Dante Posted August 18, 2009 Author Share Posted August 18, 2009 (edited) Leading video game developer BioWare™, a division of Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ: ERTS) today revealed new plot points in the epic sci-fi fantasy Mass Effect 2™. Once again stepping into the role of the heroic Commander Shepard, gamers will command their crew on a suicide mission in space. Players will strategically select each member of their squad, all of whom have a direct impact on the direction of the story and the squad’s chances for survival. Players will select from a motley cast of characters including the newly revealed ‘Grunt’ – a blood-hungry Krogan. Once players have assembled their squad from amongst the galaxy’s most powerful mystics, geniuses, and convicts, they must lead them on a suicide mission to discover why humans are vanishing from the galaxy. The success of the mission hinges on the squad recruited and their loyalty to the mission. Shepard’s future depends on it. “The Mass Effect trilogy is an epic saga with consequences that will carry through from chapter to chapter” said Dr. Ray Muzyka, GM and CEO BioWare, VP EA. “Building out a diverse and loyal party is one of the features that makes the Mass Effect series unique. “The characters Commander Shepard recruits are not only pivotal to the storyline but essential to the players overall success.” The new character revealed in the Mass Effect 2 squad is ‘Grunt’. A violent and unpredictable Krogan fighter, Grunt has never faced true defeat. His unsurpassed physical strength makes him a strong asset to Commander Shepard’s team, if he can be tamed, and if he can be trusted. Grunt is the second party member to be revealed in the Mass Effect 2 universe following ‘Thane’ a deadly assassin who was first introduced in June. More details about the rest of Shepard’s crew will be revealed in the coming months. Gamescom Mass Effect 2 Trailer new screens: Edited August 19, 2009 by Dante Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ganepark32 Posted October 16, 2009 Share Posted October 16, 2009 Release date has been announced for those interested. It's out on the 26th of January in America and then the 29th in Europe. A bit sooner than I thought but it's a nice big hitter to start the year off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LegoMan1031 Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 Played this at the expo yesterday. Very impressed with it. In game graphics are alot better + everything felt more 'solid'. The combat system in terms of aiming, shooting, cover has definatly improved alot over the first! Really looking forward 2 this! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shorty Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 Release date has been announced for those interested. It's out on the 26th of January in America and then the 29th in Europe. A bit sooner than I thought but it's a nice big hitter to start the year off. So awesome. My most looked forward to game Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sooj Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 Ah I can not wait for this game. Its going to be amazing lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James McGeachie Posted October 31, 2009 Share Posted October 31, 2009 Release date has been announced for those interested. It's out on the 26th of January in America and then the 29th in Europe. A bit sooner than I thought but it's a nice big hitter to start the year off. Christ, seriously? It's EARLY 2009? Damn! I was positive I'd be playing it this time next year. Much sooner than expected! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LegoMan1031 Posted October 31, 2009 Share Posted October 31, 2009 Christ, seriously? It's EARLY 2009? Damn! I was positive I'd be playing it this time next year. Much sooner than expected! You mean 2010.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James McGeachie Posted October 31, 2009 Share Posted October 31, 2009 Yeah I meant 2010 sorry. Is this really true though? I don't see the news anywhere else, including places like Gamefaqs and Neogaf where I'd expect someone to have posted it. EDIT: Although I just noticed the news is a few weeks old as it is, maybe that's why, ack. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LegoMan1031 Posted October 31, 2009 Share Posted October 31, 2009 Yeah I meant 2010 sorry. Is this really true though? I don't see the news anywhere else, including places like Gamefaqs and Neogaf where I'd expect someone to have posted it. Yes it is most of the online retailers i have looked that have that as the release date. Also sites like IGN have the date down as January. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Retro_Link Posted November 13, 2009 Share Posted November 13, 2009 New GTTV Focused on Mass Effect 2 http://www.gametrailers.com/episode/gametrailers-tv/78?ch=1&sd=1 Looks pretty damn fantastic!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James McGeachie Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 One bit of information I read recently has me a little bummed. It seems they got rid of medigel and now solely a regenerative health system? I don't really like that. Every second game has a regenerative health system now. Going by memory I think there was some regeneration in the first game but I get the feeling this new system is more "Halo style" I guess it's not a huge deal but that combined with the removal of armour classes/upgrades feels more like "dumbing down" the game a bit than streamlining. I hope this game definitely does feel like an improvement over Mass Effect on areas like gameplay and customisation depth and not just from a technical standpoint. I hope it's not a more shallow expeience than before. Depth was what appealed to me about the original. