staindgrey wrote...
Taradil wrote...
staindgrey wrote...
There's no race I dislike. I dislike that they all fit conveniently into human culture stereotypes, while humans remain more varied.
Turians are just soldiers. Krogan are savages. Salarians are nerds. Quarians are the other nerds. Batarians are the perceived Eastern communistic humans of today. Asari had real potential, but despite their long history and 1000 year age expectancy, they act just like humans.
Everyone salutes. Everyone shakes hands. Everyone has the same facial reactions and bodily gestures as humans. The issue of language and clashing culture isn't brought up nearly as much as it should be. All the other races are very, very human. That's what bothers me.
I mean, I understand that there are limitations in programming, but still. I would have loved to see more differences between the main races besides conversations about how different things are back home; they should be different right here, too.
But that's just a stupid thing to complain about, that's pretty obvious that the aliens fit in to human stereotypes by the fact that we, Humans, created them. We only know human behavior, that's why we give aliens that behavior. And Salarians aren't nerds, they're scientists, Quarians are not nerds either, as we see more Quarian soldiers than Turian ones. And well, I can understand a few of your complains, about the salutes all look the same and so on, but to complain about that aliens are very human when humans created them is just .. stupid.
Elcor are very un-human. Yet they're stuck behind desks at small portions of the game.
This is fantasy. There are so many chances to just do whatever you want and create something wholly original. While I understand why the aliens were created as they are, I am still disappointed with the lack of differences between races, and within the races.
Think of this: How many quarians have we met who weren't phenomenal with technology? Okay, now, how many humans have we met who aren't great with [put whatever you want here]? Aliens all seem to fit into their stereotypes perfectly, as if every one of their race does what the whole race does. Then we find humans and they're all totally different from one another. (PS: I understand that quarians live on ships, but regardless, there have to be some who are better at other things, strive for things like art or speech or politics. Not every single one has to be from Dexter's Laboratory.)
I'm simply disappointed in the lack of personality between races and between ones within the same race. I'd love to see a conflict where Wrex asks Shepard why the hell he's grabbing his hand, then explain the social obligation of a krogan headbutt. I'd love to see true conflict when romancing someone of another race, since there HAS to be consequences for that. Today we can't even let gays be treated like real people, apparently. So in less than two centuries we're going to be cool with alien-on-human action? And they're going to be fine with their alien children getting it on with that new species that just discovered FTL speeds? How do we even know all races kiss and flirt and treat romance the same way at all? SPeaking of which, how the hell are turians supposed to kiss with turtle mouths and those... whatever they're called on their jaws?
There's simply not enough variation when the sky's the limit. Everything's fictional; Bioware could have been so much more creative with the races than they have been.
I see where you're coming from and agree that the constraints of the game have forced the devs to use "shorthand" when it comes to aliens. It's very difficult to write an alien race that
feels alien without spending a lot of time explaining stuff. David Brin's Uplift books are very good at portraying alien cultures, but that's because they have hundreds of pages in which to do it. That sort of stuff would be fascinating, but would bog down the game.
The devs did try some things: for example, in ME1, Lilihierax (the mechanic Turian) and Garrus each make this facial expression where their mandibles flex downward. Unfortunately, since it only happens twice in the game, we never figure out what it means. (My closest guess is "smile.") Well, I didn't know how to feel about it, couldn't ask, and didn't experience it again, so it was totally lost on me. Probably the devs felt that way too, because it's not used in ME2. Details like that tend to be alienating, rather than immersive. Devs need a way to quickly plunge us into the situation, so they have to resort to species profiling.
I think the Asari are a good example of a diversified race. They're not all commandos -- we have scientists, pirate queens, geisha, bartenders, mercs, strippers, philosophers, cops, store clerks, politicians, etc. Sure, they are very human-like, but I think without them being so human-like they would have to be species-profiled instead.
As for the saluting and handshakes, I thought the aliens were accomodating human preference rather than doing actions that came naturally to them. My headcannon, I guess.
I'd love to see reaction to interspecies romance but have the feeling it's going to be glossed over -- *sigh*.
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