#it's the last time bioware tried to do something different with their game structure

[faejilly]

I was tagged by @la-muerta​ & @facialteeth​ & @thedivinemissema​ for the WIP/Title Game

rules: post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. send me an ask with the title that most intrigues you and interests you and i’ll post a little snippet of it or tell you something about it!

AND THEN  by @shadoedseptmbr​ @msviolacea​ & @ravenclawnerd​ for the “stories you want to write... but for some reason haven’t yet”

so this will be a mish-mash of both? The WIPs will mostly have blurbs in this case (to fit the second meme) but you are still welcome to ask follow-up questions, if you’d like ;) Assuming you make it through the list, it is uh. Not Short.

Anyone who would like to play with their WIPs, please consider yourself tagged in either or both of these. :D

Misc Fic Folder:

“untitled document” - where I’m working on fictober fills so I have word-counts for my GYWO tracker. I am not working on these because Brains Are Dumb and also Going Back To Work Is Exhausting

I made a file called “YULETIDE!” which has nothing in it but I’m determined to finish this year so that is definitely technically a thing in the Unending WIP List of Doom worth mentioning. (Tho obviously that’s all I could say even if I had started, because anonymous.)

“coda-fics, rewatch!” -yes, that exclamation mark is important! it’s to keep me motivated! (it didn’t work). Much like untitled, this is for putting stuff so I can do word count tracking even if I don’t know what I’m doing. Currently I think it just says “MARYSE” because I was working on my SH 1x6 coda-fic and then got distracted and haven’t typed anything up yet. (Yay notebooks? Boo notebooks? Not even sure at this point.)

WNIP (works not in progress) Folder:

“TOG” - I had one vivid mental image of how Nicky & Joe met (blood-stained evil smiles?) but then no idea for a follow-up story and also the fandom is insane and I’m not sure I want to deal with all of *gestures vaguely* all that

“Shan Xia Notes” -for a TTRPG that never quite got off the ground; she was a semi-tragic selkie who was still in love with the evil queen/lady who stole her skin and I got to play her for like one session and she was surprisingly chaotic neutral, which wasn’t at all what I’d been expecting. But the game never really got off the ground, so I never had enough info to really delve into writing backstory fic

“post-Kruschev” -Kruschev’s List was the last episode of Scarecrow & Mrs King, and I was debating writing an epilogue in place of the s5 we never got, to try and tie up some loose ends, but the fandom’s three old-ladies in trench coats and I never quite worked up the gumption to get it anywhere

“Code Realize warm as silk sequel” -there is literally nothing in this file except “SEX! Only a little angst” because I wanted to write some “we can’t actually touch each other” smut but never actually did. 🤷‍♀️

BioWare (also all Not-In-Progress Anymore)

“seb/adelaide”, “Theia” & “DAI Erana” -these WIP folders were cannibalized for ficlets for the last few times I did fictober, and while originally I had ideas for longer epilogues for all three of them, at this point I don’t think any of the remaining bits could support a story any longer.

”whispers in the dark” -Maia Ryder never really got much fic at all; the cancellation of any further Andromeda stuff was really disheartening, and at this point I’d have to play the game again, and I don’t think I’m gonna manage that any time soon

”TSP” -a Mass Effect 3 Shepard AU collab project that kind of went off the rails, and our mutual brains/lives never quite seem to line up so we can try and rebuild it ”Ngaio & Tane” -my one truly ruthless Shepard (Alliance background, who romanced Traynor) whose father Tane Shepard was, I think, in PsyOps, and I wanted to figure out their complicated relationship but never really did know where I was going with it

”JE Zu & Yaling” -so I’ve rambled about my Tragic Sagacious Zu Romance Thoughts regarding Jade Empire more than once (#Icy Yaling should have most of it) but apparently I want to yell about it more than I want to actually write it? Whoops.

”CI sequel: 5 times fic?” -Cruel Intentions is a kinkmeme fill that I started and then it sat for like five years before I actually finished it, and I liked the ending, but it does leave a giant fucking question mark in terms of how those people got from there to where they are after the game, and I kind of wanted to write a proper h/c fic rather than just... leaving them wallowing in all that trauma?

But I didn’t. I don’t even remember for sure how I wanted to frame the 5/1 of it all, besides it being something sad about allowing people to see you or touch you in some way. (Prayers maybe, since I think there was definitely some Sebastian & Fenris & faith stuff going on in there.)

“candles” -Merribela prompt fill that I never was happy with? Not sure what I might do with it at this point, so it’s just sitting there all sad and lonely and neglected-like.

Shadowhunters

pt1: WIP LIST ONLY

“Persuasion” -so I keep trying to write Persuasion AUs in many fandoms because it’s my favorite Austen, but I think I like it too much, I have no real solid concept of how I’d transform it, and if I don’t have anything else to say about different characters within that framework, I have no push to actually write anything? Also this SH version of it suffered from MASSIVE scope creep when I started outlining and it got too big for me to handle so I like, killed it twice? Whoops. This one is really probably never gonna happen.

“oosdt sequel” -I wanted to write more about the Forest That Eats People and Magnus & Alec as Guardians Between Worlds, and also some background Magnus’ Found Family & Lightwood Family Feels (maybe some clizzy?) and I left a Madzie plot-thread dangling from the first one on purpose even but I think this one had too many ideas and not enough focus so it’s sort of sprawling all over a doc with a lot of “???” in it

“procedural-ish” -this was originally going to be a sex-farce. and then it turned more serious. and then maybe kind of copaganda which was uncomfortable in terms of the Everything That Is The News in 2020, and then maybe it was more a Mafia AU and at that point I had self-inflicted tone whiplash and I wished the voices in my head were a little more forthcoming about their plans so I stopped before I brained myself on my computer monitor in frustration.

“I had rather a rose than live forever” -I started a reverse!verse Malec (Shadowhunter!Magnus, High Warlock!Alec) for bingo last year, and I couldn’t quite get it together in time, so I made a moodboard inspired by the bits I’d started instead. I may see if one of my prompts from Bingo this year help me finish it?

