Mass Effect: Andromeda

Kinsaras said:
Don't think it was a retcon. Personal shields improved enough to make heat clips useless so they had to change the type of ammo used. That's what Bioware came up with to explain the ammo limit in ME2 and ME3 anyways.
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I think we have a confusion of verbiage, here. As far as I know handheld weapons still use metal shavings the size of a sand grain from a metal block of various types installed in the weapon itself, like tungsten and polonium. The thermal clips just allows one to fire faster without the need to wait on cooldown.
 
The gameplay trailer seems to suggests that the gameplay is more of the same. No significant changes there.
More skill assignments is a good thing, if used right. If they go the dragon age way, then it's not a good thing. I mean ending up with so many activated skills or status skills, that you don't even bother using most. Skill points should be used to upgrade passive skills, like in ME1. With the overall number of abilities being very limited.
Unfortunately the characters we've seen so far are not very convincing. And that includes the pathfinder.

I trust all my hope now in that the exploration part of the game might be good. Because the rest is just OK it seems. Which would be fine for any random game, but not when the expectations are so high as in this case. Even the story feels unoriginal. I hope the enemy will be explained more, and get depth, and not just "they're evil and they do evil shit"
 
After reading that article, the mods better flow like the fountain of youth for all of the women in game. I'd really love to see all of them prettified since I need to find an attractive love interest... not one that looks like plain Jane.
 
MavericK said:
The guys look fine, just go gay...
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No sir! I prefer those hot lady human or alien curves. No way am I venturing into batting for the same team (or is it opposite... I forget which way that one goes) on a game I'll be spending 100+ hours into.
 
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I can't remember when was the last time I played a Male PC that I had a choice in.

Besides, seeing a strong woman PC is more interesting than male anyway.
 
I usually play as male if there's LIs involved. If not, I can choose male or female lead PC.
 
CrimsonKnight13 said:
No sir! I prefer those hot lady human or alien curves. No way am I venturing into batting for the same team (or is it opposite... I forget which way that one goes) on a game I'll be spending 100+ hours into.
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You can always play as a FemShep (or whatever the main character in this game is) and get with dudes, then it's not gay. ;)
 
MavericK said:
You can always play as a FemShep (or whatever the main character in this game is) and get with dudes, then it's not gay. ;)
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True, though I never tried that. I have seen some really good looking FemSheps, which means a good looking FemRyder is possible (maybe?).
 
CrimsonKnight13 said:
True, though I never tried that. I have seen some really good looking FemSheps, which means a good looking FemRyder is possible (maybe?).
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One of my FemSheps is Gillian Anderson :love:, though I did like the default FemShep from ME1. In ME1 I would watch my FemShep walk around just for the fun of it :cat:. Then they had to go and make all the walking animations rigid in ME2 :grumpy:.
 
Meh, all of my Sheps were default. I don't get off on character customization in RPGs.

But I will say that Jennifer Hale did an outstanding job with the voice acting. Game plays so much better as an evil bitch.
 
Armenius said:
I think we have a confusion of verbiage, here. As far as I know handheld weapons still use metal shavings the size of a sand grain from a metal block of various types installed in the weapon itself, like tungsten and polonium. The thermal clips just allows one to fire faster without the need to wait on cooldown.
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More or less. Effectively, all weapons that use a mass effect field project metal shards from an ammunition block. These are good for more than 5,000 shots. The biggest limitation was the heat dissipation capabilities of the weapons. In universe lore states that the Geth that attacked the Citadel at the end of Mass Effect used thermal clips which were replaceable heat sinks that allowed for greater sustained fire. Additionally, it allowed for the shots fired to be propelled at higher velocities. Weapons were redesigned to use copies of the Geth thermal clips. When weapons are cocked or reloaded, they simply cycle or eject a spent thermal clip. Effectively, weapons in ME2 and ME3 are more powerful than they were in ME1 due to this design change. This actually seems valid in terms of the gameplay as weapons in ME1 required considerably more sustained fire to take down an enemy unless you modified the weapon to hit a lot harder. However, doing this left the weapon in an overheated state much of the time.

I actually setup a sniper rifle in ME1 to hit with explosive rounds and a SCRAM rail to increase the projectile speed. It was a one shot wonder that required a hell of a cooling off period but it hit as hard as the M98 Widow in ME2 and ME3. I could one shot a charging Krogan with that.
 
