You may have noticed one or two trailers for Mass Effect 2 recently. One or two a day. And it's arriving very soon – the 29th of this month in fact. So RPS grabbed the opportunity to speak to lead gameplay designer Christina Norman to ask a few questions that have sprung up in the last couple of months. Here you find out a bit more detail about why certain combat decisions were made, why players might choose to die on purpose, whether Jennifer Hale will return as the female Shepard, and the possibility of lizards in bikinis.
RPGs are often huge, sprawling endeavours. With limited playtime, we have to choose wisely, so here's the best western RPGs available today.
"I started playing games yesterday" the List... Meh!
How about a few RPGs that deserve some love instead?
1 - Alpha Protocol - Now on GOG
2 - else Heart.Break()
3 - Shadowrun Trilogy
4 - Wasteland 2
5 - UnderRail
6 - Tyranny
7 - Torment: Tides of Numenera
And for a bonus game that flew under the radar:
8 - Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden
Not only glorious jank, but the idea that the story can completely change depending on what you do, or say, or side with, makes it one of the most forward thinking games ever. The amount of story permutation is the equivalent of a Hitman level but in Story Form. And it wasn't just that the story changed, no, it was that you met completely new characters, or missed them, depending on your choices. Made Mass Effect feel static in comparison.
Alpha Protocol was absolutely glorious, indeed. And it was, and still is, more Next Gen than most anything out there these days. In this regard at least.
Pity.
Wealth of Geeks explores some of the best gaming romances that have stolen our hearts over the years.
Diandra worked on Diablo 4 and also other games at Blizzard including WoW: Dragon Flight. She’s also been at Bioware, Carbine, RIOT, and she is currently working at Crystal Dynamics.
Brian was the Lead Writer on Diablo 3 Reaper of Souls, worked on StarCraft: Heart of the Swarm, StarCraft: Wings of Liberty, and was also a writer on Mass Effect 2. He’s also been involved in movies such as the Iron Giant.
Diandra and Brian discuss their industry experience, the games they have worked on, how the writing process works, and much more.
Hopefully they made a typo with the release date of the 29th because I am ready to bust this one open on the 26th.
US release date is 26th but UK is 29th. BTW a quote from the article (one of the questions)
"RPS: There have been a number of changes made to various aspects of using equipment, from the heat sinks for weapons to the removal of weapon and armour skills. How did you go about making decisions over which elements to change?"
Is this a joke? They removed "HEALTH BAR" and now they also removed weapon and armor skills? And she says that team didn't want to alienate hardcore RPG fans. Now I certainly feel alienated as a RPG and a Mass Effect fan. What kind of mentally sick developer would remove the most important aspects of RPGs to make their game look more appealing to the action loving crowd? I must admit; I loved some of the new things they added, like less cooldown times for biotic powers and location based hit reactions. But other decisions looks like they actually wanted an action game with a little bit of RPG feel. Gonna buy the game (probably Collector's Edition) of course but I hope I won't be disappointed.