Mass Effect 3 (Seriously, Use Spoilers People!)

[mosc]

I'm sure you can cancel your pre-order and open a new one up. I've done that before.

[Belial]

Unfortunately, amazon is out of CE preorders, so if you cancel yours it is basically gone.

That said, they often fix the "a better deal became available after your preorder went through" issues after the game ships. Watch for emails. They sent me a 20 dollar credit after Amalur shipped, for much the same reason

[An Enraged Platypus]

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/33 ... eneral-RSS

Tl;DR Game and Gamestation are not stocking ME3.

[Yakk]

The only remaining Canadian store that sells ME3:CE is Future Shop that I've found, in case any Canuks still want the CE.

[SirBryghtside]

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/337786/mass-effect-3-pre-order-at-game-here-are-the-alternatives/?cid=OTC-RSS&attr=CVG-General-RSS

Tl;DR Game and Gamestation are not stocking ME3.

Just found this out about an hour ago, and preordered off Amazon instead. It's a little silly how this is the first game I've ever had to pay to preorder from the store, and I'm going to have to get a refund

[Ghostbear]

Just found this out about an hour ago, and preordered off Amazon instead. It's a little silly how this is the first game I've ever had to pay to preorder from the store, and I'm going to have to get a refund

According to what I read, they won't be offering you a refund- only store credit. I'd hope that UK law say that they do have to offer you a real refund legally, but I wouldn't actually know.

[mosc]

God damnit, why can't they just sell it on steam. Do they realize I'd rather pay $5 more for a steam copy than $5 less for an origin one?

[EvanED]

God damnit, why can't they just sell it on steam. Do they realize I'd rather pay $5 more for a steam copy than $5 less for an origin one?

I won't be buying it on Origins until it comes down in price. As much as it pains me so.

(I'll post a long explanation of this later.)

[An Enraged Platypus]

In light of not having a valid preorder any more, I am deeply tempted to live under a rock for a year or two to avoid spoilers, and buy this when I can afford a rig that can beat Ultra graphics into submission. I'm going to pop into Game tomorrow and see what's up with reimbursement for the preorder charge.

[SecondTalon]

God damnit, why can't they just sell it on steam. Do they realize I'd rather pay $5 more for a steam copy than $5 less for an origin one?

They looked at the phat loot Valve pulls in through Steam and rather than taking their cut, they want the whole pie.

That's.. really what it boils down to.

On the other hand, them moving completely over to Origin makes my "Half-assed attempt to never buy an EA game again" initiative a hell of a lot easier on my part.

[mosc]

Well, make them sell off bioware and I'll join you. I can't help it if they make such awesome games.

[maybeagnostic]

This is the first time I am considering buying a game before it goes on sale so I started looking at the different preorder options and... I am a little confused. So From Ashes is a $10 DLC that you get for free if and only if you preorder a Collector's Edition? Since the only other thing from the CE I might care about is the alternative appearances for teammates is there a way to see what they are?

[Lucrece]

In the bioware official site you have a trailer for the CE showing you all the items.

What I find preposterous is that they have taken this a step further, and they're now not rewarding those who purchase new -- they're punishing those who don't purchase collector's. And physical collectors are limited.

They're withholding DLC from people willing to buy full price for the regular game, and that's a fairly dangerous practice, particularly when you're forcing people to pay $20 extra, or pay half of that and just get the DLC sans the CE perks.

Hell, an $80 digital deluxe edition is ludicrous. The physical CE somehow justifies the xtra $20, but there's no reason the digital version, without boxing or any of the material costs of producing a special version merits the same cost as the physical version.

It's why I will wait two or four months when the prices drop. They even had prior seasonal offers where you could get ME2 digital deluxe for $10 on Origin, and that's likely to happen if I just hold off for December -- it's not like I'm without any other games to distract me until then, especially GW2.

It does piss me off that people are moaning about deplorable business practices, and yet CE's are sold out and I bet sales on the regular, even having to pay extra for DLC, will happen because people gotta have what they want to have NOW at the expense of standing by principle. So, don't bitch about companies' unscrupulous antics when you're enabling them.

