[Luis Dias]

I don't have Arrival or the money to spend on ME2 DLC, so can someone tell me what happens in it that is so horrible?

Spoiler:

Shepard gets to destroy a mass relay to prevent the full blown Reaper invasion to the galaxy, with an asteroid collision, and this explosion wipes out the entire system which is populated by Batarians. 300k of them. They aren't happy about it.

PS: I didn't "hate" arrival.

[Starman01]

Well, I don't care if she is sexy, I'm in Relationship with Tali, and I wont change that  I more interested in the story. Regarding Overlord and Broker, both where very cool, especially the ending of Overlord. Poor David.

I was actually pretty dissapointed from Kasumi. Interesting Character and Location, but I found it very short actually.  I also hope for more interaction with Legion in ME3 , it was too short. It was very interesting, getting to know a new side of the Geth.

[Luis Dias]

Go talk to it after the suicide mission. He's got interesting things to talk about.

[The E]

No, Arrival isn't _that_ bad.

However, it undercuts several gameplay/game design decisions that are found everywhere in ME2 and in the DLCs.

One, it's a solo mission, with a very, VERY flimsy justification. During ME2, you recruit several people who are, supposedly, excellent at being stealthy. Krios, Kasumi, Legion, Tali, all of them are people I would like to take along for something that requires stealth.

Two, you can see the plot twist coming from a mile away.

Three, at a crucial point in the plot, the game takes the decision away from you. For a few seconds, Shepard makes decisions for you instead of you making decisions through Shepard. I found this to be quite jarring.

In addition, there's another decision point where the decision has no impact at all on the game progression.

All in all, it's far too linear an affair for a game such as ME2. It delivers the eyecandy, and the story being told isn't that bad, but the actual implementation of the story in terms of gameplay and delivery is sub-par.

[Starman01]

Go talk to it after the suicide mission. He's got interesting things to talk about.

Which one ?

You mean the final one in the galactic core collector base ? Technically, I always finished the game then, because I made every mission before it, even the small encounters

[PsychoLandlord]

No, Arrival isn't _that_ bad.

All good points. Yeah, Bioware dropped the ball with storytelling, which is my main problem with it. I actually don't mind being railroaded into the main decision though, mainly because it was interesting enough that I was willing to let it slide and see where Bioware takes it in 3. I can see why others would be annoyed with it, however.

And yes, Starman, you can converse with Legion post Suicide Mission. I strongly suggest doing so, he has, by far, some of the best dialog.

[The E]

Well, the thing is, Arrival wasn't developed by the main ME team, so you can't really make assumptions about ME3's quality based on it.

[PsychoLandlord]

Really? Did not know that. Actually also kinda makes me feel a bit better, despite being okay with it for the most part.

[MP-Ryan]

I'm pretty sure I'm the only person I know who didn't hate Arrival. Sure, nowhere near as good as Shadowbroker or Overlord, but I felt it did a nice job building up some more dread for Harbinger, plus the obvious plot twist for Shepard. Whats more, I'm never gonna say no to more things to do in ME2, even if the whole thing with the Artifact was groan-inducingly easy to predict.

You're not alone; I didn't think it was the strongest of the ME2 DLC (that was Shadow Broker), but it wasn't that bad either.  It introduced some newish ideas, like playing completely solo against enemies (which was tough on higher difficulty, particularly without shield-sapping powers), it advanced the plot somewhat (albeit linearly, but what did we expect), and provided some entertaining battle sequences.  It was more like one of the planetary sidequests (which were much less entertaining in ME2 than ME1, even with the removal of the horrible vehicle sections) than a mission-pack of the type that Shadow Broker was.  Would have been nice if it was the quality of the precursor, but I didn't finish it feeling like BioWare/EA had fleeced me like I have with other games' DLC (Borderlands Zombie Dr. Zed comes to mind).

Regarding ME2 overall, though, I somewhat regret finishing all the sidequests before doing the Suicide Mission... in retrospect, I would have liked to utilize Legion more.

Can't wait for ME3 though.

[Luis Dias]

Go talk to it after the suicide mission. He's got interesting things to talk about.

Which one ?

You mean the final one in the galactic core collector base ? Technically, I always finished the game then, because I made every mission before it, even the small encounters

can't you load the game even so? If you can, just talk to it.

[StarSlayer]

I personally wished their was the option to play Shepard as a shambling, PTSD ridden train wreck that goes up to their cabin and spends most nights rolled up in a ball.  Endlessly rocking back and forth in the shower under the mind fraking of the Beacons/Cypher in ME, the experience of actually being murdered and the combined weight of all the death, carnage of they must ednure every day plus the promise of utter annihilation by the Reapers. 

On my third Vanguard Femshep play through, hopefully third time is the charm and it will import, otherwise I'm sad panda.

[PsychoLandlord]

StarSlayer, are you on PC or 360? If on the console, I have a friend who had the same problem and fixed it. I'll ask him about it later.

