Ever paid good money for a kick in the teeth? Now’s your chance.

Developer: Demiurge

(Don’t) Buy: Xbox Live Marketplace

I almost wet my pants when Pinnacle Station dropped stealthily onto Xbox Live Marketplace. There was no warning. No hype. No buildup. But with the sequel just round the corner, what could this new DLC possibly be? Maybe an epilogue that links the original to Mass Effect 2? A prologue that explains the mysterious rumours of the Normandy’s destruction? New side missions that make sense of the pointless mineral prospecting and inexplicable random collectibles? Shivering with antipation, I dropped the 400 points and downloaded the add-on and started playing.

Within five minutes I was confused. Within fifteen minutes I was angry. And within half an hour I was finished.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Pinnacle Station offers a painfully small collection of three tiny virtual arenas in which you’ll play a total of twelve short matches. Each match is essentially a renamed Unreal Tournament gametype, with deathmatch, domination, timed deathmatch and survival modes on offer. Winning times/kill counts are then ranked on a leaderboard, with an overall first place required to ‘beat’ the thirty seconds of storyline that Pinnacle Station has to offer.

But this ain’t UT. Hell, it ain’t even multiplayer! Botmatches were only ever used for practising for the online experience, but playing them by yourself for no good reason would be deadly boring… if each match lasted more than a minute. The maps are sad, cramped, simplistic little boxes that offer no real strategic options- and the gametypes would have seemed insultingly basic back in the Marathon days. Oh, and because Pinnacle station’s all about the close range combat, you can forget about using a biotic or engineering-heavy character. They don’t stand a chance.

I could go on about the tiny, poorly designed maps. I could complain about the fact that there are only three of them. I could bitch about the pointless leaderboards that don’t even list your friends, and the appalling recycled one-liners that you’ll hear over and over and over and over again. Rightfully I ought to spend an entire afternoon listing everything that’s derivative, lazy and downright bad about this dismal product… but I’d be missing the point. You see, Demiurge (the third party developer for the PC version of Mass Effect) has managed to create the impossible: an add-on pack that will actually spoil your opinion of the original title.

Let me explain: Mass Effect was a very, very good game.

There’s no denying it. Tight scripting, incredible plot twists, advanced dialogue options and epic visuals made Bioware’s action-RPG an instant classic. However, it also had a few problems that were easy to ignore when surrounded by such an impressive package. Besides the slow-ass lifts, that is. Incredibly, Pinnacle Station has succeeded in shoehorning every single problem, glitch and issue into one convenient add-on. Seriously, Demiurge  should be congratulated for pulling off such a monumental achievement.

You see, once the rose-tinted helmet visor came off, we realised Mass Effect’s combat mechanics were decidedly mediocre. Nonexistent enemy AI, idiotic squadmates, repetitive engagements, glitchy scenery and confusing close-range bundles can be excused and ignored when wrapped in galaxy-shattering intrigue. Pinnacle Station, however, is combat-oriented… meaning that there’s nowhere to hide. You’ll probably like Mass Effect a lot less after Pinnacle Station slaps you across the face with everything that’s wrong with it!!!

On the bright side, though, the achievements are easy. A Soldier or Vanguard can shotgun his way to 150 juicy Gamerpoints in half an hour or less. It sure ain’t worth 400 Microsoft points, though.

Let’s wrap this up. Pinnacle station is a cynical, lazy attempt to squeeze one last bit of cash out of Mass Effect before the sequel arrives. It’s badly designed, derivative and actually insults both the fans and the franchise itself. Sure, Pinnacle Station gives you an excuse to pick up Mass Effect again… but you’ll probably end up wondering why you enjoyed it in the first place!

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