Octo
Commander
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Post by Octo on Jun 23, 2011 13:14:44 GMT 1
But purely storywise, they didn't. Mass Effect 2's story is just bad, and doesn't work at times. Especially the Cerberus aspect fo it. ME 2 had good characters, good gameplay, good levels, but its story was definitely not its strong point.
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Post by jklinders on Jun 23, 2011 15:50:26 GMT 1
Story wise the game got hideously bogged down with all the loyalty quests. It really cuts down on the whole urgency of story when you take 12-count 'em- 12 pauses to handle what mostly amounts to the daddy issues of your squad.
Cerberus was slightly more justifiable. But it smacks a little of working too hard to make them morally ambiguous when they were anything but. The Collectors made pretty lame enemies too.
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Post by Warhammer Gorvar on Jun 23, 2011 17:47:41 GMT 1
I did find the Colonies dissapearing aspect cool, kinda like how the Borg were introduced in TNG. to be fair, the loyalty missions did add a lot more side story to the main sotry, which is ok. MEII excelled in it's side story's but sadly at the cost of the main story.
It is a bit of a plothole that you can sabotage Cerberus severely in that game in the side missions and you get away with it.
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Octo
Commander
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Post by Octo on Jun 23, 2011 18:52:23 GMT 1
I disagree. There are not enough options to "sabotage" Cerberus (which side missions would that be, anyway?). After all, what's TIM gonna do, fire you? The problem with working with Cerberus is timing - Shepard wakes up, has no knowledge of the situation, hasn't spoken with Alliance or Council yet, yet agrees to work with Cerberus already? The same Cerberus that he/she was busy killing in ME1? Before checking any alternatives?
And then he/she simply gets totally taken over by Cerberus, to the point of wearing their uniforms. Shepard just completely walks TIM's line. And when he sends him/her into a trap, even then Shepard doesn't terminate the cooperation. This all makes Shepard simply look extremely stupid.
You get absolutely shoehorned into working with Cerberus, even when in the story it makes no sense at all.
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Post by Warhammer Gorvar on Jun 23, 2011 19:00:06 GMT 1
I think it was during an Eclipse mission where you have to rescue a Cerberus agent. but when you get there the agent is already dead and Eclipse has info from hi mthat could do damage to Cerberus. You have the chance to send it back to Cerberus, keep it to yourself or send it to the Alliance.
To be fair, you had to hitch a shuttle ride from the Lazarus facility or else you would be stuck there and slowly died from starvation. You could see it as Shepard 'accepting' for the time being. I always went for the idea of using the weapon against your enemy, as in take their ship (The Normandy II) turn their crew against them (Miranda, Jacob and all that) and do as much damage as you can (side missions) when they aren't watching.
But agreed after the Derelict Reaper though.
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Post by MarianneClaus on Jun 23, 2011 20:46:20 GMT 1
I think it was during an Eclipse mission where you have to rescue a Cerberus agent. but when you get there the agent is already dead and Eclipse has info from hi mthat could do damage to Cerberus. You have the chance to send it back to Cerberus, keep it to yourself or send it to the Alliance. To be fair, you had to hitch a shuttle ride from the Lazarus facility or else you would be stuck there and slowly died from starvation. You could see it as Shepard 'accepting' for the time being. I always went for the idea of using the weapon against your enemy, as in take their ship (The Normandy II) turn their crew against them (Miranda, Jacob and all that) and do as much damage as you can (side missions) when they aren't watching. But agreed after the Derelict Reaper though. Agreed. Subtle sabatoge was my way to go on my Paragon game.
