465 réponses à ce sujet

[Ozymandias23]

AngryTigerP wrote...

Llandaryn wrote...

Why would this make her a freak? Why? Intentional or not, there is a suggestion there of homophobia.

It's a young girl, afraid and alone, questioning her sexuality. Nowhere does it suggest that homophobia has been wiped out in 2183.

Actually, I always got the impression that her concern was combination of homosexuality and, more critically, inter-species attraction.

I didn't share that impression because if I recall correctly she didn't talk about how Morinth was an Asari, it was that she was a girl. Then came the 'Am I a freak?'. That added to some of the excellent points jib made in this thread about the non positive view of homosexuality in ME2 and I came away with the impression of homophobia.

[this isnt my name]

Yes the story wasnt as good but they cant give too much away before the end, so its not going to be as good as the first.



Asari in Omega are no different to Choras den in ME1, and unless you havent noticed there are Asari who are not strippers so thats kinda pointless.

Jacobs father let the power get to his head, he was corrupt and insane,, so what he did was bad, but he did worse than seperating women you know he killed alot off people too so seperating 2 sexes for whatever reason dosent realy stand out hes a evil/corrupt guy so it just further sows it.

Jacks mission showed how evil cerberus were, and yes what happened is bad, but cerberus is bad it just shows how bad they are.

I think she thinks shes a freak because she has only just met someone who is a completely different species and is already obsessed with her, if I becaume obsessed after 2 weeks I would be kinda creeped out.

Only major plot hole for me is how Miranda instantly recognises a collector on freedoms progress even though she has probobally never seen one.

[Ozymandias23]

Camo5050 wrote...

Rilke21 wrote...

Camo, I think it's less a question of moral upityness and more a question of taste. I doubt that BioWare is full of terrible people who develope games for degenerates. But they did fill Mass Effect 2 with a lot of garbage that took away from the story. I'm the last person who would argue against dark, sexual content in games, but that doesn't mean I like it thrown at me for the sake of faux "edginess."

I agree.  I don't typically like contrived and ham-handed storytelling either.  I also don't like being firehosed with unnecessary thematic displays in order to drive a point home.  And, I most certainly share your doubt that Bioware is full of moral degenerates who just made a game with these dark themes "just cuz it'll sell".  However, objectively I do see a purpose to much of the content in relation to an intended context when I pull back and look at what they were trying to convey.

Granted, they're video game story writers.  This isn't Dostoevsky, Tolkien, or even (dare I say it?) Rowling.  If the writers were that good at storytelling, they wouldn't be working at Bioware.  It can seem artless in comparison, but they do make an attempt, and it's not just a vulgar and gratuitous attempt in my opinion.  It all seems contextual, even if controversial.  It may be clumsy, but it's not corruptive.

I think Camo where we can agree is on a dislike of "contrived and ham-handed storytelling". Unfortunately we got a lot of that in ME2.

My issue, and I'll say it again, is not the type of content but the context in which it was used. In my opinion it was just 'a vulgar and gratuitous attempt' to inject a certain feel/tone into ME2. I saw parallels with concentration camps etc, I can't pretend that didn't jump into my mind as I was playing. It did and therefore I commented on that in this thread.

I also felt the portrayal of women in ME2 was very different to ME1. Yes you had the consort and the dancers, but you also had a strong postive portrayal of women right along side that. You had women who were commanding ships, commanding troups etc. In ME2, if you save the council, they're weak and impotent, hiding from the truth. There are numerous references on Omega to female prostitues. Aria, a crime boss, deceitful, dishonest - hardly the most positive of images.

Also, if you play the game as male Shepard you have opportunites to say 'I'm not interested' to amorous crew mates. As female Shep, I was unable to find that option. The conversation with Jacob is conducted entirely in a flirty tone. There is no 'i'm not interested in you' option, or 'I'm just trying to get to know you option". It's forced upon female Shepard and consequently the player.

As for the negative portrayal of homosexuality, I'll quote a comment jib524 made earlier in this thread

"It would be OK, if there were positive homosexual relationships shown to balance that out.  There were none.  As I've mentioned, not even the asari were in 'homosexual' relationships as all were with male aliens or had male alien parents.

The asari you give that locket too was with a male human. There was the male Krogan reciting poetry to the asari.  They were an item. The asari bartender's 'father' was  a male krogan. You see an asari shopping with her male salarian father.

When is an asari ever paired with a female?  The Nef/Morinth incident.   But of course, that was hardly a positive portrayl.  Also, there's that asari you talk to as part of Shiala's quest (I can't remember her name).   She's portrayed as a cold-hearted b*tch though and derided b/c she was a pureblood and chose to have pureblood daughters.

It seems like the asari can only be 'straight' and hook up with male aliens of other species, or they can be deviants by hooking up with another from their own species."

Anyway, thanks for sharing your opinions on this.

Modifié par Ozymandias23, 06 février 2010 - 02:25 .

[Llandaryn]

AngryTigerP wrote...

Llandaryn wrote...

Why would this make her a freak? Why? Intentional or not, there is a suggestion there of homophobia.

It's a young girl, afraid and alone, questioning her sexuality. Nowhere does it suggest that homophobia has been wiped out in 2183.

Actually, I always got the impression that her concern was combination of homosexuality and, more critically, inter-species attraction.

