92 réponses à ce sujet

[SithLordExarKun]

Listen mr albert einstein, if theres a "canon", why the f/uck would bioware even give you choices in the first place? Why don't they just make Shepard non customizable to begin with?



There was an iconic warden in ALL of biowares trailers for DAO, so why isn't he availible in the game?

[JKoopman]

InvincibleHero, is a male Hawke "canon" in Dragon Age 2 simply because the male was the first and primary face marketed? No.



You really need to learn the difference between "canonical" and "iconic for marketing purposes." Simply because they hired Mark Vanderloo to be the face of Mass Effect does not make Vanderloo-Shep the "canon" Shepard. Why do you think no Mass Effect novel or comic book ever mentions Shepard's gender or appearance? Or any of his/her actions throughout ME1/2 aside from those that can't be altered? Because BioWare doesn't want a canonical Shepard. I don't care how many people choose the default Male Shepard as their character; that doesn't make him canon. If 9 out of 10 people all choose the same path in a Choose Your Own Adventure novel, that doesn't make it the "canon" path of the book. It simply makes it the most popular.



There is not a canonical Shepard. There will never be a canonical Shepard. This argument is pointless.

[didymos1120]

SithLordExarKun wrote...

There was an iconic warden in ALL of biowares trailers for DAO, so why isn't he availible in the game?

One might ask the same about ME1's cover art Shep: that guy ain't Sheploo, and I'm fairly certain you can't reproduce him with the face creator.

[SalsaDMA]

To add some spice:



Who becomes councilor is dictated by the player in ME1.



However...



In the Novels Udina became Councilor.



So there being a 'choice' the player can make regarding an issue, like the sex or appearance of Shepard, does not prevent a 'canon' choice from existing.

[didymos1120]

SalsaDMA wrote...
So there being a 'choice' the player can make regarding an issue, like the sex or appearance of Shepard, does not prevent a 'canon' choice from existing.

Of course it doesn't prevent that.  But the devs have to actually say "This is canon."  All statements regarding Shep have been "There is no canon Shep."  Until and unless they say otherwise, that's how it will stay.

[SalsaDMA]

didymos1120 wrote...

SalsaDMA wrote...
So there being a 'choice' the player can make regarding an issue, like the sex or appearance of Shepard, does not prevent a 'canon' choice from existing.

Of course it doesn't prevent that.  But the devs have to actually say "This is canon."  All statements regarding Shep have been "There is no canon Shep."  Until and unless they say otherwise, that's how it will stay.

They also said this about the choices Shepard makes, in one of the listed quotes in this thread.

Are you thereby claiming that Udina being chosen as Councilor is not canon despite this being exactly the case in Retribution novel? Or you trying to refute the novels content as not being canon because someone from bioware said Shepard and his choices were specific for each player?

It would make future novels fiction work in the ME universe rather difficult, if not imposisble, to write under such a pretext.

[JKoopman]

SalsaDMA, have you considered the possibility that it was simply an oversight by the author? Udina being briefly mentioned as a Councilor in Redemption =/= "canon" Vanderloo ManShep.

[didymos1120]

SalsaDMA wrote...

didymos1120 wrote...

SalsaDMA wrote...
So there being a 'choice' the player can make regarding an issue, like the sex or appearance of Shepard, does not prevent a 'canon' choice from existing.

Of course it doesn't prevent that.  But the devs have to actually say "This is canon."  All statements regarding Shep have been "There is no canon Shep."  Until and unless they say otherwise, that's how it will stay.

They also said this about the choices Shepard makes, in one of the listed quotes in this thread.

Are you thereby claiming that Udina being chosen as Councilor is not canon despite this being exactly the case in Retribution novel? Or you trying to refute the novels content as not being canon because someone from bioware said Shepard and his choices were specific for each player?

It would make future novels fiction work in the ME universe rather difficult, if not imposisble, to write under such a pretext.

