I am suffering from this Mass Effect game...

So I decided to give it a try since it has been well reviewed by so many gamers. Unfortunately, the gameplay is soooo slooow for me, I think I just played for 3 hours now and 90% of the time all it did was talk, talk, talk, and walk(they won't even let me run until there are enemies!)... Then they promoted me to some higher position (can't remember what it's called) because I've proven that Saren is behind a plot of some sort...

Now they gave me my own ship! How cool is that? Of course, a captain would do his words of encouragement to his squad on how humanity is depending on their success that's why they can't fail their objective... I became excited because I thought the pace of the game would change... boy, I was wrong...

Please tell me this will get better...

 

Well, Mass Effect 1 is the slowest-paced out of the entire trilogy. If you have no patience for story-telling, then it probably won't be the game for you. But as the "anchor" game in the series, I think it does a great job of establishing the galaxy you're in and providing a very rich history and environment.

Without revealing too much, yes, the game's pace does pick up more as you find out more of what's going on.

But, if you don't have the patience to interact with your crew members, NPCs, and explore worlds, it won't be a good game for you. If that's the case, read Wikipedia to fill yourself in on the story and then start with ME2 (to get a pre-made character from ME1, you can go here [spoiler warning!]). ME2 and ME3 are both more fast-paced and have less expansive galaxies to explore (more focused).

 

You will. Remember it is a RPG with a storyline. There is going to be dialogue involved. The beginning I do agree that it is a bit slow but the pace will massively improve once you get control of your ship.

 

I don't mind stories, I actually love RPG especially Skyrim... I really hate that you can't sprint when roaming around, and I felt that the full 3 hours was played with just choosing what I have to say in conversations. I guess I'll just have to play more...

 

I think my first run-through of ME1 took me a bit short of 40 hours. So you've barely scratched the surface

 

Seriously, when I wanted to make my femshep in ME1 after playing ME3. I could not play ME1 the same way. I honestly just considered playing from ME2 and continue forth.

 

Skip ahead to ME3. It is the best out of the three games, particularly if you want a faster paced game with better level design and combat gameplay.

 

Once you've got control of the ship, there will be blocks of time when you'll do very little in the way of dialogue and plot development. There are still places where the game will start to drag if you're not into plot-heavy gaming, but it's almost all plot at the start.

 

wait til you get to play Mass Elevators.

 

ahahahaah +1
Elevator rides probably took 1 hour of my time from start to finish

 

ME1 is very similar in pacing to Knights of the Old Republic. Its not quite a "D20" style combat, but its not really an FPS.

ME2 is much more combat focused and has a lot more missions when you get the DLC. ME2 was the longest game of the series for me, but had WAY more fighting and a much smoother fight interface.

ME3 is basically "Gears of War 1" when you are in Combat, lots of cover, run-and-gun, grenades.. etc. The whole game is Much more fast paced.

Looking back, ME1 is hard for me to play and get excited about when it comes to the combat portions.. its almost painful. Same with the exploration pieces.
ME2 was radically better in every way. ME3 goes by way to quickly!

The Story and interaction is consistent across all 3 games.

 

HA! So true!

Im glad they did away with them in the later games.. And having to walk around the planets to find stuff. Im glad they basically did away with the scanners in ME3 also.. Good streamling.

 

I got bored of ME1 but so far enjoying ME2 what little I can play now.

 

ME2 has the best "relationship" engine of 3. The story goes far in depth with each character and it can take a solid 50 hours to explore them all with the DLC.

Each of the major DLCs, Firewalker, Overlord and Shadow Broker are highly recommended. The Two character DLCs are also very good, but short.

Actually, the DLC kind of makes the game IMO, especially the Shadow Broker. (And is a big part of ME3's sub-plots with Liara)

ME3's relationship engine is quite weak in comparison, as in that you really don't get the kind of closure that you would hope for. I guess all of the story arcs do end in some way, they are not quite as permanent as i would have liked. There are also far fewer characters in ME3, where the game is more about the goals of the mission than the relationships. Still fantastic and a 95/100 in my score book. Even still, ME2 might be the superior of the two.

 

Kinda unrelated, but does anyone else find that security scanner/barrier on the Normandy in ME 3 really annoying? I'm talking about the manned checkpoint between the war room area and the bridge. It forces you to a complete stop and then a slow walk when you're normally jogging around the ship. That thing really irks me, haha.