It's why games that could previously sell for $40-45 bumped to $50 and now went a full $10 up to $60 average. Because people are still willing to pay.

[Yakk]

I know! They are withholding content and offering extra content for extra money! How dare they!

By giving them some amount of money that I deem reasonable, they are obligated to hand over all content that they have ever done that is related to the thing I deem I am buying. If they don't do that, they are evil incarnate. If they raise prices, they are evil incarnate. If they produce DLC and charge for it at the same time as producing a game, they are evil incarnate.

This means war. War I say! War! People with more money, or willing to spend more money, shouldn't get better or more things!

[Xeio]

What I find preposterous is that they have taken this a step further, and they're now not rewarding those who purchase new.

Project 10 dollar is still in effect. It's just that multiplayer fulfills that requirement now for ME3.

[Belial]

It's why games that could previously sell for $40-45 bumped to $50 and now went a full $10 up to $60 average. Because people are still willing to pay.

I'm mostly baffled by the fact that people expect mass effect 3 to cost the same as madden 2012 or the latest random shovelware

[Lucrece]

I know! They are withholding content and offering extra content for extra money! How dare they!

By giving them some amount of money that I deem reasonable, they are obligated to hand over all content that they have ever done that is related to the thing I deem I am buying. If they don't do that, they are evil incarnate. If they raise prices, they are evil incarnate. If they produce DLC and charge for it at the same time as producing a game, they are evil incarnate.

This means war. War I say! War! People with more money, or willing to spend more money, shouldn't get better or more things!

Or it means that a member and mission of a race critical to the storyline, fucking Protheans, and ME universe's debut shouldn't be exclusive to Collector's Edition.

Somehow the ME2 model you've completely glossed over means "handing out all content".

But I guess it's more fun to be a smug cunt and call people entitled and place yourself among the reasonable few who don't want to screw developers out of their money.

It's why games that could previously sell for $40-45 bumped to $50 and now went a full $10 up to $60 average. Because people are still willing to pay.

I'm mostly baffled by the fact that people expect mass effect 3 to cost the same as madden 2012 or the latest random shovelware

I recall buying Super Mario Galaxy for $50, and I would not call that shovelware. ME3 does not cost $60 because it's necessary -- the publishers and distributors just discover that gamers are more bothered about not getting a highly anticipated game than by an increase to a previously working price.

Mind, I'm not singling ME3 out for the cost increase to games now. I just brought that point out of annoyance with people who are happy to whine about stunts like the Porthean Day 1 DLC being unavailable to NEW game buyers, yet willing to fork over the money and rendering the complaint moot in the process.

It's not that they can't even increase their prices. It's the notion that when people notice and organize to say "Nice try", somehow it's the customer being a rich but stingy brat wanting to hoard more money while the game industry starves and loses jobs.

[Enokh]

So, tried the Engineer so I could see how the whole turret and drone bit worked out. Was nicely surprised during the first part of the demo, when I could drop my drone, fire off some shots, throw an Incinerate, and jump between firing a bit and setting things on fire -- the cooldown for my abilities was a whole 2 or 3 seconds.

Then I jump to the second part, where you're level 12, and as I'm leveling up I suddenly notice that the cooldowns are more to the order of ~30 seconds (before upgrades). I'm. . confused. The damage seemed to increase as well, which is good as that's kind of how it should be when you level, but. . .cooldowns increasing because you're a higher level? That seems like a pretty terrible idea. I'm not even saying that 2-3 second cooldowns are alright, as in the first section I was ended up ignoring that I had a gun (except for the part that triggers when you run out of ammo) so I could throw fireballs at people all day long. But 20-30 seconds is WAY too long. Perhaps there are equipment upgrades that give you "bonuses" to cooldown, to keep it from getting so high? Or maybe there's something else I'm missing?

