Mass Effect: Revelation

"Mass Effect: Revelation" is meant for the hardcore Mass Effect fan! If you're looking for a good sci-fi novel, this is not the book you want. Its a simple story on a very interesting universe that sadly does not come alive in the book as it does in the videogame. To be perfectly honest for the non fan this book will hold little value or entertainment. However if you've spent hundreds of hours on the ME trilogy, as I have, this is very interesting and highly enjoyable. The book explores Saren and his "renegade" style deeply and we get to read how he came to know Anderson and found Sovereign! If you have no idea how important this is, again this is not the book for you. If you know what i'm talking about, read on! Also present is Kahlee Sanders who appears on Grissom Academy in ME3 as is Grissom himself. The book is filled with little treats to the loyal and fanatic ME follower and is the true start to the franchise, something any real fan cannot afford to miss! The writing is simple but effective and the action is plenty and bloody! The only fault I would point in the book from a fan's point of view is that Anderson is not really explored beyond a crush on Kahlee and his strong sense of duty! He comes across as a weak hero and severely lacking dimension and charisma. Of course my opinion is tainted by seeing Anderson over three games and already having a strong and very positive view of his character which only makes the Anderson from the book suffer even more by comparison. Saren is the real focus of the book and his road to Sovereign the payoff for the reader and fan. As a fan ME: Revelation was an enjoyable, compulsive read, giving me exactly what I wanted as a completely hardcore, obsessive ME universe lover. Looked at as a literary work this is a simple tale without much to recommend which probably wont even make someone unfamiliar with the franchise to go out and find the game! For anyone who knows what destroy, synthesis and control means, it is unmissable!

As a big fan of Mass Effect I was interested to see if the game would translate into a book and if the characters would come to life as they do when your playing the game. I also wanted to see how the book would rate compared to other science fiction novels, as I've read a lot of them. I must admit I was a bit concerned it just wouldn't add up but I was wrong.Revelation follows the story of a young Lieutenant Anderson, who if you are familiar with the games plays a significant role. The book and story is surprisingly good, the characters are well rounded and authentic and it actually reads like a normal science fiction story, you could just pick this up without any prior knowledge and enjoy it.The other characters are written very well and the story allows you to easily 'see' them in your mind as you are reading, which after playing the games is great. I would highly recommend this especially to all Mass Effect fans but also to readers of the genre as a whole, it's surprisingly very good, I'm now on book two.

As a video game tie-in, this is surprisingly good. The writing is to a decent standard and it goes some way to fleshing out the characters of Anderson and Saren from Mass Effect 1 (the game).The book's plot covers a few events mentioned in the game and pretty much leads up to the beginning of Mass Effect's story. Drew Karpyshyn, one of Bioware's writers, takes the opportunity to use the book to explain a fair bit of the Mass Effect universe, especially humanity's recent arrival in it. This does bog down a bit early on as he goes into too much detail on interstellar communications and the like, but the pace picks up in the second half of the book.One area not covered is how English is the standard spoken language of the entire galaxy...I would have loved an explanation for that one. A lot of time is also spent on Alliance hero Admiral Grissom in the early chapters, but then he is left behind by the story and never heard from again, which seemed a little odd.But overall, it's exciting stuff which remains faithful to the ME style and is a good companion to the games. I shall be checking out further books in the series.

I'd consider myself a huge Mass Effect fan, though I had never bothered reading these books. I'd recommend playing through the first game Mass Effect before reading this book because it'll give you more knowledge about the world and the species that inhabit it. The book does a decent job of describing these, but I'd still highly recommend playing the first game to give you a feel for the universe. The story takes place before the first game and through dialogue in the game you'll be able to learn about the story in the book, which means that I already sort of knew what was going to happen, though obviously not quite as detailed as in the book.The atmosphere in the book is very much like the atmosphere in the game, which is perhaps what you might expect seeing as the author of this novel is also a writer for the Mass Effect game. The thing I enjoyed most about this book is the 'Mass Effect' feel it gave me. It also provides some interesting backstory of Anderson and Saren. It's well written, and fast paced, I would easily recommend this book to fans of the Mass Effect universe who want to learn more about the Mass Effect universe and characters like Anderson and Saren, it serves very well as a prequel to the first Mass Effect game, after I had finished reading I instantly felt like playing the first game again.

+ Many well-written and exciting action scenes. These manage to forward the plot at a breathless pace whilst taking place in a variety of scenarios and locations.+ Fleshes out the Mass Effect lore and makes playing the games more enjoyable as a result.+ Very little deliberate fan service. The characters are all fallible and retain the human characteristics that make all the alien species in Mass Effect so compelling, and never stray from their established canon.- Karpyshyn's writing style is much like the Mass Effect video game trilogy itself - immediately gratifying and easy to get immersed with, but frequently hints at depth and intrigue that just isn't there.- Emotional depth. Whilst we are made to care about the characters, some attempts at making the novel's protagonists more than what they are (vehicles for the mystery plot) feel forced. For example, a romance begins to bloom between two characters but fizzles out without the reader, or the characters, feeling any regret or surprise- Length. Whilst Revelation tells the story it set out to tell (Anderson and Saren's history together and how the Spectre Agent had his big change of heart) occasional chapters jump into the perspective of characters we never hear from again. This is far from offensive, but these other characters shed light on a fascinating extended universe that just doesn't have time to emerge fully thanks to the confines of this novel's length.