45 replies to this topic

[Vanilka]

... what would you change and how? Is there any part of the franchise that particularly bothers you and you have an idea how you would prefer it to be done? Is there anything that you think is kind of okay, but you know how to make it better? Perhaps you would like to see something completely new added?

 

Following an idea from another topic, I've thought it could be fun to put our thoughts together. I must admit I'm not holding my breath when it comes to any sort of remake or remaster of the franchise. As much as I enjoy the games, I'm not sure that's ever going to happen. However, since we like to discuss them to death one way or another, I'd love to hear your opinions.

 

Thoughts? Ideas?

[themikefest]

ME1

 

- I would have humanity part of the galactic community for longer than 30 years.

- I would add Steve and Samantha as part of the crew as well as Ken and Gabby. Heck put Rupert Gardner on the ship to be the cook

- I would fix Liara's background. Have her join the asari military when she's old enough where she becomes a commando. After a few decades, she decides to leave the military to study the protheans

- Instead of Garrus crying about paperwork and regulations and quitting C-Sec, have his superior give him permission to help Shepard go after Saren

- remove Jenkins and have Ashley and Kaidan as squadmates from the very beginning

- not have Benezia as Liara's mother

- leave the decision about the Rachni Queen to the council

- Miranda makes a couple cameos representing Cerberus. She meets with Shepard. Maybe have a meeting on Noveria another meeting on the Citadel

- Udina will always become the human councilor.

- the council will always live. As soon as they are onboard the destiny ascension, the ship flies away from the battle

- the Alliance helps fight off the geth until the arms open up

- all Alliance ships fire on Sovereign from behind. Once Shepard has Sarens health down to half, a cutscene shows Sovereign taking some damage. It releases its hold of the tower, turns around and starts firing on the Alliance. Once Saren is dead, Sovereign is destroyed after destroying some Alliance ships. What this does is let you know the reapers weak spot is their backside.

 

some of these ideas I might change. I might also add a few more.

 

I will post later about ME2 and ME3.

[Tim van Beek]

ME1

...

- all Alliance ships fire on Sovereign from behind. Once Shepard has Sarens health down to half, a cutscene shows Sovereign taking some damage. It releases its hold of the tower, turns around and starts firing on the Alliance. Once Saren is dead, Sovereign is destroyed after destroying some Alliance ships. What this does is let you know the reapers weak spot is their backside.

 

One can imagine that a lot of these ideas will spawn a controversial discussion  .

But the way Sovereign is defeated in ME:1 is a problem. It looks like Sovereign loses conciousness or something after Saren is destroyed. Why would that happen? It is unnecessary, just let the fleet defeat Sovereign conventionally. 

 

For me, the biggest problem is the motivation of the reapers and the way they are defeated. The easiest way out is of course to never reveal anything about it (never explain the crucible plot device, remove the catalyst dialogue). But this is disappointing for me, because we get a lot of promises that a deep revelation is about to come. Like when the Leviathan says "the galaxy became its experiment, evolution its tool." ("It" refers to the AI controlling the reapers, of course).

 

IMHO, nothing that is said or shown in the whole series makes much sense, especially not the Leviathan and the catalyst dialogues in the EC which were created for that very purpose. For example, the Leviathan also says "It instructed the reapers to construct the mass relays to speed up time between cycles for greates efficiency." If the goal of the reapers is to save organics from creating synthetics which destroy them, why would the catalyst want to speed up the time between cycles? And what became of the "experiment"? What is that supposed to be about?

 

My idea to fix that is:

 

1. The reapers try to prevent organics from wiping themselves out, by accident or conflict or whatever. They start the harvest as soon as they come to the conclusion that the advanced species in the galaxy have developed the necessary tools and weapons to wipe out all life, and also have the disposition to do so.

 

2. The ultimate goal of the reapers is to steer evolution in order to create a civilization that has the moral strength to overcome aggression and become the new gardener of life in the galaxy, instead of its death. This is what the experiment is about. This is why the reapers created the mass relays. The faster evolution works, the more civilizations grow, the higher the chance of success. This is also why the reapers allow the civilizations to advance more and more from cycle to cycle, in order to give them more of a chance to prove themselves.

 

3. The reapers try to use the knowledge gained from each harvest to figure out why civilizations fail. This is the knowledge that is uncomprehensible to organics. As a beekeeper does not explain his breeding strategy to his bees, the reapers do not try to explain this to Shepard or any other organic.

 

4. The reapers are not "evil", just as a gardener who controls the weeds in his garden is not "evil" from his point of view.