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If they give us another "Wrex. Shepard", I'll be happy. Scratch that, I want the dialog writing to be up to par. Both the serious, and the "This is my favorite store on the Citadel." stuff. I don't want to admit how much time went into the decision on getting my discounts the first playthrough.
 
DWolvin said:
If they give us another "Wrex. Shepard", I'll be happy. Scratch that, I want the dialog writing to be up to par. Both the serious, and the "This is my favorite store on the Citadel." stuff. I don't want to admit how much time went into the decision on getting my discounts the first playthrough.
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Yeah hopefully they keep some of the humor. The Citadel DLC stuff was some of my favorite writing for the entire trilogy.
 
Dan_D said:
I actually setup a sniper rifle in ME1 to hit with explosive rounds and a SCRAM rail to increase the projectile speed. It was a one shot wonder that required a hell of a cooling off period but it hit as hard as the M98 Widow in ME2 and ME3. I could one shot a charging Krogan with that.
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I loved this part of ME1, just how well you could fine tune a weapon. throw enough heat sinks at it and you could get an Auto rifle that never overheated, or you could build a shotgun that would hit like a rocket launcher. or find that happy point where "ammo" didn't feel constrained, but you also hit like a bag of bricks. ME2 ruined that. it came back somewhat in ME3, though i thought MP benefited more from it than SP
 
Nimisys said:
I loved this part of ME1, just how well you could fine tune a weapon. throw enough heat sinks at it and you could get an Auto rifle that never overheated, or you could build a shotgun that would hit like a rocket launcher. or find that happy point where "ammo" didn't feel constrained, but you also hit like a bag of bricks. ME2 ruined that. it came back somewhat in ME3, though i thought MP benefited more from it than SP
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I think ME1 had too few weapon models, too many mods, too many redundant ammunition types, and way too many weapons that were difficult to tell apart. With the interface the game had it was confusing for some people and tedious to manage for everyone. I think ME3 struck the right balance with weapon variety and weapon customization.
 
i think they actually had too many weapons, and the base stats between them were enough that it basicly only came down to using the N7 or maybe one other weapon producer. so many weapons, not many good. the inconsistency in weapon mod naming was the bigger frustration. the low level mods used one name series for the level 1-5, but then for level 5-10 you got a different name series that did the same thing. that was needless. it made things more difficult to keep track of, in an already difficult inventory setup. i think ME2 distilled that too much into a handful of popular loadouts, ME3 came close to being spot on, i just wish the mods had a slightly wider affect.

i disagreed with ME2/3 making ammo type a power. even if it could be shared among party members. that should have remained with the weapons, or with your armor.
 
Nimisys said:
i think they actually had too many weapons, and the base stats between them were enough that it basicly only came down to using the N7 or maybe one other weapon producer. so many weapons, not many good. the inconsistency in weapon mod naming was the bigger frustration. the low level mods used one name series for the level 1-5, but then for level 5-10 you got a different name series that did the same thing. that was needless. it made things more difficult to keep track of, in an already difficult inventory setup. i think ME2 distilled that too much into a handful of popular loadouts, ME3 came close to being spot on, i just wish the mods had a slightly wider affect.

i disagreed with ME2/3 making ammo type a power. even if it could be shared among party members. that should have remained with the weapons, or with your armor.
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Exactly, once you got access to the Spectre weapons you didn't need anything else. There were a few weapons that were close, but you essentially had dozens of variations of the same weapons with minimal stat increases. They all "felt" the same too. In subsequent games, each weapon felt different. They had different fire rates, ammunition capacity, action types, etc. ME2 and ME3 felt far more diverse with their weapons despite having less modification capability and far fewer weapons to choose from. The way I see it is that ME1 was a hybrid RPG / Shooter that leaned toward the RPG side more than the sequels did. ME2 and ME3 had a different balance. The combat in ME1 was more akin to traditional RPG's with powers and weapons that looked the same being vastly different in power levels. ME2 and ME3 could be completed on the highest difficulty with the base weapons if you were skilled enough at shooters. In ME1, this was virtually impossible.

Andromeda should have a different balance still. I'm hoping to have the less linear approach of ME1 with combat mechanics that are closer to ME3's with obvious improvements. All the videos I've seen lead me to conclude that this is likely what we'll get. Far fewer squadmates too which makes things easier for sequels. ME2's Ocean's 16 approach made things difficult as any of your squad mates aside from Liara could be killed in previous games.
 
