The understanding of repitition?

In the fall of 2011, we had the two biggest first person shooters, battling it out on the multi-platform computer games market. 

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 was the 8th title under the Call Of Duty name to be released, following the epic success of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 in 2009 and Call of Duty: Black Ops in 2010, Activision have been rolling out the named brand every year since 2007. 

It would be released using the in-game engine IW 3.0 this is the same in-game engine that was used in Call of Duty 2 back in 2005, but has been modified slightly over the past few years. 

While praising at 2011's E3 that the game would run consistently at 60 frame rates per second, it does nicely, but in terms of graphics it is seriously behind. No Call of Duty has looked as impressive as Modern Warfare 2 using the heaviest modified engine, the game is purely lacking vista's, texture details and realistic animation. 

While the maximum resolution for this game is 1920x1080p without modified fixes, the game is far from pushing the boundaries of the modern genre. Sticking to its modern game play style, my question is this.................

.................. Why does it continue to sell millions of copies and break records, if not providing its audiences with anything fresh and new to the series?

Battlefield 3 joined following a 7 year absence. while further names under the Battlefield brand have been released like 1943 and Bad Company, it was a massively awaited announcement that hardcore fans had been waiting for. 

Unlike the Call Of Duty Series, Battlefield 3 was released with a brand new in game engine called Frostbite 2.0, while fully compatible with today's DirectX 11 supported graphics cards, this had only recently been released to developers and with this result has the ability to provide amazing graphics, animation and audio quality. 

While Battlefield 3 does run on high end graphics at 60 frame rates per second, it also has the ability to support 5760x1080p 3 times the resolution of Modern Warfare 3 and still runs at a consistent 40 frame rates per second.

Battlefield 3 fully supports 7.1 surround sound while Modern Warfare 3 only supports 5.1.

While Battlefield 3 sold only 10 million copies within the 1st week of release, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 sold 6.5 million within its first day of sales and the average price of Battlefield 3 was £30, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 was £50 almost double the price!

I write this article now following Steams second free weekend of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and I have had the opportunity to log around 6hrs of game play as I wasn't willing to pay for the over priced game and although this is on 10% of my current logged time on Battlefield 3 I am already bored with the game play and shear duplication of guns, maps and modes that were available in both its predecessors.

So why is the general public willing to pay these extortionate prices, for a game that technically hasn't been updated for 7 years, hasn't had a game play update for around 3-5 years? while Battlefield 3 is effectively giving you more game for your money and people are still saying that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 is a better game all round? Has Call of Duty become fashion? is it the game that everyone needs to play to stay current and up to date? Are people not willing to step out of their comfort zones and effectively play a more tactical game that requires more than running around pulling the trigger?

With the latest Call of Duty (9) being announced in less than a week, are we going to see record per-orders and sale breaking records again for the 4th year in a row?

While I don't think I will ever be able to understand peoples need to buy the same game again every year, I would appreciate your comments and discussions below.

Battlefield 3

The Fall of 2011 was one of the most over crowded seasons I've known in terms of new game releases. Big triple A titles were all set to be released into the competitive market for the Christmas period. Annual releases such as Halo Anniversary, Assassin Creed: Revelations, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Fifa 2012, all made their appearances along with other titles Elder Scrolls: Skyrim, Batman: Arkham City and Uncharted 3: Drakes Deception.

With a season so packed with new releases customers would have to pick and choose certain games as to not become bankrupt.

Battlefield 3 made its debut 2 weeks before its main competition Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 a title so backed up by millions of fans, that it was going to be a struggle to knock it off the top spot, where it has been sat for the last 4 years with the previous games in the series.

Battlefield has always been about the multi player, massive maps and destructible environments create adaptive and ever changing tactical options as you pave your way though the game.

While Battlefield 3's campaign is short and unoriginal , it still makes for an interesting sit.

Battlefield 3 is set in 2014, on the Iraq - Iran border, you play as Sergeant Blackburn, went sent to investigate a possible improvised explosive device, the last known position was a market controlled by a hostile militia called the Peoples Liberation Resistance. Sargent Blackburn and his squad are sent to Tehran to apprehend a the leader Al-Bashir. While investigating an underground vault Blackburn and his team learn that the Peoples Liberation Resistance have acquired Russian nuclear devices and that two of the three devices are missing.

