Customer Ratings & Reviews

My son loves it! It's a thinking game / choices determine direction of game.

I had this game and bought this one as a gift for a friend.

I am a little behind the curve since ME3 has been out for quite some time. I am a late comer to the franchise in general, and I went and got a copy of ME2 right after finishing the first installment. I continue to be blown away by the depth of the story, the impact of the choices, and how easy it is to relate to the characters. I am on my third playthrough, and I have even gone back to ME1 to change some things about my character in order to open up new options and dialogues in ME2.

Before I played Mass Effect, I absolutely had no idea what it was all about. I played Mass Effect 1 and contrary to some glitches and tedious gameplay elements, IT LITERALLY BLEW MY MIND. So to me Mass Effect 2 was a MUST. I have played it twice now and here is what I think. PROS. WELL DESIGNED CHOICE/KARMA GAMEPLAY: Just like Mass Effect 1, this game has wonderful cause-effect gameplay. Throughout the games you will have to make many choices and this choices will have major effect on your character development and on the story. Depending on your choices your character can be renegade, paragon or someone in between. Unlike Mass Effect 1, these choices will many times be imposed upon you. In other words, you will just be exploring the open world and all of the sudden, the main story interrupts you and will make you make difficult decisions. To me, this was amazing. This on the spot make choice plot makes the story so much more real, relevant and impactive. Furthermore, other than dialogue, even during the cutscenes you can perform paragon/renegade type of action. This experience was simply mind-blowing to me. BETTER RUNNING GAMEPLAY AND SMOOTH CRISPY CLEAR GRAPHICS: To me Mass Effect 1 was great, but it had a bit choppy graphics and glitch gameplay. They have fixed it up big times in Mass Effect 2. (Don't get me wrong there are still glitches see CONS section). When I first saw the Mass Effect 2 footage in HD on my 360, my eyes simply couldn't believe it. Trust me, you will have no complain here in this department. AWESOME COMBAT MECHANICS: Compared to 1, they greatly improved combat system in this game. It feels smoother, you can perform different moves easier and most importantly, combination you can use with your team/allies is just unbelievable. You have more classes to choose from compared to first and I just LOVED VANGUARD AND SENTINEL CLASSES. You will love the powers you will get to use. Oh did I mention, you can also choose from your allies special powers. PLENTY OF ALLIES AND LOYALTY MISSIONS: There are so many different allies you can acquire and choose from in this game. Acquiring each ally is a mission. Plus, if you want your ally to become loyal to you, there will be a separate mission. Once they become loyal, you can unlock their special power and it will also have a huge impact on the story. Now the question is can you make everyone loyal to you? I will just let you find out. While it is possible, unless you make the right choices, it will be difficult. NEW WEAPONS AND POWERS: Loved the VANGUARD and SENTINEL class provided biotic and tech powers. Also, some of the heavy weapons were pretty cool. Also liked how you could upgrade your weapons and powers by research and alloy discoveries. PRETTY GOOD STORY: Not as good as the first one, but this game still does have a pretty good story. While the creators have done a wonderful job with stories for each ally character, the central story is somewhat straightforward. However, they are also setting this game for a sequel (not a spoiler, it has been known for ages now), so that might be the reason the story is the way it is (really don't want to spoil it for you). OPEN WORLD GAMEPLAY: Just like first one you are free to explore galaxy and go where ever you want to go, do what ever you want to do first. Story will impose upon you as stated before, but again it will only make the experience more real. I love the way they have hidden the missions in open world exploration. BETTER ACHIEVEMENTS: Mass Effect 1 achievement kinda force you to do things you may not want to do (for example keep the same ally through out the game, become a perfect paragon or renegade, etc.). In this game, the way achievement system is set up, it will make you explore more and experiment more. VARIETY IN BOSSES AND ENEMIES: Loved how most of the missions include a boss. While few of them are pushovers, most of them will provide you with decent challenge. Furthermore, compared to Mass Effect 1, there is greater variety of enemies and eliminating them will require you to different strategies and powers. This will prevent the gameplay from being redundant. FREE DLCs: There are some awesome free downloadable content for this game. Some of them should have been released with the game (see cons.) CONS. LESS EXPLORATION: There are a lot of story based mission and ally based loyalty missions; however, there are amazingly few side missions. (Don't get me wrong, the game will still take a while finish. My first finish was 45 hrs when I decided to explore everything). And these side missions are ridiculously short and straight forward. NO VEHICLE: What the hell? After you download a DLC, there are four or five vehicle based missions; however, the game doesn't have vehicle based exploration. I agree climbing rocks and hills with space vehicle was torturous at times in Mass Effect 1, but still there were many planets where it was fun. Why remove that? DIMINISHED RPG ELEMENT: Mass Effect 1 kinda had convoluted level up system(if you do manually) and tedious weapon upgrade/achieve system. They improved that in Mass Effect 2 by making it extremely simple. Now you no longer have much choices when it comes to guns. Your choice of power can be maxed in no time (you will still have hard time maxing multiple powers/traits). And experience is mainly give at the end of the mission vs experience you gained by doing each and every single action/ killing each and every enemy in Mass Effect 1. The system did feel a bit more organized and easy to use, but I kinda miss Mass Effect 1 RPG element. So contrary to minor issues I mentioned in CONS., they have GREATLY IMPROVED THE GAME. If you liked Mass Effect 1, if you like RPG, if you like space/sci fy genre, YOU MUST NOT MISS OUT ON THIS ONE. You will love it.

