Chaos Raiden
Avid Gamer & Reviewer
Storyline
The story is well-told, with an extremely believable universe of space-travel. There are also many unique aliens introduced in this game, such as salarians, turians, asari, and many more. There are few good plot twists implemented in the story, which makes it even better.
The conversations carry out a lot of in-depth explanation of the game's background story, such as the origins of an alien species, the results of one of your choices in the game, and many more. You can always talk to your squadmates or other NPCs for many more in-depth information of the Mass Effect universe. Most conversations in this game are fairly unique and nice to hear, thanks to the voice actors conniving ability to make the game's universe very believable to gamers. Not only this game, but other two Mass Effect games have excellent conversations and great in-depth telling of the Mass Effect universe.
The characters are also very likable, such as Anderson, Liara, Garrus, Wrex, and many more. I felt that the characters in this game are very well-designed and well-acted by voice actors.
Gameplay
1) Customisation and Upgrading section
Before starting the game, you need to customise your Shepard, such as his/her appearance, first name, gender, class, and background history. Depending on your choices, conversations in the game may differ for each characters. You may also use the default Shepard in the game if you want to.
As you play in the game, you will gain Levels by obtaining experience points (XP). XP can be obtained by defeating enemies, completing mission objectives, opening locked crates, or getting new Codex entries. As you gain a level, you will get Talent Points to be spent to learn or upgrade your Talent. Each class and squadmates have different Talents, and should be spent wisely. As you upgrade a Talent, you will learn more powerful skills called Power, and may also learn new Talents after spending a certain amount of points. There are two types of Talent categories, which are offensive Talents, defensive Talents and passive Talents. Offensive Talents allow you to use offensive Powers like Overload and Warp, defensive Talents allow you to boost your character's shields or barriers whereas passive Talents grant you health or shield increments.
In this game, you may obtain pieces of equipment such as weapons, weapon mods, new armours, and etc. You will only get a certain equipment with certain levels depending on your current Level, such as obtaining a level 1 equipment if you are level 1 to 5. Each equipment may grant different bonuses to you and your squadmate, such as Heavy Armour grants you higher shield and damage reduction bonuses. Classes may also affect your character and squadmates ability to equip certain equipments, such as Soldier class is the only class can equip Heavy Armours.
You may also use Credits (in-game money) to buy equipment. Credits can be obtained by killing enemies, opening locked crates, and etc. However, many powerful equipment are expensive, so it is recommendable for you to sell any unwanted equipment.
2) Combat section
The combat is third person shooter based, where you need to aim your weapons and shoot at enemies. All Classes can use all types of weapons, but not all Classes have weapon specialisations for weapon damage bonuses. For example, Soldier can learn all weapon specialisations whereas other Classes may learn only or none at all.
You may also use Powers to defeat enemies quickly, or use it to increase your defenses. After using a Power, you may not be able to use it for a while until it fully charges. During the cooldown period, you are also not allowed to use any other Powers as well.
There are few variety of enemies in this game, such as organic enemies like humans, krogans, etc and synthetic enemies like a variety of geth. Each enemy have different styles of attacking you and your party, as well as have different stats. For example, Overload can be used to damage a geth heavily or break an enemy's shields quickly.
3) Exploration and Progression section
There are two modes of exploring, which is walking/running on foot and by driving Mako. In many indoor areas and explorable planets, you need to walk/run to your destinations. You also need to interact with certain objects to proceed, such as terminals or switches. In all explorable planets, you can drive Mako to your destinations. While driving it, you can also attack enemies to avoid getting your squad killed easily.
While progressing in the game, you need to make decisions that can affect the game's story and future storyline in Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 heavily. Paragon decisions are usually the 'good' person decisions where you can resolve the situations peacefully, whereas Renegade decisions are the 'evil' decisions, requiring you to do drastic actions like killing people. These decisions should be chosen carefully while playing the main Missions in the game, such as eradicating an extinct species or let it live. Paragon/Renegade options can be also chosen in normal conversations with NPCs, or during Assignments.
There are two types of missions in this game, which are main Missions and Assignments. To proceed the game, you need to complete the main Missions, where you need to solve a number of objectives as well as fighting hordes of enemies on the way. Assignments are the side quests in this game, where many of them have different objectives to complete, such as talking to a person to change his mind, destroy an enemy base, and etc. Assignments are optional to do, but it is beneficial to do since it will reward you bonuses like XP, equipment, and money.
4) Conclusion
The game has interesting gameplay, but some of it are rather mediocre, namely the Mako exploration and combat. The Mako is slow, and not easy to use. Not only that, it is boring to drive the vehicle itself to explore any areas in the game. The combat is decent, but not as intense as Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 combat, where the enemies are more strategic and aggressive. The conversation system in this game is well-implemented, with great conversations to listen. Overall, this game has average gameplay.
Graphics
Back in 2007, this game has already impressive graphics. Even now, the game still looks much better than the current games. Unfortunately, like the original release of the game, the PS3 version still has bugs and glitches present, as well as some framerate drops in certain areas in the game. Fortunately, they are not game-breaking.