I'll take your word for it, because I haven't got that far into the game yet. I'll keep an eye out when it comes around though.

Madmoe77 wrote...

"We're not in Kansas anymore Toto;" says Dorothy holding her little dog closely.
Mass
1 had this whole too perfect thing going for it as mentioned by many of
the characters while running around the Citadel. Mass 2 has the full
intent to give you the other side of the coin. I believe the goal here
is to make it hard for the player to want to save an incredibly flawed
world. Ultimately that is the choice. The game is about choices and
should you had the choice to not infect yourself with others of
opposite stature then maybe most wouldn't. But knowing that there is
undo injustice as part of everyday life makes this a real story.

Some
may want to click their ruby red slippers the moment they set foot on
Omega but those that stayed the fight found that redemption is often
short-lived but necessary all the same. As mentioned before a reality
to us all. This is the middle road and meant to test the resolve of
your character. Can you maintain shining armor with the knowledge you
are also saving the worst while working with the worst? Can you still
focus on getting home to Kansas knowing you could leave the little
people to flying apes? I personally feel this provided Mass Effect with
the realism it needed. There are no keepers on the edges of the
traverse. Nothing to soften our hands and lull us into laziness.

As
far as your personal issues with content we can empathize-and I believe
that has more to do with the distaste than anything. But without
reality to sleep on-dreams would have no purpose.

I agree implicitly.

I didn't share that impression because if I recall
correctly she didn't talk about how Morinth was an Asari, it was that
she was a girl. Then came the 'Am I a freak?'. That added to some of
the excellent points jib made in this thread about the non positive
view of homosexuality in ME2 and I came away with the impression of
homophobia.

Just because Bioware addresses the issue of homophobia, does not mean they support it. If it was true homophobia, they'd have the pitch-fork waving mob outside her door ready to burn her on the pyre. I am sure many young people going through difficult teenage periods have questioned their sexuality, and wondered if it made them different, or somehow 'wrong'. Our own society for a long time has instilled in us the belief that homosexuality is taboo, a sin. I blame religion, mostly, and it's only recently that we're starting to progress away from such narrow, conservative mind-sets -- and not everybody is there yet, either.

[RampantBeaver]

Personally I thought ME2 was one of the best games I've ever played. Yes it was very dark at times but I never found myself sickened. At the end of a day its a game trying to invoke an emotional responce which it achieves. It would be perhaps a step too far if you as the protagonist where the one comitting these heinous crimes, but you're not, you're the one giving the people like Jacobs father their just rewards and through you justice is served.

It was said long before release it was going to be a much darker chapter. Perhaps this was a ploy to attract a wider audience, perhaps not, either way i considered it a advancement over its predecessor. It was never going to be the uplifting story the first one was. I personnaly prefer the darker tale as I consider it a closer reflection of the world we live in. Now I'm not saying all life is pilage and rape but its certainly there in the darkest corners which is exactly what you are exploring in ME2.

I think your doing yourself a disservice by saying you'll never play the game again. There may be many things you missed or characters you didn't explore fully and i don't think any Bioware game is complete with out atleast a couple of playthroughs.

The underlying message of both the games is primarily that your the good guy fighting the good fight and I always get goosebumps whether im playing the first installment or the second when I reach those final stages, T-900 or no T-900.

[Myrmedus]

OP: There are some real criticisms to had for this game, especially the story and its pacing, but I can't take your 'review' seriously because it's far too doom and gloom for a game that still remains an excellent game and DOES have some great plot moments. Is there ANYTHING you don't criticise that is plot related?

I suggest you re-read your post, look at it and think what score you'd give the game on the basis of it: to me it looks like a 30%-worthy review which is utterly ridiculous. Because you seem to criticise absolutely everything it just comes across as pointless nitpicking and ends up dampening your valid criticisms - this is the entire point of a balanced review that gives equal light to positives and negative, because when you don't people just become snow-blind to negative critique.

As far as I can tell you've allowed rising expectations to hamper your objective view.

Modifié par Myrmedus, 06 février 2010 - 03:21 .

[Coldcall01]

Ozymandias23 wrote...


I’ve just finished my first and what will be my only play though of Mass Effect 2 and I thought I’d share some thoughts. Be warned, this is a long one!

I play games for entertainment, for enjoyment.  Mass Effect 1 was a game I returned to time and time again for the sheer pleasure of playing it. In spite of its flaws, it was a lot of fun, had some fantastic characters, an uplifting story that was developed throughout the game and an outstanding final mission. Several parts always stood out for me. The speech the council gives as shepard is made a Spectre. Shepard’s speech to the crew as she takes control of the Normandy. The reveal on Virmire as Shepard finally has the chance to speak with Sovereign. Ilos, Vigil and fighting our way back to the Citadel for the race through the maintenance ducts to reach Saren in time.

The story was exceptional in my opinion. Each main mission introduced another key part of the plot, another clue revealing Saren’s motivations and driving the story forward. The story rose to a crescendo as Shepard and her
team mates went though the Mu Relay, fought their way through Ilos, discovered Vigil and risked everything to return to the Citadel for the final confrontation with Saren, his Geth and Sovereign. I remember the first time I
completed Mass Effect 1, sitting with tears in my eyes as the human fleet saved the destiny ascension.

