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Mass Effect 3 for Wii U Launch, Bridges Prequels

By Jorge Ba-oh (jb)

8545 on 03.08.2012 at 00:36

Mass Effect 3 for Wii U Launch, Bridges Prequels on Nintendo gaming news, videos and discussion

EA has confirmed Mass Effect for the Wii U launch day, plus plans to bridge prequel storyline with an interactive comic feature.

The third in the popular sci-fi romp won't be leaping straight into the climatic finale and will instead recap the events of the first two games for newer players unfamiliar with the Mass Effect universe.

It's the first in the series on a Nintendo format, so to cover those essential story elements, develoepr BioWare will include an interactive comic that covers the events of both Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2. The comic allows players to play through the story, making decisions that will ultimately affect the outcome of the game itself.

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The GamePad touch screen is used to manage weapons/abilities during battle and setup eight nifty hotkeys to help out during those more tenser scenes. Of course, there's also a map that can be navigate at the touch and swoop of your finger.

All DLC up until now will be included in Mass Effect 3 for Wii U, but whether upcoming pack Mass Effect: Leviathan would make the cut is uncertain, but likely.

Will you be getting Mass Effect 3 at lanch with Wii U?

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Mass Effect 3: Special Edition (Wii U)

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justonesp00lturn on 03.08.2012 at 00:54#1

Just got Mass Effect 2 for Xbox, plan to get this for Wii U as soon as I can.

NNID: crackedthesky
My blog, mostly about writing: http://davidjlovato.wordpress.com

Phoenom on 03.08.2012 at 01:16#2

Might consider this if the recap of 1 and 2 is effective enough.

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TAG on 03.08.2012 at 09:17#3

Phoenom said:
Might consider this if the recap of 1 and 2 is effective enough.

The PS3 got Mass Effect 2, but never the first Mass Effect. Apparently they did something similar, where the comic is basically a summary of the previous game. A cool point of the Mass Effect series is that your decisions matter, even in later games. There's maybe a dozen or so decisions that really carry over from 1 to 2, so the interactive comic included these decisions (which I think is the "interactive" part).

You can probably a find a video on Youtube of someone going through the comic. I bet whatever they do on the WiiU will be similar.

*edit*
I found a video. It has major spoilers if you're at all interested in playing the first Mass Effect.

*Youtube video*

The comic isn't bad. It does its job. The decisions feel watered down and, unlike the game, have almost no emotional impact. But how much can you expect from a summary?
I feel like the writing could be a better, though. I read a couple of those Mass Effect novels, and the thing I remember most was that the writing felt immature. I get the same vibe with the comic. Good story, but the writing kind of feels amateurish.

( Edited 03.08.2012 09:31 by TAG )

TAG: That American Guy

"If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone." Romans 12:18

Jay (guest) on 03.08.2012 at 17:34#4

This is good for the 2 people who will be getting the Wii U version. The whole point of the mass effect series is that your choices carry over. It would be pretty silly to get it on PS3 if you have access to a 360 and even more silly to get on Wii U.

Azuardo on 03.08.2012 at 17:41#5

Jay (guest) said:
This is good for the 2 people who will be getting the Wii U version. The whole point of the mass effect series is that your choices carry over. It would be pretty silly to get it on PS3 if you have access to a 360 and even more silly to get on Wii U.

Pretty much. I only have a PS3 so had to use the comic in ME2, and will obviously eventually get ME3 for PS3 to carry the decisions etc over. The only people that should really buy ME3 on Wii U are people that don't have either a 360 or gaming PC (first and foremost) or a PS3.

If there are legal stuffs preventing ME1 away from Xbox/Windows, then it's not odd they aren't porting ME1 to Wii U, but it would have been more ideal to port ME2 to it as well, so it was at least on the same level as PS3 with the ME games.

( Edited 03.08.2012 18:08 by Azuardo )

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justonesp00lturn on 03.08.2012 at 17:54#6

Well, considering most of the decisions' "lasting effects" on the series boil down to whether a line of dialogue is cued here and there, I don't think it's that big of a deal (and certainly it isn't "the whole point of the series"). Mass Effect 2 came out later for the PS3 and without the ability to play the first game, but that didn't stop people from buying it, and clearly Bioware made enough from it to do it again.

Besides that, the Wii U version will be worth it for other reasons like more streamlined input (which is the point anyway) and the fact that I won't have to put in an extra $40 to get all the DLC like I would if I bought it for Xbox - it comes on the Wii U disc.

That said, while bringing Mass Effect to the Wii U is a choice that makes sense for Bioware, I'm hoping it's not just a token move and Bioware and EA continue to support the system in the future. It's one thing to port a game already out to the Wii U, but I'm hoping it can carry big name titles as they are made (though Assassin's Creed 3 is probably enough to quell such fears).

