Gameplay: Mass Effect 1 features three core gameplay "modes". Dialogue, combat and exploration.

• Speaking of dialogue first, Mass Effect 1 innovated and popularised the "dialogue wheel" as the game was initially conceived as an Xbox 360 exclusive, making the dialogue less cumbersome to use with a controller. Though the dialogue wheel has been used horribly by some titles, namely Fallout 4, its use was appropriate in Mass Effect 1 as the wheel can display up to six options at any one time, and occasionally uses the far-left spot on the wheel to open up even more alternate dialogue lines, normally lines of inquiry. Unlike in Mass Effect 1's sequels, every single line delivered by Shepard throughout gameplay is actively chosen by the player, with no disappointing auto-dialogue present in the game. As Shepard is a hybrid between a traditional RPG silent protagonist and a fully-voiced shooter protagonist, you are more controlling how Shepard conducts him/herself rather than being the hero yourself, but the game does a good job of familiarising and relating yourself to Shepard through the backstory section prior to beginning the game.
  
  
• Combat is divided into shooting, biotics and tech. There are six classes (3 dedicated to one of these playstyles, 3 are hybrids) to choose from which feature actual compromises and advantages which are greatly diminished in Mass Effect 2 and 3. The actual shooting, despite being quite acceptable for an action-RPG in 2007, is quite clunky by today’s standards. Despite Mass Effect 2’s improvements to aiming, the level and enemy design (except brain-dead AI) actually improve Mass Effect 1’s combat. The player has to use the actual environment for cover more often than convenient chest-high walls, and there are far more enemies to challenge reliance on cover, namely the charging krogans. The cover system is also clunkier, although this is an objective flaw, it actually makes the player fight in the open/use the environment for cover like in an FPS more often, actually improving the combat experience. The player has "abilities" which are where biotics and tech come in as the player can use abilities like "Overload" for example to deplete enemy shields. These have positives and drawbacks when compared to the sequels however. The drawbacks are that the abilities are too diluted and similar to one another, with little visual flair, with the upside being that they're far more powerful and usable given that there is no "universal cooldown" unlike the sequels. Holding down the spacebar allows the player to tactically pause the game and plan out where they'll attack using their abilities, unfortunately this is very easy to exploit as you can move the cursor while in this mode, meaning you can shoot and kill, pause and move mouse, and resume pointing at the next enemy. Use of this menu should have been nerfed, like only entering slow motion as opposed to pausing time, or not being able to move the mouse. The combat is clunky, but it does have depth, the main issue however is levelling. You can play on Casual and be destroyed by high-level enemies if you try and complete the "wrong" missions, but crush everything on Insanity if you're level 60. Difficulty is FAR too levelled to stats and gear as opposed to skill, making the whole point of switching to real-time combat (a change from BioWare I otherwise genuinely like) kind of null and void.
  
  
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  Lastly, exploration is… weird. The Mako is both an awesome vehicle, but also pretty terrible. How good the Mako is depends highly on the terrain. Main mission planets are designed with the Mako in mind so as to not expose the vehicle’s drunk physics (being mostly flat with smooth inclines). The side-mission planets feature 4 “mission rooms” repeated ad nauseum, with the planetary terrain being partially auto-generated in development, meaning it can be quite random. Though it’s better to have a dumb but fun vehicle that changes up the pace of gameplay than none at all like the sequels, it’s still an underdeveloped concept. Also, the game does a pretty bad job at explaining that the canon can zoom in (shift-right click), so keep that in mind. Lastly, on-foot exploration is worthwhile here as Mass Effect 1 features genuinely great worldbuilding and interesting NPCs, so make sure to run around and talk to everyone, especially squadmates between missions.

Story: I'm mostly going to stay away from spoilers as I want people to be able to read my review but still be able to experience Mass Effect and be surprised. Mass Effect begins with a brief tutorial section aboard the Normandy starship before placing you on your first true mission planet, Eden Prime. Eden Prime serves as an intelligent exposition to Anderson, Saren and Saren's warship which becomes an important part of the narrative as it progresses. Gameplay is also appropriately simple, yet still introduces most core elements. After the events on Eden Prime, you are placed on the Citadel, an artificial metropolis far outside our solar system housing many alien races and many interesting NPCs and locations. The Citadel is far more open here than in the sequels, especially 2, so be sure to look in every nook and cranny. After you gather evidence on a rogue "Spectre", take on 3 alien squadmates (all of whom have pretty weak reasons to join you but are nevertheless fun additions to the team, especially the krogan Wrex) and gain control of the starship, you then travel to three main mission planets. Noveria is the highlight, corporate secrets, alien horrors and an entirely new race introduced. Feros is also solid with its own "something's wrong here" story that comes straight out of the 70's/80's sci-fi TV Mass Effect 1 is partly an homage to. And Therum is Therum. More specifically it is a stripped down version of "Caleston" which would have been like a desert version of Noveria, dedicated to a mining corporation chocked full of raiders in the outskirs, basically a Mos Eisley, but this was cut and we have a shallow combat simulator with barely any dialogue in the end product. Therum sucks unfortunately, no way to get around that. After these missions are completed, you complete a mission on Virmire that is probably a little cooler than Feros, but not as fun as Noveria (still very good though), which leads to a mission on the previously undiscovered planet Ilos. Ilos is the reason why I haven't been giving full story details. Most of the mission is just okay with little dialogue until you meet (well, you're forced to meet) a VI named Vigil. This conversation is so gripping, sad, yet full of hope set to beautiful music that you hardly notice is a 2 minute piece on repeat for roughly 15 minutes as it absolutely oozes atmosphere. Probably one of my favourite conversions in any game. After this you're on the clock to chase and fight the Big Bad and escape Ilos for a final confrontation on the Citadel. During this mission, you get to fight "along and outside" the Citadel. It's hard to put in words but suffice it to say it's one of the best combat scenarios in the game, both in story context and actual gameplay. The final boss is a little underwhelming as he can be convinced to kill himself in three lines of dialogue, and when he enters his second stage (he still does this even if he kills himself), he looks pretty goofy. Still the ending to the game is satisfying and concludes the most “complete” story in the trilogy. There are also side-missions which despite featuring dreadful level design and gameplay, can still provide thought provoking stories despite their small budgets.

Verdict: Overall, Mass Effect 1 features serviceable combat and a satisfying story with fantastic worldbuilding, atmosphere and NPC interaction, definitely recommended if you can put up with older archaic gunplay from early action-RPGs and I’d give it a 9/10 if Steam used 1-10 ratings.