Mass Effect 2 continues the epic space saga began in Mass Effect. Players new to the series can begin with part 2 if they like, and there's even a short downloadable story that lets you optionally make all of the key decisions in the first game for import. But returning commanders who've beaten the first game will find the graphics, game play and writing style very familiar - and that's a good thing in this case. The ability to import your ME1 character along with all of the decisions you made in the first game - assuming you still have the saves on your storage device - is almost entirely unique to platform gaming. (The only other game series I know of that lets you do this is also from BioWare - Dragon Age). It is astonishing to see how many familiar faces you'll meet - they will find you in most cases - as well as to see firsthand how your choices have shaped the galaxy. The developers messed around with the weapon upgrade system to some extent, which wasn't really necessary and overall was a detraction. And they've completely removed planetary exploration in the Mako armored vehicle - now you just launch probes from orbit to gather resources, and for any encounters on a planet you take a shuttle down automatically. The orbital mining made me doze off a few times - it's not poorly implemented, just not very compelling gameplay. However, it's optional - you only need to do it to gather resources for R&D on new weapons and upgrades for your ship and crew. There are plenty of optional things you can do or skip, as before, but each core mission takes you to a very differently-styled world to experience a wide variety of compelling science fiction storylines, like little mini-plots each centering around a different member of your crew. This design approach allows for some really terrific story telling, and that's not by accident - the writers have knocked it out of the park once again. The voice acting is excellent, as in the first game, with a surprisingly recognizable cast. What really caught me off guard was that I actually recognized the *face* of Yvonne Strahovski's character - she's new to the series and will return in ME3 - before I even knew she was in the game. (That's Sara Walker from the TV show Chuck - I'm not used to hearing her speak with her native Australian accent.) Overall, ME2 is an outstanding game, and fans of the first will be delighted. And if you like the first two, just wait until you get your hands on Mass Effect 3. :D

First impression, WOW! Mass Effect 2 is by far better and greater than Mass Effect 1 in all ways. The story is deep and entertaining, my first play through took me around 30 hours to beat (that's including all side guests etc.). The voice acting is well superb, one of the best in today's games. The good and bad moral choices made this time are better than before, just the whole feel of it is better than in the first Mass Effect. The graphics are also beautiful, from character models to the detail on planets. The only problems I found with the game was at first scanning planets, it can be annoying cause at first your scan is horribly slow, though you can upgrade it to be a little faster, just the whole idea can be a pain. The second was during conversations, where you can make a paragon or renegade choice by simply pulling the left or right trigger, however if your not paying attention good enough you can easily miss it, since the choice flashes at either the lower or right corner on your TV. Overall, Mass Effect 2 is very fun to experience and play, a must have for all 360 owners.

Mass Effect 2 may just be the best single-player experience I have ever had the pleasure of playing. The cinemaic feel of the game is spectacular. There are high-end cinematic cutscenes, full-on voice acting for an in-depth exprience, and the level of detail is mind-blowing. If you have'nt played the first game in the trilogy then please do play it just to make this game all the more better. The gameplay is much smoother this time around of course not the perfect 3rd-person shooter, but its pretty far up on the totem pole. The story is rides shotgun this time around the let the characters take hold of the wheel. Some of these characters are so deep and compelling they just feel much more believable. The art style is a much darker tone to fit in with the dark and desolate story that pushes it, you are commander shepard the one man that has the drive to save the entire galaxy from extinction and the story makes it feel that way especially near the impressive end which I will not spoil here. I have played through this game thoroughly 3 times and by playing a different style every time there is always something new to see. unlike the first game the side quests here are not the same environment repeated many times in a row each one is varied and unique. After playing almost all side-quests the main story and listening to the extensive voice acting the game took me about 28 hours on average. Bioware went to great lengths to assure that each player has his or her own personal game and they succeeded. If you want to get lost in a rich and detailed sci-fi world pick this game up.

