Category: Games

Mass Effect: Legendary Edition brings the first three games in the series together in one package, letting new players experience it for the first time with new visual enhancements. But if you’re an experienced Spectre, you should know that playing the Legendary Edition won’t feel exactly like you remember. BioWare has made some quality-of-life and balancing changes from the originals. If you’re diving back in for your second trip through the galaxy (or third or fourth), read on for things you may need to know.

For more about how the collection stacks up, be sure to read our Mass Effect: Legendary Edition review in progress.

DLC Is Sprinkled Throughout

In the original Mass Effect releases, DLC expansions were added post-launch as usual, so buying the extra stories would grant you immediate access to them. Sometimes there might be level restrictions, but in general, you wouldn’t have to wait. The Legendary Edition includes almost all of the DLC across all three games from the start, but you can’t just jump straight into the DLC. Instead, BioWare has spread out the DLC missions so that they’ll appear more organically alongside regular missions. That makes it a single, unified experience, but it also means that you can’t, for example, start up the Shadow Broker mission as soon as you start playing Mass Effect 2 (you can go recruit the two DLC squadmates, Zaeed and Kasumi).

But The Pinnacle Station DLC Is MIA

The one piece of DLC missing from the package is the Pinnacle Station add-on from the first Mass Effect. As BioWare has detailed before, the data was corrupted after the original Mass Effect was released. That led to the DLC being absent from the PS3 port for Mass Effect. Similarly, when BioWare went to remaster the game for this Legendary Edition, the same corrupted data problem prevented it from inclusion in the game. Pinnacle Station does still technically exist on the Xbox Store, for the original Xbox 360 release, but for obvious reasons, it isn’t compatible with the Legendary Edition.

Use Weapons Without Penalties

The original Mass Effect included classes like the rest of the series, but more narrowly defined them by creating penalties for using certain weapons that weren’t optimized for your class. The Legendary Edition removes these penalties to give you more flexibility in your class and weapon choices. However, certain classes will be able to allocate points into certain weapon types to improve their effectiveness.

Galactic Readiness Depends More On All Three Games

In the original Mass Effect 3, your Galactic Readiness level could be buffed by playing plenty of the multiplayer mode. In the Legendary Edition, that mode has been cut (though it could return), and the Galactic Readiness level has been rebalanced. If you’re playing through the entire trilogy in order, it will be determined by the content you’ve completed across all three games. If you jump straight to Mass Effect 3, however, you’ll need to do almost everything to reach max readiness and get the best ending.

Respec at a Discount With Shadow Broker

You can respec your party’s powers and upgrades in Mass Effect 2 by investing in the Retrain Powers upgrade from the Research Terminal on the Normandy. You can find it on the second deck. But if you can wait a little while until you complete the Shadow Broker mission, you can get a significant discount. The Normandy respec costs 2500 Element Zero, while the Shadow Broker respec is only 1000 EZ. Either way, don’t worry too much about spending your upgrade points because you can always retrain.

FemShep Looks More Consistent

In the original Mass Effect releases, the male Shepard was the default in all marketing materials, and this was reflected in the games themselves. Though FemShep was always an option, her default look was inconsistent between games. That has been fixed for the Legendary Edition, so you can pick FemShep (expertly voiced by Jennifer Hale) without worrying about the consistency being broken by an ever-changing face. Naturally, if you make your own custom Shepard–male or female–that will carry through all three games too.

Trophies And Achievements Are Easier, Thankfully

Some of the Trophies and Achievements were extremely tricky, or even required multiple playthroughs to claim them all, and Legendary Edition makes some much-needed adjustments. One, for example, rewards you for playing with certain squadmates in the first Mass Effect. While it used to require you to play most of the game with squadmates–which effectively restricted you from swapping out squad members and only let you get a couple per playthrough–now you can claim the equivalent Trophy or Achievement by playing a handful of missions with a squadmate. Others that make a cumulative count will stack through different playthroughs. All these changes make getting a Platinum trophy much more attainable.

EA is releasing a new Courtyard Oasis Kit for The Sims 4 on May 18. The DLC goes live across PC, PS4, and Xbox One at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET and introduces a variety of fountains and other opulent furniture with which to furnish your Sims’ homes.

“Curated for Simmers who want to design a serene and stylish oasis at the center of their homes, The Sims 4 Courtyard Oasis Kit uses vibrant and harmonious pieces inspired by the Riads of Morocco,” EA said in a press release. “Courtyard Oasis offers even more ways for players to express their creativity and design opulent spaces with traditional filigree designs, vibrant colors and intricate tile patterns.”

