Summary

Mass Effect is a solid game, but I expected more coming from Bioware.

Strength

-A seamless combination of RPG with FPS

-You control what you say. You can be the good guy, the loving commander, the kind general, OR you can be the hardass commander, the heartless general, or the greedy mercenary.

-You choose where to go and when (mostly). You can travel all over the universe to uncharted worlds or you can simply follow the plotline.

-Speaking of the plotline, It's very good. Interesting, with a few twists and it keeps you coming back to play.

-The weapons system is great. Great selection of guns, and armor and such.

-The leveling system is great, alot like KOTOR.

Weakness

-You control what you say.. but the speech selections are very unclear. The option will be A) Go to hell
B) Let me help
C) I'll let you know
You choose A but he ends up saying something closer to B.

-Whether your a badass or a goodguy it has no effect on your character, gameplay, or the plotline. Don't get me wrong, your decisions WILL change the game, but HOW you decide will not.

-You choose where to go. Unfortunately if you are not following the plotline, and you decide to venture to uncharted worlds, you'll basically be riding around in your land rover doing nothing. There are a few bonus missions, but they don't heed any particularly amazing rewards, just busy work.

-Your squadmates aren't too helpful.

-Game itself is too short.
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Overall it was a good game, only 6-8 hours of playtime though. I should've rented it.