Sound
The game also has excellent voice cast, such as Mark Meer, Jennifer Hale, Seth Green, Keith David, and many more. Like it's sequels, I love the voice acting, since they fit their roles perfectly in every Mass Effect game.
Replay Value
Conclusion
Every Mass Effect game is awesome, with unique storytelling, great conversations, exceptional voice acting, and unique universe. Unlike it's sequels, this game has very average combat satisfaction due to some gameplay issues, as well as having a number of technical issues.
For PS3 players, if you wish to import the completed game save file to Mass Effect 2, you need to download a patch for Mass Effect 2, so that Mass Effect: Genesis can be skipped and you can successfully import Mass Effect save file to the second game.
Although this is my least favourite Mass Effect game, it is still a great game because it successfully sets the events to the sequels perfectly, as well as great story. Anyone who wants to play the Mass Effect games should start playing this one and carry on to the second as well as the third games. If you want to get this game on PS3, you may purchase it from the PS Store or buy Mass Effect Trilogy, which contains all three Mass Effect games.
Score
Story: 10/10
Gameplay: 7/10
Graphics: 7/10
Sound: 10/10
Final Score: 8.5/10 or 34/40
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Excellent storyline.
- Well-defined space themed universe and mythology.
- Good graphics.
- Great voice acting.
- Fitting music.
- Good replay value.
- Great degree of customisation.
- Many well-likable characters, both good and evil.
- Excellent Paragon/Renegade system.
- Great conversation system.
Cons
- Powers take a long time to recharge.
- Many, many technical issues.
- Long loading times in-between exploring and going to other planets.
- Grenade is awkward to use.
- Mako exploration is boring.
- Poor UI design in certain Menu sections.
- Buildings (optional dungeons) in other planets have repetitive level designs.
Stop Saren and his geth army from finding the Conduit.
You are Commander Shepard, who is working for the Alliance and is supposed to be a candidate of Spectres, one of the elite groups headed by the Citadel Council. As you landed to the planet to retrieve a beacon, you will find that the planet is attacked by synthetic enemies called geth. As the mission is over, you found out that Saren, a turian Spectre was the one responsible for this, and has to capture him to clear your name and to stop an imminent danger foreseen by Commander Shepard by interacting with the beacon earlier on the planet.The story is well-told, with an extremely believable universe of space-travel. There are also many unique aliens introduced in this game, such as salarians, turians, asari, and many more. There are few good plot twists implemented in the story, which makes it even better.
The conversations carry out a lot of in-depth explanation of the game's background story, such as the origins of an alien species, the results of one of your choices in the game, and many more. You can always talk to your squadmates or other NPCs for many more in-depth information of the Mass Effect universe. Most conversations in this game are fairly unique and nice to hear, thanks to the voice actors conniving ability to make the game's universe very believable to gamers. Not only this game, but other two Mass Effect games have excellent conversations and great in-depth telling of the Mass Effect universe.
The characters are also very likable, such as Anderson, Liara, Garrus, Wrex, and many more. I felt that the characters in this game are very well-designed and well-acted by voice actors.
Gameplay
1) Customisation and Upgrading section
Create your first Commander Shepard, and import it to Mass Effect 2 after completing the game.
Before starting the game, you need to customise your Shepard, such as his/her appearance, first name, gender, class, and background history. Depending on your choices, conversations in the game may differ for each characters. You may also use the default Shepard in the game if you want to.
As you play in the game, you will gain Levels by obtaining experience points (XP). XP can be obtained by defeating enemies, completing mission objectives, opening locked crates, or getting new Codex entries. As you gain a level, you will get Talent Points to be spent to learn or upgrade your Talent. Each class and squadmates have different Talents, and should be spent wisely. As you upgrade a Talent, you will learn more powerful skills called Power, and may also learn new Talents after spending a certain amount of points. There are two types of Talent categories, which are offensive Talents, defensive Talents and passive Talents. Offensive Talents allow you to use offensive Powers like Overload and Warp, defensive Talents allow you to boost your character's shields or barriers whereas passive Talents grant you health or shield increments.
In this game, you may obtain pieces of equipment such as weapons, weapon mods, new armours, and etc. You will only get a certain equipment with certain levels depending on your current Level, such as obtaining a level 1 equipment if you are level 1 to 5. Each equipment may grant different bonuses to you and your squadmate, such as Heavy Armour grants you higher shield and damage reduction bonuses. Classes may also affect your character and squadmates ability to equip certain equipments, such as Soldier class is the only class can equip Heavy Armours.
You may also use Credits (in-game money) to buy equipment. Credits can be obtained by killing enemies, opening locked crates, and etc. However, many powerful equipment are expensive, so it is recommendable for you to sell any unwanted equipment.
2) Combat section
Use your high-tech weapons and Powers to decimate your enemies.
The combat is third person shooter based, where you need to aim your weapons and shoot at enemies. All Classes can use all types of weapons, but not all Classes have weapon specialisations for weapon damage bonuses. For example, Soldier can learn all weapon specialisations whereas other Classes may learn only or none at all.