The kit includes “colorful fountains, ornate furniture, resplendent textiles and lush, tropical plants,” as well as columns, archways, and latticed wooden windows. EA did not confirm a price, but previous kits have each cost $5.

This marks the fourth “kit” to arrive for The Sims 4 to date. As EA describes, these add-ons are “bite-size” pieces of content that are smaller than the big Game Packs and Stuff Packs, and they typically introduce new items or features. The three other kits include the Throwback Fit Kit, Country Kitchen Kit, and the Bust the Dust Kit.

Despite first launching back in 2014, The Sims 4 continues to receive new content and updates regularly. EA recently rolled out a patch for the game that fixed a handful of small issues. The publisher plans to release another update later this month that will address even more issues; you can read more on the official Sims website.

Gameplay for Total War: Warhammer III has just been revealed, and GameSpot has a new preview that shows off what you can expect from the strategy game in development at Creative Assembly.

In the video embed below, video producer Dave Jewitt gives a breakdown of the new updates coming to Warhammer III, including one of its biggest new features: Survival battles. These huge-scale fights combine elements from tower-defense modes and skirmishes into one cohesive narrative-infused war. The single-player mode features four of these capstone battles, and in between, you’ll need to sufficiently outfit your army to take on increasingly challenging tactical skirmishes.

In this example, you’re tasked with capturing points and then holding them against waves of enemies. To do this, you use supplies you’ve acquired to literally build up a fort and paths to funnel enemies through, tower defense-style. You’ll also have to juggle adding buffs to your troops and making sure to recruit new ones.

Total War: Warhammer III launches sometime this year on PC, and will mark the end of Creative Assembly’s Warhammer trilogy. Along with new gameplay additions like Survival battles and expanded multiplayer modes, Warhammer III also digs deeper into series lore to offer new playable factions for the Kislev, Cathay, Khorne, Nurgle, Slaanesh and Tzeench–making this game one of the most expansive classic Warhammer video games to date.

The Mass Effect trilogy is a unique series of games in how your actions during an earlier game can ultimately impact an experience you end up having by the end. These special moments can sometimes have significant consequences, but other times, they’re small, warming callbacks to something you did.

Most of the time, these strange or unique outcomes required you to do something either obscure to get or are the result of choices in the past that fall in-between the cracks of the series’ morality system. Most players tend to play full-on Paragon or Renegade in their playthroughs of the series, but if you mix and match your answer, you get some pretty intriguing consequences. Below we detail a few of our favorite rare Mass Effect outcomes, which you can still experience in Mass Effect: Legendary Edition.

Keep in mind that, since this covers a lot of narrative setups and unexpected ways they can pay off, it naturally includes lots and lots of spoilers, spanning the entire trilogy.

SPOILERS FOLLOW.

Confused Liara

Why don’t we take a break from all the death and sadness and talk about a more lighthearted moment in Mass Effect 1. One of the required missions of the game is to head to a Prothean dig site on the planet of Therum and find Dr. Liara T’Soni. Most players will head to Therum first as it’s what the game recommends and you’ll want Liara early if you’re interested in romancing her. But you don’t have to. You can wait. And wait. And wait.

In fact. you can wait all the way until the ending of the game until there is nothing else to do but save Liara. When you finally show up, it turns out she’s been trapped in the Prothean security bubble this whole time and is losing her mind.

You get a unique conversation where Liara believes Shepard is a hallucination, followed by an equally hilarious scene back on the Normandy where you inform Liara that the plot of the game basically happened without her.

Mordin Lives

Mass Effect may be all about choice, but some things are predestined. Some characters won’t make it to the end no matter what decisions you make. The first and most heartbreaking loss in Mass Effect 3 is Salarian scientist Mordin Solus, who is doomed to either sacrifice himself to cure the genophage, or betrayed by Shepard and shot in the back. Either way Mordin has to die.

Or does he? Mordin can live. You might be thinking that sounds ideal, but the reality is to get this outcome you actually have to f**k up really badly and repeatedly.

Mistake number one: You killed Wrex back on Virmire, which means his bloodbrother Wreav is in charge of clan Urdnot. Wreav is both stupid and bloodthirsty and a future with him in charge of the Krogan may very well lead to another Krogan Rebellion. But that’s okay, because with Eve at his side, she can help guide him in the right direction.

