Mass Effect 2 Message Board

Bioware released a huge thank you to the fans of their Mass Effect series. See what your favorite voice actors had to say to you, the fans

Just a snippet about something that was more or less a given, but I think it’s worth stating and knowing for the record that the next Mass Effect will entirely and definitely steer clear of Commander Shephard. The controversial outcomes of Mass Effect 3 do leave some room for ‘what happened next?’ investigations, but the three-game plot had tied itself in so many knots by that point that a totally clean break for the next set of Meffects is only sensible.(more…)

We like space and it's due in large part to the cool spaceships that you get to fly around in. Join us as we talk about IGN's Top 10 Video Game Spaceships.

Aw. I know not everyone was as charmed as I was by Mass Effect 2 and 3′s scarfaced, cockney mercenary Zaeed Massani, but I found his no-nonsense, surly, partially malevolent geezerishness made him an essential part of my ME2 squad. His voice actor did great things in terms of turning, essentially, Dirty Den into a hard-bitten space bruiser, so I’m sad to hear that the chap behind those beyond-gravelly tones, Robin Sachs, sadly passed away on the first of February this year.(more…)

In response to reports of some PC copies of Black Ops 2 having a second disc for Mass Effect 2, Bioware is giving away Mass Effect Trilogy to those affected. As detailed on its blog, BioWare will send free PC codes for the compendium to the first 50 people to send the developer a photo of the error.

It's a cheeky yet inspired response from BioWare, the developer calling the mix-up an "omen" it had to take heed of. "If the universe thinks that you should be playing Mass Effect right now," the post reads, "who are we to argue?"

Meanwhile, an Activision rep addressed complaints on the official Black Ops 2 forum, saying teams are trying to work out how the mix-up occurred. The post recommends using a product key provided in the case to activate the game on Steam.

We’re still waiting for Call of Duty Black Ops 2 wot-I-think code here on RPS, but some punters who’ve already lain hands on the PC version of Activision’s latest Manshooter Titan have found themselves equally unable to play the thing. But why? Had it been tampered with by the fugitive head of an anti-virus company? Had wolves eaten it? Would it not install until Mason told them what the numbers meant? No, none of those. Something for more eerie. Some purchasers have discovered that the second disc of their brand new foreigner-killing game was a copy of Mass Effect 2, that 2010 guns’n'conversation title from Activision’s arch-rival EA. Conversation in the best-selling game of guns? Scandalous!(more…)

Players who bought retail PC copies of Black Ops 2 - some of the same people who waited in line for hours on a cold November night during the midnight launch - pop in the second installation disc to find that it is for Mass Effect 2. Reports on Steam, Reddit, 4chan and the Black Ops 2 forums describe the same problem, and the video below shows it in action (along with some NSFW language).

This prevents these players from installing Black Ops 2 with the discs, but each retail copy comes with a Steam key and the entire game can be installed digitally. It will take a while, but it is at least, eventually, playable; this process largely negates the entire "waiting in line for a retail version" thing, though.

We've contacted Activision for more information.

#callofduty More »

#masseffect Prop builder Zander Brandt specialises in turning video game guns into real-world playthings. Wonderful playthings. And his latest work is no exception. More »

#masseffect We keep hearing rumors here and there about a Mass Effect movie in the works. As much as I love the franchise, I'm not sure I ever really want to see one. My Shepard is, well, my Shepard, and any movie starring someone of that name is unlikely to tell the story I preferred having told. More »

#londonphilharmonic You may recall that a while back, we held a vote to help the London Philharmonic determine which music they'd include on their follow-up to their first "Greatest Video Game Music" album. More »

Which is better: Mass Effect 1 or 2? Plus, is Mega Man still profitable?

#masseffect (Mass Effect 2 spoilers ahead.) More »

#masseffect Q&A, an Australian current affairs program, ran an episode over the weekend about Easter. A big part of the show is that, while conversations are taking place in the studio, a ticker on the bottom of the screen lets viewers get their $0.02 in. More »

Any good smuggler or bounty hunter knows you have to take every opportunity to save a space buck. With intergalactic tolls and the rising cost of crystal fuel cells, it's important. Also, you need something to do while you're sitting around in hyperdrive all the time, y'know? So retailer Amazon is offering discounts for your downtime -- specifically, savings on Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 downloads for PC.

Both Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 can be downloaded for $5.99 each. The Digital Deluxe edition of Mass Effect 2 -- which includes several making-of videos, the game's soundtrack, some in-game items and a download code for more bonus content -- is also on sale for $8.99. Finally, a bundle of both the original Mass Effect and the digital deluxe edition of Mass Effect 2 can be had for $11.99. The sale ends on March 31.

