Mass Effect 2 *spoilers around pg 29/30*

[Lakov_Sanite]

I thought Zaheed was almost good but the fact he had no dialogue on the ship really bothered me, oh he talked about his guns but they werent real conversations.

[Velorath]

I thought Zaheed was almost good but the fact he had no dialogue on the ship really bothered me, oh he talked about his guns but they werent real conversations.

That didn't bother me too much.  I think the biggest problem was that there was no recruitment mission for him.  As soon as you step onto Omega he's just there and ready to work for you.

[Koyasha]

I thought Zaheed was almost good but the fact he had no dialogue on the ship really bothered me, oh he talked about his guns but they werent real conversations.

I heard (been looking for a source, but can't find it) that Kasumi will also have no dialogue on the Normandy.  If this is so, I certainly won't be buying her.  I don't really want another character I can't actually converse with.

[Njal]

That didn't bother me too much.  I think the biggest problem was that there was no recruitment mission for him.  As soon as you step onto Omega he's just there and ready to work for you.

That doesn't bother me after all he is a merc. I find it a bit refreshing that you don't have to go through a mission to get all your team members. The no dialog is a bummer though.

[rk47]

Wow. I don't even understand why they think we want to buy a japanese space ninja when the game's finished.
D- for effort. Why not create a danger room DLC where Shep can just play survival mode against re-spawning enemies to experiment with weapons and powers? I don't mind paying $5 for that.

[Ratman_tf]

Wow. I don't even understand why they think we want to buy a japanese space ninja when the game's finished.
D- for effort.

This is my thought. I've finished the game 3 times now. I'm not eager to go back at some arbitrary point for a DLC character.

[tmp]

I heard (been looking for a source, but can't find it) that Kasumi will also have no dialogue on the Normandy.  If this is so, I certainly won't be buying her.  I don't really want another character I can't actually converse with.

Perhaps they'll make up for it by allowing to invite her to your quarters afterwards for some co-op dance with Kelly...

[Venkman]

Wow. I don't even understand why they think we want to buy a japanese space ninja when the game's finished.
D- for effort.

Probably just adding another character for 3. If you don't buy it, you do the quest in 3 to get her/loyalty maybe. But if you do buy her before, you have a (probably really slight) headstart or something.

Other stuff:

I don't think TiM is a Saren-style Reaper sympathizer/agent. Having just finished ME1, Cerberus seemed to be trying to find ways to fast track human evolution. He's not a nice guy and definitely has a master race agenda about him. But the Reaper don't need to be that subtle about their 50k cycle given the footage at the end of 2. They've got more than enough ships.

Dan Simmons' Hyperion series has a moment pretty much like that. Could make for a really poignant conclusion to the series: convincing all the various races that they'll have to say farewell to each other and give up FTL for now until someone comes up with a different FTL tech.

That's a pretty interesting reference, and the subsequent posts add more credence to it. Memory is vague here, but the point of the Hyperion series was that Humanity's ongoing need to move faster than evolution/nature would let us has always come with major compromises. Human-created ftl communications were effectively slicing through purgatory, human-created AI developed flt travel that basically turned everyone into husks, all sorts of European-vs-Natives/Avatar/Dances with Wolves stuff.

However, as others have said, the price to fix it doesn't need to be giving up ftl and galactic civilizations. Not like that prevents the 50k cycle. Reapers don't need you to use the tech to come in and wipe planets out one by one. So they could go with the Hyperion-series finale of humanity having arrived at the "right" way to do things, (even if I thought it was a bit L Ron Hubbard about it).

[tmp]

I don't think TiM is a Saren-style Reaper sympathizer/agent.

I chalk up the eye implant thing to the shortage of art assets than anything else. Much like there's only one kind of garment for civilian human females to wear all over the galaxy, there's apparently only one model of eye implants.

The 'reaper agent' theory makes very little sense when you consider TIM prevented the Collectors from acquiring Shepard's body in the first place and spent pretty much whole ME2 trying to get access to their base and technology. Something the supposed agent shouldn't have a problem with whatsoever -- it's like having James Bond spend whole movie trying to break into MI6 quarters while he's active agent in her majesty's service.

[Lantyssa]

You mean like in Quantum of Solace?

[tmp]

That's why i put that while still active part but it was kinda badly worded; and yes with Bond it is indeed hard to tell sometimes

[Ingmar]

Wow. I don't even understand why they think we want to buy a japanese space ninja when the game's finished.
D- for effort. Why not create a danger room DLC where Shep can just play survival mode against re-spawning enemies to experiment with weapons and powers? I don't mind paying $5 for that.