 

5. The reapers are not defeated. They cannot be defeated, they are superiour, in any way. The conflict can be resolved only by Shepard convincing the reapers that humanity is a possible candidate for a civilization that can overcome aggression and achieve cooperation. Also, the catalyst has to acknowledge that the strategy of the reapers has come to a dead end. if they continue to allow civilizations to advance any more in the next cycle (see point 2), they will again suffer heavy losses during the next harvest.

 

So far it seems to me that it is possible to implement all of this without major changes to the overall story line from ME:1 to ME:3. And I think it is possible to work this all out so that it makes sense, is not self-contradictory and does not create huge plot holes, unanswered questions etc. etc. 

[dgcatanisiri]

ME1's fairly solid in terms of plot, but there are a few significant changes I'd make:

• Combine Liara and Shiala's characters - "Liala" would be about 250-300 years old, having served a stint with the commandos, as part of her mother's honor guard or soemthing. However, she also had an interest in the protheans and archeology, a deeper interest in that than in combat. Eventually, her mother convinces her to leave the commandos and go become an archeologist - 'You're only 250, go out and see the universe! You'll have plenty of time yet to be a commando and serve Thessia and its people.' Her theories are ignored amongst the scientific community, since there's some academic pushback against perceived nepotism, her being Benezia's daughter. She uncovers knowledge of the Cipher and takes it to her mother, who has already begun being indoctrinated at this point, and gives her up to the thorian.
• Ashley and Kaidan are both bisexual LIs, and there is no mandated death on Virmire (it adds too many variables for later games)
• A more coherent Cerberus narrative, one that doesn't stand at odds with later portrayals
• Benezia makes a couple more appearances, acting as a public face, and, for a period of time, is implied to be holding Saren's leash, being the big bad, making it a surprise when she's revealed to be indoctrinated and working FOR Saren. Perhaps even have her answer a summons from the Council about what Saren is up to (this would probably involve changing the message that confirms things for the Council of Saren's treachery).
• More banter, like on missions and from within the Mako, to both give the characters more development and liven up the long journeys of nothing (though I would also suggest cutting down on a few of the uncharted worlds, move that experience elsewhere, since there's a lot else to be done than exploring all of the galaxy)

For ME2 and ME3, my ideas are a LOT more involved, so I'll come back to them later. These are a good place to start from, though.

[themikefest]

One can imagine that a lot of these ideas will spawn a controversial discussion  .

But the way Sovereign is defeated in ME:1 is a problem. It looks like Sovereign loses conciousness or something after Saren is destroyed. Why would that happen? It is unnecessary, just let the fleet defeat Sovereign conventionally. 

What bothered me about the fight with Sovereign is that it made the Alliance look bad or rather Hackett. I would've had all my ships behind Sovereign firing at it. The other thing is when Saren-hopper is defeated, Sovereign loses its grip of the tower. Alliance are seen firing at the reaper, but taking no damage. But in flies this puny little frigate, the Normandy, to destroy the reaper. The whole thing was setup for the SR1 to kill the reaper. That was lame.

 

Had Hackett had all the ships firing on Sovereign from behind, its possible the fleet would've destroyed the reaper without fighting saren-hopper. Having that happen would let you know the reapers have a weak spot. Their backside. It also proves that the reapers are very powerful just by how Sovereign plowed through the Citadel defenses with ease.

[Tim van Beek]

I would've had all my ships behind Sovereign firing at it. The other thing is when Saren-hopper is defeated, Sovereign loses its grip of the tower. Alliance are seen firing at the reaper, but taking no damage. But in flies this puny little frigate, the Normandy, to destroy the reaper. The whole thing was setup for the SR1 to kill the reaper. That was lame.

Agreed. I think the ME:1 writers intended to engage the player by showing that winning the boss fight against Saren somehow enabled the defeat of Sovereign, and that the Normandy had a vital role in it, too. I'm sure that worked for a lot of players, so I probably would have went along with it as a producer, but from the viewpoint of a critic it is hyperbolic. Hey, we could also make Shepard emerge from the debris with a baby on his/her arm the he/she saved . 

 

 

Had Hackett had all the ships firing on Sovereign from behind, its possible the fleet would've destroyed the reaper without fighting saren-hopper. Having that happen would let you know the reapers have a weak spot. Their backside. It also proves that the reapers are very powerful just by how Sovereign plowed through the Citadel defenses with ease.

Oh, but we should let the player win the boss fight first. First, Shepard foils the reaper invasion via the citadel, then Sovereign finds itself facing a superior force without a backup plan. 

Is there a reason to introduce a weak spot at the back of the reapers? Do you intend to open the possibility for a conventional defeat in ME:3?

[themikefest]

Is there a reason to introduce a weak spot at the back of the reapers? Do you intend to open the possibility for a conventional defeat in ME:3?

