266 réponses à ce sujet

[Iamjdr]

I swear all leng really needs is a more intimidating character model. He looks so cheese ball people just can't stand loosing to him. Wish he was in like the Cerberus ajax armor or Something similarly bulky that would look slightly more formidable to someone as badass as shep.

(Or maybe even the Cerberus Phoenix/dragoon armor, I think that would look pretty sweet on him)

[ImaginaryMatter]

What nonsense.

 

Let's consider for a moment the fight at the conclusion of the Citadel DLC. The one where the player can utterly crush the antagonist in gameplay before a cutscene plays.

 

If I remember correctly, the clone not only disarms Shepard, but gains the upper hand rather quickly. I believe the clone is only thrown off by the movement of the Normandy. Not only that, it's a fairly long time, combat-wise, before the squadmates show up. At least a good five seconds, perhaps even ten or more.

 

Wait a minute. Where are the shrieks of 'cutscene incompetence'?

 

The shrieks for Shepard to pull out another weapon after being disarmed?

 

Where are the cries that Shepard should have pulled out his omniblade and cut the clone's throat while on top of him instead of throwing punches?

 

Where are the demands that Shepard use his biotics to throw him off?

 

Where are the accusations of the squadmates 'doing nothing'?

 

The cries of Shepard using his 'weakest weapon' (an utterly silly complaint for entirely different reasons.)?

 

Hmm. Let's think. Now what's the big difference between that cutscene and the one on Thessia?

 

One was in a lighthearted and comedic DLC?

[DeinonSlayer]

What it comes down to, David, is whether a defeat scene shows the antagonist as being competent, or a protagonist as suddenly being inept to an out-of-character degree.

 

The clone doesn't spend the entire preceding fight paralyzed in place by the squad's fire and whining about his shields, up until a cutscene where he discards his weapon, utters some excrable one-liners and effortlessly swats aside Shepard's suddenly-underequipped and tactically inept allies (the sequence you're voraciously defending). The difficulty of the fight against the clone (which, unlike Leng, is meant to be viewed satyrically) does a better job of establishing the antagonist's competence. That's not to say things in the cutscene couldn't have been improved, but the contrast is far less glaring between what we face in gameplay and what's scripted to happen (the difficulty of the clone boss fight is often praised).

 

I approved of how the Virmire fight with Saren was handled in ME1, even though we lose, because Saren usually makes a good showing of himself.

[Steelcan]

I'd jump in, but House of Cards is too damn addictive

[DeinonSlayer]

I'd jump in, but House of Cards is too damn addictive

Tell me about it.

 

Actually, please don't. I'm still working my way through season 1.

[ImaginaryMatter]

I'd jump in, but House of Cards is too damn addictive

 

Political intrigue is much more exciting than BSN intrigue.

 

P.S. Is this forum still technically "BSN"? Or does it have another name? Are we keeping the old initials because they are so dear to us?

[DeinonSlayer]

Political intrigue is much more exciting than BSN intrigue.

 

P.S. Is this forum still technically "BSN"? Or does it have another name? Are we keeping the old initials because they are so dear to us?

I'm going with "EAsn."

[KaiserShep]

One was in a lighthearted and comedic DLC?

 

Lol, yeah that kind of establishes a key difference. So strange to have the lighthearted, comedic antagonist outstrip the antagonist of the main storyline in just about every way.

[Iamjdr]

What it comes down to, is whether a defeat scene shows the antagonist as being competent, or a protagonist as suddenly being inept to an out-of-character degree.

