#but i have the dlc to do for me3 and then final mission stuff so im !! excited!!

[recalcitrantbeetroot]

Look, I still don't know how to use Tumblr correctly, but this seems like the place to put late night, rambling, fanfic planning, head cannon-y, speculative brain rot. Normally, I just put this in the notes section of my phone, but I'm... I dunno, I'm trying this blog thing or whatever.

Sorta, kinda spoilers for my ME3 fanfiction that I absolutelywillwriteandpostsomedayIswear. If you don't want to know my Shepard too much ahead of time at least.

So I have gone "on record" about loving all my Mass Effect squad members and team mates and other NPCs before, and largely that's true. I don't even hate Allers, though I think they did Emily Wong dirty and I'm still mad about that. But there are definitely characters who I rarely pick for missions and because my fanfiction is going to follow pretty closely to how I play my ideal ME run (because it makes me happy damnit), I have been trying to understand why my Shep picks who she picks and why she leaves certain characters behind a lot.

Enter Javik.

I think he's an interesting character, but I personally find him an Oscar the Grouch and there are squaddies I would much rather take because I enjoy their banter and personalities more. But why would Shep not take him? Especially when his experience with actually killing Reapers would probably be pretty useful. (Side note: wasted character potential here not having Javik be more useful with Reaper killing advice. I know he's a DLC character but still.) Working with difficult, stubborn people isn't new. Neither are vengeful teammates or overly violent aliens that she has no real authority over. And my girl is more than stubborn enough to lock horns with him regularly over their moral differences, so that's not an issue. I think it really boils down to the fact that he makes her really effing uncomfortable because she feels like she could have BEEN him.

Erin didn't want to wake him up on Eden Prime.

At all.

Here is someone who really should be dead, about to be brought back into a galaxy he won't recognize, without any prior knowledge of his beliefs and without his consent. In that moment, Liara is all giddy and Shepard is experiencing the ghost of what would be flashbacks if she remembered her death and the Cerberus experimentation that followed. On top of having her brain hijacked by those terminals with Prothean data on them.

Alliance Command gave her orders to pick up the "artifact" and Cerberus will do goodness knows what with an actual, living Prothean, so in spite of the moral implications, waking him up to at lease give him a say in what happens to him seems like a halfway decent choice. But those implications weigh heavily on Erin, someone who spent all of ME2 not dealing with the fact that nothing she knew was the same as before her death and really wishing she hadn't been brought back.

Eden Prime really puts her six months of intensive therapy while incarcerated to the test.

And then Javik wakes up and he's an imperialistic, genocidal, vendetta bound weapon of vengeance ... and it all hits a little too close to home. Because if a few things had gone a little different in ME2 ... if Cerberus had been able to wake her up properly and spent time brainwashing her ... maybe she would have been the same.

Not that it actually would have happened, because she's Commander Shepard. And while her perspective is suggestable, her moral compass is not. But Commander Mothereffing Erin Shepard is still just one woman who now has to save the whole damn galaxy and is also madly in love with a man who still thinks she's a Cerberus puppet and it's throwing her for a bit of a loop so she spends the first part of ME3 having a crisis of confidence. *deep breath* She hates waking up Javik and mostly leaves him to brood until Thessia. Maybe I'll have him be more involved earlier, because you know I'm not sticking to the two squad mates only bs on every mission. But so far that's all minus some finale stuff and on ship interactions obviously.

If you made it this far. You're super cool and I love you. And I'm sorry for the inherent weirdness that will continue to be a constant presence on anything I touch on this platform.

#mass effect #fanfic #fanfiction thoughts #its late and im tired #me3 #mass effect legendary edition #mass effect 3 #mass effect shepard #commander shepard #mass effect javik #javik

[zilllathegod]

Mass Effect Trilogy Mission Order

With the release of the Mass Effect Legendary edition I decided to gather a mission list so I can guide myself through the games efficiently. This guide should include the base missions and the DLC. Through the years I have glanced at list like this during my playthroughs so I figured if it was useful for me it may be useful for the internet also.

*Planet scanning between missions

Eden Prime

Therum

Feros

Noveria

UNC Side Missions - Citadel side missions (loads of cool stuff) - (Garrus/Tali/Wrex) specific missions

DLC: Bring Down the Sky

Virmire

Ilos/Endgame

*Planet scanning between missions

Prologue / Freedom's Progress

Citadel - Pick up Kasumi from DLC

Omega - Pick up Zaeed from DLC

Omega: The Scientist

Kasumi: Stolen Memory - Kasumi's loyalty mission rewards you with the Locust SMG, a really nice SMG.

Dossier: Archangel

Dossier: The Convict

Dossier: The Warlord

Horizon - will automatically trigger. Don't miss the Particle Beam weapon on the ground about halfway through the level, it's really nice for dealing with the Praetorian enemies.

Recruit Tali

Dossier: The Justicar - While on Ilium, you can talk to Liara to get some help but don't start the Lair of the Shadow Broker stuff yet.

Dossier: The Assassin

-- Now you've got all your recruits, so start doing loyalty missions.--

Tuchanka: Mordin's Loyalty - I always recommend keeping the data, as it opens up way more branches of story in ME3, but it's ultimately up to you.

Tuchanka: Grunt's Loyalty

Collector Vessel - This triggers after you complete Horizon and then 5 other missions. So now.

Illium - Miranda's Loyalty

Aeia: Jacob's Loyalty

Citadel: Garrus's Loyalty

Citadel: Thane's Loyalty

Illium: Samara's Loyalty

Zaeed's Loyalty - Warning: If you want to go Paragon during this mission you've got to beat a really high Charm check to keep his loyalty. I usually just look the other way on this one and hate myself for it later, to make sure he stays on board.

-- The next missions all involve high Paragon/Renegade checks, so we save them for now --

Pragia: Jack's Loyalty - Afterwards, you'll need to break up a fight. Use your Paragon or Renegade option to keep both characters loyal.

Quarian Fleet: Tali's Loyalty - This mission has a big impact in ME3. To keep her loyal, use Paragon/Renegade options whenever possible, and don't use the data to defend her innocence. If you sent Veetor with Tali back on Freedom's Progress, and Kal'Reegar survived Tali's recruitment mission, you can successfully use the "Rally the Crowd" option to get the best outcome here. Otherwise, you'll need to use Paragon/Renegade all the way through to make it happen. Hopefully your scores are high enough for that, which is why we saved it for here.

DLC: Overlord - This is a good point to put this in. You've just killed a lot of geth, so let's go kill some more!

DLC: Normandy Crash Site - If you picked this up, now is a good time for a nostalgic flashback before you head off on a suicide mission. -- POINT OF NO RETURN: Make sure everyone is loyal and you've done any side missions that you want to --

Mnemosyne: Reaper IFF

Geth Base: Legion's Loyalty - Take Tali for interesting dialogue. This mission's decision also plays heavily into ME3. Afterwards, you'll need to break up another fight. Just like last time, use Paragon/Renegade to keep both characters loyal.

Normandy Interlude

Omega 4: Suicide Mission - The following composition always gets everyone out alive for me, but again, it's your call, and I know there are other workable options as well: Fire Team Leader (Garrus), Tech Expert (Tali), Escort (Mordin), Biotic Expert (Samara). Take Miranda to the final fight for some interesting dialogue, and be sure to always leave Grunt, Zaeed, and Garrus to hold the line. They have a higher internal success score for that job, so it'll help make sure your whole team makes it out.

DLC: Lair of the Shadow Broker - This should be played right here, as the information you get from it is integral to ME3

DLC: Arrival - Very last, as ME3 picks up right afterwards

Prologue: Earth

Priority: Mars

Priority: Citadel I - During this mission, players can visit Ashley or Kaidan and Thane at the hospital, recruit the reporter Diana Allers, and recruit either Dr. Chakwas or Dr. Michel.

Normandy: First Visit

N7: Cerberus Labs & Citadel: Alien Medi-Gel Formula

Priority: Palaven - Following this mission, return to the Citadel to deliver items.

Aria: Blood Pack

Aria: Blue Suns

Aria: Eclipse

Citadel: Hanar Diplomat (Kasumi)

Grissom Academy: Emergency Evacuation (Jack) & Citadel: Biotic Amp Interfaces - This mission must be completed ahead of Priority: Citadel II or there are dire consequences. Players can also choose to complete this mission as soon as they receive it.

Priority: Eden Prime (From the Ashes DLC) - Players can recruit Javik as a squadmate.

Meet the Diplomats & Priority: Sur'Kesh (Mordin)

Attican Traverse: Krogan Team (Grunt) & Citadel: Krogan Dying Message

Tuchanka: Turian Platoon - Players need to be careful, as three missions will be available on Tuchanka. They should not choose Priority: Tuchanka yet. Immediately following this mission, players need to go straight to the next mission to avoid disastrous consequences.

Tuchanka: Bomb & Citadel: Cerberus Automated Turret Schematics

N7: Cerberus Attack & Citadel: Improved Power Grid

N7: Cerberus Abductions & Benning: Evidence

Priority: Tuchanka

Players can find items for characters on the Citadel in the following systems: Apien Crest: Banner of the First Regiment Kite's Nest: Pillars of Strength Ismar Frontier: Prototype Components Shrike Abyssal: Prothean Obelisk

N7: Cerberus Fighter Base & Citadel: Heating Unit Stabilizers

Priority: Citadel II - Players should make sure they have spoken to Thane at the hospital ahead of this mission.

Mesana: Distress Signal

Ardat-Yakshi Monastery (Samara) & Citadel: Asari Widow

Citadel: Aria T'Loak (Omega DLC) - Once players choose to join Aria's fleet at the Citadel, they will not have the option to return until the full DLC is completed.

Arrae: Ex-Cerberus Scientists (Jacob) & Citadel: Cerberus Turian Poison

Citadel: Volus Ambassador (Zaeed)

Priority: Perseus Veil

Priority: Geth Dreadnought

Rannoch: Admiral Koris & Citadel: Target Jamming Technology - When landing on Rannoch, players need to be careful not to choose Priority: Rannoch. Players need to make sure to rescue the Admiral, no matter what, to have the best chance at a compromise between the Geth and Quarians.

