#Let me play as a Quarian already BioWare!

[rjmhereunderprotest]

Only Human: Species Bias in Fantasy/Science-Fiction

Let's get the premise for this little essay out of the way now: Humans are Boring. They are the most overused, overemphasized, overdone, overrated race in any fantasy/sci-fi setting. And I'm honestly SO tired of it. And by that I mean, humans, and human-like races, are consistently the primary characters of any story. Dwarves, Elves, Halflings, they're all overdone to death, but Humans? Those other races are generally just derivatives of them anyway and they are constantly placed into the primary focus of any story. Often to its detriment in my mind. We always complain about how we want other perspectives, different heroes, different narratives, but we always default to humans and frankly its gotten stale. For me, it's become even more so the longer this has gone on. So in a follow-up to my entry about Monster-Narratives with Sarah Kerrigan, let's talk about humans and why they're so goddamn boring.

Disclaimer First

I am not saying ALL human characters and ALL human centric stories are boring. I can name many a human character who is compelling and interesting and deep. My problem isn't humans as a central POV, my problem is when given the option in a setting to do ANYTHING and be ANYONE... a story will default to human. Every. Single. Time. And worse yet, they'll even make Non-Human races more human like.

Besides the aforementioned Dwarves, Elves and Hobbits, a lot of alien or fantasy races can end up just being humans with a slightly different coat of paint. You don't need to look any further than a lot of monster girl fiction, which has universally decided that you can just have any human woman put on cat ears or pop out a fox tail or grow some wings and presto chango they're a monster now I guess. It's cosplay, nothing more. No one actually has the dragon BE a dragon i full. They have to look like a human somehow.

And let's be clear here, the reason for this is obvious. Write what you know. Everyone knows how to be human, so it's easier to just WRITE a human. The perspective will ring more true if you know what a human is and can properly depict them. And since everyone is human, everyone at least has an idea of how they're supposed to be. I'm not blaming anyone for going to the default option on this, it makes sense.

But all across media there exists multiple opportunities to actually present a perspective or allow someone to step into the shoes of something that isn't human. That isn't just a derivative of humanity. That is truly foreign to them. Sadly they rarely take the chance and when they do... well, a lot of the times it falls into some bad writing clichés. Before we get into some of the main offenders, let's address one of said clichés of the bat to better understand why human centrism in genre fiction can lead to some terrible ideas.

Planet of Hats

The Planet of Hats is the well-worn concept that alien/fantasy races are monoliths. That every member of a species thinks like each other, acts like each other, builds their society around a singular concept, is entirely devoted to that particular concept, and is forever entrenched in that one state of mind forever. That is the Planet of Hats. You see it manifested in every Warrior Culture or Pacifist Society or Amazon Island or Gangster Planet. An entire people bent to serve a singular overriding "Problem of the Week" scenario to comment on a singular issue. Mostly by going completely overboard with it. And if you want to know the biggest offender of this... well, all those examples I listed come from one single IP who has done at least one iteration of those worlds over its very long life-span.

Sorry guys, it's true and you know it. For all the good Star Trek portends to be, all the progressive ideas it puts forward, for all the social commentary it has added to zeitgeist, one place it consistently falls short in is depicting alien races. How you ask? How is one of the most socially conscious and ethnically diverse franchises in history failing in this regard? Especially considering it has spawned some of the most iconic alien races in all of fiction?

Because as I just pointed out, a lot of their alien races are basically just one note stereotypes. Built around a single idea to create a "Problem of the Week" episode. This has been true as far back as the original series. Which was completely episodic and rarely if ever revisited alien races it ran across. Now of course there are mainstays and they've been fleshed out over the decades, but a lot of that fleshing out has been a result of Star Trek trying to push back on the Planet of Hats problem. And they still don't really address the crux of it.

The best way to explain Star Trek's problem lies in how one alien race was introduced to us, the Ferengi. You know them, the big eared hyper-capitalists who are best known for being the franchise's greedy assholes/Comic Relief. And boy, was their introduction a MESS.

It's fair to say the first two seasons of "The Next Generation" were... bad. As in... awful. "The Last Outpost" is one of those awful episodes where the Ferengi first showed up. Roddenberry, Star Trek's creator, wanted to evolve a lot of the concepts from the original series. The problem was he didn't have anyone to tell him "This doesn't work" The Ferengi were made to replace the dated "America vs Soviets" allegory that a lot of Trek's previous antagonist aliens represented. For Roddenberry, the real danger was unfettered capitalism. Hard to argue with that, problem was the Ferengi weren't a threat.

"The Last Outpost" presents the Ferengi less as an alien race and more like farcical clowns who basically exist to make the Federation (Humanity) look better by comparison. The Ferengi run around the entire episode, acting like unhinged monkeys, while Commander Riker struts about with his superior moral values and beliefs. At no point do the Ferengi resemble a legitimate threat to humanity. They're buffoons, made to present less a commentary on hyper-capitalism and more of a mockery of it. As a result, none of the Ferengi come off as characters, they're caricatures. Silly, nonsensical, idiots who are there to make Picard look righteous and humanity as more evolved.

Now let's not act like Roddenberry was supposed to be fair to the alien race he created to represent the things he hated. But he was supposed to make them a culture and not just strawmen he could beat up for an hour. Hell, decades earlier, he had bothered to give the Nazi Planet more nuance! And that was a planet, as stated, full of Nazis! But even that felt more like a culture than the Ferengi running around like baboons, hooting and hollering as they unconvincingly tried to pull one over on the natives they intended to exploit. Natives that the oh so perfect Federation, embodied by Commander Riker, easily protected by simple human fortitude and stalwart moral fiber.

Of course, years down the line, the Ferengi were finally developed into something that resembled a real civilization instead of punching bag. They actually had a degree of morals, not like the Federation, but they weren't entirely monstrous. Characters like Quark helped immensely in rehabilitating the image of the Ferengi without completely discarding their original characterization. But Star Trek has never really completely abandoned it's human centrism. Nor it's tendency to portray humanity in general as the "Better Way/Only Way."

Because let's be honest here, the Federation is just humanity. Sure other races are in there, work with them, and we are TOLD their customs and beliefs are respected, but be honest. How often have you seen an alien on Star Trek in a Command position? How often are aliens in Star Trek the central character? Has any captain or lead character in any Trek show ever not been a human?

You may point out Spock or Worf, and fair, but Spock is half-human and Worf was raised by humans. They're also not the Captain of the ship of their respective series. Even then, Vulcans and Klingons don't get off so easily. How many times have the Vulcans and their reliance on logic being criticized because they don't express outward emotion like humans? How many times have the Klingons had their culture scrutinized as purely violent? Yes, they've always come back around to highlight the value of their differing perspectives, how their voices at the table are worth listening to, and how there is more to them than just the warrior and hyper-logical. But ultimately, a lot of Star Trek comes back to how each of these alien races REALLY should become more human. Oh the Federation won't FORCE it on them, but they'll just kinda neg them on it. You should really show more emotion, Spock. You should really stop being so war-like, Worf. Be more human, be more sensible, conform! Why don't you conform already?

You might argue that's not the case, but it kinda is. Star Trek will always come around to how if a lot of these alien races were more like the Federation's ideal of humanity, they'd all be much better off. And it all stems from the Planet of the Hats cliché. Which purely exists to give the Federation some problem to preach about and argue against. The Federation won't conquer you to be like them, but they will kinda pressure you to change. And sure, a lot of these cultures could do with reform. But a planet existing purely to be used as a soap box isn't a culture, it's just the Ferengi of "The Last Outpost" again.

I'll sum this section up in terms that were expressed by Chuck Sonnenberg of SFDebris. Star Trek's tendency to put alien races in a box is detrimental to its world building. If Germany was a fictional race in Star Trek, it would be defined by industrial power, a love of war, and expansionist foreign policy coached in racial purity. That even after being defeated, said society would constantly be trying to claw back to its perceived glory days, never changing, just constantly being stuck in its singular mindset for all eternity. The only thing keeping them in check being the Federation of United Planets, mostly dominated by humans, who shake their heads at how awful Germans are for refusing to change and be more like them.

Doesn't that sound stupid? And if the Federation of Star Trek, the epitome of Optimistic Science Fiction, can make such a mistake, how do franchises that aren't so hopeful and cheer faire? Star Trek is an incredibly influential series in genre fiction. It informs a lot about how its done even today. If it can't help but put humans on a pedestal, even though it shouldn't because that's antithetical to its own world-building, how have other IPs faired in that regard?

Well... not good. Not good at all.

Center of Everything

I could list so many examples of humans being positioned as the most important element of any fantasy or sci-fi story. It almost feels redundant. Star Wars generally has humans as its main protagonists. A good deal of Lord of the Rings involves the nations of men being the main bulwark against the forces of Mordor. Earth is basically the most important planet in both Marvel and DC and humanity is the most special of all races out there. How many humans get to be a part of the Green Lantern Corps? Overall, humans are going to be the focus of any story. Even if they exist in a setting where they aren't the only sapient race out there. Humans get to take center stage and lead the plot. Even if they really shouldn't and they aren't supposed to and you know where this going...

I think this is probably the best example I can use to point out how Human Centrism can be a problem. Because I think enough people at this point recognize what went wrong with the live-action Transformers movies. Yeah, I know some folks keep trying to rehabilitate them, I don't care. I'm dying on this hill! They were never that good!

A movie about the Transformers should not be so reliant on the squishy humans that no one ever cared about. A series of dynamic characters who, at the point of the first Bay Movie's premiere, had carried several stories on their own despite not being human! A race of alien robots with intriguing inter-cultural dynamics, opinions, philosophies, so much character and complexity. Sure they were toy commercials at the end of the day, but no one who watched Dinobot's sacrifice in Beast Wars' "Code of a Hero" would be able to deny that the series could not transcend that stigma! The Transformers were always meant to be the center of their franchise, as they rightly should be because they can carry it just fine on their own.

Then Michael Bay showed up and decided to turn the whole series into an extended US Army Recruitment Commercial instead. I think we can all agree Military-Industrial Complex Propaganda is far worse than making kids want to bug their parents for toys. But that's neither here nor there, even if Bay hadn't been jerking off to the US Military in these movies, the problem with them was apparent from moment one. When the films became more about Shia LeBeouf wanting to get laid than the alien robots. The films excessively/progressively revolved around humans and their interactions with the Transformers. They became the primary focus more and more until they essentially took over huge swaths of the plot and narrative. Autobots and Decepticons alike, no matter how important, iconic or well-known, were very casually tossed aside and killed off over the various sequels. And no one really cared because the Transformers on both sides became so highly interchangeable and forgettable that sometimes you could blink and miss them. Remember Arcee? Prominent female autobot? Strangely split into three motocycles for some reason? Murdered to death! With only one line of dialogue!

Oh sure, Optimus and Bumblebee got to be front and center, but mostly because they got to be colors that were just a mess of greys, browns and blacks. That and Optimus is by far the most popular of all the Transformers and the face of the franchise. But if you want an example of humans taking over a narrative to its detriment, Michael Bay's Transformers movies are the singular defining example of just such a problem. And you probably heard the defenses, it gave audiences a anchor point, a relatable view, something they could connect with.

Strange, none of the fans over the years needed humans to help them connect to any of the alien robots that were the main narrative focus of countless tv shows and comics. But I suppose Hollywood Executives know better. When have they ever been wrong, right?

To be honest though, this is nothing new. Science-Fiction especially has always had a problem with positioning humans as ultra-super special. And some people could recognize it for the dangerous prospect of what it was. Issac Asimov noted John W. Campbell's tendency to position humans as the most important or superior race as opposed to others it encountered in fiction. And to Asimov, that also appeared to extend to the smaller scale of reality and Campbell's... well, let's say belief in American Exceptionalism. Asimov didn't like arguing with Campbell, so he tried to avoid using aliens too much.

You can see the problem though, insisting on the exceptionalism of humanity often denotes a general sense of racial/national superiority. There's nothing wrong with rooting for the home team, but not everything should be a competition and humans shouldn't take over every story for themselves. Especially if it isn't their own, like the Transformers. Their franchise is proof enough that humans don't have to be central element to be successful. And yet, until now, most theatrical films felt the need to involve humans in some aspect. And sadly, because of "Transformers One's" not so stellar box office performance, that belief might persist. And it will continue to hamstring the Transformers property like it does with other stories in genre fiction.

Illusion of Choice

Even if this mindset doesn't inherently compromise a story's narrative, it can still kneecap it. The best example of how involves gaming, specifically RPGs. Despite portending that our "choices matter", so often in games they do not. Because, here again, too many franchises decide that the only perspective that matters is one that looks similar to you.

Discounting the many video games that might allow you to be an alien, monster or even just an animal, because they are out there, I feel far too many RPGs can be very limiting. Does Fallout let you pick if you want to be a Ghoul or Super Mutant? No. That's only been a recent development and only for one game and its an MMO. Video games in general, when set in a fantasy or sci-fi world will default to one of the pre-approved human or human-like races, if they present the choice at all. Dragon Age 2 famously hard locked you into being a human despite the last game letting you pick your race. Now you can say that's because they had a set story to tell that needed the characters to be human. But it's still jarring.

And I think there's one instance where BioWare itself had a huge opportunity to change things... but decided they were just going to play it safe.

After three games of playing Commander Shepard, who had to be human because that made the most sense for the story they were telling, BioWare had an opportunity to shake things up. They had a whole new story, not tied to Shepard. A whole new galaxy, again, not tied to Shepard or humanity itself. And they decided to just go with another human character... again. Mass Effect has probably some of the most diverse alien races out there and even now, you can still only play them through multiplayer. The main games? Stuck with human protagonists.

I'll freely admit I probably defend Andromeda more than most Mass Effect fans. Not completely, because it does have a lot of problems, but I admire it for what it was TRYING to do. What I can't forgive is what it didn't even attempt. It could've easily crafted a story that enabled the player to pick whatever race they wanted to play as. Turian, Asari, Salarian or Krogan! Quarians! They could've let us be quarians, but NO! We are always stuck as humans, never given the opportunity to experience this galaxy through any other eyes but human ones! Even when given the perfect opportunity to do so, Andromeda chickens out and just sticks us as an ordinary human again.

It's so painfully sad. And while being given the option to be something other than a human probably wouldn't have fixed the game's other problems, at the very least it would've been looked at as some admirable. As something that tried to expand Mass Effect's unique setting and give more dimension to the aliens it had crafted.

Humans are simply the safe option. Safe to animate, safe to draw, safe to craft stories for, safe to empathize with. The second you have to do it for something that is properly alien or decisively not human, that's when you run into trouble. Because if you can't get the audience to connect with a character, it's over. And that becomes harder if the alien or fantasy creature does not share something in common with us.

