97 réponses à ce sujet

[inversevideo]

Okay, let me clarify, I am not trolling, I am just questioning what we know, so far, and wondering about an odd piece of news, posted to the Cerberus network.

I do look at the Cerberus news stories, and last night, there was some story about how the North American president, suffered a fatal stroke, and was dead, and as far as anyone knows this is the first time that a leader had their memories/data restored so that they could function in office. At least, that is the gist of the story, not quite verbatim.
The VP disputes the president's claim to office, stating he died. 

Now assuming that Bioware did not include that story by 'accident', but rather to showcase the technology available, which might account for how they reconstructed Shepard's mind, it begs the question, is the Shepard that Cerberus brought back the same Shepard that died?

How common is it to bring someone back from the dead? Shepard's case was extreme, but what about traffic accidents? i.e vehicle collisions, or simply being shot? Dying of heart attack? Do those folks get brought back to life? Are they the same folks that died? Or exact copies?

If Cerberus spent a fortune to bring you back, for a suicide mission, then T.I.M must either a) have the abilty to make more of you as needed, or  have the ability to recoup his losses by selling resurrection services to the hightest bidder. After all, if they can bring Shepard back, and s/he was mostly meat and tubes, someone who just took a bullet, should be a piece of cake, no?

Adn speaking of Shepard, being all meat and tubes, just how does a human body, how does your brain, survive atmospheric re-entry, lack of oxygen, and exposure to the planetary surface. 

I get that they rebuild the body, and that they somehow salvage enough of what was left of your brain, to collect all of your memories/data.  Or they think they did, hence the questioning by Miranda, on the shuttle ride to meet T.I.M.

But aside from being 'bait' for the T.I.M. to draw out the Reapers, are you really you?

The glowing frame beneath your flesh, the glowing eyes, the abnormal strength.
Are you still human? Or are you a mobile A.I. with all the memories/data, reactions, and drives, of someone who died 2 years ago?

T.I.M brought you back into this world, will he take you back out, and bring you back, only maybe this time, with a bit more loyalty to Cerberus?

[Kurt M.]

I've been wondering the same since I first played ME2....

[Geth Knight]

I always believed that Shepard was just in the fringe of orbit and re-entry till he was picked up. With out an atmosphere to promot decomp, he would be fine. I assume its the same Shepard from ME1

[max_ai]

The real Shepard is Legion now (hence the N7 armor).
Cerberus Shepard is just a copycat!  

[Gabey5]

THEN WHO WAS ON THE PHONE

[epeeist]

From memory, the discussions with Jacob (not a clone etc.), one (at least) with Miranda (what she would have done differently but IM wanted no changes), one with the Illusive Man (one choice Shepard refers to noticing some upgrades) the comic about Liara rescuing Shepard's body (I only read issue #1 from the collector's edition, not the whole series), and the journal entries on the original station, unless a massive fraud/lie (and if a clone with transferred/implanted memories, why lie about it, since one's character explicitly raises the possibility of being a clone), it seems that in the story it is Shepard's original body, revived/repaired as far as possible, but with some technological replacements as necessary. The goal was to have the "real" Shepard (personality and knowledge) insofar as possible. As I posted elsewhere, maybe the in-game justification is that being vacuum-frozen preserved brain structure enough for the information/personality to be recalled (of course, one dialogue choice has one's character not remembering what Cerberus was...). One could speculate that in this fictional universe highly expensive nanotechnology designed specifically for Shepard and with "gaps" in restored memory filled in with publicly-available knowledge of the famous Shepard's life was used to repair memories and brain function, and that it would similarly cost billions to do for someone else and require specialized techniques.



Read also the Quarian codex entries, one of them notes how they had stored ancestral memories, but only as VI, that they were working to incorporate AI functionality and sapience so that they would be "alive", but that the Geth destroyed them in the war. So presumably in the ME universe there has already been work on/knowledge of storing memories artificially?



