12 Feb, 2012
You can experience the demo for yourself on all platforms this coming Tuesday, 14th February. For the impatient among you however, we’re giving some early access codes away on our Facebook page here, or you can check out the Facebook app and try and win a code or two – including a nifty Avatar prop – yourself!
Most of you know the story going into Mass Effect 3 by now, and if not, here’s a quick recap. The Reapers are now fast approaching the entire galaxy and earth. Following the events of The Arrival in Mass Effect 2, Shepard has been stripped of his rank and grounded on earth … and this is where the demo starts off.
I’ve had a few plays of the demo to try and get a feel for some of the changes in the game and – what I was most looking forward to – Kinect integration. You’re introduced to voice commands very early on when the conversation wheel pops up, as you may know, you can now simply speak the option at your TV and your Shepard reflects your decision. This does make the experience a bit more fluid when going through the dialogue trees. It doesn’t feel tacked on at all in this form, making you feel more engrossed in the story when you start giving the Alliance leaders what for and then Shepard continues.
On top of just using Kinect to direct the conversation you can also control doors, biotic powers and squadmates the same way. I found that in this case Kinect wasn’t always reliable and I got shot a fair bit standing in the open yelling commands in the heat of battle – when it did work however – it was brilliant! Having Garrus and Liara move or use abilities just using your voice makes you feel like the real Commander. I felt it was a bit overkill having it for your own powers and to open doors, but obviously you can still do all of these things the conventional way using the controller – I’ll most likely use voice control for these when I’m feeling lazy.
The game also offers a few different ways to play by changing how you control the story and leveling up. Story gives your the standard Mass Effect experience with conversation options impacting what happens as you progress. Choosing Action removes the dialogue choices and the interludes in the game play out more like cutscenes – allowing those less interested in shaping their own destiny to just shoot their way through the galaxy. Finally, Role-Playing gives your greater depth in customising the abilities of you and your squad – probably somewhere between the Mass Effect 1 and 2 upgrade system.
A big change I found was the removal of Medi-Gel and the regenerative health system. Downed teammates now can be revived quickly on the spot if you’ve got enough cover, but you will still collect med-packs. This is for the new health system – reminiscent of Halo Reach – you get a shield bar and then a five-piece health bar. Once your shield is depleted you’ll begin losing health and while in cover you can recharge your shield, but your health only regenerates to the highest bar – to refill your health entirely you’ll need to use a health pack. This gives you a bit of a tactical element when in battle of when to use your limited health packs – on the Insanity difficulty this is especially important.
You have a lot more to think about also on the tactical front with a revamped cover system that’s akin to Gears of War – allowing you to easily mantle over low walls smoothly, switching between different bits of cover and rolling away to safety. At first this didn’t seem as well executed as the 360’s bro shooter, but I soon got used to its differences and was ducking and diving out of danger every which way. Different enemy types also present you with finding creative ways of stopping them. Shield wielding Ceberus agents can be easily dealt in several ways. For example, by using Pull as a biotic class to tear the shield away from them, or if your a soldier class, you can just keep pounding them with bullets until they stop moving.
Something I also found interesting in the demo is how the story not only changes dependent on your dialogue options – but also on how successful you are. During the second mission on my third playthrough I decided to see if I could fail just to see how it played out. I was initially disappointed that the game continued on regardless of the objective seemingly lost. What I was treated to however was a slightly different exchange of words between Shepard and another character when I “completed” my task.
Mass Effect 3 is shaping up to be one hell of an experience overall and a great way to bring an end to the trilogy. Presenting a bigger scale this time round – going toe-to-giant-mechanical-tentacle with the Reapers, new smart and varied enemy types and a fine tuned combat system allowing you to fight however you want. I don’t know if I could be more excited for the game but after playing this demo, I’ll damn well try.
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