Mass Effect LegendGary Edition

[Inspector Norse]

There another one of these:

Aw shit, it's only part one and they didn't reach Conrad Verner. They should have put Kirrahe higher, he's basically the salarian Garrus.

A lot of great one-off characters there as well, the "biotic god" of course. There's a turian who you chat to for about two minutes who has the most amazing NY accent. found him

[MojoJojo]

So I just finished ME1, some thoughts -
-it's pretty short, as these types of games go. I did all the side missions I think, got the completionist achievement, and only clocked in a bit over 30 hours. Not a ripoff or anything, but short for this sort of game.
- I mentioned before how unfinished a lot of it felt. I also didn't remembered it being a lot better. Turns out when you get to Virmire there is a sudden and dramatic uptick in quality. Everything looks better, sidekicks starting making more interjections, fights get more varied and interesting. It really reinforces the impression that they ran out of money. I believe at the time in was common practice to start with the end levels first, and to only do the first part of the game when everyone is experienced - the idea being you want the first bit of the game to be the best, as more players will see it, whereas only a fraction will get to the end. It looks like this backfired here, and the ended up having to rush the middle bits.
- Further evidence they ran out of time - the inventory system. I don't believe anyone thought that was a good idea. Also weird issues like there being no Quarian armour anywhere.
- The writing is repetitive in places:
  - kill Matriarch Benezia, the Rachi queen resurrects one of her mercenaries to talk to you.
  - Kill the thorian creeper, it releases the Asari it's been cloning to fight you, to talk to you
  - Kill Saren, Sovereign resurrects him to fight you.
There's basically a lot of "the thing you've just been fighting gets brought back to life".

Not sure when I'll start ME2. The Illusive man bollocks is putting me off a bit.

[Lemming]

The thing that always puts me off ME2, in addition to the plot being shit for all the reasons Shamus Young outlines, is how inert Shepard is. Obviously in all these games the player has very minimal actual control over the plot and the choices are mostly an illusion, but ME1 and to an extent ME3 at least do a semi-decent job of making you feel proactive as a player and making Shepard feel like s/he has some control over the plot as a character. You're railroaded through a linear plot, but you can usually express an opinion about how you're being railroaded, and do some (often inconsequential) big choice at the end of a mission.

But ME2 is just inane shit happening and Shepard mindlessly going along with it. Working for Cerberus and being physically unable to protest against it in any way is obviously the biggest laugh, but it happens in every recruitment and loyalty mission too. If you're very lucky, you get to pick between two dialogue options that both express the same thing in slightly different tones of voice. It's especially bad given that all the characters are so edgy and over-the-top - a good half of the party are introduced by murdering and/or mutilating someone (Thane, Samara, Jack, Zaeed, Miranda, etc) and Shepard stands there stonefaced watching it happen and then just says "welcome aboard". Or, very occasionally, has the option to say "that's out of line. welcome aboard".

[Inspector Norse]

It really reinforces the impression that they ran out of money...
- Further evidence they ran out of time - the inventory system. I don't believe anyone thought that was a good idea. Also weird issues like there being no Quarian armour anywhere.

I think they initially planned for all the side missions and planet exploration to be much more central to the game, but yeah they didn't have the time or budget which is why we got so many bland maps with token reskins for the side missions. It's a shame because a lot of the missions have interesting sci-fi concepts at the core, but in the end this amounted to drive shit tank across boring/frustrating map, shoot goons in identical prefab bunker, read little text bit.
There is a theory that this is actually a good representation of the emptiness of space, people trying to survive at the arse end of nowhere probably would just have to plonk a mass-produced portakabin down somewhere and hope for the best, but it doesn't make for exciting or varied gameplay.

- The writing is repetitive in places:
  - kill Matriarch Benezia, the Rachi queen resurrects one of her mercenaries to talk to you.
  - Kill the thorian creeper, it releases the Asari it's been cloning to fight you, to talk to you
  - Kill Saren, Sovereign resurrects him to fight you.
There's basically a lot of "the thing you've just been fighting gets brought back to life".

I think there is also a real KOTOR feel to the first game structurally and plotwise. Several of the missions (notably Feros with the Thorian) feel like they could have come directly from one of those games. The ambient stuff, worldbuilding and graphics are where they made their advances.

Not sure when I'll start ME2. The Illusive man bollocks is putting me off a bit.

The thing that always puts me off ME2, in addition to the plot being shit for all the reasons Shamus Young outlines, is how inert Shepard is. Obviously in all these games the player has very minimal actual control over the plot and the choices are mostly an illusion, but ME1 and to an extent ME3 at least do a semi-decent job of making you feel proactive as a player and making Shepard feel like s/he has some control over the plot as a character. You're railroaded through a linear plot, but you can usually express an opinion about how you're being railroaded, and do some (often inconsequential) big choice at the end of a mission.