Mistake number two: You didn’t save Mealon’s research data in Mass Effect 2 and Eve is now dead. Or alternatively, Eve dies because you didn’t stop the bomb on Tuchanka.

With Eve not around to keep Wreav in check, Shepard now has a pretty compelling case as to why it’s not a good idea to save the Krogan right now. This is enough to convince Mordin, who then fakes his death so Wreav thinks he died curing the genophage. He then assists in building the crucible, brings you a small boost to your war assets, and sends Shepard a nice little thank you email. You even get a final goodbye with him on Earth. But as far as everyone else is concerned, Mordin is dead.

Was his survival worth the genocide of a whole species? I leave that up to you.

Salarian Councilor’s Death

Another tragic death in ME3 is Thane, who dies at the hands of series edgelord Kai Lang as he’s saving the Salarian Councilor. There is no way around this one. If Thane is alive in Mass Effect 3, he is fated to die here. But what if Thane isn’t in Mass Effect 3? What happens to the Salarian Councilor? Well, remember Captain Kirrahe from Mass Effect 1?

You actually meet Kirrahe in the first game, who ultimately becomes Major Kirrahe. For most players this is just a nice little nod to the character, but for those who don’t have Thane around, it’s actually a clever reintroduction and setup because, you guessed it, Kirrahe shows up in Thane’s place and saves the Councilor.

Of course, Kirrahe can actually die all the way back on Virmire if Shepard chooses not to help the Salarian squad by turning off a couple defenses. If that’s the case, then the councilor just dies. (Whoops.) If this happens, Udina will actually use doctored security footage to make it look like Shepard was the one to kill them, making it harder to convince Ashley or Kaidan to join you.

Ashley/Kadian Refuse to join Shepard

Let’s touch on the fate of another pair of squad members, Ashley and Kadian, whose roles are largely identical in Mass Effect 2 and 3, depending on who you saved in Mass Effect 1. For simplicity, we will refer to them as the Virmire survivor.

Their story culminates during Udina’s attempted coup of the Citadel council. There is a hidden score based on a number of factors that will determine the outcome, such as whether you romanced the survivor, if you saved the council in ME1, and how you’ve interacted with the survivor in ME3. If you get a positive score, you can convince them of Udina’s betrayal and then get the option to have them join you on the Normandy for the rest of the game. If you end up with a negative score, you can’t convince them and they’ll get shot by either Shepard or one of your squadmates. Brutal.

There is, however, a rare third outcome. It is possible to have a high-enough score to persuade the Virmire survivor to back off during the confrontation with Udina, while simultaneously still having a broken relationship with them. This means they will refuse Shepard’s offer to join the Normandy crew and can’t be a squadmate for the rest of the game.

Party Members Can Show Up As Enemies

Party member death is a pretty major part of the Mass Effect trilogy. In Mass Effect 3, not only can many of the major characters die, but often Shepard is the one who kills them, which makes a Renegade run pretty brutal. Most of this friend murder happens in cutscenes, but there are several you can kill in combat.

The first is everyone’s favorite space psychopath, Jack. After parting ways with Shepard, Jack becomes a teacher at Grissom Academy, a school for gifted biotics. A major side mission in the game involves rescuing Jack and her students from Cerberus, but it’s possible to ignore it. In Mass Effect 3, if you carry on with the main story, you’ll get locked out of side content as time moves forward and this is taken into account, as Jack and her students are kidnapped by Cerberus. Then, when storming the Illusive Man’s base near the end of the game, you’ll come across a special recording of Jack being tortured. Further in, you’ll find Jack, now brainwashed into a Phantom, and you’ll have to put her down.

Similarly, there’s Legion. It was possible to give up Legion’s body to Cerberus in Mass Effect 2–a choice absolutely nobody made because who’s going to give up the Geth party member? If you did, though, Cerberus will indeed have kept the body and experimented on Legion. The empty shell that was once Legion shows up as a special enemy type in the Cerberus base, the same room where Phantom Jack also appears.

The final party member to talk about is Morinth, one of Samara’s Ardat-Yakshi daughters who you can side with in Mass Effect 2. Morinth was always a limited party member. She pretends to be Samara for the rest of Mass Effect 2 as to not arouse suspicion, which basically means she still says all the things Samara does outside of a few small moments.

With her being so limited in Mass Effect 2, it’s disappointing but not at all surprising that she doesn’t make a proper appearance in Mass Effect 3. Shepard gets an email from her, but that’s about it. However, at some point in the game, Morinth gets found by the Reapers and turned into a Banshee, like the other Ardat-Yakshi. In the final battle on Earth, Morinth will appear. She behaves just like any other Banshee and gets no special dialogue.