Obviously, the whole situation provides in-game justification for choosing a new class (e.g. rationalize your character lost biotic abilities, gained them from use of element zero, technological replacements give enhanced engineer/infiltrator ability, whatever), and I much prefer this in-game justification to simply ignoring changes.



As to the question of whether in such a situation it would be the "real" Shepard, that raises both ontological and theological questions.

[MonkeyLungs]

My reneagde sheps had me asking these same kinds of questions OP. And had me liking the shep dies, gets rebuilt by cerberus, idea alot less.



I really love these games but killing shep in an intro cutscene to have him rebuilt by cerberus just starts to feel more and more cheap the more i think about it.

[Schneidend]

A team of sci-fi wizards did it.



But, seriously, they used some kind of miracle super medi-gel that revitalized dead tissue, which includes the brain. That's all there is to it. Shepard was completely revived, but was too physically damaged to move or sustain life and thus had some biosynthetic organ transplants, small cybernetic implants, etc. Shepard is still Shepard.

[RigAudio]

Interesting point. I don't think Bioware would be sad enough to pull that card on us, though.

[inversevideo]

justinnstuff wrote...

I like the conspiracy theory, and with the way the scars and eyes work, Shep definitely has more machine in him than we want to think. I still think he has some reaper parts. If this was the case though, why didn't TIM just make Shep controllable if he wanted a loyal soldier?

I worried about this, on my first play through;convinced that they had an 'off switch' or chip in me.

However, my 2nd play through, I questioned Miranda and Jacob more, during our initial meeting, and learned that Miranda wanted to chip me, but T.I.M said no.

Then I thought about how much money and time, Cerberus poured into my resurrection, only to continually throw me into harms way, with incomplete or mis-leading info ('derelict' Collector vessel anyone?).

And the thought crossed my mind, that T.I.M had gotten ahold of the derelict reaper, long ago.
Either before or shortly after Sovereign's attack on the Citadel; and in true Cerberus fashion, kept the knowledge and any tech they may have found to themselves. Much of the derelict Reaper's interior was extensively overlaid, with catwalks and structures, built be cerberus (catwalks, doors, workstations, platforms).

It began to feel like Shepard was bait.
That T.I.M knew that the Collectors /Reapers were somehow 'attuned' to Shepard; and would seek him/her out.
But if Shepar's personality were altered, then the Reapers might sense that, and not go after Shepard.

Judt a thought...

[Beechwell]

I think a clone is out of the question. It wouldn't have Shepard's memories, which shape most of one's personality. It would really be little more than an identical twin.

Also, I'm sure the brain (at leat the cerebral cortex) must have been mostly intact to for any attempt at resurrection. I even think that the personality would actually irretrievably lost once all neural activity has ceased. After all, our sense of 'self' is a construct of said neural activity. I don't think one can just reactivate it, so I doubt Cerberus' method to bring back Shepard (the person, not the organism) would have been actually feasible. But of course I can't say for sure.



So yes, the whole concept is a bit shady, to say the least.

[cipher_Cero]

Even with limited data on how organics store and utilize memory, all neural synapses are merely minute electrical signals encoded with information associated with audio, visual information, and physical sensations, stored in short and long-term memory.

We surmise that organic databanks may be restored by the restimulation of neurons associated with short and long-term memory, beginning with reactivation of the circulatory and respiratory systems to provide the brain with the necessary resources. What may follow is the stimulation of the proper neurons associated with recollection.

Just as functioning organics may freely recall information stored in short and long-term memory, we surmise that a revived organic may be capable of the same.

We have limited data among our runtimes pertaining to human neuroanatomy. We have not extensively studied your physiology, only societal and behavioral patterns. We know what you know.

Modifié par cipher_Cero, 04 mars 2010 - 07:46 .

[tsd16]

This is more of a philosophical question than a scientific one, since we can't possibly draw a comparrison with our modern science. Since we cant revive someone that is dead dead. i.e. deep fried KFC style in the upper atmosphere of a planet and or killed by the vacuum of space. Regardless of how ****ed up Sheps body was or wasn't which is debatable, he was dead as dead gets.



