Mass Effect 2 Discussion

[Jaesun]

ya know, I'm now at a point I actually want to re-start, in that I finally understand the combat mechanics (de-buffing). One question, can you ignore ... Smoking Man's request to talk to you until you want to talk to him? I.E. finish up all quests you want... THEN go to the conference room and talk to him?

I don't believe so. If you try and use the Galaxy Map Joker tells you that you can't.

 

Well frack... ok good to know. I assume after X amount of missions that scene triggers. Guess I'll try to get all the first wave of companions first.

[Spider]

If you're talking about the

derelict collector ship

mission, after that one is done you can go back to recuiting and what not. I think doing the next mission in that chain will lead to a point of no return (haven't yet though) but I got a choice to keep building a team before I have to undertake that one.

 

If you're talking about something else, then I'm clueless.

[GreasyDogMeat]

If you're talking about the

derelict collector ship

mission, after that one is done you can go back to recuiting and what not. I think doing the next mission in that chain will lead to a point of no return (haven't yet though) but I got a choice to keep building a team before I have to undertake that one.

 

If you're talking about something else, then I'm clueless.

I hope they don't force you into the endgame. As one of those OCD types I'd like to complete all the missions and upgrades before tackling the end.

 

I finally got to test out the nuke gun. I was having some horrible trouble with this large enemy. I died a couple of times, broke the gun out and blew it to hell... it was awesome.

[Spider]

No I think he means where are the weapons out there in the world. There's not a lot of choice for what you carry outside of heavy weapons - depending on what order you choose your missions, you could end up going through 80% or so of the game with the weapons you started out with. And if you're not observant, you could end the game with what you started out with.

 

I don't mind it, actually. I was a little annoyed that upgrading the heavy pistol involved cutting the ammo pool by over 50%, but this system is actually far preferable to the largely superfluous system of ME1.

 

Yeah, the upgrades are definitely not always improvements. Like the handcannon. before that upgrade I used the pistol exclusively. Afterwards, it ran out of ammo so fast it was almost unusable. Sure, the damage increase was nice, but not nice enough. Then came the upgraded SMG that hold tons of ammo (675 with a researched upgrade) and I've never looked back.

 

Same with the sniper rifle upgrade. Lots of more ammo, including a 12 shot mag. But significantly lowered damage output. What's the point of a sniper rifle if a headshot doesn't kill unarmored foes? So I switched back. Then I found the super-rifle in one of the storyline missions (where you get to train a new weapon class) and that one is amazing.

[Deraldin]

Same with the sniper rifle upgrade. Lots of more ammo, including a 12 shot mag. But significantly lowered damage output. What's the point of a sniper rifle if a headshot doesn't kill unarmored foes? So I switched back. Then I found the super-rifle in one of the storyline missions (where you get to train a new weapon class) and that one is amazing.

 

I like the Sniper upgrade actually. You can't one shot enemies anymore, but it was usually 3-4 shots per enemy to take them down. If you hit with every shot, the basic sniper gives you 11 (or is it 12?) kills. The upgraded sniper would get you between 15-20 kills. Also, not having to reload between every shot was worth it.

[Calax]

I'm still figuring out the upgrade system, my shepard is kinda all over the place in upgrades, but Garrus and the salarian are more focuesed.

 

I can't help but say that the Salarian actually kinda is cool. I like the way his mind works, always looking, analyzing, seeking the answer. Admittedly I still gotta run to get several other characters (only gotten Doc, and Garrus), but thus far it's been interesting... even the semi-lesbian thing that I'm not sure if I shot down or am going to keep going.

[Spider]

Original was 1 + 9 I think.

 

Thing is, I mostly use the sniper rifle to take out heavies and the like, then switch to smg to take out shielded monsters and grunts. So I rarely emptied the sniper rifle anyway. It's entirely possible (and even likely) you'd get more kills out of the upgrade, but it'd be less efficient for my purposes.

 

Also, I don't mind reloading between shots, as long as the one you shot at goes down. I'll have to find a new target then anyways, which typically means going out of zoom regardless.

 

But I think it's good design to make the weapons different rather than just better. Gives you a choice. The trained sniper rifle though is a straight upgrade over the standard. More ammo, higher damage...

[Kaftan Barlast]

I was just thinking about something, in the cinematic trailer, it sounds like the Illusive man refers to Grunt as "Sonny Tuchanka". Did BioWare make som last minute changes to the character that didnt get sent to Blur in time for them to change the trailer?

[jaguars4ever]

I was just thinking about something, in the cinematic trailer, it sounds like the Illusive man refers to Grunt as "Sonny Tuchanka". Did BioWare make som last minute changes to the character that didnt get sent to Blur in time for them to change the trailer?

 

Tuchanka is the planet. And its very warm. Ergo sunny Tuchanka.

[Kaftan Barlast]

Oooh, I havent "unlocked" that planet yet in the story.

[Enoch]

I'm still playing slowly. (Stupid work.) Recruited Garrus (fun mission), did the Normandy Crash Site bit (a pixel hunt that is only interesting if you're crazy-nostalgic for ME1), and scanned some planets.

 

I have to say that I'm starting to agree with those who question why this scanning stuff is in the game at all. And the "scanning upgrade" I purchased doesn't seem to have done anything.

 

Zaeed is fun. Doesn't seem to be completely integrated into the game (I tried to have a conversation with him on the Normandy, and he tells some fun war stories, but there's no dialogue interface), but when I took him with me to find Garrus, one of the gang leaders recognized him and treated me with a lot more respect. So far, he's basically Canderous, but without the whole "Mandalorian Pride" thing.

[jaguars4ever]

I'm still playing slowly. (Stupid work.) Recruited Garrus (fun mission), did the Normandy Crash Site bit (a pixel hunt that is only interesting if you're crazy-nostalgic for ME1), and scanned some planets.

