175 réponses à ce sujet

[Yojimbo_Ltd]

I think you hit it on the bat

[Evil Johnny 666]

Ship.wreck wrote...

Why would all the suits not be integrated? In the Navy you don't get advanced warning that you're going to accidently go overboard so that you can go change your tactical vest for your life preserver. So your tactical vest damn well better have some kind of integrated floatation device, or at least neutral boyancy so it doesn't actually sink your ass, cause when you go that tac vest is all you're gonna have.

Likewise in the future space Navy you wouldn't get any advanced warning your about to get spaced so you have time to go change your general combat / space suit for your space diving suit. So again it damn well better be integrated into whatever suit you're usually wearing.

Shepard's usuall suit obviously protects him from the vacuum and radiation of space as demonstrated on the outside of the Citadel in ME1 and as he walks through the breached CIC deck in the begining of ME2, so why wouldn't it also incorporate at least some protection from unexpected re-entry?  And actually the prototypes or designs they were showing of the actuall space diving suit were really not that bulky at all in fact they reminded me in a major way of the ME armor which is why I thought it was so cool. No idea how they do it and yes seems a little sketchy at present but still, it's the future man.

I said I hoped that Shepard would be able to space dive to safety, not thought. Granted he was obviously having serious issues before he hit the atmosphere, but even without necessarily having been purpose built for re-entry it's not out of the question that his suit could've kept him in tact enough to "re-build" It's not like he's an astroid blazing in at like Mach30 from the depths of intersteller space, he fell out of a space shuttle. And even if he is moving fairly quick upon re-entry he doesn't have the inertia of those astroids you see cratering planetary surfaces, he's just a little human body, he'd almost certainly be slowed by drag to terminal velocity before impact (Assuming an earth-like atmoshpher and why not? the joint's blue right?) which won't be more than a couple hundred miles per hour. Not at all out of the question to think he be a mushed up badly burnt / frozen puddle that's mostly all their when they got to him.

As for his speed, our perception of speed is based on relative movements between objects and refrence points... in space there aren't any. The only reference point we get is the planet a few thousand miles away, at that range he and the ship could be whiping past the planet at thousands upon thousands of miles per hour and still look like they're just drifting past... and that would make sense considering that they got hit and taken out on the run attempting evasive manuvers. Which would make slingshoting or achieving orbit easily plausible based on the info from the intro. Now based on our knowledge of the DLC we know the ship did eventually land on the planet but that doesn't mean it fell straight down, it could've been moving just barely too slow to achieve orbit. which would result in a possibly very slowly "decaying" orbit which would be a loooooonnnnngggg sloooooowwww spiral into the center before finally hiting the atmosphere slowingdown and droping in. Which could leave plenty of time to recover Shepards body before re-entry. And again even if he did re-enter not necessarily an unquestionable incineration.

As for finding him, although it's suggested by Li'Ara to have been difficult might not have been exactly impossible. In todays Navy most tactical, floatation, and flight quarters vests have integrated gps beacons automatically activated upon submersion in salt water, it's not really super high tech stuff, and that's todays not really super high tech stuff. You go in the drink, conscious or not, dead or alive, that thing goes off notifies every GPS satelite in line of sight that you're lost at sea and those tell the appriate agency right where to pick you up... namely any gps equiped vessel in range. So is it really too much to think Shepard's (and every space faring op including your run of the mill freighter) wouldn't have some extrememly simple low tech similar technology to say, "Hey what's that? The vacuum of space? You didn't tell me we were going into the vacuum of space, this must be an emergency, I'll notify everyone in the area!" and BLEEP, you're a bleep on someone's screen already.

None of this is really that sci fi or hi tech, it all exists in some form or another right now, so it's not even really a stretch to assume it exists in ME2. I mean (Edit) socks and underpants aren't specifically mentioned in the codex either but some things can just be logically assumed...

Well, considering the distance, I would think space diving suits are effective only in low orbit which wasn't the case here. He may have been "slowly" going down, but his speed would get VERY high. High speed + friction = heat, the faster you are, the more resistance the atmosphere poses, unless his suit was designed to be able to sustain thousands of degrees (unlikely since even if the suit would make it, the person obviously wouldn't) he'd become a fireball. Even if friction does slow down, Shepard isn't as big as a ship and the gravitational force would ultimately succeed in making him accelerate a great deal. Plus, I'd be surprised for a space diving suit prototype to be that small considering how big normal suits are, and it's all about stopping acceleration. You think a body free-falling wouldn't be more than a couple of hundred miles per hour? Even if Shepard was slowly going down, speed gain would be inevitable, and the closer he'd get to the planet the faster he'd get. I'd be surprised if it took more than a few hours.

Plus, the closest you are to a planet's surface, the bigger the acceleration is, acceleration already being an augmentation of speed per second. Alchera's surface gravity is 0,85g, wich is relatively close to the Earth's. Being subjected to this acceleration for 1 single minute from a null speed, you reach 500 m/s, or 1 810 km/h. Needless to say that Shepard (and the ship) will at least reach that speed, particularly Shepard who offers less resistance (regardless of mass, objects within atmosphere are subject to the very same acceleration). A ship broken in half will obviously disintegrate due to heat (everything is exposed, thus no heat protection) and all which will be left will be pieces. Even if the ship did not disintegrate, the deceleration of the impact would make a similar end to the ship (the Challenger crew compartent was subject to a deceleration of 200g the moment it hit the water surface, imagine hard terrain, not much more than a crater would be left). As for Shepard, if for some reason his suit could resist heat a human body inside can't, Shepard would be liquid.

