Its almost here, Mass Effect 2

So I've been working myself up into a frenzy the last few weeks waiting for this game to come out. I loved the first game, despite the many issues with the gameplay and cant wait to dive into what looks like a vastly improved world and system.

Now of course I'll be playing first time round with my amazing Infiltrator Carla Sheperd but looking at the videos posted on the website it looks like I might actually try this game with all the classes, they each look fun in their own special way, whether you like spamming biotics untill everybody on the battlefield is in orbit or blowing the top of someones head off with a sniper rifle there seems to be something there for you.

In an attempt to let out my excitement in managable chunks I've decided to run through each of the classes one by one and weigh up just how fun they are going to be. I'm saving the mighty Infiltrator for last of course but thats not to say the others are unworthy, Carla is going to have plenty of good competition in the spectre market.

First up, I've decided to look at something that I shy away from but am strangely connected to as an Infiltrator, the lowly Engineer. Oh whats he going to do? Hit the enemies with his wrench? What an idiot. But remember, the engineer in TF2 was one of the deadliest things on the battlefield with all those turrets of his, and the guy in Dead Space was an engineer as well. Hang on, I'm starting to get pretty intimidated by all of this.

So how do the Engineer's in Mass Effect 2 measure up compared to those badasses, lets find out...



So pretty damn awesome then it seems. If you're an synthetic enemy, you obviously dont want to meet an engineer. It looks as though the engineer, who played a largely supportive role in ME1 is now quite a badass, able to get in much closer (okay, so only a little bit closer) and do some damage (well maybe not so much damage).

First off is the combat drone, which looks pretty impressive. I can see it being used to distract enemies and draw aggro rather than being used as an offensive weapon but its good all the same. It effectivly adds another member to the team that doesnt mind getting shot at and this has its obvious uses in a warzone. Oh, did you see it blow up when it dies as well, that was cool. I can see myself sending a lot of combat drones martyrs to heaven during the course of the game. I would spawn them just as suicide bombers and let them go to work.

Next AI hacking is another skill that adds a member to your team for a short time and could potentially turn the tides of battle rather quickly. You could start difficult fights by using enemies to soak damage for you or try and hack the big boss like in the video with that Geth Prime. It only works on AI's though but there looks to be lots of those in the game, and not just Geth. The problem with hacking though is that it can be easilly resisted by stronger enemies so I dont think hacking Geth Primes and YMIR mechs is going to be easy, still though the Engineer has a much better chance of it than the Infiltrator, who fortunately also gets access to AI hacking as well. Now just imagine how cool it would be to hack this mean bastard, the YMIR mech:

The other abilites seem pretty standard, damage dealers, debuffs and anti shield powers like overload, which I have to say saved Carla's life on multiple occasions in ME1, Incinerate and Cryo Blast which are like biotic versions of the ammo powers that the other clases have access to.

The gunplay options for engineers are limited to only the submachine gun and the heavy pistol which I think would get boring for me after a while (I got sick of using the pistol on everything in ME1) but I guess this is okay. The pistols are so much beefier in ME2 and the submachine gun looks like it shreds opponents at close range. These could be good, but of course, its no sniper rifle. They also get heavy weapons but every class gets these so no biggie.

I can definately see myself giving the Engineer a good old go. It looks tactical enough to stay interesting and the ability to turn enemies on one another at the critical moment never gets old. With strong team mates backing him up I can see the Engineer winning a lot more battles than he used to. He can also fix the toilet on the Normandy, and thats good too.

Next up, the close combat awesomeness of the Vanguard