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aimless Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 I hope this game definitely does feel like an improvement over Mass Effect on areas like gameplay and customisation depth and not just from a technical standpoint. I hope it's not a more shallow expeience than before. Depth was what appealed to me about the original. My understanding is that armour is now modular, the player able to mix and match different parts — helmets, spaulders, etcetera — and select their own colour schemes. Presumably each individual piece will have its own statistics, so it should offer a lot more depth than the original. One of the best things I've heard is that your ability to aim isn't tied to your character's statistics, bullets will go where you're aiming right from the start. I'm really glad about this as you can't have an enjoyable shooting mechanic when your shots are placed by dice rolls; give me an enjoyable base mechanic and build the character progression on top of that, don't hamstring me from having fun until I've levelled up enough. I played through Dragon Age recently which has really piqued my interest in this. Why? Because DA looked terrible prior to release, truly horrendous, but it turned out to be surprisingly involving when you actually sat down with it away from the misjudged marketing. As such I can look past ME2's apparent fascination with its new found ability to swear and give BioWare the benefit of the doubt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ganepark32 Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 I think one of the main things I'm looking forward to seeing with this, other than the story, is the new Vanguard class. From the small snippets of gameplay, it looks like great fun with some great biotic powers. There'll clearly be some downsides to those, such as the charge power which I suspect will presumably have a longer cooldown period than other powers, but definitely looks great. I'm wondering whether the game carries everything over from ME1's save file, including your class, or whether you get to choose again at the start of this. I'm hoping for the latter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dan_Dare Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 I'm hoping for both, myself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LegoMan1031 Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 I'm hoping for both, myself. Same here. You can't beat choice! I lost my first best save for Mass Effect and i would loved to carry that one over, however i've still got another one from when i completed it again but i would be tempted to start a-fresh. Think i will to see how it all plays out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ganepark32 Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 I am hoping everything is carried over from the first game's save files but what I'm saying is that I hope that the choice is there at the start of this to change little things, such as class as I'd like to try out the new one along with just the standard soldier class which I used in the first game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cube Posted November 15, 2009 Share Posted November 15, 2009 I'm fairly sure Bioware said that a lot of the side missions you did in the first will have an impact in this one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James McGeachie Posted December 3, 2009 Share Posted December 3, 2009 Some recent news from interviews and the like has put me off this a bit. They mentioned in the past they'd removed the Mako and replaced it with a more improved system. I took this to mean they'd just strealined planet exploration with a better vehicle and less in the way of doing inane tasks like surveying elements. Instead though you don't explore random planet surfaces at all. You play some kind of aerial view of the planet minigame where you find things of interest from above. Some planets have mission icons and the like and if you find one of those you go straight to the mission. Something like that anyway. I understand this streamlines things but it removes one of the key things that made the first game special for me. The epic sense of scale you got from freedom of exploration. Yes, driving the Mako around mountains could be a serious pain in the ass...but it was the fact that you had the option to drive around massive areas on tons of different planets that made the game feel so huge. Even if there was tons of empty areas and the controls were a pest, the amount of exploration just added to the massive scale of the game and its atmosphere. The exploration was both the best and worst element of the game. I really don't think I like the sound of the new system in comparison. I guess I'll get used to it but I think it'll be a bit like when Final Fantasy X came out and removed the world map system from that franchise. It made things more streamlined, yes...but it did make the game world feel more "limited". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dan_Dare Posted December 4, 2009 Share Posted December 4, 2009 The mako was probably the worst gaming experience of the last decade. Good fucking grief it sucked. Happy to see that go! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LegoMan1031 Posted December 4, 2009 Share Posted December 4, 2009 The idea was good me thinks, but driving all over the planet was abit shit and boring! I'm not bothered to see it go, could easily live without something tedious like that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Solo Posted December 4, 2009 Share Posted December 4, 2009 Yeah I agree, I both like and dislike the idea of less exploration, maybe they could've just replaced the mako with a little flying shuttle or something, with tractor beam for mining goods obviously! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gizmo Posted December 4, 2009 Share Posted December 4, 2009 Don't understand what everyones problem is with the mako. Controls were fine, and it was kinda fun to drive about in on the missions it was used in. The planet exploration was a bit tedious, but that's not because of the mako. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LegoMan1031 Posted December 5, 2009 Share Posted December 5, 2009 Looks like this requires 2 game discs on PC & 360! The collectors edition has a third disc for some bonus stuff. http://uk.xbox360.ign.com/articles/105/1052167p1.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dan_Dare Posted December 5, 2009 Share Posted December 5, 2009 Don't understand what everyones problem is with the mako. Controls were fine, and it was kinda fun to drive about in on the missions it was used in. The planet exploration was a bit tedious, but that's not because of the mako. Couldn't disagree more... controls were a flabby mess. The combat was tedious nonsense and exploration was total shit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gaggle64 Posted December 5, 2009 Share Posted December 5, 2009 Gaw, I enjoyed bombing around in the Mako. I think a few more things to do in it would've improved it but generally I enjoyed kicking back in the drivers seat and clawing my up some lunar cliff face somewhere. Anyway: Glad to see Tali back - I never used her simply because I rolled a tech character anyway, but I thought she was one of the more interesting characters about and I'm delighted that we're going to get a chance to meet the Quarians and see a bit of their fleet and stuff. (Only an official trailer but I know some people don't even want to see those.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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