Mass Effect 2 *spoilers around pg 29/30*

[tmp]

Some of these small missions are very cool though, I'll give them that. Not sure which one I liked the most. Maybe the Justicar's. Maybe Zaeed's too, since that had a pretty clear moral choice angle to it.

I ran Garrus' and Thane's in single run which helped them both i think. Was like a slice from C-Sec life, i got to play both good and bad cop, deal with all sort of threats and the culmination to Garrus' mission was very neat and cinematic.

Others were pretty good too. The email you get after Samara's mission made me smile, the topic et all. Though overall the missions made me scratch my head a little as so many of them (5) deal with parent/offspring conflict in some way; it can start to feel uninspired after a while.

[Merusk]

..and I hate how she looks better in her default outfit than the alternate.

You're insane.  Black leather all the way. Rawr.

I had to restart the suicide mission, and rolled-back to before I had Jack's loyalty since it was my last actual SAVE instead of f-5.  SESE doesn't work if you're only quicksaving.

[stray]

Some of these small missions are very cool though, I'll give them that. Not sure which one I liked the most. Maybe the Justicar's. Maybe Zaeed's too, since that had a pretty clear moral choice angle to it.

I ran Garrus' and Thane's in single run which helped them both i think. Was like a slice from C-Sec life, i got to play both good and bad cop, deal with all sort of threats and the culmination to Garrus' mission was very neat and cinematic.

I like Thane's stuff on the Citadel too. Even though there's a parent/offspring similarity, I liked the unconventional way that Thane's and Samara's stories played out. There wasn't much to the gameplay per se, but the presentation was great.

[TripleDES]

All these nice touches everywhere. Got Garrus first, then took him on the spree to get Mordin. He kinda had a small complaint dragging him into the quarantine zone. 

[Merusk]

Are there any ambient conversations between your party members?  I've had exactly ONE in my game, which is in stark contrast to Dragon's Age.  It was between Garrus and Tali on the Citadel. He asked if she missed the elevator rides and she wound up threatening him with her shotgun.

 Other than that, I've only gotten a few interjections from party members during conversations.  Even then it's not very many.

[Riggswolfe]

Are there any ambient conversations between your party members?  I've had exactly ONE in my game, which is in stark contrast to Dragon's Age.  It was between Garrus and Tali on the Citadel. He asked if she missed the elevator rides and she wound up threatening him with her shotgun.

 Other than that, I've only gotten a few interjections from party members during conversations.  Even then it's not very many.

Yeah, there is a distinct lack of party bantering in this game. It's one of two disappointments I have. (the other being the mining min-game.)

I do like some of the comments party members make during conversations though and I like how it will sometimes actually vary depending on your party makeup.

[Khaldun]

I actually did not mind the minigames, even the mining one, though it gets old pretty quickly.

I agree completely though that the banter between party members was lacking--I would really like to have seen more of that.

[tmp]

Yup, not enough party banter. Maybe they didn't want to detract from background conversations and news reports you get to hear but still it can get quiet sometimes.

At least Garrus had few funny lines about the old times with Shepard in some of the missions.

[Riggswolfe]

I actually did not mind the minigames, even the mining one, though it gets old pretty quickly.

I agree completely though that the banter between party members was lacking--I would really like to have seen more of that.

I'll be blunt, I much prefered the new hacking and decrypting min-games to the Simon Says version from ME1. I also prefered mining to driving around in the Mako. However, mining does get boring. I wish I could do a new game+ and keep all my upgrades. Unfortunately I think you only get to keep your heavy weapons.

[Tarami]

I agree completely though that the banter between party members was lacking--I would really like to have seen more of that.

I think it has to do with recording limitations aswell. Due to the enormous cast (a total of what, 12 fully-voiced party members?) there's a fairly slim chance that you'll combine two that has anything in-character and relevant to say to eachother at any one location. That's why they address you and very rarely eachother. You quickly end up with an inordinate amount of dialogue needing to be recorded just to give each character a couple of back-and-forth lines during missions. You can have some reuse in replies, but that at the same time severely limits possible openers. It's a problem with exponential growth, basically, no matter how clever you try to be about reuse. Each opener takes 11 replies (one for each responding character) and then each character gets an opener each, meaning you have 144 (72 if one-directional) lines of dialogue to record per instance, if you want to ensure a dialogue takes place. If they're supposed to have a couple of lines each, it just gets mind-boggling.

There's also the issue of add-on characters, since adding character A means recording new audio for all the old characters aswell, to give character A something to talk back about. And that's not even considering having to cross-record for each DLC character. It quickly becomes unmanageable, really.

Mass Effect 1 had much fewer characters (6) and so did DA (9 speaking), where DA also let you have three additional members rather than two, which makes it much more likely that two characters in the party have shared dialogue. Both those games had a third of the possible characters in-party at all times, in ME2 you have a sixth of the characters.

Edit: Math optimization.

[Polysorbate80]

Unfortunately I think you only get to keep your heavy weapons.