[An Enraged Platypus]

So, tried the Engineer so I could see how the whole turret and drone bit worked out. Was nicely surprised during the first part of the demo, when I could drop my drone, fire off some shots, throw an Incinerate, and jump between firing a bit and setting things on fire -- the cooldown for my abilities was a whole 2 or 3 seconds.

Then I jump to the second part, where you're level 12, and as I'm leveling up I suddenly notice that the cooldowns are more to the order of ~30 seconds (before upgrades). I'm. . confused. The damage seemed to increase as well, which is good as that's kind of how it should be when you level, but. . .cooldowns increasing because you're a higher level? That seems like a pretty terrible idea. I'm not even saying that 2-3 second cooldowns are alright, as in the first section I was ended up ignoring that I had a gun (except for the part that triggers when you run out of ammo) so I could throw fireballs at people all day long. But 20-30 seconds is WAY too long. Perhaps there are equipment upgrades that give you "bonuses" to cooldown, to keep it from getting so high? Or maybe there's something else I'm missing?

It's because you are locked into having particular weapons for that section. In ME3 your cooldown lengths are tied to the combined weight of all the weapons you are carrying; the higher the weight, the longer the cooldown. Engineers got it in the shorts for part 2 because you're forced into carrying four weapons, including two of the heavier shotguns and assault rifles. In the release version, an engineer will be able to pare his inventory down to one or two weapons, which will bring the cooldowns back into line.

[Enokh]

Well that's a relief! Though that. . .seems an odd way to do it, thematically. Makes sense from balance standpoint, I suppose, since now anyone can use any weapon just as well as anyone else (with the exception of Infiltrators being better at Snipers), but I'm not sure I actually like that system in the first place.

So Adept rocking just a pistol sounds like fun!

[Yakk]

Or it means that a member and mission of a race critical to the storyline, fucking Protheans, and ME universe's debut shouldn't be exclusive to Collector's Edition.

First, why shouldn't it have content in it that is important?

Second, that content isn't actually exclusive to the collector's edition.

Somehow the ME2 model you've completely glossed over means "handing out all content".

No, I didn't mention the ME2 model. Somehow, you found the words "ME2" in my sarcasm above.

I can list a set of ways you could have gotten "ME2" from my above bit of sarcasm.

You could assume I'm telepathic, and I read ME2 from your mind when you where writing your previous post, and as such I must be referring to it in my post.

You could be telepathic, and have read my mind, discovering my hidden ME2 meaning in my above post.

You could also have decoded my secret text:

I know! They are withholding content and offering extra content for extra Money! How dAre they!

By giving them some amount of money that I deem reaSonable, they are obligated to hand over all content that they have ever done that is related to the thing I deem I am buying. If they don't do that, they are evil incarnate. If they raise prices, they are evil incarnate. If they produce DLC and charge for it at the same time as producing a game, they are evil incarnate.

This means war. War I say! War! People with more money, or willing to spend more money, shouldn't get better or more things!

You caught me.

But I guess it's more fun to be a smug cunt and call people entitled and place yourself among the reasonable few who don't want to screw developers out of their money.

You wound me.

I recall buying Super Mario Galaxy for $50, and I would not call that shovelware.

I remember getting it for free. It a pretty large number of years ago -- call it 6. At 2% inflation per year, that's 1.02^6 = 1.126, times 50$ is 56.31$.

Or, (60/50)^(1/6) = 1.0308533208864445745113175938963, or a 3.09% increase per year on average.

Seems like a reasonable price growth rate for a niche portion of the economy, and insofar as a pretty polished arcade-style game like SMG can be compared to a polished cinematic game like ME3.

ME3 does not cost $60 because it's necessary

Of course not. Nobody but an idiot prices things based on what is necessary. That is a great way to go out of business, and make less profits if you do stay in business. You price things to get the most money you can while still not losing customers to competitors.

Mind, I'm not singling ME3 out for the cost increase to games now. I just brought that point out of annoyance with people who are happy to whine about stunts like the Porthean Day 1 DLC being unavailable to NEW game buyers, yet willing to fork over the money and rendering the complaint moot in the process.

