More like Mass...Eve...Freespace...Effect?

I've been vaguely aware of Bioware's next RPG, Mass Effect, for a quite a while -- there's been plenty of chat about it on RPGnet and elsewhere, but since it's a console title (at least for now...stupid Xbox) I wasn't really following it as closely as I have been following other gaming news.  Tycho's blog post Monday on Penny Arcade mentioned that there was a character creation/opening cutscene trailer out, so I figured I'd have a look to see what it was like, at the very least.

Well, as I've come to expect from Bioware, it was quite impressive.  I did notice that the character creation was very similar to Eve's facial morphing, and the eponymous mass effect gates look very similar in appearance and operation to Eve's stargates, which was somewhat amusing -- especially in light of the similarity the game's plot has to that of Volition's Descent: Freespace franchise (created right here in Champaign, by the way).  Two of the voices in the opening cutscene were pretty familiar; Seth Green voices the ship's helmsman and Keith David is the voice of the ship's captain (you might not recognize the name, but you'll recognize his face and voice probably).  The animation looked very smooth (but that's what you'd expect from something released for publicity purposes) and now I'm definitely interested in seeing some of the gameplay.  Bioware has shown with the KotOR franchise that they can make a console RPG that does not feel "dumbed down" compared to a computer RPG, and that a simpler interface doesn't have to mean sacrificing options.  The only reason I haven't bought Jade Empire through Steam is because I balk a little at paying 40 bucks for a game that's been out for 2 years (and I have plenty of other things to spend that money on at the moment).

Sadly, Bioware has no plans to make a PC version at the moment (though they originally didn't have any plans to make a PC version of Jade Empire either, as far as I know), so I suspect I won't be playing Mass Effect anytime soon; unlike Guitar Hero, it doesn't really offer a play experience I can't really get any other way (nor does it have the social aspect) so I'm not going to go out and buy an Xbox just to play it.  Ah well.