BioWare’s “Mass Effect” was an extraordinary game which offered players an immensely complex and rich environment of open-world exploration combined with mission-oriented goals and accomplishments. Players created their own characters from the ground up, including customizing an avatar’s face to such a degree that it’s possible to make a Commander Shepard who looks like the player, and then discovered a compelling story of interstellar intrigue, plotting and treachery that threatened every sentient being in the galaxy. Effectively combining elements of traditional role-playing games (RPGs) including experience points and skill improvements with aspects of a tactical shooter (using cover, real-time combat, strategically advancing through a battlefield), “Mass Effect” had something for everyone, and in many ways, “Mass Effect 2” improves upon “Mass Effect.”

Review for Mass Effect 2 (XBox)

4.0

Great game unless you are disabled

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First and foremost, “Mass Effect 2” is an exceptionally cinematic experience –it’s clearly a game but there are extended periods in which it feels like a movie. While combat still plays a role, it seems that dialogue plays an even more crucial role in unraveling an ongoing plot to end all sentient life than it did in “Mass Effect.” The missions (quests given which directly advance the plot) and assignments (optional quests which are not required to complete the game, but may offer substantial assistance and improvements) are more streamlined and straight-forward – while missions and assignments in “Mass Effect” could involve traveling to several planets to accomplish a goal, entering a mission or assignment area in “Mass Effect 2” will allow you to complete every task in a linear progression.

In addition, “Mass Effect 2” also streamlines inventory issues and travel – simply put, there really is no inventory in “Mass Effect 2.” Weapon changes occur at a weapons locker and allow party members to use any weapon that they are qualified for and that has been discovered; unlike “Mass Effect,” you cannot equip party members with a weapon if they have not received training for it. As one example, biotics can no longer use assault rifles, shotguns, pistols and sniper rifles; they are limited to heavy pistols and submachine guns. Travel has been simplified by eliminating the Mako, a game feature in “Mass Effect” that many players disliked. In “Mass Effect 2,” a shuttle drops the party at the start of the mission – no more driving, struggling to get up a hill or over a mountain range.

Surveying is also a different game now – instead of a mini-game of pressing buttons in a certain sequence indicated onscreen, the player now scans a planet’s surface from orbit and launches probes to obtain minerals from the planet’s surface. As painful as this may be to start, it is a crucial task in the game to research weapon, armor, ship and other upgrades, all of which require certain types of elements, and missions and assignments will not provide a sufficient amount of those resources to successfully research all of the upgrades necessary to succeed.

Furthermore, “Mass Effect 2” feels like a throwback to old-school RPGs in a very significant way – importing characters from “Mass Effect.” While this was common practice at one time (“Bard’s Tale” even allowed players to import characters from “Ultima” and “Wizardry”), it has significantly fallen by the wayside over the past decade or two. Importing a level 60 character from “Mass Effect” allows players to begin the first “Mass Effect 2” playthrough with more resources, more credits and a few levels that new characters do not receive. It appears that playthroughs following a successful first playthrough will give characters more resources and more credits to aid them in subsequent efforts (which are required if you’re attempting to earn every achievement).

From a perspective strictly limited to evaluating “Mass Effect 2” as a game, it is an overwhelming success in design and gameplay, even if the linear progression does make it feel more directed and guided than “Mass Effect” did.

Accessibility Issues / Concerns

The most critical issue at this time is subtitling. While players can turn on subtitling, the subtitling is only for dialogue and does not offer a switch or option to subtitle sound effects or ambient noises. More importantly, on a standard definition television, all of the game’s text is fundamentally illegible and unreadable including subtitled dialogue, the options on the dialogue wheel, codex entries and so on. The distinction between the two terms is significant in this case; not only are the letters and words nearly impossible to make out unless you are sitting less than a foot or two away from the television, the text passages are unreadable due to their layout. At the time of this review, BioWare has said that this is a design decision and that no patch will be issued to correct it. Considering the scope of the problem, this is a game-breaking issue for the deaf, but even people with normal or corrected vision will have significant problems playing this game on a standard definition television. Finally, and once again, it is often difficult to read the dialogue against the background colors. This was a problem in “Mass Effect” and remains a problem in “Mass Effect 2,” even for gamers playing on a high-definition television.

Gamers with cognitive issues may encounter problems with mini-games and quick-time events. There are two types of timed mini-games; one which presents a number of icons (usually, three to four pairs) to match in a memory game, the other offering a pattern-recognition matching game of blocks of differently colored and indented text. Neither of these games can be paused. The colors in the text block mini-game are blue, green, orange, purple and white, and should not present difficulties to gamers with color-blindness, especially when considering that indentation is also used to differentiate the blocks. Gamers with motor function concerns may find these mini-games more problematic, especially the memory mini-game which may locate icons close to each other. While it is possible to research upgrades which will give the player more time, these mini-games may present difficulties at early levels. However, gamers who only have use of one hand should not encounter many, if any, difficulties with these mini-games.

In “Mass Effect,” there were no dialogue interrupts; in “Mass Effect 2,” it is possible for the player to use a Paragon or a Renegade interrupt to open up new dialogue options when a wing or a star flashes on the screen. It is important to note that these are only options – they may yield more or less Paragon or Renegade points but they will not prevent the player from accomplishing a goal.

Players who only have use of one hand will likely find more problems with “Mass Effect 2”; at this time, the only controller re-mapping options are for default and southpaw configurations. Buttons cannot be re-mapped to make it easier for control by one hand which is frustrating because allowing that would have allowed players limited to use of one hand to enjoy the game much more and much more easily, especially playing a Soldier character. As it is, it’s possible to play the game with one hand, but it is difficult, even in the training mission. Playing on casual difficulty with auto-squad powers enabled may help mitigate this since the squad members tend to do most of the combat on that difficulty level.

A concern for both one-handed gamers and gamers with motor function issues is the final boss fight, which effectively requires the player to be able to shoot a moving target with a finite amount of ammunition (in my experience, I had roughly 75% of my ammunition left after the fight). On casual difficulty, it wasn’t an impossible task, but it’s something to keep in mind when considering whether to play this game.