152 réponses à ce sujet

[walk0nwalls]

Ever did it occur to you that the characters in Mass Effect 2 approached near-certain annihilation with an inssuficient degree of gravity? 

Even Shepherd, the title character approaches his/her ressurrection from death with the casual shrug of the shoulder of a person being told that their toast was singed. "Oh well, these things just happen I guess." 

Death is not something that is approached with sufficient gravity in Mass Effect 2, and that was always one of my chief complaints with the title. 

In all honesty though, count how many times your companion characters mention death in their conversations with you. how many times do your crew members speak to you about the NEAR-CERTAIN ANNIHILATION they will be heading towards? If they've got all-but-certain faith that you will lead them through this alive, it seems that that's the sort of thing that might bear mention maybe once or twice in the course of conversation, even as I do love the engineers. 

People rightfully derided the companion quests in Mass Effect 2 not because they were too long, but because they were too irrelevant to the characters. With Garrus - having killed/not killed Sedonis - is he now ready to face death? Is that what he was living for? Vengeance? The ramifications and ruminiations upon what he's been living his life for never flitted across his brain?

Jacob - worst situation ever- congratulations! You've discovered your father! Is that something that was distinctly important to you? If there was anything to fault Jacob with it was that he was too distinctly uninvolved with everything. In fact, I'm going to take this moment to term the tonal problems of Mass Effect 2 "Jacob's problem" because no character approached the CONSTANTLY REPEATED "Suicide mission" with as little care as Jacob. 

Grunt - Grunt has just been born. You don't suppose he'd have more than a few concerns about dying instantly?

Tali - one of the reasons why Tali works is because it does seem that she's been nursing something of a pet crush from game 1. That said, if that's her reason for joining the suicide mission (Shepherd + me 4evas!) then breaking her heart should've provided more, well, interesting results. Whereby you could ostensibly coax her into accepting a nominally short existence, or deride her for making such a rash decision stupidly and thereby infringing upon her combat abilities to the point where she could barely fire a gun for wont of crying. 

See, we could've made both Tali-fans and Tali-haters happy. 

Jack - Jack is a nihilist. Self-destructive behavior. Has issues. Makes sense. 

Miranda - follows orders, yes. But following orders into an inferno having dedicated her life to an organization that will now send her to be killed? She's surprisingly blase about that whole angle on things. 

Samara - duty driven, makes sense. 

Thane - dude's gonna die in 3 months. Why the hell not?

Kasumi - sharp tongue aside, she's nursing a fairly significant heartbreak. Feasable. 

Legion - who the hell knows what he thinks really.
 
Look. I love the series as much as anyone else. But what I'm saying is that death was an incredibly unaddressed theme during the second game. Considering that the entire plot of the game revolved around being presented as a suicide mission, this seems positively insane. Almost resolutely mad. I think that formed the emotional basis for a lot of criticism of the second game and its oft-utterly disconnected companion quests. How many times were you reminded in very real terms of the emotional consequences of death and life being cut short before its prime. How did you - Shepherd - deal with the reality of being ressurected only to be tossed back to death like a plaything? How did other characters react to the idea of you coming back from the dead only to throw your life away again? Udina/Wrex, Alenko, Ashley? Surely they would've had more opinions on your SUICIDE MISSION than your association with Cerberus. 

At any rate, that's all I had to say. Whilst I did enjoy Mass Effect 2, everyone proceeded through the game interacting with Shepherd as though their survival was nothing short of writ in stone providential certainty when in fact it was perpetually repeated that everyone involved was engaged in a SUICIDE MISSION. Why didn't we get everyone's opinion on how they'd lived their lives and their appraisal of the likelihood of the crew's collective survival? It seems a missed opportunity for much more interesting characterization, even as the alotted episodes were very interesting in and of themselves. 

Modifié par walk0nwalls, 29 avril 2011 - 06:28 .

