Capping off an unusually big January for triple-A games is BioWare's hugely anticipated RPG-shooter Mass Effect 2. Now available worldwide for Xbox 360 and unlike the first Mass Effect simultaneously launched for Windows PC as well.

Mass Effect 2 continues the epic sci-fi tale that puts the player in control of decisions with galactic consequences. With well over 20 hours of gameplay, this is a game game that deserves a real in-depth critique and that's precisely what we hope you'll find in AusGamers Mass Effect 2 review.

ive started it this morning, its f***ing awesome.

sheppard looks exactly like me!

Awesome game, alot of hard choices to make later on, some have made me really s***ty with myself after making the choices, especially the way it autosaves straight after you made the choice, and if you wernt smart enough to save prior to that then your f***ed.

Other then that the story is way better this time around and you can feel the effects of what happened in the previous game quite well through out the universe...

i just wish id played mass effect recently and kept my save file so some of the choices i made were still in effect in mass effect 2, in saying that though.. all the choices are made were pretty much what had been made with the default chacter in mass effect 2, so its not a huge loss.

Yeah, I managed to piss off that Aussie chick for good when she had a fight with another crew member, didn't have the paragon/renegade score to settle it peacefully. Everyone else is happy with me though.

yer, i wish i had my save game still too :(

so is this the "empire strikes back" of the series?

Yeah, I managed to piss off that Aussie chick for good when she had a fight with another crew member, didn't have the paragon/renegade score to settle it peacefully. Everyone else is happy with me though.

Thats the instance i was talking about
Spoiler:
however i reloaded my game and decided to take miranda's side instead of jack's... best thing ever.. cause now if i work my paragon up i can convince her i was just saying it to come off cool

so is this the "empire strikes back" of the series?

If you mean "sequel that's better than the first", then yes.

groganus: Well... Spoiler:
The same is true with Miranda, I've just been unable to raise my paragon/renegade score enough to win her back. I'm pretty even for paragon/renegade, need to be closer to the extremes

how did u guys buy it? steam? how big is the download?


"props" to ausgamers for listing all the prices on the "buy it now" tab

Mantorok - i nearly have full paragon and im yet to recruit the last member of my squad and complete grunt and that dumb lab dudes personal missions or thanes.

Yeah i pissed miranda off too, not quite full paragon yet, so i can't win her back, but in the meantime i have been working on tali, but she wont give it up yet because she is afraid of syphilis or something, but she has that burqua mystique thing going on and i'll find out whats under that mask even if it kills her.

Kelly (the personal assistant) is pretty easy to flirt with.

where is this 'buy it now tab'?

http://www.ausgamers.com/games/mass-effect-2/buy/ yo!

Note: gamelane is apparently a grey importer; they are getting dropped from our list soon pending further discussion about how to deal with them.

Loving this game atm.
Such a vast improvement over the first.

Btw the d/l was 11gb on steam

Whose crazy idea was the price list?

Skipped through all above posts to say that me and a mate are just playing through the original now. We're behind schedule...enjoying it though.

I never played the first so I feel like I have missed a bunch of back story, but I'm still really enjoying this one. It has a great cinematic quality to it.

sold. downloading now.

mad idea with the "buy tab" trog, quick and easy way to see a price comparison.

Its so cheap on steam, but my savegames are on my 360 :(

Without spoiling ME2, can someone who's played through it tell me how much impact the choices you made in ME1 actually change the game, if you import your savegame?

I didn't import a save game, but there were parts in me2 where someone who i saved in me1 was dead which i guess is fairly noticable, but for a lot of the references it was just "oh yeah i vaguely remember blowing something up" because i played the original aaaages ago.

I guess one of the major plot points at the end of me1 was whether or not you saved the council, without a save from me1 the game assumes you let them die (which i did anyway, c***s), wonder what the difference is if you saved them in me1? Probably something cheesy like humans taking control anyway, and the game plays out the same way?

I imported my save game, and so far I've encountered loads of people/things I saved in ME1 (went full paragon path in ME1). Its pretty cool, it seems to have a fairly big impact on the way the universe is setup. I'm only 7hrs into the game too.

I also recall in an interview on majornelson podcast they said that some of the results from your choices in ME1 wont be visible until ME3, so well worth importing the save game.

Mass Effect Saves for PC

Without spoiling ME2, can someone who's played through it tell me how much impact the choices you made in ME1 actually change the game, if you import your savegame?

standard mass effect 2 character...
note* dont read if you havent played mass effect one
Spoiler:

wrex is dead.
kaidon is dead.
you f***ed ashley williams.
you let the council die and an all human council now exists.


pretty much the grunt of it.

ahh "grunt" of it.

Already clocked up 27 hours and 37 minutes. The missus just kicked me off so she could play the Wii when she found out, hahahaha.

So let me get this straight - if I never finished ME1, I could still happily enjoy ME2? It fills in the blanks quite nicely from the previous game?

Playing the first one is a good idea, a lot of the character reference don't make much sense other wise. Like how Saren was your father and that.

Already clocked up 27 hours and 37 minutes. The missus just kicked me off so she could play the Wii when she found out, hahahaha.

WHAT! completed 100% in 25hours and 40minutes..... thats with doing every quest and going to every planet, and getting every upgrade *well all thats available with one play through*

Brilliant game.

have any of you guys had trouble loggin into cerberus in the menu?

WHAT! completed 100% in 25hours and 40minutes

Spose it also depends how fast you move through the game though, and if you're reading all the codex entries, etc. Like I've heard people who played Dragon Age and completed all the quests and stuff on their first playthrough and did the game in 30 - 40 hours, whereas for me it took almost 70 hours for my first playthrough. I guess I just stroll pretty casually through rpgs :P

i wouldnt say i rushed, i took my time playing it... i cant say i read the codex though... some things i wanted to know more about.. but not everything.

I'm glad I bought this on PC instead of keeping with the xbox despite losing my saves. The game play is 100% better, plus it looks fantastic.

plus it looks fantastic.

i thought it looked pretty much like the first one

plus it looks fantastic.

i thought it looked pretty much like the first one

+1

also, someone make a thread so we can talk about spoilers.

Don't romance tali, you get gipped by the gypsy.
You don't even see her face, i'm not going to spoiler that, i consider it a public service announcement so people don't waste their time.

You mean I've been trying to f*** that 3 toed sloth for nothing!?

Unless she is going to give you the shocker with those three toes, then yes.

i thought it looked pretty much like the first one

I'm comparing between Xbox and PC. I have no idea what Mass Effect 1 looks like on PC or what Mass Effect 2 looks like on Xbox, all I know is that Mass Effect 2 looks much better on PC than Mass Effect 1 did on Xbox.

Yeah, I ended up buying it on Steam last night, couldn't justify spending the $40 - $50 extra to get it on 360 just to carry over my saves. Only played it for a little bit last night, but so far it seems most of the choices are the same as what I made in ME1, except I f***ed the blue chick, not the racist bitch.

deadlyf - Comparing PC to PC it looks better.