Just When You Thought You Knew Everything...
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| *where beer does flow, and men chunder..* |
MASS EFFECT 3: LEVIATHAN DIARY BY PETER FRANKO
Having played the Mass Effect trilogy numerous times, read the comic series, and being a glorified lore-fiend for this seemingly endless universe, I had mixed expectations about how Leviathan (Mass Effect 3's first real DLC) would change the game. Casey Hudson promised that this adventure would make us take a second look at the Reapers, and even rethink vital components of the already well defined lore. Of course being the hypocritical skeptic that I am, I didn't buy a single word he said. But now that I have played through Leviathan twice, and have had roughly a week to sit with it; I emerge from the deep, ready to share my thoughts: Leviathan completely flipped the script.
It's hard to write a lot about this story without spoiling it, so I'll keep it brief. You receive word that there is a scientist on the Citadel conducting research as to the location of a rumored Reaper-killer called "Leviathan". Upon arrival at his lab, he briefs you on what he has been studying, when a rude interruption from his seemingly indoctrinated colleague is made in the form of a bullet to the chest. After subduing the failed apprentice, he mutters in a robotic tone "you shouldn't be here. The darkness cannot be breached." With no leads, and a lab of scattered evidence it is then up to you and EDI to track down the legendary beast.
Leviathan takes off quickly and is played over three missions in drastically different locales, with Shepard routinely revisiting the lab in between. The pacing throughout the three hour playtime never really dulls, and the missions all build up to the advertised deep sea climax which left me totally blown away (chills and all). It should be noted though that if you expected underwater combat, be ready for none of it. Leviathan is a story DLC at heart, and feels like a Twilight Zone-like episode of Star Trek.
Leviathan is all together a rich and engrossing experience for your money, and is worth far more than Ashes, Mass Effect 3's infamous day-one DLC. At $10, it is genuinely an adventure worth taking.
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