You actually keep your other weapons, although the upgrades for them have to be reacquired.

This leads to one potential snafu:  I was lugging around the Revenant assault rifle on my second playthrough, and while doing Garrus' recruitment mission I was clicking on all the blue "loot me" squares scattered around the area and picked up the assault rifle in his room.  That swapped me back to that rifle for the rest of the mission until I could get to a terminal to change weapons again.

[caladein]

There's also the issue of add-on characters, since adding character A means recording new audio for all the old characters aswell, to give character A something to talk back about. And that's not even considering having to cross-record for each DLC character. It quickly becomes unmanageable, really.

Oddly enough, Zaeed is the one character I remember spontaneously saying something during a mission (Jack's loyalty).

I ran with Jack and Garrus mostly and they did interact with each other during some of the "Talk to X" triggers.  The one where you first walk into Illium springs to mind as a good one for them.

Edit: Also, the new DLC is up on the Social site.

[Ingmar]

The story complaints fall a little flat for me. This is kind of a Dirty Dozen or Magnificent Seven/Seven Samurai sort of thing (more the former than the latter certainly) - the story in large part *is* assembling the team of people and their individual stories. It isn't the same kind of narrative, and I find it kind of interesting that, for as much complaining as I see about Bioware's '4 planets' formula, as soon as they deviate from it they catch some flak.

[Strazos]

..and I hate how she looks better in her default outfit than the alternate.

You're insane.  Black leather all the way. Rawr.

Don't get me wrong; it's nice, but MUCH more dependent on good lighting. I just think the white outfit has more pop.

Unrelated:

[Phildo]

Has anyone else been unable to get the new DLC?  It's not available when I view the registered game promotions page.

[Ratman_tf]

The story complaints fall a little flat for me. This is kind of a Dirty Dozen or Magnificent Seven/Seven Samurai sort of thing (more the former than the latter certainly) - the story in large part *is* assembling the team of people and their individual stories. It isn't the same kind of narrative, and I find it kind of interesting that, for as much complaining as I see about Bioware's '4 planets' formula, as soon as they deviate from it they catch some flak.

I'd rather have a wide open game, with more sandboxy things to do, but I can't complain about ME2's story. For what it was, it was really good.

Has anyone else been unable to get the new DLC?  It's not available when I view the registered game promotions page.

I just snagged it. PC version here.

[Phildo]

How did you get it?  Was it already there in your available game promotions screen?

[caladein]

Yeah, I just went to the Registered Game Promotions page on the BioWare Social site and it was right there: Cerberus Weapon and Armor (Cerberus Network).

Downloaded and installed it just like the other pieces of DLC.

[Phildo]

OK, I found it now.  I think I was just oblivious to it sitting in between two other things I already downloaded.  Thanks, guys.

[stray]

The story complaints fall a little flat for me. This is kind of a Dirty Dozen or Magnificent Seven/Seven Samurai sort of thing (more the former than the latter certainly) - the story in large part *is* assembling the team of people and their individual stories. It isn't the same kind of narrative, and I find it kind of interesting that, for as much complaining as I see about Bioware's '4 planets' formula, as soon as they deviate from it they catch some flak.

I've never complained about Bioware's stories much. At least not for that reason.

Comparing it to Dirty Dozen is valid though, I suppose.

[Ratman_tf]

OK, I found it now.  I think I was just oblivious to it sitting in between two other things I already downloaded.  Thanks, guys.

I wish they'd at least put 'date uploaded' on those things.

[Venkman]

I JUST went through the Omega portal last night as my final act before bed. Which I wish I didn't do because it was 20 minutes after that when I could finally backup and turn off the computer That was awesome though. I guess it should still be spoilered:


Something about this game has captured me in a way DA:O hasn't, and I thought that game captured me. Wish I coulda gotten past the texture popping of ME1 to see it through.

[tmp]

The story complaints fall a little flat for me. This is kind of a Dirty Dozen or Magnificent Seven/Seven Samurai sort of thing (more the former than the latter certainly) - the story in large part *is* assembling the team of people and their individual stories. It isn't the same kind of narrative, and I find it kind of interesting that, for as much complaining as I see about Bioware's '4 planets' formula, as soon as they deviate from it they catch some flak.

I think the complaint can stem from, by increasing the 4 planets to 11 people (*2) each individual quest you complete feels like less of a milestone. Meaning there's less sense you're progressing towards the end goal where you advance ~5% at a time compared to 25% a pop.

Comparing to Dirty Dozen/Magnificent Seven specifically or even the first ME i think the finale is less poignant because it's pretty easy to avoid any casualties. In ME1 you had to choose someone who'd die and that unavoidable sacrifice had impact. If the ME2 finale was a Dirty Dozen-like bloodbath where you'd need to make similar decisions with say, half of your team guaranteed to bite the dust just to enable you to proceed to the end, it'd leave deeper mark than "and then they proceed to kick ass and lived all happily ever after" you can get easily at the moment.

[Polysorbate80]

In ME1 you had to choose someone who'd die and that unavoidable sacrifice had impact.