Rannoch: Geth Fighter Squadrons (Legion) & Citadel: Reaper Code Fragments

N7: Fuel Reactors & Citadel: Chemical Treatment - Players should be sure not to confuse this mission with the one to Destroy the Reaper Base. Following this, Shepard can return to the Citadel to deliver items.

Priority: Rannoch - To broker peace between the Geth and Quarians, the following conditions must have been met: Tali and Legion must both be alive; Tali was not exiled in Mass Effect 2; Legion's loyalty mission was completed, and the Heretics must have been destroyed; Shepard must have broken up the fight between Legion and Tali in Mass Effect 2 without taking sides (i.e., using Charm/Intimidate); Shepard must have four bars of Reputation; Koris must have been rescued on Rannoch; Shepard must have completed Geth Fighter Squadrons. If any of these conditions were not met, players will be forced to choose a side.

Players can find items for characters on the Citadel in the following systems:

Nimbus Cluster: Library of Asha Athena Nebula: Hesperia-Period Statue Irune: Book of Plenix Valhallan Threshold: Prothean Data Drives Argos Rho: Kaklisaur Fossil Silean Nebula: Rings of Alune Dekuuna: Elcor Extraction Dekuuna: Code of the Ancients Hades Nexus: Obelisk of Karza Hades Nexus: Prothean Sphere

Priority: Citadel III

Priority: Thessia - Bring Javik and Liara for additional lore and a few important discoveries.

N7 Communication Hub & Citadel: Cerberus Ciphers

Priority: Horizon - To ensure Miranda survives, players need to do the following: Shepard must talk to Miranda on the Citadel Docks; they must warn her about Kai Leng in the Specter office; Shepard must have met with Miranda in the apartment on the Citadel and given her access to Alliance resources.

Citadel: Dr. Bryson (Leviathan DLC)

Citadel: Shore Leave (Citadel DLC) - Avoid leaving the Citadel until after the party

Priority: Cerberus Headquarters - This is the Point of No Return. Following this mission, players will go straight into the endgame.

Priority: Earth  - For the best possible outcome, players need 3,100 EMS prior to this mission.

#mass effect #gaming #refrence #reblog #videogames

[annakie]

So I decided to squeeze in a ME3 (only) playthrough to finally do MShep and an Engineer in ME3.  I started this guy many years ago and never went very far with him, despite really loving the character design.  BTW, I captioned all the screenshots above if you wanna clickthrough. So (re)meet Aldis.  I tried to do his initial facial design off of Aldis Hodge, though I’m bad at creating/mimicking faces I think he still turned out as one of the most attractive mSheps I’ve ever seen, if I can say so mysellf without sounding too braggadocios. :) When I made him, there were a couple of goals I wanted to accomplish... Obviously, just finally do ME3 with a MShep.  I did ME1 and ME2 with one even longer ago, but I romanced Liara in those and I really wanted to see a MShenko romance, to see the more gradual “Hey let’s get together” in ME3 instead of the “let’s reaffirm our relationship” like with my FemShep.  I also wanted to do a more renegade playthrough, since it’s been many years since I did my Femshep Shakarian Renegade playthrough.  He is still the “I’m nice to my crew, and I’ll try a diplomatic approach but my tolerance for bullshit is near zero.”  And last, I’m just gonna wear a bunch of the dumb armors I almost never wear and just try and do things different in other ways than my main FemShep. Since the next time I do a full trilogy playthrough, it’ll be with my canon femshep in the Legacy and there may not be the possibility of mods then, I wanted a heavily modded run to see all the mods again, plus the improvements since my last ME3 playthrough about a year and a half ago.  So this time I’m playing with:

Lights Effect as the FX mod

Girl Plays Game Hair Mods as DLC (Maleshep’s ”Macho” is the specific hair mod.)

Project Variety, which, btw means no Thanemod or Backoff. because they’re incompatible.  Project Variety adds SO MUCH to the game, several of which are highlighed in the screenshots above.

Expanded Galaxy Mod (I have no idea how I can ever play without this mod again, gonna make the LE playthrough so hard and bland.)

Spectre Expansion Mod... also one I don’t ever want to live without in the future.

I have MEHEM installed because... yeah.  I still don’t feel like not having a happy ending.

So of course Citadel Epilogue Mod to close out the game.

ME3 Recalibrated to fix all the lore and errors that need fixing.

And Better Journal to make quest descriptions better.

Casual Outfits for MShep.  There’s also other new casual outfits installed for MShep and I don’t know where they came from, but I do love them. (See pics for more.)

Priority Earth Overhaul Mod to make the endgame even more epic.  The creator also made Immersive Thessia which is sadly incompatible with Project Variety so for now I’m not using this... maybe a future playthrough will swap out PJ for Immersive Thessia, ThaneMod and BackOff again.

Omega Hub for extra Omega content post Omega-DLC, really looking forward to seeing the improvements in this one.  It was just a fun 10-minute diversion last time I played through.

Ark Mod for extra missions that bridge the gap between ME3 and Andromeda.

Better Dreams for awesome and non-annoying dreaming... getting rid of The Kid as much as possible.

Alliance Warpack for more Companion outfits.

Citadel DLC Redone so most companions wear unique casual outfits during Citadel DLC

ME3 Opening Remaster to make those few seconds of the opening a little more epic.

Miranda Mod to have Miranda on the Normandy and give her cool stuff to do after Horizon.  Also if you’re a Miranda Romancer gives her a better ME3 romance.  Also better clothes.

Respawn - Mission Overhaul IDK why it’s hidden on the Nexus, but I had an old download I’m using.  Makes combat more difficult by giving the bad guys more varied powers.  A nice change of difficulty without making it crazy on normal.

Allers Redone to put Allers in a decent outfit.  Still don’t know if I’m going to bother talking to her, though I did put her on the ship.

A Lot Of Videos 4k - I’m a 4k gamer finally.... I want what I can make look good... look good.

I’m NOT using ALOT this time -- I didn’t want to not be able to easily fix things should some mod installation be wonky.  I figure the Legendary Edition is gonna be my big “Take ALL THE PRETTY SCREENSHOTS!!” time... this one is just for fun, and enjoying the mods and my pretty, pretty mShep.

Hey the new post editor SUCKS because I’ve run out of space for new paragraphs but I can add new bullet points.  Anyway, I’ll probably make a few more screenshot posts as I progress through the game.

#mass effect #mass effect 3 #bioware #video games #mshep #mass effect mods #david anderson #james vega #kasumi goto #kaidan alenko #liara t'soni #annakie's mass effect stuff

[irikahkrios]

why do u hate liara 😭 i don’t mean this in a mean way i’m sure u have valid reasons bc big brain irikah stan but i’m just wondering

i made this post a while ago that goes into it a little more in depth (edit after writing the rest of this post: this post ended up being much longer and more in-depth than that one but i'm keeping the link there anyway lmao), but tldr i think she's creepy as fuck and i hate how the writers portrayed her obsession with shepard as a good thing and didn't even consider that players might be uncomfortable with her.

i already dislike her as a character because of her constant violations of shepard's autonomy: them being forced by the plot of me1 to have creepy brain sex with her (possibly multiple times depending on the order you do the main plot missions in), her becoming obsessed with them and stealing their corpse to give to cerberus to resurrect them (which is even worse if, like me, you play a sole survivor shepard), and the way she acts super familiar and all Oh I'm Your Best Friend And Maaaaybe Perhaps Your Lover :) no matter what dialogue options you've chosen with her. all of that, combined with some truly horrible stuff from me3 (her treatment of javik which is almost as bad as her treatment of shepard, her awful dialogue with jack if you bring her to grissom academy, the way she acts like the war has Finally Actually Started when the reapers attack thessia because non-asari species suffering and dying apparently doesn't count, etc), was already more than enough to make me uncomfortable with her. but i could at least tolerate her from a narrative/character standpoint if all this awful bullshit had actually been acknowledged. stories need villains, and i think the concept of a villain who's absolutely convinced that they're the hero's best friend is a potentially interesting one. hell, if they didn't want to go full villain they could have even had her grow as a person over time and realize that her behavior towards shepard was horrifying and creepy. the character could have been salvaged if they had just acknowledged her faults and possibly let her grow past them.

but what really makes me hate liara is that the writers seem to think she's right about everything. her obsession with shepard isn't supposed to be a character flaw, it's apparently supposed to be endearing and correct. they seem to just straight-up think that all her terrifying stalkery bullshit about being Shepard's Best Friend And The Most Important Person In Their Life No Matter What :)))) is actually....literally the way things are and not just the obsessive ramblings of a very creepy character......like, the divide between liara's in-game actions and the way the games seem to want to portray her is a fucking canyon. she's so creepy and has zero likable or redeeming qualities, but the writers act like she's this amazing wonderful perfect person who's closer to shepard than anyone, even their love interest.

she's forced on the player to the extent that you can't do anything to make her go away. there's never an option to say you aren't close to her or ask her to leave you alone, you automatically hug her on illium in me2 instead of that being a paragon interrupt or dialogue prompt like it really should have been, me3 makes you have all these Deep Conversations where she comes to your cabin uninvited because clearly shepard is closer to her than to any other squadmate and you're not allowed to dispute this, and basically i just. am not allowed to roleplay my shepard as uncomfortable in any way with the person who he was forced to have creepy invasive brain sex with against his will, who stole his corpse and gave it to the terrorists responsible for the greatest trauma of his life because she was so obsessed with him that she couldn't let him go (after knowing him for a few weeks at most; i always get her at the latest point i possibly can so he's only forced to have sex with her once), and who continues to insert herself into his life and claims to be extremely close friends with him despite him not wanting anything to do with her.

so, yeah. when i make liara a villain in my canon, when i almost completely write her out of me2 and me3, when i rewrite the shadow broker dlc to be about fighting her and foiling her plot to become the shadow broker and stalk shepard across the galaxy, it's because it's cathartic for me to imagine a canon where my shepard was allowed to treat her constant creepy advances in a more realistic way.