I think it has more to do with the existence of a soul than anything else. I personally am an atheist, so by my logic if cerberus "restored" his brain. Shepard is still Shepard, no matter what they did to the rest of his body.



If you believe in a soul, by that logic reviving him at all should be impossible, no matter if they restored his body to perfect order or not, it just wouldnt work, he could not attain conciousness, because his soul ceases to exist on this plane, and I doubt his soul would just suck right back into his body from wherever the hell he is, if his body was restored. Dont bring up "near death experiences" as an example of this soul returning to the body crap. People that claim to have had near death experiences were not brain dead, you dont come back from brain dead, near death experiences are simply hallucinations caused by lack of oxygen to the brain. Once your brain is dead its friggin over because your brain is ****ed and can never function properly again.





SO in closing, it is my belief, if a god/soul does exist in the ME universe ME2 shepard IS NOT shepard, he is simply a blasphemous construct.



If a god/soul does not exist in the ME universe, in my opinion ME2 shep is just as much shepard as me1 shepard.

[Pedro Costa]

Shepard is Shepard, Miri says so, TiM says so, Jacob says so, Devs say so... what more do you need? Time-travelling Shep to say so? xD



Even his/her cybernetic implants are overblown by this community, when in fact, on a computer in the Lazarus station a vid-log, Miri says the use of cybernetics on Shepard were only to speed things up, ergo they weren't even necessary to bring Shep back in the first place, and therefore, can be "easily" removed. In fact, if you got 50000 spare platinum, you can do just that. Regardless, they're minimal.



So, Shepard is still Shepard, and as far as we know, when Shep tells TiM s/he noticed a few upgrades they might just as well be the L5-series bio-amps if you're biotic (Shep was an L3 when he defeated Sovereign), or a more recent version of the cybernetics Soldiers, Infiltrators, Engineers and Sentinels use... after all, 2 years have passed.

[The Angry One]

DarkLord_PT wrote...

Even his/her cybernetic implants are overblown by this community, when in fact, on a computer in the Lazarus station a vid-log, Miri says the use of cybernetics on Shepard were only to speed things up, ergo they weren't even necessary to bring Shep back in the first place, and therefore, can be "easily" removed. In fact, if you got 50000 spare platinum, you can do just that. Regardless, they're minimal.

They're never removed, all evidence of them is removed. They're still there.

[Suron]

shepard is shepard.



and sorry but if you watch his angle of tragectory he is in FACT entering atmosphere just before the logo shows....I guess his armor somehow saved him from being completely vaporized but this "I imagine he was still in orbit" is a bunch of crap.



he entered the planet and hit ground.

[Pedro Costa]

The Angry One wrote...
They're never removed, all evidence of them is removed. They're still there.

As I said,
"regardless, they're minimal"
And this is from a person who strongly objected to having cybernetics on his shep =P

[TheAngryHeretic]

Remember, there are a few things that we do not know.  We do not know what the real condition of his body was when Liara recovered it.  Jacob says you were mostly meat and tubes, but a brakedown of that definition was never provided. 

I like the way you bring this up.  It has been something I have thought about as well.  I hope/think the answer will come to us in the Mass Effect comics when that series progresses more.  But I really hope that the Shepard we are playing as is the correct Shepard from the 1st Mass Effect.

inversevideo wrote...

Okay, let me clarify, I am not trolling, I am just questioning what we know, so far, and wondering about an odd piece of news, posted to the Cerberus network.

I do look at the Cerberus news stories, and last night, there was some story about how the North American president, suffered a fatal stroke, and was dead, and as far as anyone knows this is the first time that a leader had their memories/data restored so that they could function in office. At least, that is the gist of the story, not quite verbatim.
The VP disputes the president's claim to office, stating he died. 

Now assuming that Bioware did not include that story by 'accident', but rather to showcase the technology available, which might account for how they reconstructed Shepard's mind, it begs the question, is the Shepard that Cerberus brought back the same Shepard that died?

