322 réponses à ce sujet

[Livi14]

Well, Hackett did say they'll regret it, and sho nuff, they did.

As for Wrex, in his position, I would've held the galaxy hostage as well. This is the one and only opportunity they'd ever get to cure the genophage. I wouldn't rely on gratitude and good faith to get what I want, so I'd force them all to make a choice as to which is more important to them: extinction now or possible conflict later. A debate would've been pointless, but interesting.

 

I really don't blame him too much either. The Krogan were on the verge of extinction. If you're going to ask your people to march themselves to almost certain death, asking for the ability to frigging repopulate and have somewhere to live in small beans. The asari were also right, it were the humans who were being unreasonable (at least Udina, Hackett, Shepard). Reinforcing Earth at the beginning of the war would have been stupid, the asari fleet would have been committed in a foolish battle that would have failed spectacularly, and it would only served to accelerate the extinction cycle.

[Vortex13]

Well, Hackett did say they'll regret it, and sho nuff, they did.

As for Wrex, in his position, I would've held the galaxy hostage as well. This is the one and only opportunity they'd ever get to cure the genophage. I wouldn't rely on gratitude and good faith to get what I want, so I'd force them all to make a choice as to which is more important to them: extinction now or possible conflict later. A debate would've been pointless, but interesting.

 

 

I can understand his reasoning behind the ultimatum (somewhat), but I really disliked how the game automatically expected you to empathize and side with him and the Krogan, as well as reducing the opponents to the Genophage cure as nothing but a bunch of petty racists. The Genophage deployment was a lot more nuanced than the third game liked to try and depict it as. 

 

If the Rachni army hadn't been wiped out off screen via writers' fiat we definitely would have had the ammunition to get Wrex to back off: 

 

"What's that, the Krogan, aren't going to help defend Palavan unless we all drop what we are doing and find a way to cure the Genophage? Hmm, as tempting as that is, I think I'm going to go with the better disciplined army that, unlike you, actually wants to help and their leader, unlike you, keeps her promises. Have fun trying to get someone to cultivate a cure for you and your people. Me and the rest of galaxy are going to be shipping the Rachni forces to relive Palavan and then go on to finish the Crucible"

[Mathias]

I don't know why people hate on DA2. It's honestly my favorite in the series

Is this bait? Am I being baited?

[Whitering]

Deus ex machina...yep, don't want that, ever, ever, ever again. I haven't minded it in the odd book, but ya.

[KaiserShep]

I don't know why people hate on DA2. It's honestly my favorite in the series

It's cuz they're mad I tells ya.

[themikefest]

I enjoyed DA2. How many games let me tell someone its ok to kill my sister?

[KaiserShep]

I enjoyed DA2. How many games let me tell someone its ok to kill my sister?

You can always be relied on for well-placed evil in every possible universe, good sir.

[themikefest]

You can always be relied on for well-placed evil in every possible universe, good sir.

I only did it the one time.

[Beerfish]

Is this bait? Am I being baited?

It had a few of the very best companions in any of their games and some of the very best quests.  The story was decent as well.  The reused environments. the terrible mob combat and the bizarrely over the top boss end battles hurt it quite a bit but it had some very good parts as well.

[Whitering]

I only did it the one time.

Way, way back in SoU (Neverwinter Nights expansion), you could recover a baby for a woman and instead sell it to a Red Wizard of Thay for a demonic ritual...Might be up your alley heh

[Mathias]

It had a few of the very best companions in any of their games and some of the very best quests.  The story was decent as well.  The reused environments. the terrible mob combat and the bizarrely over the top boss end battles hurt it quite a bit but it had some very good parts as well.

 

Dragon Age: Origins was a three course meal at one of the best restaurants I've had the pleasure to eat at. Dragon Age 2 was a tasty burger at Five Guys. I enjoyed my burger, but it doesn't even begin to hold a candle to the meal I had earlier.

[Dabrikishaw]

Dragon Age: Origins was a three course meal at one of the best restaurants I've ever eaten at. Dragon Age 2 was a tasty burger at Five Guys. I enjoyed my burger, but it doesn't even begin to hold a candle to the meal I had earlier.

This is the vest way to describe the levels of enjoyment I get out of these 2 games.

[Mathias]

This is the vest way to describe the levels of enjoyment I get out of these 2 games.

 

I'll take it even further.

 

Mass Effect 1 was also a fantastic three course meal in one of classier restaurants located near me. Mass Effect 2 was a nice hot piping pizza, with a side of wings and a bottle of soda. Not quite as classy, but tasty as all hell and fun to eat. Mass Effect 3 was Chinese takeout. Tasted fairly decent while I was eating it, but then I came down with food poisoning and proceeded to crap and puke out 10 lbs of my own body weight over the next few days as I laid bedridden. Not a good time. 

