When the credits roll on the 8-to-12 hour game you’ve been waiting all year for, your story, your adventure with whatever character you have just saved the world for the umpteenth time with is over. Before the intervention and widespread acceptance of DLC as a story-extender, this was simply a fact that people had to accept. As BioWare announced the Mass Effect trilogy – not just one game, but three separate titles interwoven with another through the choices the player makes along the way – they were attempting to chip away at this long-standing facet of the medium. They claimed they would bring deep and meaningful interactions with characters you would grow to know and care for over the course of three separate storylines.

With Mass Effect 3, the story of Commander Shepard and the brave crew of the Normandy finally draws to a satisfying, if somewhat technically frustrating conclusion. BioWare’s promise of crafting this world of strong characters, however, is the real star of the show. [Read more...]

When I picked up my copy of the original Assassin’s Creed, I was more than skeptical despite the title’s lingering precedence.  It’s always an unsure bet when depending on how “pretty” some shaders look in comparison to how the game actually functions, if at all…  Up until I stuck my disc into my Xbox 360 I only heard whispers of what seemed too good to be true.  I was so very wrong, finally it seemed as if the Havoc and Anvil engines were crafted for the sole purpose of molding this game into what is now a must-have title for any respectable gamer of most platforms (even cellphones…).  One can hardly describe what it means to play an Assassin’s Creed game:  whether it’s the remarkable and seamless collision detection or how each frame seems like a painted picture, this game set a new bar for developers everywhere.   Unfortunately they may have set the bar too high.

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