NOTE: This article contains no plot spoilers.

Now that I have explained what type of game Mass Effect (ME) is (and if you haven’t read Part 1, what are you doing here?), it’s time for me to give a brief synopsis of the ME Trilogy.

Let’s start with ME1 (where else?).  The franchise opens in the year 2183. Humanity has discovered space travel and has already been in contact with many peaceful alien races throughout the Milky Way.  The story begins with Commander Shepard, a decorated war veteran who serves aboard the SSV-Normandy, a highly-advanced prototype starship of the Humanity Systems Alliance (which basically represents humanity to the rest of the galaxy).  Shepard is sent to investigate a distress call from a human colony that is under attack; the resulting investigation leads Shepard to believe that Saren Arterius is responsible for the invasion.  Unfortunately, Saren is a Spectre, a member of a small group of elite warriors/diplomats who have the right to act outside the law as they see fit.  As he hunts down the rogue Spectre across the galaxy, Shepard discovers that something much more sinister is at play, and he must prevent an unknown enemy- known only in legend as the Reapers- from launching a cataclysmic event that would threaten all sentient life in the galaxy.

ME2 takes place two years after ME1.  Not much can be said here without ruining the ending of ME1 or giving away the plot for this game, so I’ll just wrap it all in a nutshell: Commander Shepard forms an unsteady alliance with the Illusive Man (played by Martin Sheen), the notorious leader of the pro-human/anti-alien terrorist faction called Cerberus, to investigate the disappearance of entire populations of human colonies.  This, in turn, leads to the discovery of an alien race known as the Collectors, who are abducting millions of humans for an unknown purpose.  Shepard and his crew must find and stop the Collectors before they accomplish their goal and “harvest” mankind for reasons unbeknownst to the rest of the galaxy.

ME3 is the epic culmination of the ME trilogy.  Despite Shepard’s efforts, the Reapers successfully launch an all-out invasion on the entire galaxy in an attempt to purge it of all organic beings.  At this point, the situation becomes desperate.  Caught completely off-guard, each alien race attempts to fight the Reapers back individually, to no avail.  Shepard must bring all the races together for two reasons. The first is simply that, alone, each race is being exterminated with ease by the innumerable, technologically-advanced Reapers. However, even if all the races are united, the galaxy is still hopelessly outmatched.  The second reason is that the galaxy’s one hope for survival is an ancient weapon designed by a long-extinct, highly-intelligent alien race.  The weapon, dubbed “The Crucible,” can only be completed if all the races pool every last resource to construct it in time.  Thus, with Reapers spreading like wildfire across the entire galaxy (and a completely-insane Illusive Man to boot), Shepard must fight a war of attrition that can only be won if each and every war asset is assembled to stand against the Reapers.

There you have it.  Mind you, this is a complete over-simplification of the ME trilogy; there is so much more mythology to the universe, and there are so many subplots that all tie together to weave an intricate web of emotional stories.  This is why the ME trilogy is so loved and respected.  To see a character-driven, action-based video game… it just doesn’t happen.

Stay tuned for Part 3, an explanation of the many branching storylines of the ME trilogy.