“fall fright fest (practical magic  au)” -exactly what it says on the tin! almost exactly a year old & neglected! IDEK ANYMORE (I talked about this one with the WIP meme last time tho: here)

“priest!kink theology?” -I thought it was gonna be smut? I like priest!kink. I have made other people like it and yell at me even! But then I kept diverging into demon!Magnus thinking about Priest!Alec’s faith and as usual, IDEK ANYMORE *laughs*

(If they’re remotely canon-adjacent or divergent, a bunch of these are in here because I need to rewatch the show to get the pacing/timing/tone right and I haven’t, and I don’t know why, because I enjoy the show, but BRAINS! Are Dumb! So I guess that’s it?)

“I do” -I have tried to write this damnable Malec arranged marriage fic like six different times. I have signed up for fic exchanges and bangs with it, I have rewritten massive sections, trying to change tone or structure or POV or whatever, and it basically comes down to they like each other too fast and I keep not gutting it enough to get back to a useful pace, but by the time I realized that I was on take six and kind of sick of it. I may get back to it eventually

“wing!fic” -canon divergent in early s1, trying to deal with the consequences of Simon’s kidnapping as the Truly Serious Event that it should have been. It uh. Got heavier than I expected with those consequences (considering it was originally just supposed to be Alec’s wings flirting with Magnus) and also see above re: rewatching for pacing.

“2x20 aftermath/date night/pandemonium porn“ -yes that is the actual wip title. It used to be “spite fic” because I was originally inspired by fighting against a lot of fic!Alec characterization that was clearly based more on the books and ATG syndrome than the Alec in the show, which is the Alec I know and like and want to read about. BUT, pacing and etc. again, I think. Also I have somehow entirely lost my knack for writing porn, which makes it difficult to finish something originally intended to be smut!fic. Or even teasing almost!smut.

“rubbish heap” -so this is about three different fics that I realized complemented each other really well so they’re now all in the same file as I try to turn them into the sequel of “with an if in its soul”. It includes amnesia, parabatai lore shenanigans, a s3 rewrite, and some truly awful Owl adjustments that make me wince in horrified authorly delight and pain. BUT, as with the other ones in this file, the scope is large and I normally write short-fic and I kind of just threw up my hands in exasperation. I may have to break it back up into the three different fics instead, if I ever actually want to write it. Them? But also I need to take better notes on s3 to make sure I have what I need in here.

SH Pt 2: Started posting or not yet in hiatus because it’s actually almost ready to be a thing in the real world! maybe!?

“kisses (firsts)” -I actually started publishing this one, a “series of firsts” that was supposed to be kind of relationship milestones and kind of an excuse for smut, and then there wasn’t that much smut and I lost momentum and also dear lords & ladies the timeline is stupid, wtf. I may not ever add to this one, tbqh. It doesn’t stop in a terrible place, and they’re all ficlets so they stand alone all right.

“clizzy epilogue” -this is blank atm, it’s more a reminder for me to keep poking away at my “girls who can’t breathe air, only fire” collection BECAUSE I WOULD LIKE TO ACTUALLY GET TO THE CLIZZY AT SOME POINT

"mer!alec" -pts 2-4 of a series, but apparently having an actual plan gets in the way of me *writing* the thing, and I haven't managed to throw the half an outline far enough away from my brain to be able to write again. Or something like that.

"ibhww" -if broken hearts were whole is a soulmate fic I started a million years ago, and purposefully set aside to finish some other WIPs because I thought they'd be quick, and now it's just buried under two and a half years of regret and shame so it's hard to get back to it

"iafy" -i am for you is a delightful & frothy semi-epistolary fluff piece that also just lost momentum because Life & 2020 & etc. It's far and away the most popular thing I've ever posted on AO3, which also makes me feel weird sometimes, and I feel like the fact that there's no grand conclusion planned, just a bit more fluff and settling in, might end up being disappointing? Basically, it's the first time I think I've psyched myself out about reader expectations, and until I get over that I'm going to have trouble finishing the last couple chapters. (There really are probably only two more chapters though. IT’S SO CLOSE, I wish I could just... write it. And yet?)

“fake-hating” -I do not like fake dating as a trope that much, I just do not get it, but I love outside POVs and arranged marriages and there’s this delighful tumblr post about how they wished there was more fic about people who were together but had to pretend they werent’, and uh. This may be that? Eventually? I’m not exhausted by my failure to finish it yet, so it’s still in the regular folder rather than the hiatus folder, even though nothing’s been posted for it.

AND I THINK THAT’S IT?

Not as terrible as it could be, but still. MANY WORDS THAT MAY NEVER SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY. Posting the equivalent of one’s old ratty sketchbook is always a weird feeling. :D

#on writing #writing memery #unending WIP List Of Doom

[legionofpotatoes]

My expanded thoughts on Anthem if anyone cares, under the cut

Here’s the thing about this thing. I had a very fun weekend with the Anthem VIP demo overall, despite its own damn self a lot of the time. That’s the short of it.

But I feel as a lifelong Bioware fan that’s been sucking off singleplayer titles and mercilessly dunking on competitive gaming I should like, Elaborate(tm)

Firstly yes, it was plagued by client-side bugs on launch, so the start was a fair bit wonky. I was trying to enter freeplay for like 3 hours. The incredible music kept me sane, but as the thankfully transparent communication came in it became apparent it wasn’t an easy issue so I chalked it up to bad connectivity shenanigans that won’t rear its head in the future. The devs genuinely worked tirelessly to get it fixed, so when I finally got to the meat and potatoes of it all I shed prior biases and tried to focus. What I found an intriguing new world wrapped in a type of game that still felt very.. alien to me. And yet it also felt like it had a Bioware heart beating underneath its shell. 

Which can mean fuckall nowadays, I know; but speaking about story based on the demo is wack because the context and flow of world-building is difficult to grasp; the slice here throws us in the middle of the story with no training wheels and much of exposition locked away for the full thing. There is definitely a very rich, purposefully-built lore here (already there are traces of Bioware’s signature motifs with the legacy of Helena Tarsis, the politically motivated factions of Bastion, the controversial emergence of cyphers, etc), and it seems intent on making its fat points throughout the critical path. That I found reassuring, since my multiplayer-averse ass will eventually need to latch on to something more gratifying than loot chases in order to keep invested.