But back to the OP, yeah, ME1 was definitely the slowest of the bunch for me. But, the gameplay/combat for each game definitely picks up pace when you reach the end-game quests for each. The planet-roaming side-quests in really kill the pace though. I'm glad the series eventually did away with planet exploration and ground vehicles entirely.

If you're just trying to get a grasp of the ME universe for the purpose of playing the later games, then just speed through the main quests of the first one. You can always use the save editor to "tweak" things that you missed out on prior to advancing to the next game in the series.

 

Yeah, it was a small plot device that makes you stop to listen to the endless banter of the guards.. the "common folk" from the lower ranks.

 

Get textmod and look up mass effect texture mods! Then you will really enjoy the game more graphically, yes it does take a while for you to get into the game i know i know but once you begin playing forget about it! You will love it totally!

 

YES!!! The elevators are so annoying! Anyways, I just finished doing a quest on the first planet... It got has gotten better. I think I'll try to finish the main quest of ME1 just to know the story of it, then I'll transfer to ME2 right away.

 

I don't want to spoil the game for ya.. but you have the option to plug Wrex later in the game.. Don't kill him!

 

Oh god. I remember I didn't have enough charm/intimidation at that point and I couldn't get off the planet I was already on... I spent hours roaming around killing anything and everything just to level up my character enough to be able to save him. You won't know who he is yet, but Wrex is a HUGE part of ME3, do not kill him.

 

Thats what most players probably don't realize when they start. Decisions from ME1 and ME2 call carry to the next games. Each play-through can have radically different subtexts.

I saved every character from ME2 and all of them, except Katsumi, was in my ME3 playthough.

 

Wow! The decisions carrying throughout the next games are impressive! So should I max out my charm and intimidation right away?

I know some of you might say that it depends on how I play, but can you guys give me an advice on which squad is the best to bring with me? I'm currently using the 2 original squad members and they're always dying. My character is full combat.

 

You can do either Renegade or Paragon in any of the games. Its all up to you man. The decision on Wrex (As well as other characters) will come a little latter in the game.


You pick up a Ton of characters along all 3 games. And every decision can have a major impact on the next game and the game after that.

I always used Garrus and Liara in ME1, Jack and Thane in ME2, Liara and Javik in ME3.

Always a good move to outfit your NPCs with some good gear. Predator armor and Specter weapons are great too in the first one. Be sure to get all of the DLC games for ME1 too.

Social.bioware.com is a good place to start.

There is also a good Wikia on Mass effect that can guide you.. but beware.. it will spoil it.

I played as a paragon and saved everyone in the game (except one in ME1) and it went far. Building relationships with your NPCs is also essential, talk to them on the ship between EVERY mission. By ME3, it will pay off.

 

I can't say I remember too well the mechanics of ME1 combat, but I find the single most versatile squad member in the whole series is Garrus. His Overload is indispensable for getting rid of shields/barriers. Plus he has AP ammo so he can dish out quite a licking to armored foes.

The third squad member should probably be tailored to the mission you're on. Tali is an anti-synthetic specialist. Liara is good for crowd control and her warp and warp ammo both do well aginst armored enemies too. Wrex is a great tank for soaking up damage, which I found useful on a handful of missions that swarm you with enemies. I don't think I ever used Ashley and Kaidan when I didn't have to, haha. Well, I have used Ashley occasionally in ME3, but that's only when I could get her the Revenant + Marksman.

 

what happens to those who didn't play ME1?

 

Here's a good way to level up the character real good...
Play the side-quests first.
Some of the resource gathering in ME1 can be annoying what with the Mako and roaming around the map, but it can be done.
I did ALL of them (mostly) before moving on to the main story quests.

I really enjoyed ME1 for it's immersive story. The conversations are the best part (if not a bit dull on multiple playthroughs if you pick the conversation options from before).
I finished ME1 a couple of days ago again and am on my ME2 playthrough (still at the beginning but am gathering resources mostly so I don't have to later on).
I restarted playing from the first game because Me3 got me really excited to play through the games again.

I agree that ME1 can be a bit slower paced, but to be honest, I think it wasn't until ME3 that things were more balanced out.
Me2 took the game into a more shooter direction (something I wasn't too fond of because we have too many shooters out there as it is - and it's REALLY annoying/boring).
Me3 got back to certain elements in ME1 and that's what made it really good.