Jim’s done singleplayer, I’ve done the From Ashes DLC, and now I take on Mass Effect 3′s vaguely controversial four players vs AI-controlled enemy waves co-op multiplayer mode. I’ve been playing it what might be said to be a little too much over the last week, having taken several characters to level 20 and gotten righteously indignant that I keep unlocking pistols rather than sniper rifles. Allow me to explain.

I lay there, dying and enraged. My last surviving team-mate, a Salarian Infilitrator, stood right next to me. Actually, that’s a lie, intended to cover my indignity – he was standing right on top of me, feet stomping on my face, taking wild potshots at a Cerberus Centurion hiding behind a nearby wall. All he had to do was press one button for a couple of seconds, and I’d be back in the fight, at his side, helping him to win this war and go home with the spoils of victory. I hadn’t wired up a mic for this match, so I couldn’t scream and beg at him. Still, what was required was beyond obvious – yet he would not do it. The seconds ticked away. My blood trickled away.(more…)

[Note: This story does contain spoilers about Mass Effect 2. You have been warned.]

I finished Mass Effect 2 once. The suicide mission was, in my eyes, a one-time deal, an all bets are off descent into the madness of destroying The Collectors and delaying the Reapers, one where I lost a few friends in the process.

In battle, Miranda took a shot to the head, while Tali was swarmed by seekers.

Neither character is with me in Mass Effect 3, which I started on Sunday afternoon. They will never have a cameo in my Mass Effect 3.

I'd purposely waited to play Overlord (fantastic), Lair of the Shadow Broker (great) and The Arrival (disappointing) until just before Mass Effect 3. Having a few hours to brush up on the universe before the apocalyptic Mass Effect 3 seemed appropriate. I just didn't realize how much I'd miss a virtual mass of pixels branded Miranda.

I'm not sure what exactly struck me about Miranda more than any other game character.

Our relationship ended on a sour note. Just prior to embarking on the suicide mission, I was doing my rounds on the Normandy. “How are you?” “Are you ready?” “We’ll get through this.” Miranda and I had one last chat. I can't remember what I said, but I'm sure it was flippant. It's probably because my Shepard got busy with Jack in the Normandy’s basement, and she found out. I didn't think she would.

Secretly, though, I knew which character my Shepard wanted to be with, and I’d upset her. I hadn’t considered she might run out of dialogue eventually, and now I had no more options. My response pissed her off, and she turned away. No matter how many times I tried, she wouldn't budge. There was nothing more to be said, and unless I loaded a save, this was the end.

My last save? Long, long ago.

An hour or so later, she took a bullet to the head. We never had a chance to smooth things over.

Every time the squad screen popped up while finishing up Mass Effect 2, I was reminded of my ill-timed mistake. Miranda doesn't disappear from the squad screen, she's simply covered in a red hue.

If you’re like my friends, you went through the suicide mission more than once. Maybe you did it just to see how else it could play out. Most players I know found a walkthrough to learn how to keep everyone alive, hoping to bring everyone along for the final ride against the Reapers. It's true that I don't play many games twice, preferring to mosey on, but I avoided playing the suicide mission again out of principle.

Consequence in games is important. At the very least, it's interesting. It's one thing to have a new character have a new experience, it's quite another to exploit--and that's what it feels like, exploitation--a saved game and have everything turn out the way you wanted, rather than the way it happened. It'd be great if BioWare had went a step further and ensured a character died no matter what, and made it completely random. It makes no sense everyone should survive a supposed "suicide mission," unless it happens by sheer chance. Victory would be sweeter.

My squad looked a little bit different after the end of Mass Effect 2. A tiny bit more red.

But perhaps I'm looking at it the wrong way. Making a conscious decision to not fit Mass Effect 2's ending neatly into my own desired conclusion when the game lets me do so lends the consequences more weight. I've decided to move on, and moving on is meant to be hard. It's much easier to reload, pretend it never happened.

Believe me, I’ve considered going back, despite being 10 hours into Mass Effect 3. I’ve run into other members of my Mass Effect 2 posse, but I’ll never run into Miranda. It feels terribly strange to write about a digital character like this--shameful, even. Am I upset over not seeing content that other players will? That’s the easy rationale. The harder one is that I feel bad Miranda and I did the Mass Effect equivalent of getting into a fight with your significant other and going to bed.

You never know what might happen, and in this case, I can’t make up for it.