Of course that fundamentally means that the game is not FOR me, per se. Nor would I say it’s for anyone who loves single-player games exclusively and thinks of Bioware as that particular stamp factory. This is not a campaign-driven RPG that has multiple gameplay pillars feeding its narrative. And it definitely is not doing backwards flips trying to pretend to be one (Fort Tarsis initially felt like that exact type of posturing, but it has a pleasantly balancing function instead). It has one pillar and one pillar only, and that’s the loot chase. Whether or not Anthem will be a good game depends wholly on its commitment to make said pillar into the crux of everything it contains. And so far said commitment is a bit vague - it has a nice basis for these systems, but variety, presentation, and balance seem very much at their infancy.

I say this because I have tried my hand at other games of similar type - Destiny, Warframe, Borderlands, and Overwatch. No others but I think this is a good enough blueprint to analyze Anthem’s part on the market - all of these titles dwindled out on me because of the loot chase eventually being prioritized to the point of absolution, with story, character building, and even palatable gameplay pacing (how fucking fast are WF and OW, jesus christ) sacrificed at the altar of frighteningly well-calculated doses of FUN. It all feels indulgent (which is not bad) and a bit pointless in the end (this is my own high-horse take), and as I understand that’s what kind-of makes them successful. 

And Anthem IS geared more-or-less the same way. It’s an experiment of a game that tries its best at separating storytelling from the loot chase in a way that one does not interfere with the other. The lore and worldbuilding is very clearly designed to support that structure. Which is good for obvious identity crisis reasons - this isn’t a game pretending or trying to please many audiences, something Bioware has been guilty of a lot. This is a story-driven looter shooter with a couple of gameplay loops that elevate its stake, but will ultimately only delay what is sure to become a repetitive experience for me, since the Gun(tm) is the only interaction with the world.

What saves it for me however, are two things; number one are the aforementioned escape bouts to Fort Tarsis, where some pretty hilarious and heartfelt characters are dotting the streets, and where Bioware’s tenure has the most room to breathe and work its magic. This is not a throwaway compliment, there’s decent work being done here. The dialogue system itself is barebones, non-cutscene conversations still look a fair bit stiff, but that twinkle of life that shows itself when you hear a character speak of their experiences is still there. The actual cutscenes look amazing and genuinely fresh, and, like I mentioned above, this isn’t an abstract canvas of lore that ONLY exists to justify the gameplay - there’s something being told here that has many moving pieces in a exciting, new-IP kind of way. Again, hard to deduce from the demo slice, but obvious in retrospect.

The second thing that I personally will look to as a saving grace is that left damn analog stick.

Because dudes. This game isn’t perfect, but it is insanely good at its selling point that was advertised years ago. The lush alien vista of Bastion is a bustling garden of terrain oddities and exotic creatures, with truly groundbreaking verticality hammered into it - the map is honestly more like a cube rather than a flat plane. And your javelin has the simplest tool to experience it the best possible way. It can fly. 

This is always such a weird thing to say to people asking about my big expectations for the game, especially since I’ve basically been in bed with it since its very announcement for reasons they can’t comprehend. I don’t blame any of them of course, but it really is that simple for me - the fantasy of flight in a science fantasy universe created by Bioware is that tiny indulgent thing I always wanted, ever since playing that terrible Dark Void videogame and wishing a better studio had made it. It works INCREDIBLY well, has a balancing wink to it, and elevates the core loop a fair bit. No pun intended. Even the different javelins handle in their own unique ways. It’s just great.

Of course, there’s now a possibility for a BonerLord420 to interrupt my Quality Bioware Experience by throwing a flare in my face before leading an endless army of mobs into it, which is something I hate, have hated, and will hate for the foreseeable future. But the genuine moments of cooperation I did have felt earnest, no one was being a hopeless grief, competitive shit was kept to a minimum (enemy kills don’t drop XP directly), and my socially inept heart opened up just a tiny crack to the possibility that this might be some strange kind of fun.

Bioware DID bring me out of my shell with their whimsy multiplayer modes for the last Mass Effect games, so I feel a bit safer in their hands than I normally would with a game like this. Amazingly, I’m looking forward to exploring Bastion and finding out what this Anthem of Creation business is all about. Cautious, but on board. I definitely love the grabbits with a fierce passion, as well.

#potato #text

[jake-richmond]

Thoughts on the Anthem demo:

Since I had to take a day off anyway I decided to try out Anthem. Its a 3rd person adventure shooter by Bioware. I had gotten excited about it last year because it looks a lot like both The Division (game play wise) and Destiny (world design wise), both of which I loved. I spent the day playing the demo with my brother Nick and our friend Gabe (who I also played The Division and Monster Hunter World with). They both seemed to like it quite a bit, but I had very mixed feelings...

Good: Anthem takes place in what appears to be a very large open world. Its interesting looking, with lots of space to explore. I love exploring science fiction spaces, and flying around checking out caves and weird alien architecture was fun.

Bad: There's not a ton of stuff in the world. Its hard to tell since this is just a demo, but Anthem's neat world seems to be mostly empty. Theres not a lot of reason to stop and look around. Even the neat features like the ruins of small communities, giant alien structures, huge waterfalls, etc, are mostly just decorative. There doesn't seem to be much to do. There are a scattering of enemies, but not much reason to stop and shoot them.

- Good: Anthem has a setting kind of similar to Destiny, as far as I can tell. You're the last humans in the last human stronghold, trying to protect your way of life and keep your society and technology alive in a very hostile world. Thats not super original, but destiny had a visual style that I liked a lot,and Anthem's visual style, especially for its hub city and its NPC inhabitants seems to be a direct copy. Which is just fine with me!

- Bad: There's no character creation,and you never see your character. The game asks you to select a masculine or feminine voice, and then starts you off in the hub city with no other customization. Anthem is a multiplayer game, but like Monster Hunter World and The Division your hub is an instanced area available just to you, so no other players will ever see you there. While in the hub you're stuck in first person mode, so you never get to see what you look like. This is incredibly frustrating to me.It immediately killed my immersion. Instead of feeling like i was an inhabitant of this interesting world I felt like I was just me playing a video game. In Destiny, monster Hunter World and The Division I felt like I was directly involved in those worlds through my character. Here it felt more like i was going on a theme park ride. Weirdly, as soon as you put on your futuristic Iron Man style armor suit and leave the hub city the rest of the game is played in 3rd person. So you can see your armor, and so can everyone else. And while you can customize your armor a fair amount, this feels less like having a unique character and more like having a fancy cell phone case.

