IIRC it's worse. You get to talk party members "seriously" 5 times after completing main mission(s). "Woohoo"

According to Chris Priestly, Bioware's Community Manager, the game is already out in some stores in Souteast Asia. And by that I mean Singapore, Thailand,

Korea and a few more countries. For my money, this is a very weird decision since I know that game, music and video piracy are big problem in the Asian region. The games releases this week (tomorrow on the 28th of May in 2008) in US/CAN while most of us Europeans will have to wait untill June 4th-6th.

This actually give the pirates 8-10 days to do what they do best (and no, I'm not one of them nor will I ever be) - and by that I mean cracking away at the code, the activation etc. Especially when the game is already out in a region of the world that is notorius for piracy. The same could be said for the decision not to include the drm activation scheme in Russia since apparently piracy is a problem in Russia, they decided to not use Securom in the Russian game. It will Starforce instead, though. But that's not the point, though. The point is this: Bioware and EA seem to rewarding the pirates (in Russia) by simply saying 'hey, we know there's alot of piracy going in your country - have some drm securom free version of the game'.

 

I think much is ot be said for global releases for AAA titles like Mass Effect...

The only real reason why its the 28th here in the US is because Memorial Day kind of slowed things down a bit.

This actually give the pirates 8-10 days to do what they do best (and no, I'm not one of them nor will I ever be) - and by that I mean cracking away at the code, the activation etc

 

Actually, one of the big motivations for pirating games is because it's released in US but some guy in [some country] has to wait for it. I know when I first came to NZ, the release lag was up to 2 months and it was absolutely infuriating. It was and remains, along with draconic DRM, the biggest temptation to piracy: I mean, why should they have to wait? It's very hard to give a reason that will convince people not to pirate it in the meantime.

 

The same could be said for the decision not to include the drm activation scheme in Russia since apparently piracy is a problem in Russia, they decided to not use Securom in the Russian game. It will Starforce instead, though. But that's not the point, though. The point is this: Bioware and EA seem to rewarding the pirates (in Russia) by simply saying 'hey, we know there's alot of piracy going in your country - have some drm securom free version of the game'.

 

But you just told us it will starforce instead. How is that a drm-free version? If anything, starforce is *more* draconian. Sounds like they were very aware of the problem, and used starforce there, where unlike the US, the public outcry against that idiotic DRM will be easier to ignore.

Just thinking about how BG2 came out here 3 months after it was released in the US makes me seethe.

JE is better than KOTOR

 

Really? I keep hearing the opposite. Supposedly JE is fun romp but not up to standard.

JE is better than KOTOR

 

Really? I keep hearing the opposite. Supposedly JE is fun romp but not up to standard.

 

Yeah, but some people believe in lizards being a bloodline of our evil overlord masters, ranging from every single totalitarian in human history, so what can you do?

Um, my computer lags with BG2.

 

Granted, it was probably the SCSII mod with its new scripts. But the point is, it doesn't have enough processing power to handle new games, though the Card and RAM can. And I'm sticking with this computer for the rest of the year at least.

 

Having played NWN2, MOTB and Witcher at 5-15fps, well... Mass Effect doesn't attract me enough to suffer through that again. I may bargain-bin it, after checking out how its DRM does after release.

 

But then, I said this with Witcher too, and things didn't turn out that way. It's the CRPG craving.

 

Wait, you could play NWN2? Mine crashed to desktop saying my graphics card doesn't have enough features. Haha.

 

Yeah, but some people believe in lizards being a bloodline of our evil overlord masters, ranging from every single totalitarian in human history, so what can you do?

 

Yeah, damn those Zionist lizards!

 

But seriously, where would you rank JE, Mes? And what RPG is it most similar to?

Edited May 27, 200817 yr by Krezack

Is NPC development in ME still tied to the player's level like in Bioware's previous games?

 

 

I cant say for sure, but it seems to be a combination of levels and story events. It works, thats the important thing.

Works in making the characters feel like mini games instead of people.

 

 

Mass Effect for 30

Wait, you could play NWN2? Mine crashed to desktop saying my graphics card doesn't have enough features. Haha.

 

Radeon 9600Pro defies the laws of upgrade. Hell, it even does features it shouldn't.

 

Krez, JE sucks. Let my partisan flamebait balance out Volo's enthusiasm.

 

Depends on what elements of a Biowarian CRPG you value really, since JE, just like KOTOR, NWN and ME, is another variation of the same core model.

I liked JE, it wasn't anything awesome but I had fun with it. More fun than I had with KotOR or NWN pre HotU.

 

PS

 

ATI can go diaf.

Depends on what elements of a Biowarian CRPG you value really, since JE, just like KOTOR, NWN and ME, is another variation of the same core model.

What elements are those that I, who thought JE was a huge step down, value?

 

Personally I thought it was just generally worse than anything they had done before with the exception of combat and art.

Well, personally, I agree with you Moat - but there appear to be some who think the characters were entertaining (in the classic Biowarian sense, they did have a Minsc Mach II, etc), the setting was particularly beautiful, and so on. But someone who actually liked the game, i.e. Volo, could speak better than I on that.

 

I wonder if more people would have liked Jade Empire if it came several years earlier, and if the combat was more challenging and complicated than mashing two buttons together, or summoning Jade Golem then sittin' back. Certainly, I didn't think KOTOR was particularly superior to it, but it had the excuse of coming earlier (and everyone went OMG STAR WARS).

Is NPC development in ME still tied to the player's level like in Bioware's previous games?

 

 

I cant say for sure, but it seems to be a combination of levels and story events. It works, thats the important thing.

