Guys Bioware has not painted themselves into a corner at all, the answer is staring us all right in the face.
Bioware has to create the game with the knowledge that some people who buy ME3 will not have purchased either ME1 or ME2. That being said, the default game will have none of the characters in ME2 dying. Which means that a "regular" gamer will see all the hours of voicework and animations because they are part of the default game. If we had people die in ME2 they'll just not appear, thus the default game will get more characters if you had people die in the first two.
Everyone seems to assume that all our ME3 games will be imports but Bioware has to be under the assumption that the majority of games will not be imports.
Did Bioware paint themself into a corner with ME2?
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ForceXev
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#52
Posté 19 février 2010 - 03:21
mundus66
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Well considering Conrad Verner didn't even appear at all unless you had ME1 thats a pretty big assumption. But you are probably right about squad members though, but i bet a lot of cameos will only be for us that imported.cos1ne wrote...
Guys Bioware has not painted themselves into a corner at all, the answer is staring us all right in the face.
Bioware has to create the game with the knowledge that some people who buy ME3 will not have purchased either ME1 or ME2. That being said, the default game will have none of the characters in ME2 dying. Which means that a "regular" gamer will see all the hours of voicework and animations because they are part of the default game. If we had people die in ME2 they'll just not appear, thus the default game will get more characters if you had people die in the first two.
Everyone seems to assume that all our ME3 games will be imports but Bioware has to be under the assumption that the majority of games will not be imports.
#53
Posté 19 février 2010 - 07:35
SaintofPandas
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Hey guys, first post here.
I think it's an interesting question, but it's not something exclusive to just character deaths. I think it's a problem that's indicative to the very idea of a game with branching choices. The more choices you make over the course of the series, the more options there are for variance further on, until it reaches a critical mass where you have a swell of choices over the course of the series and only a few can have a lasting impact on the overall plot. This means they can either swell the content of the game to include a bunch of side missions contingent to the main plot that serve as fallout for earlier choices (in which case the core game suffers, because the dev team has to put a bunch of care into situations that are largely inconsequential to the main plot), they can harrow down a number of choices by essentially throwing out Easter eggs for the fans who made certain choices (which they did smartly in ME2, through the use of emails that give the readers a shout-out without impacting the plot. The most important of these are the choice of who takes control of the Citadel following the finale of ME2, which, while a nice little Easter egg, didn't have a major impact on plot but was still present. I think the best example of this sort of minimalization was the "scan the keepers" sub-plot, which didn't have a major effect on the plot, but did seem to provide a minor teaser as to a plot point in ME3), or they can just fold the effects back into the tapestry of the plot, not making them pivotal plot points but still having cosmetic differences (something I haven't had a chance to see much of the fallout from, as my 360 got a disc read error after my first playthrough of ME2. But the death or survival or Wrex seems to be one of these).
My theory is this. Aside from the throughline of the main story, a substantial bulk of the loyalty missions seemed to focus on establishing allegiances with various alien factions. I'm guessing we'll see a number of major squadmates being downgraded to critical NPC's in ME3. The thrust seems to be preventing a Reaper invasion of Earth, so my guess is, a bulk of the core content of ME3 will be about recruiting alien groups to help in defense. Tali, Wrex, Legion, Mordin, perhaps Jacob or Miranda, and maybe Ashley/Kaiden will likely become your liaisons to these various factions, with certain opportunities for recruiting alien help becoming more difficult or perhaps blocked off depending on whether they survived or the choices you made when interacting with their people. When it comes to LI, I think it could go either way. They obviously held off on including Liara and Ashley/Kaiden as playable characters because they wanted your love interest to definitively survive into the third game, but whether they'll be squadmates or kept as critical NPC's is up in the air. My guess is the former, but that's really just a shot in the dark. But that would take a bulk of the ME2 characters off the table, meaning Bioware doesn't need to spec out a bunch of squadmates that don't survive, and in the case of NPC's that died in battle, they can easily replace their "liaison" text with new NPC's without too much difficulty. If Bioware does go a similar route to that, I'd hope the Rachni are included.