But hey, I guess it's just that such things irritate me more than FTL. For fun, I did some calculus, and if you take the ME codex entry of being able to reach 12 ly in a day, they would've already reached 12 ly long before the FTL speed with an acceleration of 3g (what astronauts are subject to at maximum), and that is assuming such acceleration isn't deadly after such a prolonger period of time. It's not the force of the acceleration in itself that is dangerous, but the time you are subject to it. Hell, I found plenty of numbers and they are quite funny. Obviously I would've been a fool to expect to find any of this realistic, but I just think the Shepard being retrieved bit to be a lot more far fetched than mere ignoring of the effects of acceleration when the game wouldn't exist without it, even more considering we don't know what future will hold us in regards of space ships.

[Evil Johnny 666]

Phaelducan wrote...

I think that's a strength of Western RPG's. In allowing the story to play out with subtle variations on each playthrough (or not so subtle ones, I'm,looking at you Megaton), it allows the idea of the story itself to take center stage. Shepard, as far as Western RPG's go, is one of the most fleshed out main characters I can think of. Full voice acting and a concrete class (1 of 6) and background story (1 of 3, twice) gives more framework and context than many other great Western RPG's. Yes, Shepard can only develop along strict options for quest completions and dialog options... but in all fairness that is more than most Western RPG's give.

Rarely do NPC's give two crams about earlier choices you made, and even if they do you can usually do some hokey morality junk (donate water, food, money, whatever) and erase earlier consequences.

I really feel that's what the whole spectrum of arguing boils down to, is the preference of the player about whether they like the Bioware/Bethesda style or the Square/Enix style. I still maintain there is room for both types, and god forbid there only be one style of RPG out there, but when it comes down to it... I believe strongly that when you go buy an RPG developed by a North American company... there are some conventions that you expect to be in the game.

You must be mistaken, I'm not mad at all. I'm more irritated when people are posting ridiculous comments. We all have our opinions, sure, but that doesn't mean that it disables us from critical thought or anything or that the majority is always more valid. And If I told you Britney Spears sells well being because of her music being quality, would you believe me? Thing is nowadays video games attrack people who'd normally not play video games, which can be seen as both a good and bad thing. A bad thing, because most of these people are those who only know American movies and who rates the best accordingly to a single "scene" instead of the whole thing for a random example. Anyway, I'm repeating myself and getting out of topic.

Personally, I find Shepard to be one of the most boring RPG characters I've played, to me, he's the main flaw of the ME games. Shepard is just a character defined by player choice, and most of the time, those choices aren't very fullfilling and are nothing more than either play the good guy or bad guy. Sure, he can have a different background, class and such, but what really makes him who he is is the dialog system which I find quite lacklustre due to the lack of choice, and not being able to play sometone not so unmercyfully stereotyped. I'd rather play Cloud Strife of Serge who are totally defined character whom have a rich background and story, rather than play someone who so blatantly tries to give you choice while being defined at the same time and failing. The Elder Scrolls give you a nameless character but "unlimited" choices, but Mass Effect gives you a choice among select predefined stereotypical characters with both limited background, story and choice. Making a fully voiced main character while trying to make him as complex and deep as possible as well as giving you as much choices as possible feels way too hard to pull off. Like with Oblivion having complete voice overs, it resulted in less dialog as well as less dialog options. I don't mind that much having limited options, but at least give me compelling character choices and not either a saint or a complete jerk.

Anyway. This post wasn't written with as much malice as before. It's just with going over several forums of my favourite games, I get a feeling too many people would take anything that is given without question and settle for less rather than thinking about it (good or bad) and wanting a better experience (I'm not saying everyone praising ME2 are like this at all). Video game is such a complex work that most of the time the best games are the originals, like when artists achieve something without thinking about it, but when they actually try to recapture something and/or do it on purpose they fall short. Like when Bethesda looked at their past ES games to make Oblivion and took some elements out of context. Experience often comes with a rationale a bit too important.

[Yojimbo_Ltd]

Evil Johnny 666 wrote...

Phaelducan wrote...

I think that's a strength of Western RPG's. In allowing the story to play out with subtle variations on each playthrough (or not so subtle ones, I'm,looking at you Megaton), it allows the idea of the story itself to take center stage. Shepard, as far as Western RPG's go, is one of the most fleshed out main characters I can think of. Full voice acting and a concrete class (1 of 6) and background story (1 of 3, twice) gives more framework and context than many other great Western RPG's. Yes, Shepard can only develop along strict options for quest completions and dialog options... but in all fairness that is more than most Western RPG's give.

Rarely do NPC's give two crams about earlier choices you made, and even if they do you can usually do some hokey morality junk (donate water, food, money, whatever) and erase earlier consequences.