 

For me I started playing Mass Effect 2 then 1. Yea 1 is so slow and recommend you just skip to 2 then 3 where the action is much better. It sucks you had to start with 1.

 

Regarding combat, which class are you using?

I found that going for the soldier was the best class in that game, seconded by the vanguard, this is mainly that biotic powers are not what they used to be when the game came out, and the vanguard adds flexibility, although singularity is still one great thing to have (which the vanguard wont have)

Companions:

Kaidan is a sentinel, biotic and tech together, he will be using the pistol most of the time.

Ashley she will be using the AR and the sniper rifle, the latter quite ineffectively. However due to her being a soldier she wont be dying too much in combat

Wrex is a mean killing machine, will use mostly his shotgun, although he can use the AR as well

Liara is a great biotic to carry. She is fragile, and will use only the pistol

Tali is a tech, she is the death of the synths, and with her shotgun she is deadly, her hacking abilities will ensure you get more money.

Since mostly I was fighting geth in ME1 I chose usually liara for the crowd control, and tali for the tech.

Equipment:

Regarding the game its best that you have a high level char, and that you get the rich achievement (1million credits). Why?

Because you need to buy weapons, armor, bio amps, omni tools and upgrades. The higher the level the more powerful the weapons you can get. You wont be able to get the best equip in your first playthrough, specially because you are going to be limited to lvl 50, and to get spectre weapons lvl X you are going to need to reach at least lvl 56+, the cap is lvl 60.


*Weapons spectre weapons.

*Armor... well thats tricky, I cheated to get the jormangund armors... but you can get Predator (best shields), Colossus (best damage protection), titan (good all around but worse than predator)

*Bioamps you need savant.

*omni tools you need savant.

*Upgrades
-Weapon upgrades - I usually put some damage increasing (it increases damage and heat) and some cooling solution (it reduces heat and helps weapon stability), it depends on the weapon, as you noticed, sniper rifles are usually one shot, since it overheats, so I got 2 scram rails X (increases damage +26% and -10% of heat absorption) and the ammo upgrade HE X rounds (blast radius 420cm, heat generation +500%, weapons force +500%, damage bonus +26%) , for my AR I did the friction less materials and scram rail combo that I explained earlier, with whatever ammo upgrade that suited the mission, I barely got the weapon to overheat with this.

You will rarely use HE ammo upgrade, due to the heat factor, however in sniper rifles you turn that beautiful thing into a cannon with that, the splash damage helps a lot to clean the area, and its a one shot one kill mostly no matter where you hit.
Equipment - Mass Effect Wiki - Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, walkthroughs and more

Enemies:

The best thing to get to lvl 50 soon is to kill tough enemies on foot, while on mako you can kill those easily (provided that you are aware that the shots/missiles aint guided, thus you can just move back and forth), they are though as nails to kill on face to face.

Geth Colossus - the main gun is a splash damage one shot one kill mean thing. It also packs a machine gun that will chew your shields FAST, even with the jormangund armors it took less than 20s to kill me with that machine gun.

Best strategy is to, carnage, sniper that thing, behind very solid cover, meaning behind a mountain or something like that, otherwise the splash damage of the main gun WILL kill you.

Another strategy is to soften it up with the mako and deliver the killing blow on foot

Thresher Maw - if you want a challenge thats the one you should be looking at, this is the toughest meanest thing that you will ever face in any game of the series, remember those dragon fights that are though as nails? this is harder.

To fight on foot there is only one strategy, you have to have solid cover, the spit is a one shot one kill with splash damage, the physical attack is also one hit kill, it will come out of the ground randomly and close to you, if its within 15-20 meters you are dead, even with the mako.

here are some more strategies
http://masseffect.wikia.com/wiki/Thresher_Maw_(enemy)

This is the most XP heavy enemy that you can kill, since you get XP twice, when you damage it badly, and when you kill it.

And for those saying saying that the thresher maw in me2 was difficult, you never killed one on foot in me1

Combat:

Use your powers wisely, otherwise you are in trouble.
The cooldown period while its only for that power, it takes a lot of time, and usually the combat will end before you use it more than 2 times (and thats counting that you are very high lvl with very diminished cooldown)

Use your squadmates powers, they are there to back you up.