[88mphSlayer]

that's why people call Shepard a brick in ME2

and it's why my belief is they made Mass Effect 2 like they made Halo 2 - built the whole game in episode form and only later added in Shepard dying at the beginning

[Chuvvy]

88mphSlayer wrote...

that's why people call Shepard a brick in ME2

Being a bit generus.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

I'm also tired of this kind of angst. Oh woe is me, I have to save the universe... so I'm going to cry about it. Yeah it's kinda sad that I might die, but if I go into the mission thinking "well, I'm probably going to die, let me be all sad about it" rather than "Well, time to save the world again, let's see what happens." I'm not going to be as effective.

With FemShep at least, you got this sort of world-weary vibe from her throughout. Like she was getting tired of all this death and near-death and loss. But she's too awesome to show it, and she knows that sulking will just make her less effective. So she deals with it.

TL;DR

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 29 avril 2011 - 07:12 .

[KainrycKarr]

I always just felt Shepard was unimpressed. Which is just fine with me.

[Vengeful Nature]

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...
Or, in short:

All I see is "Upgrade to Pro today! Bandwidth Exceeded!"

But yes, I'm gonna have to agree with the OP. What is especially worrisome is that ME3 is said to be "darker, but funnier at the same time". That, at least to me, is a contradiction in terms. Sure, you can have moments of lightness in a dark world, but as a general tone to shoot for, is silly.

[TomY90]

too be honest though depends on how you played mass effect 2

Miranda example you gave she gives you the impression that she is willing to follow you not just because of orders but because her sister is on the line and she cares for her sister more than herself (liar of the shadow broker even gives evidence to this in comms between the "twins")
and miranda does seem to be driven to help humanity the most out of the squad which is why she is willing to die for it

and grunt you got to remember he is krogan they do not care about life as we do they measure life on if you died in a worthy fight against a good enough enemy what better way to die than be killed by the biggest threat in the galaxy. (he even said own its the biggest insult to say you are not worthy enough to get killed)

Cannot really comment on Jacob because I never did the romance so barely any dialogue on that one for what I know but he does have a child so I can imagine thats one of things he is fighting for.
And Jacob is in a similar boat to miranda as well on that they want to stop humanities destruction by the collectors and are willing to do it by any means.

On the shepherd part I feel he did portray it not amazingly well or terribly the whole death side of things at time but one or two of the romance options from what ive seen 1st hand or by videos do seem to portray more of his concern that he has died once already and normally people do not get a second chance and he does not want to waste such an opportunity by failing

[TomY90]

Vengeful Nature wrote...

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...
Or, in short:

All I see is "Upgrade to Pro today! Bandwidth Exceeded!"

But yes, I'm gonna have to agree with the OP. What is especially worrisome is that ME3 is said to be "darker, but funnier at the same time". That, at least to me, is a contradiction in terms. Sure, you can have moments of lightness in a dark world, but as a general tone to shoot for, is silly.

not true look at what red dead redemption did that was dark whilst being funny (especially how a guy managing to talk to corpes and robbing them at the same time adds humour whilst being horrible)

[walk0nwalls]

TomY90 wrote...
On the shepherd part I feel he did portray it not amazingly well or terribly the whole death side of things at time but one or two of the romance options from what ive seen 1st hand or by videos do seem to portray more of his concern that he has died once already and normally people do not get a second chance and he does not want to waste such an opportunity by failing

It's just a strange absence of an opinion from him/her though. Understandably Shepherd is a soldier but having died once and heading into death yet again, wouldn't there be some time alone to consider how his/her life had been lead? In response to the above, discussions of death are not necessarily dark or grim, they do however have to be serious and depth-driven, which at this point I'm inclined to believe Shepherd has about as much depth as a puddle. 

[jamesp81]

I'm actually quite sick of grimdark storytelling. It's nice to have something a little bit different.

[AngelicMachinery]

Most of my Shepherd's never really considered death to be possible, they think far to much of themselves.

[Konfined]

Most of them are all trained, fully combat experienced soldiers; others are mercenaries, assassins, psychopaths, robots, or members of a fatalistic warmongering species. Even Tali is well aware of the gravity of the situation and has come to terms.

Dead is dead, regardless of the how, and soldiers are trained to deal with these situations while maintaining a calm, clear head. Going into a situation such as this, while worrying and fretting about how you're all going to die, causes one to lose focus, and thus, combat effectiveness and efficiency. The ones that aren't already psychotic or incapable of emotion, are simply focused on the task at hand- stopping the Collectors and saving the galaxy.

