130 réponses à ce sujet

[Skyblade012]

You say that no other henchmen received Singularity to keep Shepard's unique powers special. That being the case, what was the reason behind giving two henchmen the Engineer's unique ability, the Combat Drone?

Anyway, spoiler warnings start here, the work you did on Liara really did shine through. The constant banter between her and my Shepard was insane fun, and kept me caught up in the mission continually. Getting so much dialogue connected to the combat kept the overall RPG feel going, even during the long action sequences. The characters and mission came alive better than ever before, and I hope you continue this sort of trend into the future.

While I am a bit disappointed that we can't keep Liara on the team, I do feel that you did her story and character justice, even to the love interest sections. Her quest for vengeance, her struggle with who she has become, her feelings for Shepard (both good and bad), all came through incredibly well. I can only hope that you will let her join us full-time when Mass Effect 3 finally comes around. She has easily become my favorite teammate (edit for clarification:  my favorite ME2 teammate, she had already been my favorite ME1 teamate), even in just one mission.

The Shadow Broker intel center is also amazing. Filled with everything from comedy (Legion's dossier is awesome), to deep backstory (the video of Matriarch Aethyta, short as it was), to new combat applications (retraining and the additional research), I appreciate everything that went into it.


This DLC was well worth the wait. While it felt short, I realize now that it did so because I've been so engrossed playing it non-stop since it came out. I hope you all continue the DLC trend. Zaeed and Firewalker were nice starting points. Kasumi took things a step further. Overlord had been the best yet, but now you have eclipsed even that mark. Lair of the Shadow Broker is easily the best downloadable mission you have given us to date, and I am pleased to see all aspects of the game, from combat to roleplaying, being given so much effort.

I may have complained about the downtime, but it was most definitely worth it. Keep it up, I'm already looking forward to the next mission!

Modifié par Skyblade012, 08 septembre 2010 - 05:37 .

[SmokePants]

I would probably be more interested in Stasis if it could be combined with other biotic and concussive effects to attempt to throw the encased enemy out of the level and kill them indirectly. Instead of making other powers useless, it would have the opposite effect.

[Tokion]

I was disappointed that we can't keep Liara on the team, she is probably the most useful companion after Miranda to control tough targets like the eclipse Vangards and heavy weapons snipers. If given the option, I would blow the whole Shadowbroker base to hell to have her on the team.

[SmokePants]

But then it would be pretty awkward -- after all this awesome banter -- for her to suddenly go mute on every other mission you bring her on. In fact, I say screw squadmates. I'd rather have a temporary companion of Liara's quality, than permanent ones that are just sort of "there".

[StingingVelvet]

Good read, thanks. Always interesting to read about the decisions that go into such things and with Shadow Broker especially the work was really well done.

[Tony_Knightcrawler]

Personally I like stasis as a bonus power for any class as it solves a more general gameplay problem - the point blank Krogan. In ME2 if you close point blank with a shielded enemy you can melee them if they are a humanoid, but larger enemies like Krogan are unstoppable. Stasis fills this niche nicely by giving you an "oh crap" power that can save your life, and give you time to reposition.

I personally thought Neural Shock was gonna accomplish this and since I always kinda liked the medic side of things, and that was a medicine-related power from ME1, I chose it as my bonus power. But then I found out it doesn't work against enemies with any defense. And I made a frowny-face.

The long cooldown ended up feeling really punishing though, what is the point of freezing an enemy with stasis if it blocks you from using other abilities for a long time?

We adjusted the design to include diminishing returns. This let us make stasis have short cooldown, and a fairly long duration.
We weren't able to solve all gameplay issues with stasis. We weren't able to find a great way of communicating diminishing returns to players.

...

It will be useful to see how fans react to and use the stasis power. This will help us decide whether or not stasis should be in ME3, and will help us figure out what additional biotic combat improvements are necessary for ME3.

How about this? Casting the ability once in ME3 would put the enemy (or ally) in stasis and make them completely immune to all fire. For this, you'd get normal cooldown. Cast it a second time on the same target and you get triple or quadrupal cooldown, but the target's stasis is extended by 50% and takes 50% damage instead of 0%?