Romance with Javik and James

While BioWare does its best to make your shipping dreams a reality, there are some party members you just can’t woo. Two of those were military beefcake James Vega and Prothean sadboy Javik, which a vocal group of fans was pretty disappointed with.

BioWare must have heard the fans’ cries because they added two hidden “romance paths” in the Citadel DLC. During the big party, if FemShep doesn’t have a romance partner and makes certain dialogue choices, they’ll wake up the next morning having slept with either James or Javik.

The Javik scene is played as a joke, but the James is genuinely creepy. Shepard can make several advances on James throughout the game but he always turns her down, making it pretty clear he’s not interested. Yet in the Citadel DLC, Shepard eventually resorts to getting James drunk enough so he’ll sleep with her. To cap the whole thing, when the pair awake in the morning, he sounds like he regrets that it happened. I don’t think this is what the fans had in mind.

The Saddest Party on the Citadel

Let’s get back to the fun stuff: killing squadmates. The big Citadel party was the final content made for the original trilogy. As such the whole thing is one massive celebration of it’s characters. BioWare went all-out, bringing back the whole cast and stuffing in as many in-jokes as possible. As a finale to these beloved characters, you couldn’t ask for anything better.

But the Citadel’s charm is dependent on those characters, and what happens if none of them are alive? My co-worker Jake Dekker and I went on a journey to find out just that in our series The Saddest Party on the Citadel, a multipart Let’s Play where we planned out the murder of all our squadmates in order to get the fewest number of characters possible available for the party. Turns out there are only three party members you can’t kill in the whole series; Liara, James, and EDI. That’s it.

This is a bit different from everything else we’ve been talking about. There isn’t extra dialogue or a new scene. The party goes on, exactly the same, except nobody is present. I don’t think BioWare expected anyone to actually play the game this way, but I love that it’s possible. It’s the ultimate example of what happens when you push this series’ emphasis on player choice to its limits. You get a sad Shepard, throwing a rubbish party for the only few people left they haven’t gotten killed. Cheers!

Mass Effect: Legendary Edition is an all-new collection featuring Bioware’s classic sci-fi RPG series that revamps many aspects of the original games, providing a new way for old and new players to experience these much-loved games. As you’d expect, there’s quite a lot to the Mass Effect games, and it may be a lot to take in at first for newcomers. And with the new mechanical changes made to these versions of the games, even returning players might find themselves confused about some things. To help you get the most out of your Mass Effect: Legacy Edition experience, we’ve compiled a suite of guides and walkthroughs below, each detailing essential tips and tricks for all three games.

For more about how the collection stacks up, be sure to read our Mass Effect: Legendary Edition review in progress. Otherwise, read on for all our guides!

Essential Tips For First-Timers

If you’re new to the Mass Effect series, this guide is a solid place to start. We outline important tips about how to best play these games and highlight essential practices to follow to ensure that you’re always on the best path from game to game.

Everything Returning Players Should Know

Returning players should start with this guide, as it details all the big new changes to Mass Effect: Legendary Edition, many of which are important to know. This is because the Legendary Edition, in particular, does things like incorporate DLC content more organically into the main experience and create new challenges thanks to adjustments to how your actions impact the final game’s epic conclusion.

Mass Effect 1-3 Walkthroughs

Sometimes it helps to have a walkthrough handy as you play an RPG series as involved as the Mass Effect games. Fortunately, we’ve got in-depth walkthroughs that you can refer to that’ll provide beat-for-beat directions on how to get through each game. Note that these walkthroughs were published on GameSpot during each game’s original release, so the content within does not account for the changes made in the Legendary Edition. Regardless, these walkthroughs should help you get to where you need in a general sense.

Fun Side Missions You Don’t Want To Skip

There’s quite the array of side quests in the Mass Effect games–known specifically in the games as Assignments. Not all of them are as involved, but the ones that offer substantial story details and beats that follow through into subsequent sequels as your save transfers from game to game. We’ve compiled a guide detailing some amazing side quests you shouldn’t miss. As of this writing, we only cover the first Mass Effect game in this guide, but we’ll be updating it with even more awesome side quests in the days to come.