It's kinda sad honestly that the biggest departure from human-based races that Dragon Age has even done is qunari. And they're technically just horned giant people. They're not exactly inhuman enough, hell if character creation teases are anything to go by, they've actually tried to make them MORE human looking for the next game.

Which brings us to a whole other issue that is pushing us further down this hole within the confines of gaming itself. For far too long now, the gaming industry has become increasingly obsessed with hyper-realism, both in graphics and design. Unique artistic styles and aesthetics have slowly been eroded away by an obsession among developers and publishers alike. A need to force characters and games themselves to be grounded in the real, no matter how fantastical the setting is.

lately, people have often complained about how the faces of game characters have gotten "ugly" over the years. The stupid among these people think its a conspiracy to get rid of sexy ladies in video games and alter beauty standards in the mainstream for some agenda. The reality is known to the smarter set of folks, who have seen the industry cultivate motion capture technology to reduce their reliance on artists to craft characters for them. Just get a recognizable face or literally anyone you can find and make them act out the lines while wearing a facial capture rig. You wanna blame anyone for making women in gaming less sexy? Blame LA Noire for proving the viability of facial animation capturing, not some evil conspiracy of developers obsessed with some innocuous message.

As a result, gaming has emphasized realism more and more in its aesthetic design philosophy. Particularly among the Triple A Games, where they seem to think that if the characters don't look real, gamers will feel that things look too old and ugly. There's no room for artistic interpretation, that costs money. No, slap a rig on some actor's face and make them do all the work. You wanna know why MJ in the second Spider-Man game looked off to you? Well that's because the actress is a real person and faces don't always stay the same and alterations to a face scan can potentially mess things up even more.

She also suffered a car accident that required doctors to reconstruct her face, but that's probably only a minimal issue since she you can't really tell the difference as I understand it.

The point is, hyper-realism has damaged gaming to an insane degree artistically and further harmed non-human characters. Because in order to get that hyper-realistic look, games have compromised themselves. Now the qunari look even more like SyFy channel aliens than ever. The boundless creativity of CG reduced to what can be produced on a budget within the make-up chair.

And I don't expect Mass Effect's eventual fifth entry to be much better. If BioWare is still this scared about letting us play something truly non-human in a fantasy setting, then they're not even going to try to let you build your own turian in Mass Effect Beyond or whatever generic subtitle they shove onto it.

And yet its doable, they can let you craft an non-human character to be the main hero. The fact Elder Scrolls was letting you do this for years is proof enough of that. Baldur's Gate 3 revealing I could be a Dragonborn was enough to convince me to pick it up eventually. Admittedly, any game that lets me be a lizard or reptile of some kind instantly has my attention if not purchase. Purely for this very essay's stated hypothesis, it's almost impossible to find any game that will let me play as something that isn't human. Because far too many games and stories prefer to just fallback on boring humans.

And yet, nothing I've mentioned so far is the worst example of this problem.

Ultrabores in the Grimbore Future

I'm not going to mix words here. The Imperium of Man of Warhammer 40k is boring. There I said it. And it's this feeling that is impetus for this entire little article of mine. In the lead up to the release of Space Marine 2, and looking further into the lore of 40k itself, I came across two inescapable truths for me.

1: Every other race in the setting was 10x more interesting and compelling, both character and lore wise.

2: Every Imperium of Man Fanboy is an Insufferable Douche Canoe of the Highest Order.

I might be overstating that last point, but it's hard to be subtle about this because I don't think anyone is going to listen otherwise. The Imperium fucking sucks! And I don't mean as characters, I don't mean as a faction gameplay wise, I mean in-universe it SUCKS. There is NOTHING admirable about this future human civilization or anything they stand for. They're objectively fucking horrible and Games Workshop itself has admitted this. And yet, despite this fact that even the most ardent hobbyist of this tabletop will admit to, you still will find more than enough Stans of the God-Emperor of Mankind who will INSIST they are the good guys. Or at the very least, necessary for the survival of humankind.

My answer to that is no. Very emphatically, NO. The Imperium of Man is not neccessary, at least it didn't have to be. It did not have to be this cruel, this dogmatic, this blindly loyal, this xenocidal and racist. It did not have to be at all like what it is, but because of the choices of Emperor himself, it is now! And it probably can't unfuck itself, because it's already fucked over so many other people within and outside its realm of control. It does emphasize the good things about humanity, it's oozes all the worst aspects of it. That's its point. That's why this universe is Grimdark. That's why it's not a good thing that humanity has become what it is in this future.

And yet, Imperium fanboys will refuse to budge. Insistent that the Emperor did everything right and it was only everyone else not just laying down and dying that screwed anything up, if at all. And while Games Workshop itself has stated the opposite, explained in detail that this franchise is satire, that you should not take the actions of the Imperium of Man as a lesson for how to run a civilization or your life... guess what the biggest seller and face of 40k franchise is?

Yep, humans.

You might think that's a contradiction, but it makes sense you realize those are the figures that sell the most. Therefore, the Imperium gets the most books, the most lore, the most focus on media outside the main tabletop. Sure they've made games where you play as the xeno factions and books with aliens as protagonists. But the majority of 40k lore is all about Humanity and it's really affected how this franchise is viewed at this point.

You see it doesn't matter how often you say something is satire or that it's aspirational. If you place the spotlight on it long enough, people start to gravitate towards it. The Imperium of Man, being the most popular of 40k's factions, is a victim of its own success in this regard. It has become increasingly difficult to separate the satirical dark comedy of the Imperium from the lore's various attempts to make them the most badass of all badasses. People like watching struggles for survival, conflict of epic scale, heroic sacrifices, it makes for really compelling drama. It also more often than not whitewashes all the bad things the Imperium does if you overly focus on all the cool shit the Space Marine chapters pull off.

You tend to forget that the only reason anyone survived the Fall of Cadia is because a bunch of Eldar showed up to help evacuate humans. Or that Cadia only stayed standing for so long because a Nekron helped out. You ignore the pointless war that turned Kreig into a wasteland, when all anyone talks about is how the Death Corps can take down Tau with a shovel. You can point out how the Emperor is in fact, for all intents and purposes, fucking dead, but when it's coming out of the mouth of a dude who's following a sadistic murder god, it's not very convincing. People always come back to this when the Imperium is involved. "So what if they suck, they're humanity's best and only option at survival. And they're fucking badass!" And Games Workshop doesn't push back on this, mostly to not piss off its fans, generally though because tried to do that once before and it backfired.

The Tau Empire used to be an up and coming foil to the Imperium in many ways. They were ruled by reason and science, not blind dogmatic faith and religious zealotry. They believed in harmony among the races, not genocide and supremacy. They had an optimistic and hopeful view of the galaxy, as opposed to the fatalistic one the Imperium had. As it stood, they were the most heroic out of all the 40k races... and a bunch of fans, mostly Imperium as I understand it, hated them. They felt they ruined the grimdark setting by being too goody good.

So Games Workshop eventually just gave in and decided to change the lore. The Tau were only like that because their leadership was essentially mind controlling them. Great, so they're no better than anyone else in this future. Wonderful. Can't have an opposing view from the Emperor's that might turn out to be a better path forward. Nah, turn them into a brainwashed cult essentially to further justify the existence of the Imperium. Forget that an earnestly good society in a galaxy that is probably fucked beyond repair is probably sufficiently grimdark since they're such a young race but probably equally doomed. We need to make EVERYTHING in this setting so completely utterly hopeless, because anything less means the Emperor is wrong for creating the circumstances that made everything worse.

And as a result, the Imperium of Man is the one major roadblock for me getting into this franchise. Now, don't misunderstand, there are things about the Imperium I like and find interesting. Like many, I like Captain/Lieutenant Titus, because he's not a dogmatic sycophant who acts like a religious zealot. I do actually like the Death Corps of Kreig if only from a history buff perspective because I'm into the WWI Aesthetic they have going on. And of course there are the Salamanders, the only Space Marines I will ever consider truly heroic because they give a shit about things besides duty and honor, as well as possess some degree of empathy for other lifeforms. I enjoyed the first Space Marine game a lot! It's why I picked up the sequel.

However, all of these points have asterisks next to them. The Death Corps of Kreig are cool VILLAINS to an extent. I don't think you can ever present them as heroes given their mindset or origins. That's true of a lot of things within the Imperium. The Salamanders are still beholden to the dogma that has consumed a good deal of the Imperium and they are not really going to do anything to break off from it. And while I enjoyed the first Space Marine game and had fun with Boltgun, let's just admit something right now... half the enjoyment of the original Space Marine Game came from this dude.

Grimskull was probably the most fun antagonist to go up against in any game. Him just yelling "Space Marine!" in his ridiculous Cockney accent always made me smile. Titus, as badass as he is, lacks quite a bit in the personality department. The sequel doesn't do much better, even if his character arc is at least serviceably good in that game. But he remains stoic and loyal, he isn't exactly a dynamic figure like Grimskull was. And be honest with yourself, that first game got real boring after you killed the Warboss.

That's the problem I have with 40k. There are so many more interesting, compelling, fascinating alien races. Sure, none of them are perfect good guys and a lot of them are downright evil... but they're at least unique! I had a lot more fun learning about the Orks honestly than I did listening to the one hundredth iteration of something super epic and cool an Ultramarine did. We get it, they're Master Chief and Doomguy on Steroids! Do they do anything else besides pontificate about how awesome the Emperor is and go on about duty and honor more than Zuko in season one? The Orks might be idiot rampaging soccer hooligans, but at least they're funny.

And yet there are far fewer Ork, Eldar and especially Tau related books and media than the plethora of Imperium related works that have overstuffed everything. And if you admit to liking anything other than the Imperium of Man, especially the Tau, you are instantly ridiculed. I would honestly pay way more money just to play as Commander Farsight than Titus. Because Farsight feels like a natural progression for Titus to take, but never will. He just can't. While Farsight will leave his government behind and strike out on a new path to pursue the Greater Good as he now sees it, Titus can't, because that would only be seen as heresy, both by fans and in-universe.

Imperium Stans will look at this picture and honestly claim this fucking sucks without hesitation. That's the degree of brainrot they give off. Calling some of the coolest looking shit lame.

I just instantly felt Farsight is a more compelling and complex character by default because of his arc. Whereas Titus will never really change much beyond what he is, a reasonable enough Ultramarine in a sea of equally super serial hardasses that aren't much different from him. He just thinks a bit more for himself.

Farsight's crew of mech piloting badasses at least have variety. But to my surprise, so many others didn't agree, annoyed apparently that Farsight was able to resist corruption of demons, baffled at how it was possible because he lacked faith in the glorious God-Emperor of Man! None of them considered that maybe, just maybe, Farsight was able to resist corruption because he's not governed by religious dogma at all. Maybe his open-mindedness and ability to reason protected him just fine! But can't have that I guess, humans have to remain special after all.

Despite everything going for him, actually retaining a proper sense of heroism, being a truly good person who wants to do the right thing even in a universe full of shit, I still saw Imperium fans giving Farsight shit over the stupidest of things. I found a video on YouTube not long ago concerning how Farsight rightfully pointed out the weaknesses of the Imperium Titan Mecha. Oversized bulky machines that are millennia old. But while scary, Farsight noted how they can be defeated and are not as efficient or effective as the Space Marines were. The comments were FILLED with Imperium stans laughing at this bit of lore, calling Farsight names and declaring that the Titans were older than his whole civilization as if that was some kind of gotcha.

Everything the Imperium uses is older than shit though, that doesn't make it better. The reason it's so old is because the Imperium does not know how to make this shit anymore. They lost the knowledge when they rejected science in favor of their stupid religious dogma. Now their old as fuck spaceships are finite, same as their Titans. The Tau can replace their losses, the Imperium ultimately cannot. And yet here were the fanboys, praising how cool and awesome the Titans were, ignoring Farsight beat one easily, had video to prove it and that they essentially sound like those weirdos who jerkoff constantly about how awesome the Tiger Tank was. Despite it being an overly expensive over-designed mistake. One that both the Americans and Russians put to bed because their tanks didn't need special parts to function or guzzled up fuel like a thirsty pig.

Treating Titans as superior because they are older than the Tau is like arguing a Trebuchet is better than an Abrams Tank. Sure, one is way older than the nation that created the other. Doesn't mean its going to last very long in a one on one fight. But because humans have to be super special and awesome in 40k, we can never point out how their various systems, beliefs and strategies are outdated and costly.

Frankly, I'm more interested in Warhammer Fantasy by default by this point. Not just because they have a full faction of lizard people, although that is a plus. But because the factions of that universe are more diverse, interesting and not as mired in adherence to the grimdark lore mindset. Even the human civilizations are more compelling because they're not all one singular entity and have differing ideologies and strategies. I'll take that over being expected to look at the Ultramarines in awe simply because they do something badass every Tuesday which will get them six more books whereas Farsight still only has two.

And I don't think I need to point out what this has resulted in. As Asimov feared, placing humans on the superiority pedestal has emboldened that very sentiment in reality. Look no further than the current fervor over the existence of a Black Space Marine and a female guardsman officer in Space Marine 2. Even with fans pointing out how both of those things are both perfectly fine in canon, it doesn't change just how much 40k has attracted a lot of racists over the years. So much so they had to change tournament rules to prevent people from wearing actual Nazi uniforms to events because one asshole did so.

If there is any franchise that truly showcases the dangers of humancentric narratives it's Warhammer 40k. Because we are hardwired to root for the home team and we've also proven that we're incapable of reading satire. Creating the perfect storm of events that leads to far too many people stanning a literal Fascist-Dogmatic Forever War Machine. And while Games Workshop has tried to get the other factions more time in the sun, I'm not sure they can ever manage to get them up to the same level of prestige as the Imperium if they keep holding themselves back from just giving the Space Marines a damn rest for a second.

Room on the Party Wagon

I don't want to make it seem like it's all so hopeless. That there's no way for mainstream audiences to overlook their inherent human bias. I do believe it is possible for non-human protagonists to take center stage in a property and remain there. I believe that because I've seen it done before. In fact, I was quite literally there.

If there is any more miraculous franchise than the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I don't know of it. There should be no reality where two guys making a sketch of a nunchucking turtle for funsies in an apartment while chowing down on pizza could launch something this everlasting. And yet they did it. Ninja Turtles, 40 years later, is still going strong. And all with a lead cast made of decidedly non-human lead heroes. Better yet, it didn't stop with Leo, Raph, Donnie and Mikey. Over the years, countless heroes and villains have been added to the mythos. A good number of them fellow mutated animals, all with distinct personalities, motivations and interpretations over countless adaptations and timelines. It is truly astonishing to have been there from the start of Turtle Mania and to have never had them go away for very long.

And again, all with primary character who aren't human. How? Simple enough, people gravitated to the Ninja Turtles. They had distinct vibrant personalities. They were fun and colorful and different. They connected you to them by getting you to recognize their relatability.

