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beccatoriaSo, for the few people out there who know what I'm talking about, I'm replaying Mass Effect 3 as a Renegade (mostly) this time, and I just got to Tuchanka and was pretty blown away by how differently it plays and the way it still manages to maintain a sense of, well, making sense. I also am now a total emotional wreck.
My heart belongs forever to the Geth and the Quarians, but frankly, the scenario construction in the resolution of the Genophage plot on Tuchanka is jaw-droppingly sublime. I'm replaying it as a Renegade now, and honestly, I often end up playing my Renegade Shepard as more of a Renegon because there are some Renegade choices I find either psychotic or dumb. Avoiding that is what Tuchanka manages to do so well. I just killed Mordin, my best friend. I shot him in the back. But I understand why I did it. I get it. It's cruel and horrible and hollow and paternalistic, but it made sense because this Shepard genuinely believed that curing the genophage would lead to either an explosion of starving Krogan on a devastated world, or a war of expansion that would leave an already devastated galaxy helpless. That this situation was Wrex's heartbeat away from happening.
And omfg afterwards, when everyone says the same freaking things to me in congratulations, but it feels so completely different because I'm lying to every one of them. I just did the most dishonourable, cruel thing in my career.
I really wasn't expecting it to play so differently. Particularly the way Wrex treats you if you destroyed Maelon's data.
I just...I feel awful, but the whole thing... it felt like a greek tragedy, spiralling out of control as Shepard got more and more desperate until it came to that moment:
Your honour, or Salarian support? Your honesty, or Krogan support? Your best friend, now, or the lives of millions, maybe, later? And Mordin's walking away, right now, and you don't have time. You have to make the choice. Everything Mordin said when chasing down Maelon, then, or his final, guilty explosion, now?
I just think it's a real masterpiece of scenario construction. And stuff.
My heart belongs forever to the Geth and the Quarians, but frankly, the scenario construction in the resolution of the Genophage plot on Tuchanka is jaw-droppingly sublime. I'm replaying it as a Renegade now, and honestly, I often end up playing my Renegade Shepard as more of a Renegon because there are some Renegade choices I find either psychotic or dumb. Avoiding that is what Tuchanka manages to do so well. I just killed Mordin, my best friend. I shot him in the back. But I understand why I did it. I get it. It's cruel and horrible and hollow and paternalistic, but it made sense because this Shepard genuinely believed that curing the genophage would lead to either an explosion of starving Krogan on a devastated world, or a war of expansion that would leave an already devastated galaxy helpless. That this situation was Wrex's heartbeat away from happening.
And omfg afterwards, when everyone says the same freaking things to me in congratulations, but it feels so completely different because I'm lying to every one of them. I just did the most dishonourable, cruel thing in my career.
I really wasn't expecting it to play so differently. Particularly the way Wrex treats you if you destroyed Maelon's data.
I just...I feel awful, but the whole thing... it felt like a greek tragedy, spiralling out of control as Shepard got more and more desperate until it came to that moment:
Your honour, or Salarian support? Your honesty, or Krogan support? Your best friend, now, or the lives of millions, maybe, later? And Mordin's walking away, right now, and you don't have time. You have to make the choice. Everything Mordin said when chasing down Maelon, then, or his final, guilty explosion, now?
I just think it's a real masterpiece of scenario construction. And stuff.
