First, I would like to say that this isn't a traditional review and that I am assuming that you have, by now; read the reviews from other sources. To punctuate this difference I have chosen a fan made image as my lead picture for this article. Please click on the picture to be taken to his page. His work is amazing as you can see. Anyway, I know I have made a bold statement that Mass Effect 2 is the greatest game of all time. Perhaps some of my readers may remember that I dubbed Bioshock the greatest game of all time. Which it was, until Mass Effect 2 came along. That is how good Mass Effect 2.
Mass Effect 2 begins like no other game. The game begins with the death of the main character. Seems like the absolute worst way to start a game. But it works in some many ways; one of them being effectively divorcing the player from the previous game. This works for both the new player and the returning one. Basically the game is saying, things are different now, REALLY DIFFERENT.
The biggest part of Mass Effect 2 that makes it more than any other game is simply the fact that it has an intense RPG structure and an intense 3rd person action structure. It's basically Elder Scrolls Oblivion and Gears of War fused together. This sounds messy and gimmicky but the execution is anything but that. There is a smooth flow from one area to the next and one type of style to the next. The cinematics are so blended into the game that very often the player doesn't realize when they have lost control.
Here we come to where this generation's hardware and this generation's software begin to stop talking to each other or perhaps speaking two different languages at once. What I am referring to here are not only all the little problems Mass Effect 2 such as long loading screens(not that they really bother me, but others have mentioned this), audio drops(happened 3 times in 25 hours of playing, shouldn't have happened at all), and my favorite which was the reason that Uncharted 2 Among Thieves didn't get my greatest game of all time moniker, getting stuck in the environment to the degree that the game crashes. Although Uncharted 2's crash was much more severe and more complete; the fact that it exists at all is horrible.
This is not all, unfortunately.... This, however, is much more subtle and not something that can be fixed with a patch or pointed out on an excel spreadsheet of bugs. No, this is the fact that in Mass Effect 2, the player is restricted from saying things that are obvious and forced into saying things that are clever but can be lethal. There is SO MUCH emphasis put on the spoken word in Mass Effect 2 that saying the wrong thing to the wrong person at the wrong time; will result in a loss of their loyalty. Now, this is to some degree governed by your meter of Paragon points or Renegade points. You either must be REALLT GOOD or REALLY EVIL to get some discussion choices. This is fine and all, but when you know that keeping the loyalty of these team members will eventually result in whether they live or die. It seems kind of crazy that a minor disagreement in philosophy could be lethal. After all. your Commander Shepherd; the Hero of the Citadel, etc... Seems like people would be more likely to trust your opinion and leadership. That you don't have to all ways agree with them or do what they think you should. But inevitably until you get very high up on your respective points meters you lose friends or missions based on how good or bad the game allows you to be. Not how good or bad you want to be. Similarly, sometimes in a conversation you want Shepherd to say something or ask something; and the game will not allow him to do so. Also, I tend to have a problem with the fact in the beginning of the game it seems like there is a lot more squad interaction than there is throughout the game. I would have liked to have seen more of this as there is in Dragon Age Origins. But I guess the processors can only handle so much and there is only so much room on the disc.
This last criticism of the game is really a symptom of how incredible Mass Effect 2 is. No other game has ever evoked such feelings of having being cornered into the way the game wants or requires itself to be played. Mass Effect 2 achieves what no other game can, it makes the player so emotionally invested that it makes the player angry when the wrong thing happens and there is nothing you can do about it. The power of the story and the characters in that story seem to demand emotion from the player. It is completely unique. As Thane would say,
"Entropy, Entropy all ways wins!"
The only way Mass Effect 2 could be made better is to allow the player to ACTUALLY ask the NPCs questions. Which of course, was hinted at using the upcoming "Project Natal." Not that I think Natal will be functional enough to work with Mass Effect 3. No, maybe if they do a sequel series to the trilogy in 2013. Then, perhaps with a new console they might be able to make such a dream game. But then, we would have something so amazing and so great. That it would probably make people rethink what video games are or could be. Which is why Mass Effect 2 is the greatest game of all time. It makes the player wonder what IS POSSIBLE, not just what is happening before them. It gives the player a sense of the broader world even though you never really see that world first hand in it's entirety. Someday. we will all be Commander Shepherd and when our voices are coming from his lips and our choices are exactly his choices then, my friends we will be beyond the uncanny valley and beyond MMORPGs we will truly be in the future.
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