You Can Pick Any Dialogue Option, You Should Fully Play Paragon Or Renegade, Here’s Why

It may be a no-brainer for returning players, but if you’re a newcomer, it’s especially important that you commit to either Paragon or Renegade in the game’s morality system. The decisions you make are important, so it’s essential to be consistent with your dialogue choices when it comes to the game’s more complex moral situations. We’ve compiled a quick PSA guide detailing why this is essential.

• Mass Effect: Legendary Edition PSA: You Should Fully Play Paragon Or Renegade, Here’s Why [Coming Soon]

Rarest Moments You Might Not Know About

That said if you don’t make consistent decisions as a Paragon or Renegade, you will encounter some intriguing and rare moments. This is less a guide, but more of a fun feature recounting some of the most memorable rare moments that can occur in the Mass Effect games and how they happen. This feature contains a ton of story spoilers, so do not read it if you’re new to the series.

How To Get Mass Effect 2’s Best Ending

If you’re vaguely familiar with Mass Effect 2, you’ll know that the biggest story beat in it is about the big suicide mission that Sheppard and his crew need to tackle during the game’s climax. It’s pretty much what the game reiterates and works to culminate to, and it can go very wrong if you’re not consistently doing the right things throughout the game. Here’s a guide detailing exactly what you need to do to survive Mass Effect 2’s suicide mission. As to be expected, this guide will have story spoilers.

How To Reach Ideal Galactic Readiness

One of the most important aspects of Mass Effect 3 is the measurement of your galactic readiness–a factor that heavily dictates how your journey ends. In the past, this measurement was dictated by a variety of factors, including your decisions, time spent in multiplayer, activity in the game’s companion mobile app, and more. But seeing as those last two are no longer around, Bioware made some changes with the Legendary Edition by adjusting how galactic readiness is measured. To help you best understand what contributes to your overall galactic readiness throughout the three games, we’ve compiled a feature detailing what you need to know. We’ll be updating it in the coming days with even more details, but it should give you a general understanding of this complex system.

• Mass Effect: Legendary Edition – How To Reach Ideal Galactic Readiness [Coming Soon]

It’s safe to say that Mass Effect: Legendary Edition isn’t exactly a small game, what with it bundling the first three entries in BioWare’s grand space odyssey together into one gigantic package. Like any good RPG of its time, Mass Effect was built on various character classes, an entire spaceship of equipment to manage, and a whole lot of talking.

If you’re new to Mass Effect, fear not! We’ve got a selection of tips below to help you get into the swing of things right out of the space-gate. From combat to galactic readiness, here’s everything to help you get started. For more about how the collection stacks up, be sure to read our Mass Effect: Legendary Edition review in progress.

Know Your Role

With Mass Effect: Legendary Edition, there’s a more unified approach to how class systems work between all three games. Each class serves a particular need and playstyle, whether they be Jack-of-all-trades combat experts or titans wielding biotic powers. There are obviously finer details to be explored throughout the entire trilogy as you grow Shepard’s powers, but the broad strokes of each class are:

• Soldier – Weapons specialist designed around offensive play and great for beginners wanting a straightforward approach.
• Adept – Biotic specialist whose abilities give the player a range of options for managing enemies but requires lots of fine-tuning.
• Engineer – A support specialist whose tech powers can open locked crates, amplify shields, and keep mobs at bay.
• Vanguard – Mixing elements from the Soldier and Adept classes, Vanguards are great at close-quarters combat.
• Sentinel – A living shield that can soak up damage while providing versatile offensive capabilities with tech and biotic powers.
• Infiltrator – A saboteur with a cloaking device, Infiltrators are perfect for players who prefer to keep enemies at a distance

Take An Experimental Approach To Combat

You don’t just need to take a cover-based approach to combat, as Mass Effect has numerous options for dealing with enemies. Each of the classes above provides a vast number of different tactics, such as Soldiers having an entire arsenal of close- to long-range weaponry to play with, Adepts using their powers to wreak havoc on the battlefield, and Sentinel players shrugging off damage while closing in for the kill.

Combined with the various skill trees, ammo types, explosives, weapons, and tactics, each combat arena is ripe for versatile approaches to combat that end up making the entire business of saving the galaxy a whole lot more fun!

Should I Go Renegade or Paragon?

Many games have featured a morality system over the years, but Mass Effect’s take on that idea resulted in a morally complex character. While Shepard’s goal of saving the galaxy won’t be swayed no matter which action you take when presented with the opportunity to be noble or a bit of a badass, it’s how Shepard goes about their business that is changed.