Mass Effect 1 was not perfect but it had engaging, charismatic characters and an uplifting story that brought me back to it time and time again. From my perspective it was a game with a lot of class and rightly deserved the title of masterpiece in spite of its flaws.

Unfortunately I cannot say the same for Mass Effect 2. I found it crass, tasteless and deeply unpleasant. Bioware seems to have forced every nasty thing they could think of into Mass Effect 2 and in doing so utterly destroyed the feel of the Mass Effect universe. Mass Effect 2 is not a sequel to Mass Effect 1. It is a spin off. The moments where I actually felt I was playing Mass Effect were all too brief.

The ‘story’ of Mass Effect 2 was unbelievably poor and I find it impossible to believe the same person wrote both games.

There seemed to be no narrative structure to the game. The plot, such as it was, was utterly contrived, unconvincing and frankly embarrassingly bad in places.  I have never played a Bioware game that had such a weak, threadbare story, such stilted dialogue or borrowed so heavily from other sources such as Babylon 5, Star Trek, and Terminator etc. The final battle was absurd. I won’t spoil it for anyone who hasn’t played the entire game; all I will say is that a cameo from Governor Schwarzenegger would not have been out of place. It was ridiculous and utterly inferior to the end game of Mass Effect 1 in every possible way.

Having Shepard die, be rebuilt and be upgraded throughout the game with more and more synthetic parts was pointless and only served as a flimsy attempt to force the player to accept working with Cerberus. It didn’t work on any level in my opinion. The two year gap was a transparent excuse to off load the original squad mates whose personalities did not fit into the type of game Bioware wanted to make. This might have worked better if they had been replaced by characters with equal charisma. They were not, in my opinion, with the only exception being Legion and EDI.

Once Shepard was alive again and the Collectors had been identified as the enemy the ‘plot’ then took on the appearance of a grocery list. Gather specialists, do loyalty missions, gather minerals to upgrade the Normandy and then do the final mission. Personally I found it slow moving and monotonous and frankly I was bored. There were too many new squad mates and it made it difficult to feel any attachment to any of them, even if I had found their personalities appealing, which I didn’t. And whilst the new Normandy was beautiful, I had the overwhelming urge to off load the crew and fumigate the ship.

Though out this period of the game, there was little or no story progression.  The conversations with the squad mates seemed designed to railroad the player into embarking on a new romance. After one conversation with Jacob the flirting and innuendo began, and I could find no dialogue option that simply said I’m not interested. Shepard’s lines were also delivered in a forced flirty tone over which the player was given no control, not one option for her to speak in a normal tone of voice.  As for the crew, even the NPCs, speak to them at all and you had to listen to crass, lewd, suggestive comments. Wander though the bar on Illium and it was the same, crass, tasteless remarks and of course sexual innuendo. Perhaps that is titillating if you’re 15, however as an adult with
a life it became incredibly tedious incredibly quickly. Mass Effect 1 didn’t need to resort to this sort of thing to garner sales.

I also found the portrayal of women in Mass Effect 2 offensive at times. On Omega the Asari seemed to have been assigned the role of strippers, pole dancers and prostitutes. There seemed to be a recurring theme that
suggested women were play things, to be used and abused when opportunity permitted. This theme carried through to Jacob’s loyalty mission, a mission that I found disturbing on an emotional level and absolutely sickening.

In that mission we were presented with a scenario where a ship had crash landed, the captain had separated out the female crew members and placed them in a camp. He then gave these women to his officers to be used
as play things. The idea was horrific. Perhaps Bioware feel that the suggestion of rape is suitable content for their ‘dark and edgy’ video game but I don’t.  It was uncalled for and I found it sickening and disturbing. For me it evoked parallels with some of the atrocities carried out in ‘camps’ across Europe during World War 2.

This feeling continued into Subject Zero’s loyalty mission where we’re provided with a story about the abuse of children. Children bought or stolen, ripped away from home and family, transported to a facility in crates, half starved and experimented upon, injected with substances to see what effect it would have. The parallels with history are hard to ignore. The children of Bullenhuser Damm, brought from Auschwitz to Neuengamme for experimentation.  Is this really suitable for inclusion in something that is supposed to be a source of entertainment?

I remember watching the E3 reveal trailer and Derek Watts, the art director, talking about how nasty ME2 was in parts and asking his colleagues ‘have we gone too far?’.  Well my answer would be yes, you did.

Samara’s loyalty mission was another that I took issue with, though for very different reasons.  We’re presented with her daughter, Morinth, a sexual predator, whose victims are killed by engaging in sex with her. We’re instructed to go to the apartment where her last victim Nef, a young girl, lived with her mother. The mother
allows us into Nef’s room where we listen to her video diary in order to find the password to allow us into the club where Morinth stalks her victims. The diary entries chart Nef’s first meeting with Morinth and mentions the beginning of an attraction between them. In one of the diary entries Nef comments that Morinth is a girl, that she’s attracted to a girl and asks ‘am I a freak?’

Why would this make her a freak? Why? Intentional or not, there is a suggestion there of homophobia.

Ultimately I loved Mass Effect 1 and I want to genuinely thank Bioware for producing such a fantastic game that gave me many hours of enjoyment.  As for Mass Effect 2, it has been a disappointment on almost every level.  Its tone, the story quality, the squad mates, all vastly inferior to Mass Effect 1 in my opinion. I’m afraid it has killed this IP for me and I truly regret my decision to purchase it.

