushed the game out the door.
It definitely shows, though. What makes me more mad is the uber-high scores that all the gaming mags and websites are giving the game. I can't get an objective review from anyone anymore.

Well, except Yahtzee's Zero Punctuation reviews.

You just made my next game purchase the Orange Box instead of Mass Effect.

I don't know if Bioware can make a patch for the frame rate, but hopefully they can. Shame about the laziness on the dungeon designs.

I'll probably still get it, anyway. God I'm lame!

Don't get me wrong: it's a fun game. But all the "5/5! ZOMG!" reviews out there piss me off.

Favorite line:

"These Jedi Knights, I mean, Specters,"

:spray:

I've been hearing this game is great and was hoping for a PC port. Now, not so much.

That blurred-texture-thing while loading? Bioshock does that as well. It's annoying, and there really isn't an excuse. Crysis doesn't do that, for fuck sake, and that presses any system to the absolute limit. I sure do hope that behavior doesn't start a trend...

What a disappointment in the dungeon-type maps. It sounds like FEAR in that respect. FEAR was fun, until I left for lunch. I came back and played through some more, and felt like I wasn't going anywhere new. Surprise! In truth, I wasn't. The dungeons in ME sound like that. How very sad.

"But if you have a lot of upgrades, you can't see them all when you're selling them unless you scroll...down...your...list...of...100...plus...items."

If it comes out for PC, someone will probably mod that out if Bioware is smart and allows it (*cough*UnrealCrysisFEARDoomEtc*coughcough*). This is why I have a PC for games. :D Along those same lines, Bioshock's replay value just went into the shitter despite using the most moddable game engine ever. 2K has no clue.

Your most encouraging statement:

"The game will eat up a good amount of time,"

If you're willing to play it all the way through, in spite of (or even better, because of) its length, that's the mark of a decent game.

Again, nice review. You told me a lot of what I wanted to know.

But then again, I built a whole new rig to handle the game, so maybe that's why.

Make no mistake, while I enjoyed the game, it is Knights of the Old Republic, set in our universe, and without lightsabers.
The plot-specific missions have unique dungeons, and they're all complex and marvelous. But the side quests are just filler, and it feels like Bioshock sat down and said
"Okay, we've got the entire plot done, and it's awesome, but it's only 12 to 15 hours long. We need a ton of filler quests so the players play for another 10-12 hours. Write a lot of crap quests, and we'll randomly scatter them across the galaxy. We've hyped this game into oblivion, and paid off enough reviewers that we're guaranteed a shot at 'Game of the Year'."

I've finished the game, and it ended in typical Bioware brouhaha. Lots of explosions, which can be a good thing. Those explosions, and the scenes that entail said booms, are rendered in the game engine, which, as you should expect, can look really cool.
Until the Xbox 360 cries out for its mother and cuts the framerate in half.
(I'm writing this as the end credits are rolling, and I just saw them stutter as the framerate dropped. The END CREDITS.)

And the boss fight at the end. Hoo boy. All I can say is you face an enemy that's a cross between a spider monkey and a frog that's been cybernetically enhanced and shot with about a million ccs of Ritalin. Not a good idea to use for a console shooter. Seriously.

and they got the XBox version out the door first?

Oblivion, by the way, shares the same inventory issue ME does out of the box. Only PC gamers can fix it- it's a mod that reduces the inventory screen's font to a reasonable size for the PC, and which allows many more slots to display onscreen.

The 360 version has no fix for that issue.

Which is why I took the plunge and got the Xbox 360.

If there was a PC version, it'd be a port like the previous version.

Although, I must admit, Obsidian Entertainment took Bioware's Neverwinter Nights and made it fantastic with NWN 2.
The visuals are much better than I ever expected, and it's more like the Bioware games of old: Bauldur's Gate 1 and 2.

There's no inventory management, actually. You can only see one item on a particular character (a particular weapon, armor, or "psi-amp" or whatever it's called) at a time on one character. Then you have a list to your right of all the extra items of that category. That's it. No mass list of inventory items at all. Hideous.

I'm playing Crysis right now. I CALL DIBS on the Crysis review. Seriously.

I have a lot to say about this game already, much of it good, but I want to finish it before I give birth to a review. For those who care, my favorite mission thus far is the "oops we forgot one AAA site AND the radar site, our bad" mission.

The labor this time is being a true unholy bitch. But that's a good thing, in this case.

:D

As the pelicans said,

"Mine."

Besides, they were seagulls.

I've got it all, man. I have the writing chops, the sharp wit, the computer than can actually play the game, and...
and...

oh yeah...I don't have the game.


Well, then...nevermind... :P


(Actually, I just bought it today.)

Been a bit since I saw it. Ah, well.

I'm currently on the "kill the two AAA sites. Ooops, our bad- THREE AAA sites. Oops, our bad- 3 AAA sites and a radar post" mission.