It's entirly based around what you do there are four or five major planets and a series of sidequests (usually under the UNC tag) after every planet everyone has something new to say, and after three UNC quests... otherwise they just ignore you.

 

I thought that Kotor did a better job at pacing the characters than ME. In ME it felt like you would either have little or no development in the other characters for a long time then they'd all of a sudden start spitting out their life stories. or the other way around (depends on when you do the sidequests.)

 

Sidequests btw are essentially running through the same four dungons after doing an offroad challange to figure out why this mining team or that recon squad or these creatures were where or missing or whatever.

 

Honestly for ME2 I hope they have less planets but more to do on those planets.

I plan to buy it, and am looking forward to it. I'll just watch the boards for a few days before I order to make sure there aren't any major bug or installation issues.

Um, my computer lags with BG2.

 

Granted, it was probably the SCSII mod with its new scripts. But the point is, it doesn't have enough processing power to handle new games, though the Card and RAM can. And I'm sticking with this computer for the rest of the year at least.

 

Having played NWN2, MOTB and Witcher at 5-15fps, well... Mass Effect doesn't attract me enough to suffer through that again. I may bargain-bin it, after checking out how its DRM does after release.

 

But then, I said this with Witcher too, and things didn't turn out that way. It's the CRPG craving.

 

Wait, you could play NWN2? Mine crashed to desktop saying my graphics card doesn't have enough features. Haha.

 

Yeah, but some people believe in lizards being a bloodline of our evil overlord masters, ranging from every single totalitarian in human history, so what can you do?

 

Yeah, damn those Zionist lizards!

 

But seriously, where would you rank JE, Mes? And what RPG is it most similar to?

 

Below KotOR1 and 2, but higher than Mass Effect.

 

-First, the setting: Bioware had the chance to create something new with Asian mythology. You know, a western RPG set in an Asian setting, which sounded really good on paper, but on execution it turned out to be something that Disney would do.

- The Story: Well KotOR had Star Wars to it, so there wasn't much flexibility, put they pulled it through. JE was so simple, and easy to figure out that it wasn't even funny. After 4 hours of gameplay, i already knew who was the "real" main bad villain, which one who will betray me and who will do the self-sacrifice. The story makes even the most mundane Kung-Fu movie "deep".

- Roleplaying: There are more possibilities compared to KotOR, but the problem lied in that i didn't even care at this point. Instead of the promised "different-shades-of-gray", we got the light/dark-side in an Asian environment. With Asian mythology having less focus on what's evil or not, we got the Disney treatment instead. Let's just play the good guy, so we get the ending with both the girls, the palace and living happy ever after in prosperity.

- Gameplay, started of as fun and ended up being slow and tedious. Many combat-styles were redudant.

- The Character, the saving grace of the game. This is the only reason on why i rank this above Mass Effect. The partymembers are funny and varied, and some even interesting. The have their own back-story that is actually rewarding, story-wise, to explore.

 

Mass Effect is, as i already told before, CSI-random-Michael-Bay-in-space. The story is uninvolving (Humanity has saved the galaxy once again, GO HUMANS!), the characters are stoic and serious, and with the camera-work it really resembles "Beautiful people in a random Michael Bay movie". They refuse to talk to you, unless you're on your ship, the planets/missions is very unbalanced in favour of Citadel station, and the interface was more or less broken. Kudos though for making the light/dark-side less apparent. And the gameplay doesn't really work for me, Deus Ex and System Shock managed to blend stats and action fluently, but Mass Effect didn't. And finally, while the "main planets" had some idea of flora and fauna, the rest of the planets were really empty and void, making it boring and uninteresting for the player to even bother to travel there. I still managed to finish it though.

You've never actually seen a Michael Bay movie, have you? Bay uses a lot of quick cuts in his movies. Other than maybe the fight cutscenes on Virmire, the camerawork is rather smooth throughout Mass Effect, owing more to, say, Star Trek than Bay.

 

As for CSI, I have no idea at all where you get that comparison, except for maybe the blue tint to most of the visuals. But that's honestly just the way sci-fi always looks.

Edited May 28, 200817 yr by Pop

And what's wrong with Disney? Mulan rocked, jerk.

Disney is evil. DISNEY IS EVIL! AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGH!

Disney is evil. DISNEY IS EVIL! AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGH!

 

Awesome, you've been enlightened

But Mulan still rocked.

You've never actually seen a Michael Bay movie, have you? Bay uses a lot of quick cuts in his movies. Other than maybe the fight cutscenes on Virmire, the camerawork is rather smooth throughout Mass Effect, owing more to, say, Star Trek than Bay.

 

As for CSI, I have no idea at all where you get that comparison, except for maybe the blue tint to most of the visuals. But that's honestly just the way sci-fi always looks.

 

No, no, no, and no. Stop with the "har-har, you clearly have no basis for your argument, since i know a lot more than you do"-attitude. It is counterproductive if you want to have a serious discussion on the matter.

 

I've seen Michael Bay movies such as The Island and Transformers and the CSI-series. What they have in common, the fast camerawork withstanding, is shallow and undeveloped characters. And if there are jokes, they are usually really bad and stoic. This is clearly evident in facial closeups where they are usually void of any emotion, just like in Mass Effect, being super-serious for the sake of being serious. I understand that some people like this of a more serious tone in direction, but i certainly don't.

 

I don't recall complaining about the color and art, which is actually ok and even good at times.

And what's wrong with Disney? Mulan rocked, jerk.

 

"Disney" as in lack of moral ambiguity.

Actually, you are wrong. ME isn't completely black and white unlike the KOTORs (both of them) for the most part.

 

ME,a nd JE are way better than both of the KOTORs. Better characters, stories, role-playing, dialogue, quests, combat, graphics, etc., etc. No contest.