So there was an app on iTunes (Here) that went on sale yesterday from EA featuring an extended immersion in the Mass Effect Universe. The app in question provides the opportunity to receive messages from characters in the game once you interact with them, updated news from Bioware, and you can view the entire anthology of codex entries. I for one love this idea and wishes for other games to provide such immersion, provided I realize that most games don't have complexity in terms of story depth and character development to the level Mass Effect has. However, I wanted to ask this viewership whats your take? Is this a gimmick or has this genuinely enhanced your experience?

Edit: I should clarify that that the app is free and that it being "on sale" could be misconstrued

To be honest, for me, it's the equivalent of the Kinect support, nice of them to do it and I'm sure some people out there use it, but I'll never really be interested. Nothing to complain about though, as far as apps go, it seems pretty cool and you can't go wrong when it's free.

I really like the idea of it. I just wish it had the updated ME3 codex now that I've finished the game. You can also do AC:B style missions to increase galactic readiness and thats where it really shines.

Hell yeah it's gimmicky. The majority of it is dumb as hell. Bioware just retweeting positive things about themselves is news? I think not. The Codex is the only interesting thing about it.

That being said, it is free, so I can't be too upset about it.

The Galaxy at War section of this app is janky. It often takes multiple presses of a button to confirm anything. It also keeps forgetting my origin login credentials.

I've wanted a portable version of the stuff since ME1....I don't care about the questing stuff so much as the information.

Oh a relevant topic, anyone play Mass Effect Infilitrator yet? Was looking at it and wondering if it was worth $6.99.

@ccampb89: Its pretty neat but I'd probably wait for a sale unless you want to play it right now earn a few (and I do mean a few) galactic readiness points.

The Codex part and overall design of the app is really cool. The Galaxy at War component is a decent tie-in to your game, but it's a technical mess for some reason. And the text messages don't really have much meaning for me, since I'd already finished the game by the time the app was released. They seem pretty superfulous. Promo media/BioWare Twitter feed is pure fluff.

I would have liked to have had planet and war asset descriptions in there along with the Codex, lots of work went into that text and I'd love to catch up on all of it outside the game. The app is free though, and despite being a bit gimmicky I'm pretty happy it's out there.

I like having the codec in my hand, I downloaded it yesterday but haven't been to log into origin to update my galaxy at war map which is a bummer. So I haven't been able to try out all it's features. It's a good idea though and a nice little attachment.

@ccampb89 said:

Oh a relevant topic, anyone play Mass Effect Infilitrator yet? Was looking at it and wondering if it was worth $6.99.

I looked at a review that said the touch controls are bad, the story is almost non existent (has nothing to do with 3, basically) and the voice acting is woeful.

Having a codex in the palm of your hands is a fantastic idea, and I'm actually amazed it took them this long to release one.

I just had my own set of problems dealing with Galaxy at War part of the Datapad. Forgot that I had an existing Bioware Social account, so I created a new one, along with a new EA origin account. After realizing that I had an old account tied to my xbox live account, I had to scramble to find a way to delete these new accounts and/or tie this new Origin account to my Bioware Social account. It's a complete mess, with EA creating Origin and buying out Bioware, there are just too many accounts, and trying to tie them all together is a complete mess.

I've been enjoying it mainly because its a crutch to help involve me into the universe even further. we pick up codex entries which look like PDAs and for me it really feels like I'm Shepard reading them on my phone on my downtime (In class mostly). I appreciate it being there of course. Also this Infiltrator game seems cool never heard of it til now, gotta look into it. THANKS!

It's a portable codex. That's it.

Well it's free so I can't really complain. It seems like a cool idea, but I haven't downloaded it yet.