Mass Effect: Paragon Lost (2012)

One of my all time favorites.

Highly Overrated But Still Good

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

The game is incredible (to many people, you might not like it as much, though it would make no sense checking the movie, if that is true), but the animated movie (with a sub-story involving a major character from Mass Effect 3 (but not Shepard himself) is nicely told, but there is never a real Mass Effect feeling. It never got hold of me that is.The cartoon style is made differently than the one of the game on purpose. You might find that one of the reasons you might not connect. You cannot deny EA that they were trying. There is some fun dialog in the movie, but it never evolves to anything more. The question also would be, does it make sense watching it before Mass Effect 3 or after you played it? I watched it after, it's OK as companion piece, but I won't revisit this again (which cannot be said about the games ... re-playable a lot)

Anyone who is a fan of the Mass Effect games and has played the last one is already familiar with James Vega and is somewhat aware of the story of his lost platoon. Though James Vega is by no means a favourite character of mine, he still is a fun and worthy addition to the amazingly diverse roster of characters offers up in the ground-breaking game series. However, this spin-off animation does not live up at all with the original three games cinematic style, characters, story or story telling. I know it is a slightly difficult comparison to compare a game to an animation, however when a feature that has to focus more on combat than story has a more fuller narrative then you know it is bad. Even compared to the third game - an ending that is regarded as one of the worst game endings ever feels more satisfying than this.The animation felt the laziest aspect of the whole production and offered nothing special to fans. When the main character's neck is bigger than his head then you know how poor quality the animation is.Not only is the animation lacking, but the characters provided for the viewer to be emotionally invested in were two dimensional and bland for the most part, not forgetting some very dodgy voice acting and impressions of old characters, as well as a PAINFULLY obvious 'bad-guy'. Not forgetting massive plot holes e.g. why didn't Essex go after the asari and save her with biotics, or why was it so easy to get out of the pod chambers, even when they weren't paralysed).There were some parts I liked and the end felt somewhat satisfying and the beginning and end felt reasonably satisfying, however from a name this good, fans and newcomers should justifiably expect something more. I know this is based on a comic, so the production cannot be blamed entirely, however this could have been a lot more of an exciting tale if executed directly. As well as this, why they chose this piece to do as an animation is beyond me. They could have just as easily animated a satisfying alternative ending to the series (although that would be hard to execute well), or create a fresh narrative from the plentiful world that mass effect has created (pre, post, or parallel to Shepard). I would have personally liked them to create a narrative from the Rachni Wars.OVERALL LAZY AND DISAPPOINTING WITH THE POTENTIAL IT HAD

I'm not a "fan" of the Mass Effects games, although I did play the second one all the way through. The third one seems to have gotten mixed reviews, but I have been thinking about picking it up anyway.When I caught this movie, I didn't know what to expect. The story was easy enough to follow, and the art and animation art easy on the eyes. The acting was OK, and overall I enjoyed the movie right to the end.Anyone who has played the games will be familiar with the universe and some of the characters mentioned in the movie, not to mention the main antagonists. People who have never played the games should have no problem with the movie as a basic history is explained as the movie progresses, with the audience learning all they need to know for the plot to work.Basically, there have been reports of colonies being wiped out, or disappearing. A squad of marines is sent to one planet to try and stop an attack. They succeed, and are ordered to stay and protect the colony. As they work to repair and upgrade the colonies defenses, they are again attacked by an unknown enemy, one that none of them had seen before. This universe makes use of a technology left behind by an ancient dead race to power pretty much all their tech. Throughout the movie it is speculated that this new enemy may have been responsible for the disappearance of the ancient race.As the enemy tries to abduct the colonists, it's up to the heroes to stop them, the main character must make a decision that will haunt him for ever.The good thing is that the story, script and acting are all done well enough to give you some feeling for the main characters.Overall, fairly well done. I'll definitely watch this one again.

I have no problem with story, as a huge fan of whole series, it was my duty to watch that. Characters are fine, but very stupid and "cliche" acting, that is the most minus thing I've noticed. Stupidness of some things even make me believe scenarists and writers did not even know what (or where to) they are doing, what is conclusion of that story and they just "put it there" to enlarge video length to 90 minutes or so. But maybe that's just my opinion.Next thing I did not like is the very own graphics style and animation. It looks like kind of "ducktales" from 90s' :-) Why the asari have lips as big as some kind of porn-star? That was my first thought when I saw her for the very first time. Other characters are only a little bit more "normal", but still better than asari with big... blue... eyes of hers. In the original game there is theory asari looks "sexy" to all species, so krogan sees asari like "blue krogan" etc. (Refering to "bachelors party" at Ilium, ME2). Maybe we see asari like Vega's dreams "sexbomb" may appear and in games we see asari like Shepards ;) But I don't like this asari, I like Sheppards more.Next thing I have to mention here is some illogical bits and pieces of story. I don't want to make spoilers here, but just... I think some things there are written in original game better and more smooth. E.g. after watching I still don't know relation between ending of this movie and start of ME3 game, how and where J.V. met Sheppard.And last thing -- dubbing. I think it is just horrible. At game JV has more "acted" voice, here I have feeling it is just read from script. And other voices are... just... strange. I don't think bad, just strange. But after all, I think this movie is worth of it, it is not just some great "megafilm", only a little movie most for fans of games.