WHOA someone found my N7 Day post again.
jupiterjames asked:
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#mass effect musingsjupiterjames asked:
4: Favorite ME2 mission?
It’s probably cheating to say Shadow Broker, even though it’s true. I get so excited to do that mission. So if I can’t use that I’ll have to stick with the Suicide Mission, because I still get goosebumps when that music starts and the team gets out of the shuttle. Put your game faces on, everyone. Time to play.
13: Who did your first Shepard leave behind on Virmire?
Ashley.
25: What mission do you dread every time you get there?
Archangel. I love the plot, HATE the gameplay. That BASEMENT. Gah.
swaps55 replied to your post “no one’s asked you Mass Effect yet? so, Mass Effect!”
I think Udina is an awesome character the writers (I use the term loosely in this case) assassinated with the Citadel Coup. So many GREAT things they could have done, and…that?
I haven’t quite worked through my feelings about the Citadel Coup yet. I think I need to play it a second time to really figure things out (focus on story instead of not dying, basically), but I’m not even sure I mind where he went in that.
He’s still trying to do what’s best for humanity, as is his job as humanity’s voice on the Council. All the other Council members are unhelpfully spinning their wheels and trying to protect themselves while Earth and humanity’s colonies quite literally burn (except Sparatus/Quentius, who only offers you help because it’ll ultimately help the turians). The Councilors are making the right decisions for themselves and their species, and it’s certainly what Udina would do if he and Valern were reversed (this brings back Ashley’s “dog and bear” comment from ME1), but the situation isn’t reversed and it’s infuriating to be on his end receiving zero help from this governing body that’s meant to be the paragon of galactic cooperation.
Shepard’s out there doing what Shepard does and working a different angle, but it’s not happening fast enough, and it’s not happening big enough.
And so even though he knows Cerberus is an extremely questionable organization working with extremely questionable people and extremely questionable methods, Udina sees them as his only choice for helping Earth. They’re a pro-human organization willing to help him and help humanity, and he needs a little of that right now. This is war, a bad one, and his people are dying by the millions each day and I don’t blame him one bit for not thinking through the consequences of making a deal with Cerberus if it meant getting help to Earth.
Now, see, if Udina had gone to Cerberus because of a misguided wish to do something to help humanity, that in his desperation he sided with an enemy the way Shepard did in order to achieve a higher goal, I would have been SO ON BOARD with that. I would be singing Udina’s praises to the moon. That’s what I wanted to happen. Because that’s a fantastic character.
But that's not what happens. There is no context for Udina’s sudden, inexplicable betrayal. It’s done so the player can have the satisfaction of shooting him because Bioware thought we’d been waiting three games to do it, and rather than choose the route of better storytelling, they chose to give the player something that they wanted but didn’t need.
Udina, in the end, is exactly what he seemed to be - a jerk. Someone the player can love to hate. Though he has all the tools and characteristics he needs to rise above that and become one of the more meaningful characters in the series, a kindred spirit where you least expect it, he instead becomes a fandom joke.
It’s a little like Khalisah Al-Jilani. People love to punch her, right? But look what happens when you look beyond the gag, and actually talk to her. In ME3 that’s a really meaningful conversation. She’s not a joke anymore, she’s a person. Someone who’s afraid and uncertain, just like the rest of us. Udina could have been the same, someone we or Shepard could have related to in an uncomfortable way. Udina went to Cerberus for help, just like Shepard did. But he failed. How lucky are we that Shepard didn’t?
I liked the idea of the Citadel coup. It was the execution that made me angry.
sinvraal replied to your post “Let’s talk about Liara. She needs to be talked about. Too many people…”
Good arguments. I wish her retrieval of Shepard’s body in ME2 had been FRAMED better as “you have the cipher”. As it was, I felt it tread too closely to reading as obsession. I prefer your interpretation, but the game… didn’t read like that to me.
It doesn’t read like that in the game - I freely admit that’s my own interpretation. It’s a bad setup in the game, from the same people who gave us the horrible setup on Horizon. I choose to look past that bit of writing and just look at the character, the same way I do the VS.
Kaidan, for example, regardless of whether he’s romanced or not, will tell Shepard that losing them was like losing an arm. Even if your Shepard never talks to him in ME1. That, to me, is quite uncomfortable as well, but I have never heard it mentioned.
I interpret bad lines like that as Bioware being too lazy to include non-romanced dialogue with characters that can also be romanced.
Some people like to look at a character from the context of the narrative alone - whatever we’re given by the writer is what we’ve got to work off of.
There’s nothing wrong with that, and it’s a perfectly valid method of analysis. But I don’t look at it that way. I take other factors into account via my own experience with the writing process, and reverse engineer certain moments like that from the writer’s perspective. I can't not do that, because I can’t not look at a work of fiction without peeking behind the curtain at all the wheels and cogs that make it go.
I like to think I’m pretty good at identifying when X happens because the plot (or game mechanics) requires it, not because it’s in character. The framework of Liara going after Shepard’s body, and that problematic line, falls in that category. So it’s easier to me to dismiss it as a moment where Liara became a tool to the plot rather than a character responding to her own motivations.
Doesn’t mean that’s the right way to look at it. It’s just how I look at it.
swaps55 replied to your post “Ha, er yes. So. During your mobile exile I *might* have lost my shit over mShenko and started writing them. A *lot*. Someone should probably stop me.”
You know what’s odd? I don’t know if I could write them in long fic form. Just like I can’t write Liara in short fic form? I don’t know. I’m so confused. You’re not the first to suggest or ask this.
some times its easier to stick to short form with some things. it’s a good way to let out the ideas that you keep tripping over when writing longfic, that have no place in said longfic. so maybe you’re abundant writing of m!shenko is helping you keep Exordium streamlined? maybe. I dunno.
So far they are most definitely different Shepards, aside from their backgrounds (Soldier-Colonist - Ruthless vs. Vanguard - Spacer - War Hero).
mShenko Shepard has a lot less baggage than Exordium Shepard going into things. He lets go of things more easily, takes more enjoyment from things, has a slower burning fuse, likes practical jokes.
Exordium Shepard is more likely to give you a straight answer but less likely to give a damn about your question. He says more with less, refuses to regret and never gets a good night’s sleep (mShenko Shepard sleeps like the dead. And snores.).
Neither of them can make a pot of coffee to save their lives. Both of them rely on Kaidan as a stabilizing force to keep them from doing something really, really stupid.
So I don’t know either.
I’m going to follow armalis‘s lead, and in lieu of original content, I’ll be reblogging some of my favorite Matthew (Exordium!) Shepard tales in honor of Shepard’s birthday today. Tag for blacklisting purposes is: Matthew Shepard Needs a Hug, or ‘happy shepday 2015′