 

I have to say that I'm starting to agree with those who question why this scanning stuff is in the game at all. And the "scanning upgrade" I purchased doesn't seem to have done anything.

 

Zaeed is fun. Doesn't seem to be completely integrated into the game (I tried to have a conversation with him on the Normandy, and he tells some fun war stories, but there's no dialogue interface), but when I took him with me to find Garrus, one of the gang leaders recognized him and treated me with a lot more respect. So far, he's basically Canderous, but without the whole "Mandalorian Pride" thing.

The scanning upgrade basically makes the scanning process that much less annoying by speeding up the scanning cursor. Which is ironic since it almost presupposes that the devs knew that the scanning mini-game sucked donkey-balls. That being said, my dopamine fix compels me to scan-hunt every sector on every uncharted world.

 

Oh, and be sure to do Zaeed's revenge mission. Heck, save before it play it twice (paragon & renegade). It's awesome.

Edited January 29, 2010 by jaguars4ever

[zazei]

One thing I noticed about Mass effect 2 is that ever now and then they have these small bits of conversation where we can't affect things. It can go back and forth once or twice between Shepard and someone else without us choosing a response. It's not that often and I really don't mind it but I can't remember if there was any situations like this in Mass effect 1. Anyone else got this impression from the game and have any idea why they decided to go this way for the second one?

[Enoch]

Also: Getting drunk with Dr. Chakwas was pretty awesome.

[Enoch]

The scanning upgrade basically makes the scanning process that much less annoying by speeding up the scanning cursor. Which is ironic since it almost presupposes that the devs knew that the scanning mini-game sucked donkey-balls. That being said, my dopamine fix compels me to scan-hunt every sector on every uncharted world.

Huh? The cursor's speed was dependent on how fast I moved the mouse before I got the upgrade. The same seems to be true afterwards.

[Jaesun]

If you're talking about the

derelict collector ship

mission, after that one is done you can go back to recuiting and what not. I think doing the next mission in that chain will lead to a point of no return (haven't yet though) but I got a choice to keep building a team before I have to undertake that one.

 

If you're talking about something else, then I'm clueless.

 

Yeah, that's the one I'd love to bring Liara along with. I'm just hoping she might have some bonus dialogue to offer on that mission, due to what is revealed there. heh

[GreasyDogMeat]

Yeah, that's the one I'd love to bring Liara along with. I'm just hoping she might have some bonus dialogue to offer on that mission, due to what is revealed there. heh

I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure Liara isn't a companion option.

[Raithe]

Hm, and I seem to have had a small glitch in the whole carry over saved games... Conrad Verner turned up and played out as if I'd used the Renegade option on him in my ME1 saved game.. which I hadn't... Since I reran ME1 about 3 weeks ago in a fairly paragon way to have my level 60 Shep all ready to go.. my memory wasn't that bad .

Everything else I've encountered has been spot on.. so now I'm pondering if something glitched that ..

 

And damn, I was so tempted to choose the "Shoot him in the foot" option.. I'm probably going to have to reload just to try that one out...

[Enoch]

I'm curious as to how the Verner thing is going to work in my game. When I played ME1 with this character, I spoke with him once (and was polite), but ignored him for the rest of the game.

 

 

Also, am I the only one who never remembers to use the heavy weapon until too late? I always seem to realize that it would have been useful after the battle is over. (E.g., the

gunship at the end of the mission to get Garrus. The fight wasn't particularly hard-- Shep and Miranda both having Warp made cutting through its armor rather easy-- but I'm guessing that a couple RPG rounds would've helped drop the thing much more quickly

)

[Deraldin]

Also, am I the only one who never remembers to use the heavy weapon until too late? I always seem to realize that it would have been useful after the battle is over. (E.g., the

gunship at the end of the mission to get Garrus. The fight wasn't particularly hard-- Shep and Miranda both having Warp made cutting through its armor rather easy-- but I'm guessing that a couple RPG rounds would've helped drop the thing much more quickly

)

 

Depends on the enemy. I think I honestly ended up using it on the little guys more often than the big tough boss monsters. Once the little guys are down, it's easy enough to keep the big guy distracted. The only enemy that I regularly used the heavy weapons on were those damned

Praetorian

bastards. The one enemy in that game that switching weapons for is absolutely worth it to clear out those defences. I died to the one on

Horizon

at least half a dozen times before I managed to take it down and I did that at the last second just before it would have killed me again.

 

I think the toughest fight in the game so far has actually been

the two Scions on Horizon in the area with the turret controls.

I totally cheated on that section. They stick out a little bit and you can shoot them from a distance without setting off the event. On Hardcore, one takes around 7-8 shots from the starting sniper rifle, or 4/5ths of a full charge on the collector heavy weapon to take down.

[Calax]

I usually end up using my heavy weapon a TINY bit to much, and thus when I hit a boss I'm sitting there plinking away with my pistol.

[Majek]

Finally dl-ed my DD version. Runs very smooth on highest res possible, ME was really a crappy port, i can see that clearly now.

 

And pistols still kick ass, so i probably won't be using anything else. again :D

[Purkake]

Got ME2, did the whole Lazarus thing. I like Miranda, but Jacob it the usual Carth stand-in. Combat is much improved, load times are 5-10s, not really a problem. Playing as an infilatrator from my old saves.

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

This game is awesome. Afterlife is really well done, and I haven't cringed to any of the dialogue so far.

Edited January 30, 2010 by WILL THE ALMIGHTY

[Tel Aviv]

This game is awesome. Afterlife is really well done, and I haven't cringed to any of the dialogue so far.

 

I'd also like to add that Mordin is the balls.