Mass Effect 2 Gameplay

[Sephirius]

Of course Shepard is supposed to be on a stealth mission, but he can still traipse around the Citadel and do canned advertisements for stores in ME2, but that is a whole separate issue with the game.

[General Zod]

Of course Shepard is supposed to be on a stealth mission, but he can still traipse around the Citadel and do canned advertisements for stores in ME2, but that is a whole separate issue with the game.

>snip<

I find it amusing that you can endorse three or four different shops as your "favorite shop on the citadel" and nobody seems to have any qualms with that, and you still get paragon points and a discount anyway. I guess conflicting messages aren't renegade enough.

[Havok]

Of course Shepard is supposed to be on a stealth mission, but he can still traipse around the Citadel and do canned advertisements for stores in ME2, but that is a whole separate issue with the game.

>snip<

I find it amusing that you can endorse three or four different shops as your "favorite shop on the citadel" and nobody seems to have any qualms with that, and you still get paragon points and a discount anyway. I guess conflicting messages aren't renegade enough.

Duh, they are all selling different items.

Also, about Insanity... Too Hard = Flawed now I guess.

[adam_grif]

I think he's talking about different kinds of hard. A game can be hard because the AI is really smart, or because they have a lot of hit-points, or because the controls are frustrating and imprecise, or because your squadmates are dumb as bricks. Some kinds of difficulty are rewarding to fight through, and some are going to induce medical conditions.

[Vympel]

The Renegade discounts are better - so much funnier.

"Hey, this guy hates poor people!"

One thing that bothered me in ME1 - extremely minor - they didn't fix in ME2 - the extremely poor quality textures on the reporter's floating camera bot thing. Its so damn distracting.

[adam_grif]

The Renegade discounts are better - so much funnier.

"Hey, this guy hates poor people!"

One thing that bothered me in ME1 - extremely minor - they didn't fix in ME2 - the extremely poor quality textures on the reporter's floating camera bot thing. Its so damn distracting.

That's just how they get you to look at the camera in the future.

[Andrew_Fireborn]

Also, about Insanity... Too Hard = Flawed now I guess.

There is such a thing as false difficulty, which is a flaw. A lot of the deaths I've had so far feel cheap, and like the AI knows it's minions are practically invulnerable. (If I were going to give it more credit than it really deserves.)

I wouldn't mind the shotgunner I mentioned, if he wasn't waltzing around the only effective cover in that room, and to cover from him (or even retreat) would open me up to the two or three assault rifles he brought with him, which can shred me even faster.

They're not as much of a problem, when my allies don't get themselves killed 4-5 seconds into the encounter. But the AI for the squadmates loves to stand up into a full barrage while their shields and health are depleted. If they haven't decided that their cover wasn't good enough and charge halfway across the arena and get gunned down because they spent more than a second in the open.

It was incredibly frustrating to get that gunship down to a sliver, and then my last teammate bites it from my last medigel revive, and I get killed by an enemy I have no effective countermeasures against. Even though powers that should work on him are maxed.


Of course, I chose rather foolishly, and grabbed a sniper rifle at that "Choose a new weapon skill" pile on my first run. It proved less than useful on normal...

[General Zod]

They're not as much of a problem, when my allies don't get themselves killed 4-5 seconds into the encounter. But the AI for the squadmates loves to stand up into a full barrage while their shields and health are depleted. If they haven't decided that their cover wasn't good enough and charge halfway across the arena and get gunned down because they spent more than a second in the open.

Want a fun bug? One that I seem to keep running into is you can be moving along for certain maps, and when you get into a combat your teammates will be 30 or 40 feet behind you, which means they're completely useless while you're getting slaughtered. Sometimes they won't even follow you when they should, even if you're ordering them to attack a certain target.

[Vympel]

Of course, I chose rather foolishly, and grabbed a sniper rifle at that "Choose a new weapon skill" pile on my first run. It proved less than useful on normal...

How does that work anyway? I picked up the machine gun which replaced my assault rifle, I fucking loved it - if you're not a Soldier, does picking up one fo the weapons give you the skill to use the entire tree (i.e. if you picked up the MG can you use all the others?)?

[Manus Celer Dei]

Of course, I chose rather foolishly, and grabbed a sniper rifle at that "Choose a new weapon skill" pile on my first run. It proved less than useful on normal...

How does that work anyway? I picked up the machine gun which replaced my assault rifle, I fucking loved it - if you're not a Soldier, does picking up one fo the weapons give you the skill to use the entire tree (i.e. if you picked up the MG can you use all the others?)?

If your class doesn't normally let you use that class of weapon - e.g. assault rifles in the case of the machine gun - you can't pick up the weapon on the Collector ship but can instead recieve training for that weapon. So a Sentinel for exampl couldn't get the MG but instead learn to use the two standard assault rifles.

No idea what happens when you reach that point on a second playthrough, though.

Also, the best bug I've encountered so far was during communication with the Illusive Man; for some reason the hologram of Shepherd was zoomed in on his crotch.

[Aaron]

Nothing happens, the pile is ignored as you already choose the skill/weapon the first time around.

[Zac Naloen]

Is there much of a jump between the difficulty levels?

I'm playing on Veteran and I'm not finding any of the gun ships or anything particularly difficult to kill with my soldier.

[adam_grif]

Is there much of a jump between the difficulty levels?

I'm playing on Veteran and I'm not finding any of the gun ships or anything particularly difficult to kill with my soldier.

I did the one below insanity for the Tali recruitment mission (because if you do that for the entire mission without changing it mid-mission, you get a geth pulse rifle as a new assault rifle for your character), and it was pretty hard. Mainly just the final fight with the colossus.