I thought it was pretty obvious I was addressing the idea of canon Sheploo: you know, that thing people have been discussing for three pages? I'll try again: clearly,  they're not prevented from making Sheploo, or any other Shep variant they want, canon.   If one day they point at Sheploo and say "This is canon", then it's canon.  But, they have not done that.  Therefore, he isn't canon.  Yes, there are some immutable facts (surname of "Shepard", rank of Commander, member of human species, defeated Sovereign, etc.), but there's a ton of stuff that is not (sex, appearance, biotic ability, relationship history, place of birth, service history, so  on, so forth).  If Udina has become one of those immutables, fine; but that still leaves a whole hell of a lot undefined.

Modifié par didymos1120, 27 janvier 2011 - 06:07 .

[cachx]

In regards to the supposed canon in the novel (link) :

"Sometimes for the novels, certain things have to be "taken for granted" in order to tell a story. Anderson couldn't just leave if he was on the Council.
But this isn't really a "ret-con", as there was no established canon in the first place.

Also, follow this advice:

Hopefully the Mass Effect fans will understand our position and not get too bent out of shape.

[SalsaDMA]

cachx wrote...

In regards to the supposed canon in the novel (link) :

"Sometimes for the novels, certain things have to be "taken for granted" in order to tell a story. Anderson couldn't just leave if he was on the Council.
But this isn't really a "ret-con", as there was no established canon in the first place.

Also, follow this advice:

Hopefully the Mass Effect fans will understand our position and not get too bent out of shape.

I think the most important thing in that link was this:
"But if we want to continue expanding the Mass Effect universe,
there are times when we have to take certain decisions from the game and
go with one alternative over another so we can build on what has happened."

In other words, anything that isn't defined yet is open to be defined at any given time if they need it. This would include Shepards gender, and given that he has so far alwyas been portrayed as 'Sheploo' by Bioware, It's not a far fetch to asume this is what he will be when they need to stop dancing around the fire to be able to utilize the character in one of their novels.

[Lumikki]

In my opinion every information in any form what Bioware is publised is part of canon, even if some of the information is inconsistent with itself. So, as long the information is not conflicting to it self, it's all canon. When the conflict exist in information, then it's hard to say, what's the canon and what's not. Because first or second information, we have no clue what is the right one, because one of them is mistake.

[JKoopman]

SalsaDMA wrote...

cachx wrote...

In regards to the supposed canon in the novel (link) :

"Sometimes for the novels, certain things have to be "taken for granted" in order to tell a story. Anderson couldn't just leave if he was on the Council.
But this isn't really a "ret-con", as there was no established canon in the first place.

Also, follow this advice:

Hopefully the Mass Effect fans will understand our position and not get too bent out of shape.

I think the most important thing in that link was this:
"But if we want to continue expanding the Mass Effect universe,
there are times when we have to take certain decisions from the game and
go with one alternative over another so we can build on what has happened."

In other words, anything that isn't defined yet is open to be defined at any given time if they need it. This would include Shepards gender, and given that he has so far alwyas been portrayed as 'Sheploo' by Bioware, It's not a far fetch to asume this is what he will be when they need to stop dancing around the fire to be able to utilize the character in one of their novels.

I highly doubt there's ever going to be a time when they stop "dancing around the fire" and create a novel about Shepard. The Mass Effect trilogy of games is and always has been "Shepard's story". If they wanted to make more story about Shepard, they'd make more games where (again) it's open to player interperetation and not "canon".

Also, because BioWare reserves the right to make any story outcomes they wish canonical down the road does not mean we should all just shrug and recognize VanderShep as the defacto canon Shepard. That's a fairly sizable disconnect there.

[didymos1120]

SalsaDMA wrote...
In other words, anything that isn't defined yet is open to be defined at any given time if they need it.

Yes, obviously: that's how canon works. 

This would include Shepards gender, and given that he has so far alwyas been portrayed as 'Sheploo' by Bioware, It's not a far fetch to asume this is what he will be when they need to stop dancing around the fire to be able to utilize the character in one of their novels.

But they have not done that yet (and they may never do that), which is all that's relevant right now. 