The clone doesn't spend the entire preceding fight paralyzed in place by the squad's fire and whining about his shields, up until a cutscene where he discards his weapon, utters some excrable one-liners and effortlessly swats aside Shepard's suddenly-underequipped and tactically inept allies

But right here is the problem, by your own words the cutscene does exactly what your saying it doesn't ..it shows Kia leng to be very competent (knowing when your losing regardless of crappy one liners and using a gunship in a fight your losing is a pretty smart move for an honorless bastard like leng) It is only the GAMEPLAY that is showing otherwise (recharging out in the open, and flipping more then fighting/ getting owned by op weapons like the adas/harrier/lancer..etc)

[KaiserShep]

I'd say the more problematic scene is his attack on the sky car on the Citadel. Shaking him off would be the obvious thing to do, but instead Shepard opts to try to shoot through the windshield, and then fire at his impenetrable biotic field.

[Iamjdr]

I'd say the more problematic scene is his attack on the sky car on the Citadel. Shaking him off would be the obvious thing to do, but instead Shepard opts to try to shoot through the windshield, and then fire at his impenetrable biotic field.

On that we can agree, mostly because this is right after leng potentially just killed thane your friend or even some peoples LI. I definitely woulda at least attempted to smear him all over that walkway if I was driving..

[SporkFu]

On that we can agree, mostly because this is right after leng potentially just killed thane your friend or even some peoples LI. I definitely woulda at least attempted to smear him all over that walkway if I was driving..

Agreed. When the mission was over they should have done a quick cut to the walkway and shown a couple keepers hanging upside down mopping up the smear. Take that, TIM baby.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Ridiculous.

 

You should spare me the gameplay hogwash and just come right out and say "My Shepard is a special snowflake who never ever loses because he's Shepard and he never loses." That's evidently what gameplay has you convinced of.

 

You love breaking the conventions of argument don't you? 

 

Unlike combat, that doesn't win you an argument David. Outright dismissing and denying that I am actually making my argument and telling me that I wanted something else (and making it through an appeal to ridicule and a personal attack) because you can't actually make a counter argument just means you're looking like an ass.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

But right here is the problem, by your own words the cutscene does exactly what your saying it doesn't ..it shows Kia leng to be very competent (knowing when your losing regardless of crappy one liners and using a gunship in a fight your losing is a pretty smart move for an honorless bastard like leng) It is only the GAMEPLAY that is showing otherwise (recharging out in the open, and flipping more then fighting/ getting owned by op weapons like the adas/harrier/lancer..etc)

 

Really, it doesn't actually show much competence from Leng at all. He's not doing the smart thing and letting the gunship take of Shepard, only using it when he needs to recharge his shields. He could have just flown the gunship and blown up the team that way instead. They tried to make him a ninja like character from Naruto or something and make the battle seem as something as such, except that the concept falls to the ground of utility with the advent of firearms (which Shepard and company had, and Leng didn't). Read what I said in response to David about the gameplay and cutscene showing of both Shepard and Leng. They're drastically reducing Shepard's previously shown capabilities with what is pretty much the hand of god keeping Shepard from actually shooting his damn weapon when he has a chance? Or how Leng is suddenly made to be some incredible villain when he really didn't do anything except throw Liara into a squadmate while Shepard stood there (not shooting when he had the chance).

 

As for 'honorless bastard' in a fight? Boy do I have a lot to tell you about that.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

David, all I've ever seen you do is sit back and scoff contemptuously at other people's ideas, reinterpretations, and rewrites while defending even the most widely ridiculed scenes in the trilogy under the auspices of narrative theories you can't seem to comprehend straying from. I've yet to see you contribute any scenarios of your own. So, no - it's your turn. Let's see what you've got. You believe so much that such a scene could have worked? Don't demand it from someone else. Let's hear it from you.

 

I, personally, think a preprepared environment would still count as a victory for him because it would have been his ingenuity leading to victory. So I say an ambush, explosives et al remain valid. If you want to write a scene without them, describing every ballerina flip and one-liner, knock yourself out.

 

There was the time he made his conventional ending scenario known and proclaimed it to be the best around. Basically, it was where a few Reapers were on a planet and he had a fleet that shot down at them and killed them all while the Reapers did absolutely nothing. And it was done in seconds. He took something that was proven to fail, and by the power of asspull made it suddenly succeed.