You may also use Powers to defeat enemies quickly, or use it to increase your defenses. After using a Power, you may not be able to use it for a while until it fully charges. During the cooldown period, you are also not allowed to use any other Powers as well.
There are few variety of enemies in this game, such as organic enemies like humans, krogans, etc and synthetic enemies like a variety of geth. Each enemy have different styles of attacking you and your party, as well as have different stats. For example, Overload can be used to damage a geth heavily or break an enemy's shields quickly.
3) Exploration and Progression section
Paragon and Renegade decisions will affect the game's storyline in many ways.
There are two modes of exploring, which is walking/running on foot and by driving Mako. In many indoor areas and explorable planets, you need to walk/run to your destinations. You also need to interact with certain objects to proceed, such as terminals or switches. In all explorable planets, you can drive Mako to your destinations. While driving it, you can also attack enemies to avoid getting your squad killed easily.
While progressing in the game, you need to make decisions that can affect the game's story and future storyline in Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 heavily. Paragon decisions are usually the 'good' person decisions where you can resolve the situations peacefully, whereas Renegade decisions are the 'evil' decisions, requiring you to do drastic actions like killing people. These decisions should be chosen carefully while playing the main Missions in the game, such as eradicating an extinct species or let it live. Paragon/Renegade options can be also chosen in normal conversations with NPCs, or during Assignments.
There are two types of missions in this game, which are main Missions and Assignments. To proceed the game, you need to complete the main Missions, where you need to solve a number of objectives as well as fighting hordes of enemies on the way. Assignments are the side quests in this game, where many of them have different objectives to complete, such as talking to a person to change his mind, destroy an enemy base, and etc. Assignments are optional to do, but it is beneficial to do since it will reward you bonuses like XP, equipment, and money.
4) Conclusion
Decent gameplay with some issues.
The game has interesting gameplay, but some of it are rather mediocre, namely the Mako exploration and combat. The Mako is slow, and not easy to use. Not only that, it is boring to drive the vehicle itself to explore any areas in the game. The combat is decent, but not as intense as Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 combat, where the enemies are more strategic and aggressive. The conversation system in this game is well-implemented, with great conversations to listen. Overall, this game has average gameplay.
Graphics
It is a 5 year old game, but it still looks good today.
Back in 2007, this game has already impressive graphics. Even now, the game still looks much better than the current games. Unfortunately, like the original release of the game, the PS3 version still has bugs and glitches present, as well as some framerate drops in certain areas in the game. Fortunately, they are not game-breaking.
Sound
Good music and excellent voice acting.
The music is pretty good, where it is suitable to the game's space-adventure theme. Although, I don't remember much of the music since not many tracks stand out a lot itself, except the main theme where it is played when Shepard is first introduced in the game or during the ending of the game. The game also features a song by Faunts, an electronic rock band (also contirbuted a song in Mass Effect 3). The song is pretty good, and I highly recommend electronic rock fans to listen to it.The game also has excellent voice cast, such as Mark Meer, Jennifer Hale, Seth Green, Keith David, and many more. Like it's sequels, I love the voice acting, since they fit their roles perfectly in every Mass Effect game.
Replay Value
High replay value.
The game has high replay value. You can always try out different decisions in your next playthrough using your old Shepard save file, or create a new one with different background and class to have different experience of playing the game. You may also complete all Assignments in the game, where it can benefits you such as credits or new equipment.Conclusion
A good port but with a number of technical issues remained from the original version.
Every Mass Effect game is awesome, with unique storytelling, great conversations, exceptional voice acting, and unique universe. Unlike it's sequels, this game has very average combat satisfaction due to some gameplay issues, as well as having a number of technical issues.
For PS3 players, if you wish to import the completed game save file to Mass Effect 2, you need to download a patch for Mass Effect 2, so that Mass Effect: Genesis can be skipped and you can successfully import Mass Effect save file to the second game.
Although this is my least favourite Mass Effect game, it is still a great game because it successfully sets the events to the sequels perfectly, as well as great story. Anyone who wants to play the Mass Effect games should start playing this one and carry on to the second as well as the third games. If you want to get this game on PS3, you may purchase it from the PS Store or buy Mass Effect Trilogy, which contains all three Mass Effect games.
Score
Story: 10/10
Gameplay: 7/10
Graphics: 7/10
Sound: 10/10
Final Score: 8.5/10 or 34/40
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Excellent storyline.
- Well-defined space themed universe and mythology.
- Good graphics.
- Great voice acting.
- Fitting music.
- Good replay value.
- Great degree of customisation.
- Many well-likable characters, both good and evil.
- Excellent Paragon/Renegade system.
- Great conversation system.
Cons
- Powers take a long time to recharge.
- Many, many technical issues.
- Long loading times in-between exploring and going to other planets.
- Grenade is awkward to use.
- Mako exploration is boring.
- Poor UI design in certain Menu sections.
- Buildings (optional dungeons) in other planets have repetitive level designs.