I really don't understand this sentence.

It's not that they can't even increase their prices. It's the notion that when people notice and organize to say "Nice try", somehow it's the customer being a rich but stingy brat wanting to hoard more money while the game industry starves and loses jobs.

It is a luxury good, mate. Feel free to organize all you want, and I'll feel free to make fun of people who organize and protest about luxury good pricing models.

They want to be able to offer tiered pricing in order to engage in price discrimination based off of marginal willingness to pay for a computer game. This will reduce the surplus value of people who have a high marginal willingness to play, and/or would get the most of of the content. So no, it isn't good for game addicts and obsessives, especially poor ones. And said game addicts and obsessives tend to be loud about their whines, understandably.

If the content isn't worth buying, I simply don't buy it. This means I don't get everything I could possibly want, and I am ok with that -- I don't need every do-dad. And if someone wants to organize some huge boycott about how wrong it is to have a certain DLC pricing model, I won't be a supporter.

[maybeagnostic]

Well that's a relief! Though that. . .seems an odd way to do it, thematically. Makes sense from balance standpoint, I suppose, since now anyone can use any weapon just as well as anyone else (with the exception of Infiltrators being better at Snipers), but I'm not sure I actually like that system in the first place.

So Adept rocking just a pistol sounds like fun!

My main concern is that all classes have useful abilities so there is no point in carrying more than one or at most two weapons. Multiplayer kind of confirms that as almost everyone just has one weapon except for a few people with both a sniper rifle and pistol. In many cases you can get away with just a sniper rifle and heavy melee so even snipers mostly only carry the rifle. It also seems to make shotguns and SMGs rather useless because they are only good at short range unlike assault rifles and pistols which are equally good at short and long(ish) range.

The cd modification is based on fraction of the maximum weight currently carried and seems to run from -200% (i think this is 1/3 of base because it definitely isn't negative like it seems to imply) to +100% (double the base?) depending on how much weight your character is carrying. There is also a skill every class has (at least in multiplayer) that... well, does several things but one of them is to increase weight capacity so raising that means shorter cds with the same equipment.

[Belial]

The difference is that, for the high weight capacity classes (soldier especially), the added flexibility of a couple more weapon types (smgs to take down shields, shotguns to handle barriers and soft targets, snipers for distance) easily edges out the slight decrease to cooldown time.

As it should be.

[ArgonV]

Besides, soldiers mostly have passive powers or powers without cooldown (grenades), so an increase in cooldown time isn't really a problem

[Yakk]

I'm not all that confident they balanced it extremely well. It would be really, really easy to make your effective weight limit 1/3 of your actual weight limit, to the point that even soldiers cannot really use a decent loadout of equipment.

On the other hand, they could now make pistols a "crappy assault rifle" option (a general purpose weapon, usable at short and long range, against flesh, armor and shields half-decently), and make them attractive by making them light. I don't have much confidence in it, however -- as demonstrated by the multiplayer, short cool-downs for many classes seems to dominate over using weapons. I'm a bit concerned for the hybrid soldier+non-soldier classes, who relied on an increased ability to use weapons in previous versions of ME to compete with the pure-caster classes, which might end up not having the weight capacity to handle it?

[maybeagnostic]

Ah, classes have different base weight capacity. That makes a lot of sense. I just assumed adding a sniper rifle doubles cooldowns for everyone the way it does for my engineer and infiltrator. I have a vanguard with a shotgun but he is even more dependent on quick cds than the engineer and infiltrator.

Sudden switch of topic- so what's up with Cerberus? At the end of ME2 EDI tells you Cerberus currently has four cells with a total of 200 agents and the Illusive Man always keeps it at roughly that size. The Normandy is one of those and Project Overlord is presumably another. They probably have ~100 agents between the two of them so where do all the Cerberus commandos come from? I can accept there was a commando cell sent out to kill the krogan for some reason but the multiplayer seems to imply Cerberus is actually a major enemy with lots of forces.