I really feel that's what the whole spectrum of arguing boils down to, is the preference of the player about whether they like the Bioware/Bethesda style or the Square/Enix style. I still maintain there is room for both types, and god forbid there only be one style of RPG out there, but when it comes down to it... I believe strongly that when you go buy an RPG developed by a North American company... there are some conventions that you expect to be in the game.

You must be mistaken, I'm not mad at all. I'm more irritated when people are posting ridiculous comments. We all have our opinions, sure, but that doesn't mean that it disables us from critical thought or anything or that the majority is always more valid. And If I told you Britney Spears sells well being because of her music being quality, would you believe me? Thing is nowadays video games attrack people who'd normally not play video games, which can be seen as both a good and bad thing. A bad thing, because most of these people are those who only know American movies and who rates the best accordingly to a single "scene" instead of the whole thing for a random example. Anyway, I'm repeating myself and getting out of topic.

Personally, I find Shepard to be one of the most boring RPG characters I've played, to me, he's the main flaw of the ME games. Shepard is just a character defined by player choice, and most of the time, those choices aren't very fullfilling and are nothing more than either play the good guy or bad guy. Sure, he can have a different background, class and such, but what really makes him who he is is the dialog system which I find quite lacklustre due to the lack of choice, and not being able to play sometone not so unmercyfully stereotyped. I'd rather play Cloud Strife of Serge who are totally defined character whom have a rich background and story, rather than play someone who so blatantly tries to give you choice while being defined at the same time and failing. The Elder Scrolls give you a nameless character but "unlimited" choices, but Mass Effect gives you a choice among select predefined stereotypical characters with both limited background, story and choice. Making a fully voiced main character while trying to make him as complex and deep as possible as well as giving you as much choices as possible feels way too hard to pull off. Like with Oblivion having complete voice overs, it resulted in less dialog as well as less dialog options. I don't mind that much having limited options, but at least give me compelling character choices and not either a saint or a complete jerk.

Anyway. This post wasn't written with as much malice as before. It's just with going over several forums of my favourite games, I get a feeling too many people would take anything that is given without question and settle for less rather than thinking about it (good or bad) and wanting a better experience (I'm not saying everyone praising ME2 are like this at all). Video game is such a complex work that most of the time the best games are the originals, like when artists achieve something without thinking about it, but when they actually try to recapture something and/or do it on purpose they fall short. Like when Bethesda looked at their past ES games to make Oblivion and took some elements out of context. Experience often comes with a rationale a bit too important.

Oblivion could get away with it because you weren't the MAIN CHARACTER. You were the side-kick. Martin was the hero of the story.

So it doesn't make me care about my own character...  damn.

In mass effect, there is no story arch unless you try to make it into it. Some people play all paragon or renegade and their shepard doesn't change at all. He starts to become like the Master Chief. Don't get me wrong, i find the chief inspirational, but he isn't a good "hero". the story becomes more about the arbiter because his character actually has an arch.

When someone doesn't grow or change because of a story... why are we telling it?

We could tell the story of the reapers from another protagonists perspective instead of shepard. Maybe make shepard like a presence, like the master chief, instead of the main character.

[Predi1988]

Well, the only internal contradiction that bothered me was on the Heretic Station. All the way to the end when you talked to Legion, your Paragon answers was all about how wrong it is to reprogram them, strip away the Heretics free will to choose a different path (even if that is to follow the Reapers), and brainwashing (or rather reformatting) them is unethical. But when you are on the decision making point, the Paragon answer is to reprogram them.... WTF? Wasn't the paragon opinion was against reprogramming?

Other than this, every other contradiction has an explanation somewhere. Or just not that bothering to keep looking for explanation. Even the crew abduction didn't bother me...

[Yojimbo_Ltd]

Predi1988 wrote...

Well, the only internal contradiction that bothered me was on the Heretic Station. All the way to the end when you talked to Legion, your Paragon answers was all about how wrong it is to reprogram them, strip away the Heretics free will to choose a different path (even if that is to follow the Reapers), and brainwashing (or rather reformatting) them is unethical. But when you are on the decision making point, the Paragon answer is to reprogram them.... WTF? Wasn't the paragon opinion was against reprogramming?
Other than this, every other contradiction has an explanation somewhere. Or just not that bothering to keep looking for explanation. Even the crew abduction didn't bother me...

That decsion was completely grey. They just arbitrarily put paragon, renegade for no reason. It should have been about why you did what you did. Not what.

example: Destroy the geth

1.Paragon reasoning- It is unethical to "rewrite" a people
2. Renegade- kill them now to avoid potential problems later.

Rewrite the geth
1. i'm sorry, this just seems pure renegade to me...

[Vaenier]

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

Rewrite the geth
1. i'm sorry, this just seems pure renegade to me...

Paragon: The alternitive is death? This is the same as killing them, but you get new clones in the process? They were doing it themselves? they can have cake?
Renegade: The alternitive is death? This is the same as killing them, but you get new clones in the process? They were doing it themselves?

this decision has nothing to do with paragon renegade really. I hate the entire paragon renegade system myself, it kills roleplay, and makes choices kinda dumb if you always lable what is the right thing to do.