BTW you kick butt for putting up this developer diary and you all rock some serious socks for the awesome DLC (and at $10, I was intentionally making myself hard to be impressed; but I was blown away).

Modifié par Tony_Knightcrawler, 08 septembre 2010 - 09:18 .

[Ch40sFox]

Liara's Custom AI seems to die alot in my opinion, especially on the higher difficulties. I have problems with other Squadmate AI, but not as much as Liara. She seems to have some kind of old ME1 AI Thought process.



Charging right into a group of enemies, most likely expecting to kick in Barrier from the first, and slap a singularity on them all.



The actual effect, is her running into the crowd, and dying near instantly. Odd I find.



Im a little disappointed that there was absolutely no interaction between any of the old ME1 Squadmates, I know this sounds whiney, and I understand its INCREDIBLY difficult to call the VA's back in for a few small lines of dialogue, but it would have made Shadow Broker such a fantastic DLC, that it most likely would have changed the market forever.



I dont believe Ive ever actually seen a DLC of this quality with ANY game out there (Ive played alot), which shocks me further.



Im afraid youve raised my expectations further, and Im curious as to where you'll take ME2 next.



Im also curious about the question up above.



It seems which upgrade you receive is random, as someone received Sniper Rifle Damage upgrade, while I received SubMachine Gun Damage upgrade.



I believe this is ya'lls solution to DLC research that has not been made yet, as you have yet to DLC upgrade MediGel, Shotgun, Sniper Rifle, and Submachine Gun...



I assume that the Shadow Broker Intel center will upgrade the rest of them until they all hit 6, correct?

[Maestro Vivaldi]

During my second playthrough of the DLC i didn't notice an error in the Asari Scientist level 4 description i was talking about in a previous message. Maybe i was looking at a level 3 description before... No problem with it now.

[implodinggoat]

You still better damn well make sure that Liara comes back as a squad member in ME3 Bioware. I was pleased with the way you handled her in this DLC; but if she's not back on the crew for ME3, I'll be beyond pissed.

If you do bring her back, I think you nailed her power set in this DLC. With Singularity, Warp and Stasis, she would be a very useful squadmate in a lot of situations although still not overpowered in my opinion. Also I love the look of her armor, it fits her perfectly.

Furthermore since you already put the effort into adding her as a squaddie, I'd love to see an option to have her come on board following the suicide mission, partifularly if you add any major post end game expansion packs.  With the communications terminals on the Normandy and Feron manning the Broker ship, I don't think it would get in the way of her work to much if she set up shop on the Normandy.  Besides she better be setting up shop on the Normandy in ME3 anyway, so there's no reason not to set up the groundwork now.

Modifié par implodinggoat, 08 septembre 2010 - 10:57 .

[PillarBiter]

I wasn't a fan of stasis in me1, and not particularly of it in me2, but i do have to say that it saved my life a few times on the insanity playthrough.

I'd never use it for my own shepard, but for a limited mission usage, it is very well executed, I think you nailed it. Also, I never got annoyed by liara using stasis, mainly because I only saw her use it on shielded / barrier'd enemies when a lot fo others were still around, and I wasn't looking at the enemy she stasised. I don' know if that was your custom AI usage of stasis, but if it was, that was perfect.

[implodinggoat]

BTW: I'm curious if the research upgrades are random myself. I got a heavy pistol damage and a damage resistance upgrade and I'm not sure I even got credit for the damage resistance upgrade since I already had 6 of 6. If they are random I'm tempted to try replaying to see if I can get myself an assault rifle or sniper rifle upgrade for my Commando.

[implodinggoat]

MrCry0 wrote...

I wasn't a fan of stasis in me1, and not particularly of it in me2, but i do have to say that it saved my life a few times on the insanity playthrough.