You briefly play as Sergeant Miller who is deployed in an M1 Abram to extract Blackburn's team. Miller assists in the extraction before becoming captured and executed by Solomon and Al-Bashir. Blackburn and his squad manage to capture Al-Bashir who reveals Soloman's plot to detonate the nukes in Paris and New York before his passing. Blackburn's team get a lead on an arms dealer called Kaffarov, who was working with Solomon. while pursuing Kaffarov, the Americans encounter the Russian forces who are also trying to apprehend Kaffarov, they become hostile towards the Americans and most of Blackburn's squad are killed in action during a vicious fire fight. While a team of Spetsnaz Special Forces assaults Kaffarov's villa. they successfully interrogates Kaffarov who reveals Solomon's plot to Blackburn. Blackburn's commanding officer arrives and to let the Spetsnaz Special Forces escape, shoots his Commanding Officer. Blackburn is captured and interrogated by the Central Intelligence Agency, he explains all of the previous operations to them. During Blackburn's capture, the Spetsnaz Special Forces attempt to stop the attack in Paris, but are unsuccessful resulting in the detonation and the deaths of 80.000 civilians.Since Solomon is an informant to the CIA, they do not believe Blackburn's story.Left with no option, Blackburn breaks out of captivity to stop the attack in New York, he manages to kill Solomon and recovers the nuclear device.

While there are some amazing set pieces in the game, you cant but think some of the missions have been designed to give the player outstanding in game moments, before throwing a storyline in to fuse them together. While this isn't technically a negative thing as the player gets to absorb some of the ground breaking spectacle designs of the game, it doesn't assist in the storyline and rather than become attached to Blackburn's team, you're just there for the ride.

The positives with this are that the levels are fun to play and the set pieces can really build some adrenaline within the player, if its driving across the open desert in a tank, or sitting in the cockpit of a F-16 fighter jet there is an epic scale fun to be had.

The reason for the great pieces is DICE's decision to is show its amazing Graphic engine, the Frostbite 2 engine and the updated in-game Destruction 3.0 creating more refined physics than its predecessor and quasi-real-time radiosity using Geometric Enlighten technology.

Its DICE's first game with the new engine but future games will use this also.

Battlefield 3 is without a doubt the new benchmark in terms of graphics, there is nothing out there that can be compared to, with amazing lighting and textures design it has extremely little texture popping if none. With the assistance of EA's motion capture ANT technology characters seamlessly move free flowing without any pauses in the animation, this makes the characters act and look more realistic than anything (accept real human) creating real looking team mates and enemies.

The games audio as ever is mind blowing, to fighter Jets flying above you and the thud of Tanks, to the crack and wisp of every individual bullet that crosses your screen, it immerses you within the game as you start following the sound of footsteps from the enemy nearby.

While the voice acting lacks that of Hollywood stars, that doest mean it isn't good, voice acting is still great and the assistance of a Hollywood star wouldn't improve the game at all (unless it was James Earl Jones) an actor who is in the game and an actor I am a personal fan of is Glenn Morshower (Black Hawk down, 24, Transformers, X-men, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2) he plays as one of the interrogation offices from Central Intelligence Agency his voice acting definitely suits the role.

As ever there is a downside to this game, but at the moment it is a negative that I find with all games currently. Not since the improvements from Metal Gear Solid to Metal Gear Solid 2: Son of Liberty have I found a massive improvement in the games Artificial intelligence.

The Games AI is satisfactory but doesn't attempt to challenge the player, the occasional knife attack at you life means quick time button sequences but in general the games AI will not challenge you. Playing at higher difficulties doesn't make them more of a challenging either, this for me is a minor issue and I was hoping Battlefield 3 would lead the way into new AI as it has done on every other level with Graphics and Audio.

Battlefield 3 is the game that has paved the way into the next generation of games. It has raised the standards of in game content and game lifespan. While the single player campaign maybe short it is fun and defiantly worth a play, when the Battlefield servers are down for maintenance.

Halo Reach

Halo Reach is Bungie's last Halo game before they leave Microsoft Game Studios, and head off to Activision, so its fair to say, this is bungie's final attempt at creating the greatest Halo game after many previous attempts over the last 10 years.

Halo Reach uses a complete new physics engine, rebuilt from scratch, this is clearly visible throughout the entire game, with amazing vista's to refined detail close up.

