5 réponses à ce sujet

[TJByrumProto]

I'm not trying to start some kind of discussion on the matter, but if you guys want to do that, go ahead.

I didn't like Mass Effect 1 because of its gameplay, but I enjoyed its story, characters, and most of all its villain: Saren Arterius.  I really liked Saren, his appearance, personality, and such, and I think he was an awesome character and thought it was unfortunate he could not last another game or two.

But I haven't played ME1 in a long time, and his wiki page is to long to read through to find my answer.  I was wondering if Saren was actually evil.  Or was he indoctrinated?  Was he trying to find a solution to the Reapers by joining them?  I can't remember.  What exactly WAS his motivation and morality?



And, while I'm here, anyway to change my forum username?

[capn233]

No because he just had a will to power and evil is an antiquated notion passed down from the ruling elites.

But seriously, Saren is "liked" as probably the best villain in the trilogy because he at least claims to have a good reason for what he is doing, as he explains to Shepard on Virmire. If you take a look at his past, however, he is not painted in the best light even before his discovery of the Reapers. Shepard can somewhat approach his ruthlessness at a few points in the trilogy, but it seems fairly clear that Saren was supposed to be someone with questionable morals to begin with.

[Bullets McDeath]

Saren was not a particularly nice guy, but he had... reasons... for what he did. He was not a mustache-twirling villain, but there was no way he and Shepherd would ever have been able to play nicely together, Reapers or no. To use Star Wars terms, he was closer to Darth Vader than he was Emperor Palpatine.

Now, once he found Sovereign, it gets fuzzy. He joined Sovereign out of free will (in my opinion) but again, not for capital E EVIIIIIIILLLLL. He believed that Reaper victory was inevitable and he thought that if he could prove his worth (and by extension, the worth of organic life) that perhaps he could spare trillions of lives by having them enslaved by the Reapers instead of slaughtered outright. So he thought he was doing the right thing and that he was the only one who could see that resistance was futile and the survival of organic life depended on him. Of course, the Reapers were deceiving him and he was being slowly indoctrinated so his motivations and goals by the end are not really his own anyway, whatever he thinks (or says).

Hope that sheds a little light.

[Kenshen]

He was 100% indoctrinated which he even admits too. Before that I don't think he was evil but a do whatever it takes to get the job done type. He did have a hatred for humans so I can see why some would consider him evil.

I don't remember exactly the details but I thought he was investigating something and came across Sovereign. Once that happened his fate was sealed. Not really sure he had any control over what he said or did. Or very little since he was "upgraded" after starting to doubt himself and his mission after meeting Shep in person.

Modifié par aryon69, 02 novembre 2013 - 09:58 .

[Ferretinabun]

In story terms, Saren is a very interesting character. His reasons for doing what he does are actually rather sensible - he reasons that it is better to capitulate to the Reapers and survive than it is to resist and be annihilated. Which is actually a sensible (if not automatically correct) position to hold.

Which is an interesting paradox for Bioware (and any sort of story writers). To make an antagonist a believable, three dimensional person rather than a shallow 'eeeeevil' pantomime villain, they need understandable motives. And the more understandable the motives, the more reasonable their actions. Then you run the risk that your audience will sympathise more with the antagonist than they will with the protagonist. The more reasonable Saren sounds, the more unreasonable Shepard sounds by comparison.

It's tricky, but I think a simple 'they were insane all along' is a fairly cheap ass-pull to make the audience side against the villain, but Bioware does kinda do it a lot. Saren, the Illusive Man, and the villain from DA2 all have motivations which are (at least in principle) reasonable. They COULD easily have been sympathetic characters. But with all three, Bioware pulled the "OMG, they're mad! See? They MUST be evil - they're CRAZY!" card.

The best villain Bioware ever did was in DA:O where they did not pull this 'Crazy' bait and switch.

So yes, all that aside, I believe Saren is supposed to be indoctrinated from the very first moment we see him, though we are told that he was a ruthless, unpleasant character even before then.

[n1x0r]

Saren was indoctrinated, if you play as paragon he will question his actions