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Azuardo on 03.08.2012 at 18:17#7

Yeah, depends on the prices of combining it all together. By the time the Wii U version arrives at full price, the PS3 etc version will be (and already is) half of that, if not lower. So it's then about totalling the DLC prices to that. A complete edition will arrive for PS3 etc too, though, which will probably be the same price as the Wii U one.

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Mandown on 03.08.2012 at 22:39#8

Off-TV-Play Confirmed for this.

Mandown on 03.08.2012 at 23:42#9

Phoenom said:
Might consider this if the recap of 1 and 2 is effective enough.

2 is well worth buying, it's light on the RPG stuff but it doesn't hamper the game.

TAG on 04.08.2012 at 04:16#10

*Youtube video*

Linkyshinks said:
Phoenom said:
Might consider this if the recap of 1 and 2 is effective enough.
2 is well worth buying, it's light on the RPG stuff but it doesn't hamper the game.

I think two played better, but I liked the story and characters more in the first game.

TAG: That American Guy

"If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone." Romans 12:18

Jacob4000 on 04.08.2012 at 05:39#11

Well, considering most of the decisions' "lasting effects" on the series boil down to whether a line of dialogue is cued here and there, I don't think it's that big of a deal (and certainly it isn't "the whole point of the series").

Personally, as someone who has played all three on 360 importing my decisions along the way, we couldn't disagree more. People I saved/didn't save, conversations I had, decisions I made etc all made the experience that much more enjoyable and personal. The ending might not have done proper justice to the accumulation of data, but the nods throughout the games to your own decisions are actually one of the core reasons Mass Effect is such a unique experience. Boiling it all down to a few lines in a comic book might be a passable way to try to bridge the massive gap, but you're missing so much of what makes the series great.

Your decisions have much more impact when you've actually done them as part of the game's narrative rather then a selection made in a comic book. The best way to play Mass Effect is carrying your decisions through from the beginning. Starting with 2 is not ideal, but doable. I wouldn't even consider playing 3 on its own. Sort of like starting Lost in season 6 imo.

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Red XIII on 04.08.2012 at 08:05#12

I've just finished ME1 on PC. I normally hate PC games, but the story elements carrying over has convinced me to play 2 and 3 on PC as well, rather than on PS3 as I normally planned.

And I really don't like playing games with mouse and keyboard... but Mass Effect is worth it.

The only reason I likely won't be getting the Wii U version is that I won't be able to wait long enough to conclude the story. I think it's totally okay to play one version on one console and switch to the other via the comic, but just starting right at the 2nd or 3rd game is a terrible idea.

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justonesp00lturn on 05.08.2012 at 05:36#13

Jacob4000 said:

Personally, as someone who has played all three on 360 importing my decisions along the way, we couldn't disagree more. People I saved/didn't save, conversations I had, decisions I made etc all made the experience that much more enjoyable and personal. The ending might not have done proper justice to the accumulation of data, but the nods throughout the games to your own decisions are actually one of the core reasons Mass Effect is such a unique experience. Boiling it all down to a few lines in a comic book might be a passable way to try to bridge the massive gap, but you're missing so much of what makes the series great.
Your decisions have much more impact when you've actually done them as part of the game's narrative rather then a selection made in a comic book. The best way to play Mass Effect is carrying your decisions through from the beginning. Starting with 2 is not ideal, but doable. I wouldn't even consider playing 3 on its own. Sort of like starting Lost in season 6 imo.

Yeah, I had really just started Mass Effect 2 when I posted that and I've gone through more of it, and it's a bit more involved than I thought. I wouldn't recommend starting with 3 either. That said, since I played the first two on the Xbox I still made the investments in story and character and still made those decisions, so picking up the third game on the Wii U shouldn't really be any different, I can play through the comic without losing the effect playing the games would have had since I already played through them.

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My blog, mostly about writing: http://davidjlovato.wordpress.com

justonesp00lturn on 05.08.2012 at 05:37#14

Red XIII said:
I've just finished ME1 on PC. I normally hate PC games, but the story elements carrying over has convinced me to play 2 and 3 on PC as well, rather than on PS3 as I normally planned.
And I really don't like playing games with mouse and keyboard... but Mass Effect is worth it.
The only reason I likely won't be getting the Wii U version is that I won't be able to wait long enough to conclude the story. I think it's totally okay to play one version on one console and switch to the other via the comic, but just starting right at the 2nd or 3rd game is a terrible idea.

You should look into an Xbox controller for PC. I have one for playing Fallout 3 on PC, I probably wouldn't play without it.

( Edited 06.08.2012 04:22 by justonesp00lturn )

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TAG on 06.08.2012 at 06:25#15

justonesp00lturn said:
You should look into an Xbox controller for PC. I have one for playing Fallout 3 on PC, I probably wouldn't play without it.

That's what I do, too. I'm horribly awkward trying to play with a keyboard and mouse. I like using a game controller for my games, and the Xbox controller seems to have almost become the standard PC controller.