Mass Effect

Name: Mass Effect
Media: Video Game (Xbox 360 version)
Rating: Five Spaceships

WARNING: THIS GAME IS RATED M!!!

Mission Report:
Mass Effect is awesome. The gameplay is fun, and the story is excellent.
The story put some major pointers in for me. It's excellent, and the universe is very well-thought-out. Plus, part of the freakin' fun of the game is that your character is your own. Your choices affect the story... literally, they do! And not just in Mass Effect... but choices I made in this game spread out to Mass Effect 2, and even Mass Effect 3!!!
I had a grand ol' time playing this, and it was just one character! It's possible in Mass Effect to make other characters, and have them make different choices! And there are ones which will change the storyline from game to game, if you pick differently! I saw, when playing my one character, which choices would have affected the universe if I had chosen differently!
And you can pick your team! This can affect the storyline, because in a couple of the stories, at least a couple of the storyline ones, their actions and sayings have impact. At the very least, they can add insight and other stuff into your gameplay (I found a character in Mass Effect 2 whose combat talk made me laugh from time to time!). Plus, people have different abilities... like your own character!
And it's not just the big stuff. Some little stuff passes over from game to game too (at least from M.E. 1 to M.E. 2!). I found that cool!
And the combat was fun. Mass Effect is a third-person shooter, but it was fun.
There were some issues, however. Surprisingly, the issue isn't the gore, language, or other things that make this game rated "M". There's two primary issues that I have with this game.
The first is how they just throw you into the universe. There was certain data that I didn't know (specifically, who were the Council?). I made a few choices that I wouldn't normally have for the character I was playing, because I was trying to dig up information! Luckily, I'm much more informed now, and won't be making that mistake twice with the characters I will make from here on out!
The second was that, once you were done with the game, you couldn't go back with your character. I had picked up side-quests while playing the game, and once I was done with the primary storyline, I tried to go back so I could do those side-quests. But the game just threw me back to the final boss fight! ARGH!!!
Otherwise, this game is definitely one of my top fave games!