There is still an interest in non-human protagonists, and not just dwarves or elves. I'm not alone in my desire to have something other than my own species take the spotlight now and then. Wings of Fire is fairly popular series that stars no humans at all for the most part. In fact they rarely show up. The real stars of the franchise are dragons, big fire-breathing dragons who all have unique cultures and perspectives that incredibly well-fleshed out and intricate. They're also not entirely humanized either, as dragons have very different morality and cultural cues from humans.

Another interesting take on things can be found in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. Which, despite having him out for most of the runtime, was all about Rocket. He was an absent protagonist, but he was the primary because everything revolved around his story and towards him finally accepting his species' name and moving past his survivor's guilt. Rocket is probably the most prominent non-human hero in the entirety of the MCU as a result and that's a big deal.

What I'm saying ultimately is that there is room for multiple perspectives. Not just the ones we're the most comfortable with. Because if we only accept the experiences of those we consider familiar, we will never understand those that are other. The road to a society like the Imperium of Man is based in one of mistrust, fear and prejudice. To avoid that, we must be willing to look through the eyes of others and learn about the human experience from something that is not. That is what the best of science-fiction and fantasy can allow for.

If such genres are meant to be an escape, what greater escape can be found but one that is outside our limited human experience. We can never know it is like to fly, or swim deep beneath the sea, or see from a dozen eyes or just one. But we can imagine ourselves in that role and empathize with that which is alien to us. If we limit our fantasies then we limit ourselves, our imagination, our ability to connect. If all you desire in your sci-fi or fantasy is for some big burly human with a sword, regular steel or chainsaw, to murder orks and aliens, then that's fine. But there are others among us who don't want such arbitrary limitations. Humans are not boring by nature, but picking the same old fantasies and escapes IS boring. We could do with changing things up more.

What I'm saying is, it would not hurt anyone if they just did one Triple A Title in the style of the Space Marine games but for Farsight instead. We don't always have to be the Space Marine. Notif we've be okay being a Ninja Turtle. There's room for all perspectives, human or otherwise, in genre fiction. We should be doing more to open up the gates for those experiences. Sooner rather than later.

[lombax-lombardi]

Bioware Self Insert Brain Worms Time!!

okay brain worms time

Madilyn Yules:

- As established she is the child of a dwarf and Dalish Elf so she can often be seen in High Town and the Alienage, she barely makes her presence known unless someone needs her. She blends in so to speak. It has taken years for her to be accepted by the elves in Kirkwall, she plays with the children which has warmed her to them.

- She escapes Templars notice due to Chantry Belief that Dwarves cannot know magic there is evidence for that but Varric has also stated “have you seen a  dwarven mage?” obviously talking about Madilyn or as he refers to her as Bubbles, because she is always smiling.

- In Inquisition she is found in the Hinterlands healing people suffering from the Mage/Templar war, mages and templars alike (depends on which Hawke sibling she got close too which somewhat influences her decision)

- Inquire about Fenris to her. Please inquire, she’ll have Varric’s head obviously chiding him if he said anything. Wait until she finds out she’s in one of his books. She’ll freak out.

- Ask about her parents and she’ll invite them to Skyhold, she’d rather them be safe then be stuck in the war. They already escaped the Blight they don’t want to be stuck in another war thanks to the giant hole in the sky.

- Ask her about the DA2 companions she’ll have tings to say.

“Merrill? Oh she’s fantastic, I keep in contact via letter I hope she’s doing okay, she felt so isolated during her time in Kirkwall....”

“Isabela? Oh a frequent visitor in my home, drunk mind you and a dagger in her hip. A dagger! IN HER HIP! Uggggh...she put blood on the marble”

- Her dialogue will change if Anders lived or died.

“Anders? I do not understand why Hawke let him live. I hold no sympathy for a man who butchered innocent lives. Yes it’s Kirkwall! But...no one deserved that....”

Or

“Anders? Against my better judgement, I gave him a proper burial. I wish to believe there was some part of him that wasn’t.....Justice....that wasn’t....whatever he truly was. Regardless of his intention, I buried him outside of Kirkwall.”

- If you ask her about Fenris, she freezes and then sighs.

“What did Varric say? did he say he can’t smile? he’s so BROODING he doesn’t know what sunlight is? Honestly Varric...but you asked about Fenris not Varric. He’s not dealing well with me being away but I could not go to Tevinter with him, no matter how much I wanted too. He knows I can take care of myself I just hope he doesn’t get hurt”

- She is a party member also. Because I said so. And she has banter with everyone. Everyone.

Madilla nar Newwa

- Madilla is a quarian biotic, very rare but also very strong. Before meeting Shepard in Mass Effect, she had crashed on a nearby planet after the gang rescued Liara where she was save by Asari Commandos so she has a lot of respect for the Asari.

- Blossoming crush on Garrus, it’s kind of obvious.

- She and Tali are basically adopted siblings, while wary of Madilla at first since due to her biotics, but they are both on Pilgrimage so they stick together. Later on during events of ME2, due to the gangs separation, Tali and Madilla have kept in contact.

- ME2 is full of many colourful new characters and Madilla adores all of them, she asks many questions, apologising quickly if she has overstepped any boundaries she is just very excited.

- She is aware she is different to most Quarians and she fears being ostracised from her own people due to her gifts. Relationship with Garrus improving possibly dating at this point???

- She wears pink. The reason: “I didn’t wanna steal Tali’s vibe”

- Asks a lot of questions to more powerful (and in control of their Biotics) to stop her flare ups of power. Jack tells her to just hit shit. Sometimes that works.

- Overall by the events of Mass Effect 3 while slightly jaded and not a super badass like the others, Humble little pink ponk

[frecklef0x]

Mass Effect 1: Playthrough Masterpost

At last, I have finished Mass Effect 1!

I have heard some mutuals say they wish they could play it again for the first time, and you kind of can--through me! I’ve been posting little “episodes” of live-tweet-stream-of-consciousness as I play, and now I’ve compiled them into one post to make my life easier.

Anyway, here’s the first one, the rest are under the cut. :)

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode one

My ass looks great in this uniform, first of all

Impaled robo zombies, yikes

Cheap shot, Saren, smh. How will I pass my spectre test now?!

Why does he have robot eyes? Is he like, Geth-Turian? Why? Is he a robo zombie also? Was it the beacon???

Cool beacon nightmares, I'm sure this is fine

This Kaiden guy has implants? ORTEGA?!??!?

"Call me princess again and you'll be picking your teeth up off the floor" lol obliterated

The citadel elevators are very realistic, five minutes of tense silence huh

Ya girl got a PROMOTION and a DOPE SQUAD time to catch a TRAITOR

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode two

First things first, gotta go find the blue scientist to join the gang

This galaxy is HUGE! How many of these places will I actually be able to go?!

Only two friends at a time????? D:

Ah, a distress signal, let's see wha--A DESERT CENTIPEDE NOPE ABORT ABORT

Robo aliens? In MY Theronian mining facility? Its more likely than you think

Running over dudes in my Mako is extremely satisfying tbh

*runs over geth troopers* *runs over geth armature* *runs over geth colossus* ... *backs over geth colossus*

Working elevators in the ancient ruins ✔

Oooooooh man hope this nerd is gay

Wrex, a friend of yours? Nope, not a friend, too murdery

"ShAaaAame about the ruins Shep, sOooOo much collatoral damage, SHEP" stfu Council, "ruthless" was in the resume when you promoted us, 10/10 would shoot lasers through archeological digs again

When Kaiden calls us "ma'am" I am, uh, into it

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode three

Time to talk to the gang! Gotta meet the fam proper

Oh dear seems we got a shmee of racism on board, compatriots

Wow Raina, good foot-in-mouth moment with Wrex there huh...sorry about the eventual extinction of your race, lost this round of Pain Olympics

OH SHIT OH SHIT BLUE HOTTIE BIGENDER? THIS IS NOT A DRILL???

“hi I’m Kaiden wanna hear about my last crush ;)” “hi I’m Liara wanna hear about Asari mating rituals? ;)))” damn we really slidin right into the DMs no chill

Garrus: fuck rules and red tape amiright Raina: oh u right ;)

Guess I’ll actually do a mission now LETS GO LESBIANS LETS GO

Honestly rolling out with Tali and Liara is a mood, squad goals

Raina @ every corporation on Noveria: I would sell you to satan for one(1) corn chip

This reactivation puzzle is some shit

I see some Mistakes were made

We already killing moms at this stage damn BioWare

FUCK FUCK BENEZIA KILLED ME AND I LOST A FUCKTON OF PLAYTIME

THERES LIKE NO AUTOSAVE IN THIS BITCH FUUUUUUUUU

fuck fuck fuck god damn it gotta shoot a bunch of deranged baby bug people again god DAMN IT

Okay we killed Liara’s mom in front of her hope that’s fine

And we let mama bug go free because after talking to Wrex, Raina’s like “this galaxy is a little trigger happy with the genocide, good luck out there bug mama ❤️ be cool please”

I have literally watched the scientist in the hot labs get killed three times now

So far the debreifs with the council have not gone very well

“You let bug mama go?! How many generations until they take over everything???” “My money’s on two :D Place your bets now assholes or stfu :DDD”

Asked Liara if she was okay and she seems pretty Cool With It

I hope to one day return to Noveria and Death Star it into oblivion

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode four

Talked with Tali and this situation with the Geth and the Quarians is giving me an existential crisis

You “inspect” my beautiful ship? You got somethin’ to say about my crew??? Talk shit get hit, bitch I will kill you

Yoooo my old earth gang, yeah what the hell, I’ll help ou—oh nope nvm he’s a xenophobe, you hang him and I’ll shoot his friend in the face, thx for your time

Went to the citadel to finish some assignments, left tasked with twice as many

“dOn’T cUt CoRneRs” fear not dear Kaiden, I have a permit: this piece of paper that says I do what I want

Still with the elevators, I really cannot with this

“You make it all sound so...dangerous...” ;) ;))))))

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode five

Headin’ to Virmire to rendezvous with the Salarian team

A cure for the genophase?!?!?! :D

Oh wait oh no are we for real gonna talk about destroying the cure like Wrex isn’t standing right here omg

SHIT GUYS NO NOT LIKE THIS WREX PLEASE

Phew for a conversation that basically started with guns drawn, it went pretty well... “What Saren has isn’t even a proper cure, he’s just fucking with the Krogans at this point. Are we gonna stand for that? Or are we gonna murder?” “Damn Shep, you right, we gon’ murder”

Okay Ashley, go join the aliens, try not to die

Shadow Team!🎵 tearing through the base 🎶 disabling all the     defenses 🎵 (you gotta sing it to the tune of the Trogdor song)

We free the prisoners!!! :)

We shoot the prisoners??? :(

“Raina? How can you shoot them where they stand?” So it’s more merciful to let them explode? NAH FAM

This scientist is responsible for the mind control stuff? For Benezia? Fine     I’ll let her go but I hope she explodes

We did not learn our lesson concerning beacons I see

Wait if even Saren is worried about his mind control ship does that mean there are larger forces involved here?

Oh. Oh fuck

Ugh Ashley I EXPLICITLY TOLD YOU NOT TO DIE

(so we really never found any info about that genophase cure huh? disappointing)

Oh Seren, you dumb dumb. You absolute fool. Clown man.

When Raina slings Kaiden over her shoulder to carry him to the ship—mmmmmmmmwoooow I am very bisexual

Bruh Raina takes every council call and she disconnects pissed off every time

WAIT I literally just hung up with the council, ASHLEY is DEAD, and Kaiden needs a DTR RIGHT NOW?!?!? Boy, NO, READ THE ROOM

This has been a stressful day

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode six

Shepard will avoid her feelings and go to Faros instead

Seeing Ashley’s figure greyed out and her locker inaccessible makes me sad

Wrex and Garrus, let’s go shoot some geth 💪 

A mind controlling planet—of course!

Shep gets all her renegade points shooting capitalists

Saved, uh, about half the colonists

If I have one more bad acid trip I stg

Oh nope here’s another one

Shep needs a nap

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode seven

Ah, the council. Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal.

At least Liara is good at pep talks ;)

Joker, you cockblock

Haha DUDE we airborne, you THOUGHT

Now that I am exiled from the Citadel, guess I’ll run some galactic errands:

o   Killed corporate scientists who though we would rescue them lol

o   Destroyed a bunch of geth camps helping Tali on her pilgrimage

o   Disabled a nuke and killed some pirates

o   Shut down some evil Cerberus experiments

o   And illegally traded information!

Okay time to get back on track

So we may or may not be flying to our doom

OH GOD LIARA LOVES ME!!! RAINA, YOU DISASTER, YOU DID IT AAAAAH ❤️❤️❤️

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode eight

You know what I love? Being murdered by geth armatures

All these Ilos ruins be looking the same

Security panel is only kinda helpful

Oh, luckily I know Prothean now!

“CANNOT BE STOPPED” wow very encouraging, thanks

After that super motivating message and disabling security, its time to go down, down to goblin town

Vigil? Oh word?

My girlfriend is GEEKING out

I knew something what wrong with that fucking Citadel

Vigil: information is power. Also Vigil: What does it matter why they do what they do? All that matters is you stop them

“non-essential” personnel die first, huh? GROSS, VIGIL (gotta be honest that hits different in 2020)

Garrus gets it, I knew we liked that guy

Okay, find conduit, save galaxy, break millennium-old genocide cyle, nbd

Ugh Mako you gotta do me dirty one last time I see, I hate this thing

THE CONDUIT STRAIGHT YEETED MAKO

The citadel robot says we’re doomed : )

This shootout is SO fun, seriously

Saren get it toGETHER

Renegade Raina can kill with a conversation apparently, well done then

Concentrate on the Sovereign—why am I gonna save a council that hates my guts, sorry, but I have a JOB to DO that you ACTIVELY HINDERED

Great, zombie husk Saren, just what I needed as I mull over the possible consequences of my galaxy-altering decision

GO JOKER GO

Humanity-only council seems…questionable. Raina didn’t love the council but this sits wrong. Couldn’t we just appoint a more diverse council, including a human?

Anderson seems like a good enough dude, so…we’ll see.

TIME FOR WAR BOYS, GODDAMN WHAT A GAME

[vaguely-concerned]

Mass Effect: Annihilation thoughts

TL;DR I fucking LOVED IT, a balm to my heart after struggling through Nexus Uprising! Also canonical lesbians! The sweetest quarian & his badass grandma! Elcor Hamlet except this time it’ll make you cry!!! 