But ME2 is just inane shit happening and Shepard mindlessly going along with it. Working for Cerberus and being physically unable to protest against it in any way is obviously the biggest laugh, but it happens in every recruitment and loyalty mission too. If you're very lucky, you get to pick between two dialogue options that both express the same thing in slightly different tones of voice. It's especially bad given that all the characters are so edgy and over-the-top - a good half of the party are introduced by murdering and/or mutilating someone (Thane, Samara, Jack, Zaeed, Miranda, etc) and Shepard stands there stonefaced watching it happen and then just says "welcome aboard". Or, very occasionally, has the option to say "that's out of line. welcome aboard".

ME2 is probably the best in the trilogy in terms of the actual gameplay and the characters, but you have to put up with the basically irrelevant plot and yes, the frustration at not being able to tell TIM to stick it up his arse. It could so easily have been solved by just having Shepard work for Alliance Black Ops because the Council didn't want to go public (after all, you can meet them and get their tacit support anyway, so who gives a shit about Cerberus? It's just really badly handled).
I think part of the issue was that there seem to have been a team of writers who didn't always communicate. Each character's story and dialogue was done by different people, so you get some awkward and crap stuff (Jacob for example) alongside really great stuff like Mordin and the Tali/Legion bits. You see this as well because the game is, typically for the serious, a bit too overambitious with the paragon/renegade system, meaning that while a paragon Shepard can pretty much rein in the Jacks and Mirandas, a renegade (I'm midway through a renegade go-through now just to see the differences) is just unconvincing: again, seems different people have had a go at writing it, so sometimes you're just an arrogant jerk, sometimes a maverick hardass, sometimes a violent thug, and sometimes a space racist who actively wants to work for Cerberus. And half the time the renegade option just means you don't do a quest, which is daft.
The edgy stuff makes sense because it's just The Dirty Dozen in space, you're getting together a team of mad, bad and dangerous people, the only ones crazy and foolhardy enough to follow you on your mission.
That said, it does work to an extent with the choices, because many of the bigger decisions do get payoffs further down the line - things like Mordin's loyalty mission have a knock-on effect on how the particular sideplots play out in ME3. But at other times there's no consequence other than, say, a differently-worded email arriving at your personal terminal.

[Thursday]

The time-sensitive ending of Mass Effect 2 is a real misstep I think. On repeat playthroughs you know hot to game the system, and just not do that specific mission until as late as you can, (If you want everyone to survive) but that also means you miss all the interesting Legion dialogue, and can't have him along for all the missions. 

The strength of Mass Effect 2 to me is when it has this "episodic monster of the week" tv show feel, but the game keeps insisting there's this urgent threat you have to go and deal with immediately. It ruins the vibe.

[Inspector Norse]

Well yes but in pretty much any game you know how to beat the system on your second go.

There is a way to get Legion involved more I think if you are just careful to only do the loyalty missions for a specific number of characters, ie (I think) the ones you're going to choose for the specific tasks on the suicide mission plus a couple of the tanky guys to protect all the rest, before going on the suicide run.  Then you can do the rest of the loyalty missions plus the DLC and sides after the suicide mission and take Legion with you.

The other option is just to ignore the suicide mission until the very end and let Chakwas and the dude with the terrible "Scottish" accent and the rest get turned into alien gloop.

[Mobius]

I clocked ME1, but have just gotten about half way through 2 and it's really dragging. I think I went too hard exploring everything and burned myself out

So I've started Mass Effect 3 using that interactive comic to make decisions. Hopefully everyone is alive but not that bothered if not.

[Lemming]

The edgy stuff makes sense because it's just The Dirty Dozen in space, you're getting together a team of mad, bad and dangerous people, the only ones crazy and foolhardy enough to follow you on your mission.

There's a lot they could get out of the concept while still railroading the player through broadly the same plot - a Paragon Shepard trying to make as few moral compromises as possible while still trying to round up a team of "necessary" psychos could make for a good story, as could a Renegade Shepard trying to hard-arse a bunch of unruly crooks into shape and drive them berserk prior to the big mission. But you can't really do either, Shepard's just sort of limp.

If they'd gone that way they could have given the player real tangible immediate consequences for their choices too; like, the the cost of doing the right/Paragon thing could be to exclude yourself from winning the loyalty of numerous crew*, making it more likely that they'll die on the big finale and leave you in an unwinnable position. I remember being excited when it briefly appeared that Zaeed's loyalty mission would end in failure if you did the obviously morally correct thing of trying to save the trapped workers, but iirc the game just lets you shit all over Zaeed for the entire mission and punch him in the face and then he inexplicably becomes "Loyal" anyway if you pick the "please let me win" dialogue option at the end.

