More Mass Effect: Andromeda

I'm starting to worry about this game. At around 30 hours in, I finally got to the big reveal about who the Kett are and what they've been doing, and it was pretty satisfying. A good combination of horrifying and comprehensible, using a weird sci-fi technology and with some intriguing philosophical implications. And because of that, I estimate that the chances of this game ending on anything but a cliffhanger to be approximately 2%.

Call it cynicism, if you will, but the timing of the revelation was suggestive. There are six planets to explore in this game, and I'd just finished the third. So at almost exactly halfway through the game there's this dramatic reveal that completely changes the context of what you're doing while simultaneously raising the stakes. It was both welcome and proper, but . . . The story mission for the next planet revolves around finding a transponder that will allow you to track down the leader of the Kett.

In other words, they burned about 1/6th of the game's content on what is essentially a delaying tactic. Over the course of this mission, I've learned absolutely nothing new about the Kett or their sinister mission. After 30 hours, the villain finally gets a name and a face, and now the game is spinning its wheels before letting me confront him.

Let's just say, I recognize a pattern here. I'm going to fight through all these arbitrary obstacles and achieve some major victory that allows the Andromeda Initiative to get a foothold in the Helius cluster . . .  only to learn that the real threat has yet to make itself known. And don't get me wrong. It worked great in the original Mass Effect. That whole sequence starting in Virmire and going up to the end of the game was amazing. You get the coldly creepy introduction to the Reapers and then some political intrigue back at the Citadel only to follow up with learning the truth about the Protheans and appreciating the story's true epochal scope, and you end with a tense final mission set against the backdrop of a spectacular space battle with hard moral choices, and memorable visuals and music. Sure, it all added up to a huge sequel hook, but I loved it.

Which brings us back to Mass Effect: Andromeda. I can see the same pattern emerging. I'm certain that the last 20% of the game will up the intensity dramatically, and I would ordinarily be totally on board with that, except that I'm playing this game eight months after it was released, and so I already know that a sequel is unlikely. It's an entirely different thing to experience a thrilling cliffhanger when you know that the resolution is never going to come.

I guess I'll just have to try and enjoy it while I can. And who knows, maybe my worry here is unfounded. Maybe Mass Effect: Andromeda will have a perfectly satisfying story in its own right and the only thing I'll be left hungry for, come the end, is more time in the Mass Effect universe. That would be nice.