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Post by jklinders on Jun 23, 2011 21:46:41 GMT 1
I think it was during an Eclipse mission where you have to rescue a Cerberus agent. but when you get there the agent is already dead and Eclipse has info from hi mthat could do damage to Cerberus. You have the chance to send it back to Cerberus, keep it to yourself or send it to the Alliance. To be fair, you had to hitch a shuttle ride from the Lazarus facility or else you would be stuck there and slowly died from starvation. You could see it as Shepard 'accepting' for the time being. I always went for the idea of using the weapon against your enemy, as in take their ship (The Normandy II) turn their crew against them (Miranda, Jacob and all that) and do as much damage as you can (side missions) when they aren't watching. But agreed after the Derelict Reaper though. This is the thing here. Shepard is given very little choice right from the get go. Some of the fan theories about the station attack being Cerberus forcing the issue on Shepard (debunked with the Shadow Broker intel) even made sense. But here is what happened with Shepard. He is "recruited" by TIM on one of his private stations surrounded by his own private army. Now maybe Paragon Shep thinks he play along until he gets a ship and away from the station, but whoops, there is an AI in charge of the ship with God only knows what kind of pro-Cereberus fail safes installed. Can't screw him over there. All right let's just go to the Citadel and get council support, oops, TIM leaked intel only God knows how long ago that Shep was working with Cerberus, leaving Anderson and Hackett literally the only officials who believe in Shepard. So once at the Citadel Shepard has only 2 options. 1, tell Miranda to piss off and then hope someone else drops a state of the art warship and crew into your lap or 2 play along and get all your ducks in a row before betraying TIM. Paragon Shepard, being good but not stupid chose option 2.
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Post by Warhammer Gorvar on Jun 23, 2011 22:37:36 GMT 1
That's very deep and logical thinking Linders.
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Post by jklinders on Jun 23, 2011 23:32:37 GMT 1
That's very deep and logical thinking Linders. Why thank you. It's nice to be appreciated. Now the real question is, just how much along those lines were the writers thinking? Because there is not one shred of dialogue in the game that moves along those lines.
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Post by Warhammer Gorvar on Jun 23, 2011 23:47:24 GMT 1
I think it's sort of like trying to look into Shakespeare's plays and see if he was actually a catholic supporter or not. Yes I compared Bioware's writing to Shakespeare, I did the dude for two years in university, i can compare him to whomever I want. Besides most of his play's endings suck. Except Hamlet....that was awesome.
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Octo
Commander
Posts: 240
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Post by Octo on Jun 24, 2011 0:01:01 GMT 1
That was only one assignment. And it kinda rankled me that you were supposed to do regular Cerberus work. And really sending the data to the Alliance? Cerberus has so much pull there, that amounts to the same as sending it to Cerberus.
So what? Are they gonna kill him/her - after spending 4b on his/her resurrection? Besides, it didn't sound like Shepard just went along with TIM. They could have implented clues towards that. But no, as you said - the dialogue doesn't move along that lines at all. Shepard simply agrees with TIM and let him/herself be recruited, without ever seeing either Council or Alliance. The game simply shoehorns you into that cooperation.
Indeed. Strange how no Shepard points that out, though, renegade or paragon. Renegade makes a big show about ordering EDI shut down, but then simply backs down. Paragon simply makes a joke about Joker. It's really rankling.
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Post by jklinders on Jun 24, 2011 0:20:08 GMT 1
You left me a bit of meat to chew on here but at least there wasn't any gristle. Concerning why TIM would waste money on resurrecting Shep just to kill him. Why not? Seriously, TIM has flushed bigger projects for less offense. If my own theory about Shep's revival is correct all TIM was looking to get from project Lazarus was the Collector base. Everything in the game points to that being his objective. As far as I am concerned TIM is so completely ruthless he would have snuffed Shepard without a second though and written off the expense. He still had the ship and crew and Miranda would have been in charge instead. The cost of the project is meaningless. When you have TIM's resources 4b is nothing, the real currency is people. Note that while on TIM's station Shep had no weapons. I'll bet that whole section of the station could be purged on a moments notice too. TIM is utterly amoral. He showed it time and again. When you are dealing with the utterly amoral you have to take into account that they will do things that normal people would call utterly monstrous with the same casual air that I would order a cup of coffee. As for lack of dialogue from Shep about plotting to take control of his ship... If Shep is renegade he may even approve of Cerberus, though certain dialogue suggests otherwise. Paragon Shep is just keeping his mouth shut, putting on an act and trying to think his way out of this mess. We don't know what he is thinking. We are supposed to fill those blanks in. In my first playthrough I was constantly looking for ways to break TIM's hold on Shep. It did not happen until after the IFF was installed. There was still the last mission to go through and right after...well the first thing Shep does is tell TIM what part of his ass he can shove his own displeasure. Quite satisfying really.