Are you playing under DX9 or DX10?

I just passed that part.
Almost ran into what I call a "game-breaker" part. Where I have to load and reload and reload and reload and...well...you get the idea.
The checkpoint saving and loading seems to happen at the most inopportune times.
And I'm still experiencing some slowdown. Did Crytek use computers from the 24th century to make this game?

It's possible to use all or almost all of the DX10 "very high" quality settings when running in DX9, but you'll want a very fast machine with lots of RAM and video cards (yes, plural). I think they were using quad-SLI machines while developing the damn thing. When your system setting are set to "make your PC weep", the beauty of this game melts your face off.

The checkpoints are one small quibble I have as well:

"Nomad, you've got to get to thCHECKPOINT REACHED...........e other side of the harbor"

I was driving a humvee, hit a jump to cross a ravine, and suddenly got the CHECKPOINT REACHED signal.
And then the game proceeded to blow me up. Repeatedly.

I think I'll just call up Doc Brown, hop in his DeLorean, and jump forward a few years and pick up a newer rig. Sheesh.

I just had all the AAA sites disappear on me in that mission I keep referring to.

It's kind of hard to complete when your objective apparently exists on another plane. I didn't know Bethesda had anything to do with Crytek.

I could sit on the beach and stare at the ocean waves lapping at the sun-kissed rocks all day, but sometimes, when I want to do something...
Maybe it's actually a glitch in the Matrix or something.

My HUD once completely disappeared. Couldn't do a thing about it. Had to reload a save about fifteen minutes ago before I could get one that worked properly.

I'll give Crytek more leeway than I will Bioware on these kinds of errors because of the vast differences in computers out there. There's only one hardware configuration (not counting hard drives) for the Xbox 360. Any glitches like the ones I encountered in Mass Effect are inexcusable in my book, and the sycophantic super-high reviews all over the place piss me off.

I mean Baldur's Gate? Tons

BGII. Not as many but still quite a few.


KOTOR I and II: Less can be played at the same time and the total seems to keep falling slightly.

Jade Empire: About the same as KOTOR.

Mass Effect: Around 6? I assume you can only have 2 on your team with you.

They're not keeping up to their standards....or so it seems. I always enjoy their NPCs the most. They're colorful and a great addition to the game. I especially enjoyed the in game banter from BGII. It practically made you go back and play if from the beginning with a new crew once or twice.

Ironically, the team that took over the Neverwinter Nights franchise, Obsidian, upped the party number to four. It feels much better (And you can do more damage that way.)

And you have a maximum of six other characters in your group. Also, the main quests only take about 15 hours total to complete. While I've played it for 25 hours or so, 10 of those were dithering around with the repetitive "Oh, look, it's the exact same bunker layout we were in previously, except this time, there's large gardening apparatus with plants instead of the tech machinery that was in the last bunker." quests.

OK Dwarf fighter...Tiefling Thief...Elf Druid...yawn. Steriotyped up the ying-yang. They seemed so 2 dimensional.

Bioware tends to create "cool" living-breathing NPCs. Even when they have a "steriotype" they take it one step further. Kargan from BGII: Dwarf Fighter...a psychotic bloodthirsty homicidal chaotic evil bastard who says lewd things to female NPCs and eggs on the male ones. Jan Jannason: Gnome Illusionist...a rambling hilarious yarn spinning trickster who talks non-stop about turnips and his "Uncle Spanky." They had personality! That made the game to me!

People STILL talk about Misc and to a lesser extent HK-47 from KOTOR. Can you see thing happening from the NPCs on NWN II or Mass Effect? Are the NPCs "breathing"?

There's no "Go for the eyes, Boo! GO FOR THE EYES!!!!" moments in Mass Effect. Urdnot Wrex is close, but it's typical of Bioware to make the hulking lizard alien the brutish, grizzled mercenary type. Not much else there.

On edit: there was a surprising amount of humor between the NPCs during one of the final missions, but nothing like what happened in the BG series.

It would have made more sense to make Wrex a lyrical scholar who quotes poetry or something. That would have been more memorable. As it is, I rarely used him in-game.
I usually used the asarian Liara (the blue-skinned alien you have a potential romantic plot with) and the quarian Tali'Zorah nar Rayya (she's in an encounter suit the entire time) because I simply can't stand encountering a crate or wall safe I can't open. So as a result, I have little combat strength in my party, but that never really presented a problem for me.

Minsc was one of the best characters ever, I must admit.

As for Neverwinter Nights II, you're right about the characters, although I haven't finished that game yet. I was more impressed by the overall improvements to the gameplay, though. Obsidian does good codework, I must admit. Their plot and characters still need work, though.

