Help me play the Mass Effect series

Sure, but I did it because of OCD tendencies. On every subsequent playthrough you go buy all the spectre stuff and never need anything but mod loot. And since everything has a "means nothing" bar next to it, it's impossible to make really meaningful choices.

No, no, no. The following playthroughs you're so tired of having the SPECTRE Super-gear and want to try some of the other gear, y'know, for the challenge. (I realize I have a problem but what can you do.)

The less time I spent in the ME inventory screen the happier I was.

Some more newb tips:

- set squadmate power usage to manual, and then use them.
- How I manage inventory (can't recall if I posted this): after every mission I go through it. Anything I'm not using that level IV or below gets gelled; above that gets sold. Don't sell level I-IV stuff; the payoff isn't great and you'l want gel.

I haven't done this in ME, but I absolutely have done this in DA:O. "Wear whatever is prettiest and leave the mages in camp where they belong" playthroughs are my favorite. <3

One thing that really stands out to me so far in Mass Effect are the cut-scenes. Bioware has gotten more and more cut-scene heavy in their games over the years (perhaps not as bad as the FF series, but still) and seem to have decided to make that one of this this games' biggest strengths.
Animations and camera angles are fantastic, and the facial expressions appropriate. The opening of ME 1, watching Shepard make her way to the bridge of the Normandy, is like watching a movie.

I'm sure the later games improve on this, but to me it's amazing. I have an ageing PC so I can't max most modern games. Maxed ME1 looks gorgeous to me. Also keep in mind that the last game I played was NWN2, where cut-scenes meant characters were constantly rolling their eyes. They always looked sarcastic to me.
ME1 is a very cinematic experience, and while that is a buzz word nowadays, I do really mean that in the most positive way.

I've finally settled on the Infiltrator. I get medium armor, my beloved sniper rifle, some usable skills during combat, and I can do Decoding and Decrypting myself so, as long as I have 1 person with biotics, I can take anyone I want along. I had to give up the Assault Rifle to accomplish that (not enough points) but I'm slowly getting to grips with the Pistol so it's all good.

There's a film grain applied by default, I find it annoying and turn it off. What you might want to disable is whatever the graphical option is that applies motion blur, because it applies it every time you're in a lift. You'll see.

You're right about the cutscene stuff, and yes, it does get better as the series goes on with the later games giving some of the conversations the same attention to detail. I didn't play Mass Effect until January 2010 and I was similarly blown away.

Personally, I'd just let them do their thing. I've never controlled squad powers, not in all three of my plays. Hell, on my next run I'm just going to enable squad auto-levelling as well. The more they feel like people and not puppets the better I think the experience is.

Note though that your squad AI improves a lot between games one and two.

I turned the film grain of right away, it didn't do anything to enhance the game in my opinion. And the motion blur made me queasy, so that's off too.

For now my companions do their own thing, I'm having a hard enough time controlling Shepard without having to worry about the others. Eventually I might end up micro-managing them a bit more (I do in other party based games) but for now I'm letting them. I don't auto-level them though, I don't think Bioware ever managed to get that feature right in any of their games.

I suspect it's more of a problem in ME1 than ME2/3, but I won't say why.

I remember my first time with Mass Effect, coming off a very long stretch of WoW raiding with no other gaming to speak of, and it staggered me that someone was doing this with video games. It was the beginning of the end of my WoW obsession, for which I cannot thank Bioware enough. Damnit, now I'm going to have to replay the first game again.

If you're playing on easy then yah squad AI powers are OK. I am pretty sure some encounter on normal will be all but impossible though (unless you out level them). Biotic crowd control is just a must have, IMO.

I've completed all three ME games multiple times on Normal or whatever the difficulty above Normal is (hardcore?). I've always left AI squad powers on.

Note that even with this option enabled, you can still manually cast squad powers if you want them to use something specific at a key moment.

One more thing: don't listen to anyone telling you that you absolutely must bring a specific companion along because they have whatever power/ability. Just travel with the NPCs you like the best or think are most thematically appropriate for whatever mission you're doing. I did this for all the ME games and never had a problem.

That said, there is one moment in ME3 where bringing a particular companion provides some additional story insight that you won't experience with any of the others. Without giving away spoilers, the mission is titled "Priority: Thessia", and you want to bring the bonus NPC that came with the collectors' edition (or was purchased with the DLC "From Ashes"). If you don't have access to that character, it's not that big a deal (you can watch those scenes on YouTube), but if you have the DLC anyway, you really should use that character for this mission.

...downside being that you might really need the one the AI blew, or, in the later games, you might be on a generic cooldown when you really need to use a power.

Micromanaging NPC abilities is really something you only need to worry about on the higher difficulty levels. Anyone playing on Normal or Easy should just leave the AI on and experience the story without treating the companions like puppets. As I said above, I've played all three games to completion multiple times and have always left AI squad abilities turned on.

Play however you like of course; but I find that various limitations in the game (poor companion AI, not great shooting controls) make some encounters very challenging if you're not able to pop off various biotic crowd-control capabilities to limit the badness coming your way. On previous playthroughs my only solution to those encounters was to come back five levels later and just overpower it; on this playthrough I'm finding that a judicious application of squad powers gets me through them.

As I said, I've completed all the games on Insanity and I never control the squad.

I always control my team members manually too, especially on Insanity. That way I've basically made a single character who carries five weapons and has crazy techno/biotic powers, effectively.