There's nothing wrong with knowing a weak spot of your enemy. Its just a matter of capitalizing on it. If the reapers have the numbers that I've seen posted, no conventionally victory would happen. Reapers would win just by numbers alone. The other thing is a conventional victory would take a long time. It would be hard to do with only 3 games. Its even possible that a victory could happen after Shepard dies of old age.

 

Here's a post I made about how many reapers there might be.

[Tim van Beek]

There's nothing wrong with knowing a weak spot of your enemy. Its just a matter of capitalizing on it. If the reapers have the numbers that I've seen posted, no conventionally victory would happen. Reapers would win just by numbers alone. The other thing is a conventional victory would take a long time. It would be hard to do with only 3 games. Its even possible that a victory could happen after Shepard dies of old age.

 

Here's a post I made about how many reapers there might be.

Right. So as writers we want the reapers to be defeatable in the end. The way they are set up, a conventional defeat is not possible and also would be an anticlimax, because it would be drawn-out, simply because of their sheer number. It also wouldn't be much of a surprise for the audience. So I wonder what role the weakness at the back will play in your rewrite? 

 

If you don't want a conventional defeat and don't want to keep a magic plot device like the crucible around, you would need to give the reapers some weakness that makes another type of defeat possible. A usual trope, or rather a cliché at this point, is to make the reapers  dependent on a hive mind, which Shepard can infiltrate and destroy (e.g. Crysis 3). Or Shepard could hack them (e.g. Star Trek Next Generation, defeat of the Borg in the first episode of season 4, see https://en.wikipedia...ext_Generation)). I don't see any way to make this surprising, interesting and believable. 

 

My own take is of course that the reapers should not be defeated at all, but that it is possible to convince them to stop the harvest as the best possible course of action they can take at this point, as I described in my first post. 

[Fixers0]

- leave the decision about the Rachni Queen to the council

- Udina will always become the human councilor.

- the council will always live. As soon as they are onboard the destiny ascension, the ship flies away from the battle

 

Here you pretty much remove all the major choices from the first game, the fact because the latter games screwed them up is not a reason to remove them. I suppose the choice to leave the Rachni queen couldn't hurt, The council probably just sends another Spectre to kill the queen and swipes it under rug in the interest of galactic safety.

 

Forcing Udina to become councilor in ME1 would be worse than shoving into our faces in ME3, if the Alliance can't get anything other than that treasonous, lying sack of you-know-what to become humanity's interstellar represenative than they are in serious trouble. Such a disgusting person.

 

With Regards to the council it was my impression that they did attempt to get away but where intercepted by the Geth fleet, which was formidable in size. 

[Youknow]

Right. So as writers we want the reapers to be defeatable in the end. The way they are set up, a conventional defeat is not possible and also would be an anticlimax, because it would be drawn-out, simply because of their sheer number. It also wouldn't be much of a surprise for the audience. So I wonder what role the weakness at the back will play in your rewrite? 

 

If you don't want a conventional defeat and don't want to keep a magic plot device like the crucible around, you would need to give the reapers some weakness that makes another type of defeat possible. A usual trope, or rather a cliché at this point, is to make the reapers  dependent on a hive mind, which Shepard can infiltrate and destroy (e.g. Crysis 3). Or Shepard could hack them (e.g. Star Trek Next Generation, defeat of the Borg in the first episode of season 4, see https://en.wikipedia...ext_Generation)). I don't see any way to make this surprising, interesting and believable. 

 

My own take is of course that the reapers should not be defeated at all, but that it is possible to convince them to stop the harvest as the best possible course of action they can take at this point, as I described in my first post. 

Giving them a weakness makes it easier to comprehend and believe that the races could be at least holding their own against the reapers for awhile. Otherwise it kind of becomes the mess in ME3 where it's like "we're fighting but it's not going well," and that's all they keep saying. With a weakness, it makes it sorta believable that people could be fighting against them but losing through being overwhelmed by their numbers and superior offense. 

 

Conventional defeats would be fine if the trilogy wasn't about Sheperd. But as it stands, it IS about Sheperd, so the war of the gods basically needs to be done in 1 (wo)man's lifetime. This is pretty dicey to try honestly. There's nothing wrong with super kills of the hive minds or the like-- the issue is that someone needs to work on the "I win" button and it needs to be done from as early as ME1. Not just have the bloody thing being built in ME3-- even just mere foreshadowing wouldn't be enough. It needs to be started for from the start so we can have multiple people scrambling for solutions. It really seems kind of pathetic that everyone is relying on some item that might not even work. 