Actually, I was happy to throw Kaidan under the bus.  He annoyed me.

[Strazos]

In ME1 you had to choose someone who'd die and that unavoidable sacrifice had impact.

Actually, I was happy to throw Kaidan under the bus.  He annoyed me.

Same.

Also, how do you manage to NOT have everyone survive? Just not doing the loyalty quests? I thought I lost Miranda for a moment...it looked like she got shot, but she popped right back up. I actually exclaimed, "Oh NO FUCKING WAY" when I thought she was going to bite it.

I went around and did everything. I was actually surprised there was not an achievement for going to every planet and such.

[stray]

Kaidan creeped me out.


Back to story... I'm more confused than disappointed. This has some of the best presentation, directing, and cinematics I've seen in awhile, and can be creative in how some missions are carried out (like Thane's son or the Justicar's daughter like I mentioned above..) - and it's a pretty fleshed out world to boot (I mean, someone actually put the time to write descriptions of all of those fucking planets I won't be visiting)... It's just that the overall plot is simplistic in comparison. Call it Dirty Dozen if you will, but I think it could have been a little better. I'm just kind of mixed about it. Didn't like the combat, didn't like the overall story - yet I put in 40 hrs on it.

Maybe I'm just a closet dating sim fan

Speaking of which

[tmp]

Also, how do you manage to NOT have everyone survive? Just not doing the loyalty quests? I thought I lost Miranda for a moment...it looked like she got shot, but she popped right back up. I actually exclaimed, "Oh NO FUCKING WAY" when I thought she was going to bite it.

ways to get people killed:
just in case,

[Riggswolfe]

If the ME2 finale was a Dirty Dozen-like bloodbath where you'd need to make similar decisions with say, half of your team guaranteed to bite the dust just to enable you to proceed to the end, it'd leave deeper mark than "and then they proceed to kick ass and lived all happily ever after" you can get easily at the moment.

You know, I kept thinking this was going to happen. For instance:

[tmp]

You know, I kept thinking this was going to happen.

To be fair all these instances you list can end with someone dying, it depends on who is selected for the tasks and/or whether they're loyal or not. But since all these deaths are avoidable, it's not too hard to get through the whole mission with barely any casualties if at all as long as you simply play through the whole game... which well, makes it seem quite less suicidal mission than it was supposed to be.

[Riggswolfe]

You know, I kept thinking this was going to happen.

To be fair all these instances you list can end with someone dying, it depends on who is selected for the tasks and/or whether they're loyal or not. But since all these deaths are avoidable, it's not too hard to get through the whole mission with barely any casualties if at all as long as you simply play through the whole game... which well, makes it seem quite less suicidal mission than it was supposed to be.

Yeah, I know. Basically if you use any kind of strategy and actually pay attention to what your people are supposed to be good at as well as the loyalty missions and upgrades it's trivially easy not to have any casualties. I just kind of wish it wasn't. I'd have loved if the suicide mission had had moments where you were in a Virmire type situation. I could easily see this:

Shepard: "I need to pick five of you to guard this door until this mission is over. The odds are you won't make it. I choose..." <squad selection screen comes up.> Shepard gives a rousing speech.

Then the rest of the mission has intermittent cutscenes showing what's happening with that team. A couple of them die bravely. Then at the end, during the final run, the last three decide to hold the line so Shepard and the others can make it to the Normandy.

That would have been awesome, if not painful because I was attached to the characters. I honestly think Bioware didn't do it because they feared fan backlash. Too many people would have bitched "I did everything and still lost people!"

[Polysorbate80]

First playthrough, Jack lost her loyalty after her tiff with Miranda, and she was the only disloyal character going into the suicide mission.  I expected her to die, and I was okay with that--her personality is a mess I don't want to clean up.

Bitch went and lived :P  I was actually a little disappointed.

[Strazos]

Same here...I couldn't quite eek out those last few Paragon points to bring her back into the fold, but she lived anyway.

[Ratman_tf]

Same here...I couldn't quite eek out those last few Paragon points to bring her back into the fold, but she lived anyway.

Heh. I lost her twice. Lost Jack's loyalty and tried to get it back by replaying from an old save. Still didn't have enough Paragon. And the first time I lost her on the ship because I didn't have the armor upgrade.

My first playthrough didn't have max Paragon. I like to take each decision as it comes. My 2nd playthrough I'm just mindlesslely clicking the blue options, and hitting the spoiler sites so I can hit a 100% playthrough.

[Shrike]

I had some minor casualty issues with my first renegade run. Initially, I was losing Thane, but I was sending him in through the ducts, which was an obvious--if understandable--mistake. Legion stepped up and that issue disappeared, but then I kept losing Jack as the biotic cover on the offteam. Whatever the reason may have been, she simply couldn't cover the other team without dying. So. Mirandi gets the assignment and everything goes swimmingly, even to a pefect end (from my point of view, anyway).

Guess we know who would have won that biotic catfight in Miranda's quarters!

[Polysorbate80]