About a week ago, if I had to choose a game to fill that personal Game of the Year slot, it would've been BioShock. Little did I know that Mass Effect would please me so. I probably won't be doing any 2007 awards posts or anything like that, but let it be known here and now that Mass Effect is definitely my GOTY. Oh, my GOTY. Anyway, I owe some people character screenshots. Here they be:

So, why does it take the top spot this year? Well, I'm a man who likes a good story. The story is definitely there and it engages the player unlike any other before it. I still believe that BioShock does more to advance the form of narrative in video games (and I'll still hold that BioShock is perfect for various reasons), but what Mass Effect accomplishes more so is player immersion. The only elements that stifle Mass Effect in its climb for perfection are the little things: framerate drops and texture pop-ins (that happen all the time). Those are relatively minor issues, though (yes, even when they happen all the time). I find the land rover levels very entertaining and while I thought the combat was a major pain in the ass at first, it becomes something incredibly exciting. The use of the Biotic powers factors into this. "Lift" (which is similar to "Force Whirlwind" from the KotOR series), for example, is one of the most entertaining devices I've seen in awhile. There's nothing quite like suspending your enemy in the air for "X" amount of seconds, pummeling them with ammunition and watching them go flying. Good times. Speaking of which, methinks it's time for a second playthrough.

Go forth. And play games.