I actually hated the paragon/renegade system so much, I deluded myself into thinking this choice did not have lables. i was very disapointed when i learned of the reality of it.

Modifié par Vaenier, 12 décembre 2010 - 07:42 .

[Caael]

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

KEEP IN MIND! He is not complaining about UNIVERSE issues! He is complaining about PLOT issues because this is first and foremost a story.

Shep could have been swapped for ANOTHER charismatic, badass special forces commander. There is more than one... I hope.

Shepard is the only one that's killed a Reaper.

Shepard's influence is shown everywhere; especially on the Citadel with the endorsements. The game explains enough why he's an asset to humanity, I'd have thought it was glaringly obvious throughout the game? Yes he's not the only person in the universe to be able to lead a team but he's the only human to become a spectre, the only human to kill a Reaper (essentially), the one that stopped the entire Geth invasion of the citadel. The fact that he stopped the Reaper's return is not enough justification for his revival?

Modifié par Caael, 12 décembre 2010 - 07:51 .

[Evil Johnny 666]

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

Oblivion could get away with it because you weren't the MAIN CHARACTER. You were the side-kick. Martin was the hero of the story.

So it doesn't make me care about my own character...  damn.

In mass effect, there is no story arch unless you try to make it into it. Some people play all paragon or renegade and their shepard doesn't change at all. He starts to become like the Master Chief. Don't get me wrong, i find the chief inspirational, but he isn't a good "hero". the story becomes more about the arbiter because his character actually has an arch.

When someone doesn't grow or change because of a story... why are we telling it?

We could tell the story of the reapers from another protagonists perspective instead of shepard. Maybe make shepard like a presence, like the master chief, instead of the main character.

Well, you were Martin's errand boy, the dude who did all the hard work and the champion of Cyrodiil. Still, my point was that while you weren't really a defined character, at least you weren't stuck with choosing half defined stereotypical characters. Since you're the one who makes Shepard who he is, the developers can't define him too much, giving you room for your interpretation of him. Thing is, in a highly cinematic experience as Mass Effect and trying to give you several choices, that would be a huge work to make him as defined as possible for all choices you can make, thus you're left with someone who's essentially a good guy or a bad guy with a few important choices in-betwen, compared with Oblivion where you can be pretty much anything. But I don't view those important choices as being particularly important to define Shepard's character. As cool as some of these choices are, it's more often than not a choice between killing/letting die something or not, which was mostly in ME1 and felt more natural as Shepard felt less along either extremes as in ME2 (or maybe it's just an impression). I think my biggest gripe in this regard is Shepard's choices being too tied with a morality and a certain more defined Shepard character. If choices were real choices which can be tied with a certain morality, but didn't feel particularly limited or limitative, then I wouldn't be bothered at all with a character as Shepard. Thing is, every time I think I'm just answering as what the highlighted option makes me believe, Shepard too often adds something I would have never known about which I don't like at all. Like I can't tell Jacob I trust him without telling him he works for the wrong people, that's what irritates me. It's more an illusion of choice at times and I feel like playing a Shepard I chosed rather than playing my Shepard. I may be wrong, but from what I remember of Kotor, choices were much more subtile and less obvious.

Personally, I don't mind that much about your character not growing in terms of "psychology", as long as the story is highly engrossing, something which I felt ME2 was lacking. It felt more like galivanting the galaxy assembling a team and resolving everyone's problem than progressing ME's plot a great deal. We know the Reapers are coming, but let's turn our attention elsewhere.

Modifié par Evil Johnny 666, 12 décembre 2010 - 08:13 .

[Iakus]

Predi1988 wrote...

Well, the only internal contradiction that bothered me was on the Heretic Station. All the way to the end when you talked to Legion, your Paragon answers was all about how wrong it is to reprogram them, strip away the Heretics free will to choose a different path (even if that is to follow the Reapers), and brainwashing (or rather reformatting) them is unethical. But when you are on the decision making point, the Paragon answer is to reprogram them.... WTF? Wasn't the paragon opinion was against reprogramming?
Other than this, every other contradiction has an explanation somewhere. Or just not that bothering to keep looking for explanation. Even the crew abduction didn't bother me...

I have a theoery about that.  The Heretic geth are actually Indoctrinated geth.  Sovereign found a way to alter the programming of some of the geth, making them worship the Reapers.  Shepard is actually curing them of their brainwashing.  That's how I interpret it as being a paragon action.

[Evil Johnny 666]

Caael wrote...

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

KEEP IN MIND! He is not complaining about UNIVERSE issues! He is complaining about PLOT issues because this is first and foremost a story.

Shep could have been swapped for ANOTHER charismatic, badass special forces commander. There is more than one... I hope.

Shepard is the only one that's killed a Reaper.

Shepard's influence is shown everywhere; especially on the Citadel with the endorsements. The game explains enough why he's an asset to humanity, I'd have thought it was glaringly obvious throughout the game? Yes he's not the only person in the universe to be able to lead a team but he's the only human to become a spectre, the only human to kill a Reaper (essentially), the one that stopped the entire Geth invasion of the citadel. The fact that he stopped the Reaper's return is not enough justification for his revival?

