I could wrap things up here, but inevitably, I have to compare Mass Effect to Oblivion. It's not my fault this time, though, it's my girlfriend's fault. While watching me play, she asked, "Why is it I can watch you play this game, but watching you play Oblivion makes me want to kill myself?"

Wow. Burn.

It took me a second to form a response, which was basically, "Because the story in Oblivion sucks!" Yeah, Oblivion is light as hell on story. Now, the overall plot of Oblivion (emperor dying, demonic invasion, finding a lost heir) is solid enough, and would probably be interesting if it were novelized. However, in terms of actually playing the game, the presentation of the story is very weak.

My number one reason for this: Oblivion has next to no characters. In place of characters, Oblivion has plot devices. Some people dispense quests, other people are the object of quests. None of them have anything very interesting to say, you never really get to know them, and you certainly don't think of them as real people. There are occasional exceptions to this (i.e., Martin Septim), but when compared to Mass Effect, Oblivion's characters run from bland to non-existent. Without good characters, even a well-conceived story is no more interesting or emotionally engaging than reading a history book.

Back to Mass Effect, after leaving the Citadel for the first time, I landed on an uncharted planet and began exploring the surface for survey-able resources, bits of space junk, and one side quest. My girlfriend remarked that watching me drive the Mako around, hunt for stuff, and fight some scavengers wasn't very interesting. I agreed, but then it occurred to me: If you completely removed Mass Effect's main quest and took away all the characters (your companions, Saren, Cpt. Anderson, others), and all you had in the game were the uncharted planets and the sides quests…you'd have Oblivion! Yeah, it's a perfect analogy:

• Mako: Shadowmere. (Both are annoying on hills.)
• Resources to survey: Ingredients to collect.
• Combat that isn't as good as real shooters: Combat that isn't as good as real action adventures.
• Lance Henrikson giving you missions in monotone voiceovers: Unrecognizable actors giving you missions in monotone voiceovers.
• Space junk to find: Fantasy junk to find.
• Hunt and fetch missions in similar looking planetary outposts: Hunt and fetch quests in good-but-similar looking dungeons.
• Space pirates: Bandits (e.g., Random people who attack you for no reason: Random people who attack you for no reason).
• Quests which have you kill a certain number of monsters and then are resolved by a simple window of text: Quests which have you… Yeah, you get the idea.

There you go. Oblivion is Mass Effect minus the characters and main quest, just much longer. Think about it: The Cerberus side missions are about as interesting as any faction questline in Oblivion. The sidequests on the Citadel are as emotionally involving as the main quest in Oblivion. Compared to Mass Effect, the only thing Oblivion has going for it is that you can play for 500 hours and still not see all the game's content. This I've said before: Oblivion is a breadth over depth experience.