Good: You can fly. Anthem is a big place, and the main way you get around is by flying in your Iron Man style armor. And the terrain of the game really encourages that. You'll fly through underground tunnels, over vast waterfalls, in and out of ravines. Theres a lot of chaotic vertical terrain to explore by flying. Bad: Unfortunately flying sucks. once you're actually in the air the flying controls are okay. They're a little clunky,a nd don't feel super responsive, but they're okay. Unfortunately, getting in the air is awkward. You can't just take off like superman. you need to actually be in the air before you can activate your jets, which means jumping up and taking off, or falling off something and taking off. Its the "taking off" action thats the problem. Hitting the button sends you into a kind of twist animation that sends your thrusting forward toward wherever your camera is pointing. The action can be disorienting, especially since your character isn't always facing the direction your camera is pointing. As a result, you often start your flight going slightly the wrong way, or even crashing into a wall or object (which can send you falling back down to the ground, sometimes hundreds of feet). The move gets easier to do with practice, but after hours it still felt awkward to me.

The bigger problem is that  you can only fly for about 10 seconds at a time. Flying is both the main way you get around the game and one of the game's main mechanics. You're meant to be flying ��and hovering in battle often. But flying has a resource gauge (a  heat gauge) and it only takes about 10 seconds to overheat. Which means flights tend to be short and stressful, and using flying to explore the world, or even just enjoying flying for its own sake, is really limited. You can extend your fly time by cooling down your engines by flying through waterfalls or skimming rivers, but that mostly requires hugging the ground, and that kind of defeats the point?

Good: Missions are fun. Missions in Destiny and The Division tended to be short and mostly revolved around going to a place and killing a guy or flipping a switch.The 3 missions in Anthem are all more involved than that, and while none of them are super complicated all involve multiple locations, lots of different enemies and a boss fight. For this type of game they're satisfying. The game also has some public events in its freeplay exploration mode which seem fun. In one I was blowing up supply tents in an enemy camp while waves of enemies tried to take me down. In another i was collection alien tech while a giant monster chased me through a swamp. I wouldn't say these were more compelling than Destiny or The Divvisin's public events (and nowhere near as fun as coming across a random monster in Monster Hunter World), but they were enjoyable and I can see myself stopping to participate in them over and over. The demo's one Strike/Dungeon was also pretty enjoyable.

Bad: Missions do a very bad job of actually telling you the mission mechanics. Each of the three missions and dungeon had a puzzle mechanic, but I missed the explanation for all of them. Partially this was because the game just says "collect the thing", but doesn't tell you what the thing looks like or where it is. It took me forever to figure out the tiny glowing ball (hidden amidst the explosions, power effects, glowing plants, acid baths, strobe lights, exploding insects, grenade blasts, etc) was the item we were supposed to collect.In another puzzle I totally missed that there was a puzzle at all, and thought the game had just glitched and wasn't opening a door. My second time through the dungeon, after having nick explain the puzzle mechanic to me, I watched the poor random 4th player who had joined our party run around the puzzle room in confusion looking for the item, because he didnt realize that the very unobtrusive and hard to notice pouch that had appeared on his character WAS the item. unfortunately all we could do was  watch, since he didn't have  a microphone connected. 

Good: In addition to being able to equip 2 guns, each of the 4 types of armored suits has a selection of built in options hat allow you to attack, defend or support other players. These can be swapped out or upgraded too, which gives you some fun choices.  I started out with two different throwing weapon attacks, but eventually upgraded to a mine launcher and an acid spray. There seems to be lots of options. Lots of guns too.

Bad: However, gun play sucks. Maybe its just because I've played Destiny for so long, but gun play in Anthem is stiff ad unresponsive. The guns are also just not very fun to use. Theres several types of guns, but they all kind of feel the same and none of them seem very effective.  Thankfully you don't have to rely on just your guns, since the suit abilities are much more powerful. But shooting is a BIG part of the game, an the guns and gun play are just lackluster. The guns themselves may get more interesting as the game goes on, but I'm not sure gun play will at all.

So I'm undecided on the game. This is just a demo, and the game itself could end up being a lot better. But I was pretty excited about this game, and now a lot of my enthusiasm has died. In fact, more than anything its just made me want to go back to playing Monster Hunter World. I'll wait for the game to be released and see what people have to say before I decide for sure.

#Anthem demo #anthem #anthem review

[songofproserpine]

Mass Effect, mental illness, and healing.

I’m replaying the Shepard trilogy, and this has been bouncing around my thoughts lately.

So in Mass Effect 2, Miranda says that part of The Lazarus Project was the very specific order of recreating Shepard exactly as they were, no exceptions. This includes their personality, their memories, etc. Ignoring questions like ‘how do you reconstruct someone’s mental structure, store it in a computer, and then transfer it to a mind you hope to make sentient,’ this leads me to the more interesting question of (1) does future technology and medical science in the Mass Effect universe have the ability to map brain chemistry to the point of knowing how one’s individual mind functions; and (2) what does this mean for mental illnesses?

While it’s highly unlikely that Shepard could have served if they had a serious mental illness prior to their service, it’s all but flat out said in the opening lines of Mass Effect 1 that Shepard has serious emotional scars. I.E., Shepard at the very least had a PTSD diagnosis depending on what military background you chose for them. And while PTSD is treatable through medication and therapy, it doesn’t seem to have barred Shepard from continuing their service in the Alliance. If anything, Shepard only advanced further, becoming the Normandy’s commander and eventual commanding officer once Anderson stepped down.

I will allow Bioware some dramatic license for this story, and Shepard is also constantly considered a person with “a remarkably strong will,” which means they can endure pain and hardships beyond what most would find tolerable. But just because someone has a “strong will” doesn’t mean they aren’t affected by pain and trauma--they could just keep it all inside and suffer quietly, which Shepard seems to do.

Much like a post I made about Fallout 4 and Nick Valentine’s human form (and how the pre-Institute MIT folks mapped out his brain prior to his death, and simply used that data to make synth Nick’s mind), what we have here is yet another case of someone being created (or resurrected) with a mental map that included mental illness... and that mental illness being programmed in. It wasn’t removed. It wasn’t treated as a flaw to eliminate. It was an integral part of that person’s mind and identity.

With Shepard, this is likely because of Miranda’s orders: Shepard had to be the exact same, no exceptions. But with Nick Valentine, I consider this especially brutal and unfair, because synth Nick wanted so very much to put human Nick’s memories and ghosts to rest. He wanted to build a life and live that life separate from the man he was built from. And this choice of his, while noble and fully valid, was made all the more difficult for him to do because of human Nick’s PTSD and survivor’s guilt being transferred over.