[spinachdiaper]

99% of aliens are essentially Humans in costumes instead of being truly alien.

[Ahglock]

I'll take it even further.

Mass Effect 1 was also a fantastic three course meal in one of classier restaurants located near me. Mass Effect 2 was a nice hot piping pizza, with a side of wings and a bottle of soda. Not quite as classy, but tasty as all hell and fun to eat. Mass Effect 3 was Chinese takeout. Tasted fairly decent while I was eating it, but then I came down with food poisoning and proceeded to crap and puke out 10 lbs of my own body weight over the next few days as I laid bedridden. Not a good time.

That might explain why ME2 is my favorite. Pizza and wings.

But come on man you will never survive the apocalypse if you can't handle bad Chinese food.

[Vapaa]

Dragon Age: Origins was a three course meal at one of the best restaurants I've had the pleasure to eat at. Dragon Age 2 was a tasty burger at Five Guys. I enjoyed my burger, but it doesn't even begin to hold a candle to the meal I had earlier.

 

Dragon age origins was a bland meal in a plastic plate at the company's restaurant, DA2 was a tasty but small sandwitch at a decent bakery.

 

To each their own.

[Gileadan]

Ohh, food stuff.

 

Dragon Age Origins was a very nice 3 course meal that used rather standard ingredients.

 

Dragon Age 2 was a half baked, microwaved affair that tasted funny.

 

Dragon Age: Inquisition was a fine meal buried under a mountain of boiled potatoes with a great dessert.

[Fredward]

DA:O was toast.

DA2 was mayonnaise.

DAI was carrots.

 

I'm not sure I'm doing this right.

[Puddi III]

How about tropes I do want to see?

 

 

-The Gainax ending.

[Dean_the_Young]

Well, Hackett did say they'll regret it, and sho nuff, they did.

As for Wrex, in his position, I would've held the galaxy hostage as well. This is the one and only opportunity they'd ever get to cure the genophage. I wouldn't rely on gratitude and good faith to get what I want, so I'd force them all to make a choice as to which is more important to them: extinction now or possible conflict later. A debate would've been pointless, but interesting.

 

Ugh.

 

As much as I enjoy ME3's Tuchanka arc, Wrex in ME3 is a great example of how the writers in ME2 only seemed to have a passing acquaintance with the character arcs they wrote in ME2.

 

In ME1, Wrex's character arc is built around how the genophage is a red herring for his people's fall- that it's not the genophage that's destroying the Krogan, but the Krogan themselves. That they've been too short-sighted, too violent. It's not surprise that Wrex's death or survival depends on him overcoming the allure of a cure- of destroying Saren's facility and research for the good of everyone else.

 

And you know what? ME2 actually carried that forward in a good way. Wrex, if he survived, was going to change things- not by chasing cures, but by reforming the culture and focusing on breeding. The Krogan didn't necessarily like him- even his own clan has its grumbles- but they had to listen to him because he controlled the females. Don't reform, don't access the females. Less breeding, more fighting, and eventually you'd die off. Wrex's reforms were based on coercion of reproduction. Wrex's reforms were based on coercion.

 

 

Then came ME3 and the genophage cure blows Wrex's support base apart- replacing it with a dependence on gratitude and good will. Wrex- the 'mutant' by Eve's own admission- is supposed to be listened to and be able to control the Krogan firmly because... Eve likes him? Magical shamanism? Something like that.

 

Eve's political support depends on two things: the Krogan who agree with her ideals, and her value as a breeding female. Krogan who agree with her ideals are already going to go along with Wrex- he's the only game in town, and if Wrex can't unite the people who do agree with him, then there's no way he can unite the people who don't.

 

But Eve's value as a breeding female is obsolete if the genophage is cured. Wrex's entire breeding control system is obsolete. No one needs to listen to Wrex anymore because he doesn't control access to breeding. Not all the females agree with Eve in the first place- and not all the mystic shamans like Eve oppose the old bloody ways- and while Wrex can certainly claim popularity and heroism, he no longer stop other clans from doing what they want by withholding the breeding stick. He's either going to have to crush them, or tolerate them- and that includes any reluctance or refusal to go along with reforms by the Krogan who think, hey, it really was the genophage all along, and now they're free and strong again.

 

Wrex and Eve are either going to find themselves a well-intentioned, even respected, leader but powerless over the many different agendas of the different clans... or they're going to have to suppress the other clans by force to prevent them from escaping and acting naughty. And that will entail quite a bit of suppresion.

 

 

Seriously. ME3's sabotage choice shouldn't have been about convincing Mordin- it should have been about convincing Wrex that he was dooming his reforms. And Eve- rather than the basis of a cure- should have been the one fertile female who could use that exclusivity for power.