Without the Cipher he wouldn't have been able to do anything. Shepard isn't THAT good, remember, he was chosen from group, not outright hand picked like this. The galaxy's big, I'm sure TIM could've find someone almost as good. Plus, Shepard's influence did not serve him an inch, he was working with a bunch of terrorists who told him who to recruit. Sure a good leader and soldier is vital, but Shepard was 1/12 of his team, and I'd be surprised TIM wouldn't know of any other very competent leader to risk killing in a suicide mission. I don't know, I find it hard to believe someone would potentially waste so many resources to ressurect someone for a suicide mission, when the most important thing is the Reaper army coming. The whole collector thing feels highly insignificant compared to a force which killed all life in the galaxy more than a few times.

[Terraneaux]

Evil Johnny 666 wrote...

Without the Cipher he wouldn't have been able to do anything. Shepard isn't THAT good, remember, he was chosen from group, not outright hand picked like this. The galaxy's big, I'm sure TIM could've find someone almost as good. Plus, Shepard's influence did not serve him an inch, he was working with a bunch of terrorists who told him who to recruit. Sure a good leader and soldier is vital, but Shepard was 1/12 of his team, and I'd be surprised TIM wouldn't know of any other very competent leader to risk killing in a suicide mission. I don't know, I find it hard to believe someone would potentially waste so many resources to ressurect someone for a suicide mission, when the most important thing is the Reaper army coming. The whole collector thing feels highly insignificant compared to a force which killed all life in the galaxy more than a few times.

The whole thing was like a bad railroad rpg plot - your patron has more than enough resources to solve the problem themselves, but they would rather have you do it, and will spend an unreasonable amount of resources keeping that relationship the way it is.  Also, mysteriously, you have to pay for everything yourself.  

[Caael]

Evil Johnny 666 wrote...

Caael wrote...

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

KEEP IN MIND! He is not complaining about UNIVERSE issues! He is complaining about PLOT issues because this is first and foremost a story.

Shep could have been swapped for ANOTHER charismatic, badass special forces commander. There is more than one... I hope.

Shepard is the only one that's killed a Reaper.

Shepard's influence is shown everywhere; especially on the Citadel with the endorsements. The game explains enough why he's an asset to humanity, I'd have thought it was glaringly obvious throughout the game? Yes he's not the only person in the universe to be able to lead a team but he's the only human to become a spectre, the only human to kill a Reaper (essentially), the one that stopped the entire Geth invasion of the citadel. The fact that he stopped the Reaper's return is not enough justification for his revival?

Without the Cipher he wouldn't have been able to do anything. Shepard isn't THAT good, remember, he was chosen from group, not outright hand picked like this. The galaxy's big, I'm sure TIM could've find someone almost as good. Plus, Shepard's influence did not serve him an inch, he was working with a bunch of terrorists who told him who to recruit. Sure a good leader and soldier is vital, but Shepard was 1/12 of his team, and I'd be surprised TIM wouldn't know of any other very competent leader to risk killing in a suicide mission. I don't know, I find it hard to believe someone would potentially waste so many resources to ressurect someone for a suicide mission, when the most important thing is the Reaper army coming. The whole collector thing feels highly insignificant compared to a force which killed all life in the galaxy more than a few times.

Point = missed.

It's not about whether he's competent or not, nobody's questioning that he's not the only capable soldier in the universe. It's what he stands for that's important; TIM even explains in the prologue about the galaxy needing a symbol to guide them or something to that extent. 

Saying that without the cypher he wouldn't be able to do anything is moot. He HAS the cypher, so what's your point? It provides the basis for his significance throughout. The reason his influence isn't as strong throughout the game is because there's few situations where he would gain from it in game. There's no reason for him to throw around his fame, but knowing he's alive stands as a symbol of hope. 

[RyuGuitarFreak]

TIM decided to revive Shepard by the fact that he was the hero of the Citadel in ME1 and everything that came together with the package. If it weren't for it, he was never gonna be hit by the Collectors and more importantly, never resurrected. So, being the one that had the visions and also everything that happened because of it is already established as the reasons TIM resurrected Shepard. Had another human been the hero he would have resurrected him/her. If it wasn't a human than TIM would make something else, maybe spend his time banging Miranda until the reapers came. Ignoring the fact that he was the hero of the Citadel as some uniqueness is ignorance of the facts on the first game, silly and nitpicky, seriously.

I'll just leave these notes here:

TIM didn't want anyone else leading their mission against the reapers. Shepard wasn't resurrected to fight the Collectors, but to fight the reapers. It just occurred that they were a threat to humanity and were somehow associated to the reapers. Weren't they a threat to humanity TIM wouldn't have bothered and if they weren't in the Terminus and associated to the reapers, maybe Shepard wouldn't have bothered. And you know, the Collectors were confirmed to be the ones abducting human colonies with the presence of Shepard on Freedom's Progress. Also, that mission only started because Shepard accepted to go there "before parting ways with Cerberus". So, the "suicide mission" and its run against the clock because of Shepard's presence and influence in the events in the first place.

I don't think another beacon to move the story forward would make much sense because their main purpose was to lead someone to the cypher. And I think that using the same plot resources from the first game would be damn lazy.

