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While scouting Eden Prime, your party runs into the sinister and deadly Geth race. You know they're deadly because, the first time you see them, they're impaling a hapless soldier on a huge metal spike. The game launches into combat mode. No loading screen - just immediate real-time combat with aiming, shooting and even Tom Clancy-like squad commands and cover abilities.
RM: You can play the game in real-time or you can pause to carefully choose your actions in a pseudo turn-based style.
Article continues belowGamesRadar: Do you expect most players to go with real-time, turn-based or a combination?
RM: They can do both or either. You can play real-time and use the AI of your party members autonomously. You can never pause and just use the squad commands to direct your party forward and tell them what enemies to attack. Or you can actually pause the game and choose every single action for every single member of your party. Some players really enjoy that level of detail; some enjoy playing it more as a cinematic action-oriented experience.
RM: There are four basic classes - pistol, sniper rifle, automatic rifle and shotgun. And you can modify them all with X-Mods, so they'll do different types of damage or they'll enhance the effects on them. We have different types of ammo - incendiary rounds, explosive rounds, armor-piercing rounds - as well as grenades.
GZ: There are no melee weapons like swords or anything like that.
GamesRadar: So no lightsabers?
GZ: (laughs) No. But, really, the talents you have effectively act like weapons.
Sure enough, he loads a character with more advanced biotic powers. This Shepard may not have a lightsaber, but he does have some semblance of the Force. He can summon purple energy walls out of thin air, shoot balls of energy or throw enemies into trees from dozens of feet away.
RM: Your talents get more powerful as you level up. The barrier will last longer... the warp power and throw will do more damage. You can unlock the lift power and move an object that enemies are using for cover aside. Or combine the lift and throw talents to toss an object in the battlefield at them to knock them out.