At least, that's how I look at it anyway; I guess ymmv.

Modifié par Konfined, 29 avril 2011 - 07:30 .

[walk0nwalls]

Konfined wrote...

Most of them are all trained, fully combat experienced soldiers, others are mercenaries, assassins, psychopaths, robots, or members of a fatalistic warmongering species. Even Tali is well aware of the gravity of the situation and has come to terms.

Dead is dead, regardless of the how, and soldiers are trained to deal with these situations while maintaining a calm, clear head. Going into a situation such as this, while worrying and fretting about how you're all going to die, causes one to lose focus, and thus, combat effectiveness and efficiency. The ones that aren't already psychotic or incapable of emotion, are simply focused on the task at hand- stopping the Collectors and saving the galaxy.

At least, that's how I look at it anyway; I guess ymmv.

I guess that's fair. Uninteresting, but a valid interpretation of things. 

[TomY90]

walk0nwalls wrote...

TomY90 wrote...
On the shepherd part I feel he did portray it not amazingly well or terribly the whole death side of things at time but one or two of the romance options from what ive seen 1st hand or by videos do seem to portray more of his concern that he has died once already and normally people do not get a second chance and he does not want to waste such an opportunity by failing

It's just a strange absence of an opinion from him/her though. Understandably Shepherd is a soldier but having died once and heading into death yet again, wouldn't there be some time alone to consider how his/her life had been lead? In response to the above, discussions of death are not necessarily dark or grim, they do however have to be serious and depth-driven, which at this point I'm inclined to believe Shepherd has about as much depth as a puddle. 

You are right on the depth of a puddle but I do think they have done that on purpose because they seem to want us to get attached to shepherd and we create our own perceptions of shepherd like how he feels and reacts to situations.

Like if you ask people their opinions on shepherd everyone has different conceptions on him which is obvious from the forums when they talk about shepherd everyone has different feeling on him/her which is what they aimed for

[walk0nwalls]

TomY90 wrote...

walk0nwalls wrote...

TomY90 wrote...
On the shepherd part I feel he did portray it not amazingly well or terribly the whole death side of things at time but one or two of the romance options from what ive seen 1st hand or by videos do seem to portray more of his concern that he has died once already and normally people do not get a second chance and he does not want to waste such an opportunity by failing

It's just a strange absence of an opinion from him/her though. Understandably Shepherd is a soldier but having died once and heading into death yet again, wouldn't there be some time alone to consider how his/her life had been lead? In response to the above, discussions of death are not necessarily dark or grim, they do however have to be serious and depth-driven, which at this point I'm inclined to believe Shepherd has about as much depth as a puddle. 

You are right on the depth of a puddle but I do think they have done that on purpose because they seem to want us to get attached to shepherd and we create our own perceptions of shepherd like how he feels and reacts to situations.

Like if you ask people their opinions on shepherd everyone has different conceptions on him which is obvious from the forums when they talk about shepherd everyone has different feeling on him/her which is what they aimed for

Perhaps, but I'm of the school of thought that says that specificity breeds more affection than nondescript. Oh well, differences of opinion I suppose. Regardless though they seem to have taken it that route with DAII which provided 3 seperate specific interpretations of Hawke which I felt worked very well. 

[walk0nwalls]

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...

I'm also tired of this kind of angst. Oh woe is me, I have to save the universe... so I'm going to cry about it. Yeah it's kinda sad that I might die, but if I go into the mission thinking "well, I'm probably going to die, let me be all sad about it" rather than "Well, time to save the world again, let's see what happens." I'm not going to be as effective.

With FemShep at least, you got this sort of world-weary vibe from her throughout. Like she was getting tired of all this death and near-death and loss. But she's too awesome to show it, and she knows that sulking will just make her less effective. So she deals with it.

Grim does not necessarily entail sulkiness but it does inform the tone of an overall piece. If death has a due date and a set point it necessarily informs the behavior of all individuals headed towards death. I think some of the best pieces of fiction explore this and no, the behavior is not always wraught and emotional as you seem to suggest. Frequently it's quiet and introspective, which, now looking upon it, I now realize to be as palatable to the average audience as marbles are to cats. 