It's an art that I though Bioware had down pat. They've still got the same folks, right? Why can't they see that!?!?! Also the lenth of the game sounds very "un-Bioware"...their games are getting shorter too.

Meh...here's hoping that Dragon Age will be hands down better. At least their sticking to PC for that and who knows? Maybe they released the "dumbed down" (and remember I still play my PS2 every now and then so I'm not that anti-platform) version of ME that focuses on the basics for the X-Box and will make a more in depth version for PC Gamers who might appreceate different things. We'll see.

Produce a shining, sparkling-looking game with a less-than-stellar plot and then get noticed. Valve did that, too. If you really, really look at Half-Life, it was difficult to completely discern the plot for that game at times. Compare it to Half-Life 2, with much more developed characters and plot, and you can easily see the difference those six years made.

I doubt that a PC version of Mass Effect will be any different, sadly. Ion Storm made Deus Ex: Invisible War total crap specifically because they shot for a simultaneous PC/Console release. And the converted version of KOTOR wasn't any different than the Xbox version, either.

I used Wrex and Garrus (Bio/Combat and Tech/Combat) to great effect even though I was an Adept and we were a bit low on the tech side of things.

Spec'ed Wrex out with the shotgun and Garus with Tech (then eventually sniper rifles) and I never had issues unlocking anything. Singularity/Lift and a few shots from the Specter sniper rifle from Garrus and I walked through most fights towards the end of the game.

Like I said, I had little problem with anything in the game, even with Tali and Liaris. Once in a while I took Garus along 'cause he could kill stuff, or Ashley.
Rarely used Wrex or the other human...I forgot his name at the moment.

and enjoying it. The issues with slowdowns are really inexcusable for all the reasons you already talked about.

...second only to Planescape: Torment.

Penny Arcade thinks highly of it; check out their three-parter nit-picking here, and read the "news" bits about each.

Personally I put it Mass Effect behind Baulder's Gate, Planescape: Torment, Fallout and Fallout II. But still, probably one of the better RPGs and for sure a must have if you are a fan.

Wow, my heart rate went up a bit when I typed "Fallout"

War, war never changes...

It takes a lot to replace FO I and II and BG I and II in my heart. PST is still fantastic despite it's age. That's impressive.

Wait for Dragon Age to see if Bioware still has the talent to make a good RPG.

If Mass Effect comes to the PC, then I'll throw out my verdict.

:P (Just bringing in a little bit of GD in here)

No, just kidding. I know that there are people who think the game is the end-all-be-all of RPG existence. That's fine. It is enjoyable, I must admit.
But I just think it's half-finished. Nothing this unpolished should have been sent to the presses.

Then again, with that reviewer getting fired at Gamespot because he gave Kane and Lynch a bad score, I'm betting that we're going to see
even less critical game reviews in the future. Too many people will be afraid of losing their jobs. And too many of the gaming magazines/websites
seem to be in the pockets of the game companies nowadays, in my opinion.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/zeropunctuation/2738-Zero-Punctuation-Mass-Effect">Zero Punctuation Review of Mass Effect

His is much funnier than mine, but it seems we agreed on a few things.

Um, HKC, no offense, but never mention your "purple python" if you will...it's mildly creepy.

It all just reaffirms my hopes for Dragon Age...unless EA steps in and makes them release it before it's ready.

"unless EA steps in and makes them release it before it's ready"

Of course, EA has never done that before. :eyes:

And now I can't see straight, I'm laughing so hard.

"Fat man on a unicycle" = comedy gold.
"Filling with my toothpaste of love" = wet monitor.

I think I'm going to ask Yahtzee to write my eulogy. :)

Or can you play Normal, then jump to Hardcore?

TIA.

I played the first hour or two of Veteran, and I haven't touched the game since.

I'm finding the replay value to be somewhat...lacking.

:shrug:

(Rock Band is freakin' awesome, though)

It was awesome. :)

Edit: Oh wait, if you've finished Mass Effect on Normal, could you check and see if you can start a Hardcore game now, or only a Veteran one? Thanks.

:P




Confirmed: I can adjust the difficulty to Hardcore now. There's a tag in the description that says "MUST BE UNLOCKED" but it seems like I unlocked it.

Thanks for being my guinea pig! :)

I'm looking forward to replaying Mass Effect at least once--as with all BioWare games--for the Paragon / Renegade flavors.

http://gamepolitics.com/2008/01/14/conservative-blogger-claims-mass-effect-offers-customizable-sodomy">Conservative Blogger Claims Mass Effect Offers “Customizable Sodomy”

Kevin McCullough over on townhall.com has posted a rabid, mouth-frothing screed against Mass Effect. He must have played the super-super-secret version of the game. The one you pay Bioware $1,000 to play.