You mean like the awful second DLC for ME1? I'd much much rather have a new character to mess around with, personally.

[Fabricated]

I don't think TiM is a Saren-style Reaper sympathizer/agent.

I chalk up the eye implant thing to the shortage of art assets than anything else. Much like there's only one kind of garment for civilian human females to wear all over the galaxy, there's apparently only one model of eye implants.

The 'reaper agent' theory makes very little sense when you consider TIM prevented the Collectors from acquiring Shepard's body in the first place and spent pretty much whole ME2 trying to get access to their base and technology. Something the supposed agent shouldn't have a problem with whatsoever -- it's like having James Bond spend whole movie trying to break into MI6 quarters while he's active agent in her majesty's service.

Seeing as how the N7 Armor on legion thing turned out I think it's more along the lines of art people not really getting that art needs to make sense within the context of a story rather than just being super-fukkin-cool™ for cool's sake (Writer: but Legion is still supposed to be an essentially emotionless AI, why the fuck would it need to be sentimental?   Artist: Awwww it looks coooool and I drew it already...I mean, have you seen our promo art? I mean, you put that on the box and people are gonna be, "oh shit, gotta buy that." Writer: ugh.). It's not cool to have the Illusive Man just be some old dude sitting in a pointlessly artistic backdrop, he needs to have glowy eyes too just in case you were too dumb to figure out, "hey, that guy's important and mysterious!"

Also it looks better on marketing material.

Also also, Commander Shepard is a jerk. I just never like playing the asshole in a tophat in Bioware games, but man ME2's renegade lines are the best.

[Venkman]

From a creative standpoint, I can't see how such a pinnacle character would get such a defining feature merely because that's the one texture file they had on hand. You do that shit for the rank and file losers hanging out in the lower decks of Omega, or the random non-interactives on Ilium or Citadel. You don't pull the limited-resources card on a character you feature in closeups for tens of minutes of cutscenes.

Or, well, I wouldn't anyway

[tmp]

From a creative standpoint, I can't see how such a pinnacle character would get such a defining feature merely because that's the one texture file they had on hand.

I'd look at it this way -- the implant thing alone is distinct enough and rare feature as it is, so he doesn't actually need a custom texture to stand out. That the texture would cause some people who pay too much attention to the smallest details come up with a conspiracy theory, well; they'd come up with that anyway based on the implants alone. It'd be just then even more elaborate and include theory how his implants are visually different to throw people off and make the link not-so-obvious

[Venkman]

Or about how all eye-implant folks are Reaper agents or that the developers got lazy|cheap on the texture maps?
 

[Bunk]

I'm a little suprised at all the negativity towards Zaeed. Yea, would have been nice to have proper dialog on the ship, but he's got plenty of interaction on various missions and his loyalty mission was decent. He fit perfectly in to my renegade playthrough as my anti-synthetic squadmate option.

[caladein]

If you don't have him in your party I guess there really doesn't seem to be anything there.  I used him through the first half of the game along with Jack and found him pretty solid.

Honestly, I felt that all the characters were lacking in on-ship conversations so Zaeed just seemed to be more a matter of degree than an actual omission.

[Ingmar]

He needs a musical number obviously.

[Kitsune]

So, I was thinking about Liara being fucking insane all of a sudden in ME2, and it struck me abruptly that one thing would provide a good motivation to both make her completely homicidal and not be telling Shepard why: dead blue Shepard baby.  She had Shepard's kid while he was dead, and something the shadow broker did got the kid killed.  This of course hinges on Shepard having gone all James T. Kirk on Liara in ME1, but it gives Liara's actions in ME2 a new spin that makes her seem vastly less psycho in the balance.

[Reg]

If you ask her the right questions she explains why she hates the shadow broker so much. It's really easy to miss asking them though and without that explanation her actions really do make no sense at all.

[Koyasha]

I didn't really have any issues with Liara's personality or obsession with the Shadow Broker.  People get obsessed about things sometimes, Liara was young and Shepard was perhaps one of the only people she'd opened up to and gotten close to - especially with the mind-meld thing - and after losing her, then having the Shadow Broker try to sell the body to the collectors, plus the things that went wrong while she was getting the body back, she has enough reason to be a little obsessed with the Shadow Broker.

What did bug me is the way she kind of ignored Shepard...y'know...being there, especially if she was the ME1 love interest.  A lot more dialogue would have been plenty in order to make her feel completely appropriate, in my opinion.  They could have talked, done something other than a few lines of strained dialogue and some sidequests.  Even a fade-to-black dinner and more like with Kelly would have been a lot better than what we got.  Ok, they're being recorded on ilium maybe, probably, whatever (and really, how the hell can you be an information broker if you can't keep your own damn office clear of listening devices) but it's not like I wanted to discuss ultra-sensitive seekrit topics.

