Fabien's Bit Bucket

On Monday, our group at work got a copy of Mass Effect as a perk. Man, we really get the best swag here!   Anyway, they may as well have handed me a few ounces of crack cocaine, because that's how addictive Mass Effect really is. It ranks up there with Oblivion, a game in which I was immersed for over 350 hours last year. Mass Effect is a Sci-Fi RPG with a deeply engaging story line, filled with complex characters and sub-plots staged on a massive scale. It's even daunting at first: for instance, just navigating the Citadel in the first part of the game can be disorienting and it takes a bit of time to absorb the idiosyncrasies of navigating, trading and fighting, not to mention the amount of background data provided by your on-board encyclopedia as you progress through the story and interact with the world around you. The most noticeable thing about Mass Effect, compared to Oblivion, is that there's very little guidance provided to the player during quests, truly giving the feeling that you're "on your own" in this endeavor to save all life in the Universe. The combat system has its own learning curve: it's similar to the way Gears of War works, switching between a 3rd person view to a 1st person view when aiming certain weapons such as sniper rifles. Throwing grenades is a tricky business: aiming with a gun before throwing a grenade seems to be the only way to get the grenade to go where you need it. There's a cover system similar to the one found in GRAW and I found it equally hard to get used to. I wish they had opted for the cover system similar to the one found in "Rainbow Six: Vegas" for this game. The point here is that the combat in Mass Effect is not a typical "run & gun" FPS affair: it's a bit tricky and seems to reward slower tactical approaches. Weapon power and armor resiliency seem well balanced, at least in the beginning, which forces the player to be cautious in combat even with a back up team of 2 NPCs during most missions. It all adds up to making you care about your choices, whether you're talking to a NPC during a quest or dispatching enemies, because every action has a consequence, even if it's very subtle sometimes. If there ever was a doubt left in anyone's mind that video games have reached the level of an art form, Mass Effect is the masterpiece that proves it: it blends storytelling, amazing cinematic and game play into an emotional experience on par with 'Star Wars', 'Stargate SG-1' and 'Star Trek'. But don't take my word for it, just see for yourself and play Mass Effect!

The baby is officially 5 now  That's a HUGE milestone in the life of the service and a HUGE deal in the Entertainment industry. We even got an Emmy Award to commemorate this accomplishment and the impact that the service has had on the gaming industry. So, Happy Birthday XBox Live!