I swear, if there was a job to run up to these pundits, smack them across the face with a whiffle bat and scream "NO! YOU'RE STUPID! SHUT UP!" I'd take it in a heartbeat.
The sad thing is there are people out there (and more than a few on this site) that will believe this shit. Just look at the sludge-infested comments section for the article.

Calling them on something just brings about the insults instead of rational discussion...


Something oddly Hillary-supporter-like about them...

That's ... I'm ... how can they ...

:rofl:

Want to borrow my whiffle bat?

There's a ton of people who need to be hit up-side the head with said bat and told "NO! YOU'RE STUPID! SHUT UP!".

Moron didn't even play the damn game. (I seem to recall a number of people on this site taking similar stances: commenting about games they've never even heard of, much less played. Mr "Twiddle your joysticks" Benchley, for one.)

Totally transparent, of course. How did he last so long, anyway?

And McCullough digs himself into an even deeper hole today.

http://kotaku.com/344873/mass-effect-political-dickery-corrected



I take it back. He doesn't deserve the whiffle bat across the face.
He deserves a cricket bat, for he's obviously a zombie of sorts. Anyone who knows about zombies knows the best way to take them out is with a cricket bat.

(One of the more amusing unique Hellgate: London weapons, I think.)

I love how this guy's defense can be summed up as, "I saw pitchers on the internets, so it must be true!"

I'm just starting to explore the romantic subplots in Mass Effect, but sadly I don't think they'll live up to the titillation promised by Kotaku. :(

Don't you love how dirty, dirty titties (nod to David Cross) are SO much worse than rampaging violence?

And we know what happened to them...they opened Olive Garden restaurants all over the world!!!!!

And if he thinks that's the most sexually explicit game out there...

In other words, he doesn't really apologize.

http://kotaku.com/345852/political-dickery-apologizes


Hey, McCullough? *WHACK!* You're stupid! Shut up!

http://kotaku.com/355399/mass-effect-coming-to-pc">Mass Effect Coming to PC

It looks like the "Xbox 360 Exclusive" game Mass Effect isn't so exclusive anymore.

Among the improvements listed are:
* Optimized controls designed specifically for the PC.
* High resolution visuals - Mass Effect for the PC features highly detailed textures, characters and environments. (I wonder if they're going to have the same crappy blurry textures?)
* Fully customizable controls - PC gamers can re-map the control scheme any way they like.
* Run & Gun Control - Players can assign biotic powers or skills to 'hot keys' allowing them to play Mass Effect with a heavier focus on action.
* New decryption mini-game.
* New inventory screen GUI and functionality - The enhanced inventory system makes it easier for players to equip and modify their weapons and armor.

So now I didn't even need to bother with the 360. Oh well, at least I still have Rock Band. And Rez HD.

Not just KGF...I'm a Bioware fanboy too!

Haven't really noticed the frame rate thing but maybe I'm not that sensitive to such things.

One thing I noticed that hasn't been mentioned is how much this game borrows ideas from David Brin's Uplift universe - even the terms , such as "client species" and "Earthclan". On one hand, that's annoying, but on the other hand, I've always wanted to play an RPG based on the Uplift Saga...

All in all, I was really satisfied with the game play. I played an infiltrator character on the paragon path. I divided party time fairly equally among the characters, but I rarely used the Quarian or Asari characters since I wanted to have characters that used heavy weapons with me. I didn't really use the biotic/tech powers much, but I think I will play a vanguard character next time and try to concentrate on using them more.

I finally noted in the final battle cutscenes that another big influence on this game has to have been Babylon 5 - don't know why I didn't notice it before.

Definitely worth a replay - and my Oblivion obsessed wife even expressed an interest in playing it! That's pretty major in our house, she hasn't played ANY other game since we've picked up the Xbox.

I was almost finished with my second playthrough (Renegade Specialist) when I got the dreaded Red Ring of Death. So I suppose I'll just have to be patient. Boo!

I'm playing the Sentinel class and focusing on using the tech and biotic talents in combat whenever I can. One thing that would be nice, though, is if you could use some of those talents in non-combat situations, such as to open containers and probes when your decryption/electronics skills are too low.

My second playthrough was to max out as a renegade. I like the different ending you get if you let the council bite it.

It uses SecuROM, and you're allowed a max of THREE installs. (At least Bioshock gave you five)
And each time you run the game, you have to be connected to the internet so SecuROM can authorize your copy.

Isn't it great when they treat honest software purchasers like criminals?

That's ridiculous. :(

they're trying to protect?

(Maybe the landscape is changing. Galactic Civilizations 2 and Sins of a Solar Empire both have no online activation or disc protection- come to think of it, Oblivion didn't either, nor did that have any serial code to enter- and Sins actually allows for up to TWO installs of the game, AND making a copy for archival purposes.

One can hope. I probably won't buy Mass Effect, though- being slapped by 2K with Bioshock on this exact same issue was more than enough, thanks.)