We'll start with the campaign, you play as Noble Six, a new recruit into the Noble Team, you join them just as the day starts when Noble teams orders are to investigate a disturbance, which soon leads to a discovery that an Alien race are sent on a mission to destroy the planet Reach.

You play the storyline in which Noble Teams hard efforts to repel the enemy invasion fail, and as hardcore fans on the Halo Universe know, reach is destroyed.

But what is interesting is following the storyline.

While Bungie have a reputation for making life difficult in understanding their storyline, the story is pretty basic in this one, so they do a good job of character building throughout the first half of the game, completing a couple missions with sol members of the team, and you start to feel connected to a couple of major characters, then the deaths come.

The first death is indeed a sad moment as you watch one of your team members sacrifice themselves thinking they've saved Reach, only to see to see thousand of enemy space ships appear.

From there the inevitable deaths of the other characters are someone quick and meaning-less almost feeling you have been robbed, this is a shame as they are some of the best characters you'll meet and they're just killed off almost simultaneously.

As you'll notice when playing Halo Reach is how serious this Halo addition is compared to Halo 3 or Halo ODST, this is reflected in Martin O'Donnels music.

The soundtrack throughout is one on passion and meaning, some of the tracks really drag you into the game and in-captivate you.

The game has some incredible sounds, from the sound of a plasma pistol to the bombshell of the MAC blasts, and with Dolby Digital DTS 5.1 HD surround sound the game really can make you living room feel as though its in a epic adventure.

With Voice acting from Hakeem Kae-Kazim (24, Pirates Of The Caribbean: At Worlds End, Lost) Aisha Tyler (24, Friends, Bedtime Stories) the characters really come alive, they are various accents, which is good as these are characters that are from various planets, the only problem is Kat's accent, sometimes you don't understand what shes saying.

This is the most complete Halo adventure available on sale, with competative multiplayer and great co-op there are various game modes avaiable.

With Halo 3, although it had great competitive multiplayer, the only co-opperative mode was the campaign, which after a few play through got very repetitive.

Halo 3 ODST had a great mode called Firefight but this wasn't available in matchmaking, so you could only play with friends or recently played with people, this really restricted that amount of Firefight that was used, as a result, this has been improved in Halo Reach, matchmaking firefight is a great addition, meeting 3 friends in a lobby and fighting waves of enemies is great, as you can see different players tactics.

Halo Reach keeps the great competitive multiplayer that Halo 2 and 3 had made perfect in the previous series, with basic deathmatches to fun game modes like Oddball, with various different maps both large scale and small, there are hours of fun to be had.

Not only are you given these great game modes, you've also got Forge this is a mode where you can create your own maps from scratch.

this give players unrestricted creativity to create new and innovative maps that can be complex and fun.

Halo Reach also has a experience system that is integrated into Mutiplayer, Campaign, Forge, Firefight and Co-op. every match or level you play you gain experience, which can be exchanged for difference armor, helmets, voices and perks, so you can completely customize your Spartan, which is viewed in all game modes.

Halo Reach really is the defined "Halo" experience, with hours of fun, a great story, an overall package that has brought back the Halo faith to its players, who had lost faith with the release of the disastrous Halo 3 ODST.

Halo Reach is a game that all Xbox 360 must play.

Graphics 10/10

Audio 10/10

Soundtrack 10/10

AI 8/10

Story 9/10

Total 94% (A*) Outstanding

http://www.bungie.net/

Is It Time for a change ?

Is it time for change?

I was sat down last night, playing one of the very terrible Xbox 360 exclusives of Fable 3, and i couldn't quite but notice, that the Xbox 360 is very soon going to be made redundant.

If you just think about it for one minute.

The Xbox 360 has no exclusive games anymore! Halo Reach, was one of the final exclusive games on the 360, Mass Effect 2 has now moved over to PS3 at the end of January, and Gears Of War 3, will be the final in the trilogy, even thought that will be coming out on the PS3 in the late future.

Therefore there is nothing going for the 360, accept Kinect, which to be honest, isn't a good look for the 360.

Fable 3 has been going down hill for some time now, and there is no word of another Splinter Cell Game, therefore the only thing holding the torch is Alan Wake.

Sure the Xbox 360 has got a better multiplayer system, but that doesn't matter if you don't have a variety of games.

All of the good multiplayer games Call Of Duty Black Opps, Assassins Creed 2 Brother Hood, Battlefield Bad Company 2, all of these games can also be found on the PS3.