Make no mistake: I’m not saying The Lazarus Project should have eliminated any/all of Shepard’s lingering mental trauma, nor am I saying the Institute should have done something different (it’s very likely that they couldn’t, or just didn’t think it would matter). I myself have been diagnosed with PTSD--that’s why I’m so fascinated by the presence (or lack thereof) of mental illnesses in the video games I play, which are largely RPGs in scenarios where mental health and treatment are either nonexistent (Dragon Age, Elder Scrolls, Soulsborne), or very seldom remarked upon (Mass Effect, Fallout) unless it’s for a specific quest. What I am saying is that I wonder what this says to us who have mental illnesses, no matter what they are, and how we can use this narrative choice in video games as a way to change our perspective about these illnesses and the part they play in our identities?

My psychiatrist and I have weekly therapy sessions as part of my Dialectical Behavior Therapy. Very recently, we ended a session with a question that we’ll explore in later sessions: is it possible to practice acceptance and active healing at the same time? Acceptance in this scenario means acknowledging that while my situation and illnesses are not fair, that’s also what they are. I do not like that my life is so brutally sidetracked far too often by symptoms of my illnesses, or by the very existence of the illness itself. But that’s my life.

I wasted an entire decade of my life (all of my 20s) mourning and hating and being brutally ashamed that this was my lot in life, that it wasn’t fair, that I couldn’t be expected to endure all that my illnesses demanded of me on top of the normal things life asks of us all--but none of that thinking got me anywhere. It didn’t make me feel stronger, it didn’t encourage me, it didn’t offer answers or hope or anything useful in the slightest. If anything, it made me worse, to the point where my body was then literally wasting away and destroying itself because of my anxiety by the time I was 29. But I digress.

Back to the question and, eventually, Mass Effect and Commander Shepard. Acceptance of mental illnesses and living with them simply means you look your life square in the face and you accept it--you don’t judge it, you don’t question it, you don’t wonder how it could have been different. It’s not different. It’s your life--period. And it’s yours. That alone should make you want to cherish it. It might be hard, it might be frightening, it might be lonely and all other kinds of things--but it’s yours. No one else’s. And your life, and most especially your illnesses, needs your love.

We care for wounds without questioning why they dare hurt in the first place. We just tend to what hurts and wait until it heals. Why should we do any less to ourselves and our illnesses? That’s acceptance.

The second part--active healing--is trickier, and slower, and far more intricate a process than acceptance. It also requires you return to step one (acceptance) almost every single day. Or, if you’re like me, and have a mood disorder, every hour of every day, for the rest of your life--period. But all active healing really is, in the end, is looking at why acceptance was so hard for you and filling that in with love and care.

Active healing means you tend to your wounds. You get out of bed. You brush your teeth. You shower. You make food. You do chores. You go for a walk. You take your medication. You call your doctor if you feel like you need help outside of your appointments. You remove habits that no longer serve you in healthy, useful ways. You indulge in things you like to comfort yourself when you’re feeling down. You realize that you might need more time to do things, but that extra time doesn’t diminish the importance of what you do. You’re healing. You’re on the mend. You will always be recovering and repairing. This doesn’t have to be shameful or exhausting (even though it can be--but then you start back from acceptance and slowly work yourself back up). It just is.

Which, finally, returns me to Mass Effect 2, The Lazarus Project, and a resurrected Commander Shepard who has their military background include a deep emotional scar added into the mix of the very current emotional scar of having died in space. Jacob tells you that you were “just meat and tubes” the first time he saw you. You weren’t a corpse--you were pieces of a corpse. And you were remade from every atom--including your illnesses. Including your wounds, private hurts that only you ever felt or knew about.

How would this make you feel?

How would you feel about this life, this second pass through the universe, this mulligan on oblivion that pulled you back to this ol’ mortal coil? Angry, undoubtedly. It’s why renegade Shepard in Mass Effect 2 is something of a raging vicious psychopath--but I can’t quite blame them. not really.

Remember the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer? When Buffy finally lets slip that she wasn’t in hell, suffering--she was in some kind of heaven? She was happy. She was at peace. And her friend dragged her soul back to its body, forcing her to dig her own way out of her grave, back to life, before she suffocated and died once again. She got her life back, but was never asked if she wanted it back.

That’s Commander Shepard in Mass Effect 2. That’s baseline commander shepard in Mass Effect 2.

Now imagine a mentally ill Shepard having to bear this burden. I’m not questioning whether or not Shepard could endure it (you’ve probably played the trilogy--you know the answer to that question). I’m simply asking you to imagine it. Imagine a marine of whom the galaxy, the entire galaxy, demanded everything. Every thankless task, every brutal mission, every hard choice, every life-altering, life-threatening, life-shortening thing possible under every sun. Imagine a marine lying in a pool of their own blood being told, “it didn’t work,” and their response is, “what do you need me to do?”

What do you need me to do? That, my friends, is the central question of acceptance and active healing. What do you need me to do? Ask your illnesses this when times are tough, or even when times are good. What do you need me to do? Maybe your brain wants to trick you every now and then. Slips in an invasive thought, or a self-destructive demand. Maybe it tries to sell you on a suspicion, building up to full-scale paranoia. These are not things you should feed into; they aren’t actions you should take. More pain will not serve you. Hurting yourself in any way is not the answer to an already existing pain.

Acceptance. Active healing. What do you need me to do? Assess your damage, know that pain will always be integral to your existence, but is by no means the only thing that defines it, and figure out how to respond to it.

Instead of looking at your traumas, your symptoms, your triggers, your anythings as flaws, as failures, as setbacks, as things to hate and be ashamed of, look at it as a part of you in need of care, and ask, What do you need me to do?

And remember this last piece of advice: be kind. Because even after destruction, Commander Shepard took just one more breath--one more small gasp of life. And sometimes that’s all you can ask of yourself: just one more breath. And then another. And another. This is probably the hardest lesson anyone with an illness will ever have to learn: you are healing. You will always be healing. You will always have to take just one more breath. Because that’s what you need to do for you. No one else.

So breathe.