#there's some other minor stuff too like how she feels like 3 different characters in all 3 games and none of them are good or interesting #but that's more petty than the big glaring legitimate issues with her lmao

[elcorhamletlive]

Top 5 Mass Effect companions? Your meta posts have me pretty tempted to pick up the remastered trilogy and try it out 😊

Ooooh i'm glad to hear it! Mass Effect has such a special place in my heart and I'm always happy to encourage other to play it. I actually haven't tried the remastered edition yet, but I've heard only good things about it.

Onto the list:

5. Samara. Number 5 is hard to choose because I seriously like everyone in ME, and Samara is far from being one of the squadmates with most content, but still, she is such a striking presence and I treasure every scene with her through the trilogy. I love her status as this super powerful extreme moralist and how it contrasts with her relationship with her daughters (she is kind of a terrible parent, which I love). I love her voice acting and her dramatic but also serious and intimidating dialogue. Her loyalty quest has some bits of wonky writing, but it's different from other quests and carries such a mysterious and epic vibe that I can't help but adore. I love her.

4. Garrus. It's an unpopular opinion to have him so low, but I guess because people worship him so much I never had to justify liking him, so he's not a character I'm particularly protective of, which justifies this ranking. Anyway. Garrus is popular for a reason: He's just a great guy with one of the best character arcs of the entire trilogy, and the fact that Shepard can actually shape his moral compass and the person he becomes is really an awesome bit of writing and helps to reinforce how important their friendship it. I always have a weakness for characters trying to do the right thing and be just in a fundamentally unjust setting, even if they mess it up terribly, so there was no question I'd love him from his introduction. No Shepard without Vakarian, indeed.

3. Mordin. It's funny that Mordin is technically only a squadmate for one game, because he's one of the most memorable characters of the franchise and, in my opinion, the one with the best character arc. When he was first introduced I was wary of him because the Genophage is one of the bits of ME lore that always struck me the hardest, I wanted to cure it since finding out what it was, so having the guy who was responsible for it on my crew wasn't something I was looking forward to. But from his introduction Mordin is such an interesting character with so many layers, and the way the writing deals with his own sense of guilt and how he represses it, and how in ME3 he finally gets to admit to himself and to the world he made a mistake and work towards fixing it, is just so, so well done. His final scene in ME3 marks the ending of my favorite mission of the entire trilogy, and in both the full Paragon and the full Renegade playthroughs he gets one hell of a fantastic send off. Just... really, really good.

2. Kaidan. Kaidan is kind of the opposite of Garrus to me, in that I feel like I've become a lot more attached to him because I find myself having to defend him so often. People tend to dismiss him as "boring" which I find so unfair and part of general fandom trend I hate - to view any character who isn't quippy and funny as someone with no personality. With Kaidan I find it specially absurd because you literally only have to talk to him a few times and you get a sense of who he is, and who he is is a very great guy. He has his issues, he bottles stuff up a lot, but in general he's introduced as pretty much the only member of your crew with a good moral compass (his story about Vyrnnus is a perfect example of a person who is actually managing to deal with meeting new species without falling into a racist, defensive posture). He's not a doormat either - people get mad at him for lashing out at Shepard during Horizon but he was right! Cerberus sucks and it's sketchy as hell for Shepard to suddenly be working with them! And I think the fact he openly disagrees with that makes his relationship with Shepard more interesting, because he's not afraid of challenging them. It's great tension and the way it builds up and blows up in Mass Effect 3 is something I love (and which works fantastically for his romance with M!Shepard).

1. Liara. I mean... What can I say? One of the defining moments of my very first Mass Effect playthrough was the "wait, can I be gay in this? oh hell YES i can be gay in this" moment, and I fell in love with Liara from her very first scene. My OG Shepard never had eyes for anyone else, and why would she? Liara is such a loveable character from the start, with her awkward flirting and her dorky excitement over the historic implications of what you're discovering (that no one else seems to give a shit about lol). Her romance comes across as believable, being so sweet at first and then taking a tragic turn in the second game, which is dealt with amazingly in the Shadowbroker DLC. And what I love most about it is that Liara as a character grows so much while you're apart, and yet we also get to witness some of it in the DLC. Then in ME3 she's already a far cry from the inexperiened scientist you met in the first game, but she's still very much her, still attached to an overly romantic view of the protheans, still caring and compassionate and brave. People complain about her reaction to Thessia which annoys me so much, because it's such a realistic reaction, it's a moment of vulnerability that makes perfect sense and it helps to keep the stakes of the war feeling high. And I love that even near the end she's thinking ahead, trying to help future generations who might face the reapers if you fail, but also preserving Shepard's memory because she loves her so much. I adore Liara.

#sorry for the dissertation but you did say you liked meta posts! lol so here you have it

[scope-dogg]

Long post about Mass Effect below

I noticed that there’s a big mass effect trilogy remaster coming out and it just made me think back on how badly the ball was dropped with that series. When the first game came out it immediately became perhaps my favourite game of all time, it was the kind of game where I was tearing up at the ending and then immediately started up a new playthrough the instant the credits got done rolling. The game was extremely jank and rough around the edges and it ran like total shit on the 360, but I loved it anyway because I fell in love with the lore of the universe, the characters and the story. It was one of those games where I’d play it in the most obsessively completionist manner possible, doing every singe sidequest possible, talking to every character on the ship after every mission, browsing the ingame codex for hours on end and dosing up on lore. When it was confirmed that Mass Effect 2 was in development I had such high hopes, of course I wanted to see the gameplay tightened up and the technical side of things improved, but more than that I just wanted to see more of the universe, get more of the universe to explore and learn more about it, and I was especially excited at the possibility that the choices I’d made, especially the massive ones in regards to the council at the end of ME1, would carry forward and really shake up the way the fate of the universe would pan out in the long term.

When the game finally came out, I enjoyed it, but it wasn’t really what I was hoping for. While the combat was much improved over ME1, I couldn’t help but feel like everything else was pared back too much - like, levelling and loot in ME1 weren’t all that well done but I was still really disappointed to see how they were all but stripped out in the sequel. I especially hated how crap sidequests on uncharted worlds were, they were basically just short combat sections with almost nothing in the way of meaningful dialogue or choices to make. Like, don’t get me wrong, uncharted worlds in ME1 felt like the maps were procedurally generated and the Mako had wacky controls, but they still managed to pull off the right atmosphere of going to these dangerous and remote places on alien worlds, and there was some legitimately intriguing stuff going on in some of those sidequests, and it was honestly a little infuriating to see all that basically get the axe entirely instead of getting some polish. I also just felt like the additions to the lore and story were disappointing. I was excited to find out about how society in the Terminus systems was different from Citadel space and meet some new alien races, but that didn’t really happen - I guess they tried with Omega, but that just felt like a mildly edgier version of the Citadel. The only new alien race aside from the Collectors they introduced were the Vorcha and I guess the Batarians if you didn’t play the DLC for ME1, but neither ended up being all that interesting. People remember ME2′s story fondly because of the characters, and I agree that the characters are great, Legion and Mordin especially stand out though all of your squadmates and major supporting characters on the ship are great (except maybe Jacob I guess) as are each of their accompanying stories that get resolved through their loyalty missions, but I think that the actual core plot of ME2 isn’t good at all. The whole thing about you dying and coming back to life seems like it was done just to have the excuse of having a timeskip happen, and I never felt particularly compelled by the Illusive Man or Cerberus as a faction - they were in a sidequest chain in ME1 technically but I still felt like they kind of came out of nowhere and never really fit into the grand scheme of things properly - there’s nothing that they really enable Shepard to do differently that wouldn’t have already been justified by you being a Spectre. The revelations about the Collectors and ultimately what they were doing with the colonists they were kidnapping felt really stupid and pointless apart from giving you an excuse to have a really cheesy and out-of-place final boss. The final mission was only exciting because of the tension of potentially losing one or more of your squadmates than because of what the actual consquences of failure for the galaxy were if you failed. There was no compelling antagonist to square off against like Saren in ME1, and ultimately the whole thing felt kind of pointless - it wasn’t until later after the trilogy was done that I realised that you could take ME2 out of the equation entirely and it wouldn’t make that much difference, but even in those moments as the credits were rolling after I beat the game for the first time, I was struggling to make up my mind about whether I’d actually enjoyed the game or not. I mean, it wasn’t like the game was bad or anything but I was thinking more about the opportunities that they missed rather than the good things they added. I was really missing that sense of discovery and exploring an alien galaxy that the first game had and got left by the wayside for the second. I did start up a new playthrough after that like I did with ME1 but IIRC I didn’t bother finishing that playthrough.

Then along came ME3. Everything about that game is depressing. The whole path of the plot and just the unrelenting apocalyptic tone of the game in general feels like it’s actively punishing you if you actually like the setting, characters, lore and so on and so forth. I know a lot of people like the Citadel DLC that they released because it lightened the tone a bit, but even with that I find it hard to set aside the fact that the universe is literally ending while you’re trying to take a break from it all with how hard the rest of the game beats you over the head with it. How bad the endings were even with the “fix” DLC that got added is a horse that’s been thoroughly beaten to death by now, but it’s not just the endings either. I already didn’t like the Illusive Man or Cerberus and had a hard time buying them as an organisation with the kind of reach and pull they had as portrayed in ME2, but seeing them turn into the Hellghast in ME3 not only betrays that portrayal of them as an org that works through subterfuge but also stretches my disbelief beyond breaking point, plus it brings you into contact with Kai Leng who has to be up there as one of the most obnoxious rival characters in any videogame ever. Otherwise, it did a few things that ME2 did slightly better and some things slightly worse, and didn’t really do anything to recapture the stuff that made ME1 so memorable to me that ME2 skipped out on. And then there was the way that Javik, the game’s most interesting new squadmate by far, was preorder DLC, and then there was the multiplayer that you were kinda forced into playing if you wanted the best ending in the singleplayer (for all the difference that made) and was riddled with lootbox microtransactions (the first major implementation of that in a AAA game IIRC.) The coup de grace for me was when dipshit vidya journalists circled the wagons around Bioware and were taking a dump on angry and disappointed fans who were demanding a change to the ending. Like, looking back I think there was a lot of histrionics involved with that from the fanbase, and let’s just say that the Bioware fanbase has earned a reputation for being particularly turbulent, but even so I really couldn’t stand the attitude that they were taking and it made me hate the game itself by proxy that much more. (I honestly think that entire saga set the stage for Gamergate two years later.)