 

Which is even worse IMO. Pacifying them would be an interesting take if the game didn't waste my time through three stories of me getting to this point. I think that's the biggest issue with Mass Effect: the game has you overcome seemingly impossible odds constantly, and then you reach ME3's ending and the game decides "okay, enough of this overcoming odds garbage. You can't do that." And the player asks why, and he "DM/Writer basically says 'because I said so.'" I think that's the biggest issue people have with the ending. It feels like you're playing a D'n'D session and the DM just says "I'm done. The game's over. Oh, and your character died." 

[themikefest]

Here you pretty much remove all the major choices from the first game, the fact because the latter games screwed them up is not a reason to remove them.

Before I answer your post, I want to ask you something.

 

Why are assuming I removed those decisions because of what happened in ME2/3?

 

[Tim van Beek]

Giving them a weakness makes it easier to comprehend and believe that the races could be at least holding their own against the reapers for awhile. Otherwise it kind of becomes the mess in ME3 where it's like "we're fighting but it's not going well," and that's all they keep saying. With a weakness, it makes it sorta believable that people could be fighting against them but losing through being overwhelmed by their numbers and superior offense. 

There is a "slow reaper progress condundrum". When I watched "War of the Worlds" (the remake by Steven Spielberg) I wondered why the Martians didn't use any kind of weapon of mass destruction. I think the answer is that Wells wrote the story before WWI, when the very concept was unknown and, it would seem, inconceivable. That's the way the reapers operate, too. It would be believable if they tried to harvest each species, but AFAIK they only try to harvest humans.

 

I'm not sure that giving them a weak spot is an idea that helps to solve that conundrum. There is still the reaper's inability to come up with convincing battle strategies and tactics (I'll give you two "likes" if you don't mention the "It's not about strategy or tactics" speech  ). Then there is the question of why the reapers would allow civilizations to develop the necessary technology to become a serious threat to them, well beyond the stage where said civilizations could create AI's and synthetics that could wipe out all live in the galaxy, for that matter.

 

 

Conventional defeats would be fine if the trilogy wasn't about Sheperd. But as it stands, it IS about Sheperd, so the war of the gods basically needs to be done in 1 (wo)man's lifetime. This is pretty dicey to try honestly. There's nothing wrong with super kills of the hive minds or the like-- the issue is that someone needs to work on the "I win" button and it needs to be done from as early as ME1. Not just have the bloody thing being built in ME3-- even just mere foreshadowing wouldn't be enough. It needs to be started for from the start so we can have multiple people scrambling for solutions. It really seems kind of pathetic that everyone is relying on some item that might not even work. 

Alright, it is better to copy an old but good idea than to come up with something new that doesn' work   . So how would you do it?

 

 

Which is even worse IMO. Pacifying them would be an interesting take if the game didn't waste my time through three stories of me getting to this point. I think that's the biggest issue with Mass Effect: the game has you overcome seemingly impossible odds constantly, and then you reach ME3's ending and the game decides "okay, enough of this overcoming odds garbage. You can't do that." And the player asks why, and he "DM/Writer basically says 'because I said so.'" I think that's the biggest issue people have with the ending. It feels like you're playing a D'n'D session and the DM just says "I'm done. The game's over. Oh, and your character died." 

My solution to this would be to have Shepard fail on more occasions. The player should not expect to win every fight, unscathed, neither should Shepard. 

A good starting point would be to rearrange some plot points as they were planned initially:

 

1. Shepard looses the fight for Vendetta on Thessia against Cerberus,

2. The Cerberus coup on the citadel happens after that, the reason for the coup is that TIM needs to aquire the catalyst,

3. Shepard may be able to save the council, but shortly after that the reapers arrive and take over the citadel, so Shepard fails here, too.

 

It is not hard to turn ME:3 into an uphill battle that makes both Shepard and the player wonder if victory is possible, not by telling ("Our plan is oh so desperate, but we always win nevertheless, right?"), but by showing. Oh, and of course it should turn out that victory is indeed not possible, if the EMS is too low.

 

This is one of many surprising decisions that the BioWare team made about the ending. The crucible is always built, the beam run is always successful, the crucible is always docked at the citadel, it always "changes" the catalyst in a way that there is always a kind of "we win" - button.

[Youknow]

 

There is a "slow reaper progress condundrum". When I watched "War of the Worlds" (the remake by Steven Spielberg) I wondered why the Martians didn't use any kind of weapon of mass destruction. I think the answer is that Wells wrote the story before WWI, when the very concept was unknown and, it would seem, inconceivable. That's the way the reapers operate, too. It would be believable if they tried to harvest each species, but AFAIK they only try to harvest humans.