- Aaaaaah the audiobook reader is Tom Taylorson (so male Ryder)!! Fryda Wolf (female Ryder) read the two others and did a nice job, but man I’m soft for his voice in a way only rivaled by (...outside-of-Overwatch!)Jennifer Hale and Nicholas Boulton haha. He also has a much better handle on the pronunciations and voices for the different alien species -- delightful, I’m still cackling over his pitch perfect elcor impersonation. (Bioware please give him more Scott Ryder to voice I miss my son)

- I’m only about half an hour in and this is already SO much better than Nexus Uprising, it really does feel like a brave new galaxy haha. Very funny, very warm and smart and engaging in how it does its characterization and Valente clearly has affection for the setting and the universe, she and Jemisin both do incredible jobs with these. 

- I’m fucking crying laughing at this cross-species near-brawl over a flower arrangement, god I love Mass Effect SO MUCH (what a neat idea though. something blooming quietly even when no one can see it. impractical as hell and hilariously including a high-nutrition celery now, but still neat)

Taylorson continues to wonderful things with the voices, that volus suit sound is so good. (he’s just generally really good at comedy) also a volus bellowing insults ‘moments before punching an anti-bouquet batarian in the groin’ sdafhjklsahfsjadkhfklajshdfkjlsadhf

- a high as a kite elcor... what a time to be alive, to get to read this book

I have already reached the ‘I LOVE EVERYONE IN THIS BAR’ stage with these characters, hard boiled drell detective lady and sweet sweet quarian first officer and manically enthusiastic elcor doctor TOT I would die for any one of you!!!

- The quarian/multispecies ark was built for long-term habitation, potentially over multiple generations. So what you’re telling me is that the quarians are the only ones who fucking thought this through and the rest of the Initiative probably should have listened to the people who’ve essentially been living on arks for ages. Who’d’ve thunk huh lol. (I guess the in-universe explanation is that people like the mysterious benefactor just wanted those arks yeeted to Andromeda ASAP, no time to get fancy in case the Reapers changed up their schedule. Fair enough)

- ;n; petition to let senna have a SAM pls (also uh. how happy do you think the stringently anti-AI quarian pathfinder will be when he finds out about everyone else’s SAMs lol lol lol he’s going to PASS OUT FROM RAGE upon meeting ryder. well he sounds like an asshole, I hope he dies so senna gets a chance)  

- I can’t BELIEVE yorrik is an anti-stratfordianist, i am betRAYED! disgraceful, how can I still love you knowing this (and yet I do he is extremely funny and sweet)!!! (at least his theory is that this so-called ‘shakespeare’ was actually an elcor, which makes it better somehow lol. anything so long as he’s not an oxfordian tbh)

senna and yorrik’s friendship is so good and wholesome 

- I really love the consistent alien POVs in this book, mass effect should indulge in this more -- everyone loves this universe so much, bioware, stop making us squint through a human lense to look at it!!  

- oh of course quarian ‘pirates’ exist, the people who’re thrown out of the fleet must be doing something huh. 

- haven’t written that many notes in a while just because I’m enjoying myself so much, I keep forgetting 

- lfsdkhfsajkldhfskadjhfsjakdfhsdkjfh communist volus!!!! this is not a drill, communist volus! I am completely and utterly charmed by this entire book

- the quarian ancestor VI is so interesting and weirdly touching. senna is adorable (and relatably neurotic lol)

grandma AI smoking T___________T I love everything about this, she’s so cool. the worldbuilding being done around pre-geth revolution rannoch here... exquisite 

- way to make me cry about batarians cat valente ;_______;

- the voice acting is SO FUCKING GOOD! I keep forgetting it’s one dude reading all these characters haha, I caught myself wanting to look up who voiced this dying batarian. (special shoutout that he does so many wonderfully distinct and specific female voices!) 

- haHA I KNEW the quarian VI was a full AI (or near enough that it makes little difference tbh)!!! this fabulous grandma was self aware the entire time b i t c h e s !!!!

- the running joke of borbala’s ‘you need ______? I can make _______ happen’ is SO satisfying hahaha

ooooooh serious femslash vibes!!!! initially I thought batarian ex-crime matriarch was too old for drell PI, but this is undeniable. (I don’t think we actually ever get to know how old annex is, anyway, come to think of it) I guess if asari get to be five times older than everyone else and still fuck freely this isn’t really that weird lol

- “don’t look! it’s not so bad if you don’t look!” ofhsdalfhskldlsfjas oh senna baby boy 

hey qetsi? qetsi both senna and I love grandma liat more than you. stand the fuck down 

- NOOOO GRANDMA LIAT ;______________________________________;

- do you think SAM could meet liat (either ship!liat or just grandma!liat).... and have... a friend ;_________; (a cool laidback friend who isn’t a murderous angaran ai who might very well go the murder suicide sort of friendship route lol) 

anyway I miss SAM a lot and love him??

- yorrik noooooooooooo this is awful everything is bad and terrible I love all of them so much why must senna be sad and watch everything he loves fade away 😭😭😭

“Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood/Clean from my hand?” He realized he’d forgotten to preface the words with an emotion. Now they wouldn’t understand what he meant.

Oh. Oh what a way to drive home the sadness and loneliness of this moment f u c k  (and again the emotion taylorson brings to it jesus cHRIST) 

I’m destroyed over how much senna and yorrik love each other, cross species found family out here wrecking my heart in true mass effect style 

- yorrik is such a great character though. he’d be so easy to make a one-note joke character (like most elcor have been in canon lbr), but there’s nuance and depth and just enough satsifyingly believable alienness there. (I love the staunch elcor ‘you can’t call anything love that hasn’t lasted at least two centuries’ perspective haha) his memories of his childhood and disappointment with his profession and everything... goodnight sweet prince indeed :(

- they went and made elcor hamlet heartbreaking how dare they 

(to be real for a second I think some of the human culture references are a little bit clunky, but the elcor hamlet stuff is perfect. contextualizing a throwaway joke from the original trilogy and giving it emotional depth, helping us see it from the elcor perspective and how frustrating and lonely it is to be so fundamentally not emotionally understood or seen on a level most of the other races are, despite their other differences, even though you have all these feelings and want to communicate... its very good.)   

fun additional fact: both mordin and yorrik have played/wanted to play polonius in a production of hamlet! though I guess mordin is the slightly problematic fave in that duo and yorrik is a sweet melancholic angel who has never done anything wrong in his life, I would say protect him but I guess it’s too late for that D:  

- qetsi giving off some real ophelia vibes here, I wish yorrik was here to see it, he’s the only one who’d properly appreciate it despite it all

- I. am. SO FUCKING HUNGRY for more mass effect after this (well even more so than usual) I’m so hyped!! I love this universe so much! I want a new andromeda game with senna as quarian pathfinder and grandma liat as the ship’s AI and see how they interact with ryder and SAM! (honestly though I feel like senna might be the one who’d translate the most cleanly into a game, I think there’s a lot of potential in him that’s barely being realized towards the end there with his deep righteous rage cutting through his uncertainty. also I just want nice things for him. is that so much to ask. he is a good boy, yorrik was so right.)

- aaaah not just femslash vibes, canonical lesbians, this is not a drill! I can’t wait until they propose... ‘we get shit done together, want to be in good cop/bad cop with me until the day we die y/n?’  

- the ME universe doesn’t feel quite itself without all these ‘background’ species hanging around, I suddenly realize. I dream of an Andromeda sequel with all of them on the board and in play again Y-------Y 

- potential Liat and SAM dynamics are so fucking interesting though! if she becomes/is confirmed as a full AI (all I hope and dream of), you’ll have two artificial intelligences with such different starting points but not that dissimilar goals? Liat was an organic person once who’s looking out for her family even now, and SAM is completely artificial but also intimately tied to and protecting His People. (and pulling a whole lot of symbolic weight re: the strength of familial/interpersonal relationships to boot; he’s the best way alec ryder managed to connect with his children. even though he was dead. because as established alec ryder was a disaster of a person)  

- I enjoyed the loose murder mystery structure of this quite a lot, but that might also be because nexus uprising is so shapeless and meandering by comparison that I’d be relieved by anything else (sorry I’ll stop ragging on NU soon it just. took some hours of my life I can’t get back)  

- jemisin did great stuff for characters already in andromeda (cora, SAM, alec ryder) and valente made me remember just why I love this universe so much and desperately want these aspects brought to andromeda too... and now I’ve exhausted all the fresh mass effect content I had available to me and will sit here consumed with lust for the rest of the time it takes for a new game to be announced thank you and goodbye  

[annakie]

An Annotated Mass Effect Playthrough, Part Four

Wherein we make it to the Citadel, and do a lot of running around.

List of Posts: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

So right away, we meet Udina and the Council, way to throw us right into it.  

It’s a brief introduction and gives us an idea what Humanity is up against and who is representing us.  Basically, we’re supposed to get the idea that it’s a lot of bureaucratic bullshit, I guess.

This is also the first time we see Asari and Salarians, and they’re in reddish-brown and white, which really isn’t the best look.

Bioware continues to push the story forward.  We get enough to know that Udina is kind of an ass, and the Council isn’t going to just trust what some guy says even if he is the representative for billions of people.

And finally, after this, we’re set free.

The Citadel I think is one of the coolest locations in like almost any game I’ve ever played.  They do a great job of both making it feel huge, but also accessible.  Enough bridges to get across to places you need to get to, and after you walk somewhere once, Citadel Rapid Transit is great.  I still choose to take elevators about 80% of the time even when I can CRT somewhere, just because I like the squad conversations and news updates. There’s a shorter elevator rides mod that helps, too.

There’s so much to do and see, and having one of the main areas just be such an awesome combination of scifi futurism and lush greenery + water is both trippy and breathtaking.  I think, especially with the updated graphics mods/settings, the Presidium especially holds up fairly well.  I mean it definitely feels more populated and modern in ME3 but, I just consider this to be more of a residential / professional area of the Presidium and most of what we see in ME3 is a more retail section.

It’d be annoying to be a groundskeeper here, though.  Lots of green areas that you’d really need to climb to, or garden on a steep slant. :p

I always found it interesting that the natural first place to head to is into the ambassador’s office next door, where we find some friendly aliens, and one not-so-friendly one.  But honestly, this is a great place to find out the different ways other species view humanity, and how there’s apparently tiers of respect given to various species.

I always kind of hoped the Elcor would feature more prominently into the world in future games, but at least we got Hamlet.  I have SO MANY QUESTIONS about how Elcor like... do things?  We never see it but you have to assume that their hands have opposable thumbs and they’re able to stand on two legs, right?  I want to see what an Elcor ship looks like and Dakuna specifically.  Give us more elcor, Bioware!

BTW, the Mass Effect: Annihilation (aka the book that was supposed to be based on the Quarian Ark DLC that never happened in Andromeda) is totally worth reading just for the elcor character in it.  It’s also probably the best of the Mass Effect books, in my opinion.

Din Korlack’s got a point though, they not only have to share an office, but their view isn’t nearly as good as the human’s.  This is especially bullshit for the volus, who could stand on that railing and probably STILL wouldn’t have a view.

I love how Mass Effect 2 takes her from a completely forgettable character to making me think  “Sorry you’re gonna die in a few weeks, your mom’s really gonna miss you.” every time I see her.

PALIN DESERVED BETTER.

I don’t remember which ME3 mod it is, maybe the Spectre Expansion Mod or maybe EGM, but thank you whichever modder it was who made Palin’s story and death more clear in ME3.  Sorry Udina got you killed.

Also, it was good to get a dissenting opinion on Spectres from him.

Avina is such a good, optional way to get more loredump.  Yes, you can again ask them about Spectres if you want to hear about them again.  But I liked that each Avina terminal taught you a little more about whatever you were nearby, and the state of the galaxy in general and since they were programmed to be information dumps, it felt more natural to get information this way.

Don’t these people have jobs?

I love the Krogan statue, and the Avina terminal nearby telling you about it.  But now every time I see it, all I can picture is Grunt and his buddies climbing it.  So good.

Managed to get a clean shot of the crew without the UI in the elevator, thanks Flycam!  You have about a half a second to get this shot though, because the camera is stationary while the elevator is not.

Oh hell-lo Pailin, who is your charming-looking friend there?

This entire conversation needs to be longer. It’s a nice, quick introduction to Garrus, but, well, let’s spend a little more time with the main characters!!

I mean how can you not just not immediately love that?  Hey remember how bad Garrus’ face texture used to be?  Thanks, modders.

I just really love the Citadel tower.  Absolutely beautiful and atmospheric.

SO the thing is, if you can pretend that Saren isn’t, you know, already half Reaperized, 100% the Council is right to not just go throwing one of their longer-term agents in jail because Shepard had a bad dream and a random dockworker said the guy who killed Saren looked like this.

Honestly though, this and OH A GOOD CHUNK OF MASS EFFECT 2 would be so much easier if Shepard wore a bodycam. :p

Also, I wonder who took the dockworker’s testimony?  Did Kaidan run back real quick while Shepard was sleeping?

This was an embarrassment for humanity, and I agree with Udina that we needed more to go on before making demands of the council.  The council is right to not convict based off a bad dream Shepard had.  Go get some real proof!  Also, do a bunch of sidequests!

And scan some Keepers for this shady guy!

Which is actually good quest design, because you really have to go to every nook and cranny in the Citadel to find them all, though it would have been nice if they showed up on the minimap.   Really gets you to explore and get to know the area like the back of your hand.

This time around, I forgot to grab the one outside Dr. Michele’s office and had to hunt for it before heading up to grab the last one at the docks.

Thank you, though, Barla Von, for telling us all about the Shadow Broker and telling us about Wrex.  See u in ME3.

Bioware please give us diverse-suited volus in a remaster.  Maybe I’m reusing a pic of Din Korlack, you’ll never know! :p

Thanks, texture modders, for really highlighting what the end of the hanar’s noses look like. 

The hanar are another species I wish we got more of throughout the series.  They are probably the most alien of all the aliens we interact with.   I mean, at least we got Blasto.  I’d really love to visit Kahje someday.  I know it’s in the comics, but you know, in-game.

Annnd let’s go visit Sha'ira.

I have very mixed feelings about Sha'ira.  On one hand, she’s clearly very respected, is probably making bank, in control of her own destiny etc.  On the other hand, she’s probably the asari we have the second most interaction with in this game after Liara, and after just seeing Benezia’s boob-tastic clothing and then heading to Chora’s Den soon to see the dancing asari we’re getting a very slanted view of the species.  I think Bioware course corrects in later games but oof this is such a dude-fantasy alien species in ME1 it hurts.  Especially since Liara is almost a born-sexy-yesterday trope.

Also... don’t touch me if I don’t wanna be touched. =\

Noveria advertisements... that just say Noveria.  I guess this is effective marketing in 2148.

Look how great those shadows from the tree are... actual definition in shadow... wow.

Raise your hand if you’ve missed this conversation in a playthrough before and reloaded like an hour or more past to make sure you get it.

