LegalBagel

I was also confused by the random hatred for another first person puzzle game coming from a Portal co-creator. There's something wrong with working with what you know and creating a new game with different mechanics based on that?

Looking forward to trying this when it comes out.

Super Metroid all the way. I played the heck out of that game when I was a kid going for speedruns and 100% runs, and have gone back and beaten it probably a dozen times since even 2000. On my personal top ten of all time list.

I'm in favor of this endurance run and of spoony bards.

Man, what a whiny rant. If you get an exclusive review, expect people to be skeptical of your impartiality, especially if you give the game a high score, and especially among people who don't have some preexisting trust of you. That's the way it works. If you can't take it, don't make exclusive deals that make people question your reviews. And really, if you can't take criticism, don't become a critic.

As I think Jeff said in his last Jar Time - preferably reviewers should be getting no perks related to games they are reviewing. Sometimes you make concessions to deliver a needed product or review to your audience, like accepting a game a week earlier with a review embargo so you can get a review out in a timely fashion, but things like early exclusive reviews are a different beast. You're not doing it for your audience, you're making a deal with a publisher to get an advantage over the competition. Further, if publishers/developers have any sense, they're giving exclusive reviews to publications/reviewers they expect will give them a great score, or at least a better score than others.

So yeah, I'm going to treat exclusive reviews with more skepticism. That's not a knock on the dude's integrity, it's just the reality of the situation.

So basically this whole annoying thing was a backdoor way to get GameStop to pony up some used game money back to WB, entirely screwing over new and used offline players in the process, and giving the evil GameStop empire a huge advantage? That's, if possible, even worse.

And I could see this easily becoming standard. In order to play a used game you need to buy an "unlock code" of some sort, and publishers make a deal with GameStop to provide used purchasers with codes in exchange for a cut of the used game sales profits. I'd be happy there that some used money is going where it belongs, but that just creates a pretty terrible slippery slope.

I'm still just waiting for consoles to go entirely Steam-like, make online purchases and playing disc-free ubiquitous (with a discount since there's no physical infrastructure required), and kill off GameStop and the used game industry. A pipe dream maybe, but that seems like the best route for console and game developers.

Yep, probably on my top ten of all time list. I had one save with all level 99 characters, the best armor/weapons for each (which took 4-5 playthroughs I think), and having seen all the endings. Ah, the golden days when I had 100s of hours to toss into a game.

I remember back in the SNES days the idea of New Game Plus and multiple endings was amazing to me.

I'm as anti-used game as they come, but I still think this is a dick move. This is apparently a single player game's version of "online pass" now? Way to put a cloud over what should be the much anticipated release of one of the best games of the year. Insignificant bonuses and skins are one thing, but actual parts of the game - which are apparently required to complete the Riddler challenges from what Jeff's review says - is ridiculous. Basically there's a huge swath of people who will buy new and never get to experience a sizable chunks of the game.

Hopefully the next generation of consoles will just emulate Steam, so we can cut out used game sales entirely and stop dealing with this crap. Let me install on my system (or buy online), register it with my system, and play without discs.

Still not liking that it's connected to single player. I don't want to sit on the bridge of my Normandy, cursor over a planet, and see "Co-Op Mission, Press X to Invite Your Friends". Or to see areas of the galaxy I haven't finished or can't experience because I don't want to jump into non-story team and play through some co-op missions. Because knowing Bioware, the co-op missions will have some plot trappings and backstory behind them, even if you can still finish the game without doing them. At least most other single player experiences have had the courtesy to make their multiplayer a separate element.

And yeah, "Galactic Readiness" sounds like a really simplistic thing to determine how your game ends. Like Fable 3's "this much gold saves your kingdom" ending metric. ME2's system was much more nuanced in terms of getting character support and upgrades, and being able to see the direct impact of every choice or missing element through the end sequence. It may just have been "do everything and you'll get the best ending" but it still felt like you made choices, instead of X co-op missions being equal to 50 readiness points.

I get trying to have style and not just regurgitate press releases, but a three paragraph extended joke to start your article might be a bit much.

Eh, even if they're making every effort to reassure us, the idea of multiplayer intruding on my Mass Effect story in anyway still doesn't sound great to me, even if it's minimal.

"Success in multi-player will have a direct impact on the outcome of the single player campaign, giving players an alternative method of achieving ultimate victory against the greatest threat mankind – and the entire galaxy – has ever faced."

I don't really want to see a flashing "JOIN FRIENDS NOW" button while I'm looking at the map in my Normandy. And just the fact that Mass Effect is now another game where multiplayer is required to experience everything doesn't sit well with me, regardless of whatever achievements/bonuses/etc. will be tied in.

It can still be done well, but I'm still wary about the fact that every game has to have multiplayer now.