 

I'm not sure that giving them a weak spot is an idea that helps to solve that conundrum. There is still the reaper's inability to come up with convincing battle strategies and tactics (I'll give you two "likes" if you don't mention the "It's not about strategy or tactics" speech   ). Then there is the question of why the reapers would allow civilizations to develop the necessary technology to become a serious threat to them, well beyond the stage where said civilizations could create AI's and synthetics that could wipe out all live in the galaxy, for that matter.

 

 

Well the only reason we have is that they somehow hoped the the civilizations would have the ability to not make synthetics that would rebel against them (despite the fact that they state that it's inevitable and that the organics will always follow the paths they make)... Ugh. I think the issue with the strategy and tactics is that Bioware themselves aren't familiar with strategy or tactics. 

 

Alright, it is better to copy an old but good idea than to come up with something new that doesn' work    . So how would you do it?

 

Me personally? I'm a fan of having both be an option, so hear me out on this one because it's a bit wild. 

 

ME1: Leave it. The plot has problems, but the general structure and ideas for it are okay. I might change things like have Miranda make an appearance in an attempt to rally support for Cerberus, and show certain figures (perhaps someone on a sidequest that you helped, join up with her).  

 

 

ME2: ME2's plot should be... ME3's plot sans the reapers being there. One of my biggest problems with ME3 is that the timing for everything just feels wrong. All of these people rush off to go do their own thing when the reapers are knocking at the door. It just seems odd and kind of forced for drama TBH. So what we want to do is not have ME2 be pointless and more specifically, to give Sheperd something to do during ME3. So let's make ME2 to have just been "prepare for the reapers." Have all of the conflicts that rise up in ME3 be handled in ME2. Genophage? ME2. Geth versus Quarians? ME2. Asari problems? ME2. Seriously, just make ME2 literally about preparing for the reapers. You can even still have the collectors be the "main" enemy here to still give the reapers some "presence" as they make their way from dark space. It could also be used for foreshadowing to show that this is what they do to fallen organics and reveal that the reapers don't outright KILL the organics, but do *something* with them.

 

And then later on the collector base assault, reveal that not only do they turn them into foot soldiers like the collectors, but they make them into reapers. IE, why human colonies were being attacked. It's revealed that human colonies were chosen because a human, Sheperd, foiled Sovereign's plans, so human harvesting was used as a distraction for Sheperd while they continue to advance. 

 

ME3: Assuming you have a certain amount of assets, Sheperd can stand together and actually defeat the reapers through a conventional victory because rather than spending the time of rallying everyone together, they can concentrate on actually finding and exploiting weaknesses against their foe. The crucible is still there in case you make mistakes, but it's not necessary in this version, and you can still win without it. 

 

If you don't have enough assets to actually win, then there's the crucible, but it's more of a group of architects saying "guys, there's this thing we found that MIGHT help, but we don't know what it is, if you guys can hold the fort, we might be able to make this super thing that can win." So kinda like ME3 now except without the let's help everyone. Instead, the missions are more sidequest like than anything else and trying to hold the reapers back while the crucible is built. 

 

Basically, I would have had ME3 go wild with any of the decisions you made. For instance, if you faked the cure of the genophage and Wrex was there, he would have the krogan troops fight against you because you left his people to die anyways, so he's going to make sure you don't live. Stuff like that. 

 

 

 

My solution to this would be to have Shepard fail on more occasions. The player should not expect to win every fight, unscathed, neither should Shepard. 

A good starting point would be to rearrange some plot points as they were planned initially:

 

1. Shepard looses the fight for Vendetta on Thessia against Cerberus,

2. The Cerberus coup on the citadel happens after that, the reason for the coup is that TIM needs to aquire the catalyst,

3. Shepard may be able to save the council, but shortly after that the reapers arrive and take over the citadel, so Shepard fails here, too.

 

It is not hard to turn ME:3 into an uphill battle that makes both Shepard and the player wonder if victory is possible, not by telling ("Our plan is oh so desperate, but we always win nevertheless, right?"), but by showing. Oh, and of course it should turn out that victory is indeed not possible, if the EMS is too low.

 

This is one of many surprising decisions that the BioWare team made about the ending. The crucible is always built, the beam run is always successful, the crucible is always docked at the citadel, it always "changes" the catalyst in a way that there is always a kind of "we win" - button.

 

Sounds like you and I are kinda on similar pages to just allow things to be pretty radically different. I mean, it's the end of the series. There's no reason to not have the game go absolutely nuts at that point. 

[SwobyJ]

One of the biggest things I would change is have a smoother flow, in many ways, between the games.