Sorry i only saw this today but excellent critique.

But there is a clear correlation between ME2 becoming much more of a shooter, and the content becoming more "sleazy". Its all much more "instant gratification" based than the first game.

Its a good shooter, but its what a shooter is and no doubt developed to capture much of that crowd on the xbox.

Hence its sleazier than other Bioware games.

[MhorRioghain]

Removed (Slightly Off Topic Rant) 

Modifié par MhorRioghain, 09 février 2010 - 04:31 .

[Doug84]

this isnt my name wrote...

Yes the story wasnt as good but they cant give too much away before the end, so its not going to be as good as the first.

Asari in Omega are no different to Choras den in ME1, and unless you havent noticed there are Asari who are not strippers so thats kinda pointless.
Jacobs father let the power get to his head, he was corrupt and insane,, so what he did was bad, but he did worse than seperating women you know he killed alot off people too so seperating 2 sexes for whatever reason dosent realy stand out hes a evil/corrupt guy so it just further sows it.
Jacks mission showed how evil cerberus were, and yes what happened is bad, but cerberus is bad it just shows how bad they are.
I think she thinks shes a freak because she has only just met someone who is a completely different species and is already obsessed with her, if I becaume obsessed after 2 weeks I would be kinda creeped out.
Only major plot hole for me is how Miranda instantly recognises a collector on freedoms progress even though she has probobally never seen one.

Nice points, although the last one about Mirandia I sortof half to disagree with; some people have dealt with the Collectors before, and for a group like Cerebus, they probably have pictures and footage of them - TIM was already devoting resources to investigating them in Mass Effect Ascention, and in the Mass Effect comic. Both of which where about a month or 3 after the attack on the Citadel - given that time, they are bound to have at least got a photo of one. And if TIM already suspected the Collectors, he probably would have at least made sure Miranda knew alittle about them, and/or seen the recon photos.

[Miqti]

I disagree with the OP. The beauty of Mass Effect 2 is that it's plot IS character development! We knew before it's release that there is a third in the series, and we know the ultimate threat is in coming. I felt the character development was stronger in ME2 than ME1, and will likely be a greater service to the trilogy. It was am interactive movie... supporting Tali in a trial while at the se time understanding the dynamics of the trial's implications for the Quarians and the galaxy as a whole... Delving deeper into the the culture of the Krogands... the beautiful and heart-wrenching story of Thane, a dying person seeking redemption... seeing how isolation from civilization and rules leads to the degradation of morals (not a new theme but certainly with a unique twist). You become involved with certain story plots introduced in ME1, if you read the Codex and explored the side missions. While by no means perfect, I truly believe that the Mass Effect trilogy, with the plot of ME1 being character development in a dark context, is shaping up to outdo Star Wars.

[Melisenta]

Miqti wrote...

I disagree with the OP. The beauty of Mass Effect 2 is that it's plot IS character development! We knew before it's release that there is a third in the series, and we know the ultimate threat is in coming. I felt the character development was stronger in ME2 than ME1, and will likely be a greater service to the trilogy. It was am interactive movie... supporting Tali in a trial while at the se time understanding the dynamics of the trial's implications for the Quarians and the galaxy as a whole... Delving deeper into the the culture of the Krogands... the beautiful and heart-wrenching story of Thane, a dying person seeking redemption... seeing how isolation from civilization and rules leads to the degradation of morals (not a new theme but certainly with a unique twist). You become involved with certain story plots introduced in ME1, if you read the Codex and explored the side missions. While by no means perfect, I truly believe that the Mass Effect trilogy, with the plot of ME1 being character development in a dark context, is shaping up to outdo Star Wars.

Couldn't agree more. The characters in ME2 are so well written. I'm on my paragon playthrough of ME1 now, and the characters (don't get me wrong I absolutely love them) just seem a bit shallow compared to those of ME2. But Ozy said in another topic that he/she didn't feel any connection to the ME2 characters and that at the end it didn't matter for him/her if they survive or not. Don't know how you could possibly not care about, say, Mordin... after hearing him sing G&S, or after seeing him full of regret standing near that dead Krogan female during his PQ...

Modifié par Melisenta, 07 février 2010 - 12:33 .

[Nautica773]

Ozymandias23 wrote...
"It would be OK, if there were positive homosexual relationships shown to balance that out.  There were none.  As I've mentioned, not even the asari were in 'homosexual' relationships as all were with male aliens or had male alien parents.

The asari you give that locket too was with a male human. There was the male Krogan reciting poetry to the asari.  They were an item. The asari bartender's 'father' was  a male krogan. You see an asari shopping with her male salarian father.

When is an asari ever paired with a female?  The Nef/Morinth incident.   But of course, that was hardly a positive portrayl.  Also, there's that asari you talk to as part of Shiala's quest (I can't remember her name).   She's portrayed as a cold-hearted b*tch though and derided b/c she was a pureblood and chose to have pureblood daughters.

It seems like the asari can only be 'straight' and hook up with male aliens of other species, or they can be deviants by hooking up with another from their own species."

Anyway, thanks for sharing your opinions on this.