That just leaves the presence of Grunt, Jack, and Garrus up in the air. (I guess you could include Than and Morilith/Samara in that list too, but they seem somewhat extraneous, given their back stories). I'd hope they'd be included, as they're three of my favorites, and having characters who are off limits due to the decisions you made would be a pretty epic impact based on past decisions. But it's hard to say. I guess we'll have to wait and see. Still, the fact that they made the background stories of ME2 characters such a critical part of the story means they don't have to flesh the characters out nearly so much in the third game, so the inclusion or absence of the characters based on whether or not they died wouldn't have too big an impact on the final product. i.e. their stories are done, they don't need missions to flesh them out in the third game and so, if Jack died in the second game, you won't be missing a mission for her in the third. You'll just be missing a character to fill out space in your roster. My guess is, we'll see a core cast of ME1 and ME2 characters, with some being optional based on whether or not they survived the prior two games, alongside a handful of fresh characters, maybe half the size of the new characters introduced in the second game.
Does anyone know if there are characters who are incapable of dying in the final sequence?
Regardless, the dev team is more clever at this than me. I'm sure they'll do just fine.
I think it's an interesting question, but it's not something exclusive to just character deaths. I think it's a problem that's indicative to the very idea of a game with branching choices. The more choices you make over the course of the series, the more options there are for variance further on, until it reaches a critical mass where you have a swell of choices over the course of the series and only a few can have a lasting impact on the overall plot. This means they can either swell the content of the game to include a bunch of side missions contingent to the main plot that serve as fallout for earlier choices (in which case the core game suffers, because the dev team has to put a bunch of care into situations that are largely inconsequential to the main plot), they can harrow down a number of choices by essentially throwing out Easter eggs for the fans who made certain choices (which they did smartly in ME2, through the use of emails that give the readers a shout-out without impacting the plot. The most important of these are the choice of who takes control of the Citadel following the finale of ME2, which, while a nice little Easter egg, didn't have a major impact on plot but was still present. I think the best example of this sort of minimalization was the "scan the keepers" sub-plot, which didn't have a major effect on the plot, but did seem to provide a minor teaser as to a plot point in ME3), or they can just fold the effects back into the tapestry of the plot, not making them pivotal plot points but still having cosmetic differences (something I haven't had a chance to see much of the fallout from, as my 360 got a disc read error after my first playthrough of ME2. But the death or survival or Wrex seems to be one of these).
My theory is this. Aside from the throughline of the main story, a substantial bulk of the loyalty missions seemed to focus on establishing allegiances with various alien factions. I'm guessing we'll see a number of major squadmates being downgraded to critical NPC's in ME3. The thrust seems to be preventing a Reaper invasion of Earth, so my guess is, a bulk of the core content of ME3 will be about recruiting alien groups to help in defense. Tali, Wrex, Legion, Mordin, perhaps Jacob or Miranda, and maybe Ashley/Kaiden will likely become your liaisons to these various factions, with certain opportunities for recruiting alien help becoming more difficult or perhaps blocked off depending on whether they survived or the choices you made when interacting with their people. When it comes to LI, I think it could go either way. They obviously held off on including Liara and Ashley/Kaiden as playable characters because they wanted your love interest to definitively survive into the third game, but whether they'll be squadmates or kept as critical NPC's is up in the air. My guess is the former, but that's really just a shot in the dark. But that would take a bulk of the ME2 characters off the table, meaning Bioware doesn't need to spec out a bunch of squadmates that don't survive, and in the case of NPC's that died in battle, they can easily replace their "liaison" text with new NPC's without too much difficulty. If Bioware does go a similar route to that, I'd hope the Rachni are included.
That just leaves the presence of Grunt, Jack, and Garrus up in the air. (I guess you could include Than and Morilith/Samara in that list too, but they seem somewhat extraneous, given their back stories). I'd hope they'd be included, as they're three of my favorites, and having characters who are off limits due to the decisions you made would be a pretty epic impact based on past decisions. But it's hard to say. I guess we'll have to wait and see. Still, the fact that they made the background stories of ME2 characters such a critical part of the story means they don't have to flesh the characters out nearly so much in the third game, so the inclusion or absence of the characters based on whether or not they died wouldn't have too big an impact on the final product. i.e. their stories are done, they don't need missions to flesh them out in the third game and so, if Jack died in the second game, you won't be missing a mission for her in the third. You'll just be missing a character to fill out space in your roster. My guess is, we'll see a core cast of ME1 and ME2 characters, with some being optional based on whether or not they survived the prior two games, alongside a handful of fresh characters, maybe half the size of the new characters introduced in the second game.
Does anyone know if there are characters who are incapable of dying in the final sequence?
Regardless, the dev team is more clever at this than me. I'm sure they'll do just fine.
Modifié par SaintofPandas, 19 février 2010 - 07:44 .
#54
Posté 19 février 2010 - 02:53
Wild Still
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You're never painted into a corner when a three hour cut scene with two minutes of game play can be used to whack the main character to reboot the whole story.