Where as the PS3 has had some of the best games in recent years, God Of War 3, Heavy Rain, Uncharted 2, Metal Gear Solid 4, Killzone 2, and there are going to be even more in 2011, Uncharted 3, Killzone 3, all of these exclusive to the PS3.

So where does this put the 360 is ask?

All of the game due to come out on the 360 are going to be available on PS3.

Some of the games i really want will be on the PS3 anyway, for the same price.

Test Drive 2, Homefront, Dragon Age 2, Mass Effect 3, Crysis 2, all available on the PS3, so i think it boils down to either, you want a good multiplayer service, or you want a variety of games to play.

If you have any theroys, please comment.

Many thanks

Red Dead Redemption

I recently picked this game up pre-owned from "Gamestation" when i traded in a bunch of games that i no longer played.
"Red Dead Redemption" had only been out six weeks, and as i desperately wanted to play it, i grabbed myself a hell of a bargain.

"Red Dead Redemption" is set in South American during the time period on 1911, just a few years before the breakout of World War One.
You play as "John Marston" a retired outlaw gang member, but when government agents kidnap his wife and son, he's forced into tracking down all of his remaining gang, in order to keep them alive.
The game opens up well, from the opening cut scene, you can instantly see the great exploration that awaits you. Like in "Oblivion" when you walk out of the sewers, and this was the first time since then that you look out and suddenly realize you can go anywhere.

Now as this game was created by the same people who created the mega blockbuster "Grand Theft Auto 4" you can instantly see that they haven't just taken all of the features and thrown them into another game, they have actually expanded.
While " Red Dead Redemption" does have similar parts to "Grand Theft Auto 4" like the map, and the menus are almost identical, with similar buttons, "Red Dead Redemption" has its own features that make it, its own game.

Comparing this to "Grand Theft Auto 4", no longer are you walking, gritty dirty grey scaled streets, you are in the wild west. there are amazing sunsets and sunrises, there is always a horizon that you can gallop into the distance with.

While there is now more open countryside to run around it, all the towns are extremely spaced out, which after a few hours really gets on your nerves as you have to go by horse and it can take 2-3 minutes, of riding, which can sometime become kind of tedious.
But that said, if you find a flat piece of land nowhere near roads or cliffs or rivers (that of which you cannot swim) you can pitch up a campsite, and quick travel, but only to local towns and locations, what i do is whack open my map, mark a way point, and then select that, from this you can travel anywhere.
You can also travel by horse and cart, get in the back of a carriage, and select your destination, you can either sit and watch the world go by at an extremely slow rate, or hit the "Skip to Destination" when your character falls into a deep sleep and you wake up in time to dismount the carriage.
Now you can travel by train, you can go to a train station and wait for the train, or chase it on horse and jump on, but if your going to do that, you might as well ride there, and the train is always a million miles away.
If you ever do catch the train and you want to travel somewhere on the other side of the map, there is no skip button, you have to sit and watch the train travel all the way there.

So traveling is a bit of downer, but forcing you to travel more with your horse, creates a bond with your horse and increases its stamina so when you repeatedly tap "A" to gallop his last a little bit more.
So you tap "A" to gallop with your horse, and if you hold "A" he stays at selected speed, which is never fast enough, but if your traveling with a group and you hold "A" you stay at the speed that they're traveling at. This is a good little feature but they're still never traveling fast enough.

If you in combat while mounted on a horse, and you have a way point selected, there is no need to continue directing your horse as it will travel that way, give you more control of shooting the enemy. But this doesn't always work, as sometimes they wont corner fast enough and you find yourself wedged up a bank or between some rocks.
As you gain money within the game you can purchase faster horses and there are a variation, or you can go out and try to capture wild horses and try breaking them, once this is done you own that horse.
One very good feature is you can whistle and your horse will come to you which is a lovely feature as the roads are almost constantly deserted, and there is nothing worse than thinking that you've got to walk all the way back.

Red Dead Redemption had some good features, you can work to gain some money, you can be a horse breaker, night watcher, bounty hunter, or be like me and play poker, blackjack, liars dice, all gambling, which as you get further into the game cost more to play, but if you clear everybody out, you can gain nice rewards - lots of money, or if they clear you out do what i do, put me balaclava on, so they don't know who you are, and shoot them in the head, there is no better feeling than knowing that the little git is dead.

