It would have been a sad Christmas indeed if my brother-in-law hadn't saved the day with his recently purchased Xbox 360. He also happened to have a copy of Mass Effect, so we were able to spend a little time with it, and see what all the hype was about.
The first thing we noticed was that the game looks amazing. Not to be outdone, the music, sound effects, and voice acting are all top notch as well.
I was very worried that it was going to end up being one of those games that had a great story and game play, but would require hours and hours of reading. Surprisingly every character that we spoke with actually had audio, and not only that, they had their own video close-ups with synced and appropriate animations.
Although tricky looking, the dialog and decision making controls were easy enough that my 9 year old had no problem figuring them out. Although I didn't agree with some of the decisions he made, it was great to see the different reactions from the characters, as well as hear what they had to say about it.
Thus far, Mass Effect looks like a winner. Look forward to our full review in the coming weeks.