 

I do theorize about a secret context change between each game, but it otherwise doesn't need to be so jarring and discourteous of players (IMO). It wasn't as trilogy as I hoped. Some efforts were made to counteract that, but while ME2 might be the most liked ME to many, its role in a trilogy was rather poor.

 

Another thing is I wanted more Reaper. ME1 Reapers involved earlier. ME2 Reapers explored earlier. ME3 Reapers explained earlier. Get us, even very optionally, more interested and knowledgeable of the basics of how Reapers work inside, how they view their sense of order over the galaxy. Not all of it, but definitely more than we got.

 

ME3 should not have had that much Cerberus, period. Technically more Cerberus missions than Reaper, when DLC is included. Yikes.

[Tim van Beek]

ME2: ME2's plot should be... ME3's plot sans the reapers being there. ...

Right. ME:2 works very well as a video game, I enjoyed it very much, but the plot is a big problem as the middle part of the triology.

Personally, I think a story like "a very powerful enemy is coming, you have two years to prepare, what do you do?" fascinating, but it seems to be hard to create ongoing suspense for a broad audience...

 

ME3: Assuming you have a certain amount of assets, Sheperd can stand together and actually defeat the reapers through a conventional victory because rather than spending the time of rallying everyone together, they can concentrate on actually finding and exploiting weaknesses against their foe. The crucible is still there in case you make mistakes, but it's not necessary in this version, and you can still win without it. 

 

If you don't have enough assets to actually win, then there's the crucible, but it's more of a group of architects saying "guys, there's this thing we found that MIGHT help, but we don't know what it is, if you guys can hold the fort, we might be able to make this super thing that can win." So kinda like ME3 now except without the let's help everyone. Instead, the missions are more sidequest like than anything else and trying to hold the reapers back while the crucible is built. 

So it's still a conventional victory or the crucible  .

A conventional victory could work very well as a video game, with increasingly difficult fights and boss fights, culminating with a critical boss fight against Harbinger that many fans expected  . Depending on combat performance and EMS, we could have utter failure, Shepard has to sacrifice him/herself, or Shepard lives but a lot is destroyed (maybe other squad mates die), and a perfect happy ending. This would have been such a commercial success for BioWare! (I'm sure some people were tearing their hair at the time.) 

 

Of course it would diminish the reapers, question their ability to control the cycle for a billion of years and introduce the danger of "villain decay" (http://tvtropes.org/...in/VillainDecay). And I am still thinking about the possibility to keep up the original vision the writers had of the reapers, which simply does rule out a conventional victory. Even with years of preparation.

 

 

Sounds like you and I are kinda on similar pages to just allow things to be pretty radically different. I mean, it's the end of the series. There's no reason to not have the game go absolutely nuts at that point. 

I'm open to debate any kinds of interesting ideas, but what I proposed in this thread is actually a rather small fix in the overall story. Switching the citadel coup and Thessia is not a big deal, neither is giving the reapers a motivation and background that actually makes sense. All you have to do to implement that is change a few dialogues in ME:3 (most importantly the Leviathan and catalyst dialogues).

And of course change the solution of the central conflict as I already explained.

 

P.S.: I'm serious, it really really bugs me that we don't get a reason for why the reapers built the mass relays that makes sense, and why the reapers let civilizations evolve well beyond the point where they can develop AI's etc. It would seem that this disposition is not shared by many.

[Redbelle]

All I'll say about making Liara more of a commando is that giving her a military background takes away from her innocence. Liara's character arc was to go from niave researcher to hardened and cold researcher.

 

Adding more people with martial prowess as a defining factor into the narrative means that Liara can no longer ask the niave questions and act as the outsider the audience needs when clarification and context is needed. If she's been a commando then she can't fill the role of outsider in a group that is based around military discipline......

 

I understand that giving her a mitiltary background is 'cool'.... But keeping her as just a researcher and adding scenes of training her to handle a weapon while learning how her biotics work would go a long way to explain the nature of Biotics for first time players back in ME1. Which is really the point of ME1. It has to carry the story, but also introduce folks to the world.

 

Making everyone military slants the narrative towards a militaristic perspective, and if Liara is still niave after having served as a commando..... Then she's worse than niave. She's a rejectionist in the face of military realities that the rest of the group accept due to training and experience. Or to put it another way..... She gains the same historical background as Raiden from ME2 who rejected his past and constructed realities based on events that suited his perspective on life. And you can't introduce a the Asari perspective of the galaxy to a player when the character's views are so....... selective.

[themikefest]

If her not having any experience in combat, I would never make her a squadmate

[Redbelle]

And thus you never enter the situation of escorting a specialist to a site to figure out something the group needs. Combat specialists can perform escort missions and giving Liara the chance to grow on screen by giving her training adds to her, rather than leaving her static or taking away from her character. Espeically if she's treading the path the rest of the group have that let's people see what she could become if she sticks with it.