 

Everybody ripped him a new one on it, and in typical fashion, he dismissed the arguments against him. 

[Xilizhra]

Really, it doesn't actually show much competence from Leng at all. He's not doing the smart thing and letting the gunship take of Shepard, only using it when he needs to recharge his shields. He could have just flown the gunship and blown up the team that way instead. They tried to make him a ninja like character from Naruto or something and make the battle seem as something as such, except that the concept falls to the ground of utility with the advent of firearms (which Shepard and company had, and Leng didn't). Read what I said in response to David about the gameplay and cutscene showing of both Shepard and Leng. They're drastically reducing Shepard's previously shown capabilities with what is pretty much the hand of god keeping Shepard from actually shooting his damn weapon when he has a chance? Or how Leng is suddenly made to be some incredible villain when he really didn't do anything except throw Liara into a squadmate while Shepard stood there (not shooting when he had the chance).

 

As for 'honorless bastard' in a fight? Boy do I have a lot to tell you about that.

Kai Leng does have a firearm, though; his palm blaster thing. Granted, he also uses his sword a lot, but it seems to be able to effortlessly slice through both shields and armor, so I can understand why (maybe it was easier to put such functionality on a melee weapon?).

I didn't mind this cutscene as much, but maybe it's because I play as an adept and am not geared towards fighting shielded enemies all that much, so Kai Leng never falls without a fight here.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

I'm the one asking for a revised scenario, not you. It's relatively easy to imagine Leng stopping Shepard's car, particularly when he has goons and an extra car or two for backup.

 

I want a scenario where Leng beats all three squadmembers on his own two feet. Nothing but the ground and the environment around him. No tricks, and no backup. If you can comprehend that, write that for me.

 

So no asymmetric warfare and him armed the way he is with nothing but his sword?

 

No, not really. It's 3 on 1, and he's at a distinct disadvantage with his opponents bringing his firearms. In fact, this is essentially what you see on Cronos Station (and he still brings backup). He'd use his biotics to throw off the team a bit, but it's not going to win the battle for him. Otherwise, he has to get close with his sword against three targets shooting at him the whole time. He has no advantage in the fight you've described. Assuming he's not using the terrain to his advantage (and not using asymmetric warfare), he really has no chance against Shepard and 2 relatively high caliber fighters.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Kai Leng does have a firearm, though; his palm blaster thing. Granted, he also uses his sword a lot, but it seems to be able to effortlessly slice through both shields and armor, so I can understand why (maybe it was easier to put such functionality on a melee weapon?).

I didn't mind this cutscene as much, but maybe it's because I play as an adept and am not geared towards fighting shielded enemies all that much, so Kai Leng never falls without a fight here.

 

He really never seems to use his phase disruptor ability more than once on Cronos if I remember correctly. He uses it more as a biotic shield, and it's one that can be depleted rapidly with enough gunfire. 

 

And even if his sword does cut through shields and armor, still? Why the hell is he bringing a sword to a gunfight?

 

At Thessia, the only intelligence he really shows is bringing the gunship with him, which, as I said, if he was smart, he'd let it do all the fighting for him. 

 

Contrary to what iamjdr is saying about combat (which I can't stop laughing at), you don't fight fair. You fight to win. And it's not really that cool to see Leng just suddenly win because a cutscene is showing Shepard and company not fighting when they should be fighting. As I said previously, Shepard stops firing his weapon. An automatic weapon. At a point blank target. Leng was absolutely stupid to even step out of any kind of cover less than 20 feet from Shepard when he has such an advantage. But Shepard is even stupider because he stopped firing. And it gives Leng the opportunity to call in the gunship. Or Liara. She did the same thing. She just watched Leng run at her with a dumbfounded expression. Instead of shooting at him. I'm normally a detractor of Liara, but even I'd say she's smart enough to realize that if she has a gun pointed right at a guy running at her with a sword, she'd be firing until he was down. And the other squadmate. Why the hell is he running? Why the hell isn't he firing his weapon? 

