I’m finding it hard to muster any interest in playing through Mass Effect. I’ve started it many times over the years; originally intending to complete the game before Mass Effect 2 came along, before realising some while later that people were up in arms over Mass Effect 3 and I still hadn’t guided Shepard through his/her first assignment. The thing is, every time I task myself with ticking Mass Effect off my backlog of games, I manage to play through the first episode on the Citadel, visit a couple of planets and then lose complete interest in the whole thing.

In the past I’ve put my stalling down to flightiness, but after my latest attempt to get through the trilogy I’ve come to the conclusion that Mass Effect just isn’t that exciting. In fact I’d put it up there with Star Wars: The Old Republic as Bioware’s Most Tedious Game.

Maybe I’ve become jaded with Bioware’s dialogue system, which all too often seems to offer inflection dressed up as choice. Then there’s all the running around and backtracking through overly-large and tediously prefabricated locations, being trapped in elevators and combat that isn’t nearly as tactical as it thinks it is.

And don’t get me started on Origin: I spent so long with various EA support reps, trying to get the game to run at all, that I gave up and downloaded a cracked version instead. It’s a curious irony that I have three legitimately acquired copies of Mass Effect, two of them digital, yet in order to play the game on my current PC I have to resort to piracy.

Nevertheless, in spite of the hassles and mounting disinterest, I will soldier on, if only to see what all the fuss was about with the sequel. The adventure continues…