As you do more good/bad deeds around the world, people will react to you more, the better you are, people my turn a blind eye to your actions, kill people, and shops will give you discounts out of fear.
As you help local strangers out you become more famous, people will give you gifts for your actions, but others will challenge you in a battle of "Duel" a shoot out, if you agree, you both line up in the street, and have a duel, the first one to kill the other wins.
This is something i haven't quite mastered yet, but i find it a lot of fun.
Red Dead introduced "Dead Eye" a little feature that slows down time, giving you valuable seconds to find your enemy and either shoot him, or as you upgrade you can mark multiple targets and let out a bullet storm it feels great marking several people in the head and shooting them all down in unison.

Now i must move on, the characters are what you'd call, weird, there aren't many characters who i actually like, the sheriff, and the lady who helps, you at the beginning, but everyone else is just stupid, or annoying and with a game that is really well crafted, the characters really let it down, they do nothing accept annoy you as you help them with their stupid missions so eventually they'll help you with yours, and i mean eventually.
The thing is, that there are so many characters that they're all in and out after a few missions, you learn a little bit about them, but when you say your final goodbyes or one of them gets killed off, you never really care, you don't interact with the characters enough to like them, its almost as if the designers just threw them in to make the story last longer. And it wasn't until towards the end of the game where you return to your Ranch with your wife and son, that i actually really started to enjoy the missions with the characters, normal characters, no grave diggers, fat fraud people, alcoholics, drugged up doctors, just simple people, and it wasn't until towards the end that i actually cared about the 3 characters, John, his wife and his son.

The voice acting is great, from the works of "Rob Wiethoff" (16 Blocks) who does a great voice for "John Marston". "Kimberly Irion" (Immortally yours) does lovely voice of "Bonnie Macfarlane" and in general they sound works great, horses sound great, and the gunfire all sounds individual every gun has its own unique sound, and the "Ping" you hear as a bullet fly' past you, all sounds amazing.
One highlight for me with the sound editing is the thunderstorms, they really sound realistic and sound like they are overhead, its nice to have an atmospheric sound that really brings something to the game.

Bill Elm and Woody Jackson create a great soundtrack to the game, keeping to traditional Western genre and creating great music to accompany the settings of space and desert, with good pace music for chases and shootouts.
They also create a great sense of suspense with the build up to a duel, little tapping of drums really creates the atmosphere of life, or death.

While the Artificial Intelligence is good in most places, its the horses who really let it down, as I've said before.
The AI is good in battle as they hide behind cover and try to shoot you. Its nothing special, but it sure works well.

While this game is genuinely good from the outset, it can soon become a nuisance, missions are tedious and repetitive, horses are dull. the countryside can become repetitive at points, and the characters are just dull.
But it does have good points, the combat is fun and enjoyable, but i think co-op would be good, which i know there is a co-op pack free to download, which i will review shortly.
The game does make you feel lonely, and you spend most of your time alone, in the vast beautiful countryside.
It is a game to enjoy, just shoot all the horses you see, they will get on your nerves.

Graphics 10/10
Audio 10/10
Soundtrack 10/10
AI 5/10
Story 7/10

Total 67.2% (B+) Good

Mass Effect 2

Now "Mass Effect 2" Has been out for around 5 months now, I've played it through about 4 times and this is one of my most favourite games and i have a huge love for this trilogy.

"Mass Effect 2" is the sequel to 2007's smash hit "Mass Effect" it sees the player take control of Commander Shepard, and takes place 2 years after the events of "Mass Effect".

You follow the story of human colonies disappearing and there is no evidence of anything, accept for the fact that thousands of humans have disappeared.

Commander Shepard is no longer working for the alliance or the council, as at the beginning of the game your ship the " SSV NORMANDY SR1" is attacked by an unknown enemy and in your attempt to save as many of the crew as possible, you sacrifice yourself and drift off into the empty void of space.

A giant corporation group known as "Cerberus" retrieve your remains, that there are very little, and spend Billions of Dollars in rebuilding you with your DNA but it has to be more than just a clone, they spend even more on rebuilding you to the very point in you life where you died, everything has to be the same, so effectively you've been in a very deep sleep.

This certain project has been funded by someone called "The Illusive Man" because he wants to find out who or what has been attacking human colonies, and he feels only Commander Shepard is the one to lead a team of highly skilled human and alien races on what they will all call the suicide mission.

