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BioWare’s Mass Effect series stands alone in terms of scope. Spanning three games and numerous spin-offs, the story of Commander Shepard’s seemingly impossible battle against the ancient race of sentient starships known as the Reapers has captivated audiences around the world in both its scale and its degree of freedom. The series now arguably stands alongside science-fiction giants such as Star Trek and Star Wars with a fully realised world set in a believable future and with a freedom given to the player that is literally unprecedented; all three games feature a unique save import system, ultimately allowing minor choices you made in the first game to play out to fruition in the finale.

This week sees the release of the demo for Mass Effect 3, and with it comes the final countdown to the series’ undoubtedly epic conclusion. But with Mass Effect 2 now two years old, and gamers having a traditionally short attention span, what is there to bring you back? And why should you care if you’ve never played the series before? Let’s take a look at what makes Mass Effect 3, and the series as a whole, so special.

The End of an Era

Since 2007, fans of sci-fi RPGs have been exploring the Mass Effect universe and becoming their own version of Commander Shepard. Mass Effect 3 is the end of that journey, and to miss it would be like watching every Star Wars film apart from Return of the Jedi (although arguably that might be for the best). For fans of the series there really is no question here as it concludes the story that they have so heavily invested in, but what about newcomers to the series? The fact that the game is a finale is a harder sell, but one that BioWare have taken in their stride.

If you’re not willing to play through the first two games though, this probably is a good jumping on point, after all, the game is a self-contained narrative and will finish the Reaper story. As long as BioWare treat everything that has gone before as back-story to the main game, Mass Effect 3 should be a good place for newcomers to jump in. There’s also the fact that Mass Effect 3 has built upon and refined everything that has gone before it in the series so far, with BioWare touting the best combat in the series yet and a return to some of its original RPG roots. In theory, this should be the most refined gameplay experience in the series to date.

A Fully Realised World

The world that BioWare dreamt up expands far beyond just what you do – things are continually in motion even while you’re doing something else. The series is set-up to have a rich and fulfilling back-story, with historical conflicts between the Quarian and Geth, Turians and Humans, the extinction of the Rachni and the story of the Krogan Genophage all playing a large part in how everyone communicates with each other. Then there are the machinations of Cerberus behind the scenes, along with the hand of the Reapers subtly affecting the world of Mass Effect. It’s an incredibly deep and complex world, and coupled with some down-to-earth scientific theory behind the technology in the game, a very believable one. The fact that you return to the same world in every game breeds a familiarity and homeliness to it – it’s this attachment that BioWare will be playing on throughout Mass Effect 3.

The races that inhabit the Universe, which while predominantly humanoid, something that is arguably not even bordering on likely, are all unique and diverse in their own special way too. From the graceful Asari to the avian featured Turian, each race has a characteristic that defines them and despite your better judgement, will colour your opinion of them initially. It’s a living and breathing world and it’s one that is easy to get lost in.

But how easy will it be for newcomers to the series? BioWare promise that the introduction to the world will be easier, and if you’re coming in for the finale it’s likely you won’t be too worried about the reams of lore that has built up around the series. Nonetheless, while the world is fascinating and a real vision of the future, for newcomers there is potential for confusion. After all, established fans will not want to listen to an Elcor explain his speech pattern again.

Meeting up with the family

While many game series feature the same characters, none get close to Mass Effect in terms of actually making you care for them. Every character in the game has a quirk or personality trait that is unique to them, and as a result every character has a very different relationship with you. For me, meeting up with Garrus and Liara is always a brilliant moment in the game – Garrus has become like a brother and Liara is my Shepard’s love interest so there is a definite bond there. Then there are the other crew members who you either like or hate, and a wide array of supporting players who aid or hinder your progress in the game. It says a lot about the character development when even characters such as the Admiral who gave you missions in Mass Effect is as important to me as any of the other characters.

Quite simply, the cast of Mass Effect become like a family, and from what we’ve seen of the game so far, BioWare have tried to put that across, with team members now acknowledging each other if they have been apart for a while. How that translates to a new player is debateable though. On the one hand it can be ignored as it is part of the game set-up, but if you don’t care about the characters, a large portion of the decision making process is taken away. After all, those of us who played Mass Effect 2 know how painful it was to lose a team member; losing any more in the finale would be a devastating way to finish your story.

Your choices, your consequences

The original Mass Effect was a pioneer of allowing reactive decision making to be undertaken by the player, due in large part to the conversation wheel it introduced. While the overall narrative remained largely the same, players were given branching paths to reach it, many of which influenced their relationship with other characters. Choosing the Paragon path ultimately allowed you to defuse the final boss battle early on, while a Renegade path took Shepard down a much more aggressive route, tarnishing his relationship with characters and in some cases such as Wrex, even getting them killed. The choices made ranged from significant to insignificant, but thanks to BioWare’s save import system, every choice is important in Mass Effect 3.

Did you save the Rachni? Did you reprogram the heretic Geth? And are you looking for a third strike at the reporter on the Citadel? All those decisions will have consequences in the finale, and whatever your choice, it will create a scenario based upon it that is unique to your world. It has been said many times, but for fans of the series, the finale will be different for everyone.

New players however receive far less choice in this area, and having not played the previous games will be left with standard options. In many ways, the randomisation of elements in the finale for series fans is the ultimate thank you from BioWare – while newcomers get a reasonably standard set-up for the game, the fans get their own story that has been crafted by them. What other game series can even approach that level of customisation?

BioWare’s proven skill

Perhaps the most important reason that everyone should be excited about Mass Effect 3 is that it is a new BioWare game, set in a universe that they know well, and with the refinements of two previous games put together. BioWare are renowned for their skill at crafting RPG adventures, the past two Mass Effect games are testament to that, and with the knowledge of what worked well and what didn’t in the previous two games, it’s not a huge stretch to believe that this will be the best of the series so far. We’ve already seen gameplay refinements in terms of combat, but we really have yet to brush the surface of the game – there is undoubtedly a lot more we do not know about yet.

And then of course there is the story. We know BioWare can produce some wonderful stories, and while Mass Effect 2 doesn’t exactly hold up upon closer inspection, we can all remain hopeful that Mass Effect 3 will. After all, the game only needs to conclude the series, and that has to have been something that they have been planning for some time. The only worry here is that the game will have a ‘silver bullet’ style gimmick, which ultimately leads to the Reapers becoming weaker than they have appeared in the previous games. It’s something BioWare have to avoid, after all Sovereign needed an entire fleet to take him down, but it should be something that BioWare can achieve if they write it well enough.

And that’s probably the best reason of them all for everyone to get on board with Mass Effect 3. BioWare’s RPG skill is legendary, and with 2 games in this series already completed, and a fantastic and believable world created, the finale should be one of the finest action RPGs ever created thanks to the numerous improvements and refinements that have been made over the years. Obviously whether or not Mass Effect 3 cashes in on these promises is up for debate right now, but during the first week of March we will have our answers, and also finally have the answers to all the questions that have been laid out throughout the Mass Effect series.