#55
Posté 19 février 2010 - 10:37
Lvl20DM
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Mass Effect 2 is a self-contained story. I fully expect all or most of your squad-mates to be moved to non-squad roles in the next game. Many of them have solid reasons for not being in the next game, others will have reasons written for them. This is not a bad thing. Part of these games is encountering new characters and getting to know them. I do think that Liara and Ashley/Kaiden are likely candidates for squad-mates in ME 3, though.
#56
Posté 20 février 2010 - 01:15
_-Greywolf-_
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mundus66 wrote...
I did the suicide mission with only 4 loyal (1 of them being Zaeed). And to my surprise nobody died i even wanted some people to die but nope all alive. I had all the ship upgrades though. Tali (loyal) tech expert, Miranda(loyal) fire squad both times, Samara(loyal) biotic and sent Tali back to the ship. Took Samara and Miranda for last fight and the only loyal that held the line was Zaeed.
So my point being that its pretty easy to keep your squad alive if you upgraded your ship. Most people should only get 2-3 dead tops unless didn't upgrade their ship. So a huge part of the crew should be in ME3 imo.
How did you keep everyone alive? I had everyone loyal and the ship fully upgraded and Jack still died (this however is not a bad thing). I sent Tali as the Tech expert, Jacob for the first fire team, Samara as my Biotic and Jack for the second fire team, I had Mordin and Grunt in my squad for the entire mission.
Of course this question is more out of curiousity as Jacks death was not entirely unintentional.
#57
Posté 20 février 2010 - 01:19
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Lvl20DM wrote...
Mass Effect 2 is a self-contained story. I fully expect all or most of your squad-mates to be moved to non-squad roles in the next game. Many of them have solid reasons for not being in the next game.
I believe Thane has a pretty damn good excuse for not being in the next game.
#58
Posté 20 février 2010 - 01:57
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_-Greywolf-_ wrote...
I believe Thane has a pretty damn good excuse for not being in the next game.
Mordin is Eleventy Million and Four as well.
#59
Posté 20 février 2010 - 03:12
SaintofPandas
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_-Greywolf-_ wrote...
How did you keep everyone alive? I had everyone loyal and the ship fully upgraded and Jack still died (this however is not a bad thing). I sent Tali as the Tech expert, Jacob for the first fire team, Samara as my Biotic and Jack for the second fire team, I had Mordin and Grunt in my squad for the entire mission.
Of course this question is more out of curiousity as Jacks death was not entirely unintentional.
I'd guess you lost Jack because you used her for the second fire team. She's not exactly leadership material, after all. I used Tali as my tech, Miranda for the first fire team, Jack as my biotic, Jacob for my second fire team, and sent Grunt back to chaperone the crew to the ship. Miranda and Legion (I think?) went with me on the final mission. No casualties.
#60
Posté 20 février 2010 - 06:10
_-Greywolf-_
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SaintofPandas wrote...
_-Greywolf-_ wrote...
How did you keep everyone alive? I had everyone loyal and the ship fully upgraded and Jack still died (this however is not a bad thing). I sent Tali as the Tech expert, Jacob for the first fire team, Samara as my Biotic and Jack for the second fire team, I had Mordin and Grunt in my squad for the entire mission.
Of course this question is more out of curiousity as Jacks death was not entirely unintentional.
I'd guess you lost Jack because you used her for the second fire team. She's not exactly leadership material, after all. I used Tali as my tech, Miranda for the first fire team, Jack as my biotic, Jacob for my second fire team, and sent Grunt back to chaperone the crew to the ship. Miranda and Legion (I think?) went with me on the final mission. No casualties.
Oh well, I kinda made Jack leader of the 2nd fire team in the hopes that she would die, I actually sent Zaeed when I first tried it and he took a bullet so I reloaded a save and sent Jack to take the bullet in his place.
#61
Posté 20 février 2010 - 07:09
SaintofPandas
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_-Greywolf-_ wrote...
Oh well, I kinda made Jack leader of the 2nd fire team in the hopes that she would die, I actually sent Zaeed when I first tried it and he took a bullet so I reloaded a save and sent Jack to take the bullet in his place.
Bastard!
I went out of my way to keep Jack safe. She's my little honey bunny.
#62
Posté 21 février 2010 - 06:22
iNixiRir
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David Gaider posted this in the Dragon Age subforum, but it also applies to Mass Effect.
[quote[David Gaider wrote...
