In Progress Let's Play Mass Effect 3: Emotional Engagements

[RK47]

 

[Jaedar]

You should take Garrus

 

[TNO]

Loving the capsule reviews of the NPCs, RK-47.

Edit: It is notable how almost all the romances you get score really highly on the wagsty/whiteknight scale. "Oh Protaganist! Listen to my stories of woe and pick the top right dialogue option and we can have the lovemaking cutscene! We can even put on Coldplay's 'fix you'" I mean FFS:


Liara: 10/10 Mummy issues in the first game, sheperd attachments in the next two, all the drippy shtick about finding it hard to deal with people and being pathetic.

Tali: 9/10 Daddy issues in the second game, also behaves like a bit of a drip. One point deducted for being not a complete ball of wagnst before romancing.

Jack: 8/10 Evil bitch, but, no, wait! Turns out she has security issues after all! Complete with wagnsty tears before you consummate your paragon romance.

Ashley: 4/10 Fairly unwagsty barring the daddy issues --> why I'm not a fan of aliens, but bioware chickened out on portraying a less-than-angelic-waifu romance option and just airbrushed out her character in ME3.

Miranda: 4/10 Also fairly unwangsty despite daddy issues, although you get a bit of 'but I'm just my genetic modifications' stuff in ME2. Bioware also creeps a little bit further towards less-than-angelic-waifu with her arrogance and bitchiness. Unsurprisingly the least popular romance amongst bioware gamers.

Traynor, Chambers: 1/10 No real wangst because the characters aren't fleshed out enough. I'd bet loads if they had more screen time Bioware would conjure up some massive trauma for the protagonist to play therapist to.

Steve: 7/10 "Steve don't let me be an Anchor!" +/- standard bereavement shtick.


And now for Femshep

Kaidan: 8/10 Hello Carth Onasi. Oh, you childhood friend got beaten up? I feel your pain. At least you stop being such a whiny beta loser in ME3.

Thane: 10/10 Wangsty solipcism + Terminal disease + Trying to save his estranged son! Also get teary wagst scene just before sexing, because everyone knows that discussing emotional trauma is perfect foreplay.

Garrus: 1/10 Happily unwagsty throughout the entire series. No childhood traumas, from a well-adjusted family, doesn't go emo over his disfigurement, keeps his head when palaven gets attacked, and generally acts like a proper bro.



I mean, if someone you knew in real life kept chasing after all the folks with deep seated emotional trauma, you'd take that as a pretty fucked-up fetish. That bioware writers struggle to conceive of romances not being built on a foundation of lay-therapy sessions (or that the gamers love them so avidly) says a lot about some weird freudian psyche hackery.

 

[PlanHex]

Steven Heck would severely disapprove of Shep's sudden outburst of "STEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!1111".



Great to have you back on this LP, RK47. Keep 'em coming!

 

[RK47]

The sad part is my first name is Steve. That adds to the lulz factor.

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

Jacob is a 0/10 then. He's called 'bland' because he's the only normal character in the crew. Biodrones mostly hate him because Femshep acts like a horny teenager around him.

His "brutha from tha hood, yo" mannerisms kinda made him an immature douche, to be honest. And his "we have to rescue daddy or I can't concentrate on saving the galaxy" schtick didn't add any charm, either.
If we held the Least Shitty ME Character Princess pageant, I'd still give Garrus the crown for being the most 'normal' human among the whole bunch of teenage misfits. Well, as close to 'normal' as biowarian characters go.

 

[BrotherFrank]

I'm genuinely shocked Big Ben is still standing and apparently in fine condition despite London apparently having gotten the worst of the fighting on Earth, and reapers had like what, a week or however long Sheperd's been flying around the galaxy to do some damage?

The aliens from Independance Day got more shit done.

 

[sea]

I'm genuinely shocked Big Ben is still standing and apparently in fine condition despite London apparently having gotten the worst of the fighting on Earth, and reapers had like what, a week or however long Sheperd's been flying around the galaxy to do some damage?

The aliens from Independance Day got more shit done.

Well duh, how are the Americans going to know they're in London if they can't see Big Ben? The Reapers were very considerate to avoid destroying national landmarks.

 

[TNO]

Oh, I forgot Jacob, how remiss of me! He probably gets a 1ish. His daddy quest doesn't provoke massive daddy issues. I agree that bioware keeps messing up the pitch from 'happens to be black' to ebonics spewing brutha. As another testament to Bioware's commitment to diversity and not riffing off unfortunate racial stereotype:

Spoiler

If you romance Jacob in ME2, in ME3 you find out he has shacked up with someone else after a couple of months whilst Femshep was in prison, and the subplot ends with him fathering a child with this other woman. You can imagine the squee teenybopper butthurt.

