By: Miles Chandler

Four years ago, the critically acclaimed game Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was released for the original Xbox. The game was loved for the control you had over your character, stepping away from the more linear gameplay that was forced upon you in other games. Knights of the Old Republic allowed you to do and say anything you wanted to other characters in the world and influence the storyline depending on how good or evil you were to those around you.

The company responsible for that groundbreaking role-playing game was Bioware, who went on to make other similar games like Jade Empire that excelled in storytelling and choice making. After handing the sequel to Knights of the Old Republic to another developer, some people didn't appreciate it as much as the original. So now, after four years of waiting, Mass Effect , the expected true sequel to Knights of the Old Republic , has finally come out for the Xbox 360.

Although Mass Effect isn't based in the Star Wars universe, it is very similar to it, including space travel and alien species spanning the galaxy. Bioware's focus on storytelling can easily be seen from right off the bat. They released a prequel book to the game before it even came out to allow gamers to be further immersed in the new universe and the game is the first in a trilogy, leaving plenty of time to grow on the already large universe.

To start, you create your character. You have full control here, including choosing your character's gender, reputation and background, to his eye color, shape of his nose and the size of his jaw. You also choose your character class ranging from a Soldier, who can take more hits, to the Adept, who has magical powers that force you to use more tactical approaches to battles. You can't change these settings after you start so you have to be careful about what you choose.

In the beginning of the game, humans are a relatively new species to the wider galaxy and are shunned or mistrusted because of it. Your character is on a mission with an agent of the government to prove humanity's worth. Long story short, this first, and most critical mission, to the human race goes horribly wrong and your character is propelled into a series of events that land you a place as a Spectre, which is a special ops agent who is allowed to do anything to get the job done. This is where the game really starts.

When you become a Spectre, you get your own ship, allowing you to travel from world to world and complete quests in whatever fashion you so choose. Basically, you can help people in need and refuse a reward, or you can beat the crap out of everyone in sight to level up fast and then force a reward out of them afterwards. Tempting, huh?

Let's get into the gameplay. A third-person shooter with enough interface freedom to allow you a targeting system, battles are either extremely easy or extremely hard. As a Soldier or Vanguard, you can blast through the game without much trouble thanks to the extra Health and firepower, but as an Adept, enemies can overwhelm you due to a recharge time for you powers. In any case, the combat is not the game's strength.

The game's strength comes into play when interacting with other people in the game's world. Every line of dialogue is voice acted, with the voices matching the lip-synching perfectly. Conversations look real and are very fluid. Your actions throughout the game continue to affect the gameplay, giving you the feel that what you do really matters, and it actually does; the ending of the game changes depending on how you acted during the game.

The other strength of the game is its graphics. If you play the game without subtitles, the conversation you have with other characters play out like a movie, to an unsuspecting watcher. One of the major problems with this game has to do the graphics, though. When you initiate conversations with someone, there are occasions when the textures don't load for a few seconds, leaving you talking to someone without a face for the duration of the conversation.

Overall, the game is beautiful, the story is compelling and it's only the first of a trilogy, leaving room for improvement. A little brush up on the graphics and environments and this game would be a 10 out of 10, but for now I'm giving it an 8.5.