[themikefest]

Incorrect. She is a liability that requires babysitting if she's a squadmate. Shepard has no time to train someone. I would expect someone who will be on my squad to have some training  and if not, give me someone who does have training.

[Redbelle]

Well that's the rub. She's the Prothean specialist and a trained Biotic. And she did end up on the squad and performed well without formal military training.

 

While we're on the subject, Tali doesn't have military training, yet her technical ability compensates for the lack of military training. Garus may come from a military culture, but he was a cop, not a soldier. Wrex has a militaristic background and experience, but again, no formal training. Just aptitude.

 

So if training is the requirement of being a squad mate, then everyone except Ash and Kaiden have to be excluded unless you open up the parameters of acceptance to allow those with aptitude in combat to fight.

[themikefest]

To continue with what I posted

 

-I would have Tali with some experience. I always thought she shouldn't be on the squad, but Udina says otherwise. I would not have  her on her pilgrimage, but that she was assigned by the quarian leadership to investigate reports of geth. She gets the audio from the geth she disables.

-I would give femshep the opportunity to flirt with Conrad.

-after the Normandy is haneded to Shepard, Anderson is reassigned to another post

-when Udina locks the Normandy, Shepard gets an anonymous email telling him/her that the Normandy will be unlocked shortly

 

Again I might add or changed a few ideas

[dgcatanisiri]

Here's the thing about why I don't like Liara as is joining the crew - she IS a liability. We're talking about someone who's only proven themself as a researcher and pawn. She has limited combat skills, and, while Tali would not be much more familiar with combat duties, she's proven herself as a tech expert, getting data the rest of the galaxy thought impossible from a geth memory core, so she has skills that are useful on the battlefield, since Shepard and company are fighting geth. Liara, however, is a pure researcher, unused to combat. Her biggest claim to combat are her biotics, which, reasonably, she has not had occasion to use offensively much, if at all. Of all the ME1 crew, game mechanics aside, she IS the biggest combat liability.

 

Reasonably, she should be brought back to the Citadel and left in protective custody - she's Benezia's daughter, and there's already been one attempt on her life, keeping her on the Normandy is putting the ship and crew at greater risk if they come after her again, and there's a reasonable suspicion that Liara is working for her mother, who is working with Saren. Give her canonical history with combat experience, it balances out the possible security risks, not to mention makes her later rise to prominence as one of Illium's most respected information brokers in the span of a year and a half much less improbable. And, honestly, I find her youth far too emphasized in ME1, so yes, I desperately want her to have an age-up so I don't feel like Shepard is robbing the craddle in possibly romancing her. So why not have her be someone who's changed careers, from soldier to researcher? It even offers a better look at asari culture this way, that her theories are ignored not because of her youth and inexperience but because other 'pure' scientists view her as only able to look at things from the perspective of a soldier. It at least makes a better reasoning for Liara being the first person in two thousand years to notice the patterns of the cycle and say 'this is a recurring thing' and being ignored just because of her youth - make it that the asari are actively ignoring this idea because they are looking at the information with colored glasses, that ALL asari are viewing the protheans through a distorted lens (I mean, given Liara's treatment of Javik in ME3, treating him as an archive to peruse instead of a person with PTSD as he's woken up as the last survivor of his species, it's even in character and would serve as foreshadowing).

 

Anyway, I also agree with the concept of turning ME2 into a 'get the galaxy ready' story, rather than dealing with the Collector threat. Like, sure, we can keep the Collectors as enemies, but instead of going after their base, save that for ME3 and have them just as the new threat for 2. I think ME2 would also have been improved by removing the 'Shepard dies' element. Instead of two years of death, they've been sidelined by the Council and steadily ignored as they try to address the Reapers over that time. They ultimately go for bypassing the Council and going straight for the various governments. That can still give us the multi-species team of specialists, as it's showing that the galaxy CAN come together for the greater good.

 

Since in this version, we're bypassing the Collector base (that could serve as a set piece in ME3, maybe in place of the resolution to the geth-quarian conflict), we instead fight one of the Destroyer variants on a Council world, in public where everyone can see this is not the geth, this is not going away, and war is on our doorstep. It still allows Shepard's crew to separate - Ashley/Kaidan (though, if we're building off of my above ideas, it'd be both of them) are reassigned by the Alliance, Wrex and Tali have gone back to their people, Garrus is still in C-Sec (he could be a 'C-Sec liason' during Shepard's mission, or something like that, build off of the Paragon version of his character arc in ME1), and LIara is off on her pick of prothean digs, now focused on efforts that can help fight the Reapers (to foreshadow the Crucible).