[SecondTalon]

Lucrece, Yakk

This thread is becoming tiresome for me to read. Knock it off.


Love and Snuggles,

SexyTalon

[Belial]

Sudden switch of topic- so what's up with Cerberus? At the end of ME2 EDI tells you Cerberus currently has four cells with a total of 200 agents and the Illusive Man always keeps it at roughly that size. The Normandy is one of those and Project Overlord is presumably another. They probably have ~100 agents between the two of them so where do all the Cerberus commandos come from? I can accept there was a commando cell sent out to kill the krogan for some reason but the multiplayer seems to imply Cerberus is actually a major enemy with lots of forces.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that, shortly after the collector incident, they started recruiting much more openly and in earnest.

Let me see...

CITADEL – A report by the salarian Special Tasks Group, warning of the increasing danger of human-supremacist group Cerberus, is garnering attention in the halls of the Citadel Tower. ANN has agreed not to publish the classified report’s contents, but experts within the STG, speaking on condition of anonymity, warn that what was once considered a small and extremely select group has grown drastically in size and power. “There has always been a segment of the human population that believes the Council government is lying to them,” said one agent. “Cerberus exploits that fear.” A confiscated recruitment video included in the report states the Cerberus mentality plainly: “Other species may talk with us, trade with us, even live with us, but when a crisis comes, we are on our own.”
Critics of the report are quick to point out its flaws. “This report covers ground that Spectre intelligence has already covered,” said one Tower insider. ”We know Cerberus has the ability to field many troops, build a stealth frigate, and conduct groundbreaking research. It’s been clear for months, even years, that Cerberus is growing in numbers, but when it comes to how Cerberus are able to do all this, STG only says, ‘we don’t know yet.’ It is past the point where that is acceptable.”

And some stuff suggested in the comics implies that, whether the collector base was saved or not, the Illusive Man has been sending ships through the Omega Relay to scavenge the debris field. My educated guess is that his plan has changed to "destabilize any resistance to the reapers, then retreat through the relay and twiddle our thumbs while the Reapers wipe out all non-humans. Re-emerge later, rule galaxy."

[Xanthir]

Well that's a relief! Though that. . .seems an odd way to do it, thematically. Makes sense from balance standpoint, I suppose, since now anyone can use any weapon just as well as anyone else (with the exception of Infiltrators being better at Snipers), but I'm not sure I actually like that system in the first place.

If you look at one of the personal-development feat lines, there's a lot of abilities that raise your weight cap or lower the weight of weapons, which helps in this regard.

So Adept rocking just a pistol sounds like fun!

Indeed!

[Enokh]

I accidentally read a bit too much at the main Mass Effect wiki (trying to get all the lore from the books/comics without reading the books/comics) and spoilered the HELL out of ME3, as far as the intentions of Cerberus/Illusive Man.

Spoiler:

The Illusive Man has either found, or heard about, a weapon-artifact on Mars that will allow him to control the Reapers. He wants to use said weapon-artifact to make Humans dominate the galaxy. Which is why he's fucking with Shep -- if Shep gets his way, he'll just destroy the Reapers, and Cerberus can't use them to beat the shit out of/enslave the other races.

I rather hope this is true, as I like the idea of there being multiple bad guys for the supposed Grand Finale, with none of them having compatible goals with one another. Though I guess Shep could play along with Cerberus -- especially if you didn't blow the Collector Ship -- and just make the Reapers kill each other.

I really hope they expand on the Reaper's point of view. I get the whole "we want to wipe out everything so nothing can develop far enough to kill us", I suppose, but. . what do they DO while they're floating outside of the galaxy? I hope there's some bigger threat out there, and that the Reapers kill off all life because if a galaxy has too much activity, then the Bigger Big Bad rolls in and enslaves everyone (including the Reapers).

Though there is something to be said about the Unknowable Enemy, I suppose.

[Ghostbear]

Well, it's revealed in ME2 that reapers appear to need organic life to, err, "reproduce". Beyond figuring out their origins, I think their actions are pretty solidly explained by that fact- they need life develop enough for them to absorb to make more of themselves, but they can't let it get so far as to become a threat either.