Bye.

Modifié par RyuGuitarFreak, 12 décembre 2010 - 08:35 .

[Terraneaux]

Caael wrote...

Point = missed.

It's not about whether he's competent or not, nobody's questioning that he's not the only capable soldier in the universe. It's what he stands for that's important; TIM even explains in the prologue about the galaxy needing a symbol to guide them or something to that extent. 

Saying that without the cypher he wouldn't be able to do anything is moot. He HAS the cypher, so what's your point? It provides the basis for his significance throughout. The reason his influence isn't as strong throughout the game is because there's few situations where he would gain from it in game. There's no reason for him to throw around his fame, but knowing he's alive stands as a symbol of hope. 

It's also worth noting that if the Cipher was used to solve some of the problems or gain information about the Collectors in ME2, it would mean that Shepard was doing more 'acting' instead of 'reacting' and based off of how the story was written I don't think the writers wanted to do that as it would give the player too much agency.

[Evil Johnny 666]

Caael wrote...
Point = missed.

It's not about whether he's competent or not, nobody's questioning that he's not the only capable soldier in the universe. It's what he stands for that's important; TIM even explains in the prologue about the galaxy needing a symbol to guide them or something to that extent. 

Saying that without the cypher he wouldn't be able to do anything is moot. He HAS the cypher, so what's your point? It provides the basis for his significance throughout. The reason his influence isn't as strong throughout the game is because there's few situations where he would gain from it in game. There's no reason for him to throw around his fame, but knowing he's alive stands as a symbol of hope. 

Why do you need a symbol working with terrorists getting killed on a suicide mission? (chances of Shepard being killed were supposedly very high) How can Shepard be a symbol for humanity when he's working in the shadows in the terminus systems getting ready to maybe kill himself? No one would even know he got killed at the galactic core. Hell, most thought he was dead. If for some obscure reasons news of Shepard getting killed by trying to destroy agents of the Reapers (which everyone still think are a legend in ME2) would break, it wouldn't be good for his reputation. Even less if anyone knew he was working with terrorists. It was a very low profile terrorist suicide mission, why would you need the most important human symbol?

Why didn't they just resurrect him, throw him to the Alliance and let him wait around till the Reapers come, and then let everyone turn to Shepard for his advice? That's what I would've called a real symbol at work. How can you act as an important human symbol when you work for people labelled as terrorists? It feels more like a cinematic device more than anything else.

Modifié par Evil Johnny 666, 12 décembre 2010 - 08:45 .

[Terraneaux]

Evil Johnny 666 wrote...

Why do you need a symbol working with terrorists getting killed on a suicide mission? (chances of Shepard being killed were supposedly very high) How can Shepard be a symbol for humanity when he's working in the shadows in the terminus systems getting ready to maybe kill himself? No one would even know he got killed at the galactic core. Hell, most thought he was dead. If for some obscure reasons news of Shepard getting killed by trying to destroy agents of the Reapers (which everyone still think are a legend in ME2) would break, it wouldn't be good for his reputation. Even less if anyone knew he was working with terrorists. It was a very low profile terrorist suicide mission, why would you need the most important human symbol?

The answer, of course, is that you wouldn't, and it seems the writers *really* wanted to write a story about Cerberus and co., but they let Shep come along, as long as he doesn't impact the story much.

Modifié par Terraneaux, 12 décembre 2010 - 08:45 .

[Evil Johnny 666]

I don't mind Shepard working for Cerberus, and in fact I loved the idea, but I think the circumstances, how it was pulled off is poor at best. Like how they made every single squad member go on a non-existing mission so everyone on board the Normandy can be kidnapped.

[Terraneaux]

Evil Johnny 666 wrote...

I don't mind Shepard working for Cerberus, and in fact I loved the idea, but I think the circumstances, how it was pulled off is poor at best. Like how they made every single squad member go on a non-existing mission so everyone on board the Normandy can be kidnapped.

I don't mind Shep working for Cerberus, but they needed to sell it better.  As has been stated before, by a few people, a better plotline probably would have been the council being unwilling to publicly acknowledge Shep's mission in ME2, but instructing Shep to infiltrate Cerberus and take them out - and then at the end of the game you can choose whether to side with Cerberus or the Council, based off how your character feels about the issue.

[Yojimbo_Ltd]

Caael wrote...

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

KEEP IN MIND! He is not complaining about UNIVERSE issues! He is complaining about PLOT issues because this is first and foremost a story.

Shep could have been swapped for ANOTHER charismatic, badass special forces commander. There is more than one... I hope.

Shepard is the only one that's killed a Reaper.

Shepard's influence is shown everywhere; especially on the Citadel with the endorsements. The game explains enough why he's an asset to humanity, I'd have thought it was glaringly obvious throughout the game? Yes he's not the only person in the universe to be able to lead a team but he's the only human to become a spectre, the only human to kill a Reaper (essentially), the one that stopped the entire Geth invasion of the citadel. The fact that he stopped the Reaper's return is not enough justification for his revival?

was it? can you name one instance where ANYTHING he learned in the first game, was used to advance the plot of the second game. Besides the lame ass excuse by the TIM that you just used?