Given the promises BioWare made about Mass Effect in the beginning, this feels right. If I want to know what it’s like to have Miranda giving me a peptalk as the universe ends, I’ll see that when I play through Mass Effect again. Or maybe I won’t, and this will be the one, permanent journey I have through BioWare’s drama. That, too, feels right.

In my Mass Effect, Miranda died, and there’s nothing I can do about that.

Tomorrow (or Friday in blighted Blighty) is Mass Effect O’Clock, and the day when we discover whether or not the purported conclusion of Shepherd’s adventures can live up to over a year of having enough marketing to make twenty Daikatanas a success fired continually at our exhausted eyes and ears.

Which means we have scant hours/days to ensure we get the ME3 we want. I’m in a tricky situation whereby the crew I wound up with at the end of ME2 is not the crew I’d want in ME3: is endlessly replaying the climactic ME2 suicide mission until the right folk make it out alive my only hope of rewriting my destiny? Nope! Mass Effect 2 spoilers and savegame-fiddling below.(more…)

Do you want to play Mass Effect 1 or 2, or Modern Warfare 2, but don't have them yet? Or -- a more likely scenario -- do you want to play them, but don't feel like getting them off the shelf and putting the discs into a console? Such effort. Such drudgery.

Amazon has the PC download versions of these games on sale today for $5 each. The Deal of the Day also includes the Digital Deluxe Edition of Mass Effect 2 for $7.49, or Dungeon Defenders for $2.99. And you don't have to get up at all, unless you don't have your credit card handy.

#masseffect Mods can make Skyrim look better. They can make Grand Theft Auto look better. They can make, well, just about any PC game look better. Including Mass Effect. More »

#deadendthrills Since we ran a feature on Duncan Harris, the groovy "video game photographer" behind the website DeadEndThrills, I've been sharing some of his work each week here. More »

Sculptor Kerry Dyer seems to be a purveyor of adorable sculptures and 3D art, and her latest conquest is the turian race from Mass Effect. Kerry created a few super-cute, sassy turian figurines like a pro, with a full rundown of the process on her blog.

#masseffect Here's a treat for Mass Effect fans. If you've played Mass Effect 2, you'll know that at some point, you run into an old friend from Mass Effect 1 on the colony of Horizon, who depending on how things play out, leaves you a heartfelt letter upon your departure. More »

#masseffect The folks at The Sneaky Zebra are making a short film based on the Mass Effect universe, and have sent along three new character trailers for the game. The one up top is for a renegade character named "Hale," which I would imagine (or at least hope!) is a reference to voice actor Jennifer Hale, who plays the female version of the game's protagonist Commander Shepard. (You may recall I had an opportunity to interview Hale at PAX this year). More »

#masseffect Prop builder Zander Brandt figured the world was short on replica M-29 Incisor rifles from Mass Effect 2. So he went and made one. More »

#fancypants To help give their Mass Effect cosplay a little more professional edge, the team at Crabcat Industries commissioned master craftsman Neil Gambini to make this Garrus mask. It's terrifying. In an awesome way. More »

#thisweekincomics Each Wednesday brings new comics worth reading. Some of them are about video games. This month, a lot of them are new DC super-hero comics, since that company is re-launching everything. Read on for recommendations of this week's best stuff and for my capsule reviews of DC's second wave of new books... More »

#speakuponkotaku Commenter Supra5mge spends a great many hours squeezing ever ounce of enjoyment out of his role-playing games. How do your numbers compare to his? Show him up in today's Speak Up on Kotaku. More »

Major Nelson has posted the Xbox Live Marketplace schedule for the next few weeks, including some good deals and one strange one. This week's Deal of the Week is for Mass Effect 2 DLC. Gold members can snag "Lair of the Shadow Broker" and "Kasumi -- Stolen Memory" for $3.50 each, half the usual price. "Arrival" is also half-price at $5.

DLC for several Microsoft-published titles is also on sale, including content for Halo: Reach, Gears of War 2, Forza 3, Fable 3 and Alan Wake. This sale is not part of the Deal of the Week promotion, and appears to be open to both Gold and Silver members of Xbox Live.

As for next week's deal, well, it's a bit strange. Microsoft is offering the ability to change your Gamertag at a discount. It normally costs $10 to change an Xbox Live moniker, but next week's "deal" drops the price to just $7. So, if you hate your Gamertag but not quite enough to justify ten bucks, next week's deal is for you.

#toybox For a series with such great characters and great visual design, Mass Effect has sadly been neglected on the action figure front, DC Unlimited only just releasing its first line of Mass Effect 2 figures in April 2011. More »