It’s one of those little moments that they didn’t have to put in.  Just a little conversation reflecting on humans and humanity, and our place in the world, and showcasing Ash’s wit and Kaidan’s adorkableness.  Also making sure you appreciate all the work that went into this particular view.  It’s a pause in the action and all the things you have going on, and it’s so great for characterization and making you feel a part of the world.  

Speaking of the view... I decided to flycam it.  Warning, I spoil some of the “magic” below.

Pretty quickly, you see that the arms are actual objects, untextured on the non-visible side.

I decided to head for the closest line of “cars” on the bottom center-left to see what those “cars” looked like.

Flycam feels pretty fast when you’re trying to frame a specific shot just right... but when you need to travel a great distance, it feels verrry slow.

It took me probably close to five minutes of traveling to make it all the way there.

What I discovered was... a few of the buildings are real, the rest are a very good painting.

This is how far away the citadel is from the rest of the map. That grid would be that entire view from outside Dr. Michele’s office all the way to the edge of the shops on the other side, plus some extra.

So both the building that those “cars” (the string of white lights) are coming from and going to are... on the painting.  Neither one are physical objects.

Made some gifs.

You can see the lights moving at a mostly-downward angle, while it looks like they’re just heading south when standing on the Citadel.  Also you can see other lights moving farther up the map.

And here you can see the lights “disappearing behind a building” but they’re really just hitting an invisible wall, the dark angle of that building is just a part of the wall painting.   

Looking up from the wall...

So that was a fun distraction.

Emily Wong deserved:

Better.

An entire shirt.

A mention in ME3 after she gave her life on social media defending Earth against the reapers while keeping her cool reporting on the invasion the day before ME3′s release.

That day before launch though... was amazing.  Bioware did such a great job on social media with the reaper invasion happening on twitter.  I loved that lots of fans got into it, too, posting photoshops and their own reaper invasion stories.  I remember being at work that day but not actually working very much.  A few friends and I had a google hangout going on to report in on anything we saw happening on social media and keep up with it and to be very hyped together online.  

We reblogged a bunch of it on fuckyeahbioware starting about here and working backwards through numbers.  

One of the ME3 mods, and again, sorry, don’t remember which, does give Emily a nice tribute through an email.  She deserves it.

Okay that’s enough for this post!  Will try to finish up the Citadel next time!

[el-gilliath]

Welcome to the first fic of the Bioware Challenge; the Mass Effect AU.

I dedicate this to @hannah-writes, who besides betaing it, has been pestering me for a long time about writing this. Without you my writing would not be as good.

The Roswell is a ship worthy of a queen in Alex’s eyes. But then, Isobel Evans has always been as good as a queen in the Spectre community, especially since she helped saved them from the Collectors. Well, they helped. Between Isobel and Shephard, the ladies have the Spectre’s well in hand. But Alex... Alex left nice behind a long time ago: he knows his stellar flying got her out of more than one scrape. He does worry when he’s weaving in and out of tight spots, watching Isobel and her team run towards him. Usually, hot on their tails is raging gunfire or rampaging creatures that want to kill them (and sometimes, on really bad days, both.

He’s especially worried when Michael is out with them. His suit is beautiful, all the upgrades and new parts making it stronger now than it’s ever been, after being on the Normandy for years. But one rupture, one injury, one shot... All of it can be enough to overload his immune system. 

It freaks him out more than it should.

Michael has been handling himself and his system for years, even that is stronger now than it’s ever been. But it still scares him to death.

On top of that he has to deal with a fucking AI flirting with his whatever-the-hell-they are. And EDI? Is not subtle about it. She purrs whenever Michael is near the engine, or the bridge, or anywhere that has to do with her systems. Which means she more or less purrs at Michael all the time. And as much as Alex appreciates bantering with her and her help when they’re in a tight spot, he fucking hates her flirting with his b- Whatever-the-hell-he-is.

“EDI, help me check out these calibrations would you?”

“Of course, Michael. Anything you need.”

“Thank you darlin’,” Michael says, the drawl in the slight robotic tone from his suit making Alex shiver. There’s something so unbearably sexy about Michael standing bent over in the engine room, the deep burgundy accents of his suit gleaming in the light. They’re docked at the Citadel and Alex and Michael are the only ones left on the ship. While shore leave is all well and good, he’s uncomfortable if he’s away from the Roswell for long. Michael electing to stay more often than not doesn't help his desire to stay away for longer than he has to. 

It’s a time they have together. Alone, to just be them without supervision or nosy teammates. 

“Oh, you know I adore helping you, Michael.” 

Well, them and miss flirty AI. 

“How does it look, EDI?”

“The calibrations are complete, and as always they are absolutely correct. You always do so well with my internal components.”

“Now you’re just flattering me, ma’am.”

“I enjoy learning from you and watching you work. It’s my… pleasure.”

“Well-“

“Okay,” Alex interrupts. “Enough with the flirting.”

“My apologies, Alex. You are very competent as well.”

“That’s not-” He sighs. “Thank you, EDI.”

“My pleasure, Alex.” The different way she says ‘pleasure’ is not lost on him. “Is there anything else I can help you with, Michael?”

“No thank you, darlin’. Imma sign off for the night, spend a little time with Alex since we’re alone. We can pick this up tomorrow.”

“Of course, Michael. Enjoy your evening.”

Alex knows very well what EDI sounds like when she’s pouting, and he tries very hard not to smile. He doesn’t want to annoy her as he does need her when he flies. Of course, he could fly this beautiful ship by himself, but EDI makes things a hell of a lot easier so he can concentrate on getting the hell outta dodge, and not on every calculation needed to successfully jump away from danger. 

“What do you say, Alex? Wanna hang out with me?”

Alex smiles softly, taking in the facial features he can almost see underneath the mask of the helmet. “Of course I want to.”

“Good,” Michael says and reaches up to release the latch on his helmet, a soft hiss escaping as he takes off the faceplate and pushes down the rest until it lays comfortably around his neck. 

Seeing Michael’s face always takes Alex’s breath away, the soft brown curls a bit squashed from the helmet, honey-colored eyes shining back at him. Michael pushes a three-fingered hand through his curls, ruffling them up until they’re surrounding his face like a halo. 

“Hi. Been a while since I looked at you without the mask.” Michael’s voice without the modulator in the helmet is as smooth as silk, making Alex shiver just as much as his modulated voice does.

“I missed the curls,” Alex replies. 

“These things? Nah, they’re a bit limp right now. Give me a shower and they’ll be great again.”

“No. They’re great right now. They’re always great.” The smile he gets in response is blinding, as all of Michael’s smiles are. Having lived most of his life in a suit, Michael speaks with a lot of emotions since people don’t normally see his face. But, without the mask, his smile is a sight to behold, just as gorgeous if not more so, than his suit. 

“Maybe so. It’s real good to see your face though, without my mask.”

“Yeah, it’s been a long time. Will you be okay?”

“You know me,” Michael says, his smile sharpening into a grin as he walks over to Alex. “Half-Antarian, half-Quarian. My immune system’ll be fine, I can mostly handle living without the suit. Besides, I wanted to see your face again.”

A sharp hiss sounds as Michael releases the catch on his gloves, taking them off. His left hand is still a bit deformed, badly healed but healed nonetheless, crushed after his father caught them together. His long finger still has pretty hefty scarring, though his bones seem to have been straightened. It was something, at least. 

“Hey, Alex.” Alex looks up to see Michael looking softly at him. “It wasn’t your fault. None of it, okay. Don’t blame yourself for the sins of your fucked up dad.”

“Mich-“

“No.” Alex leans into the hand that cups his cheek. “You were the best damn thing in my life, regardless of what your dad did. You are the best thing. I’ve missed you, for a decade, and the times I’ve seen you have been the best of my life. Okay?”

Alex sighs. This man is too good for him. 

“He is speaking the truth, Alex,” EDI’s voice chimes suddenly. Alex isn't sure if he's pleased or not that she's chosen this conversation to break her 'no eavesdropping' rule. “He’s spent many nights, talking of your past adventures, and your love for one another. Maybe my flirting is a way of pushing you two together.”

Alex closes his eyes. Breathing deeply in and out as he considers her words. Considers her meaning. Her flirting. Considers who she is. “You would, wouldn’t you.”

“Perhaps. Enjoy your evening, Flight Captain Manes, Engineer Guerin. Try to get some sleep, sometime during the night, yes?”

Alex huffs, as Michael snorts in laughter. She’s been playing them all along, and they both fell hook, line and sinker for it. 

“We will EDI,” he says with a smile, glancing up at one of the cameras located in a corner. 

“Well, we’ve been played by an AI. I’m actually kind of proud.”

Alex leans his head back and lets out a full-bellied laugh, the kind of laugh he hasn’t let out for years. They shouldn’t be encouraging EDI but he’s proud as well. So damn proud. 

“Hey, Alex?”

Alex tilts his head back down and looks at Michael. “Yeah?”

“Kiss me, already.”

And Alex does. Threads his fingers into Michael’s hair, pulls his curls lightly and slots their lips together. It’s just as perfect as it was ten years ago, five years ago, two. 

A human, disabled pilot, and a half-antarian, half-quarian tech genius. Who would have thought. 

Michael’s suit, if anyone was wondering. I love this thing.

[isuspectyouhavefantheories]

Dear BioWare,

Well shit.

Here it is. Can’t say I’m pleased. Or anyone’s pleased. I feel like you just left us with an unfinished piece. What about the Quarian DLC? What about the Remnant? The Jardaan? THE ANGARA? RYDER’S MOM??? You had so much to explain. Now it’s just “Whoop, sorry guys, wait for a comic book or novel to explain.” I waited for this game for FIVE YEARS. I’ve been a fan of the franchise since just after the release of ME2. I’ve been invested in this series nearly all my teen years.

Not to mention I spent over €65 on this UNFINISHED game. Do you know how long it takes for me make that much money? A long ass time. I feel like myself and so many ME fans have just been kicked down. The story was cool. Interesting enough. You had a great franchise to play off of. A staple for RPG lovers. And this is what we get?

I love Mass Effect. Always have, always will. I liked MEA. Felt like I was coming home but in a different way. I like Sara and Scott. The team. Everyone. But now you guys just leave us hanging? I honestly knew this was going to happen day two of playing MEA. But to actually have it happen now is just really disappointing. So much could have been done. But it was wasted.

BioWare, you better up your quality over your quantity, because it’s lacking right now. I’d rather a few well done places on a map, than 20 sparse, empty areas filled with a million mind numbing side quests.

I feel like the name has been tarnished for me now, and will make me wary of future games like “ANTHEM”. I only hope you don’t mess with my other favourite, “Dragon Age”.

BioWare, guys, look. You’ve enjoyed a very loyal fan following. Andromeda didn’t do too bad money wise. Simply because of pre-order. I know that for a fact. People trusted BioWare for a good game and they got a glitchy game with an interesting story that left way too much out in return.

There’s a lesson to be learned from this though. Even the best can fail sometimes. Even you BioWare. I just hope you can dust yourselves off and impress us with Anthem and DA4. Seriously though BioWare. Bring your A game back.

I want the old BioWare who didn’t care about this social justice warrior bull. That included everyone by simply just including them. Not for the sake of being “new age open minded” but by just having characters like Dorian and Krem. They weren’t added so the writers could get a pat on the back for being “so inclusive”. They were there because it MADE SENSE to have them there.

I want the BioWare that could let me fall in love with my band of merry misfits and and break my heart in the best way. That weren’t afraid to do something that might have seemed an unpopular choice because it’s YOUR game as much as it is ours.

I want the BioWare that didn’t step on eggshells and break their back to please everyone, because that’s impossible and ruins artistic integrity.

And most importantly, I want BioWare to care. As much as Andromeda was a fun game with Easter eggs and jokes for the long time fans hidden here and there, it’s just felt a little “manufactured nostalgia”. I felt like I was coming back, but at the same time, I felt like they didn’t get the essence of what Mass Effect is. What it means to the fans.

Mass Effect is a get away. A place you can be a hero or a villain. You can escape the world. Be yourself or someone else entirely. You can switch off normal life and just get lost somewhere else. That’s what we love about DA Inq and the ME trilogy. You truly can be anyone and have your own story.

With MEA however it was like we were just popped into an already established character. Back story. Family. Cannon personality. Linear dialogue with little variation. Saying the same thing four different ways. Almost like we were hijacking an already worked out character. Not what we want for an RPG.

Please BioWare. Do better. For the fans who have stayed with you for years. Shelled out hard earned money for DLC, merchandise, followed you to conventions, remained loyal. If you guys have another slip up like this, your name will end up being remembered only for some terrible meme joke floating around the Internet.

Show us what you got guys. We are counting on you.

Rose. A Mass Effect, KOTOR, Dragon Age and Jade Empire fan for life.

[chancelipscomb]

How to Win Back Andromeda

Wide-Open, New Worlds

With the canon of the Heleus Cluster being a ravaged wasteland, Bioware gave us an explorer’s playground with lots of space for expandable content. Critics argue that it was empty space, but it was an investment on future installments. We’ve settled into these decimated worlds and created a Milky-way friendly biome on them. To capitalize on it, simply do what settlers do: expand. DLC drop a new, post-game settlements. To facilitate a low-budget, fast paced schedule and reconcile fans of the series, I outlined a plan for modular DLC drops.  

1st DLC New Neighbors           $5-10

This one’s relatively cheap to produce. There’s not much new content and almost no new asset production, but it will give you an estimate of people willing to come back to your story.

Eos has its exile faction that wanted to mine the natural gas. If you helped them with the hammer, they’re underway. If you didn’t, they start stripping parts from the one you placed less than a kilometer away. Use pre-existing level assets, like Kadara & Elaaden’s caves, to build out a base for Ryder to explore. Drop a few hints with the exiles about the Benefactor’s assassin and leads to Kadara, for a bonus. Script out a peaceful and hostile solution for those settlers to build upon in future games. Key question: do they fold in with the Initiative, get blasted, or operate autonomously?

On Kadara, the assassin’s trail goes cold, but you learn that the Shadow Broker also has agents in Andromeda. They have new items to buy, and promises of quid pro quo. For the port itself, you simply see how your new power dynamic is playing out. Sloane or Reyes may have work hunting down the other faction, with Reyes having romance dialogue if courted. The Doc and bartenders may have some quests involving supply runs. Utilizing Vorn can tie Elaaden and the Nexus to the itinerary.

Not much has changed on the Nexus, H-047, or Elaaden, as newly awoken crew are funneled to settlements. The water crisis on Elaaden hasn’t changed yet, despite the vault and shipments from Voeld. New enemies in the Flophouse, and idle chatter over Okeer’s notes. Maybe spend some time reanimating Krogan fighting techniques.  

