Why Can't You Just Talk to Me? Irritation in Andromeda

 It was a bit of a slow gaming news week--I didn't encounter anything that piqued my interest (apparently the PS5 ordering has been a complete and utter clusterfunk, but I'm not part of that crowd), so I thought I would give some thought to my current Mass Effect:  Andromeda re-play.  I've been playing for awhile now and have settled back into the groove of the game...and, it's still mostly the mixed bag that I remember.  I've encountered some small, but nonetheless irritating issues that I vaguely remember from previous playthroughs.

Issue #1

I jog my Ryder (who looks basically identical to another Ryder I created....I'm bad at the character creator, can you be bad at that?) over to an NPC either to strike up a conversation or to turn in a mission.  My squadmates are lingering somewhere in the background when I hit the "e" button to initiate the conversation.  The NPC talks and it's fine.  Ryder talks and it's still fine.  Things get annoying when the NPC/Ryder says something and one of your squadmates responds...but, they're off in the background somewhere and the camera is fixed, so you can't hear anything that they're saying!  I'm stuck looking at the POV of my Ryder and just silently standing there....I had forgotten about this issue but now that I've encountered it multiple times, I'm freshly annoyed by it.

Should you play Andromeda?  Yes, with some warnings.

Issue #2

I've reached the point in my playthrough where I'm fighting the Remnant Architects (I like to think of them as "space dragons" because they operate on very similar principles to the dragon fights in Dragon Age:  Inquisition).  The Remnant Architect fights are designed to be boss fight-like encounters--long, drawn out rumbles with a big baddy.  My main point of irritation has to do with the fact that the encounter doesn't autosave when you take down one of the "leg" conduits.  It would be so nice if you didn't have to completely restart the encounter when you die.  Last night I was fighting the Architect on Voeld--probably my least favorite fight location in the game (you have to deal with environmental hazards and the battleground is spread out in a weird way with cramped locations offering the best cover but being difficult to move in)--and it was a huge pain in the buttocks.  Part of me wishes they had spiced up the Architect fights a bit--there is no variety in the tactics of the fight, once you master the pattern it gets very rote.

Since my current Ryder is a vanguard build, I also get irritated at how useless certain ability sets are for the Architect fights.  You really can't charge/nova at all (I'm not quite at the point where I have enough points to create a swappable ability set for just the Architect fights).  I just want to punch an Architect in the face!

Issue #3

Why, oh why, isn't it possible to swap out gear at any place in the field?  Yes, you can fast travel to a forward station (if you've found a few) but that can be a bit of a pain if you're in a new location.  I just want to be able to equip the hot new piece of loot I found!

I don't want to totally diss on Andromeda though; I've always enjoyed the combat and found it quite challenging and I find that with each new playthrough I enjoy the companions more.  It's still not the OG Mass Effect trilogy, but it's worth playing (especially now that it is available for extremely cheap).  I just wish they had fixed a few of these small, irritating things.  It's really a shame that the DLC was scrapped and that we'll never get a satisfactory end to the story.

How Long is too Long? A Story Length Query

This week I've been trying to navigate all the social media posts about people doing some version of the following:  1.) bemoaning the fact they haven't had success in ordering the PS5; 2.) gloating over the fact they were able to order a PS5 or, of the more PC variety, 3.) bemoaning the fact that they haven't had success ordering a 3000 series GPU; 4.) gloating over the fact they were able to order a 3000 series GPU.  After seeing approximately 9 billion different versions of the aforementioned posts, a couple of pieces of gaming news were able to break through.

System specs for CyberPunk 2077!

Both pieces of news are related to the highly anticipated CyberPunk 2077, which is slated to be released later this year (November-ish, I believe).  After much waiting and anticipatory gnashing of teeth, the system requirements were released (see image below).  I was pleasantly surprised as both the minimum specs and the recommended specs seen reasonable.  I know there was some concern that the game could gobble up an insane amount of disk space, but the 70 GB listed is well below what many people anticipated (I think Assassin's Creed:  Odyssey is currently gobbling up a very sizable chunk of space on my HDD).  Now everyone has a target to aim for and hopefully the rabid fanbase can get their hands on needed upgrades prior to the release

The other piece of news is related to the length of the main storyline.  According to this source, the story in CyberPunk will be shorter than the story was in The Witcher 3.  Data from player activity in TW3 revealed that many players never actually finished the main storyline and CD Projekt Red apparently wants more people to finish it.  I am a bit surprised by the fact that people didn't finish the main storyline--according to the above linked article people can finish the entire main storyline in 32 hours...if they skip all the side content.  What kind of monster does that though?!?

Personally, I've always enjoyed a big RPG and if it's well designed (as TW3 is) I'm willing to spend a lot of time playing.  I can also understand the reality that many people just don't have hundreds of hours to sink into completionist playthroughs of todays uber open-world RPG's.  I am looking forward to a long jaunt through the world of CyberPunk 2077 and fully intend to spend as much time as I can meticulously completing every bit of content.

Even though TW3 had a long story I liked how it was designed--it took you to every region in the main game and placed you in a new location at perfectly spaced intervals.  Lingering too long in one place can get tedious, so a change in scenery is needed every once in awhile.  One of my main complaints about Assassin's Creed:  Odyssey is that the absurd size of the map feels fairly pointless.  The main storyline doesn't take you to every region (although there are side quests that can draw you there) and much of the exploration based content seems a bit like needless filler (but, I'm positive that I read something Ubisoft said--that in their playtesting people actively requested the nightmare map o' symbols that seems pretty stock in their games).  I'm on board for engaging content rather than the mindless grind through map symbols that don't contribute much to the actual game.

