Quick Look: Mass Effect Legendary Edition

Rambo mass effect

jeff effect

Still not unlocked on Steam for me here in Australia :(

It's May 14 in the afternoon here, is it a global unlock time?

Even if bullied into it, ME3s updated ending is better. The DLC is good. They might not have the most exciting resolutions for things like the Rachni Queen, but they stick the landing with the squadmates, which was a thousand times more important to me.

They said it’s a good jumping off point but that was just a marketing department going HAM, only 1 squadmate was a brand new character and that was Vega. Unlike Dragon Age where it’s a 90% refresh each time, including protagonist.

Even with all that, given the ‘my Shepard’s story is told’ sentiment, the only way I can see someone like Jeff going through the whole series again is by making a bizarro Shepard. Female instead of male, renegade instead of paragon, biotic instead of soldier, etc. maybe even just do the motion comic and skip straight to 2.

Regarding the feeling that it felt like it was rushing forward with too much urgency, that’s the kind of stuff that the DLC and expanded ending address.

Mass Jeffect

“Eye love it”

I played 30 minutes of mass effect 1 in this update and realised maybe I actually only want to play 2 again

ME was the only series I loved enough to read novels and preorder artbooks. I agree with Jeff's opinion that the bits along the way were pretty unsatisfying. The ideal ME3 for a fan would have been 5 hours long but accounting for all choices by hundreds of large variations.

ME2 had the theatrics and polish, but being the middle chapter the big ideas weren't as good as ME1 laying foundations. Which meant ME3 directly tarnishes ME2 more. Yeah Illusive man was cool, but only in 2, he ends up a chump anyways. [deletes several other cases of spoilers] Whereas Ilos is still pure greatness.

ME1 being so clunky also made a great case for a full-on remake, like Demon's Souls/FF7R. Bring everything up to date, get the highest quality visuals, maybe even restore some cut content or add a few things. What could have been. That's how I'd build good will, leading up to the new ME, or eventually remaking ME2/3 in the same engine.

As someone who has only played a couple hours of the first game years ago, I was looking forward to finding out if this would be worth jumping into, 2 hour quick look should help me decide!

What I wanted was something like the World Tendency system in Demons Souls, where you could literally miss out on content, based on your actions.

If a certain character died in ME1 or ME2, then maybe you can't recruit a key asset in ME3. And that might be terrible, but what a way to show you the consequences of your actions!

That would be AMAZING, because it would incentivize more, unique playthroughs to see what's out there.

And EA would NEVER do something like that.

Jeff is spot on with how ME3 was pitched as "A perfect place to jump on board".

They wanted to push that game to the mainstream as hard as possible, and the cost was that nothing you did really had any consequence, which was so sad.

Im in the zone

I love this :D

I agree, I read all three mass effect books. Played all of the games multiple times and got all the achievements including the DLC ones. I also didn’t have a problem with the ending, neither the first time nor when they “fixed it”.

But I don’t need to go back. I never tried Andromeda either so if I was going to do anything I would give that a shot. Mostly I just want a new story.

Give us Garus: Citadel Cop you cowards!

What is up with Udina's face in this? Like? Did he always look like he had vitiligo? I do NOT remember him looking like that at all.

@bestyhammar: But... if characters die in ME1 or 2, you CAN'T recruit them as war assets or as squadmates in 3.

In my main playthrough of the trilogy, I had a squadmate who's recruitable in 3 die at the end of 2, and as a result I missed out on all their content in 3. Conversations didn't happen or were handled by different characters, and it created a much different experience than my other playthroughs where that character lived.

I honestly felt like the whole "3 is the best place to start!" was more false advertising on EA's part. I played through ME3 with three different Shepards, and each playthrough was noticeably different due to choices I had made. I agree that BioWare dropped the ball in some areas with it (like the Rachni Queen), and it could've been done better in others, but to say nothing you did had any consequence is just flat wrong.

I find this to look extremely boring. It really doesn't look like enough of an upgrade to warrant a re release. I loved these games but this looks pretty meh.

@misterfrodo17: But that's kind of what I'm talking about. I'm not going to go into details here, because I'd hate to spoil things, but if certain key characters happen to be dead, someone else conveniently happens to be there to fulfill their EXACT SAME ROLE. The only thing that really changes is who gives you the mission.

If Bioware really wanted your actions to matter, then certain events should just be cut off completely. Maybe you're forced into a shitty ending for ME3 because you had high casualties in ME2. That would be really cool. It would be an amazing way to show that your actions have consequences. But it makes no difference. You can get the same ending in ME3 regardless of how bad the first two games were for you. And that feels rather absurd.

Seeing as I just played through all 3 of these in 2017, it's definitely too early for me. Maybe by the time I'm ready, this release will have gotten some more support?

Oof, the Kaiden hate is strong, from what I saw of the stream. Never going to understand the group of people who despise that guy. If you want to hate someone, hate Ashley! People seem to forget that she's a racist in that first game.

This looks the same....

Something about Shep's voice sounds a lot like Velvet Sundown....

I wonder if they finally made the ME:1 sprint speed faster than standard running...

