Sigh... Since I can not seem to get to the video, all I'll say is:

F' Yeah! More Mass Effect! Woohoo! Yay! Awesome!

A sick, twisted part of me is hoping that Sheperd has been assimilated into the Geth, Locutus of borg-style. The sane part of me realizes the game probably wouldn't be as fun playing as an emotionless, robot giraffe-monster.

When it comes to what I really think the trailer means... I'm with larrymadill.

If nothing else I hope our old Shepard doesn't have too much of an effect on the story. Having to play through ME1 again just to hit the right triggers for events in ME2 would be the worst sort of grind.

I wouldn't read too much into the twist at the end, seeing how Bioware has said that ME1 save games will carry over to ME2, unless that just means things Shepard did rather than the character.

I'm checking the box next to "Fake Out" on this one. There's no way BioWare announces that you're not playing Shepard like this.

Other than that, wow, was that cool? Quite a punch in the gut. I'm really looking forward to this one.

That and the fact that they can't mention human associates, since one of the two ended up dead in ME1.

To be honest, I don't give two hoots how they spin it - I loved the first game. Not so much for the gameplay as much as the richness of the universe. It tickled my scifi gland good and proper.

I did pick up the Mass Effect novel, and suffice to say that Iain Banks needn't start worring about the competition.

Cerberus are the baddies in the second Mass Effect book, Ascension. It would definitely makes sense for them to be more prominently featured. Given that you have to level up your character, it would make some sense for them to have you playing someone other than Shepard. You could still interact with the sidekicks from the first game. I'd miss Wrex if he wasn't in ME2.

My wild stab in the dark would be that Udina became president, Cerberus got to him (or he was already with them) and now the protagonist is on the run from the council who have developed anti-alien policies and recruited the Geth to help them. That would match the overall three-act structure for each game

Maybe Shepard is captured and brainwashed into turning geth, so the player has to first find him behind enemy lines and then use that Asari chick to return his memories to him (maybe she got them during the mind meld they did). It will be Mass Effect 2: The Search for Spock . . . err, I mean Shepard.

All of this talk makes me want to bag on my feeble attempts at playing through Fable 2 and go buy Mass Effect again. My local game store has it for like $15. So excited.

So if the first book was bad, how is the second book, really?

Shepard as a Geth double agent would be cool.

Start the game captured, agree to work for them, gain their trust, then reveal it was all a setup.

Remember that the geth in the trailer had a Human Alliance design on it (The N7 design, specifically). This led me to assume that you would be fighting against the Alliance High Command in some form. The Mass effect Wiki lists "N7" as meaning Alliance Special Forces, Highest Level.

Finished Mass Effect today, I get the feeling I could have delved deepeer into the backstories of the other crew members (Tali, the human guy, Garrus, etc) but somehow the game didn't impose me anything so I put my efforts on getting into Liana's pants. I'll probably play it again and try a really evil redheaded bombshell this time. I hardly ever go the evil route on rpgs, but I would like to give it a try with this one (notable exception Oblivion and the dark brotherhood quest)

I hope I can kill Wrex in Mass Effect 2! Sort of an endless chain of punishment for the guy.

Why would you punish someone for being so awesome?