Author Topic: Andromeda  (Read 4728 times)

Zephlar

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Andromeda
« on: March 22, 2017, 08:50:36 AM »
Anyone pick this up? If so what do you think? I'm waiting for Angry Joe to review.

Spectere

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #1 on: March 22, 2017, 10:57:10 AM »
Not yet. I want to finish up Breath of the Wild and Night in the Woods first (and possibly Ocarina and Majora's Mask for 3DS).

I've heard some shaky things about the visual quality (namely the facial animation controversy) but I'm more concerned about the story. The animations were kind of hit or miss in the original trilogy as well, after all.
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Zephlar

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #2 on: March 22, 2017, 03:26:58 PM »
Not yet. I want to finish up Breath of the Wild and Night in the Woods first (and possibly Ocarina and Majora's Mask for 3DS).

I've heard some shaky things about the visual quality (namely the facial animation controversy) but I'm more concerned about the story. The animations were kind of hit or miss in the original trilogy as well, after all.

I've seen the GIF's lol. There is definitely some goofy animations but I can definitely look passed that. It's the odd design decisions and script I'm concerned about. No more skill wheel, having to switch drive modes to go up hills in the vehicle (wtf?), the compass/map debacle etc.

I loved the Multiplayer in 3 though and it's pretty much the exact same thing so if anything I'll grab it on sale for the multi.

GIF dump since we're on topic:






vladgd

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #3 on: March 22, 2017, 11:09:30 PM »
I'm SO over all the drama over this game. People are just butthurt for no goddamn reason, but the game is fine. If the game wasn't made by bioware, I GUARANTEE nobody would be talking about this stuff. I'm fine with people hating on a game, but like, don't buy it, don't waste your energy on it? I don't like mobas, but I don't spend my free time shitting on them on the moba reddits. The internet makes me almost feel ashamed to call myself a mass effect fan.

Ohh but we're talking about actually playing the game and not judging cherrypicked gameplay footage? Well I have it, and I have played it.

I'm only 10 hours in, and it is a slow burn, so don't expect to be engaged right away. It does start to hit its stride when you start driving around the jeep.

Having issues with the combat, but partly trying to get used to ps4 controller again. That and I don't even know what to make of my character, no class system means I can do anything...and not knowing how all the powers work in this new game, I feel I can't avoid a respec because I'm just going to have to put points into whatever until I can find something that I can jive well with. Too much freedom? Not a bad thing, but I'd like some direction. The mobility in this game is part of why i think combat is hard, in the good way? You can jump, dash, jump dash, most buildings you can jump on, it feels really nice.

Will talk more as I put more hours into the game, currently just put a base thing on the desert planet, to give you an idea of where I'm at. I am still super early, but I feel mass effect fans should be safe in purchasing this game.

It's just Drack, he can't be spoilers at this rate, but pointing it out just in case.

« Last Edit: March 22, 2017, 11:27:01 PM by vladgd »

Zephlar

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #4 on: March 23, 2017, 01:57:14 PM »
I'm SO over all the drama over this game. People are just butthurt for no goddamn reason, but the game is fine. If the game wasn't made by bioware, I GUARANTEE nobody would be talking about this stuff. I'm fine with people hating on a game, but like, don't buy it, don't waste your energy on it? I don't like mobas, but I don't spend my free time shitting on them on the moba reddits. The internet makes me almost feel ashamed to call myself a mass effect fan.

Ohh but we're talking about actually playing the game and not judging cherrypicked gameplay footage? Well I have it, and I have played it.

I'm only 10 hours in, and it is a slow burn, so don't expect to be engaged right away. It does start to hit its stride when you start driving around the jeep.

Having issues with the combat, but partly trying to get used to ps4 controller again. That and I don't even know what to make of my character, no class system means I can do anything...and not knowing how all the powers work in this new game, I feel I can't avoid a respec because I'm just going to have to put points into whatever until I can find something that I can jive well with. Too much freedom? Not a bad thing, but I'd like some direction. The mobility in this game is part of why i think combat is hard, in the good way? You can jump, dash, jump dash, most buildings you can jump on, it feels really nice.