[letterX]

what do they DO while they're floating outside of the galaxy?

Compute large primes! It's the Reaper national sport!

[Enokh]

Well, it's revealed in ME2 that reapers appear to need organic life to, err, "reproduce". Beyond figuring out their origins, I think their actions are pretty solidly explained by that fact- they need life develop enough for them to absorb to make more of themselves, but they can't let it get so far as to become a threat either.

Ah, yeah, forgot about that. Well that makes sense.

Was also hoping for much more varied styles of Reaper ships.

And am still hoping that, if you save the Rachni, they come back in force and wipe out everything in the galaxy.

[Yakk]

If they are willing to do the extra work...

If you save the Rachni, there are quests where you have to deal with "rabid" Rachni. And the "friendly" Rachni solve some other problems for you. If not, there are quests to deal with whatever the Rachni dealt with.

You can imagine a similar pattern around a bunch of other plot points. If you gave the tech to Cerebus, Cerebus has better tech -- but you can steal that better tech from Cerebus. But the tech has traps in it, which the Reapers exploit ... yada yada.

[Belial]

I really hope they expand on the Reaper's point of view

I really hope they don't. Right now, they're an homage to lovecraft-style unknowable elder evils who follow a logic beyond the ken of lesser beings. Their activities are structured the way they are for a reason that makes sense if you're a dreadnought-sized collective machine intelligence, and doesn't if you're not. I think going much further than that ruins them.

[Ghostbear]

I definitely agree with Belial here. In a lot of stories, part of what makes unknown entities like reapers so interesting is because they're unknown. Just like the G-man in Half Life, or the true non-chantry origins of darkspawn in Dragon Age, or the Force in Star Wars (midichlorians just ruined the whole thing) or the origin of the Xenomorphs, or... The mystery is good, and usually, when they try to explain it, it makes whatever you're dealing with less interesting.

I mean, what possible information could we get on the reapers that would make them more compelling as villains? That they have to fear a reaper-reaper? Or that they're just an oversized version of the geth from the "original" organics? I don't think there's anything that we could be told about them that would make them more interesting. I'm not even sure the reveal about them needing organic life was a good one, barring some additional developments in ME3. They're a mystery, let them stay that way.

[Xanthir]

If they are willing to do the extra work...

If you save the Rachni, there are quests where you have to deal with "rabid" Rachni. And the "friendly" Rachni solve some other problems for you. If not, there are quests to deal with whatever the Rachni dealt with.

Some early Game Informer articles clearly showed some rachni husk models.

I mean, what possible information could we get on the reapers that would make them more compelling as villains? That they have to fear a reaper-reaper? Or that they're just an oversized version of the geth from the "original" organics? I don't think there's anything that we could be told about them that would make them more interesting. I'm not even sure the reveal about them needing organic life was a good one, barring some additional developments in ME3. They're a mystery, let them stay that way.

Their motives seem pretty simple. They're hyper-intelligent life that would prefer the universe remain predictable so their long-term planning isn't disrupted. (If I had to speculate, I'd assume their goal is to engineer the universe to support computation indefinitely, or at least longer.) High-tech life is disruptive, but also inevitable, so they've set up pest traps that they have to clean out on occasion.

[Enokh]

Yeah, you guys have swayed me to the "Reapers are fine the way they are" side of things. It's made much more palatable by the presence of Cerberus, though, and other antagonists you can actually talk to.

Anyone else catch what looked like a flying Husk chasing one of the Human fighters/whatever during the first level? That seems promising.

[Belial]

There are supposed to be harvester husks:



(Also, is it obvious yet that the husks are technological Darkspawn?)

[An Enraged Platypus]

There are supposed to be harvester husks:



(Also, is it obvious yet that the husks are technological Darkspawn?)

Welp, time to finish DA:O. My progress through it has been glacial; I'm left cold by the writing, to the extent that periodically bits of me fall off into the sea to sink unsinkable liners.