I'm just saying it would've been nice to have heard some interesting perspectives on what would've constituted a meaningful life for each character. It's an incredible opportunity for characterization and an exploration of the values of both your companions and the title character to have those conversations out in the open, conversations that normally would not take place in any other circumstance. What a fantastic opportunity! Don't you think? 

[EternalPink]

Pilots in war time don't hug and say goodbye before each mission, they have cliche "smoke me a kipper, i'll be back for breakfast" since if they focused on the possible death they wouldn't be able to go on missions or you wouldnt trust them with a very expensive craft.

Right at the beginning with joker Shepard could have go "oh s*** i'm about to be spaced" drawn a hand gun and blown his head off rather than die from atmospheric re-entry/explosive de-compression/asphixation and so on which would have made for one very short game.

If we or they all focused on death none of us would even take the most marginal of risks

Modifié par EternalPink, 29 avril 2011 - 07:41 .

[TomY90]

i do agree hawke had more depth you could get more emotion out of him but they are very different characters

[aimlessgun]

walk0nwalls wrote...

Ever did it occur to you that the characters in Mass Effect 2 approached near-certain annihilation with an inssuficient degree of gravity? 

 

I think the mistake was not with their reactions, but with presenting the situation as a suicide mission. I never once thought of it as a suicide mission. The entire concept is absurd. The Collectors are not a big enough threat for me to go into a suicide mission for, sorry. Tens of thousands of people? That is literally NOTHING on a galactic scale.

TIM's assertion that the Collectors are the "biggest threat in humanity's brief history" was out-and-out laughable. 1 ship, which an un-upgraded frigate or a set of podunk colonionial AA cannons can defeat. Abducting tiny quantities of people. My Shepard is sure as hell not going to kill herself over that.

So basically, the degree of gravity was sufficient, because it wasn't a suicide mission. The numerous references to it being so in the game I ignored as crappy writing meant to hype things up artifically, and tried to just ignore them.

Modifié par aimlessgun, 29 avril 2011 - 07:48 .

[walk0nwalls]

Ultimately, yes. They are different characters and while some in this thread may prefer the militaristic evasion of worldly circumstances, it still just seems like a missed opportunity to me. It's such a ripe premise to be explored in fiction and it's thwarted by the same mechanisms that prevent us from discovering meaning in our own regular lives: the dictates of our obligations to society.

Just seems a shame, really. Soldiers or no.

[Iakus]

Insufficient gravity regarding the Suicide Mission?  Shepard already died once and hardly blinked about it.  Neither did anyone else.  How else would they react about the possibility of dying (again)?  Brick indeed!

[walk0nwalls]

thurmanator692 wrote...

walk0nwalls wrote...

Thane - dude's gonna die in 3 months. Why the hell not?

How 'bout to raise his freakin son?

3 months probably isn't going to be enough for absent fathers to set things right with their wayward sons. Beyond that, both father and son are willful and independent and Thane doesn't seem particularly comfortable playing the role of a father. That's just my interpretation though. 

[walk0nwalls]

Nyoka wrote...

Nah. All of those people have seen a lot of death. If one of the guys were mortally wounded, and in severe pain because of that, none of them would hesitate to do him the favour of grabbing a knife and mercifully cut his throat without a word. They're used to it and accept it. When your number comes up, it's over.

Loyalty missions. Haven't you noticed how when you have something to do, it keeps annoyingly returning to your brain, unvoluntarily? You're doing something else and suddenly it comes through your head. "aw crap I had to do that". When you have unresolved issues, you can't help thinking about it from time to time. And that can be fatal in a mission that requires maximum concentration. I can easily imagine Jacob escorting the crew back to the normandy and thinking about that distress signal and his father for a few seconds: enough time for an enemy to shoot him before he can react, something that wouldn't have happened had he been completely devoted to the mission.

What bothers me about Jacob and for a lot of the cast is I never got a sense of WHY it was important to these individuals save for, well,  I guess Jacob's the exception but Jacob did not ever truly present a unique perspective, if that makes sense. It's not indicated why his absent father was so important and what that meant to him in the way that other scenarios clearly laid out.