2nd DLC Voeld and Havarl       $15

As a two-for, this price point will be a little higher, but it has more content. With proper handling of the Eos pack and its nature, fans will be more eager.

Voeld and Havarl offer their own opportunity. Rather than new maps, focus on story expansion and lore here. The Angara have learned their origins and the truth about exaltation. In both places, they’re dealing with this. The Roekaar are leaderless, so address whether someone will fill the power gap or if they’ll be welcomed back by Evfra. Tie in the Glory Seekers here for added effect.

Use these stages to flesh out the body gestures for the existing dialogue system. This’ll draw attention away from stiff animations angst and give your developers better tools for future content, including DA:4 and other Frostbite titles. I haven’t seen your pipeline, but if this isn’t part of an art/animation workflow suite, you really need to hire me Bioware. I can make your life, and your fans, much happier.

On Havarl, expand upon the Mithrava lore and the ancient stellar maps we saved. Build some context around this new species. Crafty players now have access to shared scientific research thanks to the coop. That’s an opportunity for weapon/armor/item packs, not to mention ferry quests for flora to the Nexus and less fruitful planets. Use Jaal and his family to deepen our understanding as well. That’s a great place to flesh out angaran relationship culture. This’ll address fan feelings about the race and any animosity over Jaal’s romantic preferences.

For Voeld, pick up on the yevara poacher quest. These beasts will require modelling and animation, but your script made them a crucial bit of angaran history. We have evidence of living creatures on “The Lost Song” side quest. Since the Kett still have that huge fortress in the hills, prepare to drive them out for good. Organize the hunting party with the resistance. Now, get ready to drop the bomb: en route, you find a pair of Quarian escape pods. Since Voeld is now an ice planet, it makes sense they’d head there to limit foreign bacteria exposure. Thaw them out to reveal the fate of the Keelah Si’yah. Connect their audio log event to the assassin and Benefactor, implying their designs trace back to the Milky Way. It doesn’t have to be the core cause, but it’s important to keep that thread alive.

3rd DLC Quarian Ark    $5-10

Not going to lie, I want this to be free but it is content-heavy like DLC 2, so despite being an olive branch to fans, it’ll take money to make. The low cost still rewards fan loyalty.

Do not shortcut this one. Use the ME 2 assets to marry quarian style to the Initiative tech. Build the tertiary races like elcor, hanar, and drell… even if we only see them briefly. It’s both an investment in the franchise and rekindles that wonder and nostalgia from the original trilogy.

Not sure what the writers have in store, but based on the multiplayer additions, I’d say involve the Batarians and the Salarian pathfinder from the outset. With neither having a squad mate spot in Andromeda, there’s a huge opportunity here. Both have multiplayer and game models to source for single player inclusion.

If you followed up on DLC 2, let players pick the male or female Quarian escapee they want to party up with. The other will play a support role, like sibling Ryder. Vary their move-set if possible, but the story elements should be the focus of their addition. Build franchise characters like Tali so that their returns exceed development costs, and match accents with the original trilogy.

Now the rest depends on the plot direction scripted so far. If the Reaper-Geth or Reapers themselves followed the Initiative, there’s a much longer conversation I’d need to build this story. Open to chat, Bioware. I’ll even pitch it to EA for you. If the Benefactor, Kett, some malfunction, or Scourge are the culprit; tie up those loose ends here.

Kett: make it big and challenging. The Archon, like Corypheus, was a bust for a boss. Fighting the Architect in confinement was a nice touch, but if players tackled them already, it cheapened the experience. Craft an intense, unique battle that they’re eager to replay this DLC to repeat. The Primus is the perfect candidate, flouting that the Archon lost his way, and offering an ulterior motive to pulling their forces from the final battle. Since they aren’t present, even missing “Dissention in the Ranks” doesn’t upset the quest line. Finally, set up travel to Kett space or an invading armada for the true sequel.

Benefactor: Jien Garson’s body never turned up, and paired with Alec and SpecTRe agents seemingly littering the Initiative… they all point to the first-time game reveal of the Illusive Man’s identity, and his connection to Cora. You’ve laid out the dots connecting the Harpers and fans are clamoring for impact on their decisions. Make them wreathe. Does this shatter the pathfinder team’s core leadership, or will Ryder and gang be able to look past her heritage? Did she even have a relationship with her father? Could she be the assassin? That’d take some work to spin, but she was awake before Ryder and likely has special resources if so. In any case, it explores her character and the relationship to the crew. It ties two large settling points of the game plot together. Based on the outcome, you may even weave an enemy with very intimate knowledge of the crew into sequels. 

Scourge and Technical difficulties: The Quarians took on a lot to bring all those other races to Andromeda. For a sabotage angle, the original showed us that Reaper agents were embedded everywhere… even the Hanar, and by de facto, the Drell. Imagine fighting an indoctrinated version of Thane, or an enraged elcor. What if they were preventing the wake-up procedures? Have they evolved over the 600 year trip? What if the Volus simply seized the ship as an opportunity to create their own hierarchy, sick of their status in Council Space? Finally, as a technology based race, the Quarians face unique trials when it comes to the scourge, which wreaks havoc on any technology, even if it only actively seeks Rem-tech. This is pre-geth boosted immunity, but if the Krogan used their travel-time to adapt to the genophage, perhaps the Quarians did the same.

Overall, address what time their ark left the Milky Way and what that means for Mass Effect 3’s endings. Determine whether or not any more travelers are en route, friendly or otherwise. Even if these two aren’t enacted immediately, they’ll guide future scripts. And just for feels, let’s see some of Jill’s handiwork. Nothing says invested like newborn babes. If she and Gil had one, show him revealing to Kallo that they named it after one of the Tempest engineers. Show Cora tending sprouts in a garden, even if she’s now an enemy. Let Liam try an angaran sport on Aya. Show Vorn, Kesh, and Drack teaching Lexi Fire Breathing Thresher Maws of Doom in Vortex. Have Peebee, Jaal, and Suvi tinkering around the monoliths. Have Kallo and Lisana T’lesso, the ice runner from Voeld racing through the Scourge with new pilots.  

[the-questionmark-kid]

So I finished my first ever run through of the Mass Effect Trilogy.

How. what the fuck. w. why. why this. was that really fucking necessary bioware holy FUCK. 

I....genuinely don’t think I have ever been so affected by a game before. And I know a lot of that is because I created this character that the games gave life and then made his decisions count for a series of events that spanned literally years. If I had played as John Shepard, I would not have felt this as strongly. But I created Thaddeus Shepard from the ground up, specifically for this game, and he was Mine...except he wasn’t. It’s always strange to play a game in which you can create or insert a character for - that’s part of why I love customized RPGs; you will feel things so much deeper than simply playing for a third party character provided by the game creators. Whether you recognize it or not, you put some of yourself into your own character and in a lot of ways, he’s your avatar. I personally would have made some majorly different choices from Thaddeus; however, the way Thaddeus reacted to things forced me to react very emotionally in ways I did not think would effect me. I finished the game feeling very, very upset in a ways that I am unaccustomed to. 

(Basically: I thought DA:I was bad lol I understand ME players so much better now because I’m one of them.)

I have such a hard time explaining WHY exactly these games hit me so hard without getting very technical, very into the semantic choices, and extremely invested in my own creation. Thaddeus stayed with Tali from the second game on, never deviating. He fought for the geth’s destruction on Rannoch partially because of his own violent bias against synthetic beings, but also largely because Tali and the quarian people as a whole deserved to have someplace to call home (something he, as a spacer kid, never had). But then at the end of the game? 

“I have a home,” she says. “Come back to me.” And I think that’s what did it. 

That parting is the reason I cannot accept that Thaddeus Shepard dies there on the Citadel: he is someone’s home and he has to get back to her. He will not let her wander, homeless, ever again. 

Mass Effect as a whole, I feel, is very big on our concept of family and home, and I think....that’s why it hits me, personally. We are incapable of separating the things that are important to us as people from the things that bring us joy, from the things we invest time and emotion into, and Mass Effect allowed me to revisit these deep convictions I have about my own life, while applying them into a fantasy verse. And while I have several issues with the ending of the third game and complaints scattered throughout the series...I’m so very glad I played them. It feels important that I did; from the perspectives of consumer, creator, and really just on a personal level. 

And now I’m going to go buy Andromeda to hopefully soothe my shattered heart yeah lol no it’s gonna hurt too I can already tell

[makoparkingonly]

MASS EFFECT ANDROMEDAAAAAAAA

This is gonna be a rambly mess of feelings because I played end game last night and have a lot of thoughts. I’m using a cut but if you’re reading on mobile just scroll really fast past this post.

Okay first of all, I played Sara Shepard, kept the default name (you get to hear it in dialogue!!!!) and default appearance (during the preview I was hesitant to waste even a second of play time on altering my appearance). I romanced Jaal because I really loved his emotional dialogue. I saved the salarian pathfinder instead of the krogan (I thought Drack was gonna kill me). I put colonies on every world, got everything up to 100% viability, and had a planet named after me. I saved Sloane but I couldn’t shoot Reyes in the back.

I got everyone but Peebee loyal because no where on the description box does it tell you how important getting remtech out of the vaults is. By the time I realized I needed it to trigger her mission, I had already cleared the vault and couldn’t go back in. So if you’re reading this and you haven’t cleared all the vaults yet, GET THE REMTECH. 

This is going to be so rambly and out of order but I just found the Jaal sex scene on youtube so let’s start with that. I try really hard not to judge other people’s player creations but this one is . . . not great. Please pay no attention to that. 

It’s like they tried to recreate Amy Schumer and could only work with what Bioware gave them. It’s uncanny valley for sure. 

I actually really like that the romances are so different??? That it’s not “and here you’ll get a romance scene and of course before endgame you’ll have the sex” and the formula from the first three games. I like that this was just a random date on Aya that ended up being, like, the ultimate romance moment of the game. It’s frickin great. 

I’ve since watched the Suvi romance just for some contrast and because she’s the one I’m least likely to want to romance on my own playthrough. Though Ryder has some HILARIOUSLY awkward dialogue (“I like you you’re pretty I like seeing you on the bridge.” Kallo: “kill. me. now.”) that romance doesn’t do nearly as much for me and lacks any semblance of the scorching alien sex scene you get with Jaal. No one takes their clothes off, for starters, and you definitely don’t get boobs and alien oral sex.  

So anyway: romance in this game is great. I’m pretty sure I could have romanced Vetra as a lady, because she was responsive and didn’t shut me down, and I really want to try that. Obviously Liam. Cora shot me down, and so did Lexi. Kallo and Drack weren’t even options, though I’d only romance Drack for the novelty of it. Gil’s only an option for dudes. 

Okay let’s talk about ENDGAME because I just played it and it’s still fresh in my mind. The endgame of Andromeda is what Mass Effect 3 should have been. YOUR WHOLE SQUAD SHOWS UP. ALL OF THEM ARE THERE IN THE FINAL BATTLE and since you can’t direct anyone it doesn’t matter that you can’t direct them either. As you’re charging through the forest in the Nomad all of the various fleets show up. I literally cried when Sloane showed up to make sure that everyone knew that Kadara had helped. 

SPEAKING OF KADARA let’s talk about open world. I’m really grateful that I spent the week before this playing Dragon Age because the maps in Andromeda are basically identical, only space age. It also employed the same method of highlighting loot (only they call it crates). So it’s nice that in the vaults where you need a path, you get the path of previous Mass Effect missions, but you still get open world exploring. 

THE VAULT PUZZLES lol so many videos on youtube of people bitterly complaining about the vault puzzles, I thought they were going to be murderously hard. One guy spent literally two hours trying to figure out a puzzle that you couldn’t use the vault key on. I finished it in under two minutes. It’s basically sudoku with shapes instead of numbers and oddly shaped boxes but it’s still sudoku. I got that. I did not have nearly as much luck with knowing which console to interact with at which time, but you know whaaaatever.

BACK TO FEELINGS also I had a lot of siblings feelings about Scott, and a ton of feelings about the fact that I, the sister, saved him, the brother. It was like Jill of the Jungle all over again. I want to play as male Ryder but I also don’t want to lose that feeling ever. 

I was playing on easy and the endgame was actually super easy. I mean yeah and architect showed up AND nullifiers AND observers AND whatever the ones that make other ones are called, but honestly with your whole squad there it barely mattered? By the time I figured out what Scott was doing and actually paid attention to the architect they’d already mostly taken it down themselves. 

It was just nice to feel like all of the work I’d put into the galaxy paid off. That all the other pathfinders showed up and had all their moments. That you fought beside salarians and turians and also the angara. 

WHICH ALSO OKAY so when you get to choose a representative to the Nexus you can choose the Moshae??? Love that that’s an option. 

AND back to combat I really miss the power wheel, even though this made combat go a lot faster. I didn’t like that I couldn’t direct my squad powers, so combos largely happened by accident, or I made my own with my powers. I never could figure out the mechanics of the favorite profiles, let alone how to switch on the fly like they showed in the combat video. Nor could I find any guide online. 60 hours of game play and I couldn’t figure it out. So much for that being intuitive, Bioware. BUT, I like that there’s finally a reason that Shepard I mean Ryder has so many extra powers and abilities, and Sara teaching Sam how to be a real boy was really cute. ALSO CUTE: THE SPACE HAMSTER. 

And idk I just started thinking about the throwbacks to ME3, the fact that you meet ex-Cerberus scientists in the wilds of Kadara and Conrad Verner’s sister in the port. That Zaeed Massani’s son is in the desert of Eos. That fallout from the Overlord Project follows you to Andromeda. There are so many interesting easter eggs for those who played the original trilogy but this also was really accessible for anyone who’s never played the originals. 

Not related: I had some HILARIOUS bugs in later stages. My ship wouldn’t load sometimes and I found this out because I went up the stairs to the conference center and literally fell out of the spaceship into space because the floor hadn’t loaded. Related: I like that falling off shit doesn’t get you the dreaded death music, that you just pop back up right next to whatever you fell off. 

I like some of the social issues it touched on. The trans woman you meet in the colony on Eos who came to Andromeda to start her new life as a woman. Gil deciding to have a baby with his friend Jill. 

COLONIZATION BABIES. Y’all I want to read (or write) the fic where plural marriages are a thing, and Sara proposes to everyone (including Drack) on the Tempest to make sure they always get to stay together and also because they’re all pretty conveniently in love with each other in various ways because what they really love and want to keep doing is exploring and pathfinding. I want one of them thinking maybe I want to colonize and farming for a bit and being okay at it but ultimately finding it boring as shit so they come back and they’re given a bit of shit for it but it’s okay. I want Sara having Liam’s baby but sleeping in Jaal’s bed most nights while Liam hangs out in Peebee’s escape pod. I want Cora having Gil’s second baby and letting him name it whatever he wants, which is how she ends up with a child named after a drive coil. I want them having petty fights about who left crumbs on the counter in the galley that Lexi tries to mediate. I want them to go to port thinking they want nothing more than to not see each other for a few days and then to end up back in each others presence in an hour because they had a thought they couldn’t wait to share. This may or may not have been influenced by the latest book in the Expansion series, but that’s a different post. 