Eventually when ME Andromeda ended up being a stillborn flop, it didn’t even really move the needle for me that much because ME3 had already set the bar so low. Worse though is that the first game was retrospectively ruined for me. Like I said earlier, I was a hyperfan for that game when it came out, but now I can’t go back to it without thinking about the disappointments that followed it, and its flaws stand out extra hard now. After I beat it for the first time it was my number 1, now I’m not sure it’s in the top 10. There’s probably the added factor that I played it to death and know it almost off by heart which takes the shine away, but that’s also the case for some of my other all-time favourites like Metroid Prime 1 and 2, Ace Combat 2, or Command and Conquer Red Alert 2, but those never really dropped in my estimation the way Mass Effect did. Honestly to this day I’m still waiting for someone to do another star-hopping sci-fi RPG in the same vein as Mass Effect and to pull it off well, because at this point I’m all but certain that it’s not going to be Bioware that does it, not with the new one they’ve got coming in the works or the trilogy remaster.

[maskydoolovesmasseffect]

Mass Effect Tag

Wellio, I’ve been tagged by @berryshiara. Passing this on to @grummel83

Gunna answer my questions now. Y’all feel free to tell me what you think of these answers. ​

I’m a fan since: 2008. I was just out of high school and still not over KoTOR. I was fresh in the army and got to talking to some other dude fresh to the army about video games. He asked me if I played Mass Effect. I said no. By the next day I just about totally forgot about him, then he suddenly appeared out of nowhere sat in front of me in the chow hall and pulled a copy of ME1 for Xbox 360 out his pocket like he was a magician doing a magic trick (ACU pockets are huge.)

Anyway turns out that guy was a romance option and I must have picked the right dialogue options. I’m still with him, too.

Favorite game of the series:

Mass Effect 2. It seemed like that’s the one where choices mattered most and you really got to know your squaddies. Also MAJOR gameplay improvements over the first game. And that game gave me the most freedom to do basically whatever I wanted and wasnt afraid to give me consequences for it.

MShep or FShep:

FShep. Nothing against MShep, but for me the real Shep is FShep. Can’t beat Jennifer Hale’s voice. 

Earthborn, Colonist, or Spacer:

Colonist. I like having the background of knowing just how dangerous the galaxy can be and how the Alliance can’t be everywhere at once so sometimes you need to manage your best on your own.

Biotics or Tech:

Both.

Paragon or Renegade:

Paragon, mostly. I tried being renegade but some of the actions are just so pointlessly dickish, or even outright unhinged in a way that would make it impossible to believe the Alliance would ever promote Shepard as an officer or even keep her in the Alliance at all, especially in the first game.

That said, there are times where a renegade action is more expedient and practical than a paragon one, like in 2 when you stab a dude in the back to prevent him from repairing an enemy gunship, so even with a paragon playthrough, my Shepard will have no issues taking that opportunity. She’s already seconds away from betraying all those guys anyway.  

Paragon in treatment of others, renegade in combat pragmatism.

Favorite Class:

I play as infiltrator and vanguard.

Infiltrator is great for using a sniping and opening loot, and then for going invisible, and if I remember right AI hacking too. That’s cool and I wish there were more genuine opportunities for stealth.

Nowadays I play as Vanguard in my playthroughs mainly just so my Shepard can be canonically biotic for story reasons. From 2 on when looting no longer needs a special skill and I get to charge around the map. I don’t really care much about using biotics (that’s what the squadies are for) but the movement is super useful (when Shepard actually does the thing instead of just standing out in the open soaking up bullets until the ability decides to actually work.)

Favorite Companion:

Garrus. I like to set him up in sniper positions. When he actually STAYS where I put him instead of running straight up to enemies to try to snipe them at point blank, he’s great.

Also his quips in 2 on are pretty entertaining.

Least Favorite Companion:

Garrus, Oh my god. Go back to the sniper position where I put you. Leave tanking to krogan; you do not have the HP for this.

Also Kaidan in ME1. He can not shoot to save his life - literally.  

My Squad Selection:

For all ME1 playthroughs after my first one, Ashley and Kaidan, just of their comments and because... well... I only have so much time with them.

Apart from that I mainly just pick my team based on who’s likely to have the most interesting commentary on whatever the mission happens to be, squad balance be damned. 

Favorite In-Game Romance:

Garrus X Shepard is my favorite love story. They are just so adorable together and always supportive even when they disagree.

But my cannon romance is Kaidan X Shepard for the drama and angst.

Favorite NPC:

In ME1 there’s this random Turian on Noveria who randomly has like a New York accent and I absolutely adore him. He plays basically no part in the story other than some minor information but he’s just so pleasant to speak to.

“If you need anything, I’ll be here.”

Favorite Antagonist:

Morinth, the Ardat-Yakshi daughter of Samara. Yes, she’s a murderous vampire who will absolutely kill you given the chance... but like, it’s a medical condition. And I really can’t help but feel for ardat-yakshi in general when their only options are to spend their whole lives on the run from justicars out to execute them, or waste their entire 1000 year lifespan imprisoned in a monetary unable to experience the world at all. Yeah, Morinth is evil, but Ardat-Yakshi don’t exactly have a good deal.

Favorite Loyalty Mission:

Grunt’s loyalty mission is the best. I get to help my baby boy, reunite with Wrex, enjoy krogan society being fleshed out, have a kickass battle against a thresher maw, and get a breeding request. It’s nice to have a quest that isn’t about family drama and genuinely gets a happy end.

Favorite Mission:

Despite Citadel DLC requiring everyone to have a deathgrip on an idiot ball, and also basically gloss over some really dark stuff, the whole clone storyline with the whole crew is an absolute ride all the way though, with lots of interesting and unique scenarios, a ton of replay-value, and funny party banter that feels like it came straight out of a Marvel movie.

Favorite DLC:

Again, Citadel DLC. Not only did it come with the story above, it also had all those interactions with past and present crewmates, including a memorial for Thane (finally!), a cool apartment to hang out in, a party, an arcade, and an awesome battle arena. It really added a TON. Also, it’s nice to see Bioware figure out that DLC needs characters - I’m remembering back in the DLC to ME 1 the party never had a single thing to say, no matter what was going on. The fun and wacky Citadel DLC is a far cry from the serious and somewhat dark space opera Mass Effect started as, but as the final DLC capping off the end of the series, it gets to do a silly victory lap (and get the taste of the ending out of our mouths.)

Control, Synthesis, Or Destroy:

No.

Favorite Weapon:

Sniper rifles, whatever I have that’s fast and has high damage output. Also that one pistol that shoots tiny energy grenades. Pew pew.

Yeah I wasn’t really big into the weapons so much. I’m here to get my story on. 

Favorite Place:

The presidium on the Citadel. It bothered me a lot when I couldn’t explore it in the second game. I know it would have been terribly impractical, but as the presidium is just a huge ring, it would have been cool to be able to explore the whole thing, going past all the little park areas, shops, monuments and so on until you loop aaaaall the way back around to where you started. Like, how cool would it be if the ring had a running track? Maybe C-sec  academy trainees would be spotted jogging together along it in formation. And can you imagine grabbing a coffee (I was going to make up a space-related name for Starbucks but it’s already STARbucks...) and taking a nice stroll along the water before finding a nice bench to alien-watch from? Other locations in the game are like great places to explore and do gameplay stuff, but the presidium seems like a nice place to just be.

Favorite Quote:

"Stand in the ashes of a trillion dead souls and ask the ghosts if honor matters. The silence is your answer." - Javik.

This is such a fucking raw damn line. It makes me think a lot about Cerberus. When ME3 wasn’t out yet, I thought maybe the plan was Shepard would at some point choose a side, Alliance for paragons and Cerberus for renegades. It would have been so cool to have morality not merely be good vs evil, but idealism vs that ruthless calculus Garrus mentioned. How fucking raw would it be if Cerberus wasn’t just generically evil for no reason and suddenly indoctrinated but really were embodying that ruthless calculus, determined to defeat the reapers at any and all cost. Maybe Cerberus actions’ were more likely to do terrible things for the sake of ultimate victory, doing whatever it took, whereas the Alliance would be less willing to make the terrible choices and ultimately be less likely to succeed.

Now obviously, that’s not what happened, as it would have required Bioware to basically make two entirely separate games. But that line from Javik makes me think of that concept, and a universe where like Dragon Age party members can approve or disapprove of actions not merely as good or evil but along the lines of their personal values. I think Javik would sit at victory at all cost.

Also that one mission in 2 where some random NPC catches Shepard sneaking around and is all like ‘what are you doing here?’ and Shepard is like ‘What am I doing here? What are you doing here? Get out here before it blows!’ and the guy’s freaking out like WTF and she says ‘RUN!’ then laughs to herself as he flees from an imaginary bomb. Shep you troll. 

The thing I like the least about the entire franchise:

The misogyny and objectification that crept its way in, epically from the second game on. Really didn’t like those ass-shot camera angles, or female characters being slut-shamed in-universe for the clothes the designers made them wear. Yikes. 

But the biggest yikes for me in that regard is actually the reveal in 3 that the prothians guided asari development. That was fine and all, but the part that bothered me was the characters commenting “ooooh, so that’s why asari are so advanced,” as it was ever any kind of mystery before that exact moment. For one thing, asari aren’t really shown as being more advanced than anyone else, apart from having discovered the citadel first, and for second, why wouldn’t asari be advanced? All the way from ME1 it’s established that 1: Asari live for a really long time, and 2: can instant transmit information directly from brain to brain. That means they have long lifetime in which to accumulate knowledge and experience, and also can easily spread and preserve that knowledge without even the need for books. That ALONE should put them ahead. And even with all that, they only barely beat the salarians to discovering the Citadel first. But no one asks for an explanation for why salarians, who live only a few decades and can’t do mental data-transfer, are so advanced. No, only the success of the all-women race needs explaining. It was just one moment but it still bugs me. 

