Mass Effect 2

Rating: M

Score: 9.0/10

Mass Effect 2 is the most anticipated game of the year. Why? Simply put, Mass Effect One set the bar high back in 2007. Gamers are excited to see if the predecessor can even be bested. Gamers rejoice: it can. This game is available for the Xbox 360 and PC.

Mass Effect, for those who haven't tried it, is a third-person shooting game with quite a few customizations available, such as selecting your class, back-story, squad members, and plenty of different speech options during a conversation. It's broken up well, delivering interesting storylines that hook you with the fact YOU can decide what to say (out of selected number of speech options, of course). After some story, you're catapulted into intense third-person shooting against evil aliens with selected squad members (that you select, no doubt). Mass Effect 2 works with the same formula, thankfully.

I'm not going to ruin any bits of the story, especially since a lot happens in the first few minutes of the game. You'll jump right into the story, and continue on anyway you like, depending on who you trust, what you do, and how you do it. You can either play through the new story with the Shepard (main character) you had in your Mass Effect One saved file, or start anew. Again, you can set your class as Soldier, Infiltrator, Vanguard, Sentinel, Adept, or Engineer. Each has their own unique abilities, weapons, and skills, and likewise each plays differently. For example: An Infiltrator likes long-range sniping and hacking, while a Vanguard will love to get up close and personal with their shotguns and effective bionic powers.

The gameplay remains very similar, except in one aspect: ammo. Before, you just needed to worry about your gun overheating, that's it. Now, limited ammo becomes a problem to manage. It's a love-hate thing: running out of ammo for your best weapon mid-boss fight is still a disheartening feeling, but it adds balance, especially when you consider the new Heavy Weapons that can blow through waves of enemies like nothing, or help in harder boss fights, though ammo is limited.

The game also looks and sounds amazing. Visually, each planet has their own unique color tones, and they all are very detailed. The music is good, and picks up at enemy encounters. The voice acting is also the best you'll hear in a video game ever, which is good since different conversations and speech options are everywhere. The dialogue can range from the shameless one-liners to hilarious jokes and satires to dead serious discussions. None of it feels too forced, and it all sounds great.

You can buy new weapons and equipment from your ship now, which is very convenient. Thing is, to get the right resources, you need to scan planets. To scan a planet, you must find a planet that isn't "discovered" yet, and send probes to exactly the right spots. Scan, find area, send probe, repeat about twenty times, move to another planet, repeat. It gets redundant fast, and slows an otherwise perfectly paced game.

There's a good reason for all the hype, and the over half million sales first day: the game delivers on all fronts. The game jumps from an interesting story you control to exciting wars you choose to fight. For fans of the series, it's a must-own (although most fans already own it), while gamers new to the series will find its high-quality customization and shooting enjoyable.