Sticking to the Paragon route is a more morally challenging route that forces players to talk their way out of situations, while choosing the Renegade path typically ends an encounter with a fight. The choice is yours, as you’ll either become a soldier who always takes the high road when it comes to conflict or a rebel who has no qualms about using more ruthless methods so long as they get the job done.

Paragon and Renegade options are easy to spot during conversations, as blue choices on the dialogue wheel represent the more peaceful approach to resolving situations while red text indicates a more direct and dangerous path. Once a conversation has ended, you’ll also see your Paragon or Renegade gains in the corner of the screen.

It’s also important to commit to one route as opposed to a mix. The reasoning is that it heavily impacts the opportunities that open up as you get further into the series. Being wishy-washy with your approach may lock you out of these moments, so be sure to be as consistent as possible. You can learn more about how this impacts the game in our guide detailing why it’s crucial to go either total Renegade or Paragon.

Max Out Your Charm/Intimidate Skills

The Mass Effect games require plenty of talking between missions, and if you want to get as many dialogue options as possible to continue on your Renegade or Paragon path, you’re going to want to become a smooth talker. Unlike other stats which are unlocked with points earned from gaining new levels, Charm and Intimidate stats only open up by earning their respective Paragon and Renegade points.

If you choose not to invest in these personality traits, you’ll still see those speech options but those various quips and threats will be grayed out as inaccessible options.

Talk To Teammates

As soon as you finish a mission, start a conversation with all of your Normandy crew members, or at least your favorite ones! Your allies will always have something to talk about, and getting to know them will eventually unlock more missions and relationships, and have an impact on how the saga of Mass Effect progresses.

Complete As Many Side-Missions As You Can In Mass Effect 1

There’s no shortage of optional missions–known in the game as Assignments–to use as stepping stones to increase your skills in Mass Effect, but these are more than just useful grinds for experience points. There’ll be actual ramifications from these missions that will be felt in Mass Effect 2 and 3, some minor and some major. Completing these missions also provides a lot of context to the game, shedding new light on characters and organizations that you’ll encounter in your journey and enhancing your personal journey through the trilogy when these events are referenced.

To ensure you don’t miss out on the game’s best side stories, we’ve compiled a feature detailing fun side missions you need to play.

Do As Many Of Mass Effect 2’s Loyalty Missions As You Can

Feeling attached to the crew you’ve assembled in Mass Effect’s first sequel? Then you’d better focus on completing their various Loyalty Missions, which not only creates a much better sense of camaraderie on the Normandy, it also has a huge impact on the final mission that the game builds up to.

For more details on Mass Effect 2’s pivotal climactic mission, be sure to check out our guide detailing everything you need to know.

Make A Choice, Accept The Consequences

It might be tempting to roll back to an earlier save so that you can make the best decision possible, but you’re doing yourself a disservice by quantum-leaping through moments that require you to select an option at the spur of the moment. With a storyline that stretches across dozens and dozens of hours across three games, no two Shepards are ever the same. There’s a story worth experiencing, actions that have actual consequences, and some very hard decisions that you’ll have to make that will have devastating ramifications.

Plus if you don’t like your original playthrough, you can always start a new one to see how that journey would have played out. That’s a whole lot of value right there.

In A Rush? Mass Effect’s Interactive’s Genesis Comics Provide A Huge Shortcut

If you’ve decided to skip Mass Effect 1, which is a shame considering all the work done to remaster it, and you want to play the Mass Effect sequels first while dealing with the ramifications of the decisions made in the first game, there is an option for a more unified experience in the form of the Mass Effect: Genesis interactive comics.

Originally part of Mass Effect 2 for its PS3 launch as a way to catch up on the first game and seen again in Mass Effect 3 when it arrived on Wii U, these comics provide crucial story recaps and chances to make vital decisions based on events from the first two games, which will be used to tailor a more unique Mass Effect 3 experience.

Get The Galaxy Ready

When Mass Effect 3 originally launched, one of its big draws was the idea of “galactic readiness” for the war against the Reapers. Players could work on this through the game’s main campaign, going off the beaten path with side missions, and engaging in multiplayer to prepare the galaxy for war. Working on those side activities increased the galaxy’s overall preparation for dealing with the Reapers, with a higher percentage resulting in a better ending overall.

For Mass Effect: Legendary Edition, a few things have changed. Mass Effect 3’s multiplayer may not be present, but you can still increase your galactic readiness score by playing through the entire trilogy from start to finish. Various key quests will increase your rating, and every activity in the game contributes to the ending you get, affecting story beats along the way.