Edit: Aaah... Someone re-textured some of these folks with diseased skin. This is upsetting.

Regular ass PC mods look better than this

It is global unfortunately. Unlocks 6 hours from now.

@thisisdell: No it doesn't.

Having played them all on PC these dont look that much better, and im with Jeff on i just dont have the will to go through them all again

It would be good to see Jeff do another Endurance Run for some big RPG again. Think it would be a good nostalgia hit the fans need right now.

Looks like a sub par release.. not enough work done. Or enough visible work that is, backend work might have improved things but people want to see ME1 in 4k with high res textures on console.

Hi Jeff, I’m sorry Mass Effect 3 totally failed to strike good with you in seemingly any way. I hope not everyone watching this Quick Look takes away a predisposition to be disappointed with that particular game in the series; more specifically those who may first be experiencing the series through this edition. Personally, I have previously played the trilogy, and left off feeling entirely satisfied; but I am also wholly excited to revisit it again in its entirety (and with proper PC controller support), as well as have my partner experience the series for her very first time!

i loved mass effect, loved them all even the first!.... but i dont know if wanted/needed this either. I dont think they have changed or improved enough and all just looks and feels little 'weird'.

*still buys it* dammit!!

Oh boy some of those facial animations look rough nowadays. Anderson's mouth in the ME1 council scene was barely moving as he spoke.

I kind of knew this would happen but this looks really disappointing to me. I wanted way more effort put into bringing the Mass Effect trilogy back, especially more attention to the first game.

A cohesive look and artstyle is easily broken by slapping higher resolution assets on top of things originally designed for a more limited fidelity.

@thisisdell:

I'm glad it's just not me. It looks like they put a fresh coat of lighting over the old game. It's pretty disappointing but then I remember Bioware isn't what it used to be.

This seems like a "in case of emergency, break glass" release because they lost so much goodwill over the years.

At least it's an easy way for someone to play through the series if they're curious.
And having controller support on the PC ports is a good touch.

I'm sure this will be a slam dunk for Bioware simply due to nostalgia and how much people love these characters, but I can't deny it's a little disappointing that this looks so rough in spots.

That sweet sweet galaxy map music

Jeff Gerstmann is still a threat.

@scrollcourier: it does look the same if you played on PC with A LOT texture mod.

Woof. If the point of a remaster is at least in part to capture the feeling of the original, then this is a bit of a face plant. It honestly makes me wonder whether the people at BioWare even understand what made Mass Effect great in the first place.

The graphical changes (I definitely wouldn't call them improvements), show a near total lack of consideration for tone or cohesion. Take the Eden Prime mission for example. In the original, Sovereign was surrounding by billowing clouds and red lightning. It looked appropriately apocalyptic. Now it's just kind of floating there in front of a nice sunset. The scene went from "the end is coming" to "honey, the Reaper is back in the garden again."

Plus, some of the additions are just so . . . odd. Like, there are cushions on the benches in Noveria now. Maybe that seems like a minor thing, but they weren't there in the original, so it was a deliberate choice to insert them. And just like so much of the remaster, it's feels like it was added without putting any thought into what was around it.

Noveria is supposed to be a frozen corporate hellscape. It's not supposed to be welcoming or show consideration for employee comfort. That's why everything is concrete and the architecture is decidedly brutalist. That's why almost the entire color palette of the level is made up of grays and cool blues. So of course Bioware's "improvement" was to add leather cushions in warm earthen tones.

Kaidan is slightly better than Ashley but not by much.

Not sure if I will actually play all these again, but will I buy it? Absolutely.

I'm in agreement w/ Jeff here, it's "too soon" for these games. Mass Effect 3 was such a letdown, I cannot bring myself to interact with it again. It's a very weird dichotomny, as ME2 was literally one of my favourite games of the modern generations, it's brilliant.

Unlike a lot of people though, I preferred the combat in ME1? Probably because I grew up playing KOTR and Baldur's Gate.

@therealturk: I'm so glad I've been seeing more and more people as concerned with these kinds of remasters as I am. I couldn't agree more. I really don't like how comfortable remasters have become with overwriting the original art.

Wow what this video is proving is that the graphics in Andromeda really weren't that bad. Yeah, you had the glitches that needed to be fixed, but the overall presentation was an improvement, just high-res. People's fond memories of original Mass Effect trilogy made Andromeda doomed on arrival. It had no chance.

Edit: Oh, yeah... for anyone trying to bring up Sara Ryder, her look was sabotaged on purpose, so she wouldn't be seen as a sex symbol. Look up images of original Sara before they changed her look. A crime I tell ya...

Wow, this remake looks terrible. I think I agree with jeff...in some cases the old version did look better. Its like seeing people with bad makeup on 4K video, every pore and blemish looks 10x worse.

I feel like BioWare consulted George Lucas on making this and used all of his notes for the "special editions" of Star Wars.

Waiting for a giant lizard to walk in front of the camera.

Edit: Also maybe it's because I just watched all of Mass Alex in the last year or so and they had the HD mods and all that but it doesn't look much different.

I hate Kaiden!