[Shrike]

There's a rumor going around the O-fficial forums--and some evidence found in the PC game files--that there'll be some paid DLC involving Liara and the Shadowbroker storyline. It's seriously spoilerific, including the identity of the Shadowbroker. I haven't looked/listened to this stuff since I'd like it to be an ingame surprise. From what little I have seen, it seems like it might address the issues brought up here.

Personally, in my save games, I can't stand Liara (renegade), or barely tolerate her foolishness (paragon) and have kept her at arms length as much as possible. I'd like to keep it that way.

[Lakov_Sanite]

if it's dlc then that's kind of bullshit. The whole shadow broker storyline was a recurring thread in the first and second game and to resolve it in dlc instead of mass effect 3 is a lame money grab. I'm really tired of people thinking anyone gives a good god damn about expanded universe shit. Sure it worked for star wars but while mass effects is a great game i dont want to have to read comics/novels/download dlc and get an iphone app just to know how the fucking story turned out.

[Polysorbate80]

Ok, they're being recorded on ilium maybe, probably, whatever (and really, how the hell can you be an information broker if you can't keep your own damn office clear of listening devices) but it's not like I wanted to discuss ultra-sensitive seekrit topics.

Well, her assistant is actually working for the broker, and Liara doesn't figure it out on her own.  She's definitely got some things to learn :P

[LK]

This game has done a better job than most of breaking the prejudice I have about how Bioware conversations between two people involve them standing there and doing a back and forth. Characters move around, assume different poses, fidget convincingly while speaking. It's great.

Mordin's writer is fucking brilliant. The writing quality overall seems improved, though there are instances where Shepard seems to lack common sense or forget things previously mentioned.

The missions feel like episodes in a high-quality television series. It does help that the situations and morality explored plays out as some damn fine science fiction. Also, there are interesting characters that appear to have full backgrounds and lots of dialog options that go nowhere, like the butch asari bartender in Eternity on Illum.

[caladein]

This game has done a better job than most of breaking the prejudice I have about how Bioware conversations between two people involve them standing there and doing a back and forth. Characters move around, assume different poses, fidget convincingly while speaking. It's great.

Yeah, going from Mass Effect 2 to the Dragon Age expansion has me noticing every "turn to face character" animation something fierce.

[taolurker]

BTW, Right now you can get ME2 from Gametap for 29.95... Don't know how long this will last, but I hope it will be there next week when I have funds in the bank.

[Lantyssa]

I didn't really have any issues with Liara's personality or obsession with the Shadow Broker.  People get obsessed about things sometimes, Liara was young and Shepard was perhaps one of the only people she'd opened up to and gotten close to - especially with the mind-meld thing - and after losing her, then having the Shadow Broker try to sell the body to the collectors, plus the things that went wrong while she was getting the body back, she has enough reason to be a little obsessed with the Shadow Broker.

You only know that if you ask the right questions at the right time.  There are two or three other times if you go down that conversation tree, you lock yourself out of learning any of that.

[caladein]

Hammerhead gameplay footage.  Honestly, I think I'd rather have more regular side quests added.  Not that this looks bad or anything, but I'm hoping there's at least some story involved in the Hammerhead missions and that it isn't all just flying around spastically and shooting stuff.

On the same day that the Hammerhead stuff comes out, March 23, the ME2 site says they're releasing an alternate costume pack for $2 (or whatever 160 MS/BW points are for you).  I haven't seen anything on it aside from a tweet on the BioWare account today, so uh, yeah.


I quite like that Jack costume although I'd have to see in-game shots of the shades to see if they ruin it or not.

Edit: Quoted the wrong Velorath post.

[Fabricated]

Reminds me of the horse armor thing from Oblivion. Pointless.

[Engels]

At least the Oblivion horse armor looked cool and significantly changed appearances. Jack looks like a bosnian refugee. Now she looks like a bosnian refugee with tinfoil on her eyes. Yay?

[Khaldun]

Wow, $2 to make Jack look like she's having her identity protected in an incriminating pedo video. Joy.

[Nightblade]

Wow, $2 to make Jack look like she's having her identity protected in an incriminating pedo video. Joy.

It looks more like a piece of duct tape over her eyes. The outfit was fine, what Im assuming is supposed to be a visor was too much.

[Ingmar]

It is kind of odd that they're charging for the cosmetic stuff but giving content away for free.