Mass Effect 3 Demo Impressions

As of February 14Th, The Mass Effect 3 Demo is available on the Xbox Live marketplace and me being the big Mass Effect fan that I am, blew off my Valentine date to play this demo over and over to give you my first impressions on it. I'll walk you through the demo from Beginning to End while talking about things that I’ve noticed. First off once you’ve downloaded the demo and started it up, the game will ask you the usual questionnaire of whether Sheperd is a Male or Female, Class select, and other questions it’s asked before in the series. Two new questions that it asks is whether Ashley Williams or Kaiden Alenko died in the original Mass Effect or if numerous squad mates died during the course of the two games. The other is more a gameplay choice to be made. The first question aside from Sheperd’s sex is whether you’d like the game to be geared towards a action based experience, a role playing one, or a story one. Role playing is what fans and vets of the series will pick as it is the original Mass Effect style gameplay. Action turns the game into a run and cover shooter with cutscenes, getting rid of the conversations and the options it allows. Story is quite the opposite, focusing more on the story rather than the action. Combat is basically turned down to Easy difficulty for you to enjoy the cinematic experience of Mass Effect 3. After all of the questions, you decide your appearance and the demo begins.

Off The bat, Bioware gives you a quick cutscene prepping you for the hell that’s about to begin. The first cutscene is the opening scene of the game showing off the moment the Reapers attack Earth and Bioware did a damn fine job foreshadowing the events of what’s to ensue in it. Once you get actual control of Sheperd, the games camera starts off showing you a Reaper blowing up towers and buildings like it’s a more badass version of Godzilla. You then proceed to scramble across the rooftops to get to the Normandy. Along the way the game introduces new elements to the series like the running leap that you activate when run towards a gap climbing ladders and a new combat roll to evade attacks. My guess is it’s to add more immersion into the game and surprisingly it succeeds! That’s not all that’s been added as well. Melee attacks now snap to enemies getting rid of the annoying melee attacks of the past and to make melee even MORE SWEET is this awesomly SWEET (Yes it’s so cool I used sweet twice, bear with me) heavy attack that’s activated by holding down the melee button. Now depending if your character has either biotic powers or not, the attack changes. If your character has any biotic powers, the move turns into a Falcon punch but with biotic energy. If you don’t have any biotics then it turns into an awesome omni-blade swipe that demands awe. Again all of these have been added to put more immersion into the game. Now there are two parts to the demo the first one being the invasion of earth (Which basically acts like tutorial and set-up) and the second being a more action packed shoot-em up level to show off the core game-play. Before I get to that that though I do have to applaud Bioware on one cinematic in the earth level. Halfway through you meet a boy hiding in a vent, Shepard tells the boy to get out (Differs on choice of either Paragon or Renegade) and follow him or her. The boy just mutters "You cant help me..." and disappears. At the end of the level, Shepard sees the little boy from afar, trying to get into a shuttle. He jumps in just as a Reaper ship drops down and starts attacking and blowing S@#T up. Sadly though the shuttle gets caught in the Reapers laser and what can only be compared to as the Finale of Act 3 of Gears of War 3, wrenches your heart as you know this is a foreshadow of whats to come.

Like I mentioned before there is a second part to the demo, this is a more Action/Shoot'em up level compared to the first. It has you saving a Female Krogan from a Cerberus attack. Now there are two things in this part that made me go "umm whaaaaaaaat the hell?" 1) Female Krogans are finally revealed and they look like how Arab woman here do by covering themselves only revealing their eyes and 2) Urdnot Wrex from Mass Effect 1 is ALIVE?!?! I could of sworn that (depending on your choice in ME 1, This was mine) Ashley shot him to HELL?!?! Apparently Bioware has some big story planned out for all of the characters so maybe we'll find out why Wrex isn't 12 kinds of deceased. My money's on the Superman Healing Coma from the Death and Return of Superman.  But hey, I digress. The rest of the level is just trying to save the female Krogan by moving her and Mordin (From Mass Effect 2) up to safety. Here is where the combat really shines. Once you start the level the game starts you at lvl 12 with Squad Points to spend. Each Ability is more customizable now with branching paths to choose from depending on your style of play. One Ability that stands out is the grenade ability. Depending on your class, you can throw a variety of different grenades. This helps the game feel more like a real shooter with tons of options on how to defeat your enemies.  Now the shooting itself feels very nice and effective and the cover system has been improved to allow cover-to-cover movement which is a welcome addition. All in all, the level is a good display of action and the core gameplay.

 With only a few bugs and glitches that I noticed in my several playthroughs of the demo (mind you it is a demo so Bioware does have time fix them), Mass Effect 3 is shaping up to be the EPIC game we've come to hope it is. Be sure to check back in with us here at the Vault for when the full game comes for the Full Review.