That would be a lot of work, indeed... and were any of those companions unavailable it would be work you wouldn't see and wouldn't even be aware it was there and made unavailable by your choices in the main game. I appreciate the idea that this would add to replayability, but we can't make content only for people who intend to replay the game... not with party members, one of the most expensive things we can put into a game like this.[/quote]
I think that Bioware has a lot to think about. Not only do they want all the decisions to play a (big) part in ME3, they will also have to make the game compatible for new players(although I would find it odd if people play ME3 without ever playing Me/2).
Shepard can die, and if he does; you will start Me3 with someone else(not Shepard - Think this has been stated by Bioware). This means that ME3 has 4 different soundfiles instead of 2 only for the main character(Mark Meer, Jennifer Hale, a new male and female).
Explanation: If my Shepard dies in Me2, I don't want to see a different Shepard in part 3, because the one and only Shepard died in my story(Shepards story ended with the collectors, but the reapers are still out there). So new players would play with someone else than Shepard
Every squadmember can die also. I don't think Bioware would play another Me2(Normandy destroyed again, Shepard reborn, crew went off to do something else). But if you and your crew survived, why would anyone leave your team? Not one squadmember has a good reason to do so, at least not a better reason than stopping the reapers. That's why I also want to have Liara/Ashley/Kaiden back as a squadmember, because chasing the Shadow Broker or being pissed of at Cerberus isn't more important than winning the war against the biggest threat in the galaxy.
However, the question is how Bioware is gonna do this. I have no doubt they will deliver. I hope that your Me squad joins your Me2 squad and along the way some other new peeps will join. But I guess this is a long shot.
[quote[David Gaider wrote...
That would be a lot of work, indeed... and were any of those companions unavailable it would be work you wouldn't see and wouldn't even be aware it was there and made unavailable by your choices in the main game. I appreciate the idea that this would add to replayability, but we can't make content only for people who intend to replay the game... not with party members, one of the most expensive things we can put into a game like this.[/quote]
I think that Bioware has a lot to think about. Not only do they want all the decisions to play a (big) part in ME3, they will also have to make the game compatible for new players(although I would find it odd if people play ME3 without ever playing Me/2).
Shepard can die, and if he does; you will start Me3 with someone else(not Shepard - Think this has been stated by Bioware). This means that ME3 has 4 different soundfiles instead of 2 only for the main character(Mark Meer, Jennifer Hale, a new male and female).
Explanation: If my Shepard dies in Me2, I don't want to see a different Shepard in part 3, because the one and only Shepard died in my story(Shepards story ended with the collectors, but the reapers are still out there). So new players would play with someone else than Shepard
Every squadmember can die also. I don't think Bioware would play another Me2(Normandy destroyed again, Shepard reborn, crew went off to do something else). But if you and your crew survived, why would anyone leave your team? Not one squadmember has a good reason to do so, at least not a better reason than stopping the reapers. That's why I also want to have Liara/Ashley/Kaiden back as a squadmember, because chasing the Shadow Broker or being pissed of at Cerberus isn't more important than winning the war against the biggest threat in the galaxy.
However, the question is how Bioware is gonna do this. I have no doubt they will deliver. I hope that your Me squad joins your Me2 squad and along the way some other new peeps will join. But I guess this is a long shot.
#63
Posté 21 février 2010 - 06:29
Ocelot83
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iNixiRir wrote...
Shepard can die, and if he does; you will start Me3 with someone else(not Shepard - Think this has been stated by Bioware). This means that ME3 has 4 different soundfiles instead of 2 only for the main character(Mark Meer, Jennifer Hale, a new male and female).
Explanation: If my Shepard dies in Me2, I don't want to see a different Shepard in part 3, because the one and only Shepard died in my story(Shepards story ended with the collectors, but the reapers are still out there). So new players would play with someone else than Shepard
If Shepard dies in ME 2, the game doesn't create save file import for ME 3. In ME 3 you play as Shepard, if your Shepard is dead, you have to play as the default Shepard.
#64
Posté 21 février 2010 - 06:58
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Ocelot83 wrote...
If Shepard dies in ME 2, the game doesn't create save file import for ME 3. In ME 3 you play as Shepard, if your Shepard is dead, you have to play as the default Shepard.
Really? I recall Casey saying that if you die in Me2, you will start as someone else in Me3(not Shepard). But maybe I misunderstood him.
#65
Posté 21 février 2010 - 07:08
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iNixiRir wrote...
Really? I recall Casey saying that if you die in Me2, you will start as someone else in Me3(not Shepard). But maybe I misunderstood him.