 

[Stereotypical Villain]

Brudda in't got to make no excuses to da white womyn.

 

[Ion Prothon II]

That's it RK47, now prepare for sanity loss. The most logical and coherent scenes of game are behind you now.

 

[lightbane]

The Reapers sure got weaker and weaker. Right now you one-shooted one like it wasn't a big deal... Which makes the endings even more sillier (especially considering these last conversations with your companions).

PS: It seems that Liara wasn't joking when she said that thing about embracing Eternity.

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

That's it RK47, now prepare for sanity loss. The most logical and coherent scenes of game are behind you now.

Unfortunately, after watching the endings on YT, they appear to have added retconned some explanation to the final events. Still derpy as fuck, but the exposition simply ruined Bioware's original trolling vision. The initial, Shriveled Cut was much more "What the shit just happened? "-worthy.

 

[RK47]

The rest of the team ending up just masturbating with the rest of the Alliance forces while Shep takes just two seems retarded IMO.
What happened to Suicide Run?

 

[Ulminati]

Ah yes... "Common sense".

 

[RK47]

ur rite. im stuped

 

[RK47]

 

[lightbane]

I think I already asked you about it, but would you kindly mention the songs' names?

Shitty speech is shitty. The Parangon option is talking about the bloody Power of friendship/Strength of Bonds, seriously? That only works (not) in (bad) anime. Plus Shepard suddenly becomes schizophrenic if you randomly change to the Renegade option.

Lastly but not least, I don't know much about hi-tech military gear, but is a guidance system really necessary for targets that are big as a bloody skyscraper? What about manual aim?

 

[913]

I think I already asked you about it, but would you kindly mention the songs' names?

Shitty speech is shitty. The Parangon option is talking about the bloody Power of friendship/Strength of Bonds, seriously? That only works (not) in (bad) anime. Plus Shepard suddenly becomes schizophrenic if you randomly change to the Renegade option.

Lastly but not least, I don't know much about hi-tech military gear, but is a guidance system really necessary for targets that are big as a bloody skyscraper? What about manual aim?

"it's too close to the beam"

 

[RK47]

Sorry bout that, I used mostly
Two Steps from Hell Track
-Black Blade
-United We Stand
-Protectors of Earth
and ripped one from Republic Commando : Vode Ahn,
and....the briefing was accompanied by Battlefield 3 Theme.

Schizo? I honestly felt Shepard treat his friends differently - comrades as you call em. 'I' would refer to Ash & James as 'Soldiers' But Garrus, Liara and Tali? These guys for their own reasons, are not 'soldiers'. Hence the Paragon pick Sorry if it sounds stupid - but Friendship is magic, bronies.

Also:

What about manual aim?

"Use the Force, Luke"

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

The bravery of comrades in arms valiantly attacking the raeper with rifles touched me to the bottom of my spleen...

 

[BrotherFrank]

I think the Asari kinda fucked up in not checking firesupport was available BEFORE she ordered those ambushing infantry to open fire and reveal their positions to the giant death machine.

Though if it's the same asari who stopped talking randomly before looking up to the reaper about to lazor her, then i guess she just has a flair for the dramatic.

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

Question is: what were they trying to achieve - at all - with their rifles, fire support or no? It's like calling an artillery strike, then heroically charging a tank with a bowie knife.

 

[RK47]

i'd love to post an update today, but i just reached home at 11 pm and i gotta start work at 9 am tomorrow. so.. yeah. Sorry folks.
I was out all evening with a friend. We played Saints Row 3 co-op over LAN. That was awesome.

 

[BrotherFrank]

Question is: what were they trying to achieve - at all - with their rifles, fire support or no? It's like calling an artillery strike, then heroically charging a tank with a bowie knife.

Well I'm no tactical genius like Anderson is so it's possible the nuances of the plan escapes me, but it seemed that it was the cannon fodder's job to distract the reaper whilst the fire support (those tanks the cannon fodder had been escorting up to this point, armed with thanix missiles if i recall which lore wise is based on reaper tech and one of the few weapons that can consistenly hurt reapers) take advantage of the cannon fodder's destruction to target the reaper without getting 1 shotted by the lazors.

Only asari was a noob and didn't check the tanks were in position (or that they could even fire?) so just wasted loads of Rk47's precious war assets.

The alternative explanation is: like heroically charging a tank with a knife, it's done for maximum emotional engagement