First of all, this game is incredible. Bioware did a fantastic job on the second installment of Mass Effect 2. The graphics are amazing with incredible facial expressions. The story makes you want to keep playing! Now that this game is a third person shooter it makes a lot more fun than the first. If you purchase this game, make sure you install onto your hard drive, the load times are VERY long compared to other games. The game does have a few glitches like Shepherd will get stuck in some random place and you'll just have to reload your last save to fix the issue. All in all it's a fantastic game! Do not hesitate to buy this!!

The game play is awsome, and the story is also very good. I'm not sure why they went back to using ammo, I liked it better the other way. But it's not really an issue as there is ammo every where. Scanning planets can get tedious, but after upgrades it becomes bearable. The powers are a little annoying. You use one, and then ALL of them need to recharge, I don't understand why this is, in the first one you could cycle through all of them and the powers woud recharge individually. For part three, they need to go back to this way of power recharging.

Mass Effect 2 picks up 2 years after Mass Effect 1 left off, which reflects time in real life between games which added to the immersion of the game. Good things about it are less micromanaging of weapons and upgrades, More background story on each and every one of your squad mates. The choices you make in Mass Effect 1, if you imported the character, are evident here, and the choices you make during the game will make your endgame different. A possible downside would be for those with non HD TV's the txt may be a bit small because from what I've experianced the game is designed for HD TV's. This being said, this game's graphics are impressive. The music is very effective at making the mood known, and draws you into it better. For parents looking to buy it for their childeren: There is quite a bit of cussing in it, and possible romantic scene with a squadmate... Just FYI. about 20 hours roughly for main plotline, about another 10 hours for side quests... Then a high replay value, where you can go again as a different gender, or make different choices. Impossible to get all achievements on xbox 360 on first playthrough, so you're looking at 60 hours of gameplay for a real hardcore minimum... I borrowed it from a friend, and I STILL bought it after I completed it its that good.

After playing the first game of the trilogy a repeated number of times (also having a 1200/1200 achievement points in it), I highly anticipated this game. First off, I'll say that this game is beautiful. The graphics are very nicely done as is the voice acting. Shepard's emotion truly comes out when he is being a renegade, an improvement upon the first game. The music is just as impressive. However, some cut scenes have clipping issues, faces/heads into armor, characters mouths. I still love one of the opening scenes. The length of the game is very short compared to the original, I finished it in a little less than twelve hours - doing all side missions/companion quests. I've replayed it twice now, each taking a bit more time as I amped up difficulty: one of the games big upsides. Insanity is actually challenging this time through, you will actually die multiple times and have to redo scenes until you become very frustrated. Games rarely do this now-a-days without leaving a bad taste in your mouth. Shepard this time takes everything to the extreme, you're either an utter jerk or the do-gooder. Even the neutral options usually tend to make him sound like a renegade and get someone mad at you. The character development in this game disapointed me a little. You cannot talk to anyone with them trying to get in your pants, unless you're the same gender, then they talk to you a few times then blow you off every other time. Combat in this game is different - it is now a first person shooter first and RPG second. You have limited ammo, even after all the lore of the codex built up a reasonable explanation of why there was none. It doesn't make much sense as it's explained now as a coolant, but if you stay out of battle for an hour, you still have to replace the coolant from a long previous battle. You lose connection with pretty much everything/everyone from the first game but they are built up to be in the third game (at least hopefully). You can't even walk around the Presidium in this one, even though my curiosity on how they recovered there was high. The game is fun, but it's very different from the first game in a lot of aspects. The inventory system is gone as well, losing another aspect of RPG. I'm still a big fan of the story and lore though, and the game was not a failure in pushing the story forward and keeping it interesting. The collectors edition is not that great the equipment in the game is better than the Collector's armor and all the versions get access to the Cerberus Network. The artbook is the only thing I really enjoyed. If you want the comic, buy the full-size version for 3 dollars... I recommend sticking with the standard edition. I look forward to the third installment, I just hope that they bring back some of the original features.