[StarSlayer]

StarSlayer, are you on PC or 360? If on the console, I have a friend who had the same problem and fixed it. I'll ask him about it later.

That would be awesome.  My first ME playthrough imported properly but the two subsequent ones show up as invalid in the ME2 importer.  If you got a possible solution I'm all ears.

[Grizzly]

By the way, are they EVER going to release an all in one DLC pack?

[newman]

By the way, are they EVER going to release an all in one DLC pack?

You better hope not if it means losing the ability to buy each DLC separately. All in one DLC pack would include those bs DLCs like "alternate appearance packs" that look ridiculous and don't contribute anything to the gameplay. It's far better to be able not to spend money on that crap and just get the DLCs that offer new story and characters. Though it's probably too much to hope that people won't buy those alternate appearance packs, profits from them will be low, and bioware will learn that they can't sell crap.
A DLC pack that would include all the free ones, plus Shadow Broker, Kasumi, Overlord and Arrival would be practical though. There's just plenty of bs and I'd rather they not force people to spend money on them by making them a part of a pack.

[PsychoLandlord]

That would be awesome.  My first ME playthrough imported properly but the two subsequent ones show up as invalid in the ME2 importer.  If you got a possible solution I'm all ears.

Alright he just sent me a long-ass text about it. So first off - you say they appear as Invalid? As in they appear in the importer but aren't highlighted green? If so, then they have imported, its just that the importer only excepts input from the D-pad, so you have to use that to scroll. Thats apparently the problem he had, so it was less 'he fixed it' and more 'he got smart and used the other input method.' Sorry about that.

Now if your other end saves simply aren't appearing, but they do save properly to the Hard Drive, then have you changed your gamer tag recently? It will only read saves from you gamer tag, and will also only read special end of game autosaves, so you may need to go back in and rebeat Saren really quick or some such, assuming you have a save available.

I also checked around a bit, and there are a few people whose saves wouldn't appear until they reformatted their HD too, so you could try that.

[StarSlayer]

That would be awesome.  My first ME playthrough imported properly but the two subsequent ones show up as invalid in the ME2 importer.  If you got a possible solution I'm all ears.

Alright he just sent me a long-ass text about it. So first off - you say they appear as Invalid? As in they appear in the importer but aren't highlighted green? If so, then they have imported, its just that the importer only excepts input from the D-pad, so you have to use that to scroll. Thats apparently the problem he had, so it was less 'he fixed it' and more 'he got smart and used the other input method.' Sorry about that.

* StarSlayer inserts palm in face, palm exits out back of head. 

I'll try it when I get back home but yes the above showing up but not in green was the issue I was having.

[PsychoLandlord]

That would be awesome.  My first ME playthrough imported properly but the two subsequent ones show up as invalid in the ME2 importer.  If you got a possible solution I'm all ears.

Alright he just sent me a long-ass text about it. So first off - you say they appear as Invalid? As in they appear in the importer but aren't highlighted green? If so, then they have imported, its just that the importer only excepts input from the D-pad, so you have to use that to scroll. Thats apparently the problem he had, so it was less 'he fixed it' and more 'he got smart and used the other input method.' Sorry about that.

* StarSlayer inserts palm in face, palm exits out back of head. 

I'll try it when I get back home but yes the above showing up but not in green was the issue I was having.

Glad I could help out. Enjoy your new (old) character.

[The E]

By the way, are they EVER going to release an all in one DLC pack?

You better hope not if it means losing the ability to buy each DLC separately. All in one DLC pack would include those bs DLCs like "alternate appearance packs" that look ridiculous and don't contribute anything to the gameplay. It's far better to be able not to spend money on that crap and just get the DLCs that offer new story and characters. Though it's probably too much to hope that people won't buy those alternate appearance packs, profits from them will be low, and bioware will learn that they can't sell crap.
A DLC pack that would include all the free ones, plus Shadow Broker, Kasumi, Overlord and Arrival would be practical though. There's just plenty of bs and I'd rather they not force people to spend money on them by making them a part of a pack.

Well, I think what is going to happen is that they'll release a ME2 Ultimate Edition similar to the DA:O Ultimate Edition sometime in the Summer.

[StarSlayer]

By the way, are they EVER going to release an all in one DLC pack?

You better hope not if it means losing the ability to buy each DLC separately. All in one DLC pack would include those bs DLCs like "alternate appearance packs" that look ridiculous and don't contribute anything to the gameplay. It's far better to be able not to spend money on that crap and just get the DLCs that offer new story and characters. Though it's probably too much to hope that people won't buy those alternate appearance packs, profits from them will be low, and bioware will learn that they can't sell crap.
A DLC pack that would include all the free ones, plus Shadow Broker, Kasumi, Overlord and Arrival would be practical though. There's just plenty of bs and I'd rather they not force people to spend money on them by making them a part of a pack.

Well, I think what is going to happen is that they'll release a ME2 Ultimate Edition similar to the DA:O Ultimate Edition sometime in the Summer.

IIRC the PS3 version came with all the DLCs included