[Yojimbo_Ltd]

Vaenier wrote...

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

Rewrite the geth
1. i'm sorry, this just seems pure renegade to me...

Paragon: The alternitive is death? This is the same as killing them, but you get new clones in the process? They were doing it themselves? they can have cake?
Renegade: The alternitive is death? This is the same as killing them, but you get new clones in the process? They were doing it themselves?

this decision has nothing to do with paragon renegade really. I hate the entire paragon renegade system myself, it kills roleplay, and makes choices kinda dumb if you always lable what is the right thing to do.

I actually hated the paragon/renegade system so much, I deluded myself into thinking this choice did not have lables. i was very disapointed when i learned of the reality of it.

I agree with you on all points made.

I got sucked into the P/R system. It wouldn't matter if it didn't affect the way I wanted scenes to play out. 

[Caael]

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

Vaenier wrote...

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

Rewrite the geth
1. i'm sorry, this just seems pure renegade to me...

Paragon: The alternitive is death? This is the same as killing them, but you get new clones in the process? They were doing it themselves? they can have cake?
Renegade: The alternitive is death? This is the same as killing them, but you get new clones in the process? They were doing it themselves?

this decision has nothing to do with paragon renegade really. I hate the entire paragon renegade system myself, it kills roleplay, and makes choices kinda dumb if you always lable what is the right thing to do.

I actually hated the paragon/renegade system so much, I deluded myself into thinking this choice did not have lables. i was very disapointed when i learned of the reality of it.

I agree with you on all points made.

I got sucked into the P/R system. It wouldn't matter if it didn't affect the way I wanted scenes to play out. 

"I'm commander Shepard and this is my favourite store on the Citadel"

[Yojimbo_Ltd]

Caael wrote...

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

Vaenier wrote...

Yojimbo_Ltd wrote...

Rewrite the geth
1. i'm sorry, this just seems pure renegade to me...

Paragon: The alternitive is death? This is the same as killing them, but you get new clones in the process? They were doing it themselves? they can have cake?
Renegade: The alternitive is death? This is the same as killing them, but you get new clones in the process? They were doing it themselves?

this decision has nothing to do with paragon renegade really. I hate the entire paragon renegade system myself, it kills roleplay, and makes choices kinda dumb if you always lable what is the right thing to do.

I actually hated the paragon/renegade system so much, I deluded myself into thinking this choice did not have lables. i was very disapointed when i learned of the reality of it.

I agree with you on all points made.

I got sucked into the P/R system. It wouldn't matter if it didn't affect the way I wanted scenes to play out. 

"I'm commander Shepard and this is my favourite store on the Citadel"

shoot me now

[Ship.wreck_]

Evil Johnny 666 wrote...

Ship.wreck wrote...

Why would all the suits not be integrated? In the Navy you don't get advanced warning that you're going to accidently go overboard so that you can go change your tactical vest for your life preserver. So your tactical vest damn well better have some kind of integrated floatation device, or at least neutral boyancy so it doesn't actually sink your ass, cause when you go that tac vest is all you're gonna have.

Likewise in the future space Navy you wouldn't get any advanced warning your about to get spaced so you have time to go change your general combat / space suit for your space diving suit. So again it damn well better be integrated into whatever suit you're usually wearing.

Shepard's usuall suit obviously protects him from the vacuum and radiation of space as demonstrated on the outside of the Citadel in ME1 and as he walks through the breached CIC deck in the begining of ME2, so why wouldn't it also incorporate at least some protection from unexpected re-entry?  And actually the prototypes or designs they were showing of the actuall space diving suit were really not that bulky at all in fact they reminded me in a major way of the ME armor which is why I thought it was so cool. No idea how they do it and yes seems a little sketchy at present but still, it's the future man.

I said I hoped that Shepard would be able to space dive to safety, not thought. Granted he was obviously having serious issues before he hit the atmosphere, but even without necessarily having been purpose built for re-entry it's not out of the question that his suit could've kept him in tact enough to "re-build" It's not like he's an astroid blazing in at like Mach30 from the depths of intersteller space, he fell out of a space shuttle. And even if he is moving fairly quick upon re-entry he doesn't have the inertia of those astroids you see cratering planetary surfaces, he's just a little human body, he'd almost certainly be slowed by drag to terminal velocity before impact (Assuming an earth-like atmoshpher and why not? the joint's blue right?) which won't be more than a couple hundred miles per hour. Not at all out of the question to think he be a mushed up badly burnt / frozen puddle that's mostly all their when they got to him.

As for his speed, our perception of speed is based on relative movements between objects and refrence points... in space there aren't any. The only reference point we get is the planet a few thousand miles away, at that range he and the ship could be whiping past the planet at thousands upon thousands of miles per hour and still look like they're just drifting past... and that would make sense considering that they got hit and taken out on the run attempting evasive manuvers. Which would make slingshoting or achieving orbit easily plausible based on the info from the intro. Now based on our knowledge of the DLC we know the ship did eventually land on the planet but that doesn't mean it fell straight down, it could've been moving just barely too slow to achieve orbit. which would result in a possibly very slowly "decaying" orbit which would be a loooooonnnnngggg sloooooowwww spiral into the center before finally hiting the atmosphere slowingdown and droping in. Which could leave plenty of time to recover Shepards body before re-entry. And again even if he did re-enter not necessarily an unquestionable incineration.

