Mass Effect Legendary Edition

[Uncle Mike]

If you've never played a Mass Effect at all before, is it likely these will still be good in 2021? Or is it a nostalgia exercise in the main? I literally have no idea.

[danbot]

They'll still be good and well worth playing.

[KartoffelKopf]

The story, world-building and characters are all pretty much timelessly great. The jank could potentially come from the dated combat and UI but looks like they've made some big changes to try and mitigate that. The inventory management improvements look to have been well thought out.

 

I worked out it's been 9 years since I did my trilogy playthrough (including reading all the novels) and it was one of the best gaming experiences ever and I was a bit worried that the memory will be tarnished if these aren't like I remember them in my head but I'm confident they are making enough under the hood tweaks to make them feel fresh enough.

[Thor]

22 minutes ago, Uncle Mike said:

If you've never played a Mass Effect at all before, is it likely these will still be good in 2021? Or is it a nostalgia exercise in the main? I literally have no idea.

DDUUUUUUDDDEE!!! 

 

Mass Effect 1 may or may not come across as a bit shoddy/loose in terms of gameplay, that aspect was never ME1's strong-suit, so I'm keen to see what the devs have done with it. 

 

The original ME2 and 3 are still amazing even today.

[JoeK]

I wonder if they're finally added a ‘holster gun’ option in ME3. It was always slightly upsetting that I had to wander around with the damn weapon always drawn when I was trying to be cool.

[Thor]

8 minutes ago, JoeK said:

I wonder if they're finally added a ‘holster gun’ option in ME3. It was always slightly upsetting that I had to wander around with the damn weapon always drawn when I was trying to be cool.

Yeah, I'm hoping they've done that too. They claimed "memory constraints" back in 2012, can't possibly be the case now.

[Alex W.]

I wonder if that’s the canon explanation.

 

”Shep you can’t just run around pointing your gun constantly.”

 

”I’ve forgotten what peace is.”

[Yiggy]

I’m planning on playing through all 3 with my wife. Both our first times. She is okay with games and loves sci-fi. 
 

If there’s an easy mode we’ll probably use it. 

[Mallet]

I have always thought that the first 2 games have some of the best endings in any medium, simply fantastic. 

 

I just googled ME 3's release date, it's over 9 years. WTF

[JoeK]

6 minutes ago, Yiggy said:

I’m planning on playing through all 3 with my wife. Both our first times. She is okay with games and loves sci-fi. 
 

If there’s an easy mode we’ll probably use it. 

Nothing wrong with using the easy mode on the Mass Effect games as far as I’m concerned. It’s all about the story and the journey for me in these.

[Mercury]

Mass Effect 2 is probably still my favourite game ever. It's certainly up there despite my Shep looking like sunburned Posh Spice.

 

 

The thought that went in to the end game was great. Who dies and why spoilers inside.

 

Spoiler

 

[Harrisown]

 

[jonamok]

I honestly don’t think it looks much better. Just brighter and different.

[Lorfarius]

The faces are awful.

[Camel]

Are they?

[Harrisown]

I think in a lot of those scenes the originals looked better

 

 

the state of that texture...

[moosegrinder]

The thing that's wonky on the new one is they've got all that swanky new rendering and remodeling and shit but the facial animation is exactly the same. There's a weird static nature to the faces that's always been present, and they've not tweaked it. At least that's what it looks like to me.

 

As for the games I remember fuck all about them. I know I lost Tali. I know that the begining of ME2 is one of the singularly most incredible openings to anything ever. And I know Shepard isn't scrupulous about what she endorses on the Citadel.

 

Oh and that the Mako was garbage.

[SeanR]

I think most of those looked better in the original

[moosegrinder]

The only thing about the original versions on that video that I preferred was the contrast.

[Oz]

8 minutes ago, SeanR said:

I think most of those looked better in the original

Are you looking at your phone? If so, look at the 4K image.

[SeanR]

1 minute ago, Oz said:

Are you looking at your phone? If so, look at the 4K image.

 

fair point. My laptop struggles with 4K video, but it does look a lot better than the 480p it defaulted to.

[Dudley]

This series x game doesn't look much better than a Playstation one I say, viewing the series X footage on a VCD through my Playstation.

[Alex W.]

That is some Halo 2 level obnoxious bump mapping. Gives you more visible detail for the 4K resolution to exploit I guess but Garrus looks laminated.

[Thor]

2 hours ago, Alex W. said:

That is some Halo 2 level obnoxious bump mapping. Gives you more visible detail for the 4K resolution to exploit I guess but Garrus looks laminated.

He certainly does, but overall they do appear to have made clear improvements. I think I do prefer the overall lighting of the original game, though. 

[Wiper]

Yeah, the move to true, reactive dynamic lighting clearly works to the detriment to some of the more carefully shot scenes from the original; it's particularly unfortunate that the specific example the trailer chooses to focus on to show the improvements in itemised breakdown only accentuates that, taking a moodily lit scene where everyone is shot in such a manner that they almost come across in silhouette, and completely washing it out. Like deciding to 'improve' Dark City by, you know, taking off some of the rough edges, giving the lighting better coverage, you know?

 

Yuck, far too dark. What idiot was in charge of lighting this set?

 

 

Ahh, much better!

 

(only, you know, worse because I wasn't able to entirely annihilate the contrast per Mass Effect's literal lighting changes, but also better because Mass Effect wasn't quite as reliant on being visually striking as Dark City in the first place)

[Talvalin]

5 hours ago, moosegrinder said:

the Mako was garbage.

Wash your mouth out with soap!

[Stevie]

14 hours ago, jonamok said:

I honestly don’t think it looks much better. Just brighter and different.

 

Yet another example of a "remaster" where modders could do a better job for free. 

[Alex W.]

I was going to say something about how you can’t move something to a new engine using a mod, and how this reminds me of the poorly received Return to Arkham collection which ported the Batman games from UE3 to UE4 with mixed results.

 

But the Legendary Edition is still running on Unreal Engine 3, apparently?! Were all of the visual changes deliberate then?

 

Edit - Watching the video through again, it almost looks like they got the settings wrong when they were recording the remastered version. The desaturation and loss of contrast has that “I used the wrong RGB range” look.

[Harsin]

You can see where their prioties lay when 'remastering' this.

 

 

[Stevie]

 

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