Assign them places to be, its best that they have cover

Assign enemies for them to kill, they will deal more damage.

Understand one thing, the cover system is broken in this game,

Understand another thing, the combat difficulty in me1 is much more than in sequels

Use your upgrades, and constantly sell/buy your equipments and ACQUIRE LICENSES for the requisition's officer on the normandy (this is done by purchasing them on the several vendors in the galaxy), this way you are equipped to fight another day. (You need to be a dungeon crawler in this game, you NEED the MONEY)

Decisions:
Common sense, use it.

They will affect your game, in me1, me2 and me3


I think this covers most of your needs right now, without a lot of spoilers.

This is the wiki, I used it a lot and still do for me3
Mass Effect Wiki - Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, Walkthroughs, and more

 

Just played a couple of missions. I think I'm starting to like it, and I got all squad members unlocked.

 

Yeah, the DLC really makes ME2 great. I didn't love Firewalker or Arrival, but I really really REALLY loved Overlord and Shadow Broker. They were as good or better than the core campaign missions. And Shadow Broker is really important for ME3.

 

Mass Effect 1 is a masterpiece of science fiction. It wasn't realy designed as an action game so much as an attempt at more realistic approach to space colonization/travel/adventure. There are a lot more science elements to the game, the planets, the colonization.. Etc.

I really enjoyed the game for these science fiction elements. Being used to the KOTOR combat system, it wasn't so bad. (KOTOR Pauses the action, lets you select from a pre-defined set of moves, then plays them out D20 Style). However, i do enjoy the more FPS oriented combat systems of the latter, i feel they cut quite a bit of science fiction content from the 2nd and 3rd game for the sake of pacing.

 

Agreed on all accounts.
What the heck is with people looking for fast paced action everywhere?
I'm so sick of those games (as if they aren't mindless for the most part) - which is why I don't really game most of the time anyway.
Games like 'The Dig' back in the 90-ies... ST:A final Unity, KOTOR 1&2... ME trilogy (ME 2 and 3 while more action oriented still retained a good portion of RPG elements that made it interesting along with the story- ME3 even more so than ME2).

 

Evolution of society. People don't have the attention spans they used to, because everything is easily accessible and instant now.

 

I blame 12 year old little guys and the recent cod series. That generation ruined gaming for us.

 

WHAT ? An RPG that makes you talk to other characters............AHHhhh............the agony of it all !

Go buy a shooter......not that ME was a real rpg, in the first place !

 

Don't you mean, de-evolution of society?
That kind of behavior permeates all sectors of gaming.
Almost nothing but shooter type games.

 

Devulotion and evolution would be same thing, society is adapting to its environment, though i think it is called negative reinforcement in environmental studies. At any rate yes our society is going more and more full retard.

 

Says the person with a picture of a bikini-clad bottom as an avatar

The more capable our technology is, the less capable we have to be. Don't know something? Look it up on Wikipedia with your iPhone. With entertainment, it's more about replacing experience with vicarious experience. What young male hasn't watched a war movie and dreamed about going to war? Now you can do so in your free time with the added bonus of death only lasting 5-10 seconds (depending on server settings ).

Of course, comparing games like The Dig to Call of Duty is flawed. Adventure games came into their own in days when the most immersive gaming experience was high-story low-action due to technical limitations. By the time The Dig came along, the commercial viability of high-budget, high-profile adventure games was dying as more interactive games had been around for quite a while and the tides of gamer preference had shifted in favor of action rather than story (after all, the scale of interactivity gaming offers is almost unique, not so for storytelling in games - people wanting a story have other outlets). Fast forward to now and interactivity and realism have forged forward to dominate the market while storytelling is often marginalized. People are voting with their wallets - plenty of gamers who complain about the low standards of storytelling in games will nevertheless buy Battlefield 3 for $60 at release, but far fewer of them pay full price for Amnesia or The Whispered World or Yesterday, if they buy them at all.

And to get back on the Mass Effect topic:

re: TheBluePill - I wouldn't necessarily say that Mass Effect is a more realistic version of space colonization, but it's one of the most fully-imagined worlds in gaming recently. Obviously it's not got the history or following to hold a candle next to one of the Star's (Wars and Trek), but it's clearly an attempt to go in that direction.

 

Mass Effect kind of reminds me of Halo with the environment. I think Halo and/or Mass Effect would make for a great TV series or movie Trilogy.