How common is it to bring someone back from the dead? Shepard's case was extreme, but what about traffic accidents? i.e vehicle collisions, or simply being shot? Dying of heart attack? Do those folks get brought back to life? Are they the same folks that died? Or exact copies?

If Cerberus spent a fortune to bring you back, for a suicide mission, then T.I.M must either a) have the abilty to make more of you as needed, or  have the ability to recoup his losses by selling resurrection services to the hightest bidder. After all, if they can bring Shepard back, and s/he was mostly meat and tubes, someone who just took a bullet, should be a piece of cake, no?

Adn speaking of Shepard, being all meat and tubes, just how does a human body, how does your brain, survive atmospheric re-entry, lack of oxygen, and exposure to the planetary surface. 

I get that they rebuild the body, and that they somehow salvage enough of what was left of your brain, to collect all of your memories/data.  Or they think they did, hence the questioning by Miranda, on the shuttle ride to meet T.I.M.

But aside from being 'bait' for the T.I.M. to draw out the Reapers, are you really you?

The glowing frame beneath your flesh, the glowing eyes, the abnormal strength.
Are you still human? Or are you a mobile A.I. with all the memories/data, reactions, and drives, of someone who died 2 years ago?

T.I.M brought you back into this world, will he take you back out, and bring you back, only maybe this time, with a bit more loyalty to Cerberus?

[Devidose]

Well, first off, it's the Systems Alliance President, not the North American one, SA was set up as the rest of the world was too busy squabbling over what to do at the relay 314 incident.

The CDN update was something I found interesting this time around. As mentioned, the Quarians had a similar tech before the Geth, turning imprints into something similar to the VIs ingame.



I think the Shepard we have is the original. The re-entry doesn't have to have been as bad as considered were it a planet like Earth.



http://masseffect.wi...om/wiki/Alchera



Providing that is the planet we see at the start, then the atmospheric pressure, gravity and average temp are all below that found on earth. This could have offset the severity of re-entry, coupled with the protective properties of the N7 armour, and kept key parts of Shepard, (Brain), intact enough for Cerberus to restore him.

[MPSai]

The whole resurrection is far-fetched for sure, but just convincing enough to not be annoying, at least to me. Really it's just an excuse to explain the simplified power system, let you change the character's looks and class, and explain why you can't just continue with the same crew.

[Miqti]

It's the 22nd century... everyone is doing the impossible by our standards... FTL travel, a created AI race, extreme genetic engineering... though very rare, there are a few people in the modern world that undergo extreme circumstances... even clinically dead... and are brought back... these are exceptional instances in an unexceptional time. I believe there's a case of someone that survived a 30,000 foot fall (don't quote me on that one) Also remember there is terminal velocity... so as long as Shephard's armor holds up it doesn't matter if you fall from 5,000 feet or 100,000 feet... you will hit the ground/water/ice/whatever at the same speed. Yes Shephard's body internally looks charred, but in that future alternate world this seems to be within a believable realm.

[The Angry One]

The whole intro basically shows you a dead body being restored to life functions anyway.

If Shep were some sort of clone that would be redundant.

[cos1ne]

My thoughts on what happened to shepard.



First he's killed by anoxia as all the air in his suit is siphoned off into space, then his body begins to suffer the ravages of vacuum while he falls into the planets atmosphere. Luckily for our hero his suit has built in kinetic barriers and enough non-newtonian fluid that when he makes landfall instead of being incinerated in the air or splattered on the ground his corpse is only mostly mangled.



The frigid conditions of the planet help to preserve his corpse long enough for it to be taken to cerberus' labs where he is painstakingly put back together slowly. I assume they would replace most of the non-neural portions with artificially created organs or cloned cells made up from Shepards own body. They probably worked very hard not to mess with the brain because Shep has the Prothean memories trapped in his brain and if they messed with this then they could've altered his ability to interact with prothean technology. Also probably why TIM wouldn't allow a control chip placed in his brain.



Also I would like to note that Shepard being dead for 2 years is no more a moral dilemna then a man who drowns in a frozen lake and is legally braindead for 30 minutes being brought back to life.