Mass Effect

A flawed but wonderful game that started a whole series. I'm writing this review many years after having completed BUT having just replayed it maybe 6 months ago.

What it gets right is the story and characters. The mystery of the universe, discovering the different races and the lore behind them is fantastic. The way it slowly unrolls, showing a giant unknown alien ship, and leading up to your first encounter with a Reaper is fantastic. Truly goose-bumps inducing moments abound.

Your companions are fantastic as well. Of course Garrus, the ultimate bro, is the star of the show here. But I also love Urdnot Wrex.

What this game gets dinged for is ultimately the combat and the fucking Mako levels. It just kind of feels like trash. Shooting has no weight. Abilities feel bleh. And there's not much loot or interesting abilities to be found ultimately. It's like a worse KOTOR. And don't get me started on the Mako levels. It's like somebody was learning how to do 3d terrain modeling and then didn't put anything on the planets. They're just barren husks you have to drive this stupid bouncy fucking car around on. Insanely bad.

But despite all this the story really carries this bad boy along.