Mass Effect 3: Special Edition Review

And boy is it ever fun to toss the bad guys skyward, though that isn't the only fancy skill you can perform. You might sprint and tumble about, sliding into cover and using cryo ammo to freeze a creepy cannibal before charging into it and smashing it to pieces. Or perhaps you would rather send a powerful shock wave careening toward oncoming troopers, flinging them over a facility's railing and into the abyss beneath. As you level up, you eventually make choices about how to upgrade your powers. For instance: do you increase the Pull ability's recharge speed, or do you learn to launch two Pull projectiles at once? Don't assume that Mass Effect 3's missions are all about guns and space magic, though. A pistol isn't much help when you traverse a virtual space made of neon cubes and floating platforms.

On most occasions, you're joined by up to two other squadmates of your choosing, who have their own powers to perform. While you can pull off these skills by pulling up a radial menu (which pauses the action), you can also tap corresponding icons on the Wii U's tablet. The tablet interface can require a bit of pre-mission maintenance, especially if you switch out squadmates every so often, because there are a limited number of icon slots, and you must manually assign them. This micromanagement can be a chore, but using the tablet in this manner improves the experience overall, because you can utilize your squad's powers in tactically efficient ways without ever pausing the game. The benefit to the action's pacing is immense.

You can also use the tablet to manually position your cohorts, though doing so is laborious and rarely useful. But even if you do make use of the possibilities of manual squad positioning, your cronies show off their general lack of intelligence by crouching on top of crates, and your foes thoughtlessly tumble against walls rather than sliding into safer positions. Other minor flaws include camera angles going awry, weird cover system quirks, and a journal that doesn't always fill in important details.

Yet the action rarely suffers when the faults emerge, due to Mass Effect 3's varied level design. While there are times when cover is laid out in predictable ways and adversaries emerge as you expect them to, some expansive combat areas and aggressive enemy types give rise to diverse pacing. Shrieking banshees can destroy you in a single grab if you let them come too close, and hulking brutes constantly threaten to intrude on your personal space. In tandem, they create memorable, challenging combat sequences that require you to intelligently use the surrounding space to minimize danger.

And now, the tables have turned.

Mass Effect 3 isn't all talking and shooting. Outside of combat, you walk around the Citadel, picking up odd jobs and eavesdropping on diplomats and refugees. There are some wonderful moments to experience here: having a bizarre conversation with a virtual copy of yourself, checking in on an old ally in bad health, and punching an old nemesis square in the face. Refugees mourn the lost and missing, gazing at a collection of photographs that serves as an ad hoc memorial. It's the subtleties that pull you in. A crewmate gets a tattoo to celebrate his newfound ambitions, you ponder the meaning of a human-on-AI romance, and you grab a drink in a busy nightclub. It's a pity that the entertaining lesser races--the Hanar and the Elcor in particular--are in such short supply. Mass Effect 3 isn't big on comedic interludes.

The side missions you pick up at the Citadel aren't all that inspired. In some cases, you wander around searching for objects to interact with. In others, you head to the Normandy and take to the galactic map. You zoom about the galaxy from a top-down view, scanning solar regions to identify planets of interest. From here, you scan the planet itself, drop a probe onto its surface, and collect the artifact or object in question. This busywork is complicated by reapers, who appear in these solar systems after a few seconds and swarm and destroy you if you don't make a swift escape. This game of cat and mouse is more annoying than entertaining, getting in the way when you wish you could just get the job done.

Galactic exploration is important if you want to tackle the reapers with the might of the galaxy behind you. The more side missions you conquer, the more fulfilling the finale becomes, though there is another way to prepare: playing Mass Effect 3's online multiplayer. The more you play, the greater the galaxy's state of readiness. There's only one mode, the standard "defeat progressively stronger waves of enemies" mode, and it's mostly fun. Tossing grenades and incinerating ravagers as part of a four-player force is a blast, especially when an objective draws you to a central point to defend an area or focus on a specific enemy. The action lacks the heft of Gears of War 3, or Uncharted 3's speedy tempo, but benefits from a variety of classes and races to unlock, some of which were added to the other versions postrelease. It's a pity that Mass Effect 3's most substantial downloadable additions, Leviathan and Omega, are not included here, making this special edition not as special as it might have been.

Shepard has a tendency to get all fired up.

Yet even without that additional content, you couldn't rightfully accuse Mass Effect 3 of feeling incomplete--not with so many missions to undertake, so many individuals to engage in conversation, so many choices to make. If you haven't yet had the opportunity to spend time with some of the Milky Way's most intriguing personalities, now is your chance. Just be prepared: bonds can be broken and ties can be severed. When your goal is no less than ensuring the survival of an entire galaxy, sacrifice is inevitable, and Mass Effect 3 makes sure you feel each and every one.