The xenophobic Asari on Illium was a positive portrayal. She was in a relationship with another Asari that ended badly when her partner and children were killed during the Geth attack. I felt her scene was particularly moving and very sympathetic. I guess it could be argued that it's not a great example since any Asari-Asari pairing is going to be the same gender, but at least it's one instance of an Asari not being with a male from another species.

[Camo5050]

Ozymandias23 wrote...

I think Camo where we can agree is on a dislike of "contrived and ham-handed storytelling". Unfortunately we got a lot of that in ME2.

My issue, and I'll say it again, is not the type of content but the context in which it was used. In my opinion it was just 'a vulgar and gratuitous attempt' to inject a certain feel/tone into ME2. I saw parallels with concentration camps etc, I can't pretend that didn't jump into my mind as I was playing. It did and therefore I commented on that in this thread.

I also felt the portrayal of women in ME2 was very different to ME1. Yes you had the consort and the dancers, but you also had a strong postive portrayal of women right along side that. You had women who were commanding ships, commanding troups etc. In ME2, if you save the council, they're weak and impotent, hiding from the truth. There are numerous references on Omega to female prostitues. Aria, a crime boss, deceitful, dishonest - hardly the most positive of images.

Also, if you play the game as male Shepard you have opportunites to say 'I'm not interested' to amorous crew mates. As female Shep, I was unable to find that option. The conversation with Jacob is conducted entirely in a flirty tone. There is no 'i'm not interested in you' option, or 'I'm just trying to get to know you option". It's forced upon female Shepard and consequently the player.

As for the negative portrayal of homosexuality, I'll quote a comment jib524 made earlier in this thread

"It would be OK, if there were positive homosexual relationships shown to balance that out.  There were none.  As I've mentioned, not even the asari were in 'homosexual' relationships as all were with male aliens or had male alien parents.

The asari you give that locket too was with a male human. There was the male Krogan reciting poetry to the asari.  They were an item. The asari bartender's 'father' was  a male krogan. You see an asari shopping with her male salarian father.

When is an asari ever paired with a female?  The Nef/Morinth incident.   But of course, that was hardly a positive portrayl.  Also, there's that asari you talk to as part of Shiala's quest (I can't remember her name).   She's portrayed as a cold-hearted b*tch though and derided b/c she was a pureblood and chose to have pureblood daughters.

It seems like the asari can only be 'straight' and hook up with male aliens of other species, or they can be deviants by hooking up with another from their own species."

Anyway, thanks for sharing your opinions on this.

Thanks for the reply and your observations on this.  I can certainly see where you would get the impression that there's a bias against healthy homosexual relationships. However I don't think it's so much an agenda against them as much as it seems to be unimportant for the story writers of ME2 to portray them.  With that said, I'd like to express a tangent .

The video game industry is still a very salaciously male dominated system, and to be quite honest, is rife with male-centric, subtly homophobic and even seethingly sexist attitudes.  I have observed and experienced it first hand, as well as many of my close gay/female friends who are or may have been a part of the industry.  And, without in any way pardoning this behavior, I think it has more to do with the general immaturity of the industry than it does with there being an explicit advocation of such behavior.  In other words, it tends to be run like a large treehouse for boys and I do think that it bleeds over into the overall production.

That doesn't mean however that there aren't extraordinarily talented and socially compassionate people working in the industry.  It just means that they have a harder time providing a counter balance to the persistent low-frequency chauvanism.  But, even with the general pandering to the marketing axiom of "sex sells", I don't believe that on an individual level any of these writers are intentionally pushing a chauvanistic agenda.  Rather, it merely manifests itself in that way from an endemic ingnorance.

All that being said, I still think that contextually, much of what is seen as dark, reprehensible and uncomfortable in ME2 is indeed there as an attempt at purposeful storytelling and not merely as a gratuitous and vulgar showcase of chauvanistic wish-fulfillment.  I'm not expecting to see socially compassionate and intelligently explored social dynamics when I sit down and play a video game. If it happens, I'm pleasantly surprised.  But it's certainly not the top of my list for media in which I can observe and experience culturally compassionate content.

And I guess that was the point of my first post to you - Not that you find certain elements of the product offensive, but rather that you look at those offenses a bit more objectively than you seem to have done when you wrote your first post.  I can understand the evocation of anger on your part, but most of that seemed to be (by your own admission) drawn from personal expansion of the offense, rather than the static contextual intent.  I've not been deriding you for having a reaction, but rather cautioning you from having a disporportionate one.  Comparing Jacob's or Jack's loyalty missions to Himmler's death camps or Mengele's experiments on children does seem, in fact, disporportionate.

Modifié par Camo5050, 06 février 2010 - 06:27 .

[Turin_4]

I also felt the portrayal of women in ME2 was very different to ME1. Yes you had the consort and the dancers, but you also had a strong postive portrayal of women right along side that. You had women who were commanding ships, commanding troups etc. In ME2, if you save the council, they're weak and impotent, hiding from the truth. There are numerous references on Omega to female prostitues. Aria, a crime boss, deceitful, dishonest - hardly the most positive of images.

...along with, possibly, a woman who is a titanic heroine of the ages, savior of the galaxy and untold trillions of people, victor over the worst evil anyone has ever heard of? And, of course, there's Miranda and Samara, two very powerful, intelligent, skillful women (or 'women' in the case of Samara) who are troubled in some ways but work hard to make the world a better place.