Will talk more as I put more hours into the game, currently just put a base thing on the desert planet, to give you an idea of where I'm at. I am still super early, but I feel mass effect fans should be safe in purchasing this game.

It's just Drack, he can't be spoilers at this rate, but pointing it out just in case.



This is what I'm looking for. Keep me posted.

I am a die hard Mass Effect fan I assure you, but the trilogy is done and over with so I had no idea what to expect in lieu of the ending of that trilogy. Let me be clear the ending in 3 did NOT ruin the franchise for me, but it was utter garbage and really left me scratching my head about a bunch of shit. I was really emotionally invested by the end. Shed a couple tears here and there which is why it's my favorite game of all time (trilogy as a whole).

Spectere

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #5 on: March 23, 2017, 03:43:38 PM »
I'm SO over all the drama over this game.

The problem, as I see it, is that people can't just criticize. And yeah, some of those animations are pretty bad, awkward at best. However, people can't seem to just leave it at that. Instead they have to throw a goddamn tantrum, flex their puny Internet "muscles," and start screaming, crying, sending death threats, and acting like misogynist pissants.

It's like the reaction when Jim Sterling had the gall to give Breath of the Wild a 7/10 (which, on his scale, is still good) because it had some things that genuinely annoyed the piss out of him (like cardboard weapons and a laughable starting sprint distance). OH NOES, NOW IT ONLY HAS A 97/100 ON METACRITIC INSTEAD OF A 98/100. Oh, boo hoo. If the game's so fucking good, why the hell aren't you playing it? It's ZOMG 8.8 all over again.

The internet makes me almost feel ashamed to call myself a mass effect fan.

As both a Sonic fan and an Undertale fan, I know how you feel. <_<

Let me be clear the ending in 3 did NOT ruin the franchise for me, but it was utter garbage and really left me scratching my head about a bunch of shit. I was really emotionally invested by the end. Shed a couple tears here and there which is why it's my favorite game of all time (trilogy as a whole).

To be honest, the ending of 3 actually ruined the original trilogy for me, which I didn't even think would be possible. I thought about replaying it a few times, but then I thought about the ending and just said "fuck it, why bother?" Normally I'm not like that, and I think the reason it happened with Mass Effect is because of how invested I was in the characters and story coupled with how unbelievably awful the ending was and how much it flew in the face of literally everything. Ever since the beginning of the series (especially as things started escalating) I figured that the series wasn't going to have a particularly happy ending for everyone, and I was fully comfortable with everything more or less leading to one path (I certainly didn't expect there to be a thousand different endings), but...wow.

That being said, as far as I'm concerned, what happens in Shepard's story stays in Shepard's story. I just hope that they don't pull that kind of bullshit in this new series.

Anyway, speaking of the actual subject, I do worry about a few things. I saw one screenshot where a trans woman casually deadnaming herself in one of her introductory lines. I, uh...what? Maybe that's just something people do in the future? That sort of struck me as one of those moments where they decided that they wanted to be inclusive without really knowing what they're doing. Hopefully that's either just something that was taken out of context or a highly isolated example.



Oh gosh, that looks like it was animated in Source Filmmaker. XD
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vladgd

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #6 on: March 23, 2017, 06:34:54 PM »
I mean I am a biased mass effect fan, and even I cant defend the ending of 3. However, the ending doesn't matter when this new game separates itself far away from that game.

Best I can to describe my 13 hours (I checked) logged, is think of this game like the first mass effect. It has somewhat similar feel of wonder and whatnot, and the overall tone is a lot more lighthearted than me2/3.