I'd never use it for my own shepard, but for a limited mission usage, it is very well executed, I think you nailed it. Also, I never got annoyed by liara using stasis, mainly because I only saw her use it on shielded / barrier'd enemies when a lot fo others were still around, and I wasn't looking at the enemy she stasised. I don' know if that was your custom AI usage of stasis, but if it was, that was perfect.

I actually like Stasis a lot.  So many of the biotic powers in ME2 are useless until you get an enemies defenses down that having a power that immediatley incapacitates an enemy for a long duration regardless of protection is really useful, particularly when it has a fairly short cooldown.

I'd definietly like to see it return in ME3, prefferably as Liara's bonus power just as it was in LOTSB.

I just wish I had more opportunity to use Liara because she was an extremely entertaining squadmate.  She had warp for dealing with armor and barriers, stasis for quickly incapacitating an enemy regardless of any level of protection they might have and singularity for flinging a huge group on unprotected enemies around the map.

I paired her up with Garrus on LOTSB and the combo of Garrus's area overload on a cluster of mercs followed by Liara's wide singularity was immensly entertaining and extremely useful.

[Arcadionn]

Strange; Liara's AI seems solid on my end; after finishing it twice and now looking like a ghost at work - I have yet to lose her once.



Her singularity (and the fact it is distinct in shape) is also amazingly useful. Losing her as a "squad-mate" once the DLC is over is the only con i have with it.

[implodinggoat]

For what it's worth, I love stasis and I'd love to see it make a return in ME3, preferably as Liara's bonus power (FYI: I'll be pissed if she doesn't return as a squad member in ME3). The ability to instantly incapacitate an enemy with protection is really useful and the short recharge duration keeps you from being apprehensive to use it when you need to. It makes a really nice compliment to the other biotic powers since so many of them require you to get an enemy's protection down before they become effective. I found it extremely useful for incapacitating high level enemies while I picked off their low level allies (thus allowing me to focus on them once they come out of stasis) and as a save my butt power when I was getting lit up by an enemy and needed to run for cover. It's a particularly great power for Liara or for an Adept since it adds a very useful ability; but keeps things balanced by maintaining the biotic's weakness against shields.

Also, I think you nailed Liara's set of combat powers, they fit her character perfectly, they're extremely useful in a wide number of situations and yet she still didn't feel overpowered. Warp is always extremely useful for any biotic and gives her a great direct damage power, stasis gives her an ability which is helpful for incapacitating protected enemies and singularity is a blast for taking out large groups of unprotected enemies. I paired Liara with Garrus during LOTSB and had a great time using a combo of Garrus's area overload to bring down a group's shields and then nailing them with Liara's wide singularity to send the whole group flying through the air.

When you bring her back as a squadmate for ME3 (I'll be devastated if she doesn't come back) I highly recommend giving her the exact same set of powers and weapons; because I found her to be one of the most useful and very possibly the most fun to use (singularity really is great fun as a squad power) squad member in the whole game.

PS: Since you already put the work into developing her, I'd love to see her added on as a permanent squad member, post suicide mission, particularly if you guys plan to release any major (disc sized) post suicide mission DLC expansions in the future. If nothing else it would make another great selling point for the LOTSB DLC, since it would give players more opportunity to use a really fun new squad member.

On a side note, I know this is probably a long shot since it would likely entail an unholy amount of programming; but have you considered the possibility of adding her as a squadmate pre suicide mission and scripting the game so that an explosion during the approach to the Collector base incapacitates her before you board the base, making her unavailable as a squad member during the suicide mission and thus ensuring she'll survive into ME3? I know its probably not happening; but I like her character and as I said I think you nailed her power set to such a degree that I had more fun with her in my squad than I did with any other squadmember.

Modifié par implodinggoat, 08 septembre 2010 - 12:40 .

[implodinggoat]

Arcadionn wrote...

Strange; Liara's AI seems solid on my end; after finishing it twice and now looking like a ghost at work - I have yet to lose her once.

Her singularity (and the fact it is distinct in shape) is also amazingly useful. Losing her as a "squad-mate" once the DLC is over is the only con i have with it.