#mass effect #mental illness #borderline personality disorder #ptsd #nick valentine #fallout 4

[sammgreer]

Mass Effect Andromeda - Review

Despite being a huge fan of the original games, I wasn't expecting too much from this. I felt they had concluded nicely and the universe didn't really seem suited for new stories. How could anything compare to Commander Shepard and crew's fight against the Reapers? On top of that Bioware's last game Dragon Age Inquisition, whilst enjoyable, was mired in the tedium of open world fetch quests and busy work. So when Andromeda marketed its massive worlds and seemed to emphasise combat over the kind of storytelling that had made the originals so successful, I was very cautious.

But against all the odds I really enjoyed Mass Effect Andromeda. A lot. It has numerous flaws, it's a bit of a mess but in reaching for new heights it manages to breathe life into a setting I had convinced myself was finished. Make no mistake though, compared with modern RPG heavy weights like The Witcher 3, Mass Effect Andromeda is a rougher, less elegant game. However it is a lot more accomplished than it may seem.

Its relation to the original games is pretty irrelevant, Andromeda wisely adopts a clean break from that trilogy by removing its story completely from that setting and time. We play as Ryder, part of an initiative to establish colonies in the distant Andromeda galaxy. Cryogenically frozen we awake over six hundred years after leaving the milky way.

Andromeda doesn't put its best foot forward. Instead of introducing us to a thrilling new galaxy, it spends the opening hours introducing a host of characters, many of whom won't reappear after this introductory mission. Those who will are your human companions, also the game's flattest or most irritating characters. The mission itself is a closed, linear affair that deprives you of many of the interesting features that define the majority of the game. It is also where we're introduced to the game's antagonists, the Kett. This initial counter devolves too quickly into gunfire and violence. No mysterious first contact, just a perfunctory introduction to the games cannon fodder. Whilst they're fleshed out later, they never really rise to be more than “the baddies”, fanatics with an inherent hostility. Filling the need for foes in an action driven RPG is fine but something more inspired would have gone a long way.

Once this dull setup is complete you're handed a ship, the sleek Tempest and set loose. It takes a while to unlock all the game's expansive worlds but even on the first, there's lots of sights to see and discoveries to make. Whilst there's also a lot of busy work, the stream lined quest structure means few feel like a chore. Most important of all, the mechanics that make up your time are so enjoyable.

Combat is something you'll be doing quite a bit of, though it felt like it made up a lot less of the experience than the action heavy Mass Effect 2/3. Where their combat was fairly bog standard third person shooting with a sprinkling of interesting powers, Andromeda's combat is a genuinely brilliant affair. The large environments have encouraged Bioware to move away from tight linear corridors and instead emphasise movement to go toe to toe with enemies. Using Ryder's jet pack we can leap not just into the air but also horizontally, combining both movements, till you're zipping between cover and enemies with a pace that almost feels like Bloodborne in the form of a third person shooter. It's remarkably inspired for a series where the combat always felt functional rather than exemplary.

A lot of time will be spent behind the wheel of the Nomad, a space rover and slick re-imagining of the original game's clumsy Mako. This coupled with the jet-pack platforming makes navigation simple but very enjoyable. It helps too that the planets you visit, whilst not spectacularly alien, are pretty stunning with some cracking vistas. Views from your ship as you travel between worlds are also frequently spectacular, reflecting your chosen location on the Galaxy Map. There's variety too, not just visually but in the types of terrain and hazards. I was happy to seek out more quests in spite of some so-so design because I like spending time in this world. One memorable moment came about on a planet with a dangerous, scorching heat where I couldn't find a way to get the rover through a canyon. So I crossed a huge desert flat on foot, dashing between boulders and the shade to recover life support. It was a small moment but gave a thrill to exploration that many similar games lack.

The purpose of all this exploring is to establish outposts on worlds. First you have to make each world viable for colonists, by activating ancient alien structures belonging to an absent civilization the “Remnant” and terraforming the world. These ruins are still cared for by automated machines and they were my favourite among the foes, with distinct classes and behaviours in their ranks. Once you've established a colony and raised the viability of the world, new areas open up for you to explore so that this act of terraforming feels like more than just ticking off a box. It helps too that all this busy work is, unlike Inquisition, entirely optional and the player is free to pursue the main quest as they wish. Though doing so will change how the game's finale plays out, with decisions from various side-quests coming to play in the conclusion.

Of course it's here that Andromeda stumbles, drawing as it does on unsavoury colonialism. Whilst there's some acknowledgement throughout of the issues of colonising alien worlds, including an optional rebuttal against colonialist interests near the end, the game never goes far enough in confronting the implications there-in. It's far more interested in being a thrilling space adventure and to that end it succeeds but as a piece of thoughtful science fiction, it's muddled at best.

But what of the things Mass Effect is renowned for? Well the main story isn't up to much. It's mostly fine, enjoyable and kept me engaged to the end but there's nothing remarkable about it. You go up against some baddies, you give them a thrashing, the end. There's some nice conflicts between the cast and various factions as well as some big exciting set-pieces at key points but the narrative's main thrust is fairly tried and tested. It works well but it isn't great.

The companions that make up your ship's crew on the other hand manage to measure up to the iconic members of the Normandy team. Whilst I doubt they'll go on to become as beloved as the cast of the originals, they're nonetheless mostly well written and developed with a care that's much richer than the previous titles. Rather than merely prompting them for exposition until reaching the requisite loyalty missions, you end up much more involved with a series of missions leading to something more substantial .There's also a great implied life to them, you get the feeling the crew exists when Ryder's not around. They chat between themselves on board the Tempest and when on missions, giving hints of their relationships with each other. Peebee and Drack were the stand outs for me and the chatter between them on missions regularly put a smile on my face.

Even most of the core supporting cast are engaging, with some good performances from Natalie Dormer and Kumail Nanjiani, imbuing their roles with welcome nuance. The minor NPCs that litter the world are far less compelling and the further you go from the main cast, the worse and more tiresome the writing becomes. The biggest flaw with the writing is consistency, with plenty of moving scenes and memorable moments but also plenty of clunky exposition, awkward emoting, especially in the game's opening hours. Hindered too by the already much discussed facial animations which are it must be said mostly a step-up for Bioware but are sadly quite behind most of the competition. Though there's nothing quite as lifeless as the likes of Deus Ex Mankind Divided either.