Omega is supposed to be one of the worst, most awful, crime-ridden nasty places in the galaxy. The only message about broader political correctness themes anyone can take from ME2's portrayal on Omega is the following: this is what the writers of the story thought things would be like at their worst. The game didn't make you happy, we all get it. The dark, grim, sometimes vulgar portions of it distressed you. That's fine. But it doesn't mean it's badly written just because it makes you upset, especially when it's supposed to make you upset!



As for homosexuality...I am honestly curious: is a game not tolerant of homosexuality if it doesn't actively include it in the main plot of the story? The fact is, most people aren't homosexual. That's not prejudiced, that's just a simple fact. Is it racist of ME2 that all the cover art and the default Shepards are white people, male or female?

[medlish]

This is the worst text I have witnessed about ME2 to now. Half of it was OK but packed with words like "disgusting" which made the text less and less believable.



It also sounds like you're some women rights activist or something. We men surely aren't complaining about all the bad men in the game. We're not complaining about Jacob's father. We're not complaining about the male racist turian politician. We're not complaining about Garrus' male traitor. And we're not complaining about all the evil male scientists.

I wanted to say you should CALM down but now I'm the one who should.

[OrionUnas]

there is no point in arguing with the femanist movment, no offence to you all, but you all got your head up your arses. At the end of the day, it's just a video game. Get over it.



On that note, I really wish bleeding hearts would die of their prolonged chronic disease.

[Rilke21]

OrionUnas wrote...

there is no point in arguing with the femanist movment, no offence to you all, but you all got your head up your arses. At the end of the day, it's just a video game. Get over it.

On that note, I really wish bleeding hearts would die of their prolonged chronic disease.

Pssh.

I've studied feminist philosophy in detail, and it's true that some of the work is just plain irrational. (Guess what: that can be said of ALL philosophy.) But to say that "femanists" have their heads up their asses is something of a self-defeating argument, wouldn't you say? Let me spell it out for you: if you argue that all feminists are morons, you make a ridiculous and unsupportable assumption, proving in the process that YOU are a moron.

Not that I'm calling you a moron or anything. But if I was, I'd probably wish that there was a space shuttle to the sun with your name on it.

Modifié par Rilke21, 07 février 2010 - 12:07 .

[Llandaryn]

I hear the sun is nice this time of year.

[Rilke21]

I wouldn't know. Edmontonians only get updates 4 out of the 12 months. (This might explain the dark and dreary content of Mass Effect 2.)

[Ozymandias23]

Camo5050 wrote...

Ozymandias23 wrote...

I think Camo where we can agree is on a dislike of "contrived and ham-handed storytelling". Unfortunately we got a lot of that in ME2.

My issue, and I'll say it again, is not the type of content but the context in which it was used. In my opinion it was just 'a vulgar and gratuitous attempt' to inject a certain feel/tone into ME2. I saw parallels with concentration camps etc, I can't pretend that didn't jump into my mind as I was playing. It did and therefore I commented on that in this thread.

I also felt the portrayal of women in ME2 was very different to ME1. Yes you had the consort and the dancers, but you also had a strong postive portrayal of women right along side that. You had women who were commanding ships, commanding troups etc. In ME2, if you save the council, they're weak and impotent, hiding from the truth. There are numerous references on Omega to female prostitues. Aria, a crime boss, deceitful, dishonest - hardly the most positive of images.

Also, if you play the game as male Shepard you have opportunites to say 'I'm not interested' to amorous crew mates. As female Shep, I was unable to find that option. The conversation with Jacob is conducted entirely in a flirty tone. There is no 'i'm not interested in you' option, or 'I'm just trying to get to know you option". It's forced upon female Shepard and consequently the player.

As for the negative portrayal of homosexuality, I'll quote a comment jib524 made earlier in this thread

"It would be OK, if there were positive homosexual relationships shown to balance that out.  There were none.  As I've mentioned, not even the asari were in 'homosexual' relationships as all were with male aliens or had male alien parents.

The asari you give that locket too was with a male human. There was the male Krogan reciting poetry to the asari.  They were an item. The asari bartender's 'father' was  a male krogan. You see an asari shopping with her male salarian father.

When is an asari ever paired with a female?  The Nef/Morinth incident.   But of course, that was hardly a positive portrayl.  Also, there's that asari you talk to as part of Shiala's quest (I can't remember her name).   She's portrayed as a cold-hearted b*tch though and derided b/c she was a pureblood and chose to have pureblood daughters.

It seems like the asari can only be 'straight' and hook up with male aliens of other species, or they can be deviants by hooking up with another from their own species."

Anyway, thanks for sharing your opinions on this.

Thanks for the reply and your observations on this.  I can certainly see where you would get the impression that there's a bias against healthy homosexual relationships. However I don't think it's so much an agenda against them as much as it seems to be unimportant for the story writers of ME2 to portray them.  With that said, I'd like to express a tangent .

The video game industry is still a very salaciously male dominated system, and to be quite honest, is rife with male-centric, subtly homophobic and even seethingly sexist attitudes.  I have observed and experienced it first hand, as well as many of my close gay/female friends who are or may have been a part of the industry.  And, without in any way pardoning this behavior, I think it has more to do with the general immaturity of the industry than it does with there being an explicit advocation of such behavior.  In other words, it tends to be run like a large treehouse for boys and I do think that it bleeds over into the overall production.

