Hello my beautiful darlings. As I'm sure we're all blissfully aware, Bioware has given us the Valentine's Day gift of a big sexy Mass Effect 3 demo today. By now, the single player demo should be live for PS3, 360, and PC users by now. If you've got an online pass from Battlefield 3, you should have access to to the multiplayer as well.
However, since not all of us have Battlefield 3, Tara and I decided to take the ME3's multiplayer for a spin. The verdict? It's surprisingly enjoyable. Watch the video for our full impressions.
Oh, and don't worry -- everyone will get a crack at the multiplayer demo starting on the 17th. That's in three days.
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Max Scoville is the co-host of The Destructoid Show on Revision 3 and left-leg component of the original Megazord. Born in France, raised in Connecticut, and while he studied painting & drawing at the SF Art Institute his true passion is entertaining others.
Likes
The intro to Super Metroid, Uppercutting somebody in Mortal Kombat, Lucasarts 1989-1998, The "!" noise in Metal Gear Solid, Duke Nukem 3D's puerile sense of humor, Frank Zappa, Steve Martin, and William Gibson.
Meet the rest of the team
Its a good addition to the game, and make sense story wise that other teams are fighting the Reapers as well.
That said Im disappointed at the lack of customization for your character. I would have liked it if you could pick a race, then pick from the available classes and have some of them be grayed out due to that race not having biotics or not being known for that class. Im not a fan of the choice they made, since now Ill be forced to either play a Sentinel or Soldier class since I want to play as a Turian.
Ill play it none the less, but its a bit disappointing to see such a lack of customization on that part of the game.
Man... I'm not lying when I'm saying I played the multiplayer for 10 hours straight today. My friends and I just had so much fun. Leveling our characters while losing and winning. Buying new packs of items and laughing at my friend who got the shittiest items imaginable from them while everyone else got amazing stuff. Just a lot better than I honestly expected.
Lets face it everyone: yes, ME3 is going to be great, but its not something new. I enjoyed the SP demo, and I haven't had a chance to try the MP demo just yet (not enough people that want to play) (panda sadface) but according to senor Maximilian (!) its pretty fun, and not an excuse to add an online pass and apparently its quite relevant to the SP. Awesome!
Exceeded my expectations. It.actually makes you a better player by taking.away the pause and play crutch and having to deal.with.attacks from actual flanks . Couple rounds of no and I was used to the new controls
Want to play the multiplayer demo, but my buddies are all busy till next week and I'm not sure playing online with random folks would be all that productive considering the helpfulness of your average online player (ie. nonexistent).
I'll believe it when I play it. I've already heard some differing opinions and have a difficult time taking those that still believe Bioware shits gold seriously.
Still, it is there to justify an online pass. Let's not be naive enough to think otherwise. It doesn't help that there are contradicting statements that it does/doesn't affect the main campaign in anyway. EA themselves can't get the story straight there.
@Andy Dixon - How about that shit! I was saying months ago to give this a chance, and I'm very glad that it looks better than I hoped =]. MAN this game can't come out fast enough!!! The ONLY thing this year that might out-do it for me is Bioshock Infinite.
Biodrones? What? Fans of good games get a label now? When are people on the internet gonna mature enough to know that just because you don't like something, that doesn't make it bad. Horses for courses and all that...
Well look at that. It looks like a well made and story relevant addition to what will surely be a huge hit, and hipsters everywhere stick their heads up their ass yet again :)
Because, y'know, EVERYTHING popular and current in the gaming industry is shit. SNES 4 LIFE.
If Bioware had a cock, Tin Man would be choking on it right now. Just saying. It's one thing to be displeased with people for disliking what you like, but don't be a dick about it. If I say someone or something other than yourself is a steaming pile of shit and you get offended by that, you need to get a hold of yourself. If you can say that something is awesome (because you like it) then anyone else should be able to say it sucks (because they don't like it). Just like you say that not liking something doesn't make it bad, liking it doesn't make it the greatest thing ever. It works both ways. Get over it.
That said, I haven't been able to play the MP yet, but the single player demo was pretty underwhelming outside of combat. They've made some odd design decisions (Ashley's goddamn face!) and went back on their promise of deeper RPG elements. It's all combat and cheap dialog as far as I can tell. Not to mention an intro that looks like Michael Bay directed a mash up between Pearl Harbor and Transformers - including a super lame cliche.
