BioWare have for a long time, been one of the premier Western RPG developers. Mass Effect 2 does nothing but solidify that position. Mass Effect 2 gives players so much to do and see, that despite being a lengthy game, if the first thing you do when you finish, is start again then you know you've just played something special.

To be blunt, Mass Effect 2's story is one of the best written stories in video games. As Commander Shepard you're required to assemble a team and go on a mission to save humanity, and the galaxy. It sounds simple enough, especially when boiled down to such a basic concept, but the overall story experience is so much more than the sum of its parts. There is so much to do and explore that you can easily spend 30-40 hours on a single playthrough and each step of the journey reveals new information on the overall story, and details about the characters you're travelling around with.

You'll bump into most of your team from Mass Effect at some point throughout your experience with Mass Effect 2, and you'll appreciate their presence if you played the original. If you didn't, the game doesn't dwell too much on the past which is very much appreciated. It allows players who haven't experienced the last story to keep moving forward and develop their own new story, instead of being stuck reminiscing on experiences they didn't have.

While you may initially miss the old cast of characters, Shepard's new crew are simply fantastic. The pre-release trailers outlining the new cast portrayed many of them to be nothing but guns for hire who just want to get to the action. They didn't do any justice to the actual depth and story that each character has to offer. As you spend time on your ship you're given plenty of chance to discover more about them, and learn how multi-dimensional they all are.

As you assemble your crew, you're also given the chance to do missions to help each one out, gaining their loyalty in the process. Gaining their loyalty gives each member a special, unique ability that can be used in combat, but more-so, it gives you the chance to learn much more about these characters and their past. It's another testament to the great writing and overall story that's been woven into the overall Mass Effect 2 experience.

While Mass Effect 2 is the middle game in a trilogy, like the original it delivers a story that is both self-contained and over-arching at the same time. While you're still faced with the threat of the Reapers (an ancient robotic race who are soon to eliminate life in the galaxy), you're also given a more immediate problem to deal with. You're taken through the story dealing with this immediate threat, and that story is fully resolved at the end. However throughout you learn more about the Reaper threat that gives enough of a 'carrot on the stick' to make you look forward to the stories conclusion in Mass Effect 3.

Mass Effect 2 continues and expands the dialogue system that was introduced in Mass Effect. Here your dialogue options aren't expressed through reams of text that you want your character to say, instead you're given a handful of options that only tell you the gist of what ultimately comes out of your character's mouth. In Mass Effect the conversations, while interesting and well written, were quite static, with basic camera angles and little character animation throughout. Mass Effect 2 largely fixes these problems, providing a much more cinematic experience. If you are able to chose your options in time (before the last character stops speaking), you are able to craft some amazing and engaging conversations, that you, as a player truly feel a part of.

When you break down the parts of Mass Effect 2, the conversation system and the combat system feel like two different games. At some points you may feel you haven't done anything but watch for some time. But when you think about it, during that time you've been moulding the story based on your responses in conversations, and you realise that the game has just been engaging with you in a different way than what you're used to. People who play video games are so used to interacting with the world their given through 'physical' means, like fighting or shooting because that's traditionally the easiest way for developers to get players to feel like they're having an impact in a virtual space.

With Mass Effect, BioWare have opened up a new avenue for player interaction with the world and story that hasn't been copied or replicated by other developers. But Mass Effect 2 almost perfects that system, and hopefully other developers will be able to now take note and incorporate these elements into their own games. There are plenty of players out there who hate watching video game cinematics and just want to get to the action. Mass Effect 2 will likely change their minds.

Before starting Mass Effect 2, you're given the option of either importing your character from the original Mass Effect, or starting from scratch. If you start over with a new character, the critical events from Mass Effect are decided for you. Did Wrex die? Did you save the council? Of course if you're importing a game, you shaped these events so you know the answer, but it's interesting to see what the 'correct' version of Mass Effect's events were.

When you import your character you're shown a list that remind you of the pivotal decisions you made in the last game. It's an impressive list, but more than those critical points are brought across. You'll receive messages from minor characters you helped, get different new quests depending on the choices you made and even hear seemingly throwaway dialogue that's based on your past decisions. It's quite fascinating to hear and see all the finer details that are brought over, and it helps appreciate all the minutia that BioWare have incorporated into Mass Effect 2.

The action in Mass Effect 2 plays like a third-person shooter, albeit a little different to what you might expect. The controls and overall gameplay are much more refined than those of Mass Effect, which feels quite loose in comparison, but Mass Effect 2 has taken steps to make it feel more like a precision shooter, similar to what you'd expect in a game like Gears of War. Its cover system is also much easier to use, so now instead of 'snapping' to cover when you're near it, you actually push a button to go in and out of cover.

Your biotic and tech (read: future magic) powers have also been greatly expanded and improved. The biggest change to these is that they can be used around cover. So when an enemy is hiding, if you are on the right angle, your biotic shots will curve around the cover Wanted style, and take out an enemy. This helps give some great strategic options when you're up against groups of enemies, and creates a fun challenge of playing cat and mouse, as you leapfrog around from cover to cover trying to get the jump on them.

The much improved shooting and powers help give Mass Effect 2 a very satisfying action element that perfectly compliments the slower exploration elements to the game. The fact that there are more character classes in Mass Effect 2 also greatly expand your combat options.

Through all this talk of action, let's not forget that Mass Effect 2 is also an RPG. The RPG elements have been toned down a bit over it's predecessor, but are still very much present. There are less option to assign your skill points to, with the bulk of the options going to improving your powers. For example your speech skill have been removed as a statistic, and is instead determined by your paragon and renegade scores. The more you become one or the other will change what options you have when interacting with other characters. So while the players options have been stripped back a little when it comes to the RPG elements, it's a much more refined system.

One of the biggest gripes for the original Mass Effect was the inventory system (at least on the console version). Mass Effect 2 doesn't just refine that system, it essentially removes it entirely. Yes, you can still get new weapons and armor, but these can only be changed in specific places on your ship, and occasionally out in the field. These changes to the inventory and statistics systems mean you spend much less time floating around menus, and much more time in the game itself.

Over the past two years, BioWare have clearly gone to great lengths to learn more about the Unreal Engine 3 which powers Mass Effect 2. The majority of the technical glitches that were present in Mass Effect are gone, leading to a much more visually pleasing experience. But more than just the technical details are fixed. The fine details that have gone into the presentation elements of Mass Effect 2 are quite impressive. From the refined UI in menus, the new and vastly improved HUD during combat, all the way down to the load screens that are actually relevant to what you're currently doing. Mass Effect 2 is a huge visual improvement over the original.

This isn't to say it's not a perfect game though, there are a handful of glitches that you may (or may not) experience, such as invisible characters during conversations or incorrect camera placements that obstruct your view. Luckily these appear quite rarely so it's not a big issue, but the fact that they are present warrant a mention.

While the visuals may have some hiccups here and there, what is near perfect is the voice acting in Mass Effect 2. BioWare have gone out and assembled an all star cast, including the likes of Martin Sheen, Carrie-Ann Moss and Adam Baldwin just to name a few. In addition to this the excellent sound effects and a score that really punctuates the action help deliver one outstanding audio package.

BioWare have delivered the first big hit of 2010in Mass Effect 2. They've clearly taken the feedback given by fans and critics of the first game to heart, refined the experience, improved it, and refined some more. This is undoubtedly BioWare's best game to date, and it's exciting to know that there is a Mass Effect 3 coming soon enough, which will surely only get better.