Mass Effect 2 does have New Game+

By Tom Bramwell Published 4 January, 2010

Or you can just go back in after the end.

BioWare has incorporated "New Game+" into Mass Effect 2, despite originally ditching it because it would make it harder to handle the transition to Mass Effect 3.

New Game+ allows players who complete a game to replay it using the same character with which they finished it, retaining abilities and so on.

The process is complicated here because the Mass Effect games are intended as a continuous narrative, with episode two (and eventually three) able to inherit decisions made by players in the original adventure via a save-game import feature.

"Yes, originally we removed New Game Plus from Mass Effect 2 early in the development process," community man Chris Priestly explained on the BioWare forum. "However, we decided later that it was a valuable addition to the game then looked at ways of implementing it back into the game.

"After thorough design and testing we felt that the feature was ready to be placed back into Mass Effect 2 and implemented it again."

New Game+ isn't the only option once you finish Mass Effect 2 though. In order to better support downloadable content and to "tie up any loose ends", e.g. side missions, BioWare will allow you to continue playing after the end of the game without having to go back to the beginning of the main story.

Mass Effect 2 is out for PC and Xbox 360 on 29th January and our review will be available around then.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (17) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • hiddenranbir #1 2 years ago

    Just like ME1 then...

  • ardamillo #2 2 years ago

    You can choose which playthrough to use.

  • Koborover #3 2 years ago

    The unclear 'point of no return' in the ME1 story caught me by surprise and I missed out on side-quests and ally-related achievements, quite annoying and surprisingly poor game design by Bioware (still love the game though). I'm glad to hear they've learned from that mistake.
    Edited by 1 at 04/01/10 @ 09:14

  • Britesparc Verified Creative, ITV #4 2 years ago

    Yeah, me too. Gutted that I never got to fully explore the Citadel. Got really caught up in the story, and wanting to stop Saren, so a lot of side quests got left by the way-side.

    Again, still a good game though.

  • linea #5 2 years ago

    yeah. It was a bit of a funny relationship, the side missions with the main story in ME1. I ended up not playing most of them since had I diverted from my REALLY TIME CRITICAL MISSION WHICH IT IS REALLY IMPORTANT TO COMPLETE BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE to piddle about looking for missing survey teams or eradicating rogue slavers would have felt a bit untrue to the thrust of the story. A few pauses in the story where it's explicitly OK to muck about a bit would have been good.

  • metalangel #6 2 years ago

    Can I select my character's first playthrough (where I obsessively did everything) for stuff completed but her third for level (where she hit level 60)?

  • ardamillo #7 2 years ago

    No, AFAIK you have to pick one playthrough

  • soviet_ #8 2 years ago

    Actually, on the PC version when you finish the game you get an end game save file. This file is used for New Game+ in the original and is the file that is imported into ME2.

    If you complete the game again using NG+ another end game file is created which can also be imported. Basically any character you complete the game with will have a file to import with that playthroughs choices, custom look, background and alignment.

    There are loads of threads discussing/explaining this on the official ME2 forums
    Edited by 1 at 04/01/10 @ 17:33

  • penhalion #9 2 years ago

    @linea

    You know that the story does imply that you have years before anything happens and not days or hours right?

    It's Shepards own actions that accelerate things to critical. Because of this you were always encouraged to explore and do things at your own pace. The only exception is the final run through the citadel because Saren is trying to activate the citadel before you can stop him and way before the citadels own automatic sequence would have begun .

  • Moribundman #10 2 years ago

    Seriously, don't know why you guys are moaning about the first one's point of no return... Snakehips is right, and the same applies on the 360.

    Just replay using the same character for an enriched gameplay experience (such as being able to use Paragon/Renegade options for bonuses earlier than you can on the first playthrough) and get extra acheivements like the Insanity mode completion, Long Service Medal, Level 60 option and different ally bonuses as well as the chance to make different decisions or explore missed sidequests.

    As for "which playthrough" gets imported you can choose your first, second, third etc etc version of the same character - it imports the snapshot character save taken at the end of each playthrough (when you see Shepard standing in a hero pose in front of the starry bg after the credits on ending the game. This is where you can choose to replay as the same character from in ME1. If you completed once at level 30 once at 50 and once at 60 it'll give you the option to choose any of those for a replay.

    Each of these snapshots will incorporate all the decisions and completed quests specific to that playthrough. I assume this will be used to import characters at the start of ME2 but you can only import a maximum of 14 characters/versions of the same character from ME1. AFTER the initial cut scene there is a good plot related reason for being able to alter your appearance and class.

    In short - import your level 30 guy who made decisions you don't like or who missed sidequests out, or replay ME1 with them, do everything you want to do, get them up to level 50 or 60, and you get a carry over that uses the plot decisions you want and apparently gives you a bonus or perk if you were fully paragon or renegade as well as if you hit either the level 50 or 60 threshold.

  • SomaticSense #11 2 years ago

    "New Game+ isn't the only option once you finish Mass Effect 2 though. In order to better support downloadable content and to "tie up any loose ends", e.g. side missions, BioWare will allow you to continue playing after the end of the game without having to go back to the beginning of the main story"

    About bloody time Bioware.

    Why the hell has it taken so long for you to figure this out?
    Edited by 1 at 04/01/10 @ 12:56

  • soviet_ #12 2 years ago

    @Snakehips76, no problem. Been playing over Christmas getting a character ready with multiple playthroughs and was wondering the same.

    Looking forward to ME2 so much. I enjoyed playing the original recently on the PC as much as when I first played it on the 360 and that was over 2 years ago. Only other game that feels as fresh is TF2 and that has changed significantly over a similar timeframe

  • Koborover #13 2 years ago

    @ Moribundman

    Points of no return that go by without a clear warning are just bad. It's not necessary to force people to replay a game like ME in order to access stuff they missed, getting nice bonuses during a replay is beside the point.

  • NewbieZilla #14 2 years ago

    Reading the comments here, I get the impression some people only played the game once. I just can't understand that.

  • Tkozy #15 2 years ago

    Newbie, I just finished my first play though. I was really bummed that I couldn't go back and finish all of the side quests after I took down Saren, like a lot of people complained. After this past run, the story was revealed for me. Now that drive to figure out all the mysteries in ME1 has been removed, even if there are bits of unexplored dialogue and quests.

    That's just my two cents... er... pence.
    Edited by 1 at 04/01/10 @ 19:35

  • soviet_ #16 2 years ago

    Confirmed decisions from Mass Effect that carry over (this is why I have 3 playthroughs, 1 Paragon, 1 Renegade and 1 what I would do). May contain spoilers below

    The decision to save either Kaidan or Ashley.
    Whether or not the player kills Wrex on Virmire.
    Whether or not the player decides to save the Citadel Council at the end of Mass Effect.
    The player's choice of love interest.
    Whether the player spares or destroys the Rachni Queen at Peak 15.
    The player's treatment of Conrad Verner.
    Whether or not the player completed the UNC: Asari Diplomacy sidequest.
    Whether the player chose to allow the Alliance to conduct experiments on Nirali Bhatia's body.

    Could be more than that, but that is so far what is known to change your Mass Effect 2 experience
    Edited by 1 at 04/01/10 @ 23:49

  • dagas #17 2 years ago

    Good. Now You don't have to replay the game to do DLC.