Also the general loss of realism after the second game. First game everyone gets armor, including full-face helmets automatically on in environments that need it. After that, people can apparently just wander the battlefield half-naked and even somehow survive in a total vacuum if they just put a plastic cup (that isn’t even connected to anything) over their mouth and nose. In the first game they at least made up some reasonable-sounding science fiction explanation for things, but after that it’s like F-it everything is just space magic now. 

Oh, and those repetitive unlocking stuff minigames. I use a mod to just skip those. 

#mass effect #tag

[pestopascal]

why are you defending cyberpunk so much? its a really buggy mess, it barely works on even some of the best pcs, they lied when they advertised it working on the ps5 but not ps4, and there were a ton of issues even before release happening with their social media team

my point is that people pick and choose when they wanna throw their arms up over the standard that is AAA gaming releases, and has been since prooooobably da2′s release (14 months to produce and release a game). maybe even earlier if you consider kotor2′s release (aka, given 11 months to make a game).

my point is that fallout 76 was an unplayable, game breaking, exploitative game riddled with many of the same issues. and i dont know anyone who continues to play it to this day but i know faaaaaar more people who refunded it or cancelled their orders just prior to launch because they didn’t want to brick their consoles.

my point is that one of the biggest blowbacks towards crunch was in regards to rockstar and red dead redemption 2′s release, a game which is now heralded as one of the best of all time, despite the way it treated everyone who worked on it. the moment it fixed everything, people forgot about just how hurt people working on that game were

my point is that skyrim is treated with this gentleness and fondness for dragons flying backwards and giants leaping into the sky and glitched quests (and how trophies, still to this day, sometimes will never work so you will have to put in another 100+ hour playthrough to be able to MAYBE get something). the irony in sony going after cp77 but STILL not forcing companies to fix broken quest lines

remember daa, with the silver mines? how if you happen to get that bug, that’s it. you basically have to restart. all ur items are gone, you can’t proceed. boom. bioware has never made an effort to fix it. they just released awakening as is, and proceeded onto their next project.

you also have to take into account that, okay sometimes they can’t pick up on all the glitches prior to testing like one or two are gonna slip through! but there’s a difference between that and a glitched out unplayable mess. cp77 honestly isnt unplayable, in fact it is one of the better games ive played at launch in a long time. do you know what gets these ppl notes and likes on the internet? blowing this shit out of proportion. in my 30+hrs of playing already, where im still just wandering around and picking up side missions and checking out clothes and whatever, sincerely have not seen half the shit ppl have said. not that it isnt true! the screenshots and vids are there! but people are piling it on, completely and totally, just for the sake of interest.

remember when mass effect andromeda dropped, and they had that beta test version that like journalists got to play, and how the models for cora and ryder had weird kind of motions and how sara ryder’s facial expressions are still a meme to this day? and how it kept getting piled on sooooooo much when it was like... not actually like that gameplay wise, and the story was quite nice, but who actually talks about that when you can talk about how bad the game looks ugh loading sequences ugh 360 head spins. fallout 4 had those weird smiles coming from npcs that are quite haunting, weren’t fixed.

you can actually tell that cdpr paid attention to writing a story that works, the endings are cathartic and not 2edgy2bedifferent like me3′s fucking starchild bullshit. also speaking of games who spent so long in production their story fucked up: persona 5 and final fantasy 15 are examples of spending too long being worked on with the story that despite how good it looks, it is a vapid excuse of a game that you HAVE to play either sequels or the dlc to get the full brunt of it. remember persona 5′s advertising? COMING SUMMER 2013. final fantasy 15 was ff versus for the lonnnngggeeesssstttt time too before square enix took it upon themselves to fuck it up and then GET MAD when ppl pointed out the story was kind of shallow (and also “why arent you releasing ff7r already”)

oh and then we also have things like kingdom hearts 3, which was quite frankly? awful and was FULL of corporations just getting their hands on it and doing whatever with it story wise (disney wanted frozen to feature so bad they intervened completely). borderlands 3 which keeps messing with the dlc and im amazed they even keep trying. bl3 was the sequel no one asked for, because it had no idea what it was doing. it was setting up to a story that i think very few ppl are now interested in.

yes cdpr lied. yes there are issues with their social media team. who do you actually blame though? the investors? corporations like sony and microsoft who no doubt wanted the game released as well? project managers, their bosses, the CEO? shareholders? fans who wanted the game now instead of putting up with another delay because lets be real: if a company needs to delay the game, they need to delay the game. its a demand and supply thing going on and the ppl who sit behind desks just see numbers they dont give a fuck about the people and we all know this. it fucking sucks.

this is not the first company, this is just the most public blowup because this game was teased in 2012 and people have held out for years and i get it! i do! ive been waiting for this game for years as well. and we can argue about how you shouldnt preorder games or not play stuff at launch or like how you should already have the latest console that has been sold out since it was announced and wont arrive in your country until march ! this can go back and forth and we can talk circles around cdpr but the point is: this isnt the first instance of it. it wont be the last.

if sony actually gave a fuck, they would review every single goddamn game that has been released to this day and has had bug reports. they dont. this is to clear up their public image. these companies truly dont give a fuck. bethesda admits to relying on fans to make their games playable with modding and to ALSO keep track of their story because it doesnt matter to them.

#replies #if you play on pc you can get a fix from a modder #which is in no way an appropriate venture considering it should be the company's responsibility #but you can get fixes and changes and whatever. #sony especially is one of the worst companies and are only pulling it because of this whole 'refund poliicy' #because NOTHING matters more to sony (and microsoft) than public image #remember the shit with sw battlefront 2 and the lootbox issues? #disney got soooooo mad that they had parents ringing them complaining #they are the only company who pulled ea AND sony into line with doing something about it #long post #im not putting this one under a cut im not sry #Anonymous

[biotic-boshtet]

1, 11, 12, 18, 23, 31, 36, 42, 43, 49, 61?

hoh boy thats a List, but tysm!

1. How did you get into Mass Effect?

I started playing in 2015, either at the end of my junior year, or beginning of my senior year of high school, mostly because it seemed like suddenly all the Dragon Age blogs I followed flipped a switch and were all Mass Effect blogs, and right then the entire trilogy was on sale on Origin so I got them to see what all the fuss was about and I’ve been in love since!

11. Do you prefer ME1, 2, or 3?

I really prefer 3, mostly because i love love love how everything comes together, and choices you made all the way back in me1 really come back to bite you in the butt. And also, it seems to have the easiest casual setting of the 3, bc I am Bad at shooter games.

12. Favorite mission from ME1?

My favorite would have to be the string of missions on Noveria, because the decisions you make there impact ME3 pretty nicely regarding the Rachni, and it also served as a good foundation for some of my Shepard’s moral compass.

18. Favorite mission from ME2?

From ME2, my favorite mission tends to be Dossier: Tali. I love how challenging it is to play on Haestrom, and I love Tali and Kal’Reegar, I always try to keep him alive.

23. Favorite mission from ME3?

The Citadel DLC, but after that? Its rescuing the Cerberus scientists, because it really hits home that we’re dealing with a lot of gray areas here, and that good people can work for bad people, and still remain good people. I love the way the resolution of the mission has Kaidan thinking critically about the people working for Cerberus, and how they aren’t all ruthless maniacs like The Illusive Man, most of them are just people.

31. Favorite team member overall?

Can I have a three way tie between Garrus, Mordin, and Tali?

36. Funniest moment in the games?

Hmm, I’m stuck between the Blasto scene in the Citadel DLC and “There’s a REAPER in my way, Wrex!”

42. One romance you just can’t stand/doesn’t make sense/etc?

Mmmmmmmmm, well, I’ve never completed another romance besides Kaidan’s, but the hookups for Vega and Javik really squick me out.

43. Non-romancable characters: who would you romance?

Lemme smooch Joker,,, blease!! But also! Wrex, I’d love to romance Wrex. We need a Krogan LI!

49. Favorite Shepard headcanons?

I love it when people hc stuff for their Shepards that adds depth and flavor to their background, like how Norah Jean and Joker were high school sweethearts that still get along like a house on fire. Or how Norah Jean is lactose intolerant, but still eats cheese every chance she gets.

61. Best story moment in the games? 

I love love love the opening scene in ME3 because, finally, everyone acknowledges what Shepard’s been practically screaming in their faces, but it comes too late and its so heartbreaking and so human and I can’t get enough of it.

Ask me questions!

#me ask meme #jedirangerpenguin #mass effect #mandi rambles

[goodeveningtalos]

Mass Effect Fandom, we need to have a talk about Jacob Taylor

I’ve been taking a gander through his tag tonight and WOW is there a lot of gay porn there. More posts about some pornstar than about a prominent squadmate from a AAA vdieo game RPG. Let that sink in.

What posts we do have raise some disturbing trends. A lot of the content there for him is stuff that includes either the whole squad (i.e., the jock/nerd prep/goth meme) or are just straight up transcripts and screenshots of gameplay, so not actually Jacob content.

No one should be surprised to find that a lot of the posts are people complaining about how BORING he is and how he’s BLAND and has no CHARACTER and how talking to him is AWFUL. But of course, Garrus, whose character in ME2 tops out at being your best bud with a grudge, is Sexy and Interesting.

I had to scroll so far to find actual fan art of him that for a while, I was convinced no one had drawn him ever. I finally found some and I love them! But there were fewer art pieces than there are fingers on my hands.

I will give a shoutout to a small part of the fandom who appeared in the tag to complain about the way his loyalty mission portrayed black men and black fatherhood or to break down how his ME3 plot arc relies on some damaging tropes of black men. But those posts were few and far between the posts lamenting the wasted time spent talking to him, the sham of a romance, or how femShep was forced to flirt with him- which, while incredibly true and is uncomfortable especially for people who have lesbian or ace/aro Shepards, is also the case for Jack or Liara. More people were upset that Jacob cheated than that were upset Jacob was written to be a cheater.

