Ah… It’s that time of year again. The holiday sales are over, irritatingly cheery Christmas songs are replaced by vapid elevator music at department stores, and people make New Year’s resolutions they promise themselves to keep, even though it’s the exact resolution they made last year. Normally these resolutions consist of improving one’s self, whether it be losing a few pounds or getting that damn promotion that continues to elude your grasp. Unfortunately my resolution more closely relates to self-detriment, as I have decided to complete Mass Effect 2 on insanity. Consequently, many of my nights now consist of muffled obscenities and asking a TV screen why it hates me. It’s not all bad though, as the frequent loading screens have given me plenty of time to think about what I would like to see in the next Mass Effect, and here’s a list of what I have come up with so far:
Improved Partner AI
One thing playing Mass Effect 2 on insanity has done is put a magnifying glass over the flaws of your partner’s AI. The problems weren’t obvious on lower difficulties, as I could normally clear a room of enemies with little assistance. However on insanity, I need to rely on my companions to a certain extent which wouldn’t be a problem if they didn’t die a minute into battle. I understand the difficulty “insanity” is meant to be hard, but my companions shouldn’t be crouching on top of cover no matter the difficulty setting. To be fair, most of the time my companions take cover and follow orders, consequently saving my ass on more than one occasion. It would just be nice if they didn’t run through a group of Krogan warlords when I order them to regroup.
Bring Back the Loot
If you played the first Mass Effect, chances are you can recall spending hours sifting through a broken inventory system to find items you just picked up. It was a pain—a pain that Bioware “solved” by replacing the many guns and armor sets from the first game with only a handful in the second. You no longer have to spend time scrolling through your inventory because there is no inventory . While the inventory system may have been garbage in the first game, you still had the option of customizing your weapons and armor to your unique playing style. If you liked to run into battle guns blazing, then you could outfit your armor with extra shielding to compensate. If your assault rifle overheated too quickly, you could equip it with an attachment that would decrease the amount of heat it would produce.
In most RPG’s, part of the fun is finding better equipment to improve your character—something that is missing in Mass Effect 2. So what’s the solution? Well for one, make an organized, navigable inventory system that allows the player to find exactly they want within seconds. If a player wants to equip a squad member with an improved set of armor, don’t include the armor of a different species in the list. Color code weapons and armor to give the player an idea of what is good or bad without having to read all of the stats. Add sorting options so players can look through items based on different stats. Having a large inventory is fine as long as the player has the tools to manage it effectively.
Add a Psychological Profile Mission
What I mean by a “Psychological Profile Mission” is have a mission based on your Shepard’s Psychological profile that you chose in either the first or second Mass Effect. For example, if you picked the “Sole Survivor” psych profile, then there would be a mission where Shepard revisits Akuze and reflects on what happened. The memory would be playable and you would fight alongside your fellow marines as they get wiped out by thresher maws. Or if you chose the “War Hero” profile, Shepard could revisit the events on Elysium where you fight against Batarian slavers with barely any support. Playing out the missions described in Shepard’s psych profile would give the player a chance to witness firsthand how Shepard became the hero of the galaxy and the bane of the reapers.
Have Shepard Recruit Entire Species
In Mass Effect 2, Shepard spent most of his time recruiting elite individuals to help him stop the collectors. In the next game, it would be neat if Shepard had to convince the Humans, Turians, Asari, Salarians, Krogan, Quarian, and possibly Geth to group together and fight the reapers under a single banner. With all the racial turmoil that is prevalent in the Mass Effect universe, there would be problems that Shepard and his crew would have to solve in order to convince the various species to join his cause. Past actions would also play a crucial role when asking for aid. For example, if you killed Wrex in Mass Effect 1, the Krogan would be much harder to bring to your side. Each mission would involve you traveling to that species’ home world. You would witness firsthand, the differences in that species’ government, military, religion, architecture, etc. that have so far only been described in the codex. I could go on and on about my ideas regarding Mass Effect 3’s story and overall mission structure, but that would turn this blog into a giant fan fiction and nobody wants to see that. Moving on.
Make it Obvious When Squad Members Want to Talk
One of the most frustrating parts of Mass Effect 2 is jogging across the Normandy to talk to your squad mates to see if they have something new to say, only to hear “I’m not interested in talking, come back later”. This problem is exacerbated by the fact that your squad is split up all across the ship, ensuring that you visit every fucking room aboard the Normandy if you want to be sure you’re up to date with everyone aboard. Again, this is a huge pain that can be easily fixed by making it painfully obvious when a squad
member has something new to say. At first, I praised Bioware when Kelly Chambers said she would inform me if team members wished to speak with me. I thought, “Yes! I don’t have to scour this ship that’s twice as big as the first Normandy to see if people want to talk.” However it soon became apparent that Ms. Chambers would only do this if my squad members wanted to talk about loyalty missions. If a squad member failed to utter the words “loyalty” and “mission” Kelly would conveniently forget to tell me someone had something new to say. I appreciated her feeding my fish, but it would be nice if in Mass Effect 3 she did her damn job.
Even with all of my aforementioned gripes, I still think Mass Effect 2 is the greatest game of 2010 and one of Bioware’s top achievements. It has a cinematic element many games don’t even come close to achieving, and contains one of the most well-developed universes that I have ever seen. If some of the things I’ve mentioned above are fixed or addressed, I have no doubt that Mass Effect 3 will be one of Bioware’s greatest games yet.
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