 

It all comes across as very forced. 

 

I'm not opposed to Leng beating Shepard. But it was portrayed in such a terrible, terrible, terrible way.

[von uber]

Also, where the hell was the gunship hiding given that the Asari ones lasted about 3 minutes before being blown out of the sky.

[Xilizhra]

I won't argue that it was terribly good, but Thessia is definitely when the game starts to show signs of being forced out unpolished.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

I honestly think I'm still missing how everyone finds the fight on thessia so bad... I mean everyone keeps say its because you lose to Kia leng but he CHEATS to win. I mean thats the point of that entire scene isn't it? to feel cheated and that leng got out by the skin of his teeth. Kia leng realizes he can't win so he gets away from everyone, bubbles and calls in the gunship to do his dirty work. If he was so sure he could win he would have stayed to finish the squad off after but he is gone before shep climbs out of the hole, which was pretty quick. Shep even says as much in the cerby HQ mission "I only seem slow cause I'm not running" " you ran on the citadel, you ran on thessia"

 

I'm just going to say buddy, your idea of combat is very limited. Ever hear of combat pragmatism?

 

The whole purpose of combat is to win so that you can end a conflict faster. It doesn't matter how. There's no rules for cheating or fighting dirty.

 

I can't believe I'm actually defending Leng here, but he's doing the smart thing. Fighting without honor might make you (just you) feel bad, but fighting with honor will get you killed.

 

There's an adage about fighting in combat; 'If you're in a fair fight, your tactics suck.' 

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Also, where the hell was the gunship hiding given that the Asari ones lasted about 3 minutes before being blown out of the sky.

 

I'd gather that the Reapers weren't focusing (or possibly outright ignoring) on Cerberus targets because of indoctrination.

[von uber]

I'd gather that the Reapers weren't focusing (or possibly outright ignoring) on Cerberus targets because of indoctrination.

 

Which is contradicted by Horizon, but yeah possibly.

Anyway my problem with the Kai Elng thing is not the defeat in itself but how it was portrayed, coupled with the awful character of Kai Leng. The emotional impact of the 'failure' is lessened by the fact that it ffeels ridiculous to lose in such a way.

Hell, they could've made it so you don't even fight but he steals the data ahead of you and you are too late - like a call back to Eva Core, but this time you fail when you would be going 'oh, this again, we'll catch him'.

[Tyrannosaurus Rex]

One way I think the defeat on Thessia could have been handled is to have Kai Leng through the use of traps (explosives and what have you), the gunship and Cerberus goons isolate Shepard from the two squadmates. Kai Leng would then proceed to take Shepard on in a 1v1 fight where he wins.

 

Reasons why I think this idea could work is because it could show a more prideful side to Kai Leng, he uses clever tricks to seperate Shepard from the squadmates but insists on taking Shepard on in a 1v1 fight. It also shows that while Shepard is a tough cookie, he is not unstoppable on his own and that his true strenght is as the leader of a team. Thereby showing how dangerous Kai Leng is without diminishing Shepard.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Which is contradicted by Horizon, but yeah possibly.

Anyway my problem with the Kai Elng thing is not the defeat in itself but how it was portrayed, coupled with the awful character of Kai Leng. The emotional impact of the 'failure' is lessened by the fact that it ffeels ridiculous to lose in such a way.

Hell, they could've made it so you don't even fight but he steals the data ahead of you and you are too late - like a call back to Eva Core, but this time you fail when you would be going 'oh, this again, we'll catch him'.

 

They specifically mention why it was contradicted on Horizon. It's a plot point. 

 

To the second statement, yes, I agree. Thanks for reinforcing my point. Granted, I never really felt an emotional impact for the loss of Thessia period.

 

That would actually have worked fine if you ask me, even if it is somewhat redundant to the previous set-up. I think they wanted a confrontation where Shepard is physically beaten (which never happens since they took an alternate route).