Difficulty:

Just Right

Time Spent:

100 or More Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Best in series"

I started playing CRPG's on a C64, so suffice to say, I have a few games under my proverbial ever-expanding belt. DnD on a system called "Aqaureus", which I may be the only person who ever owned (They also made a similar DnD game for Intellivsion). Ultima before it was online, the Gold Box games of the 80's through Nintendo's foray into Final Fantasy then...Bah, Nothing of note until FF7, Vandal Hearts, Suikoden, and Fallout all seemed to drop from the sky at once.

Then, CRPG's died, again. JRPG's continued to flood the market, but most were horrific, and I assumed the glamor of the Gold Box Pool of Radiance was a memory. Fallout and FF gave me hope, for a fleeting moment, but they were gone too quickly.

Then something crazy happened. An upstart company named Bioware was releasing a new Dungeons and Dragons game called Baldur's Gate, Rumors of a possible appearance by Drizzt abounded, and I waited.

CRPG's have not been the same since. Mass Effect 3 is no different in my opinion. My favorite in the series, and played on a PS3 oddly enough (ME1 360, ME2 PC, ME 3 PS3) which is essentially used for sports gaming, blu-ray, and Netflix.

I found the game engrossing from beginning to end, much like the first Baldur's Gate and it's sequel, Knights of the Old Republic, Dragon Age 1, and Mass Effect 1. Besides the endings, which I despise; not because of unresolved issues or thinking my choices, 100% Galactic Readiness and 7k military strength meant more, but because the game was over. I had no DLC's to pursue, just multi-player and a replay. Stupid great games not being able to go on forever.

Story: A+
Design (Implementation of Concept): A+
Graphics: B-A+

Programming (ie. lack of bugs, lag, or crashes for me)
Single Player: A+
Multi-Player: D- I have to shut my PS 3 down every time I want to play, and even then it may take 2+ hours to get in a room with 1 person. Very frustrating and my only real gripe

Controls: A
Replay Value: A
Ending/s: A
Music: A
Voice Acting: A+
Writing: A+
Characters: A- (The NPC's Just were not as engaging as ME1 or 2)
Combat System: A

This game is great. I believe it is $19.99 new at Amazon. An absolute must have.

For a quick rating of modern CRPG's (When 3d replaced sprite graphics) here is how I would rate the most common that jump to mind:

Neverwinter Nights 1: 8
NwN 2: 8
Oblivion: 9
Knights of the Old Republic 1: 10
KotOR 2: 8
Fallout 3: 9.5
Fallout 3 New Vegas: 8
The Witcher 1: 7
The Witcher 2: 8.75
Mass Effect 1: 9
Mass Effect 2: 7.5
Mass Effect 3: 10
Dragon Age: 10
Dragon Age 2: 8.25

Mass Effect 3 covers so much in regards to travel, new revelations, and with the datapad for your smartphone and the infiltrator game (Datapad free, I paid .99$ for Infiltrator on my ipad and iphone) the game can literally go everywhere with you. Yes, I was a tad obsessed, but these type of top teir games in your favorite platform only come out a few times a decade, so take advantage. I almost missed Planescape:Torment because I could not definitively pick my class and name. What an oops that would have been.

No matter how you slice it, Bioware did it again, proving that they can Shepard can still kick serious gaming backsides, even if they can't show the backside because they are no longer an independent game maker and the ESRB rating system has a much bigger influence on their in game content than it previously did.