Well, considering the distance, I would think space diving suits are effective only in low orbit which wasn't the case here. He may have been "slowly" going down, but his speed would get VERY high. High speed + friction = heat, the faster you are, the more resistance the atmosphere poses, unless his suit was designed to be able to sustain thousands of degrees (unlikely since even if the suit would make it, the person obviously wouldn't) he'd become a fireball. Even if friction does slow down, Shepard isn't as big as a ship and the gravitational force would ultimately succeed in making him accelerate a great deal. Plus, I'd be surprised for a space diving suit prototype to be that small considering how big normal suits are, and it's all about stopping acceleration. You think a body free-falling wouldn't be more than a couple of hundred miles per hour? Even if Shepard was slowly going down, speed gain would be inevitable, and the closer he'd get to the planet the faster he'd get. I'd be surprised if it took more than a few hours.

Plus, the closest you are to a planet's surface, the bigger the acceleration is, acceleration already being an augmentation of speed per second. Alchera's surface gravity is 0,85g, wich is relatively close to the Earth's. Being subjected to this acceleration for 1 single minute from a null speed, you reach 500 m/s, or 1 810 km/h. Needless to say that Shepard (and the ship) will at least reach that speed, particularly Shepard who offers less resistance (regardless of mass, objects within atmosphere are subject to the very same acceleration). A ship broken in half will obviously disintegrate due to heat (everything is exposed, thus no heat protection) and all which will be left will be pieces. Even if the ship did not disintegrate, the deceleration of the impact would make a similar end to the ship (the Challenger crew compartent was subject to a deceleration of 200g the moment it hit the water surface, imagine hard terrain, not much more than a crater would be left). As for Shepard, if for some reason his suit could resist heat a human body inside can't, Shepard would be liquid.

But hey, I guess it's just that such things irritate me more than FTL. For fun, I did some calculus, and if you take the ME codex entry of being able to reach 12 ly in a day, they would've already reached 12 ly long before the FTL speed with an acceleration of 3g (what astronauts are subject to at maximum), and that is assuming such acceleration isn't deadly after such a prolonger period of time. It's not the force of the acceleration in itself that is dangerous, but the time you are subject to it. Hell, I found plenty of numbers and they are quite funny. Obviously I would've been a fool to expect to find any of this realistic, but I just think the Shepard being retrieved bit to be a lot more far fetched than mere ignoring of the effects of acceleration when the game wouldn't exist without it, even more considering we don't know what future will hold us in regards of space ships.

Terminal velocity dude, terminal velocity. Shepard just doesn't have the inertia to resist deceleration due to drag, he'd slow down to terminal velocity well before impact, and his terminal velocity wouldn't be much faster than a couple hundred miles per hour at worst. That's if he wasn't recovered from a decaying orbit before re-entry even happened. A decaying orbit could take years to terminate.

Again Shepard's suit protects him from space. Without the protection of an atmoshpere it gets ALOT hotter up there, and alot colder. Just that alone shows that it can effectively insulate his body against hundreds of degrees + and -  So maybe it would get to hot to live in that suit for re-entry, if it's not designed for it, which it's likely that it is. But even if it isn't designed for re-entry since it can insulate him from many hundreds of degrees without injury (not even first degree burns) then it could easily insulate his dead body from thousands of degrees without the body being destroyed. The only question at all is, can the suit hold together through re-entry. Well, it's also a combat suit and appearently takes thousands upon thousands of rounds of ammunition without falling apart. Shepard can be damaged inside, but appearently it's ability to protect Shepard from space remains uncompromised. Remember fighting the Geth outside the Citadel, if any of those rounds had penetrated Shepard's suit and injured him the breach exposing him to space would have killed him... logically speaking, but my Shepard was injured many times in that battle and the suit protected him from space without fail. Just a little reminder that it's just a game.

All that said the possibility of a space recovery from decaying orbit, the probable protection the suit offers from re-entry, terminal velocity. All things considered it's not at all impossible that his body could be recovered mostly, if not completely intact. In fact Shepard's recovery is alot more likely logically speaking than FTL. So if you're playing a game where the mathmatical impossibility of FTL travel is the norm, the least of your worries should be Shepard's recovery.

Modifié par Ship.wreck , 12 décembre 2010 - 11:31 .

[Ship.wreck_]

People keep referencing that Shepard is a symbol for having killed a Reaper and arguing wether that means anything because most people don't believe in reapers and do believe he's dead.

As I recall when TIM was telling Shepard that he's a symbol, TIM kept referencing what the REAPERS think of him, not what the people think. The Reapers know that the Reapers exist, the Reapers (supposedly) know that Shepard led the mission that eventually killed one of them, and the Reapers eventually know that Shepard is back. Harbinger refers to shepard by name upon first contact.

I think the idea is Shepard is a symbol to the REAPERS, and it seems like everyone's overlooking that (I only skimmed).