All of that being said, I think this might be the most upsetting thing I found. I’d like to remind you of that time when you first met Miranda Lawson and you probably thought “What a bitch, I sure do hate her and her frigid personality,” and if you’re attracted to women you may have also thought, “but at least she’s got a hot butt and a nice rack.” But then, at some point, you, and a lot of this fandom, realized Miranda was victim to misogynistic writing, unnecessarily sexual camera angles, and other unfortunate creative choices that framed her in a damaging light for the fandom. As a result, Miranda grew a large following of people who were vocal about loving and protecting her, about how she deserved better. Well, Jacob gets a very similar treatment, whether from individuals or from blogs like dirtybiowareconfessions, where people proclaim things like “he’s so boring but I wish he’d rail me” or “I’m apathetic about Jacob at best but dat ass”. People don’t care about Jacob as a character but sure do love him as a sex object. Now where might we have seen that before... I wonder why Miranda got a #defensesquad but Jacob has so few fans at all, let alone the ride or die following Miranda has. Anyone got any guesses?

And I’d like to cap this off with a touch of speculation. Everyone loves to pin their distaste for Jacob on the fact he cheats in ME3 because, you know who doesn’t cheat? Garrus. Everyone loves Garrus. Everyone romanced the weird bony alien. And because of that he got an actual romance in ME3, complete with an intricate dance scene in the Citadel DLC. You gotta think, maybe there’s a reason Garrus got an actual romance in ME3 and Jacob got nothing. If Jacob had been the most popular romance in ME2, don’t you think he’d have gotten a prominent romance arc? It’s just good business. But he wasn’t, so he got shafted and he got the infamous Cheating Arc instead. So, for everyone to go and pin their distaste for him on an arc that only arose due to their apathy instead of the root cause, i.e., blackness, is shortsighted and you should really be trying a lot harder to give literally a single shit about the only black squadmate in the first 9 and a half years of the franchise.

#mass effect #me2 #me3 #c: jacob taylor #jacob taylor me #jacobtaylordefensesquad #contradicting myself to make a defense squad for him right now lol

[elfyourmother]

Fic Self-Rec Meme

@breadedsinner tagged me to pick five things I’ve written and explain why I like them. This is...hard for me tbh because I’m a horrible perfectionist who can’t live up to the impossible standards I have for my work and so tend to hate 95% of it. But I’ll give this a shot anyway. Most of these are going to have smut in them, because, well. It’s me.

1) Heart of the Phoenix (Warcraft III/WoW, Kael x Illidan x Vashj): I hate to start with a WIP but I would be remiss if I didn’t mention this behemoth of a fic that’s basically my life’s work at this point (sad as that sounds, lol). This is my infamous re-write of the first WoW expansion, Burning Crusade, told from the POV of Kael’thas Sunstrider, Illidan Stormrage, and Lady Vashj. The earliest chapters are admittedly cringey to me because it’s clear how much my writing has improved since I started. So I’d probably change a lot about those opening chapters in Northrend. But, on the whole, I’m proud of how it blew up into something much bigger than I intended, and I’m proud of what I’m doing with it: wrangling the kudzu plot of BC into something that actually makes sense and stays true to the characters, fleshing out one-note NPCs and loot piñatas into characters the reader actually cares for, all in a story that at its core is about love and redemption. If you at all enjoy the worldbuilding and canon-busting I’ve done with Dragon Age, HotP has it on an even bigger scale--I was doing that to Azeroth years before Thedas came along.

2) Pygmalion’s Hand (Mass Effect, Imani x Miranda): I’m really skittish about my femslash, for a lot of reasons, but this one I’m still really proud of. It all started from a gag too, like most things that seize my brain: how the hell did Imani wake up in the Lazarus facility with makeup on? It turned into the story of how Commander Shepard, humanity’s shining star and icon of heroism, became “Imani” to Miranda, a very human woman that she fell hopelessly in love with despite everything. Imani and Miranda’s romance was a slow burn sort of scenario that was built over the course of two games, and I like to think I captured the UST between them well here. 

3) First and Last and Always (Mass Effect, Imani x Garrus x Thane): Probably the ME fic I’m most “known” for, I guess, and one I still love. This was how Garrus and Thane ended up consummating all the UST they had, and was the thing that lead their V with Imani into becoming a triad. There’s a lot of uncertainty when this takes place: in-between Arrival and ME3, as Imani’s off to face the music on Earth for those DLC events, before Thane goes to Sur’Kesh for a treatment he’s not sure will work, etc. There’s a lot of heady emotional stuff going on and I think I balanced that well with the smut. I also know for a fact that this fic nearly singlehandedly built up the canoe for this polyship, and I’m still kinda smug about it tbh.

4) The Demands of Prescience (Frank Herbert’s Dune, Paul x Feyd-Rautha): As close to PWP as I ever get, this AU is based on one single change: what if, during their duel in the palace at Arrakeen, Paul spared Feyd-Rautha and held him prisoner rather than killing him? And what if he did so because it turned out to be the one thing that might prevent the cosmic jihad he unleashed? It’s not at all fluffy like my usual fic. There’s something raw and desperate about Feyd to me, and I tried to capture it here, as much as Paul’s sense of compassion.  I intentionally aped Frank’s style of prose, and I think I pulled it off relatively well.

5) Penumbra (Final Fantasy IV, Cecil x Kain): My most recent Final Fantasy fic, since diving back into that old fandom, and my favorite one. This takes place literally at the start of the game, right after the King of Baron dismisses Cecil from the Red Wings and sends him and Kain on what is, unbeknownst to them, a horrific mission to kill the summoners of the village Mist. A lot of people, at least in the American FF fandom, like to paint Cecil as a boring hero, but I love him precisely because his story is the kind of redemption story that makes me weak--he’s a shellshocked soldier that’s been forced to do things no one should do, torn between his loyalty to his country and the man who raised him and his own conscience. People who came later to the franchise like to point to Cloud and Squall as the stereotypical angsty Final Fantasy protagonist, but Cecil was the prototype for all the ones that followed, and is still one of the best examples IMO. I think I did him justice in this fic. At this point in his story, he’s wrestling with guilt, at having the rug pulled out from under him, and being afraid--but then, Kain is there for him. Their often volatile relationship is at its heart based in a profound sort of love imo, and I tried to get that across. And there’s a lot of foreshadowing for what happens during the course of the game. But I like to think I did it in a non-anvilicious way.

Anyway y’all know I never tag people for these things, so if you want to do it, consider yourself tagged.

#bisho writes #writing memes #fic recs

[miss-aligned]

I finished the game!

Mission complete. I’ve had some time to think it all over, and I’m just going to leave some of my Mass Effect-related thoughts right here. I’m going to try and keep it mostly spoiler-free, though I am going to tag it for you fine folks who may still not want to hear/see anything about it.

There are plenty of people out there complaining, and my heart goes out to the development team, because they worked really hard and have been met with some seriously heinous, negative, and unhelpful commentary. I prefer to focus on the things I liked, because, despite the very vocal haters, there are good things. Shocking, I know.

The ending hit me in the feels. There. I said it. My heart went out to the Ryders more than I realized as I played through that final mission. This whole time I was feeling a bit disconnected from most of the characters, but suddenly and without my recognizing it, I was locked in and ready to see what was going to happen to all these lovable dopes I’d been gallivanting around the new cluster with this entire time.

Some of the personal quests were funny, or at least had elements that got me laughing out loud. Unlike the majority of the original Mass Effect trilogy, which was often very intense or somber, these moments stood out to me. It reminded me a lot of the Citadel DLC for ME3. If you liked that, you’ll enjoy these silly moments.

As I said, I was having a bit of a disconnect with the characters, including my own. I think that’s because I was looking at this person like they should be Shepard. That error was my fault, of course, but it was there regardless. It wasn’t until I finished the final mission that I acknowledged this Pathfinder as a new hero. As everyone regroups after that mission, you can tell that the companions love Ryder. They would follow their Pathfinder to hell and back, as Joker might say. That made all the difference in the world to me, because I’d seen all the crazy stuff this person had done, too. I hope that if Mass Effect continues (and it had better or my heart will be broken), Ryder is heavily involved, preferably as protagonist again.

I like that I didn’t feel pressured to chose any particular romance option over the others. The Liara Effect (TM) was strong in the original trilogy, as you might have noticed. In Andromeda if someone wanted to get with you, they’d say it. If they didn’t, they’d say it. End of story (unless, of course, you wanted it to continue). For a long while, I was choosing every romance option offered, because, let’s face it, awkward flirting is hysterical. Sidenote: beware Reyes Vidal, that smooth bastard. Hehe.

I love the angara. They’re diverse in personality and opinions, but ultimately all about culture. They’ve been through some terrible times, but are fully invested in defeating a common enemy, even when that means giving up some precious space for those pesky Milky Way races.  They are open and honest and very expressive, whether in hatred or love. They’re just really cool, okay?

I love Drack. I loved him from the start, more than my own character. He’s just a cool, old, grumpy krogan and his banter with the other characters is fantastic. I want him to be my adopted grandpa.

I’m not sure if the choices I made really mattered, but the really hard ones did come up again through the game. One companion that I had clearly upset took a moment to remind me of the decision on more than a few occasions. I felt like a jerk, but still felt that the choice was necessary. I still think about it now. I guess that means it worked. BioWare is brutal and sneaky about making me feel feelings. Damn it.

Once the game was over, I watched the credits roll and had about a thousand fanfic-speculation-type thoughts run through my mind. Wouldn’t it be interesting if some protheans had fled to Andromeda long before the Andromeda Initiative had arrived? Wouldn’t it be fascinating if other previous intelligent Milky Way-based races had, too, thereby escaping the cycle of the reapers? What other unforeseen complications could an implanted AI have on a Pathfinder’s body/psyche? What’s the Ryder twin been doing this whole time and how’s the recovery been weighing on them? Ahh. So many questions. Maybe they could be answered by future games. Maybe they can be expanded upon by your local fanfic writers. Hehehehehehe.

I like Mass Effect. I like the story, the races, the characters, the universe. I realize now that I needed to detach myself from the crazy nostalgic view I had of the first trilogy in order to really appreciate this one. Unfortunate that I didn’t really realize it until the end, but hey...

My next run-through has already started.

