Finding A New Path In Mass Effect Andromeda

When you’re the guest in someone else’s house, you have to, to a certain extent, play by their rules. It’s their patch of land, after all, and while you’d expect them to be gracious hosts, ultimately it’s their choice whether you’re allowed to stay. As the Ark arrives in the Andromeda galaxy after 600 years of flying through the incredibly vast stretch of space between that galaxy and our own, it’s made clear quite quickly that the races of the Milky Way weren’t invited across the threshold.

It’s not just the first aliens you encounter that are unfriendly, but the starkly inhospitable first planet you arrive at. This was meant to be a habitable planet, from the long range scans made back in the Milky Way. Now it is, shall we say, less habitable. If anything, it’s actively uninhabitable.

Of course, the first and most important thing to do in the game is to create your version of Scott or Sara Ryder, whether simply picking Bioware’s own take on the brother and sister pairing or delving deep into the character creation tools. What’s much more fluid and open is how you go from there, as you’re no longer pushed to pick a character class, but can place skill points in whatever tree you see fit as you play, with class ‘profiles’ being unlocked if you meet certain skill prerequisites.

You get a tiny glimpse of this on this first planet, but it’s cleverly teased to you. Working through the early combat sequences, I was eager to push forward, making use of the new jet pack to bound towards enemies in cover – and yes, I basically bunny hopped for about two minutes when it was first enabled. Rushing the enemy doesn’t work so well, even at the start of the game, and in fact, it’s a fairly standard cover shooter at this point.

It’s later on as you unlock more skills and profiles that the flexibility of the game’s combat will come to the fore. That’s teased as you team up with Alec Ryder, your father and the Pathfinder of the expedition. As an N7, he’s absolutely an elite soldier, and there’s a wonderful slickness to the way that he orders the other members of the team to switch profiles and alter their roles in battle.

As a rookie soldier, that’s something that your Ryder can only dream of being able to do, but as the game thrusts the mantle of Pathfinder onto your shoulders, it’s one that you’ll have to grow into. While early combat felt somewhat rigid, what we’ve seen of later fights is enticingly action heavy, bordering on no-longer being an RPG. The jet pack on its own offers so much more manoeuvrability, with in air dodges and attacks, but being able to switch profiles gives you that ability to adapt to a situation. That is, unless you decide you want to absolutely specialise in one character archetype.

Despite having travelled together for six centuries, you, the player, and Ryder will be meeting practically everybody on the Ark for the first time. It’s a little unusual when you think about it, especially for the military teams to not already have a working relationship, but it’s also good for the player to be able to forge all these bond for themselves. We all know how important relationships are in Mass Effect games…

Jumping to quite a bit later in the game and visiting the planet of Kandara, having stepped out of the Tempest scout ship, And it’s quite clear that the story takes some interesting and rather fractious twists and turns. If you’d expect the 20,000 of each of the four races sent by the Andromeda Initiative to band together, pull up their socks and work in harmony, you’ve another thing coming. If anything, being so far away from home, so cut off seems like it might let people indulge in their selfish and self-invested natures. In retrospect, this kind of internal struggle is something I should have expected, but it surprised me to see this particular layered approach to the evolving galaxy that Bioware have created.

One of the big returning features is being able to drive around a planet’s surface, this time in the Nomad all terrain vehicle. Though the game as a whole is linear as you follow the threads of the main story, Bioware want to give you that feeling of exploration. There might be fewer story planets, as they describe the main celestial bodies you visit, but they each feature their own story arcs, both main and side stories, and let you venture out from the hubs and explore.

The Nomad’s a strange one to control, not feeling particularly spritely despite a sharp and fast looking design. Its huge wheels certainly make it look like more of an all terrain vehicle, but it’s only when you raise the suspension that you can slowly climb hills of any substance. Add in a boost and a jump ability and it’s certainly flexible, but it’s no Halo Warthog, that’s for sure.

There’s more to these planets in both story content and sheer surface area, specifically to cater to driving around in the Nomad. Heading out into the wilderness of a planet called Kadara, there’s a certain No Man’s Sky vibe to the landscape, right down to the acid lakes. You can, of course, simply head off to your objective point, do what you need to do, and get on with the story, but there’s also roving bands of hostiles, occasional outlaw outposts and angry local fauna that you can drive past or engage in combat.

That feeling of exploration is a big part of what Bioware are trying to achieve with Andromeda, as you venture to worlds unknown and struggle and fight to earn your place. This is something of a blank slate – ideal for both newcomers to the series and old hands – whether it’s dropping you into the Nomad and letting you head out onto a planet’s surface or simply forging new relationships and delving into the inevitable clashing cultures within the story. There’s a whole new galaxy just waiting for you to explore.