That doesn't mean however that there aren't extraordinarily talented and socially compassionate people working in the industry.  It just means that they have a harder time providing a counter balance to the persistent low-frequency chauvanism.  But, even with the general pandering to the marketing axiom of "sex sells", I don't believe that on an individual level any of these writers are intentionally pushing a chauvanistic agenda.  Rather, it merely manifests itself in that way from an endemic ingnorance.

All that being said, I still think that contextually, much of what is seen as dark, reprehensible and uncomfortable in ME2 is indeed there as an attempt at purposeful storytelling and not merely as a gratuitous and vulgar showcase of chauvanistic wish-fulfillment.  I'm not expecting to see socially compassionate and intelligently explored social dynamics when I sit down and play a video game. If it happens, I'm pleasantly surprised.  But it's certainly not the top of my list for media in which I can observe and experience culturally compassionate content.

And I guess that was the point of my first post to you - Not that you find certain elements of the product offensive, but rather that you look at those offenses a bit more objectively than you seem to have done when you wrote your first post.  I can understand the evocation of anger on your part, but most of that seemed to be (by your own admission) drawn from personal expansion of the offense, rather than the static contextual intent.  I've not been deriding you for having a reaction, but rather cautioning you from having a disporportionate one.  Comparing Jacob's or Jack's loyalty missions to Himmler's death camps or Mengele's experiments on children does seem, in fact, disporportionate.

I'm afraid we're going to have to agree to disagree. The parallels are too obvious, too striking for me to ignore or pretend to myself they're not there.

[Ozymandias23]

Coldcall01 wrote...

Ozymandias23 wrote...


I’ve just finished my first and what will be my only play though of Mass Effect 2 and I thought I’d share some thoughts. Be warned, this is a long one!

I play games for entertainment, for enjoyment.  Mass Effect 1 was a game I returned to time and time again for the sheer pleasure of playing it. In spite of its flaws, it was a lot of fun, had some fantastic characters, an uplifting story that was developed throughout the game and an outstanding final mission. Several parts always stood out for me. The speech the council gives as shepard is made a Spectre. Shepard’s speech to the crew as she takes control of the Normandy. The reveal on Virmire as Shepard finally has the chance to speak with Sovereign. Ilos, Vigil and fighting our way back to the Citadel for the race through the maintenance ducts to reach Saren in time.

The story was exceptional in my opinion. Each main mission introduced another key part of the plot, another clue revealing Saren’s motivations and driving the story forward. The story rose to a crescendo as Shepard and her
team mates went though the Mu Relay, fought their way through Ilos, discovered Vigil and risked everything to return to the Citadel for the final confrontation with Saren, his Geth and Sovereign. I remember the first time I
completed Mass Effect 1, sitting with tears in my eyes as the human fleet saved the destiny ascension.

Mass Effect 1 was not perfect but it had engaging, charismatic characters and an uplifting story that brought me back to it time and time again. From my perspective it was a game with a lot of class and rightly deserved the title of masterpiece in spite of its flaws.

Unfortunately I cannot say the same for Mass Effect 2. I found it crass, tasteless and deeply unpleasant. Bioware seems to have forced every nasty thing they could think of into Mass Effect 2 and in doing so utterly destroyed the feel of the Mass Effect universe. Mass Effect 2 is not a sequel to Mass Effect 1. It is a spin off. The moments where I actually felt I was playing Mass Effect were all too brief.

The ‘story’ of Mass Effect 2 was unbelievably poor and I find it impossible to believe the same person wrote both games.

There seemed to be no narrative structure to the game. The plot, such as it was, was utterly contrived, unconvincing and frankly embarrassingly bad in places.  I have never played a Bioware game that had such a weak, threadbare story, such stilted dialogue or borrowed so heavily from other sources such as Babylon 5, Star Trek, and Terminator etc. The final battle was absurd. I won’t spoil it for anyone who hasn’t played the entire game; all I will say is that a cameo from Governor Schwarzenegger would not have been out of place. It was ridiculous and utterly inferior to the end game of Mass Effect 1 in every possible way.

Having Shepard die, be rebuilt and be upgraded throughout the game with more and more synthetic parts was pointless and only served as a flimsy attempt to force the player to accept working with Cerberus. It didn’t work on any level in my opinion. The two year gap was a transparent excuse to off load the original squad mates whose personalities did not fit into the type of game Bioware wanted to make. This might have worked better if they had been replaced by characters with equal charisma. They were not, in my opinion, with the only exception being Legion and EDI.

Once Shepard was alive again and the Collectors had been identified as the enemy the ‘plot’ then took on the appearance of a grocery list. Gather specialists, do loyalty missions, gather minerals to upgrade the Normandy and then do the final mission. Personally I found it slow moving and monotonous and frankly I was bored. There were too many new squad mates and it made it difficult to feel any attachment to any of them, even if I had found their personalities appealing, which I didn’t. And whilst the new Normandy was beautiful, I had the overwhelming urge to off load the crew and fumigate the ship.