#Mass Effect #mass effect andromeda #ME:A #me:a spoilers #positivity

[farfromdaylight]

beat andromeda! spoilers follow, obviously.

i really enjoyed it! i imagine it'll get some flak, but it's a mass effect ending so :') that's to be expected. honestly, i really just enjoyed that all of the NPCs i'd interacted with were a part of the mission! it reminded me a lot of me3, and obviously took inspiration from it, and in some ways it was as important (since, well, it was a Big Deal for the cluster) but also the stakes in me3 were very high, and couldn't really be matched in this single game.

i also FUCKING LAUGHED when i saw the architect-like-thing at the end. I FUCKING KNEW THAT WAS GOING TO BE A PART OF THE MAIN PLOT. I FUCKING KNEW IT. honestly the final battle wasn't hard as much as it was tedious

I SUPER LIKED THE STUFF WITH SCOTT, ACTUALLY, although it was. pretty obvious lmao i knew the stuff with SAM was going to come to a head and THIS IS WHY, CLEARLY. it was also very terrifying going from level 50 to LEVEL FUCKING ONE and only having a fucking pistol to shoot kett with, oh my god. oh my god.

(seriously my ryder has a high-powered sniper rifle and my skills are min-maxed to optimize it, getting stuck in scott was just like HOLY SHIT, WHY THIS)

rather annoyingly my game clear achievement has not popped. THANKS XBOX. my achievements have been so dicey lately. i could probably try and replay the last mission but fuckin hell it was so long, i dont wanna. weeps.

i REALLY enjoyed the epilogue scene after the credits; my favorite part of mass effect 2's ending was the fact that, well, it didn't just end! i could go talk to everyone afterwards! and they had stuff to say!!! i loved that so much. it was what i had always wanted in an RPG: my party members to actually give their opinion on the final battle. so i'm really glad that scene happened.

the bit about picking an ambassador felt like a udina/anderson choice all over again (and it totally was); i went with bradley after some hesitation mostly because he's been a solid dude. very helpful in liam's loyalty mission, helped me out on some other sidequests, proven he knows what's what. i did consider pathfinder hayjer but was swayed by the somewhat negative response by the nexus folks, and also the fact that hayjer has very little experience.

all in all, i think this game took inspiration from every game in the original trilogy -- me1's structure and explorable worlds, me2's loyalty missions/cast, me3's side missions -- and made it its own thing. it's not a perfect result, but that makes it just like every other mass effect game, honestly.

i think my biggest issue with the story is that it feels a bit unfinished. this game draws a lot of inspiration from mass effect 1, and in me1, while you don't get the whole story about the reapers in the first game, you get the basics: you learn about what they are, you learn that sovereign is the first of many, you go to ilos and learn a lot about what happened to the protheans. you really do get a lot of information! and it's all wrapped up in saren, and the plotline itself finishes in that game while leaving itself open to be continued.

i always look back to me1 when talking about mass effect's story because it really is the most cohesive, and it's evident when you look at mea's. mea asks a lot of questions that aren't answered in this game. who are the jardaan? why did they build the remnant? where are they now? who is the benefactor? where are they now? and so forth. these are all questions that the game leads you do, and then provides nothing further.

i'm tired so at this point this is very disconnected, but i'm sad that the quarian ark never did show up in this game. i hope that there's a DLC mission to find out what's up with them. i was really hoping that the message about it would spawn a mission, but no dice. this game lacked a bunch of my favorite species. quarian! hanar! volus!!!! seriously if there were krogan all over this game but no krogan ark you could have given me a volus.

all told, though, i really, really enjoyed this game. i have a hard time ranking the mass effect games (i'm biased towards 1, but i do really need to replay 2 and 3), but i really loved this game. i fucking loved getting to explore all these planets. i also absolutely loved how MUCH there was to do. i loved how long this game was, and how enjoyable all of the quests were. seriously, this game flew by. if i could erase my memories and play it all from scratch it absolutely would. it was that good.

ahhh, mass effect.

#mea liveblog #mea spoilers

[zydrateacademy]

Retrospective Review: The Entire Mass Effect Franchise

Andromeda is coming out in a week (as of this writing) and I feel like I want to revisit the franchise. I’ve done a post like this a few years ago when my blog was new but didn’t really settle in on a style and it was kind of garbage with a lot of pointless paragraph breaks. First, some quick insight. I was born in ‘89. That means I was too late to life to be considered an “80’s” kid, and the 90’s were half over before I was able to form real likes, dislikes, or memories. It’s a strange bit of flux because most of my “Nostalgia” is usually in the form of Legos as opposed to comics, games, movies, etc.

It’s a flux that’s kind of leaked into my daily life. My family is not, and never has been particularly affluent. Every extra ten dollars we find, we think “YES. A few days of gas” or “YES. Lunch money.” We’re not poor, we’ve never had a lot of room for amenities. We update our computers basically once every 5-10 years based primarily around income tax returns. Whatever hand-me-down I get from person who was able to afford their new computer, it was always better than what I had. A problem that has recently been remedied when I was employed for two and a half years as a part-time cashier still gave me enough to buy my own completely up to date computer that will last me the next five years on its own. Stick with me, I’m getting to the point. As a result of all of that, I tend to not be able to get games as they come out. Especially not games that turn into these huge franchises. A few games hold special places in my heart BECAUSE of the very fact that I was able to start with them. Mass Effect is one of those series. I started with it on the Xbox, probably borrowing it from a friend initially and playing it in bite-sized chunks before getting it used (likely bought for me like everything else was). The story starts out well. Your character (do I even really need to name them at this point?) is on the track to becoming a Spectre, a sort of special service agent for the entire alien government. During the screening process, another Spectre goes rogue and the entire game is building up a sort of power base against him while discovering a secret of the universe that may lead to the death of everyone in it. Damn. Ramped way the hell up, didn’t it? I suppose that’s fine, as studios don’t exactly expect all their games to shoot off the way they do sometimes. Mass Effect was good for its time. A fairly basic shooter with some RPG elements, in the older days where putting a point in your skills increased damage by 4%, and other things like that. It was incremental, but it had a cool idea based around a boring mechanic. Every few levels in the huge variety of skills you had at your disposal, you’d get a new ability or some kind of boost. Put enough points in “Fitness” and you’d unlock an ability called Immunity, an active ability that reduced taken damage by a flat rate for a few seconds. It’s interesting how the following two games basically dropped that idea, gave you the same 4-5 abilities (that vary per class), called it a day, and just built everything around those. It made the second game a certain kind of boring because every playthrough was effectively the same. You hotkey your main one or two attacks and just shoot stuff when it’s on cooldown. The second game’s story went sideways rather than forward, a point against its favor when looking back at the series as a whole. It continues, presumably a few months after the events of the first game and your ship gets shot out of space and Shepard literally dies immediately. In the introductory sequence establishes that you were picked up by the Cerberus organization and basically rebuilt like goddamn Robocop. I was expecting a “We have the technology!” type dialog but alas, we were deprived. Cerberus was an organization briefly mentioned in some tiny fetch quest in ME1 when you discover a small outpost had been husk-ified. To their credit, this definitely tied into what they would end up doing en masse in ME3 but we’re getting ahead of ourselves. They come to ME2 full force as Shepard is more or less forced to work with them when the mere association makes the alien council backpedal their support for Shepard, whom they presumed dead. As a result, you don’t see a lot of them in ME2. The whole story culminates in fighting a sort of human-based reaper that the collectors (who you later discover were reaper-possessed Protheans. Christ this series is weird) have been building by harvesting human colonies just on the edge of the government’s jurisdiction. Because of this they refuse to respond to the abductions and Shepard joins Cerberus to figure out this mystery and solve it. With bullets. Or whatever the hell comes out of guns in this universe. Something something mass effect fields. The entire game is basically the Dragon Age 2 problem all over again. It feels like it takes place in a single setting even though it doesn’t. It’s mostly padding. Half the game is loyalty missions as you run around to make sure your minions are happy enough with their lot in life, so they’re suicidal enough to do the suicide mission at the end but not suicidal enough to shoot themselves on the Normandy because they’re just not quite sure their father is still alive or not. I never liked this aspect of the game. Every where I turned, someone on my team was whining about something that barely mattered in the grand scheme of things. You could argue that settling their business gives them enough drive and morality to survive the mission at the end. If they didn’t have the morale, maybe they would be too sad to move out of the way of certain bullets. I get that, morale is a huge thing and I suffer from the gain and drain of it on competitive multiplayer games. I feel it, but it’s exhausting to try and manage it across a 20 to 40 hour game. Especially since the mechanics were dumbed down as I alluded to earlier. In the end, ME2 barely matters on a story standpoint and mostly served to update the graphics, systems, and mechanics from the first. To that end, they did fine. ME2 looks fine, even by today’s standards. In a more combat-oriented game, ME2 functions as a successor.  This brings up to ME3. It opens up about a full year after the events of the second game, where Shepard is being punished for their actions in the Arrival DLC of ME2. Never got around to doing that DLC? Tough shit, as they reference it throughout the entire first act of the game and even later when you meet a Batarian on his deathbed. I played through it maybe once and I still don’t really understand what happened or why it was my fault, but there you go. Basically, in the second scene the reapers attack and fucking finally, the goverment lets Shephard get their best murder on and fly out to kick some actual ass. This is even lampshaded by Legion (a Geth teammate you acquire in late-game ME2) who told their own people that the reapers were coming and were believed immediately and began prepping. “Must be nice”, Shepard says. Indeed.  The entire game is spent gathering war assets for the finale of the series. The more you have, the better it goes on a story standpoint. If you scrape for every asset you are capable of, there will be less loss of life. More soldiers on the field, more field assistance, and generally a slightly less bleak atmosphere (which is still pretty goddamn bleak). The mechanics are a crisper version of ME2′s. You still only have 4-5 main abilities to use per class but the leveling system is a bit more nuanced and more in-depth than before, which edged towards ME1′s style without being too stupidly gratuitous like adding 4% to damage. They saved that for actual gun modifications. The cover system has remained through the entire franchise (As it will continue in Andromeda) and it mostly serves to give you shield recharge while reloading your gun and not much else. Mass Effect 3 is probably my favorite of the entire franchise. Some are beholden to the first game as classic nostalgia, and I don’t know many who talk about 2 very much. However mostly decry the third game for its flawed ending and I chalk that up to a PR misunderstanding, or just bad wording on Bioware’s part. See, the sting mostly comes from when they claimed that “Oh the ending won’t be a simple A, B, C matter...” That’s exactly what it became. In the end you had the choice between destroying ALL synthetic life, taking control of the reapers for yourself and effectively fusing your consciousness with them, or if you gathered enough assets, full on synthesis. This basically fuses organic life with synthetic code, making everyone a sort of hybrid and thus rendering the Reaper’s flawed logic completely moot, and they fuck off into the void of space all over again. However for those who actually watched the endings, with the help of the extended cut, there’s a lot of nuances that that simple choice does not immediately seem apparent. In the extended cut you can see the multitude of your choices play out. Did you cure the genophage? You witness the rebirth of Tuchanka and see it get rebuilt in grand buildings with Krogan mothers celebrating their children. What did you do about the Geth/Quarian conflict? You see the results of that as well. Yes, the ending decision did boil down to an ABC choice but the ramifications of a few choices that you made since the first game still absolutely had an effect. A mass effect, if you will (please kill me). Ultimately I feel like there’s a lot more to do in ME3. I’ve played it for a few hundred hours, changing something big every time I do it. I take on a different lover, I switch sides and sabotage the genophage (which I will never ever do again because holy shit). I hop between Paragon and Renegade because it’s fun to watch the world change before my eyes as I decide to murder people that I would not otherwise have done. I do run out of things to do however as the level cap is 60, and if you’ve imported a ME2 save you’re probably already level 25-30 so it takes a single playthrough to max out. After that point, doing NG+’s only change a bonus power and maybe you can fiddle around with different weapon types and adjust playstyles. Which I did often. While I wrap this up with a sort of game-by-game summary, I want to give an honorable mention to ME3′s DLC, The Citadel. It’s often considered the ‘true’ ending to the series and is my personal headcanon post-final battle regardless of lives lost. It takes place on the Citadel (obviously) while most of your crew is on shore leave while the Normany gets cleaned up as it presumably does every time you dock anywhere across the franchise. Shepard’s life is never simple as it turns out there’s a plot against their life and must scramble to figure out another mystery. It’s an incredibly funny DLC with a ton of humor and mostly acts as a tone-shifting breather for the general “We’re all fucked” aura the game mostly gives you. It even ends on a “We’re all in this together” high note with most of your crew (And some from ME2 come back!) overlook a beautiful view while in the titular Citadel. So. We’ve reached the conclusion with my overarching thoughts on the franchise as a whole. It’s good. It’s an experience, and I highly recommend playing through it because there’s a lot to talk about. I’ll give a basic rundown. Mass Effect 1: Fine game, but has not aged well on a visual standpoint. Story is perfectly solid and moderately self-contained without originally relying on a whole franchise to carry it. RPG elements are excessive and each individual upgrade doesn’t feel like it does much until the higher levels. Mass Effect 2: Basically sidesteps its predecessor. Weak story that takes the plot nowhere but with crisper, actionized mechanics and less inventory menus to worry about. Mass Effect 3: Is the culmination of everything they learned from the last two games. More nuanced RPG systems that seem like a middleground between 1 and 2. Story comes to a solid conclusion, and I don’t agree with all the constant whining about how the endings ruined the entire game for some people. Grow up. I’m sure the game has some kind of anthology pack you can buy on sale at this point and I’d recommend giving it a go. If you’re a newcomer to the franchise, be prepared to set aside anywhere from 50 to 200 hours between the three games. If not, Andromeda takes place between the events of 2 and 3 while taking place in a completely different galaxy and will very likely only slightly reference the previous games. There’s the occasional nod, like you meet a sibling of the Turian female in Omega. Other little nods like that but it won’t be necessary to go through all three to enjoy the full experience of Andromeda. Can’t wait!

