Most Overrated Game of 2007: Mass Effect
Dear Bioware,
Back in 1998, I rushed out on Christmas Eve to pick up Baldur’s Gate at FedEx so that I could play it over the holiday. Looking back, it is still one of the best, most exciting RPG experiences I’ve ever had, and it was eventually overshadowed by its siblings, Baldur’s Gate II: Shadows of Amn, Baldur’s Gate II: Throne of Bhaal. But ever since you abandoned the 2-D Infinity Engine, your games have been declining in quality.
Yes, I know Neverwinter Nights was designed to be a toolset, and the campaign that came with it was meant to show would-be game developers what they could make, but the fundamental play mechanics were flawed. It was like you forgot the strategy and party-management elements of Baldur’s Gate and churned out a 3-D Diablo clone.
And then there’s Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, so beloved because it was a Star Wars licensed game that didn’t suck. But overall, it was a shallow, dumbed down version of Baldur’s Gate in 3-D — those of us who spent hundreds of hours of your old games couldn’t help but feel disappointed by the lack of depth. Jade Empire was a total misstep, but then you promised us Mass Effect — a scifi RPG to rival Baldur’s Gate, a monstrous XBOX 360 exclusive that would make us all believe in you again.
Despite all the hype and good press, I have to say that Mass Effect was a dumbed down and simplified version of Knights of the Old Republic — not exactly strong praise. The party system is even more bare bones than KOTOR — making me wonder why it was even included. Why have party members you can’t micromanage? Yeah, you can tell them who to shoot, but it’s so cumbersome and so weak, that you might as well just let them run into to walls on their own without giving them orders only to see them do the same.
Sure, you’ve got some pretty nifty dialogue trees, but without the gameplay to back it up, it’s just a choose your own adventure story. Every second I play this game, I think back to how Baldur’s Gate made me believe that the world was real — and made me care about each and every one of its characters. BG’s Minsc is still the finest NPC ever made in an American RPG, only to be rivaled by the evil droid in KOTOR. There’s no one here like that. I haven’t played BG in about five years, but I still remember Imoen, Minsc, Jaheira, and Aerie — I can’t say the same for ME, a game I played a few weeks ago.
I haven’t even gotten into the broken game engine with its frame rate problems. Any first person shooter as many hiccups as ME would be taken out and shot by the fanbase, yet the players all praise the genius of ME despite the fact that it runs like a dog.
I wanted to like the game — I really did. But at the end of the day, it’s just not very good. Oblivion, which came out shortly after launch, is still the superior RPG. I could play that game for the next ten years and still find new things to do and enjoy. Mass Effect, not so much.