Agreed, I think I had more fun with Liara than I did with any other squadmate.  Hitting a cluster of enemies with area overload then having Liara fling them all into the air with wide singularity was immensly entertaining.  Aside from that warp is always useful and I found stasis a really great compliment as well since it gave her an ability to help against shielded enemies and an ability which can instantly save your butt in a bad situation.

If there's anyway to do it, I'd love to see her get some more spotlight time as a squadmember in ME2.

[davidshooter]

implodinggoat wrote...

Agreed, I think I had more fun with Liara than I did with any other squadmate.  Hitting a cluster of enemies with area overload then having Liara fling them all into the air with wide singularity was immensly entertaining.  Aside from that warp is always useful and I found stasis a really great compliment as well since it gave her an ability to help against shielded enemies and an ability which can instantly save your butt in a bad situation.

If there's anyway to do it, I'd love to see her get some more spotlight time as a squadmember in ME2.

I agree, I'm hoping we can figure out how to mod her into the regular game - obviously she won't speak, but just her powers alone will make her a welcome addition.

[Dinkamus_Littlelog]

I was actually quite happy with stasis. Its a nice gesture for people like me who got sick of being overwhelmed by the necessity of shooting everything up all the time. I think its a good response to be able to control the amount of enemies that need "debuffing" before you can actually employ any sort of biotic powers. Knowing that you can now still make an impact on combat when facing down 4-5 shielded opponents was a good addition. I mean it sure helps when before your only option was warp spam (limited in its effect quite often) or play the class like a soldier.

Likewise can I say that the ability to use statis on the bosses was also a really good touch. Maybe you could consider that as a standard addition for ME3? I dont know if it was absolutely essential that statsis be used on vasir and the broker, but it certainly felt more effective, like I was doing the right thing. The early part of my battle with vasir was faught without stasis, and it certainly felt like I wasnt making as much of an impact as I should. Switching to using stasis changed that right away.

So yeah, it would be nice to see that in future, and perhaps with a wide variety of other powers as well. Not having it be essential, but making it so that "shooting everything until it dies from it" is not always the standard and most effective method. I mean bosses in vanilla ME2 just felt like standard enemies but larger, with the stripping of their defenses being the same monotonous affair that it always is. Feeling like using the right power at the right time was something that had a noticeable impact (as opposed to simply lowering the shield/barrier/armour bar a little) felt good in LotSB.

Modifié par Dinkamus_Littlelog, 08 septembre 2010 - 01:48 .

[JediHealerCosmin]

Very nice article, thank you very much.

I really have to agree with you. While playing my Adept, I found the Stasis an incredible Crowd Control ability. I played LotSB on Hardcore and there were at least 2 occasions  when I got saved by Liara's ability.

However from my own perspective, I wouldn't really use it that much. I've finished the game on Insanity with mostly using the Warp Ammo. I know I'm not resorting to the whole 'Adepts don't need to fire a single shot' , but I find it more entertaining that way.

I really wouldn't mind having it as a henchmen ability, but other than that I am mostly dependent on Singularity + Warp in close encounters like Harbinger. 

[XGCFriedchicken]

Very good read. I deeply enjoyed the DLC and found stasis to be especially useful on my Adept. It works wonders on enemies like Heavy Mechs where Singularity won't cut it. Good job.

[implodinggoat]

davidshooter wrote...

implodinggoat wrote...

Agreed, I think I had more fun with Liara than I did with any other squadmate.  Hitting a cluster of enemies with area overload then having Liara fling them all into the air with wide singularity was immensly entertaining.  Aside from that warp is always useful and I found stasis a really great compliment as well since it gave her an ability to help against shielded enemies and an ability which can instantly save your butt in a bad situation.

If there's anyway to do it, I'd love to see her get some more spotlight time as a squadmember in ME2.

I agree, I'm hoping we can figure out how to mod her into the regular game - obviously she won't speak, but just her powers alone will make her a welcome addition.