Dan_D said:
More or less. Effectively, all weapons that use a mass effect field project metal shards from an ammunition block. These are good for more than 5,000 shots. The biggest limitation was the heat dissipation capabilities of the weapons. In universe lore states that the Geth that attacked the Citadel at the end of Mass Effect used thermal clips which were replaceable heat sinks that allowed for greater sustained fire. Additionally, it allowed for the shots fired to be propelled at higher velocities. Weapons were redesigned to use copies of the Geth thermal clips. When weapons are cocked or reloaded, they simply cycle or eject a spent thermal clip. Effectively, weapons in ME2 and ME3 are more powerful than they were in ME1 due to this design change. This actually seems valid in terms of the gameplay as weapons in ME1 required considerably more sustained fire to take down an enemy unless you modified the weapon to hit a lot harder. However, doing this left the weapon in an overheated state much of the time.

I actually setup a sniper rifle in ME1 to hit with explosive rounds and a SCRAM rail to increase the projectile speed. It was a one shot wonder that required a hell of a cooling off period but it hit as hard as the M98 Widow in ME2 and ME3. I could one shot a charging Krogan with that.
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It would be great if you could just use the weapons as regular wait for cooldown weapons when you run out of thermal clips.
 
I'm feeling the hype for ME:A. I finished a series playthrough to refresh my memory, as a full paragon vanguard this time around. Fun but not quite as amusing as my "Trainwreck Shepard" run, all about intentionally making the worst possible decisions and losing as many allies as possible. Playing an aggressively incompetent Shep was fun as hell.
 
At this point I refuse to read any in depth looks at the game. Or watch third party extended footage from it. I don't want to spoil my first experience.
 
Truth- I'd rather play through the first time cold. I want to stumble through doing what seems fun or right and not worry about min/max~ing or correct choices. That's for later.
 
DWolvin said:
Truth- I'd rather play through the first time cold. I want to stumble through doing what seems fun or right and not worry about min/max~ing or correct choices. That's for later.
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I have watched some short gameplay videos and one of the initial launch trailers. I haven't seen anything else. I'm not actively seeking that much information on the game for the same reason.
 
The Mass Effect: Andromeda hype-train continues today as EA has posted the system requirements...

MINIMUM SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

OS: 64-bit Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10
PROCESSOR: Intel Core i5 3570 or AMD FX-6350
MEMORY: 8 GB RAM
VIDEO CARD: NVIDIA GTX 660 2GB, AMD Radeon 7850 2GB
HARD DRIVE: At least 55 GB of free space
DIRECTX: DirectX 11

RECOMMENDED SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

OS: 64-bit Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10
PROCESSOR: Intel Core i7-4790 or AMD FX-8350
MEMORY: 16 GB RAM
VIDEO CARD: NVIDIA GTX 1060 3GB, AMD RX 480 4GB
HARD DRIVE: At least 55 GB of free space
DIRECTX: DirectX 11
 
That's not too bad given what the screenshots, visuals and the size of the environments should demand.
 
polonyc2 said:
The Mass Effect: Andromeda hype-train continues today as EA has posted the system requirements...

MINIMUM SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

OS: 64-bit Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10
PROCESSOR: Intel Core i5 3570 or AMD FX-6350
MEMORY: 8 GB RAM
VIDEO CARD: NVIDIA GTX 660 2GB, AMD Radeon 7850 2GB
HARD DRIVE: At least 55 GB of free space
DIRECTX: DirectX 11

RECOMMENDED SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

OS: 64-bit Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10
PROCESSOR: Intel Core i7-4790 or AMD FX-8350
MEMORY: 16 GB RAM
VIDEO CARD: NVIDIA GTX 1060 3GB, AMD RX 480 4GB
HARD DRIVE: At least 55 GB of free space
DIRECTX: DirectX 11
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I'm going to try and see how my i7-2600 and HD 7750 plays this. I was eyeing the GTX 1050ti LP as well but may not need the upgrade. I won't be at 1080p anyway.
 
DWolvin said:
I can't even imagine... How many people did you have by the end of ME3?
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Maybe four survivors? It's apparently possible to do a 'perfect failure' run, where your only survivors are Thane and Mordin, and we know what happens to them in ME3.
 
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