Perhaps the most surprising member of the cast is Ryder. Playing as either sibling, Scott or Sara (as a nice touch you get to customise both and the other plays a part in the story), Ryder comes across as a younger, more flawed and ultimately more human lead than Commander Shepard. Shepard was always an icon, a hero the galaxy could rally behind. People doubt Ryder throughout and they too seem to doubt themselves, able to show vulnerability. Fryda Wolff and Tom Taylorson voice Ryder in a way that more than lives up to the legacy of Jennifer Hale and Mark Meer.

Thankfully the binary paragon and renegade split in dialogue choices is gone so instead we can much more freely move between various tones and options. This allows you to give Ryder a dynamism that wasn't available with Shepard, where instead consistency was much more greatly rewarded. Neither is Ryder swinging between “good” and “evil”. You feel like you can be rude, cheeky and smug yet still able to make the smart, noble call when the moment calls for it. I had a lot of fun as Ryder, I made her brash, cocky but also deeply uncomfortable with her responsibility. In the end I'm much more attached to her than I was Shepard.

In her boots I got to have fun and an optimistic tone is refreshing after Mass Effect 3. The trilogy's final part is still a standout game but I never quite appreciated how wearying the tone of it was till I got to Andromeda. Here your journey isn't a burden, it is an adventure. It lacks the stakes of Shepard's story but it's also freeing. I felt invigorated when the story came to a close and I'm surprised to find myself keen to spend more time with Ryder and company.

Minor complaints that I found myself able to easily overlook might prove more irritating for others. The user interface for instance often feels needlessly convoluted, with important options buried in menus separate to where they could be more readily relevant. Having to run around the ship to check different menus at different locations, all to see how much of one resource a new blueprint requires is bothersome. There's a also still at this point a lot of bugs in the game though none I experienced were game breaking.

My biggest complaint might seem inconsequential to some but for me the lacklustre score is a real sore point given the memorable themes of the original trilogy. The game's main theme is pleasant enough but so much of the score fails to make an impression. It's effective in creating a suitable atmosphere but it's telling that my favourite piece of music in the game is the reworked galaxy map music from the original trilogy. If Bioware intend to follow this up with sequels, they might want to find stronger music to define this new galaxy and give its cast a stronger identity.

Compared against the titans of the last few years Andromeda feels as much an unwelcome underdog as Ryder does, struggling to find a place in a new galaxy. How much fans of the series will enjoy this new entry will largely depend on just what it was about the previous games that they liked best. There is still compelling characters and an enjoyable plot but there's no Virmire or Curing the Genophage to propel it skyward. Yet there is a consistent thrill of exploration, of small scale drama and neat discoveries. If you want to feel like the hero in a battle against godlike machines, then there's nothing so compelling here. But if you want to feel like a scrappy space adventurer, getting lost in a expansive galaxy with some baddies at your heels, Andromeda is frequently thrilling.

I loved it far more than I ever expected to and though any recommendation comes with a warning of its numerous flaws, I nonetheless endorse it wholeheartedly. Andromeda's too much fun not to.

#Mass Effect #mass effect trilogy #mass effect andromeda #scifi #science fiction #video games #videogames #review #pc #bioware #ea #Ryder #Shepard #Tempest #Peebee #Adventure #colonialism

[ravel-puzzlewell]

why is everyone complaining that Mass Effect Andromeda is "big"? how is that a problem when there's more game to play?

The size is not a problem in itself. The problem is that bioware doesn’t know how to work with “Big”. Hear me out.

So bioware obviously tries to move into the open world direction, with DAI and now comparing MEA to DAI in terms of “BIGGER!!!1”, and I think it’s such a shame, because bioware sucks at open world\sandboxes. I don’t even mean it as an insult, it’s just a plain fact - bioware are it’s best at contained, story-driven, linear structure. Their best games have distinctly different locations each with a gimmick and with a linear plotline that starts at the entry point, motivates your exploration of the location so you can pick up the side quests, ideally has a theme and involves one of your companions and culminates in the final decision. After that, the location is finished. You report the side quests and that’s it, you’ve exhausted all your options, you leave the location and never look back. Well, maybe you return once for plot reasons for 5 minutes, but you don’t engage with it meaningfully. And it’s not a bad thing! This is “40 min TV show episode” kind of structure that can work great and it does in the entire Mass Effect series. The story is simple, usually with one or two twists, but it keeps you engaged because it’s tightly knit and clearly presented, the involvement of your crew members gives you emotional stakes, the distinctly ~weird~ location and NPCs there make you feel like you’re actually seeing different places and seeing different cultures. It’s *fun* and that’s what matters.

But if you take out the location-based plotline and add a lot of empty space\padding to the mix, it all starts falling apart. Because bioware only writes superficial weirdness, this weirdness becomes bland real quick, the gimmick wears off and becomes annoying, NPCs blend in into the endless background, and you go “oh thank GOD it’s over” when you leave the location. Imagine if in ME3 Tuchanka had the size and structure of Hinterlands. The hardcore severe planet would turn into a boring wasteland, instead of epic badasses that represent the spirit of a planet Thresher Maws would turn into a boss fight grind (like dragons in DAI), without your friendship with Wrex the stakes are low, without the linear plot creating AND keeping up dramatic tension, you’d just wander around and randomly stumble onto the cut-scenes.

Bioware thinks that you can just make locations big and take out linear structure and boom, you’ve got yourself a sandbox. But it’s wrong. You can’t just take away the scripted plot-line and NOT replace it with anything. Good open world RPG requires you to make locations not just distinct, but layered, interesting to explore, it adds ties between locations that are meaningful, the quests start in one location and run through multiple of others organically, so you have to travel back and forth and when you revisit them, it doesn’t feel like backtracking. Not everything is played out at the moment you enter the location, some NPCs only become important when you get new quests in other places, so the exploration is dynamic, layered in time. You keep re-discovering things, adding new layers to the context. Bioware just cannot write things like that. They can’t make differences between locations subtle, but meaningful, which is why I literally cannot tell any forest locations in DAI apart, they don’t know how to make quest-lines span between places and be layered in time, they don’t know how to keep players’ attention without a strict narrative tunnel. The only distinct thing between locations is visual design, but even that can’t take you far. There’s a location in DAI that is very visually striking - white snow, red lyrium, black rocks. Beautiful, unusual, interesting. But I wouldn’t be able to remember what happened there with a gun to my head. What was my quest? Idk. There was a dragon I think? And for other locations that don’t have such striking visuals, the situation is even worse.

