I'm about 6 hours in or so. I'm not really that far in the story because I keep looking around and exploring. Just about everything about this game is an upgrade from the first one. Especially the graphics. Great looking game.

It's also interesting how they mixed the familiar with brand new stuff. The only thing I'm kinda nitpicky about is the thermal clips. In the first ME, you didn't have ammo. You just had to watch and make sure that your gun didn't overheat. Here, we have thermal clips that serve as ammo. There isn't a shortage of clips for the most part though, so it's a minor nag.

They've integrated Paragon/Renegade options into the cutscenes now, which I thought was really well done. You still have the Paragon/Renegade dialogue options, but from time to time you'll see an option to press one of the triggers to do a bold Paragon or Renegade action. (Think Assassin's Creed 2 when the buttons would appear, but "smoother".)

I'm also really glad that I played the first Mass Effect again right before this came out. Not only does it reference some of the obvious plot choices you made, but many of the minor side missions are referenced. (For those of you that remember reports of Hamlet being done with an all Elcor cast, that's mentioned.) It just makes the game that much better.

Combat can be friggin' hard!! I'm still getting used to it, but I've had a few fights that I had to do a few times because I was getting straight tagged. (I'm playing on Normal for now.) I've been playing with Space Kanye for the most part, but his special abilities seem to include running out in the midst of a fire fight and getting it handed to him. I do like that you can tell your squad to go to separate locations now.

The new ship is huge. Four decks. And the galaxy map is, in my opinion, much better. Scanning planets is much more interactive. And you can use the minerals that you gather to build upgrades. Just watch your flying when you go to a neighboring system. Doing that spends fuel and you can easily float by your destination, which will use more fuel. Not a huge deal though.

So now I'm just waiting for work to be over so I can get back to it. *Looks at clock* CRAP!