[Han Shot First]

But that sometimes isn't the case. We're not special because of some superior racial trait. We're special because we try just a little harder. I know there are some stories that do what you've described. But I've seen stories that have handle "humans are special" pretty well, which is why I don't agree there's anything wrong with this trope at its core.

But the first step should always be to not flat out say humanity is "special" because that's just lazy. It should only be implied through our actions and accomplishments amongst our peers who arguably have more fascinating racial traits.

 

Mass Effect did give the humans a superior racial trait. They were said to be more adaptable than other species as well as more determined. That is in addition to having a meteoric rise to power, controlling more territory than many species that have been space-faring for far longer, having super special genetics, and their home planet being the focus of the entire war effort for no other than reason than it being Earth.

[liclic]

You know, every game has its own clichés; however, there are some that are consequences of the game type. For instance, in mass effect games, you will have gun to kill them all ( or almost)... Another one; only you are right... (And for that, I find the end of ME3 really interesting to show you that what you did, you cannot necessarilly say that you did good or bad or whatever decision you did.

[Shechinah]

their home planet being the focus of the entire war effort for no other than reason than it being Earth.

 

Which was a bit of egregious problem, in my opinion, since it seemed to be assumed that there would be an emotional attachment to the planet for the sole reason of it being Earth which I consider to be a bit flawed as Mass Effect 3 was the first time the player ever saw it from anywhere but orbit and even then only for a short while before having to leave. 

 

Personally, I had a greater emotional attachment to the Citadel because it was something I'd seen and been to throughout all of the games and where moments, important and personal, had happened. I met people who lived there and explored it so thoroughly that I knew it like the back of my hand in more than one game. 

 

Earth seemed nice and potentially interesting setting but I looked at it with the eyes of a stranger or a tourist even: Never had I met any of the people who lived there and never had I explored any of it's cities like I had the people of the Citadel and the Citadel itself.     
 

[Gothfather]

grossly predictable and goody-two-shoes cheesy lines. American trash.

 

"glad I could help"

 

I would NEVER say that in real life. what I want to see is a morally ambiguous protagonist with at least two different outcomes based on the choices he/she has made. I mean, you can call Shepard renegade all you want, but he/she is always there at the forefront "fighting the good fight".

 

oh please. This childish give me an anti-hero mantra is getting old. Renegade Shepard is the very definition of morally ambiguous.

 

What else do you fraking expect? Shepard fighting against the reapers isn't a sign that Renegade Shepard is "good." That is a very simplistic view, it is instilling moral integrity onto a character just because they are on side X. Shepard "Fights the good fight" because the other side is the side of total annihilation. You don't have to be a morally good person to choose to fight against a force trying to destroy you. 

 

What? you think the only way Shepard could be morally ambiguous is if they gave you an option to side with the reapers? WTF? Seriously did you even stop to actually think what you were writing? This is like a teen talking about philosophy and not having even read a philosophy 101 text.

[Gothfather]

Right. But why does the 'truth' they're telling in this case be so one sided? Why do good resolutions generally align with morally acceptable decisions and bad resolutions go with morally questionable actions? If I managed to save the quarians and the geth why doesn't a misunderstandings/skirmishes between fringe elements cause a drop in the combat effectiveness of both? Why doesn't Morinth show up at the Ardat-Yakshi monastery instead of Samara and get captured there or something? Instead of simply being a throwaway enemy at the end. When does Wrex (or Wreave or whoever) turn into a spymaster?

 

Actions having consequences isn't objectionable, 'good' actions always leading to good/objectively better resolutions is objectionable.

 

 

Why? because it is one of those "truths" that people could observe and not have tested for most of the span of humankind. The facts are that the pragmatist, the person willing to frak you over for their own self interest doesn't actually have the advantage over the "nice" guy, the opposite in fact. The experiment of the 'prisoner's dilemma' is proof of this "truth." Statistically speaking you get far better results on average by NOT being pragmatic but idealistic, this is statistical proof that being nice, actually has a tangible advantage. That it isn't a weakness. Which explains why almost every society believes that being the "good" guy is better, because they have observed this time and time again. Moral beliefs do not happen in a vacuum and while people may not have had the evidence to assert this position until the 20th century, it is something that could be observed and explains why most cultures have stories of the hero doing the right thing and "winning" because you are more likely to "win" by not being a jerk/pragmatic.

 

So it only makes sense that the paragon path gives you better results, because we have evidence to show that this will create better outcomes than being pragmatic despite the fact that it is unintuitive, the evidence doesn't lie. Now if you want to talk about how the game can create cost free victories, then yeah that is a problem but that is the nature of the stupid "I win" button be it paragon or renegade. Not a failing that he paragon path give better results.