Mass Effect Legendary Edition Review

The universe is under a new threat and needs someone to step up and defeat that threat. You are a soldier who has miraculously made it this far in life, but a new adventure is about to take place and it needs you at the controls. You will play the part of Commander Shepard and will get to explore countless galaxies and worlds. You will interact with all types of alien races, and you will build a crew that will help you with the many obstacles that will be put in your way. 

When Mass Effect first came out on the XBOX360 I was hooked, it had exactly what I was looking for in a space themed RPG. Yes, you did get to shoot plenty of “bad guys”, but the game mechanic behind “every choice changes your story” is what truly hooked me. Yes, there are plenty of games that go the “choose your own adventure” method, and yes you are making choices, but the ramifications are usually good or bad, there is no grey area. Mass Effect brings in a ton of grey areas. Sure, some of the choices you will make are absolutely good or completely evil (bad), but it’s really the small choices that will really affect something hours down the line. Now to make it all that much more complex you have the option of continuing your Mass Effect game into Mass Effect 2, and of course Mass Effect 2 into Mass Effect 3. The thought that my actions I did early on in Mass Effect caused something to happen in Mass Effect 3 was mind boggling amazing. One of the main recipients of your decision will be who is on your crew over the different games. There is also a romantic side to things, as you will be able to “woo” a fellow team member, and if you do a good enough job you get to have a brief intimate scene between your character and that character.

The true beauty behind the Mass Effect Legendary Edition is that, yes, I get to play through all of it again, maybe make some new/different decisions, but the real bonus is the fact that all the DLCs that were a part of the trilogy are included. This allowed for expansion in certain aspects of the overall story, and of course, since I didn’t play any DLC my first time through (on the XBOX360), I was able to enjoy parts that I had never played. I do want to point out that if you do pick this up through Steam you’re going to have one slightly confusing experience, and that is that in order to play the game you’re going to also have Origin (EA’s digital platform) installed and active. I’m guessing this is the only way that EA would allow this collection to be sold on Steam. What becomes beyond annoying about this extra bit of setup is that when you have achievement notifications enabled you’re going to get a Steam notification with the EA/Origin notification quickly following. Hopefully this doesn’t happen to others but from time to time when the second set of notifications appears the game will minimize or the notification will stick around after its allotted time.

I really want to break down every game in this trilogy, but I’m afraid I’d give things away that could potentially ruin a gamer’s experience. I will tell you that I played this trilogy for just a bit under 120 hours. So if you’re looking for a game(s) to really sink your teeth into, this definitely will keep you busy. There are some slight differences between each game, outside of graphics obviously. You’ll notice that things such as menu layout and navigation change throughout the games. There will be different tweaks done to the skill point system that is used throughout the games. There are also tweaks made to equipment options, what I mean by that is that Mass Effect had more customizations to weapons and armor than Mass Effect 2 had, and that Mass Effect 3 regained a little bit of that customizability back. You will also notice that the way you interact with planets changes between each game, and honestly I think the evolution that occurs with that part of the series is for the best. 

I loved getting a chance to play through this series again. It's one thing to remember playing this series almost 10 years ago, but to play it again and have the game still have the pull that it did back in 2007 says a lot. I think the pull was even stronger this time around because I literally jumped from one to the next. It allowed me to keep the story fresh in my mind and also locked me to the point where I needed that next Mass Effect “fix”. This is a solid series, the story has so many layers of complexity, and the relationships you foster during the series just makes the story that much more intricate. Sure, there are some small tweaks that might bug you from one game to the next, but if you’re anything like me you’re going to forgive those issues because you need to keep playing.