Modifié par didymos1120, 27 janvier 2011 - 08:15 .

[InvincibleHero]

AdmiralCheez wrote...

InvincibleHero wrote...

AdmiralCheez wrote...

Ah, so apparently Shepard's actually a Dutch underwear model. Good to know!

 I don't want to know how you knew that factoid. He's just the default facial reconstruction of male Shepard anyway. oh wait his face is just marketing Shepard or is that iconic Shepard.?

Hey man, with your logic, default/marketing = canon.

Therefore, Shepard is a Dutch underwear model.

Nope simple logic using a male Shepard creates the branding for the ME universe. Are they suddenly going to reverse themselves and start promoting it with a female wasting all that time and money spent to create the brand identity? NO WAY. They want you to think of that face (male Sheploo) as Shepard. Really even if they changed the face and went with another male face they'd still be reinforcing Shepard is male. Conversely they have done next to nothing to promote shepard is female. So they have established the canon of male while saying there is no canon because some people would get angry over it.

My logic isn't faulty, only your logic is faulty equating what I said with that aberration. No one could suggest a real person is a video game character.

[InvincibleHero]

Lycidas wrote...

BW used an iconic warden for the Dragon Age trailers yet this specific warden was not even in the character creator as a preset. How does that fit your theory?

Simple using the male Shepard creates the brand for ME. There is only one commander in the game.

I haven't got around to getting Dragon Age yet, but isn't it that wardens are highly variable. Anyway Mass Effect is not DA. In ME their marketting Shepard is an option in the game. So you don't think that alone adds more weight to me saying it establishes canon of CS being male? I do. He is more than a promotional character.

[JKoopman]

You continually equate advertising to canon. For the umpteenth time, using Mark Vanderloo for their advertising promotions does not mean that BioWare has secretly established a canon Shepard but simply isn't telling us so that we won't get "upset". VanderShep may be the more recognizable face, but THAT DOES NOT MAKE HIM CANONICAL. To continue to argue that fact is quite simply asinine.



I guarantee that a male Hawke will be featured on the cover for Dragon Age 2. That doesn't mean that a female Hawke is some aberrant bone thrown to the fanbase and she doesn't truly count. It's just freakin' advertising.

[didymos1120]

InvincibleHero wrote...
 So you don't think that alone adds more weight to me saying it establishes canon of CS being male?

One thing, and one thing only, matters: what the devs SAY. If one day they actually declaim "Hear ye! Hear ye! Sheploo is canon! Sheploo is canon!" then, and only then,  is he canon. They have NOT done that. They have in fact, done the opposite. Repeatedly.  What is so difficult to grasp about this?  By continually denying that what they've actually said matters, you're effectively saying that they are lying. 

Modifié par didymos1120, 28 janvier 2011 - 05:39 .

[swenson]

I don't have much of an opinion on the canon/noncanon debate (if I had to take a side, I think I'd say that the ME games are a good example of flexible canon, where certain elements are set [Shepard is a Spectre, for example], certain elements are heavily implied, and certain elements are left entirely up to the player [Shepard's background]), but I'd like to throw in my opinion on two points a lot of people might be missing.



First of all, default Shepard is not necessarily canon. Default choices (Wrex's death, for example) might fall into that "heavily implied" category, but they aren't canon until Bioware specifically says so. Default changes depending on gender, anyway, so you could even argue there's two canons--one for FemShep and one for ManShep.



That being said, having choices does not mean there can't be an official canon. As much as it pains me to admit it and as much as I don't want it to be true, Darth Revan is canonically male. This does not change the fact, however, that it's perfectly fine to have a KOTOR playthrough where Revan is female and that this experience is just as valid as the canonical version.



If you absolutely can't accept the idea of a fixed canon (if there even is one for ME... like others have said, Bioware has carefully avoided any specifics about Shepard in external material), why not try the idea of continuity? When something comes up as a default choice or even officially declared canon and you don't like it, just declare it not part of your personal continuity. Hey, it works for comics!