Friday, November 24, 2017

Mass Effect: Andromeda - Wrap-Up

With 62 hours under my belt, I am finally done with Mass Effect: Andromeda. I didn't quite get 100% completion, but I'm satisfied with what I have. Mostly it's just directionless collectibles quests and hanging out with my crew that I have left to do. It's likely, that if I ever play through this game again (and I almost certainly will), that I will go into all the corners, guide in hand, and clear everything out of my journal, but for now, 90% is fine.

It was actually pretty nice to get to play a game naively for a change. No agenda, no benchmarks, just going where I want and doing what interests me. Which isn't to say I don't enjoy playing games for the blog, it's just different. I'm not quite so mindful of the passage of time. I'm not constantly composing and refining my next bit of insightful (don't laugh) critique. I'm just enjoying the game for what it is. And that's a nice change of pace.

Now, for the part where I ruin it by overthinking. Mass Effect: Andromeda had a pretty good ending. Much as I predicted, there was a sequel hook (indeed, at least 3 or 4 dangling plot points that were left unresolved), but to its credit, it wasn't like the original Mass Effect. It didn't end on a note of "there is this big, dangerous problem happening imminently that we are only now getting prepared to face." It was more like, "you won an important and decisive victory, but the main antagonist was only a mid-ranking officer in a larger galactic empire, and thus the Helius Sector's short-term prosperity is clouded by a looming threat." The Nexus and the Angarans have successfully wrested control of the sector away from the Kett, and it may be years before they face retribution.

And you know what, that's okay. I really want to play the next phase of the conflict, where a rising multicultural galactic power takes on the cruel fascists and where Ryder learns more about the mysterious circumstances of the Remnant's fall from grace. But I didn't feel cheated out of a resolution. The story of this time and this place wrapped up nicely, and if there is more to do, then maybe that's because life itself doesn't have an ending. There will always be more stories to tell. . .

Although the fate of Ryder's mother and the identity of the mysterious Benefactor are loose ends that only make sense when you're trying to establish a series. Not everything in life needs to be neatly wrapped up, but when you're telling a story, it helps.

I think the reason the sequel hook went down as well as it did with me was because Mass Effect: Andromeda was more of an open-world game. The planets were big maps you could explore and drive around on, rather than simple hub areas connected to a couple of dungeons. The original Mass Effect had random planets that might have been similar, except that they were almost entirely deserted, and thus never really got to the point where they had individual character.

Mass Effect Andromeda's worlds did not suffer from that problem. They were all gorgeously realized sci-fi locations with their own character and identities (though I'm not sure why there were two separate desert planets). All of which adds up to me just wanting to be really ungrateful here. Why can't I have as many explorable world as the original Mass Effect, but with each one having as much personality as the worlds in Mass Effect: Andromeda? Is that really too much to ask?

Obviously, it is, but I can dream. Ultimately, when I look back at Mass Effect: Andromeda, I'm going to see a game that was a contender, but which didn't really have what it takes to be a classic. The Kett turned out to be pretty effective villains after all (I really wanted to kill the Archon by the end), but the Angarans didn't even manage to rise to the level of the original triology's secondary species. Right now, I am thinking about the game having the exact same plot, but replacing the Angarans with the Elcor, the Volus, or even the Hanar, and it's already about a hundred times better. Which makes it a real shame that it has to follow up on a series that spoiled us with all three. And while I enjoyed helping out the colonies and building up their viability (and there is a pretty neat post-game payoff for getting them all to 100%), too often that involved long and aggravating fetch quests that forced me to go through entirely to many loading screens.

The funny thing is, I think if this game had successfully spawned a new Mass Effect trilogy, it could have been retroactively redeemed by its sequels. If you move the action up to the galactic scale and liberate the clusters the other Archons were assimilating, you could have the diversity and the wonder that was missing. If you polished the mechanics just slightly in the sequels, you could make this opening chapter essential playing as a prelude to some really amazing games. With a bit more backstory, the Remnant may well be as compelling as the Protheans. The potential is there, but it's probably never going to happen. The studio was shut down and rumor has it that the sequel was entirely cancelled. Such a shame.

Oh well, at least I got to charge into a bunch of enemy's face-first, and I will always cherish Mass Effect Andromeda for that.

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