Take the location with Civil War in DAI (I think it’s Dales? But not sure) I literally cannot remember what were the differences between the sides there. Hell, I can barely remember the sides! It’s the Orlesians and… other Orlesians? But they are called “Free”-something. Why, idk. And there are also the Dalish clan hanging out nearby, but they don’t have anything to do with the Orlesians. Why was I in this location in the first place? I have no idea. To be clear, it’s not because I have shit memory. I have great memory, I can remember meaningful details from the games I played once ten years ago. It’s just DAI didn’t give me anything meaningful to remember. The conflict is not set up, they just let you wander around aimlessly, the sides are both boring and bland, the location is just kind of an open field littered with undead and wolves. When you let players discover different factions just by stumbling onto them without a straightforward narrative, you better fucking make sure they are a) very distinct b)very clear about what their deal is. Show me anyone who can mix up the Legion, NCR and House in FN:V.

Imagine the same location done in a traditional for bioware linear structure. You enter the location and immediately see two groups arguing. Each side has a charismatic leader and these guys are yelling at each other, which gives you exposition. One of them is, like, a well-groomed Orlesian noble and the other one is a rude peasant Robin Hood. You enter a conversation and get more exposition, what their deal is and how they are in conflict. One of your companions support one faction and the other one - another. (idk, Vivienne and Dorian vs Blackwall and Sera, frex) Then both of them invite you to their camps and leave. You have a narrative already. You visit their camps, get to know them. Get some sidequests from both sides. While exploring you meet the Dalish, who are bitter because the Dales were THEIR land and now shems are fighting over it. You do some quests for Dalish. At the mid-point the game makes you choose a side and the last plot-arc is about breaking the resistance of the other side and deciding what to do with them. If you do some side quest for Dalish and pass a Paragon speech check, you can find some holy scripture that Andraste made about Dalish owning the land and you can grant the place to Dalish. That’s it. Yeah, it’s cliched and yeah, it’s cheesy, but it’s clear and it has narrative and stakes. It gives you basic framework for roleplay. Bioware never could write complicated plots, but they don’t need to. The plot doesn’t need to be complicated, it needs to function in the chosen form. If it doesn’t function, then big locations turn into empty spaces with fetch-quests.

Also, being “BIG” was never Mass Effect’s appeal in the first place. People loved it for the tight Star Trek-episode structure with a new planet every hour, weird gimmicky aliens and meaningful interactions with the crew. Not for LotR-style of “3 hours of walking through an empty field”.

#bioware #meta #dragon age #long post #Anonymous #asks tag #dai spoilers and grumps #nope bioware

[krokonoko]

Man you've played a lot of games. Do you have a favorite game?

I’ve got a lot of fav games actually!

First on my list has to be Skyrim. There’s never been a game that drew me in so much, inspired me so much and that felt so much like home. But I’m constantly rambling about how much I love Skyrim so yes. Skyrim. Good shit.

I love, love, LOVE Ace Attorney 4, it’s one of the best games I’ve ever played. I love every single character in it, the dialogues are amazingly witty, it’s only flaw is that it never got a sequel.

ALSO MAN Monkey Island 3 is WHERE IT’S AT that game is fricking AMAZING! Been playing it since I was a kid! I already talked about it at length over here, about how much effort they put into the graphics, into the soundtrack, how the riddles are the most well-structured of the entire series… Believe it or not I’ve played this game SO many times by now, I can give you a complete walkthrough from the top of my frickin head!! Haah I gotta replay it some time soon, I miss it sometimes~

Of course Dragon Age 2 is on here too because MAN I ADORE that game to bits and pieces. The combat is TONS of fun, the dialogue system is the absolute pinnacle of what Bioware can do, there’s just the right amount of companions. I love the severity of consequence in this game (some of your friends will just ditch you if you’re not nice enough), I love the story, I love the atmosphere of Kirkwall, I love the menus, I love that there are just enough but not too many side quests and how a lot of them are running through the entire course of the game… DA2 is awesome.

Same goes for Mass Effect 2. By far the game I love most out of the series. Of course its got its flaws like every other Bioware game, but there are some of my favorite ME characters in it! I really liked the dialogue options (it’s very important to me that in a game that boasts about giving you freedom of choice, there is ALWAYS an at least somewhat pacifistic solution, something that’s becoming less common for some reason), and honest to god, the Suicide Mission is the BEST final level of any video game I’ve ever played. Also for some reason the sound design really sticks out in this one for me. Picking up ammo, launching probes etc, everything feels SO SATISFYING thanks to the sound design!

Pokemon in general is something that makes me feel happy, especially the 2nd and 3rd gen, but at the moment, my favorite game is Omega Ruby / Alpha Sapphire (…especially Alpha Sapphire tbh… I just really love Team Aqua, they’re hilarious!) Not only is the 3rd gen awesome, the remake made it even better! The graphics are neat, the dialogue is funnier and more on point than in any other Pokemon game, and there are endearing NPCs all around.

Also it’s been a while, but I remember really liking Metal Gear Solid 3.

Yeah and I think that p much concludes it. …Jesus, MI3, AA4, DA2, ME2, ORAS, MGS3… seems like I’m somewhat of a middle ground kind of guy? Idk I often feel like the first few games of a series are awesome, but they’re only the starting point. Often they’re a bit awkward and it takes the developers a couple of tries to really figure out where they wanna go and realize the full potential of their game. …Until the series starts floundering for one reason or the other, maybe cuz the game series has overstepped its reasonable lifespan, maybe cuz too many cooks spoil the broth, maybe cuz the higher ups dropped the ball on reasonable money management, maybe cuz the developers are losing sight of what their game oughta be cuz they are jealously ogling the money other developers are making with different games… and we get clusterfuck disasters in game form like Andromeda, ESO or *shudders* Monkey Island 4.

But hey, all hope is not lost! There’s always the possibility that the developers drag themselves up by their own bootstraps, straighten out their game concept, remember what it is that makes their game special, add improvements that actually make sense, and bring us new, fun games in the spirit of their precursors, but with the excitement of ingenuity!

(Games that I never played but I love nevertheless: The Last of Us has some of the best writing I’ve ever encountered in the video gaming world period.)

#cal rants #gaming #gaming industry #skyrim #tes #mi #da #me #pokemon #mgs #tlou #anonymous #ask