Commander’s Log – Entry 1 – 2185CE
The date shocks me as I stare at it. Two years, two years since my last entry. Have I really been gone that long? Locked in a prison of my own body. In a coma they said. Dead others say.
Cerberus revived me to fight a war with no name against an enemy very few believe exist. A war I would never have seen if they had left me to die along with the original Normandy. I say original because I now sit in a copy, a hacked duplicate of my original beloved ship. Some things are the same, others – like the crew – so different. I have just returned from recruiting my first companion Mordin Solus the salarian geneticist who can supposedly help us fight the Collectors. He is the first of the Illusive Man’s party that I am to claim as my own. By rights, I should be choosing my own people, not following his orders but it seems for now, I have no choice. As told Joker, I got lucky surviving what I did. But, that luck comes with a collar and lease. I am, for now, a Cerberus agent.
A dog…
This is the mental dialogue I find myself imagining that my Commander Sheppard from Mass Effect 2 has with herself. I’m about five hours into the game. I had been 14, but then I found a way to download the Cerberus Network and restarted my game to make use of their Dark Horse Comic feature. Confused? Let me elaborate.
The Exciting.
This game might well become one of my favourites to date, knocking FallOut 3 out of its place (but let’s not get hasty). The dialogue is good, the system runs relatively well on the PS3 and as expected the dialogue is great. I love the details of the interpersonal relationships that you as Commander Sheppard can form with your crew. You also see old faces, link up with old friends from the first Mass Effect game and you have a nice, big and shiny new Normandy (even though you’ve had to endure seeing the first one blow up). All in all, this game is great and it might well keep me busy for months to come.
The Irritating.
As I’ve said before, when I just started playing this game, the copyright by Mass Effect 1 is held by Microsoft which means that it will never be released on PS3. Bioware overcame this issue by bringing out the PlayStation version of this game with an interactive comic book which gives you a broad overview of the first game. I’m saying broad because it takes what had been about a 100+ worth of gaming hours and reduced it to a 10minute comic. But, it does allow you to start your Mass Effect 2 game with the basic important choices of the first game in tact namely which of your crew members to save and who you want your primary romance to be. It redeems a lot of the game play which I found vexing in the beginning of my first start of the game. (For instance, I had chosen to sacrifice Kaiden Alenko instead of Ashley Williams, the default Mass Effect 2 start for a female Sheppard has it the opposite). But, the downside to this light is that you have to download this content despite the fact that they claim it comes with the game. Now, unlike in America, not all South African households have WiFi and more to the point, we pay quite a lot per megabite that we download (if you are your normal run of the mill household that does not possess an uncapped line). I decided – for the sake of the game, that I would try to download this pack but I had to MacGuyver my PS3 and my laptop together. Then, I had to fix my Vodacom Internet line and eventually jerry rig the whole system because my work computer that I was trapped on wouldn’t do what I want. Long story short – it was a LOT of trouble and throughout the 675MB download I kept praying that for some or other reason my connection wouldn’t be severed (which meant that I would have to pay for everything again). There, I have to say that Bioware and EA games were really REALLY stupid and short sighted. Even the ‘Game of the Year’ edition of Fallout 3 came with all the Downloadable content in game.
But, it didn’t irritate me for long and now I have the full benefits of the Cerberus network which is well worth the download. J
I will keep you updated on my progress and if you are interested, give you more ‘Commander’ Logs.
Happy gaming everybody.
Alyssa's Blog 
Keep us updated. Mass Effect 2 really IS my favourite game to date.
I can see why!
As a 360 owner, I can tell you that a mere comic doesn’t compare to the experience of playing ME1. Then again, the two games are very different in game play (especially the tactical use of powers). I always used MaleShep (for obvious reasons) and I tried to use FemShep but I found her voice annoying (I guess it’s just me).
Also seeing how the choices on the first game impact the second give it a sense of legacy. I downloaded The Arrival and will download Lair of the Shadowbroker soon, as I prefer Liara to Ashely (too racist for my taste).
But Bioware have outdone themselves in this series, too bad that the next game release got pushed back to Spring 2012 (in North America).
Oh well….
I’ll just replay ME2 for the elbenty time.
😀
I played ME1 on PC and yes, lol, I know that the comic doesn’t do it justice. But, as a PS3 owner I’m happy that we could at least bring something of our previous characters through. The only thing that really vexes me is my Paragorn/Renegade score that I’m loosing.
lol, I romanced Liara as well purely because Kaiden irritated me. I have to say, I prefer FemShep to MaleShep. I love her voice and espesually if you play paragorn she really shows belivable compassion. With the PC game I played MS1 through one male and one female and the final speech delivered by FemShep was amazing. It was just amazing. So, she won me over. I’ll now be FemShep till the world ends (or is saved). It is a shame about the game being pushed back – I had figured that it would be excellent timing for me. I’ll finish the game by September and then go directly to ME3 (which us PS3 owners will get at the same time as you guys, lol).
Well I downloaded Lair of the Shadow Broker and Bring Down the Sky, an excuse to play ME1 and 2 back to back (again.) Will see what 3 brings.
I can’t wait!