#took me half an hour of reloading to post this ; u;

[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!

[punkascas]

the story of the underwear cockles op

y’all wanna hear the story of how @amazinmango and i got this photo op at phxcon this weekend?

PART ONE: BEFORE THE OP

so here’s the thing: n o n e of this was planned. it was amazing, hilarious, ridiculous kismet. 

mango’s had his birthday recently, and so i brought his birthday present with me to phxcon. part of the present was a pair of jensen’s underbears (i think the text i sent mango right after jib was, “we’re close enough that it’s not weird if i buy u underwear right????”) bc i thought that was hilarious from jib and mango is a huge jensen fan and dean!boy. so the original joke was just that mango could have the bear underwear. i also got him a second pair in orange, bc orange is his fav colour. this was as far as i thought this would go. 

so i get into phoenix thursday night and give mango his present. we didn’t know there were cockles photo ops until friday afternoon when we saw hard tickets for sale. i distinctly remember being bummed that my hometown con had cockles photo ops for sale online but phxcon, the one i was actually going to, did not. but obviously once i saw they were available, like. THERE WAS ONLY ONE CHOICE. so after deciding it was completely financially irresponsible when we have no money, i bought the op. 

i can’t remember when it occurred to us that we had both the underbears and a pair of lucky orange underwear for misha in our hotel room. we wanted to do something fun and funny for the op, and cracked ourselves up at the idea. but we were also aware that it could be, you know, kind of sort of maybe intensely uncomfortable to be like (a) i know what underwear u were wearing and (b) here i brought pairs of them for you to further laugh over. i have a T E R R I B L E akdslkjkas embarrassment squick, so we didn’t want to do anything that made us uncomfortable, and we definitely didn’t want to do anything that would make misha or jensen uncomfortable. we wanted them to have fun with us and play around with us. 

we ran our idea passed our roomie, who has some good con experience, to see if she thought it would fly or not. we agreed on judging our plan based on their mood on the day and asking them if they felt comfortable enough to do it was the best course of action, with a back-up plan ready to go immediately just in case, so j+m knew we were serious that they could totally pass on it if it was weird. CONSENT AND SAFE SPACE. we were hella concerned about this. 

PART TWO: THE PHOTO OP

sunday we get all our props together, the underwear for Plan A and the wigs for Plan B. (both mango and i have mohawks, so we bought them mohawk wigs so the four of us could just mohawk it up). finally tickets for our op get called and i bounce all the way down the corridor next to mango, first as a joke and then for serious because i started to get nervous/excited and asking mango who was gonna talk and how were we gonna get the backstory out quickly that they were mango’s birthday underwear and it was just too funny and coincidental to us to pass up and we love them and we’re sorry and they can totally say no. 

so we get into the room, and at this point i’m chanting PROPERTY TAXES in my head to try to adult maturely and repress the hysterical giggling i’ve been doing for the last half hour, while also dancing around bc i always need to move, especially when i’m all adrenaline-y and happy and slightly manic (as anyone who has ever drank with me will tell u), and mango’s false mask of calm is completely dissolving as he starts swearing and we can SEE THEM and they’re RIGHT THERE and we really want Plan A to be a go but we don’t know and also they are like two meters from us holy shit holy shit breathe. 

at the j2 panel, jensen seemed like he was in a good mood, but that had also been a couple hours passed already. so we check in the handler, and she’s like, nah you’re fine they’ve been happy and playful all day go ask. so then it was us! and we showed them what we brought and did our quick spiel that i bought the underwear for mango for his birthday and they can totally say no; we just thought it was funny. so jensen and misha are, like, inspecting the underwear and jensen does really seem to like those underbears. he was like checking the size and holding them up against himself to see how they’d fit. mango mentions to jensen that i bought one of the last pairs because when i reloaded the website after paying, they said SOLD OUT. and then jensen leans over to misha and laughs that he should’ve bought stock in ethika. 

so at this point we’ve taken up wayyyy more time than we’re supposed to and get waved to move to the side out of the frame (we already mentioned we didn’t want to be in the photo once they said yes), and jensen and misha pose, and then given us back the underwear and i got a quick hug from jensen. 

PART THREE: THE AUTOGRAPHS

obviously after this both mango and i are, like, hysterical and super happy and can’t believe they actually fucking did the thing. and had fun with it. and it wasn’t awkward and they don’t hate us or think we’re creepy and we’re going to have an amazing, amazing photo. so, like. i know a lot of people will cry before/during/after their photo ops, but for me, apparently my response is just loud, uncontrollable pleased cackling. i laughed for the next hour and 15 minutes just continuously and bouncing around and waiting impatiently for the photos to come out so we could take a picture and be like  LOOK AT WHAT WE DID. which is when i posted the op yesterday. 

right after that, jensen and jared started signing autographs. so we’re waiting for our row to be called while i’m watching my phone start to blow up with notes and questions and mango and i also realize that we’re starving and need to go get food stat. 

we’re standing in line for jensen’s auto cramming bacon-loaded grease sandwiches in our faces with one hand and watching our phones with the other hand when i start to notice the op getting tagged with #underbears and people asking if we’re going to get them signed. and, okay, i love you fandom. i love you so, so much, so i say this with all the love in the world. but when i read the tag #underbears i literally fell down on the floor laughing because that was the funniest shit i had ever heard in my life at that point. and was like, MANGO WE NEED JENSEN TO SIGN THESE I HAVE TO TELL HIM ABOUT THE UNDERBEARS TAG. and mango was like, well we’ll ask but say he can sign something else, and i was like, no no no he h a s  t o i have to tell him that his underwear has a tag and it’s great and i love everything right now. 

so again, once we got up near the table, we asked the handler if it’d be okay, and they were like, oh please he’s signed like four pairs already. so: score! 

jensen totally remembered us, and we thanked him for being such a good sport about everything, and then i told him about the tag. which his response to was an eyebrow and a, “well, r a w r.” in that smirky smug playful attractive asshole way of his. and then he signed the underbears with rawr as well. 

we thought that’d be it (i was after mango for autos, and was waiting for jensen to sign my thing quickly), but then jensen asks mango if he’s tried ethika and what he thinks and mango says yes and then jensen gets into this, like, two minute discussion about underwear preferences and how comfortable ethika is. to the point where he leans back, spreads his legs, pulls up the hem of his shirt, and shows us like almost the entire crotch of the underwear he’s currently wearing. which were these:

so. you know. THAT HAPPENED. 

he’s also a size large. 

you’re welcome, fandom.

and to anyone STILL wondering if it was the bear underwear jensen had on at JIB: uhh, yes, yes it was. and to anyone STILL wondering if we made jensen uncomfortable: no, no, we didn’t. we took a lot of pains not to, and he laughed and joked around with us both at the op and at the autos. 

we’re getting the jpeg, so high resolution is coming, so you can see their ridiculous smug teasing faces better. i’m probs gonna write up something about the rest of my time at the con, because that was ALSO amazing, but at least now you have the Saga of the Underbears.