Mass Effect 3 demo review (or rather preview?)

[NixOlympica]

So yesterday ME 3 demo came out and I will say right from beginning it's definitely not flawless for me, I would even risk saying, it's rather mediocre but let's get to the point.

After spending whole evening where the hell is the download link because other people already said they are playing I found it out on Origin, here is one thing I would like to congratulate to EA, no origin freezes and I even had my full download speed, that is something I did not expect.

Since I also pre-ordered BF 3 I can test that one too but I will get to it a bit later.

I downloaded in circa 30 minutes and then drooling started the game. The demo menu is rather simple. SP demo, multiplayer, options (You can't change graphic options except for brightness and such, which is a bit weird) and that's about it.

SP demo here we go. Since the demo doesn't have save support from previous titles, you pick up a female/male (you can customize them as you like), class and brief history as known from previous titles (spacer, colonist/war hero, ruthless etc) and also thing that affected your Shepard (three options: Death of Ashley/Kaideen/more losses in squad - this will most definitely decide who you see in game, since you meet Ashley right at the beginning) and then you go right away in.

In short, Shepard is grounded, colonies go dark, Hatchett calls for mobilization and you are called to meet the defense committee. You have a chance to see the new teammate as well as face-lifted Ashley (personally I really don't like it). And here come my first complains.

The cinematic parts - I don't know maybe its me, but the ME 2 looked just better, the face movement of characters is rather... weird, it somehow looks like if they wanted to have super detailed faces and then said "I am too lazy" and did the rest in MS Paint (metaphor of course)

The dialog wheel now has just two options (in whole demo part!).

Frightened defense buro asks Shepard what to do when the first wow moment happens - Reaper attack live.

Here you get first to control, you run with Anderson to your ship where Ashley awaits you.


First two seconds and I was again D:, Andersons movement was just... akward, I am not picking up details really it just hit me on first look.

Male Shepard's looked rather fine, but then when playing female Shepard? I have nothing against large bottoms really, but do I have to have her ass on half of my screen? (needles to say, such a close zoom is only in this part - but still, it really hits your eyes)

The second wow moment was Reaper two shotting a human Dreadnought, scripted but it makes the effect,

After you get to Normandy, you get fast skipped in the story to the point where you are saving the Krogan female. Your teammates are Garrus (Huzzah!) Liara (Yay) and to make me most happy Wrex (sadly he is on the mission with you but not as a part of your squad). Concerning this mission I have nothing to say really, it's a basic push and defend one, so I will get back to basics.




Combat, yeah, that is the thing that matters me most, the reworked cover system is just ... I might admit it's just me but it feels terribly clunky, Shepard covers when you want him to shoot, aims when you want to leave the cover and so long and so long, at first it looks really similar to ME 2 one but it's just ....

Different.

I think that will be all for now, feel free to comment and don't forget this is my personal opinion. I will get to the MP part in another post.