Currently playing an engineer profile, overload, cloak, flamethrower, using a sniper. Does the job so far, but i'm still playing around with my options. Tech was so weak in the trilogy (exceptions made for specific classes in the multiplayer of course) that it's kind of nice to see tech can hold it's own easier in this game.

Playing a little multiplayer as well, and i'm still not used to the combat. Something just feels off, it may be the aim delay on the console versions? PC didn't have this issue from my playing of the trial. It's hard to nail down, but it just doesn't feel as polished as me3mp. Take this all with a grain of salt though since im still playing bronze (and not doing well, I AM bad at this combat still), going to need more time. Friends I played me3mp with who got it on xbox one are really enjoying it though, so maybe I just need to unlock a few things and level a few more times to get a hold of it. Single player took a good 4-5 hours to start getting in a groove, I think multiplayer may take a bit longer than that. Also comparing release week andromeda multiplayer with years old full dlc me3mp just doesn't work, since andromeda has at least a year of support that is guaranteed to go into it.

tldr single player is getting pretty good, raincheck on multiplayer until i log 20-30 hours into the sonbitch

That being said, as far as I'm concerned, what happens in Shepard's story stays in Shepard's story. I just hope that they don't pull that kind of bullshit in this new series.

Theres reference to stuff in the first game in my time so far, but it's light. Genophage this, liara protheans stuff that, stuff that feels relevant to the andromeda effort for the most part. So far it's just fluff. If there is some bullshit later on, I'll spoiler tag it in a future post.

No more Shepard, just Pathfinder, or Rider, or Scott, or Sarah (assuming you do not change the default name, they will use your first name when appropriate). Kind of nice people not strictly calling you one thing tbh.

Zephlar

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #7 on: April 03, 2017, 10:27:54 AM »

vladgd

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #8 on: April 03, 2017, 11:42:21 PM »
I'm too afraid to watch any reviews until I finish the game myself.

51% complete...51 hours played, 'gon be a long one.

Overall I am enjoying the game. There are issue I do have with the game, and facial animations aren't one of them. Maybe I'm too biased to know, but, they don't look any better or worse than most other games, and they're probably better than a lot of other critically acclaimed games. Examples? Iunno, any bethesda game, but nobody seems to mind there.

But issues, let's see...
- the crafting system is garbage,
- sam talks way too goddamn much,
-the multiplayer is a shell of it's me3 self,
-the profile system feels tacked on and only useful when you're past level 50+,
-bugs bugs bugs too many to even list here,
-call me crazy but i feel there's delay in the aim which makes targeting harder than it needs to be,
-while freedom in leveling is fine the classless system is simply too overwhelming for the first 10-20 hours,
-other previewers mentioned how chatty your squadmates are while you're out and they do chat, as big as the game is, it feels few and far between, not to mention there isnt that much recurring dialogue when you talk to them on the ship periodically besides "great job on the last thing blabla"
-wheres the damn music? it's there but it's so quiet i forget theres even music in the game
-as i feared, open world game = repetitive filler missions, there is good content, but as you can see from my hours played and % completed, there's filler.
-remnant Sudoku puzzles
-minor complaint, no option to change temperature to farenheit. YES I KNOW 50 degrees celsius is hot, but I don't intuitively know how hot that is, just a toggle in the options menu please?
-talking to random npc's you have to be in a very specific spot to even press the button to talk, and it leads to situations where you're running around circles to find the sweet spot just to engage in dialogue
-shops only stock ONE augmentation, and when you want say...5-10 kinetic augmentations, you have to buy one, go to the elevator on the nexus to go to a random place, then go back for it to restock to buy ONE more. it's tedious, and not fun gameplay. Wouldn't be a problem if you could...
-NO CRAFTING AUGS, this confused me and goes to the shitty crafting system. you research an aug, you expect to be able to spend resources to then develop it? NO, you get one free copy for research (related bug mention, bio converter will not give you a free copy its bugged so you have to spend remnant research for some shield aug which will then award you your bio converter), which gives you the privlidge of...making them? no, finding them randomly in the world. if you want an aug, research it immediately and hope you get lucky enough to find a second or third one if you need them.
-cryo perks that give you periotic rewards. they're on a 45 minute timer, and you must be on your damn ship at the avp station to press the button, they don't stack, so if you're on planet for 4 hours and come to collect a reward once, you''re screwed out of like 5 ticks of that perk for not coming back in a timely fashion.
-ui isnt the most user friendly thing out there
-no control of your squad powers, this one is REALLY bad imo. fuck facial animations if you cant even CONSISTANTELY set up combos on command like you could do in the past games, it's inexcusable.