Because, finally, I LOVE THIS CREW. I started this game off just so unsure of Cora and her talking about what a poooowerful biotic she is and how she scared everyone in the Milky Way and blah blah blah but by the time I finished her loyalty mission I was literally crying about how much I loved her. Last night after endgame I finally finished all of the piddly requests and requirements to make movie night happen and it honestly was the best fucking thing to end a game on. Next play through I’m waiting to do that the very last thing, because it felt like the end of the party at the Citadel DLC, everyone sitting around on a couch and laughing and just being their perfect selves. 

In conclusion: 

Detractors: no power wheel, no squad powers, actually wonky facial animation, some game glitches (I could never complete a mission on the Nexus because I’d already scanned a thing and it kept telling me I hadn’t.) (previously mentioned falling through the floor of my ship)

Positive: heavy on feelings, so many feelings, all of the feelings, my crew, INTERESTING AS FUCK stories, choices that matter, endgame appearances by everyone, twin feelings, open world exploring

EDITED TO ADD: OMFG THE QUARIANS. WE GONNA GET QUARIANS IN ANDROMEDA 2. 

[overthinkingfeathers]

I finished MEA! Well, 97% complete, with a few unfinished “additional task” side quests and at least one bugged out quest that I never got, but still. I’ll finish the additional side quests at some point. RIP bugged out quest, presumably always barring me from 100%. 

Anyway, random thoughts below. Spoilers of all kinds. 

-I’m going to need to replay the last major mission at some point, because I cannot figure out exactly when or how the Archon got off the Hyperion or why exactly it crashed. I assume it was explained, but I missed it. 

-On a related note, I’m amused that Ryder yelled out in the middle of battle that since the human ark crashed onto the planet, it was their planet now. I’m even more amused that everyone agreed. I’m not really sure that’s how typical planetary negotiations work. “Well, the bad guy stole our ship and crashed it on the best planet here, so dibs!” 

-The kett need to look less similar. I get that they’re all basically literal clones, but the scowling survivor kett at the end was just confusing to me. Didn’t I already kill that guy? Did the game bug out and think I didn’t, or is this a new one? Is the guy I killed a couple missions ago not the second in command? I have no idea what’s happening here. Can we get them badges or something? 

-God this game was buggy though. I still loved it, but it was not ready for release. 

-Also, the space driving thing is excruciating after the first few planets. I get it, space is pretty, but I spent literally an hour just scanning a few galaxies. Do I get anything for it? Probably not. Does Mass Effect have a history of tying future game scenarios to little things you did in previous games? Yep. 

-Ryder’s heart literally stopped on at least two occasions with Liam (her romance) in tow, and he did not react. Like, I get that the first one was planned and thus only a little bit of concern was strictly helpful, but come on, the second one was a much bigger deal. There was no warning she was going to go down, let alone that hard. It was just a bit jarring to have her trying to stagger across a room while the two companions, one of whom was her love interest, just... stood there. I have no problem with the stagger walk scene, and I know they love it in the latest Bioware games, but it only works when there’s no companions around. Otherwise they just stand there looking silly. 

-Speaking of romances, man, they really played favorites, didn’t they? Like, don’t get me wrong, Liam’s romance was cute - the final scene in front of the crowd was adorable - and I really appreciated how many chances he gave Ryder to make decisions and not feel weird about it (”Things get weird on a ship sometimes”/casual dates/”It’s fine if it’s just we used to flirt”). But I looked up the rest because they kept pushing the sex! in! space! thing before release, and his scenes were all fade to black (and so were Vetra’s, who boyfriend romanced), and uh. Wow. There’s some disparities, hey? Cora, Peebee, and Jaal are just straight up porn, and everyone else is some variation of fade to black. I don’t even mind fade to black, but the obvious time and effort put into 3 out of... what, 8? 9? is kind of obnoxious. 

-I’m still totally going to romance Reyes next playthrough, because of course, but the sex implied scene right outside the cave where he just had his crime lord opponent murdered is a bit concerning. I know you’ve got to have your kinks, but I’m shaming a bit here. 

-Really though, the scene implied scenes in a couple different romances were a bit concerning. Y’all are going to go at it on a mountain/in the desert (not that far from the outpost!)/against a cave wall? In your space armor? I know it’s fantasy, and we’re not really able to do any of this, but sex with the space armor (and sand) is apparently my line for suspension of disbelief. 

-They desperately want me to love Jaal, but I do not. He puts my teeth on edge for some reason. The codex describes him as Ryder’s best friend. Sigh. 

-So the Quarian ark DLC is all but confirmed, right? They didn’t even try to be subtle about that. 

-Also, I’m glad Ryder thinks that their entire former galaxy is probably dead and never gets to talk about that to anyone at all. Also never brings up their mother’s surprise cryo thing to literally anyone, including the doctors on board. That doesn’t seem relevant. 

-Also totally going to be a benefactor DLC. 

-Also also, they are so fucked. Nevermind the kett, who there’s undoubtedly going to be more of, but the whole other races so advanced that they’re creating/destroying entire planets? Beyond our comprehension. 

-I’m complaining a lot here, but I enjoyed the game. I’ll totally replay it. I just hope they fix some of the issues soon.

[thatoneoboegirl]

Thoughts on Andromeda

Now that I’ve gotten in roughly ten hours of gameplay, I’m starting to develop more concrete opinions, as unpopular as some may seem, about the game.

1. I am really impressed by the combat system and abilities. It’s obvious Bioware spent a lot of time honing in on this portion of the game. For the most part, abilities are fluid, the combo system is really fun to match with, and the abilities to build your own personal class of Ryder with the different ability loadouts is awesome. So far, I’m a pretty big fan of the charge-nova combo to get into the thick of battle and the pull so I can stay well enough away and let my team handle the rest. The only thing I really have to complain about the combat system is the pin-point accuracy of the enemies even while you’re dodging. I’m playing the explorer class, which has a dodging ability that allows a small amount of teleportation. IMO, I think it’s ridiculous that I’m getting hit with the utmost of accuracy by computer generated enemies on normal when I’m dodging and even backing well out of fights. 

2. I expected the writing to be pretty rough this game after hearing that a couple of the lead writers had left Bioware. Part of what made 1-3 so amazing was the detail of the writing and story that made the characters lovable and believable. Right off the bat, I was not impressed with the writing for the characters of Andromeda. I had no real connection with my team until about now, and even then it’s only for one or two members of the team. A lot of the writing takes the same sob-story for each character and hammers it into the players’ heads the certain quirks of each teammate. For example, I’m about sick and tired of Cora always talking about how she was in the asari commando. I’ve watched a couple of scenes during my bf’s game (he’s much farther in the story than I am), and even then her first bit of conversation in almost every dialogue scene is “I served with the asari commando”. Like, we get it, Cora. What I loved about the original trilogy is each character developed per game in conversation. You follow Tali through her pilgrimage and learn about the quarian culture while also learning her place in it in the very first game. None of this beating a dead horse about what commando unit you were in or how hard life was raising your little sister all by yourself.

3. I’m not impressed by the angara. I understand their purpose in the game, but I feel like they are a very shallow culture. To me, they are a replacement for the quarians while also having a very Prothean-like story (the whole being genetically changed into a new alien species that’s evil and taking/attacking colonists). I feel like a lot of thought went into them as far as shoulder-up design and their weapons, but they feel very lazily written, modeled, and scripted. They are described as being a very emotional race, but from what I’ve seen, nothing that Jaal or any of the other angara have done are much different from the Milky Way Galaxy races.

4. Expanding on lazy model designs, I am outrageously disappointed by the turian designs. The only turian I have seen thus far who has had good sculpting, shading, and over-all a more finished effect is Vetra. Everyone else seems to be very lazily rendered, and not a lot of time was put into them. So many of the turians look as though they’re wearing styrofoam or really badly done prosthetic make-up. They remind me very much of Gothmog from the Return of the King, as far as coloring, shading, and texture:

That all being said, the thing I’m most angry about is the change of design for the bottom half of turians. Their legs/hips absolutely infuriate me. From 1-3, the turians always looked like they could fuck someone up because of how sturdy and built they looked. In Andromeda, they look like someone could break them in half very easily. They look like the sentinel elves in Dragon Age: Inquisition, which I think design-wise was a very poor attempt at making people look small, yet muscular. Their hips look out of place and their upper thighs look bulbous in comparison to their bodies and lower legs. Pics for ref:

(can’t find good reference pics of turians in Andromeda, but just by looking at the above pic, you can see what I mean). To me, the redesign of turians was like the redesign of elves from Dragon Age Origins to 2: why?

5. I’m a huge fan of some of the hilarious Mass Effect glitches outside of combat. The head turning 180 degrees, sending your crew to faceplant in lava, it’s great, and some of those hilarious glitches have found their way into Andromeda. I had Drack reproduce asexually in my kitchen during a cutscene and all of a sudden I had 2 Drack’s standing there. What I don’t like, however, are the glitches during the combat, which is something I’ve already stated that Bioware did a good job of developing. There have been many times where I’m fighting and my game freezes, or I’m running and all of a sudden I come to a complete stop despite having the running function clicked. I like least of all having to press a single button multiple times before it finally activates. I expected glitches, hell, all games have glitches, I just don’t like when glitches interfere with what I’m doing.

6. If you look at any of my maps for Witcher 3, Dragon Age Inquisition, and any of the Assassin’s Creed games, you will see that I unlocked every single main quest, side quest, and collectible mission available. I’m a completionist, and I love the fact that Mass Effect has expanded into a bigger world that you can not only navigate through, but also build up XP from interacting with all the other things the game has to offer. My bf has been mostly doing story missions, and last I saw, he was level 29. I just reached level 25 with my Ryder by almost restricting myself to side quests and collectible missions. Obviously, I’ve done some main quest story, but having much better weapons, more upgrades and augmentations, and skill points has really helped when I get to the main mission fights. Plus, I get the sense of I’ve finished a lot of little things in order to get to the next big thing.

7. I love that femRyder has some better hair choices. More than 8 or so would have been nice, but you know what, I’m not complaining, I have a choice of having longish hair that doesn’t look terrible for once. 

8. The little references to the original trilogy warm my heart. I’m still looking for my femShep to show up somewhere in the Codex or storyline, but what I’ve seen so far are wonderful little surprises.

9. I’m going to start off with this next point by saying I hated the Mako. Hated it, everything about it, and what it stood for. Hated it. I was happy to get the Firewalker missions in ME:2 so I could have a flying combat ship that was maneuverable, fast, and packed a lot of power. It really came in nicely for my insanity runthrough, being able to dodge was so nice and something I couldn’t do with the Mako. I started Andromeda already not liking the Nomad because of my experience with the Mako and because I couldn’t get it out of the first map point on Eos without running into literally everything. However, it was easy to get used to the feeling of driving the Nomad, and I started actually growing an appreciation for it when I installed about 8 upgrades to it. I don’t like that it doesn’t have weapons (yet maybe?), but at the same time it serves its purpose: an exploration and research vehicle. 

That’s what my thoughts are so far, I’m still trekking through Andromeda and learning more about my crew and what all the game has to offer. I’m sure my opinions on certain things will change the further into the story I get, but that probably won’t be for a while, considering I’m not able to play it as often. 

[the-desolated-quill]

Mass Effect - Video Game blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t played this video game yet and wish to remain spoiler free, stop reading now)

I have a PS3, which means I never actually got the chance to play the original Mass Effect when it came out. Mass Effect 2 was the first game in the series to be released on PS3 and it did a very good job introducing newcomers to the franchise. But thankfully the first Mass Effect was rereleased on the Playstation Store, which meant us Playstations users could finally experience the entire Mass Effect trilogy as a whole. And since Mass Effect Andromeda comes out at the end of the month, I thought I’d play through and blog about the entire trilogy.

Mass Effect is a sci-fi, action RPG series that allows you to customise the protagonist’s name, gender, background, combat style and appearance. I played as Commander Alice Shepard, a colonist and soldier who received many medals of valour for her heroic deeds during the Skyllian Blitz. Set in the 22nd century, humans are fighting for recognition among the numerous alien races on the Citadel (the hub of galactic civilisation). Shepard is appointed as the first human Spectre, a group of elite warriors who perform covert missions for the Council by any means they see fit. Your first mission? Track down a rogue Spectre called Saren before he and his geth army unleash upon the galaxy the Reapers. A race of sentient machines hellbent on destroying all life in the galaxy.

It’s going to be a bit hard to judge this game on its own merits due to the fact that Mass Effect 2 was my first proper introduction to the series. It’s hard to tell if any of my criticisms I have toward this game are merely because I’m used to how the sequel operates. I’ll try my best not to compare the two, but I will say this. I think Mass Effect 2 does a far better job introducing you to this universe than the first Mass Effect does. Mass Effect 2 managed to trickle out important information about the world and lore whilst telling an engaging narrative. Mass Effect 1 however does have a tendency to get bogged down in exposition a lot. Maybe it only feels slow and plodding to me just because I’m already familiar with the lore, but there are a number of occasions where you’re encouraged to talk to your teammates and they just provide you with massive info dumps as opposed to meaningful interactions.

But anyway, let’s start with the story because that’s the main selling point of the Mass Effect franchise. On the whole, I liked it a lot. Bioware really put in a lot of effort building this universe and its lore and all that hard work really pays off. All the alien races are really cool. I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for the turians personally because I just love their design and their methodical, militaristic nature, but the other races like the asari, krogan, salarians and quarians are all really interesting too. I love the relationships between the races and their histories. For example you have the quarians who actually created the geth centuries back only to lose their home world in a Terminator style revolution. All the stuff with krogan are interesting too. The salarians used them to defeat an insect race called the rachni only for the krogans to rise up and were eventually sterilised by the genophage. And then of course there’s all the stuff with the long extinct Protheans, whose technology (or so the characters initially think is Prothean technology) serves as the basis for the whole of galactic society and innovation.

In fact it’s the politics of it that I find to be the most interesting thing about Mass Effect. The Council races mistrust humans and frequently patronise them (the turians in particular have a lot of contempt in humanity due to the fact that the two races used to be at war due to a misunderstanding at first contact) and the non-council races view humanity with disdain, feeling they’re getting too many privileges and are dangerous. This plays into the game’s moral choice system and how you play the game. Do you try to appease the Council and improve galactic relations or do you dismiss diplomacy and charge in headfirst, risking further alienation? The game is ostensibly about humanity, through Shepard, carving a place for themselves in galactic society. Either peacefully or through force. This especially comes to a head near the end where you have to choose to either save the Council from annihilation at the hands of Sovereign or let them die, which would mean an all human council taking their place. Considering the headache the Council give you throughout the game, it would be severely tempting to let them die, but it could have dire consequences on galactic relations in the future. (I chose to save the Council by the way). Shepard is basically dealing with two conflicts. The A plot of stopping Saren and the B plot of finding the right balance between serving the alien Council and looking out for human interests.