Mass Effect 2 is much better than Mass Effect 1, or maybe I should say improved. Since there is 2 discs, the game is much bigger and much longer. In the first game, I ended the main mission in about 12 hours. I'm 15 hours in on Mass Effect 2 and I don't see a end near, which is good!!! The Mako is gone which is good, and overheating weapons are gone too, it just magazines baby. There too many changes to state in this review but most are for the better. I don't like that you can't change different weapons types and armor on the fly though. Importing your guy from Mass Effect 1 is just awesome! Bioware did a great job here. Some give those guys a cookie, LOL

This game provides exactly what it advertised ... a mostly non-linear, revolutionary gaming experience. The storyline is very fluid, and reacts greatly to your decisions and actions. The voice acting is rich, as is the design and implementation of the individual worlds and relationships. The only drawback I can find is that there seemed to be a lot of references to the original game. That being said, I played Mass Effect 1, so I tended to notice those things; I can see how someone who has not played the first game would simply gloss over those references. They are not crucial to the game, and I don't expect that someone who hasn't played the first game would feel at a loss. They do a good job of providing data to bring you up to speed. There were a few times in the game where I experienced minor problems, including being stuck in the environment in one form or another. It did not happen often enough to be even a minor issue, and was resolved by simply re-loading a saved game. I saved often by habit, but the timing of the auto-saving would more than take care of this error without having to repeat more than a minute or two of game play. This game will get even the novice player interested in how the trilogy will end!

Not finished yet, and I"m already going to give this game high praise. I've enjoyed Bioware storytelling back to Neverwinter Nights and Jade Empire, and they just keep getting better. The more FPS style of play does make it just different enough, although it's not the toughest AI you'll ever face (but no pushover). The good part is though, it's not enough to overshadow what it's supposed to be and that's an outstanding single player RPG. Storyline and development options abound, and with the "save anywhere" ability, it's not something you have to block out 3 hours for to make sure you complete a mission without losing progress... although I've gone for more than 3 hours on several sessions. Bad case of "just one more thing". Like a good book or movie, it's hard to walk away from although you could pause or bookmark at any time. Waited longer to pick this up than I intended, but RDR kept me busy... the $20 price tag didn't hurt.

I just picked up the game from Gamestop and here are my first impressions of the game. First off the graphics are amazing. Like the first one however there can be a little bit of chopping then major events are taking place. This is in no way to be considered a flaw since it only lasts a couple of seconds. You'll get absorbed in the scenery of all the planets you explore and at points forget to play the game. (Again not a bad thing) Now for the game play. The combat execution is the same as the first game and is as amazing as it was there. The weapons and your powers flow together very smoothly and is very enjoyable. This game is pure enjoyment from the very start and you'll be reluctant to stop playing. I have only had the game a couple of hours and havent even began to touch the surface of all there is to do in this game. I'll post a more detailed review when I have completed the game. (Dont hold your breath on that one.)

Played through part of the first Mass Effect, but couldn't really get into it. After reading all of the reviews for the second one I decided to try it out. It's much better. Great story, graphics, voice acting, gameplay, etc. Highly recommended.

Mass Effect 2 is a continuation of the fantastic first Mass Effect. If you have played Mass Effect then you need to play this game. Mainly because the great story is progressed and the game is quite an improvement over the last game. I was very satisfied with the game and recommend it to anyone. The story is great, the way you interact to change the story is great and the gunplay is finely tuned and very enjoyable. The graphics are incredible as well making this one of the best games to look at. If you haven't played the first one then definitely play that one before playing this one. You will have an extremely hard time understanding what is going on if you don't. Plus, you can import your character from the last game into this one. It's not only a cool addition but it comes with a handful of in-game bonuses.

If you like part one, then you'll more than likely enjoy this one. For me, this game right of the bat totally changes from part one as far as the story goes. So, try non to be discoraged from the total game change. I dont want to leek anything to new people who want to get the game. Another thing is the way stats are from part one. In part one we had many attributes to choose from but in part two there aren't as many. Still ME2 is an outstanding game and there are more impacting choices that will be sure to strong effect the next part!

If you liked Mass Effect you're going to love Mass Effect 2. After the first couple of minutes I already was loving it. Seems like anything that was lacking in the first game they worked on in the second. The thing that I like the most is how all your choices from the first game effect this game. Its really cool to see your choices continue to make a difference for better or worse in this game. Highly recommend you play ME before playing ME2 it's a much better experience that way and you understand the overall story better.

this game can be challenging if you are on the right difficulty for your level the length really depends on if you get dlc and if you go the extra mile to get all your crew loyal and with the dlc offering another teammate, why not? everything in the first mass effect that was not so good was made better and more they really did a good job on this one, good job bioware =) this is definitly a middle part for the mass effect serries i just cant wait till mass effect 3 to see the end of this epic saga.