I've done a lot of modding on the 360 and with the restrictions 360 modding has, I could see it being theoretically possible to mod her into your current squad for a specific mission by modding your current squad selection; but when you finished the mission, the next time you selected your squad she would be gone and you'd have to mod her into each mission you wanted to use her in, which would be a tremendous pain in the ass.

With PC modding it might be possible to make her a permanent squad member by taking a squad member you don't use very often and overwriting a bunch of the character's files with Liara's files; but that would be very complicated and I'd be very concerned about corrupting or crashing the game.

Unless Bioware adds her as a permanent squadmate, I doubt it would be possible even through modding to make her a permanent squad member.

I'd love to see Bioware add her in as a permanently selectable squad member though and I actually think it could be done relatively easily for future post suicide mission DLC so long as Bioware created the DLC with Liara in mind.  If they release a big disc sized expansion pack (Dragon Age: Awakenings size) then adding Liara in as a new squadmate would be a major selling point and if you needed LOTSB to get her on board then it would be a major selling point for LOTSB as well.  Story wise it would be pretty simple to add an intel center on the Normandy where Liara could [SPOILERS] manage her Shadowbroker operations from the Normandy, while tasking Feron with running the Shadowbroker's ship and maybe picking up some of the slack [END SPOILERS].

Theoretically they could add Liara in as a pre suicide mission squadmember while still ensuring that she's definitely going to be alive in ME3 by adding a scripted event in during the approach to the Collector base where she is incapacitated by an explosion thus making her unselectable for the suicide mission itself and thus ensuring her survival.   The big problem with that though is that it would take a huge amount of programming to ensure that she would work properly in all the missions which occure before the suicide mission and I'm not sure its reasonable to expect that kind of effort from the programming staff.

In any case I'd love to see more of Liara as a squad member in ME2.  I love her character and Christina and the gameplay team did a great job of making her an extremely fun and useful squad member in combat.

[Bruddajakka]

I found she was a lot more cautious once I switch her over from the Locust to the ME5. My other squad mates were ticking me off a bit though.

[davidshooter]

implodinggoat wrote...

davidshooter wrote...

implodinggoat wrote...

Agreed, I think I had more fun with Liara than I did with any other squadmate.  Hitting a cluster of enemies with area overload then having Liara fling them all into the air with wide singularity was immensly entertaining.  Aside from that warp is always useful and I found stasis a really great compliment as well since it gave her an ability to help against shielded enemies and an ability which can instantly save your butt in a bad situation.

If there's anyway to do it, I'd love to see her get some more spotlight time as a squadmember in ME2.

I agree, I'm hoping we can figure out how to mod her into the regular game - obviously she won't speak, but just her powers alone will make her a welcome addition.

I've done a lot of modding on the 360 and with the restrictions 360 modding has, I could see it being theoretically possible to mod her into your current squad for a specific mission by modding your current squad selection; but when you finished the mission, the next time you selected your squad she would be gone and you'd have to mod her into each mission you wanted to use her in, which would be a tremendous pain in the ass.

I don't mind the modding.  My saved games are on the usb so I just take it out and stick it in my laptop.  I've already done most of the missions solo by unchecking the "in squad" box but since Liara isn't in the Gibbed flag editor it will be more complicated than that - but hopefully still doable.  I gave her the incisor in my last playthrough ( it matched her outfit well) so she is at least somewhat moddable.  Fantastic DLC, better than the original game  IMHO, felt like ME1 again.

Modifié par davidshooter, 08 septembre 2010 - 04:09 .

[The Spamming Troll]

i love grunts dossier there. his extranet searching is hilarious.



.........sharks and dinosaurs.

[Multifarious Algorithm]

I thought Liara did a great in combat: I had my usual problem which was Garrus tends to leave himself way too exposed. Once I switched him for Kasumi things went smoothly (though the squads were still damn vicious: you really couldn't leave yourself exposed, and they flanked you pretty aggressively if you didn't shut them down).

[Bruddajakka]

If I had the option of firing Zaeed to replace him with Liara I'd do it in a minute.

Modifié par Bruddajakka, 08 septembre 2010 - 06:25 .