#Mass Effect #mass effect: andromeda #Andromeda #Bioware #EA Games #Electronic Arts

[thunderheadfred]

Mass Effect Question Meme

Tagged by @stormcallart-blog! Thanks!

Favorite character: In terms of moral ambiguity and character complexity, Mordin Solus takes my brain. In terms of swaggering dip-shit likability, Garrus Vakarian steals my heart. In terms of people I wish were my space dad, David Anderson owns my whole dang soul.

Paragon or Renegade: I have never managed to play a Renegade Shepard. I’ve tried, and I never, ever see it through. Can’t do it. All of my characters in every game (regardless of franchise) always wind up light-side Jedi... but my Shep did blow some krogans up and kick a dude out a window, so. She has bad days.

Favorite Class: Um. Yeah, I’m that person. Soldier??????? Everybody likes vanguard and infiltrator, but I really like having ALL. THE. GUNS. Most of my ‘tactics’ involve squaddies with powers fit for the occasion (or... um... Garrus plus someone else haha), and then switching out ammo types to use ALL THE GUNS. And tanking. I have no subtlety or patience whatsoever, and might not actually be that great at video games tbh. hahaha.

War Hero, Sole Survivor, or Ruthless: I’ve never played Ruthless (see no renegade play-through...) typically War Hero or Sole Survivor.

Spacer, Colonist, or Earthborn:  Earthborn.

Favorite Alien: TURIANSSSSS. All of them. But really, all the aliens are my favorite. I am so ludicrously invested in the world-building of Mass Effect. All the aliens. All of them.

Favorite Planet/Location: Hmmmm. I was really blown away by the Presidium in my first ME1 play-through. I like any and all the Prothean stuff - Ilos, the Collector ships, the random ruins you can find on random planets, etc.

Favorite DLC: Shadow Broker? Probs.

Favorite Weapon: M-96 MATTOCK semi-auto assault rifle. This thing is my baby. This gun is my life. The sound effects are the most. satisfying. thing. ever. thup-thup-thup. Hell, slap some incendiary ammo in that puppy and tear everything apart. Yesssss.

Favorite Shepard/OC:  Yeah so I’m pretty much just in love with default red-haired soldier Jane? Is that boring? I’ve played her... every time. Freckled heart-of-gold space marine with lots of muscles and a weak spot for turians. Yeah. I’ll take 10,000 identical play-throughs, thanks. (I am MUCH more exploratory with my Dragon Age characters)

Favorite Mission: I was definitely having heart palpitations on Tuchanka in ME3. I wish the finale of the game had stuck to the same standard..........

Favorite Track: LET ME LIST A THOUSAND.  Combat Theme (Overlord DLC), Samara (ME2), Infiltration (ME2), Suicide Mission (ME2), Sur’Kesh (ME3),  I’m Proud of You (ME3)

ME1, ME2, or ME3: ME2 is a gaming masterpiece - the mechanics of the game are used to tell the story and vice-versa. The idea of that simple, episodic plot (gather a crew and gain their loyalty) is honed so precisely that it’s nearly flawless. I just wish some of those loyalty missions were a bit more developed. Only complaint. 

SR-1 or SR-2: SR-1. I love how cramped and dark it is, honestly. Feels like a stealth ship.

Most of the people I would tag for this have been tagged already!

[joomju]

MASS EFFECT QUESTION CHALLENGE

I was tagged by the lovely @tarysande! By tagged, I mean, she put “do this if you want” and I let it sit in my drafts for like a year. 

Seriously, a year. 

Favorite character: Samara is who I wanted to be when I grew up. When I actually did grow up, I found out I’m too Chaotic, but I will always admire and respect Samara. 

Paragon or Renegade: Paragon. Like, 16 out of 18 game completions, all paragon. 

Favorite Class: WHYYYYYYY I love them all, okay? They’re all different, and with different classes I get to bring different teammates on different missions to compliment and I just... Okay. I like Sentinel in ME2, that “shield mops the floor with everyone” thing is just so much fun! And vanguard in ME3 is always a riot! Vanguard is best for “fuck the world I need to slaughter stuff”. Infiltrator is really fun because you don’t need a team. Engineer is fun because you absolutely need your team, and you have to learn to work with the AI (and a pistol in ME2, if I remember right). 

I don’t love soldier. There. I picked a not-favourite, that’s the best you’ll get out of me. 

War Hero, Sole Survivor, or Ruthless: Sole Survivor. How else do you explain a 30 something year old woman with no friends, no connections, no letters from family or fellow academy graduates or ex lovers or... community? How else do you explain a 30 something year old woman with no community?

Spacer, Colonist, or Earthborn: Spacer. I have no strong feelings on this one. 

Favorite Alien: Salarians! Scientists who get shit done and are ace? C’mon, that’s a no-brainer!

Favorite Planet/Location: I want my apartment to look like Grissom Academy. All gleaming white with modular panels hiding storage lockers. Lots of natural light with carefully cultivated plant life. Very welcoming!   

Favorite DLC: I haven’t played all of the ME3 DLC yet. I know! One of my moves, the console didn’t come with me. So I’m looking forward to finally meeting Nyreen and working with Aria.

Favorite Weapon: Hand Cannon. There are other guns that can do more damage much more easily, but no matter which class I’m playing, no matter which difficulty, I can always whip out a Hand Cannon and get myself out of a tight spot. 

Favorite Shepard/OC: ...there’s more than one? Honestly, I’ve tried, but as long as she has Jennifer Hale’s voice I have to play her as Jane Shepard. Just the one. I tried a runthrough with M!Shep, but I really couldn’t connect with how flat the character seemed. 

Favorite Mission: I honestly can’t pick! This latest playthrough is a major nostalgia bomb (I haven’t gone through the ME2 stuff in 5 years!) and it feels like coming home. Every. Single. Mission. 

Favorite Track: An end once and for all. 

ME1, ME2, or ME3: ME2 is my favourite story. I love “getting the band together” stories, I love how we all worked together as a team, I loved it so much. ME3 had the better gameplay. 

SR-1 or SR-2: SR-2!

Choice You Always/Never Make: Always save as many people as possible. Always put Anderson on the council - I was so not surprised in ME3 when Udina was somehow magically shoehorned in! Always reunite the Geth and the Quarians, always choose Synthesis. 

If there’s anyone else playing again before ME4 drops, please, fill this out again!

#mass effect #shepard