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Octo
Commander
Posts: 240
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Post by Octo on Jun 24, 2011 0:28:54 GMT 1
I don't think even Cerberus can write off 4b just like that. Besides, TIM is utterly evil, but he doesn't do stuff for the evulz. If Shepard won't cooperate, I can see him letting him/her go his/her merry way. After all, he/she is still important to the fight against the Collectors/Reapers. Really, TIM does not come across as somebody to waste potential resources just for shit and giggles. He's no cartoon villain.
Defeating the Collectors is the primary objective, but building up Shepard as a symbol and icon for humanity, behind whom it can rally (and which in turn is controlled by Cerberus) is definitely the secondary objective. I think that's clear from the prologue dialogue between TIM and Miranda. And TIM won't just throw away both objectives at once, just because he can't get both.
Anyway, to get back to my criticism of the game: The problem is that all you say is good and all as fanfiction material or general fanwank - but it isn't in the game. None of the dialogue, absolutely none, even only hints at what you've said. So while you can try to compensate for the games shortcomings all you like, the game storyline itself simply fails.
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Post by jklinders on Jun 24, 2011 0:45:00 GMT 1
I don't think even Cerberus can write off 4b just like that. Besides, TIM is utterly evil, but he doesn't do stuff for the evulz. If Shepard won't cooperate, I can see him letting him/her go his/her merry way. After all, he/she is still important to the fight against the Collectors/Reapers. Really, TIM does not come across as somebody to waste potential resources just for shit and giggles. He's no cartoon villain. Defeating the Collectors is the primary objective, but building up Shepard as a symbol and icon for humanity, behind whom it can rally (and which in turn is controlled by Cerberus) is definitely the secondary objective. I think that's clear from the prologue dialogue between TIM and Miranda. And TIM won't just throw away both objectives at once, just because he can't get both. Anyway, to get back to my criticism of the game: The problem is that all you say is good and all as fanfiction material or general fanwank - but it isn't in the game. None of the dialogue, absolutely none, even only hints at what you've said. So while you can try to compensate for the games shortcomings all you like, the game storyline itself simply fails. Well if we are going to say that if it isn't spoken in game then it wasn't happening then what are we discussing. But I will indulge in one more rebuttal before I drop it. If Shepard flat out refuses to work with TIM that leaves TIM with nothing to go on but Shepard's previous track record in dealing with Cerberus. Which is to say out and out destruction of several Cerberus facilities and labs and projects (assuming you did all the side quests in part one). That makes him a lia-freaking-bility. What does TIM usually do with liabilities? Hmmm? As for building Shepard up as a symbol for defending humanity. How does that work when it is said in game that TIM seeded intel to both the council and the Alliance that Shepard was working for him. Effectively cutting him off from both lines of support. This is half the reason why Paragon Shep is forced to work with him. Replay the Horizon mission. Pay attention to when Shepard brings up that Ashley/Kaiden were sent there to investigate Cerberus and Shepard's role in the abductions. TIM flat out admits that he seeded intel that will put you there with Cerberus. It is very hard to build someone up as a symbol to rally behind when you are making him a renegade from every legitimate government in the entire galaxy. When was the last time you have seen a majority of citizens call terrorists and those who work with them heroes? Honestly it makes no sense to cut Shepard off from all support from the council and Alliance unless stopping the Collector was a secondary goal. The primary goal being getting their tech. So it only makes sense if TIM was lying from the start about his reasons for bringing Shepard back. This may be fan wank but I have thought it out carefully. And a prudent man does not take risks when dealing with the utterly amoral.
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Octo
Commander
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Post by Octo on Jun 24, 2011 0:49:59 GMT 1
Uh, this whole sub-discussion started with me criticizing the game for bad writing. So yes, of course the measurement is what is spoken in-game. That's the point - I won't continue the line of what options Shepard had. The point is none of that is shown in writing. In the dialogue, Shepard simply merrily goes along with whatever TIM is saying. Even though hints could have been built in. So yes, that's a story line fail, and that was my point.
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