Angry mob of ea/bioware haters on the internet, you got your priorities wrong, there's a lot of legit gameplay problems that need more attention over some minor animation quirks.

Mind you this is my experience, your mileage may vary. Mind you, I do enjoy the game, but with as much time as I put into it, issues can start to pile up.


Spectere

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #9 on: April 04, 2017, 02:07:31 PM »
Looks like Bioware/EA will be addressing some of the most commonly reported aesthetic and gameplay issues in Andromeda: https://www.engadget.com/2017/04/04/how-bioware-will-fix-mass-effect-andromeda/.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but it seems like a lot of polish just sort of went right out the window this time around. Despite what EA said previously about being willing to delay ME:A as long necessary, it really seems like the game was rushed.

I honestly think they would have been better off waiting. Considering the high profile games that came out this month, I feel like it would have been better if they targeted a Summer release. There almost certainly would have been less competition in the AAA space.
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vladgd

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Re: Andromeda
« Reply #10 on: April 07, 2017, 02:42:02 AM »
~72 hours played, 94% completion, ~16 days after release

I beat it

Despite its flaws, it's a DAMN GOOD game. Like people say the main story arc is kind of weak, and the main antagonist is kind of weak, they're right...but like the personality of the characters really nullifies that imo. I think as much as the original trilogy characters had personality, they did it better in andromeda. Like in the original trilogy when Shepard gets fucked over, Shep is typically "IVE GOT TO STOP THEM BLABLA" or something boring and heroic like that. Those moments are still in the game (up to player choice) but unlike Shepard, Ryder apon getting fucked over is like "I'm going to kill that motherfucker nobody fucks with me" and it feels more...realistic?

And I think...all? of the squad is good in this game? ME 1 was the first so even awesome characters like Garrus weren't fleshed out yet, and introduced everyones most hated space racist Ashley. ME 2 had a great cast with some boring ones like Jacob and I personally despised Miranda. ME 3 had good characters, even turned boring ass Kaiden into a likeable character, but they had the foundation of the past two games to get that far. Only weak link in andromeda I can see squadmate wise is cora for being kind of bitchy (for good reason) but later on after her loyalty mission, it tones down and she becomes pretty pleasant.

There's just so many "feel good" moments in this game, and nearer to the end and after the credits, they keep on coming.

A group of wise cracking assholes who take no shits roaming around space, took a few hours to get into, and many more to warm up to, but the end of this game just made me super excited for what direction "OF WHICH THERE ARE MULTIPLE DIRECTIONS(no not like me3, more like, the ending reveals things, and there are a few radical different directions they could choose to go" any possible future game may go to.

in conclusion

mass effect fans need to play, but curb your expectations, kind of a slow burn but eventually hits its stride into something really satisfying. And yeah, my last post still holds up, there's many flaws, but nothing that ended up ruining my experience with the game as a whole. I mean me1 is still positively regarded, and that's a way more flawed game than this, people who think otherwise are deluded.

Now if you excuse me, im going to put Persona 5 into my ps4. I should have taken the month off from work.



*edit*

multiplayer as of now is booty buttcheeks, don't buy this game if you only want the multiplayer experience. I hope it gets better with dlc/patches.
« Last Edit: April 08, 2017, 08:41:52 PM by vladgd »