To send the data you need to log in with an Origin account that has Mass Effect 3 on it. Throughout the game you collect intel and you can either upload them to your account (there's a button) or trade them for 25 credits each. The connection is the typical "send us your data to improve performance" deal, but EA are not exactly on my list of favorites at the moment. The controls are essentially Dead Space, but left/right movement feels stiffer. In gunfights though, they are unnoticeable. Like I said, think Epoch for movement, except you can move along cover as well as jump from cover to cover. To select biotics or weapons you have to hold in the top-left, or -right corner and a selection screen pops up. With biotics you select the power and then select an enemy to use it on. Guns just get equipped. At the end of each gunfight you get a grade screen. There are 3 categories with 3 stars each - Style Points, Time and Health. As far as I can tell, the better you do at each category, the more credits you will get. Style points you earn for being stylish - chaining enemies, using special moves and swapping weapons while chaining all give you additional points. Time and health are self-explanatory, I think.
Wow... uhh... not sure what to see after seeing a few gameplay vids put up on YouTube. Out of an excitement level of 100, it's now dropped to 20%. Seems to be a major letdown... but will reserve my final impressions until I get my hands on this.
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I dunno, I'm really liking it so far. The story is just getting GOOD. Seems to be similar to Dead Space though - or at least the 10 minutes that I've played of that game. Full installed size is 1.0Gb.
Tap enemy to attack, tap buy to win While tap an enemy to pop out and attack seems intuitive and elegant, it does seem a tad... less challenging than traditional iOS fps mechanics, Modern Combat- and N.O.V.A.-style. In the video, combat actually looks a bit static, and occasionally simplistic and easy. But I suppose that when battles are mixed up with additional weapons, biotics and smarter enemies, the game might introduce enough variation, dynamics and stress to add greater elements of challenge. (Perhaps I'm not just comfortable with cover-based shooters. I prefer the Modern Combat principle, where you always move manually, duck behind stuff, stand up to attack (possibly with the addition of a lean-to-the-side-out-of-cover button), and have to move your sights manually to enemies, with no "sticky" covers, leave cover buttons, automatic vaulting to the next cover, etc. I would have like to see those mechanics in a third-person shooter, especially this one. As a general rule, the less automatic and more manual operations in a game, the more challenging and skill-demanding it is.) (Also, I just referred to an iOS control mechanic as "traditional"! That must mean iOS is now an established gaming platform ) Ah, well, at least the character does not strictly auto-aim at the nearest available enemy when he pops out of cover. That mechanic ruined the combat in Shadow Guardian for me As for IAP, I think we just have to learn to see the inclusion of purchaseable progress (credits, xp, holy leaves, dragon condoms, tap buy to win game, etc) in premium games as a standard. And stay well away from the buy button if we want any kind of challenge and sense of natural progression in our games
Frankly I'm baffled. Why is that a disappointment? If looks almost exactly like what EA described. BTW the cover-to-cover mechanic is not an Epoch "thing": Deus Ex: HR had pretty much exactly the same system and it worked great there.
The IAP actually doesn't feel necessary at all. After doing fairly well on the last 4 fights I have quite a lot of credits. It's not enough to pimp me out in one go, but it certainly feels like it's balanced appropriately. I'm also going to sleep (2:30AM) so ask questions now if you have any, after Sanuku's videos. I stick to what I know. I haven't played a single Mass Effect game prior to this. And I believe I used Gears of War, not Epoch to describe the cover-to-cover thing.
Weird, I thought they ditched the unlimited clip from Mass Effect 1 to thermal clips for Mass Effect 2? Mass Effect 1: Mass Effect 2:
In contrast to my less enthuastic post above (which is more a genre preference thing than any disappointed with the actual product, which looks polished as a really, REALLY polished thing, pretty as a equally pretty thing, and above and beyond most iOS games in many regards), I must say that the upgrade system seems very nice. I had expected new weapons and biotics, possibly armor, so the abilities (Sprint, Cloak) and melee upgrades were a nice surprise. Also, while purchasing products based on the past merits of a company is a traditional human folly, in this case, every time someone mentions Dead Space and reminds me that these fellas made that game, I come close to insta-buy at midnight enthusiasm Good catch. When is Infriltrator set? Might the story take place in the early days of the return of the geths and Sovereign's spearhead? Otherwise, it is only a small canon error, not hugely embarassing, but one dedicated devs should be able to identify and avoid with some original IP research.
Another addendum to my posts above, in a confused mess of positive and negative impressions: the combat summary screens that appear after each fight are to immersion kinda what covering someone's eyes in a movie theater, beating him with a broken frying pan, and pouring salt into his ears would be to his enjoyment of the movie