 

Cerberus can also resume the more 'background' elements it had before, because they'd be able to be a smaller organization, since they're not rebuilding Shepard after their death. Perhaps we don't even learn about Miranda's Cerberus ties until halfway through, that she comes as a specialist with information for Shepard that gets them off on this 'personal crusade' (as the Council would call it when they refuse to offer Shepard Council resources for this mission), and only later reveals her colors.

 

Also, much as I love the ME2 crew, I would have to say cut some of them down to characters like Gianna Parasini or Shiala are now. It kills me to say that, but the ME2 crew is way too big for them to really have a place in the overall narrative.

 

And, of course, I say save the 'Suicide Mission' elements, the split into teams with certain characters dying if you don't do things right, for ME3 - it makes it too difficult to plot them into ME3 if they can all die in 2, as we saw.

[themikefest]

I forgot about this thread. My bad

 

to continue from above

 

After Sovereign is defeated, Shepard meets with the council. They believe Sovereign wasn't a geth ship. Shepard plays a recorded conversation with Saren before he died. Shepard also plays the conversation with Vigil. The salarian councilor and asari councilor agree the reapers are a threat. The Turian councilor is not convinced. Shepard asks the asari councilor to mind meld with him/her to see the images for herself. She is hesitant at first, but goes through with it. After few minutes, she does agree that something needs to be done about stopping the reapers. But first, they must take care of the mess left by Sovereign. Udina is made councilor

 

- the SR1 is destroyed by an unknown enemy

- Shepard survives with only a few bumps and bruises.

- the council assigns scientists and engineers to find the signal that is needed to open the citadel relay

- for the next two years, Shepard uses another ship to travel to different locations to find a way to stop the reapers

- Liara, along with some fellow Prothean experts, head  to Eden Prime to see if there's anything more that can be found

- Wrex heads back to his homeworld to try and convince his leaders to help stop the reapers. Tali does the same

- Garrus goes back to C-Sec

 - Shepard a long with Ashley/Kaidan head back to Ilos to see if there's is anything useful that can help

- Shepard receives an email from Miranda Lawson to meet her

 

Shepard meets with Miranda who represents Cerberus. She says Cerberus would like to help the Alliance stop the reapers. Cerberus has built a larger version of the SR1 and offers it to Shepard to use. Miranda also mentions that human colonies have gone missing and that Cerberus would like to know who is responsible. Shepard is curious why Cerberus would help. Miranda says Cerberus is doing to help humanity. Miranda says that if Shepard and the Alliance accept their help, she is to be join Shepard to help. The Alliance agrees after scanning the ship and finding nothing suspicious

 

On the ship is edi. But looks similiar to Mira on Noveria. Shepard takes Command of the ship. Samantha, Steve, Joker, Ken, Gabby, Dr.Chakwas, Rupert Gardner, Greg Adams, join Shepard along with other Alliance personnel to operate the new Normandy.

 

I will continue later

[Gonda]

For me only two things.

 

Happy ending with Shepard alive with his/hers LI on a planet looking at the sunrise or something.

 

Instead of haveing only two squadmates on misson it should be increasd to 3 or 4. Also adding more enemies becuase of this.

[themikefest]

to continue from above

 

Shepard heads to freedom's progrees and finds Tali there. They learn its the collectors that are kidnapping the colonists. Tali joins the squad

- Shepard heads to eden prime to get Liara. We Shepard arrives, there are mercs that have Liara and a few co-workers trapped in a building. After the enemy is defeated, Liara mentions a pod that is found. Its Javik. He doesn't become a squadmate, but talks about his time with the reaper.  Liara also mentions she doesn't know why the mercs would be after her and her fellow workers. She stays on the Normandy

- the recruitment mission is nearly the same for Garrus, but instead of Archangel, he was sent to Omega to see why none of the C-Sec officers reported in. These officers were working undercover to track some criminals that were being investigated by C-Sec. Garrus is ok and joins Shepard on the Normandy

- I'm not sure what a good recruitment mission would be with Wrex. I will get back to that later. For the moment he joins the team

- Mordin is recruited. His mission is the same. He will not be a squadmate. He will stay on the ship to find a way to couter the swarm the collectors use.

- Ashley/Kaidan joined Shepard when Shepard took control of the new Normandy.

 

At that point, Miranda passes an email she got from TIM that he has reason to believe Horizon will targeted by the collectors. Instead of Ashley/Kaidan on Horizon like is seen in ME2, an Alliance representative is there to help the colony with the defense systems.

 

I will continue later. Again I might make some changes, maybe even to previous posts