Above: Site 2: Resilience, a failed colony from before the Pathfinder

The Mass Effect series has always hit me in the heart strings. I must've put a good couple hundred hours into the second and third games due to their replayability and absolute mastery in storytelling. When the story arc of John Shepard came to a close with the destruction, assimilation, or symbiosis of the Reapers (lore wise the destruction of them), players had relished the thought of a new story within the series.

Enter: Mass Effect: Andromeda.

This game was hyped for so many months, no, years, ever since it was teased back in 2015. All the fans hoped for a more expansive universe with more diverse storytelling and fruitful animation as well as more fluid combat and decisions.

Well, you got most of it, and then some.

Above: The Nexus, the seat of power within Andromeda

I'm not going to get into any part of the story due to it recently coming out and the necessity of not including spoilers, but this game is MASSIVE. The way the galaxy map is changed to you legitimately choosing where your crew should go and then seeing the animation of going to that object in your eyes is absolutely breathtaking. Ships go through the atmosphere belly-down before they break the air, the magnificent black hole bends the light and space around it as you change perspective, the landscapes shine in the starlight, the new races are interesting and beautiful as the older races look updated... which is where the first problem comes to.

Above:Director Tann aboard the Nexus

The turian and krogan posture are off! They lean back way too much (and I know that's a picture of a salarian but still) and sometimes, a turian blinks and you can see his/her eyelids THROUGH THEIR CARAPACE MASK! What the hell?!

Some of the animations are way off (sadly, I own it on the console when I would rather use my PC to get better graphics and such) but still. Some cutscenes are actually lazily put-together Elder Scrolls-type zoom-ins instead of the regular animation the older games used. I mean, this is a massive game but with a budget of 50 million dollars they could've totally spread out the work. Look at the Witcher III: the game is practically run by vodka and magic and it plays amazingly, and CD Projekt Red even said they did not know how to make games beforehand!

With the acquisition of the Frostbite engine to make the game, some resolution bugs and animation glitches shouldn't be so apparent, especially in the beginning. The day one patch hasn't even come out yet, but these are mostly animation issues. Animation is pretty difficult to patch together. Sigh.

Above: Combat

Combat impressed me... like REALLY impressed me. It works with such a fluid motion that you could be a long-range build, biotically-teleport through a barricade to melee an enemy and then jump into the air and hover as you snipe other units. Or, you could give-off an aura of death as a companion robot attacks auxiliary enemies while you are tanking the boss. Combat is probably the BEST part of this game. I literally have nothing else to say. If you get the game, jump into the combat missions right away. I promise you it won't disappoint!

Now... the Nexus isn't fully completed during the game. By doing various missions, you can aquire points that can be spent on getting more colonists out of cryo sleep as well as getting upgrades to any settlements you had found. Big decisions are here, folks. If you choose a certain type of settlement as your first settlement, opposing citizens will absolutely hate you. If you choose a suspicious settlement type on a world inhabited by another civilization, they will get suspicious and hate you. See what I mean? Just be careful and use common sense, but using common sense will cause the problem to come back and bite you in the but when you get farther down the road.

Above: the Nomad on Eos

The Nomad... is just far more superior to the Mako that some of us drove in Mass Effect. It handles better, the jumps make more sense, it doesn't tumble all-over the place, and it is just... wow. You will be impressed by it's capabilities as well as the thought that went into making this machine. There are two shifts: two-wheel or six-wheel. Two-wheel drive is faster, and allows you to cover vast, relatively flat distances fast, but six-wheel drive is for the more hilly and absolutely mountainous. There is one issue, however. Some very shallow hills cannot be traversed with two-wheel drive, and when I mean shallow, I mean an observed 30 degrees.

Crafting is a neat little system. You need to research guns, armor, modifications, and other things before you can craft them, and crafting them is a whole other animal. You need research points from the system you are from. Interestingly enough, there are other things you can research and craft as well: consumables. Ammo types aren't passive anymore, as well as shield boosts and such. I haven't even come across having to need to use any consumables, yet, but that is probably because I am still on the first planets going full-completionist.

Above: The Male Protagonist, Scott Ryder

A lot of players and critics feel that the game does not do justice to the series due to not having a solid main character as well as a solid team. The team part I sort of understand due to the lack of communication and fiddling around with the chat wheel, but if you think about it, either character isn't supposed to be solid. They are both supposed to be fluid. They are supposed to be your conduit into the Mass Effect universe so you can experience the new perils and challenges that affect you in Andromeda. Their witticisms and dialogue are written to portray them as the underdogs. They aren't war heroes like Commander Shepard was painted since the first five seconds into Mass Effect. They are young and naive about the events that they will face. They are essentially... you. Screw the critics reviewing the game about not having a strong base character. The character is you! And... it isn't supposed to feel centered around one person, but an idea... THE IDEA of migration to Andromeda with equality and safety for all.

All over the game there are peppered references to the original trilogy. I'm not saying anymore. If you want a hint, I got really giddy when I found a mercenary tearing apart an enemy installation in the Golden Wastes. After you find a settlement, go over there and check it out. It's... beautiful.

Above: Ketra and Kallos, the provisioner and pilot respectfully

All in all, Mass Effect: Andromeda is a beautiful game. Get over some of the issues over animation and the usual day one bugs because in essence, the game is a solid 8. Grab it and check it out. I find it fantastic. Sometimes you'll get back to the game after a break to find yourself overwhelmed with the amount of stuff you can do.