"Mass Effect 2" runs on "Epic Games Studios" "Unreal 3.5" engine, previously seen in 2008's game of the year "Gears Of War 2" a very good looking engine, and what makes the engine better in "Mass Effect 2" compared to "Gears Of War 2" is the use of colour, where was " Gears Of War 2" has very much a gray scale overlay to the game, we can see the full potential in "Mass Effect 2" with vibrant colours used in the armor and the multiple Alien Characters skin texture.

Now with the use of the new in-game engine, there is a downside which is loading screens, they are often and long, installing the game to your Hard Drive does decrease the loading time, but its still a good 15-20 seconds depending of the size of the area it has to load.
With the introduction of loading screens we loose the elevators, "Mass Effect" was criticised for the length in which you would sit in an elevator as it took you to the next place the elevators were used to hide the loading of the next area, there are good and bad points about this, the good points are in fact that we don't have to sit and watch an elevator travel slower than a snail, the bad points to this are that it takes you out of the game, games that have one continuous story line and don't have levels i feel shouldn't remove you from the game world "Gears of war 2" did a good job of this by not showing loading screens, the levels would load behind a cut scene and therefore you were always in the game. "Metal Gear Solid 4" had an intense loading screen of around 5-6 minutes, but then that was that, for the in tire level, levels lasting 3-4 hours a piece.
This isn't a major flaw within the game, its just my personal opinion, many may like the loading screens and as with all games today, it gives you hints at the bottom of the screen.

The voice acting is world class in this game, with voice casts from " A List " celebrity's such as Martin Sheen (The Departed/Catch me if you can) Seth Green (Austin Powers/Rat Race) Carrie-Anne Moss (The Matrix) and Adam Baldwin (Serenity/Independence Day/The Patriot).

The Soundtrack Composed by Jack Wall is a intense dark soundtrack with a full orchestral band, classic tracks such as "Suicide Mission" really create a atmosphere of bravery and heroism, that I've been unable to find in any other games soundtrack.
Its a soundtrack that really puts that extra emotion within the game universe, and puts that addition weight on the player, as this particular track is played towards the end of the game, it really makes you the player think that every decision that you've made throughout the game, will now help you in your attempt of a successful mission.

The game play for " Mass Effect 2" is mixed, at heart it's a third person shooter, with the choice of different classes it really makes the game more varied, Solider class, is very much a shooter and using the cover to your advantage, flanking the enemy and using your full arsenal of weapons to take down the enemy ahead of you.
Other classes let you play the game more differently, different classes let you use "Biotic" powers you outwit your enemy's, "Slam" uses a physical power to raise the selected enemy into the high Sky's and send him hurling towards the ground the 3 time the speed of light, crushing their body's, other let you become invisible, and sneak up on the enemy from behind, each class lets you play the game to your choice, you can be sneaky and stealthy, or go in all guns blazing, it is really up to you.

The Artificial intelligence is your standard expectations, the enemy will try and outsmart you by flanking you, but in most cases, they'll just run towards you spraying bullets in your general direction, almost as if the AI is expecting you to just gun him down. i was disappointed in the fact that the enemy AI don't use more of their ability's or powers against you, the enemy biotic's don't try and use "Slam" on you, they'll use "Push" which just makes you fall over, but within 5 seconds your up again.
Unfortunately the same can't be said for you friendly AI, often they'll not listen to your orders and just stand behind cover and do nothing, other times they'll shoot like crazy, but wont take cover when taking hits, and they'll just be gunned down, and more often than not they'll just get in the way, but that's not to say their bad, you've just got to make sure that they go into position and then pretty much just leave them there, to take the grunt of the attack while you fight your way into their flanking position, or do what i do, and use you friendly AI's ability's to expose the enemy and shoot them down.

The Message inside "Mass Effect2" really is a universal one.
It takes the idea of unifying under one banner global peace in a fight against a bigger threat.
Recruiting your team of mixed Alien races all with bad history against one another, to come together and fight an elite Alien race with a hunger for destruction, putting the past behind them to an even bigger cause.
this is almost the same idea, with today's global problems, Global Warming, Economic Instability, toady's world says we'll help you do this, if you help us do this, when really they should all unite together to fight the bigger picture, and do so together.

Verdict

Graphics 10/10
Audio 10/10
Soundtrack 10/10
Game play 9/10
AI 7/10
Story 10/10

Total = 89.6% (A*) Outstanding

masseffect.bioware.com