The antagonists are really cool. The Reapers are an incredibly compelling threat and suitably mysterious. The conversation you have with Sovereign is definitely one of the highlights. He’s ancient, cold and intelligent. Utterly compelled to carry out the genocide of every sentient race in the galaxy and the scariest thing about him is that we don’t know why. He displays a high level of arrogance, claiming the motivation and purpose of the Reapers is beyond our comprehension. It certainly does raise a lot of interesting questions going forward. And then of course there’s Saren, who really makes the Reaper threat a lot more personal. Unknowingly indoctrinated by Sovereign, Saren believes that helping the Reapers is for the greater good, claiming that if he can prove to the Reapers that organic life forms can be useful, they’ll be spared. Saren is very much a tragic character. He’s ruthless and at times bloodthirsty, but he’s not evil. Not really. He honestly believes he’s doing the right thing and that he can somehow outsmart the Reapers’ machine logic, only to then get in way over his head and become an unwitting pawn. He makes for a great antagonist and part of the thrill of the conflict comes from trying to convince him that he’s been indoctrinated and trying to convince the Council that Saren is now a threat. (Although I’m surprised it took so much to convince the Council that Saren is working for the Reapers. I mean just look at him).

(Does he often wear sinister cyberpunk outfits to work?)

Gameplay is okay. I much prefer Mass Effect 2′s game design. Instead of ammo, your weapons can overheat and you have to wait for them to cool down, which can get a bit annoying. There are a number of side missions you can do, but they tend to get very repetitive due to the similarities of the maps. Every lab is the same, every spaceship is the same and every mine is the same. You can hack certain objects for collectibles by playing an incredibly repetitive and boring mini game where you just match the button prompt. And if you for some reason can’t press a simple button, don’t worry. You can use omni-gel, which you can get by recycling unwanted items, to bypass all of it. So if you’re in the habit of recycling a lot like I am, you’ll have so much omni-gel that the game actually starts to become disgustingly easy. Omni-gel can also be used to repair the Mako, which you’re required to drive around maps. Now a lot of people complain about the Mako saying it’s hard to control, and I honestly don’t know what they’re talking about. Granted it’s a bit of a pain when you want to reverse or make a sharp turn in the middle of a battle, but it’s not undriveable. It’s like one of those RC cars I had as a kid and it’s easy enough to control, so I don’t see what all the fuss is about. I was more bothered by the repetitive maps more than anything else.

You can’t customise your armour like you can in the sequels, but there is a large variety of armour and guns for you to choose from as well as mods that can be fitted for added benefits like heat absorption to prevent your gun from overheating or more powerful shields and so on. Unlike the sequels, you can also do the same for your squad mates, not that they’re much use. I swear the AI for them is fucked. There are instances where an enemy is hiding behind a crate and instead of doing something sensible like walking around the crate, they choose to fire at the crate. I’ll tell you something else that’s fucked too. The cover system. There are numerous instances where I’m standing right next to a wall and press the X button, and Shepard will just stand there like a blancmange. And whose idea was to make me crouch before going into certain types of cover? Crouching is usually reserved for stealth. The last thing I think about in a firefight is ‘Oh shit. I’d better crouch now.’

Finally let’s discuss the characters and the moral choice system. Throughout the game you get moral choices that earn you Paragon and Renegade points that can open up certain dialogue options provided you remember to upgrade your Charm and Intimidate skills in the Squad menu (yeah I’m glad they got rid of that in the sequels). Now the game boasts that all of your choices will change the story and have an impact, and that’s true in the sequels, but in this game and this game alone... really? Sure you see Shepard slowly change and evolve the further you go along the Paragon or Renegade paths, but I can’t really detect that much difference in the narrative. It seems to play out mostly the same to me. You’re also encouraged to talk with the other characters often in between missions to really bond with them, but as I said before, they have a tendency to speak almost entirely in exposition most of the time and (with the exception of Wrex where you share a pretty tense exchange on Virmire and how its resolved depends on how you’ve interacted with him previously) it never really seems to make much of a difference no matter how much you interact with them.

I suppose that’s really my biggest problem with this game. It does feel very much like setup. Mass Effect 2 (and Mass Effect 3 to a certain extent) does an excellent job introducing new players to the franchise whilst also continuing the overall narrative and telling its own self contained story. You could (and can) play Mass Effect 2 without having played the first one and still follow along. With the first Mass Effect, it very much sacrifices meaningful character interaction in favour of setting up a grander narrative. That’s not to say I hate the characters or that they’re underdeveloped. I really like them. I love the cynicism of Wrex and the skepticism of Ashley, Garrus and Tali are pretty cool, and Liara is just utterly adorable. I just never felt any real kind of bond with them like I did with the characters in Mass Effect 2. In Mass Effect 2 you had loyalty missions and meaningful dialogues and you feel like you’ve really gotten to know this group of people and formed a strong emotional connection with them. I just didn’t get that with this game, which unfortunately affects certain parts of the narrative. On Virmire for instance you have to choose whether to rescue Ashley or Kaiden, leaving the other to die for the cause. It should have been a very powerful and tragic moment, but I didn’t really feel anything because I felt like I hadn’t really bonded with the characters as much as I should have (also it wasn’t exactly a hard choice. Kaiden is by far the most boring character in the game, so naturally I was going to sacrifice him).

It also sadly affects the romance. In the game you can choose one of three characters to be your love interest. Ashley if you’re a man, Kaiden if you’re a woman and Liara for both. (I picked Liara, in case you’re wondering). Again, because I feel I haven’t bonded with the characters as much as I should, it’s hard to be invested in the romance, especially when nothing really comes of it other than a sex scene. It’s also all a bit forced. I remember in Mass Effect 2 that the game would give you the option to make the relationship with a character more flirtatious if you wanted, and thus open another a whole other level to the dynamic between both characters, but here it’s like the game wants you to start a romance to the point where it becomes kind of awkward. When I was talking to Liara, one minute we’re talking about why she chose to be an archaeologist and then suddenly she starts throwing herself at me saying she feels a bond between us. Like... Liara, I’ve literally only just met you. Calm down. And then there was one really awkward bit where Kaiden suddenly got pissy because he thought I was romancing himself and forced me to choose. I wasn’t even aware I was romancing Kaiden! I thought I was just being nice! (perhaps that was the intention. To show what women have to go through when a man misinterprets friendly gestures as romantic ones. I don’t know. I suspect I may be giving the developers too much credit on that one).

While Mass Effect is still an enjoyable game despite its faults, I’m very glad that Mass Effect 2 was my first proper introduction to the series as it is a far superior game and story to this one. Which, in fairness, is what a good sequel should do. Improve upon the original. I guess it shows that Bioware respond well to constructive criticism, and that’s always good :)

[jaldaris]

A little more information about romances from Male Ryder’s view in Mass Effect: Andromeda

Thank God to this journalist who actually tried her best to find out more about the romances at https://www.vg247.com/2017/03/07/everything-we-know-about-banging-in-mass-effect-andromeda-after-going-hands-on-and-quizzing-bioware/ 

Vetra:

“Some people are calling Vetra the new Garrus, but to them I say: nonsense. Garrus was my best bro and comrade in arms, a burned-out cop whose heart of gold I extracted through patience and friendship. Vetra, on the other hand, is a cheerful wheeler and dealer who knows how to work shady, underground connections – and yet comes over all dorky and embarrassed after a good flirting session. I will climb her like a tree. Tall space girlfriends are the best space girlfriends.”

Liam:

“A former cop, among other things, Liam fulfills the unfortunate role of early BioWare companion who says a lot of obvious things and asks eye-rolling questions in order for exposition to be delivered to you, the player, who unfortunately cannot be trusted to remember things for whole seconds or form simple connections, due to years of over-stimulation and instant gratification. Hopefully he improves as time goes on. He does not bang dudes and stated this explicitly when I tried it on.”

Cora:

“Unless there’s some scene in Mass Effect Andromeda where you put on a play, we know Cora is at the very least interested in banging one of the Ryder siblings, because she and Scott have a pash in a trailer. And yet I received zero option to flirt with her during my preview, despite lengthy dialogue. This pleased me somewhat because I secretly hope Cora and Sara get together, but I’m guessing she’s The Hard To Get One.”

Drack:

“There were no flirt options for Drack. Is he off the table? When oh when will BioWare let us bang krogans? Sure, they have four testicles, but Turians and Quarians have, like, poisonous physiology, and they get banged. How on earth do all these species even – well, look, the point is: come on BioWare, let us bang a krogan. Maybe not Drack though; that doctor voiced by Natalie Dormer already called dibs. You can just bet I’m gonna help make that happen.”

Jaal:

“The Best Boy. 100% omnisexual, I’m calling it now, based on zero hard evidence and purely on how clear it is that BioWare staff consider him the heartthrob. Has a nice voice but, without going into spoiler territory, he’s not really in a romance mood during the time we spent talking. We had a pleasant chat and got on very well, but when I tried to talk to him again he snapped at me and told me he was still mad about our argument. I had no idea what argument he was referring to but this is not inconsistent with my real life relationship experiences.”

Some guy in the hold:

I forget the guy in the hold’s name – I don’t think he was a party member? – but he was 100% DTB Scott Ryder.

[runicscribbles]

Peebee

Scott Ryder could not seem to resist flirting with Peebee; the option came up multiple times in our chat, which seemed to be the first opportunity the pair had had to really get to know each other. Peebee was very open about her life and experiences – I won’t spoil what she actually said – but much more guarded about her immediate plans, even as she asked Ryder for help with them. I don’t know how she would have reacted to Scott’s flirting because I felt I could not make myself vulnerable to someone clearly hiding a potentially dangerous secret. She might be building a Reaper or something. I refuse to have another Anders or Solas moment.

Vetra

Some people are calling Vetra the new Garrus, but to them I say: nonsense. Garrus was my best bro and comrade in arms, a burned-out cop whose heart of gold I extracted through patience and friendship. Vetra, on the other hand, is a cheerful wheeler and dealer who knows how to work shady, underground connections – and yet comes over all dorky and embarrassed after a good flirting session. I will climb her like a tree. Tall space girlfriends are the best space girlfriends.

Liam

A former cop, among other things, Liam fulfills the unfortunate role of early BioWare companion who says a lot of obvious things and asks eye-rolling questions in order for exposition to be delivered to you, the player, who unfortunately cannot be trusted to remember things for whole seconds or form simple connections, due to years of over-stimulation and instant gratification. Hopefully he improves as time goes on. He does not bang dudes and stated this explicitly when I tried it on.

Update: On reflection, Liam actually said something like he wasn’t into “that” – as opposed to men specifically. Possibly by “that” he meant banging on short acquaintance – or maybe he meant her’s not into banging at all. In any case, we must move this one out of the “sorted” pile and back into “isn’t the breadth and complexity of identity and relationships just breathtaking”.

Cora

Unless there’s some scene in Mass Effect Andromeda where you put on a play, we know Cora is at the very least interested in banging one of the Ryder siblings, because she and Scott have a pash in a trailer. And yet I received zero option to flirt with her during my preview, despite lengthy dialogue. This pleased me somewhat because I secretly hope Cora and Sara get together, but I’m guessing she’s The Hard To Get One.

Drack

There were no flirt options for Drack. Is he off the table? When oh when will BioWare let us bang krogans? Sure, they have four testicles, but Turians and Quarians have, like, poisonous physiology, and they get banged. How on earth do all these species even – well, look, the point is: come on BioWare, let us bang a krogan. Maybe not Drack though; that doctor voiced by Natalie Dormer already called dibs. You can just bet I’m gonna help make that happen.

Jaal

The Best Boy. 100% omnisexual, I’m calling it now, based on zero hard evidence and purely on how clear it is that BioWare staff consider him the heartthrob. Has a nice voice but, without going into spoiler territory, he’s not really in a romance mood during the time we spent talking. We had a pleasant chat and got on very well, but when I tried to talk to him again he snapped at me and told me he was still mad about our argument. I had no idea what argument he was referring to but this is not inconsistent with my real life relationship experiences.

Some guy in the hold

I forget the guy in the hold’s name – I don’t think he was a party member? – but he was 100% DTB Scott Ryder.

[adalhied-prime]

N7 Day 2017

Oh boy, N7 day already? The year’s flown by. 

So, everone’s talking about their ME journey, so I figure I’ll tell mine. I first heard of ME in 2010, when my sister was playing it. I specifically remember sitting next to her as she ran around on Illium and overhearing the two asari talking about Erinya and (having been rereading Harry Potter at the time) confused on why purebloods were considered bad. I also started the seeds of a crush on Garrus, majorly because my sister was romancing him. 

My own personal experience with the game started in 2014, when I’d go visit my sister and her gf at their house and they let me use their xbox. ME1 was missing, so I started on ME2 without any dlc, intending on making a hardass renegade femShep since I wouldn’t be able to create the worldstate I wanted. But I don’t like doing renegade options, so Clarice Shepard ended up being a mirror of Garrus, who was also her romance. I only reached Horizon, but it was fun while it lasted.

Then my parents got ME1 for my brother and I, so I made a new Shep. Inari was a Earthborn Sole Survivor Infiltraitor who had a few years of misadventures with a quarian as a teenager, and as such, has a very close attachment to them. She was also a lesbian (the phrase “I don’t like penis” constantly ran through my head every time she talked with Kaiden) and I was debating whether or not to have her romance Liara or to hold out for Sam in 3, when the disk got damaged and we couldn’t play anymore. 

The latest chapter of my ME journey was this year, starting around when Andromeda came out. The excitement for it, as well as some general bioware love from finishing Dragon Age Inquisition, got me looking through the fandom again, and I’ve found lots of cool people to follow. I haven’t completed Andromeda yet, just haven’t had the time to, but I've really enjoyed it, even if I agree they should have waited until and had everything fixed before release. The Tempest crew aren’t the Normandy, but I like all of them, though I was partial to Vetra and Jaal (I think I have a thing for turians and guys in blue with accents and space monocles).

As well, my lil brother’s been playing Mass Effect, and together with my sister, we’ve created a story with our three Shepard siblings, Rowena, Rhys and Aerynn, doing all we can to save the world from the Reapers, while also being proud members of Team Dextro (the ships being Rowena/Garrus, Rhys/Tali and Aerynn/Nhilus). 

ME has been a big part of my life, helping bring me closer to my sister and brother, and I will always be grateful for that.