He said that if your Shepard dies in ME 2, you will still play as Shepard in ME 3, just not as your Shepard aka the default Shepard.
Like you said yourself, they would have to use 4 different voice actors in ME 3, if they allowed the dead Shepard save file to be imported.
Casey said in a another interview, when talking about the continuation of the Mass Effect games, that the first three games are the Shepard-trilogy and ME 4 will be about someone else.
#66
Posté 21 février 2010 - 08:07
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I'd say the solution is that none of the main story or side quests revolve around the party members. Thats what ME2 was for, to make the connection with the party members and build a great background. Thats done now, no need for it in 3.
So if there are no side quests or stories that are prior-party member *focused* then the only content someone misses by not having party members alive is dialog on the Normandy and their comments in missions that are all optional/variable content in ME1 and 2 as it is. Mission content wise they'd be the same.
As for having a enough party members to work with if everyone dies in ME2, I think it will be okay. You get back Ashley/Kaiden + Liara + maybe 1 or 2 new party members. That gives you a full squad to play with. Sure that may sound like it sucks, but who cares? Someone who is choosing to import a game where their whole party died is making that active decision for themselves, they clearly want to play a game where everyone dies and thats their prerogative as a role playing game. They don't have to and if they wanted to they could always replay ME2 and get some of the party members back or just use a default game which would assume many more, maybe all, survived.
I mean its no more of a content problem than it is for ME1/2 where a player may choose to have the same 2 party members in their group the whole time and only ever talk to them on the Normandy.
So if there are no side quests or stories that are prior-party member *focused* then the only content someone misses by not having party members alive is dialog on the Normandy and their comments in missions that are all optional/variable content in ME1 and 2 as it is. Mission content wise they'd be the same.
As for having a enough party members to work with if everyone dies in ME2, I think it will be okay. You get back Ashley/Kaiden + Liara + maybe 1 or 2 new party members. That gives you a full squad to play with. Sure that may sound like it sucks, but who cares? Someone who is choosing to import a game where their whole party died is making that active decision for themselves, they clearly want to play a game where everyone dies and thats their prerogative as a role playing game. They don't have to and if they wanted to they could always replay ME2 and get some of the party members back or just use a default game which would assume many more, maybe all, survived.
I mean its no more of a content problem than it is for ME1/2 where a player may choose to have the same 2 party members in their group the whole time and only ever talk to them on the Normandy.
#67
Posté 21 février 2010 - 09:40
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Anyone else think mordin might be working to undo the genophage in me3 so we can have a krogan horde (commanded by wrex) to fight the reapers. I kind of got the impression of this from his loyalty mission.
#68
Posté 22 février 2010 - 02:31
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emb31588 wrote...
Anyone else think mordin might be working to undo the genophage in me3 so we can have a krogan horde (commanded by wrex) to fight the reapers. I kind of got the impression of this from his loyalty mission.
Don't know if it'll be mordin but i definetly think the cure will play a part if you kept it.
As someone else pointed out it makes complete sense that the plot of me3 be mission related instead of character related, which would mean something along the lines of building the alliances you need to stop the reapers, the krogans would come into this equation.
If the plotline is building alliances then the amount of characters available as squadmates becomes something that allows bioware to go in a route which solves most if not all of the problems they might have.
In a default game Shepard lives just not your particular shepard so what's to say that in the default game everyone who could live does, barring the ones that bioware decided to write out (i'm thinking thane for obvious reason, Zaeed because he's a dlc character in me2 so not really part of the main game and maybe mordin because of his age), so someone starting the game fresh gets everyone else plus liara and ash/kaiden basically bringing them back up to the same level of squadmates as me2.
For those of us who managed to get everyone out alive we'd get those we saved plus liara and ash/kaiden but would lose those that bioware write out (thane.zaeed etc) bringing us back to the same level we were at in me2.
For those who lost squadmates well they would be minus whoever they lost but would get Liara and ash kaiden which no matter how you play it brings you back up to me1 levels.
But since in essence the squadmates are just that and don't really affect things overall you wouldn't really lose out no matter how you played. It just might be a tad quieter on the normandy in some peoples games.
There would be no wasted characters for the simple reason that a new player would get basically everyone and a returning player would get those they saved so the only people who would lose out on characters would be those who let people die on the end mission, but even this works because then they'd have suffered a consequence of their actions.
It makes no sense for bioware to create a whole raft of new characters considering to any new people just starting at me3 any character would be new in the first place.
