Choose life, choose a class, choose stealth, choose diplomacy, choose garish yellow armour with matching helmet, choose a forking big gun, choose to sleep with blue women, choose your future. Mass Effect remains one of the finest forays into classic RPGs available on a console, blending some fine real-time action with a cracking original story. Produced by Bioware, it felt very much like a spiritual successor to Knights of the Old Republic, using a similar engine but applied to a unique universe which allowed the developers to spread their creative wings. Set in the 22nd century, mankind has only recently taken to the stars and in a refreshing change to most sci-fi games, humans are in fact an unimportant race, a new upstart figure on a galactic council. The plot followed Commander Sheppard, the first human Spectre (a sort of galactic super-spy) as he fought to take down a rogue fellow agent and fight the Reavers, a new galactic threat. It was well written, acted and paced with more interesting concepts than most sci-fi films. Most of all it offered a wide range of choices for the player, with greater subtlety and more interesting repercussions than Bioware achieved with Knights of the Old Republic.
Xbox 360