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Mass Effect Reborn is a mod that aims to recreate the Mass Effect Universe created by BioWare into Homeworld 2. This version is no longer supported, please visit our new page on ModDB for Homeworld: Remastered: Moddb.com
Visual aesthetics are the leading force in this mod. The vessels look great, the animations of ships (such as the reapers) when they prepare to fire are wonderfully done. The music is very impressive and actually enjoyable to listen to as the game goes on. The only bit of a bummer in the graphical department is the strange error I seem to be getting with planets, however I am sure that is an easy fix.
Game-play is a bit different, however. The lack of a research tree makes the game feel a bit shallow, and the AI's constant creation of only dreadnought class capital ships makes versing AI rather boring. Geth fighters are extremely powerful. When playing as the reapers the Geth sent in a plethora of fighters, which none of my larger vessels could target (although I noticed this to be a problem of any larger ship versus smaller craft), and I had to produce wave after wave of fighters to even begin damaging the Geth. In fact, by the time I left the game, the skirmish was still going on.
On the subject of larger ships versus fighter craft. The only time I noticed my larger ships firing on fighter craft was when they had previously target larger ships. Only then would their anti-fighter weapons actually fire. When engaging a Cerberus AI, I had around 10 fighters harassing their command center and a dreadnought. They didn't fire back. When engaging a reaper AI, however, their larger ships were able to fire on my fighters without a problem.
Ship building wise, I feel as if build times are a bit too slow, and the lack of any dedicated ship building facilities makes production of a large fleet extremely time consuming, and makes investment into dreadnoughts to bolster production capabilities a necessity.
All in all the game is a good bit of fun, however needs work in order to rival some of the other mods in Homeworld 2 (Halo Homefront for example, being a good bit of fun even for only having one playable race). I can't wait to see what comes next!
The mod itself seems to of been a victim of it's own hype. Visually, it's very well done, the shading, the models, all quite nice. The issue with the mod itself is simply gameplay or lack there of.
Anyone familiar with HW2 will know of the depth of the gameplay, the research arms race, the mixed fleets, the roles and abilities of the variety of ships and such. Unfortunately, this mod lacks any real depth. With only a small line up of simple ships with somewhat artful descriptions never explaining their main role (example; the Geth Destroyers description is "Powerful and durable warship" rather than it's actual purpose in game terms). While in itself is not truly an issue, it rather makes the mod feel lower in quality, with a hap hazard description just thrown in.
Tying into the above issue is the actual lack of variation in any of the sides. The only side that has any kind of moderate variety is the Council with Cerb following a close second. The issue is though, they all play mostly the same, with ships only growing partially in price and power for those two sides, while Geth and Reaper are pretty much just lacking in anything interesting.
Throwing in a complete lack of research means that the lack of variation and unique units is even more stale as it's a simple case of tedious gameplay. For instance, there are no probe, and your brief selection of fighters have appalling sensors, meaning the only way to scout is ironically a slow frigate or capital ship, meaning any kind of planning beyond "build x of same ship type" is pointless. The maps themselves are also fairly mediocre, with no real depth or interest to them.
While yes, the issues above do take away from the mod, that isn't to say don't try it. Visually, it's a treat, and while the gameplay is very basic, it's still playable.
I'll close by simply saying, if your looking for a polished, final product, you'll be disappointed. But if you look at it as simply an early beta, you'll see there's potential
ripped models and textures, that alone should makes this mod not worth playing.
Absolutely beautiful textures and details. However, there was just so little excitement.
It seemed even simpler than an old Command and Conquer RTS.
No Tech Tree
Limited Ships
No real special abilities to speak of
No support craft
Add stations or bases that could be defended.
Kinetic Barriers would be nice
More weapon variety would be cool too.
Really short life spans on all ships
I would like to see a tech tree added and just an effort made to add some complexity to the game.
THIS IS A FANTASTIC BETA! I hope there is more to come though, because as it stands there is little to be found in the way of entertainment here.
So this is my 'honest review' of this (version of the) mod.
Ups
Ships models and animations were excellent done.
Game music is pure awesome-ish.
(Personally) Mod was easy to install,no problems.
Downs
Non existence of research abilities.
Lack of challenging AI.
Graphic glitches on some nvidia cards(planets flicker).
Production of larger capital ships takes up huge amount of time.
Races need more balancing.(issues with anti-fighter ships)
Needless to say this is my opinion. I tried to stay objective as much as possible,personally I think this mod is a victim of so much hype that formed around it. That said,I like the mod, being a mass effect fan and all,I really enjoy being able to play as the Citadel races or the Reapers. Its not that I don't appreciate the time and effort the developers gave so we can see the light of day for this mod,cause i do,but there are quite a few issues that need fixing. Hope that this is a beta and not the final product and that there will be many more patches and updates coming. So guys thanks for a good mod,and I really hope that you will improve it.
Nice mod but i wont say awsome thats not ok
Not only are the developers a bunch of crooks by stealing models and other concepts, but they've delivered a half-baked Alpha of a mod (claiming it's the 1.0 release) and deflect all faults and bad design choices as simple 'user error'. These guys are scum, don't download this mod nor support their future work.
Ripping models, no AI, no research, this doesn't deserve anything more than 1/10
Really great mod,hope it going to be a better mod
I am Giving this a 10/10. The people who labored on this for as long as they have did not disappoint in this despite it being only a Pre-Beta!
I have seen full and complete mods that were far less playable than this tidbit we got and that's something worth bragging about!
Cant wait for the full thing & am really hopeful to see each race represented independently in the full version!