I think for the most part they can be left to their own devices, I only occasionally have to force stuff, even on higher difficulties.

I don't doubt that it can be done, I just find it more comfortable and ultimately faster to do it myself. I don't have a high opinion of my teammates' discretion.

I've been in exactly 3 battles (counting the first planet as 1 big battle) so far in 4 hours of playing, hehe. I'm sure I'll get to grips with the companion controls, as soon as I can actually do some battle.
I'll probably leave them to their own devices most of the time, and control them when I really have to.

I managed to gain a renegade point by the way, very unusual to me. Apparently good little Paragons don't compliment Garrus' shooting skills while in hostage situations... bad Shepard!

Oh, and Wrex' voice... oh my! I could listen to that guy all day long, I love deep voices. Why do they never give love interests voices like that? I'd melt like a puddle, honestly!

Wrex = Steven Blum, who has been a voice in basically everything EVER. If you want to romance him, play SWTOR and make a female Sith Inquisitor.

Whoops, I remembered wrong, he's a different Krogan later in the series. Regardless, if deep and growly is your type, there you go.

I somehow never noticed this, but you're right! Why don't they have deep voices more often?

Hmmm, off the top of my head:

KOTOR: CARTH, so none.
KOTOR2: I still don't consider any of these to even be real romances, but they are certainly not deep voiced regardless.
DA:O: No manly man deep voices for romance.
ME: There's only one dude at all, and he is CARTH
ME2: Jacob is sorta in the zone?
ME3: As above, not really anyone.
DA2: Fenris definitely qualifies.
SWTOR: I don't know what some of them sound like yet (IA, JC, and I already forget what the BH's boy toy sounds like), but Andronikos is the only one that leaps to mind as being grumbly sounding.

So yeah, my people are not adequately represented. There are also almost none with facial hair, I will point out. These things may be related.

True on the facial hair! And as the wife of a man with a lovely beard, I feel that that's a shame. They are all a bit boyish, aren't they?
I'll have to check out Jacob once I get to ME2 ;)

No facial hair makes me sad, too. I like facial hair on my mans. Although the facial hair in the ME universe is awful, so it works out there, at least. :P


EDIT: Does Thane (ME2) count as grumbly, or just ... odd?

On the subject of appearances, what is up with all the FemSheps in this thread? Need I remind you that this is Commander Shepard we're talking about? Since when do they allow longhairs in the military?

You missed Jade Empire and Anomen from Baldur's Gate II. Anomen had facial hair.

Yeah but he was Anomen.


EDIT: If he wasn't Anomen, I'd totally make out with him though.

Yeah, I skipped him because the amount of VO in BG2 is so small, relatively speaking. He's another mid-range snooty voice guy though.

I cannot even remember who the JE LIs are for the ladies. There's the totally boring guy with the dead wife, but I don't remember what he sounds like. And uh... probably there's someone else?

I should play that game again. I actually messed around with it a bit this weekend but I cannot get the resolution/aspect ratio to work right for some reason. It claims it is doing 1920x1200 but it looks all fucked up.

Anomen is the earliest NPC that Bioware allowed you to corrupt though. You can have darkside Anomen, which I heard makes him less whiny.

I'm currently playing through Jade Empire at the moment. It's not their greatest work and it sure does love putting long cutscenes before fights and then not allowing you to save after.

Sky from JE had no facial hair though. The love interest there should have been Zu anyway, a far more interesting character.

It isn't corrupting him so much as he can fail at <spoilery thing> if you don't do things just right, and turns into a bigger dick. I think it also shuts down the romance but I can't remember. TIME FOR A REPLAY OF THIS TOO.

Alas, I have to rely on memories of what a friend told me. Like with all Bioware games I totally intended to try different things, but always ended up with the same party following the same romance.

Yeah I have this problem too. It's probably going to be my 4th JK in SWTOR before I finally do a dark side one.

I branch out on my romances usually (I always SLEEP with Zevran, but I probably dumped him about half the time so I could finish as someone else's (usually Alistair's) lovebug.) but for major decisions I am usually in a rut. I started a new DA:O playthrough this week and did a couple of things differently than "usual," though, so maybe I am getting better at it!

I just played Jade Empire again. It seems like if you pick the correct aspect ratio the scene rendering is fine, but the UI elements are still in the wrong aspect. Not great, but survivable.

No idea who the male Love Interests are though! Sky's apparently got wife in a refrigerator syndrome, and I guess other than that there's... the (of course) Bi Princess? Henpecked Ho is henpecked, and Zu is probably a eunuch.

Pity you can't put the moves on Black Whirlwind! Now there's a guy with a great voice and a manly man beard! Cute too in his little... ponytails?

One trick I forgot: you can make infinite money with a bit of footwork. After doing a couple of quest the lady in the Citadel med clinic will give you a better deal on equipment; that includes when you sell stuff to her. You can make infinity money by selling stuff to her, buying it back from another vendor (only 20 items at a time), and selling it back to her. Do it with a pile of level IV gear and you can make a million credits in no time!

Does that mean you can buy Spectre gear early in the game and then never have to worry about the awful inventory system ever again?

Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaybe. :)

In actuality: kind of. Items below level IV sell for so little that you'll be doing it all day. Once you have 20 level IV-V items, you can crank out a million credits in 20-30 minutes. Do that, buy the specter gear, then start selling it. Each round of selling the four specter items makes you 150k; doing that for ten minutes sets you for life cashwise.