Combat is great though, so woo! This game is gonna be so badass!!!
Im confused still as to why people bitch about the amount of violence and explosions in the first part. Its an invasion by a race of extremely powerful robots who are hell bent on the destruction of every living organism in the current galaxy. There is no mention of them showing mercy or restraint before, why the hell would they NOT go all out now?
@ Nephilym, offended much? I asked a question that was ignored, and made a general stupid post mocking somebody elses general stupid post. It does look well made(which isn't subjective, it does), and it is story relevant. So stop putting words in my mouth and take a minute to get the fuck off that high horse of yours.
Super fun, cant wait to play it with my friends. Leveling up/augmenting gets addicting. I've surprisingly put nearly 2 hours into it already. Awesome addition to mass effect.
I think all the skepticism of the coop is justified given the industry's (and particularly EA's) penchant for slapping multiplayer onto everything. That said, I was as skeptical as anyone and I had a blast playing it a few hours last night. I'm still not sure whether it will have any legs, but I've found it very addictive.
I'm actually more worried about the single player now, bizarrely, as I found much of the dialogue in the demo hackneyed and flat. Here's hoping it's not representative of the full, final game.
Ok.. i'm going to be brutally honeset with you guys.. the multiplayer feature is a nice addition to the game but it does have some things going on that takes away the flare. Some of you may just enjoy single player and never touch the multiplayer. Some of the things that I see is the game engine isn't designed to be fast action paced and it feels kind of clunky at times. The multiplayer makes it feel like enemies are just coming in spawning from all corners.. I didn't think they would do something like that but I still found the game fun. One of the things I wished they did was have a better level design to make the multiplayer feel like single player but with friends. The level design based off of these two level available aren't that great. You are simply in the middle of a small map with enemies. Why not have a level where you constantly progress as a team.. and give it more of a RPG feel like single player feels? All in All it was fun but its not going to be my main focus but I'm glad its there in case I want to screw around with some buddies.
I love the show. This kind of looked like you were being forced to do a "we're sorry EA" at gunpoint though, lol. I'll have to admit that I'm interested to at least check out ME3 now. Maybe it'll be cool, who knows?
I love the show. This kind of looked like you were being forced to do a 'we're sorry EA' at gunpoint though, lol. I'll have to admit that I'm interested to at least check out ME3 now. Maybe it'll be cool, who knows?
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Contest:
11:00 PM on 02.14.2012 | 
That said Im disappointed at the lack of customization for your character. I would have liked it if you could pick a race, then pick from the available classes and have some of them be grayed out due to that race not having biotics or not being known for that class. Im not a fan of the choice they made, since now Ill be forced to either play a Sentinel or Soldier class since I want to play as a Turian.
Ill play it none the less, but its a bit disappointing to see such a lack of customization on that part of the game.
Still, it is there to justify an online pass. Let's not be naive enough to think otherwise. It doesn't help that there are contradicting statements that it does/doesn't affect the main campaign in anyway. EA themselves can't get the story straight there.
I think it suffers from being an action focused mode played in an engine that is not fully up to scratch for pure action.
It is not crap but after playing it, it is still not something I am looking forward to.
Sigh....I gave it a chance and was disappointed, where are you biodrones now.
I really hope they didn't cut checks on single player, time will have to tell.
Because, y'know, EVERYTHING needs multiplayer nowadays to be epic for the win.
I don't mind though, their parents were assholes. We robbing all of the car spaces with their blinged out pickup trucks.
Because, y'know, EVERYTHING popular and current in the gaming industry is shit. SNES 4 LIFE.
That said, I haven't been able to play the MP yet, but the single player demo was pretty underwhelming outside of combat. They've made some odd design decisions (Ashley's goddamn face!) and went back on their promise of deeper RPG elements. It's all combat and cheap dialog as far as I can tell. Not to mention an intro that looks like Michael Bay directed a mash up between Pearl Harbor and Transformers - including a super lame cliche.
Combat is great though, so woo! This game is gonna be so badass!!!
A child dies in the game, I am boycotting it because I don't support children dying.
I'm actually more worried about the single player now, bizarrely, as I found much of the dialogue in the demo hackneyed and flat. Here's hoping it's not representative of the full, final game.