 

Just finished it for a 2nd time-Man I enjoy this game. Really, really hoping for DLC. Might even play multipalyer next time I play through, just to get Galatic Readiness to 100%.

 

There's a multiplayer?

 

in me3? yes. In the other games? no.

 

I think they really tried to keep the Science in the Science Fiction more than most fantasy worlds do. Now, its all fiction and there is more than a little wiz-bang gadgetry, but they do try to have more grounded / speculative elements in the game. The first one had colonies that were all "cookie cutter" setups, modular and very similar. A lot of people complained about it, but i figure when mankind is less than 100 years out in space, there will be a lot of similar or modular fabrication used in early exploration.

Some the the physics elements were well thought out, with the only exception being the kinetic aspects of surviving a 2,000kps bullet fired out of mass-effect field weapons. I did like the idea of Element Zero for the biotic power, i thought that was pretty cool.

The different Amino Acid bases of the species, the variations in the races (minus the Asari) were all pretty cool too.

But.. Science Fact can make for Dull Science Fiction.. so I think they got the mix right.

 

I specifically wanted to get my feet wet in PC gaming by playing Mass Effect 1, which I just finished. I'm planning to buy and play ME2 and ME3 eventually, but I was dead set on finishing ME1 first.

As a longtime hardcore console game enthusiast I grew up with a lot of Japanese RPGs and ME1 was a great Western sci-fi interpretation of the genre. That you have more granular control of the responses Shepard can use is awesome.

The Soldier class is definitely the best in the game. My femShep is a soldier and combat with her is much better compared to using any other class. I've created a Vanguard-class maleShep from scratch (+ sniper rifle specialization) and I'm finding it very, very hard to fight because he dies too early and too often.

As for squadmates I never found much of a use for Liara. Ashley is a little too one-dimensional but great for dishing out damage. Kaidan is a good biotic and good with tech but no match for the three other alien characters. Wrex is brutal at short range, while Tali I usually assign for hacking/decryption and shotgun backup. Garrus is awesome as a sniper.

Brushing up on sniping skills pays off well in ME1; there are lots of situations where you can reach out and dish out damage while your opponents cannot. I generally suck at FPS games and as such I never really enjoyed them, but ME1 gave me a compelling reason to stick with the genre - the story.

 

And by the way, while we're talking about ME1...I also did the side quests first before proceeding with any main quest apart from Liara's rescue. Though tedious it was a good way of builing up EXP and your characters.

Pay attention to what ammunition you have loaded in your characters' weapons; it usually spells the difference between life and death. Armor-piercing/Tungsten rounds are your best friend against Geth; anti-personnel rounds are better for organic/human/alien targets. Forget about high-explosive rounds unless you're absolutely sure you can land every hit, as the penalty for using them is a massive increase in weapon overheating.

 

That's why I use incendiary rounds.
Effective against any target.

 

I found that it helps to play like a jerk.

Be a full on Renegade, treat everyone like dirt. Also do the side missions. Get to ME2 as fast as you can with a good established save.

Also be a Soldier. The Vanguard/etc classes tend to be a lot slower in the action but a Soldier can use Assault Rifles, Sniper Rifles, etc.

 

there are some formulas available for the best dps in terms of ammo and upgrades combination on the wiki, as I said, HE rounds are for sniper rifles only, it WILL make you a portable artillery with that.

Infiltrator and vanguard are pretty much OP in that game, i do prefer to go for soldier or vanguard, with vanguard when you have a good shotgun like one the of spectre ones, you can pretty much still do tons of damage on mid range, and one shot kills on close, for sniping you use carnage. At least the cooldown time for that is relatively short, I think its something around 25s.

and sincerely the best thing for long ranges, regarding the vanguard, is the pistol. With marksman you can turn that thing into a sniper rifle, and when I got master marksman I loaded the weapon with HE rounds X, and 2 frictionless materials X, with that i could kill a geth colossus with relative easy, the battle took about 5 min only. At least ashely dont usually miss the geth colossus... Shouldve taken garrus on that geth incursions missions...

 

That is one of my few complaints about the ME weapons. They make the Pistol the most accurate weapon in the game. When in real life, the Rifle would be.

 

Indeed even the specter rifles dont come close to that... the logic dictates that the longer the barrel the higher amount of force in the mass effect weapons, not to mention precision