Though out this period of the game, there was little or no story progression.  The conversations with the squad mates seemed designed to railroad the player into embarking on a new romance. After one conversation with Jacob the flirting and innuendo began, and I could find no dialogue option that simply said I’m not interested. Shepard’s lines were also delivered in a forced flirty tone over which the player was given no control, not one option for her to speak in a normal tone of voice.  As for the crew, even the NPCs, speak to them at all and you had to listen to crass, lewd, suggestive comments. Wander though the bar on Illium and it was the same, crass, tasteless remarks and of course sexual innuendo. Perhaps that is titillating if you’re 15, however as an adult with
a life it became incredibly tedious incredibly quickly. Mass Effect 1 didn’t need to resort to this sort of thing to garner sales.

I also found the portrayal of women in Mass Effect 2 offensive at times. On Omega the Asari seemed to have been assigned the role of strippers, pole dancers and prostitutes. There seemed to be a recurring theme that
suggested women were play things, to be used and abused when opportunity permitted. This theme carried through to Jacob’s loyalty mission, a mission that I found disturbing on an emotional level and absolutely sickening.

In that mission we were presented with a scenario where a ship had crash landed, the captain had separated out the female crew members and placed them in a camp. He then gave these women to his officers to be used
as play things. The idea was horrific. Perhaps Bioware feel that the suggestion of rape is suitable content for their ‘dark and edgy’ video game but I don’t.  It was uncalled for and I found it sickening and disturbing. For me it evoked parallels with some of the atrocities carried out in ‘camps’ across Europe during World War 2.

This feeling continued into Subject Zero’s loyalty mission where we’re provided with a story about the abuse of children. Children bought or stolen, ripped away from home and family, transported to a facility in crates, half starved and experimented upon, injected with substances to see what effect it would have. The parallels with history are hard to ignore. The children of Bullenhuser Damm, brought from Auschwitz to Neuengamme for experimentation.  Is this really suitable for inclusion in something that is supposed to be a source of entertainment?

I remember watching the E3 reveal trailer and Derek Watts, the art director, talking about how nasty ME2 was in parts and asking his colleagues ‘have we gone too far?’.  Well my answer would be yes, you did.

Samara’s loyalty mission was another that I took issue with, though for very different reasons.  We’re presented with her daughter, Morinth, a sexual predator, whose victims are killed by engaging in sex with her. We’re instructed to go to the apartment where her last victim Nef, a young girl, lived with her mother. The mother
allows us into Nef’s room where we listen to her video diary in order to find the password to allow us into the club where Morinth stalks her victims. The diary entries chart Nef’s first meeting with Morinth and mentions the beginning of an attraction between them. In one of the diary entries Nef comments that Morinth is a girl, that she’s attracted to a girl and asks ‘am I a freak?’

Why would this make her a freak? Why? Intentional or not, there is a suggestion there of homophobia.

Ultimately I loved Mass Effect 1 and I want to genuinely thank Bioware for producing such a fantastic game that gave me many hours of enjoyment.  As for Mass Effect 2, it has been a disappointment on almost every level.  Its tone, the story quality, the squad mates, all vastly inferior to Mass Effect 1 in my opinion. I’m afraid it has killed this IP for me and I truly regret my decision to purchase it.

Sorry i only saw this today but excellent critique.

But there is a clear correlation between ME2 becoming much more of a shooter, and the content becoming more "sleazy". Its all much more "instant gratification" based than the first game.

Its a good shooter, but its what a shooter is and no doubt developed to capture much of that crowd on the xbox.

Hence its sleazier than other Bioware games.

You're probably right. I think part of what disturbs me is that there are elements in this game that makes me feel that Bioware designed ME2 for young teenagers, and yet it has content that isn't suitable for them.

[CardonT]

If you think Nef had feelings of homophobia, then you somehow missed the point of that diary entry.
She didn't question herself for being attracted to another woman. She even underlines it very clear. "Morinth is a girl like me, and she is definitely not human." She thinks that it is odd that an alien understands her better than any human.
And I never understood the arguments that something is only for kids or teenagers when it comes out on a console. Mass Effect 1 was released for XBox360 only, when it came out, duh. Get over the fact that games are programmed for multiple platforms, because more people can afford a console than a PC that runs all the new games.

Modifié par CardonT, 08 février 2010 - 07:54 .

[Schneidend]

Whether or not you liked the game is not something that can really be debated. Where you see a "threadbare" plot I see a character-driven story. This is purely subjective, like debating which color is the best.

[DuffyMJ]

gr00grams wrote...

It was TL:DR, but all I can say is that ME1's story is vastly, and I mean vastly superior.

The convo's were great, but the overall main story was not on the scale of the first.
Other things were better, etc, but just talking pure story, no it definitely does not live up to the first, sorry Bioware.

This is sans romances, as in both they are 'okay' nothing special.
Just the main plot.

The events and revelations on Ilos in ME1 alone, just the dialogue with the prothean VI trump all of ME2's main plot.

If it's too long for you to read, then don't comment.  Are you so in love with your own voice that you have to chime in on everything?

Modifié par DuffyMJ, 08 février 2010 - 08:06 .

[Rilke21]

Schneidend wrote...

Whether or not you liked the game is not something that can really be debated. Where you see a "threadbare" plot I see a character-driven story. This is purely subjective, like debating which color is the best.

Bahaha. Nothing is purely subjective. Every subjective mind is built up of every objective experience that has ever shaped it. You read one book, I read another, and poof! We think (and percieve) differently. Does that mean there's no such thing as a good book? Heck no!