Listening to the reviews was a mistake!

I’ll admit this right up front – listening to those early reviews was a HUGE mistake! As a massive fan of the original series, I, like many, was pretty jaded with the ending of ME:3 and so I refused to trust another BioWare game until I saw endless glowing reviews about how amazing Andromeda was. Even when friends told me the reviews were way off and the game was actually very fun and entertaining to play, I simply ignored them. After all, if someone makes a YouTube video about a game, it must be true – right?

Long story short, I went ahead and bought the game a few days ago and to my surprise, it felt just like what I’ve always come to expect from a Mass Effect game – engaging. It’s like that amazing book you’ve read where you find yourself being unable to put it down because you “must know what happens next!” Granted, the early parts of the game are a bit slow and some of the open world quests can be boring or add little to nothing to the overall story. And yes, some of the animations are fairly dismal compared to what you would expect in 2017 but overall, they don’t jump out at you as terrible like most reviewers have claimed.

That thought brings me to all the endless and mind-numbingly drool of complaints about how vanilla the characters are, how the voice acting is pathetically bad or how there isn’t any emotion to character interaction. Really? They must not be playing the same game that I’m play because those accusations couldn’t be further from reality. From what I’ve seen so far, the characters have distinct, memorable personalities, the VA is top notch (with some great one-liners) and interaction between the characters (especially squad mates) is a breath of fresh air. When considering the history of BioWare games and character development, ME:A stands right up on the top rungs of the ladder.

As for the rest of the game, the combat is amazing, the new skill combination system is exactly what most of player base was asking for and the music is very fitting for “most” of the scenes. Overall, it’s very much a Mass Effect game and well worth the history of the franchise.

All those terrible reviews I saw, read, listened to – well, I sure feel dumb believing them.

I don't know how you can tolerate that game despite it's flaws that are obviously noticeable, each to his own but the game looks horrible. I seen the game in YouTube the story is terrible, the animations were horrid, and the combat is downgraded compared to ME3. And top of all that it was on on hold and the studio has shutdown. They are fucking up.

You miss nothing, earth clan. Breath of the mild is overrated.

which only gives you a small impression of what the game is like.

Yeah, this is a bizarre attitude to say the least. More information is pretty much always better than less information, and so best would almost certainly be to utilize both. And as you say, its not like gameplay videos are a valid substitute for reviews, unless you're willing to watch hours of gameplay videos (and not just of combat, but of dialogue, exploration, character creation, cutscenes, etc.). Reviews shouldn't be taken as gospel truth, that's absolutely true, but to disavow them entirely is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I guess maybe you should avoid reviews if you lack any confidence in your ability to critically weigh what you read and come to an independent decision, but for most people feedback/information about potential purchases (games or anything else) is always a good thing. 

Yeah, this is a bizarre attitude to say the least. More information is pretty much always better than less information, and so best would almost certainly be to utilize both. And as you say, its not like gameplay videos are a valid substitute for reviews, unless you're willing to watch hours of gameplay videos (and not just of combat, but of dialogue, exploration, character creation, cutscenes, etc.). Reviews shouldn't be taken as gospel truth, that's absolutely true, but to disavow them entirely is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I guess maybe you should avoid reviews if you lack any confidence in your ability to critically weigh what you read and come to an independent decision, but for most people feedback/information about potential purchases (games or anything else) is always a good thing. 

Gosh you are still here, commenting on a game you apparently hate.

It's like one of those children who go around pulling a girl's hair when they secretly fancy them.