[General Zod]

Well that confirmed my bug was really a bug rather than a one-off glitch. Seems like Shepard likes to get "stuck" looking in a certain direction during combat and isn't easily 'un-stuck'. So he can be facing to the left and will keep facing to the left while enemies are coming at him from the right, and simply won't turn no matter what.

[Aaron]

I've managed to cure that by pressing Start on my controller and getting into the menus, then exiting. It only works about 50% of the time though.

[Pulp Hero]

I just watched the "Everyone Dies" ending on YouTube. I think that it is much more epic and compelling than the other endings. (I know this won't happen, but: ) If that ending becomes the canon ending for ME2, ME3 could do some very interesting things-

-Zombie/husk/Reaper Shepard returns as an antagonist. Just like in any good story, if you don't see the body, the character isn't dead.

OR

-You play as Shepard, starting from you fall off of the Normandy. You survive due to being teleported into a pocket universe/some other technobabble.

-Commander Joker.

-You play as a totally new character, this gives possibilities for an alien PC.

[Joviwan]

I just watched the "Everyone Dies" ending on YouTube. I think that it is much more epic and compelling than the other endings. (I know this won't happen, but: ) If that ending becomes the canon ending for ME2, ME3 could do some very interesting things-

-Zombie/husk/Reaper Shepard returns as an antagonist. Just like in any good story, if you don't see the body, the character isn't dead.

OR

-You play as Shepard, starting from you fall off of the Normandy. You survive due to being teleported into a pocket universe/some other technobabble.

-Commander Joker.

-You play as a totally new character, this gives possibilities for an alien PC.

they've said in interviews that if you all die in ME2, you cannot import into ME3, and your new game will have a shepard who survives and you select-your-own-backstory again.

[General Zod]

they've said in interviews that if you all die in ME2, you cannot import into ME3, and your new game will have a shepard who survives and you select-your-own-backstory again.

It even says this on some of the loading screens in the game itself.

[Havok]

I just watched the "Everyone Dies" ending on YouTube. I think that it is much more epic and compelling than the other endings. (I know this won't happen, but: ) If that ending becomes the canon ending for ME2, ME3 could do some very interesting things-

-Zombie/husk/Reaper Shepard returns as an antagonist. Just like in any good story, if you don't see the body, the character isn't dead.

OR

-You play as Shepard, starting from you fall off of the Normandy. You survive due to being teleported into a pocket universe/some other technobabble.

-Commander Joker.

-You play as a totally new character, this gives possibilities for an alien PC.

they've said in interviews that if you all die in ME2, you cannot import into ME3, and your new game will have a shepard who survives and you select-your-own-backstory again.

Wait, I though that it said if Shepard dies, you don't get to import him into 3 at all.

[General Zod]

I just watched the "Everyone Dies" ending on YouTube. I think that it is much more epic and compelling than the other endings. (I know this won't happen, but: ) If that ending becomes the canon ending for ME2, ME3 could do some very interesting things-

-Zombie/husk/Reaper Shepard returns as an antagonist. Just like in any good story, if you don't see the body, the character isn't dead.

OR

-You play as Shepard, starting from you fall off of the Normandy. You survive due to being teleported into a pocket universe/some other technobabble.

-Commander Joker.

-You play as a totally new character, this gives possibilities for an alien PC.

they've said in interviews that if you all die in ME2, you cannot import into ME3, and your new game will have a shepard who survives and you select-your-own-backstory again.

Wait, I though that it said if Shepard dies, you don't get to import him into 3 at all.

You might want to read his post again.

[Havok]

No I meant, that I thought they said that you can import the game, but that Shepard will be dead.

[Stark]

The fact that nobody even considers simple solutions shows why videogame writing is bankrupt. There are lots of dramtic things they could do, but everyone knows it'll be something to fellate the player.

[adam_grif]

No I meant, that I thought they said that you can import the game, but that Shepard will be dead.

No. Shepard must live for ME3 to continue, you get a default Shepard who lived if you don't import a game. You simply cannot import a game, at all, unless Shepard lives.

So, the fact they you can even die is just a non-standard game-over screen. Calling it a "choice" or "possibility" is laughable.

The fact that nobody even considers simple solutions shows why videogame writing is bankrupt. There are lots of dramtic things they could do, but everyone knows it'll be something to fellate the player.

Lets face it - if anybody has brains, it wouldn't be "The Reaper Threat" it would be "The Reaper Joke". Slam an unmanned Kodiak drop shuttle (which can go FTL) into a reaper at high speed and watch as they are utterly destroyed. Even if you can't for some reason, then there's no excuse for why missiles in the MEverse don't simply zip up to 0.999C to breeze past point defense and then detonate.

Radiation explicitly ignores mass effect fields, so nukes contact detonating on the hull of a reaper seem ideal. Their hull certainly doesn't appear to be unusually strong, just their shields (i.e. the Normandy's pathetic main gun overpenetrate both sides of the reaper in ME1 when the shields were down).

[Stark]

Well the answer is they don't use missiles in the ME universe. You have to ignore the exclusively missile-based combat. Some guy in the codex says so!

Just like how it says that heat mags replace cooldown, and you just throw mags away. Even though... they'd be cool enough to reuse in a few seconds. UH OH.

[wautd]

Just started it last night. Only was planning to the intro but one hour later...

Heh... I was hoping to start with my Lvl 40 Sheppard from ME1. Oh well...

Can't really remember how bad I treated Cerberus in the first game though.

First impression: load times seem not quite as bad as in ME1. How I loathed that you even had long load times in the Normandy.