As much as I would love to pre-order CyberPunk, I'm probably going to hold off until it has been released, gone through the early release growing pains, and is stable and has been patched (even though I don't remember many problems with TW3).  It's going to be painful, but I think I will survive.

Good luck to those of you trying to navigate the PS5/3000 series GPU ordering frenzy.  I would highly encourage you PS5 people to come to the world of PC gaming where it's not a bare knuckled brawl for hardware (the vast majority of the time).  I know you love your exclusives....but it's better over here ;)

Sitting in my Smoke Filled Room

Today it's hard to want to do anything.  The state where I live is dealing with catastrophic fires--luckily, I don't live close to any of them, but we're currently dealing with hazardous levels of smoke (the air quality index for the town where I live is so high that it's completely off the scale....by a lot).  I'm grateful to be safe and it's heartbreaking to see what has been happening throughout the West.  We're going to be contending with hazardous smoke levels all weekend and I'm currently feeling the effects--I've had an ongoing headache and my throat has started to feel very scratchy.  Even with all the windows closed and trying to barricade myself inside the smokey smell has made its way indoors.  So, I'm going to try my best to drum up something for this week even though it's hard to think.

Is the era of Andromeda hate over?

As a teacher, the first few weeks of school are generally a bit chaotic.  This year is no exception since I'm starting the year teaching fully online.  Much of my time has been spent trying to redesign everything for an online format.  I haven't had a ton of time to dedicate to gaming.  What time I have had, I've spent starting up a brand new Ryder in Mass Effect:  Andromeda.  What drew me back to this weirdly controversial title?  I guess it was a combination of seeing the "mostly positive" reviews on Steam and seeing a number of posts about Andromeda in a ME group I follow on social media.

I am fairly certain that the Ryder I designed is almost identical to one that I created in one of my previous playthroughs--I'm getting weird deja vu vibes that makes me think that I'm not very creative and will pick exactly the same features every time.  This time around I decided to play a class that I've always struggled with, vanguard.  Look, using the biotic charge ability is lots of fun, but my personal play style leans more toward shooting than punching.  I don't know if I just need more practice with using the abilities, but it seems difficult to charge into a group of enemies, then scramble back into cover before getting swiss-cheesed with bullet holes.  I also opted for some extra challenge and am playing on insanity mode (I don't know if I have finished it on insanity before) so it's a rootin'-tootin', my Ryder dying a lot, good times!

Andromeda got a ton of flak when it was released in 2017 and it's interesting that the reviews on Steam have angled toward the positive side.  I do think some of the scorn was unwarranted--the combat is fun, challenging, and much more mobile than in the original trilogy.  There are still things that bug me--the facial animation remains awkwardly wonky at certain moments--cringeworthily so, but I think there are plenty of things to enjoy.  The more open-world nature of the game is a change from the ME trilogy and lends itself to better exploration.

Part of me hopes that BioWare doesn't give up on ME and that in the future there is some resolution to the lingering questions that were left when they decided to scrap the DLC for Andromeda.  I'm keeping a wary eye on the development of the upcoming Dragon Age game as an indicator for the possibility of the continuation of the ME series.  Any way you look at it, a new ME game is probably way off in the future.

Stay safe commanders!

Newsy News

On my own personal gaming front, I sadly don't have much to report, plus, it's back to school time which means my time has started to be spent elsewhere.  Mostly I am exhausted and like to just plop down in front of something relaxing.  My go-to relaxing game continues to be PC Building Simulator.  Unfortunately, I've hit level 31, unlocked all the parts, and don't know if simply completing jobs is enough to keep me invested.  I'm on the hunt for another relaxing game to unwind with.

So shiny!  So chonky!

There has been some interesting gaming/hardware news this week.  NVIDIA announced its next generation 3000 series GPU's and, shockingly, some of them could actually be semi-affordable (although, I would say with the state of the world right now, I don't know how many people are going to be clamoring for even the cheapest of the new cards).  They rolled out their announcement with some gorgeous shots of the hotly anticipated Cyberpunk 2077 featuring the much lauded, but little understood ray tracing.  I am very much looking forward to Cyberpunk 2077, but won't be trying to beat the ravenous crowds of hardware nerds to these fancy-shmancy GPU's.

Another piece of good gaming news was the announcement that The Witcher 3 is going to be getting a graphical update in time for the release of the next generation of consoles and this includes the PC version (PC Gamer Article)!  It has been a few years since I've delved back into TW3 and this update might just be the thing to start up another adventure with Geralt and pals.  CD Projekt is awesome.

This isn't exactly breaking news, but fairly recently EA decided to begin selling its games on Steam.  I am very excited about this prospect because I was never wild about Origin.  Unfortunately, it doesn't look like you can migrate your Origin games over to Steam (sadface).  Weirdly, one of the games I've been feeling a hankering to go back and replay is Mass Effect:  Andromeda.  For a game that was critically panned by many fans of the series, the Steam reviews are currently sitting at "very positive."  I guess time has softened those wounds....

Whether you're starting to scrape up some pennies with the hope of snatching a 3000 series GPU, waiting for TW3 to get all fancied up so you can play through it for the 20th time, or thinking about replaying a game you felt fairly meh about (I'm looking at you Andromeda), have a happy, long Labor Day weekend!