[oggyraiding]

I don't like how in ME2, the mechanics of resolving the two instances of conflict in the team (Tali and Legion, Jack and Miranda) is fundamentally the same whether you're Paragon or Renegade - you just need (I think) 50% Paragon or Renegade to solve the first conflict you encounter, and 100% Paragon or Renegade to solve the other. Then everyone gets along fine and will all be loyal to you.

I like the idea of the conflicts, especially Tali and Legion, and they could have really built on it, but ultimately their conflict is resolved with a simple stat check.

[Mobius]

Even though it has the crap ending. I feel like ME3 is definitely the best. the gameplay, gunplay, movement etc feel the smoothest of all of them. I like the 'war score' stuff, makes the conflict feel bigger, and being chased by reapers on the map is a bit silly but more engaging than the maps in the other 2 games I guess? Obviously the graphics are nicer, and it seems (the few hours I've played so far) more cinematic, like the camera angles and stuff during conversations.

I'm enjoying it so far anyway. I haven't played ME3 since it came out / the ending furore whereas I have replayed 1 & 2 in the past, plus ME3 is obviously just a bit more modern so it's an easier adjustment I guess.

Jack seemed pissed at me for giving away a base to Cerberus when I met her, so I guess one of those comic choices had a negative impact.

[Inspector Norse]

There's a lot they could get out of the concept...
If they'd gone that way they could have given the player real tangible immediate consequences for their choices too

I don't like how in ME2, the mechanics of resolving the two instances of conflict in the team (Tali and Legion, Jack and Miranda) is fundamentally the same whether you're Paragon or Renegade - you just need (I think) 50% Paragon or Renegade to solve the first conflict you encounter, and 100% Paragon or Renegade to solve the other. Then everyone gets along fine and will all be loyal to you.

I like the idea of the conflicts, especially Tali and Legion, and they could have really built on it, but ultimately their conflict is resolved with a simple stat check.

Yeah the choice and morality mechanics are ultimately a bit lamely implemented across the trilogy, not just in 2. There are a few sideplots where you really do get to choose the ending, or, even better, where the ending in ME3 is affected by decisions you made way back in the first game, but there are a lot where you just go "do this or do that" and it's just a different email that comes and nothing more; likewise, if you have a high enough score in the blue or red box you can bend anyone to your will regardless of morality.
I think it's great that some of the decisions aren't black and white, and make you think, but the game mechanic still has to show everything as the "good" or "bad" choice, and as I mentioned, the morality goes a bit awry anyway when you want to be a naughty boy: sometimes you want to be a smart-mouthed hardass, but then next time you choose that option it makes you into someone who randomly shoots people in the face just for being annoying, beats up lady journalists or supports Cerberus or the EDL guy on the Citadel.

In Andromeda they abandoned that Mechanic and just made your character come back with a different "feeling" each time, which was an OK idea but ultimately made it blander, partly because the writing in Andromeda was stripped of most of the wit and creativity of the original trilogy so everything was Hollyoaks-tier. The new game is in pre-production but looking at the news updates they've got a few veterans from the trilogy and some new talent like one of the main writers from Deus Ex, which suggests choice is still going to be a key feature. Perhaps they can develop the way it works to be, well, better.

[Lemming]

I think the strangest example of a complex choice being forced into "good/bad" is the Tali loyalty mission. Still can't wrap my head around "cover for war criminal = paragon action" and "tell the objective truth to a court of law = renegade action". The rationale seems to be literally just that whatever upsets Tali is morally wrong, and whatever makes her happy is morally right. Even if what makes her happy is withholding key evidence from and lying to a war crimes court. Madness.

Though I was pleasantly surprised by the bit where you meet Tali in ME3 and she tells you that she's thought about it a bit more and now agrees that you did the right thing by turning in her father.

[Inspector Norse]

I think the strangest example of a complex choice being forced into "good/bad" is the Tali loyalty mission. Still can't wrap my head around "cover for war criminal = paragon action" and "tell the objective truth to a court of law = renegade action". The rationale seems to be literally just that whatever upsets Tali is morally wrong, and whatever makes her happy is morally right. Even if what makes her happy is withholding key evidence from and lying to a war crimes court. Madness.

Though I was pleasantly surprised by the bit where you meet Tali in ME3 and she tells you that she's thought about it a bit more and now agrees that you did the right thing by turning in her father.

I just did that one again on my renegade playthrough and yeah - it's a good mission (especially if you take Legion to confuse the shit out of all the Quarians), and a good dilemma at the end: but it doesn't fit the red/blue system. They just painted themselves into a bit of a corner with that. I think for a normal playthrough you'd just take whatever you thought was the best option, and ignore the red/blue thing, but you can't if you don't have the nice-guy or bad-guy stats.