30 Days of Mass Effect: Days 22 & 23
Jul. 3rd, 2013 09:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccatoriaMOAR ALL AT ONCE.
Hardest part of the game.
Well, I generally shift the difficulty rating down low enough I can play casually (though GO ME, I'm finally actually upping the difficulty level and you know, it's not so bad), so difficult in terms of getting killed all the time?
I find the stuff in the Mako when you have to shoot at stuff in general kind of frustrating because I'm just not good at aiming that thing. I find the targeting reticule often blends into the background and I really miss the ability to panic pause the game with the power-wheel. But dudes, I find it easier to get OUT of the car and take on Geth Armatures or even a Colossus on FOOT when you can't even get hit once without dying, than I do to kill them in the Mako sometimes because I'm that bad at it. Plus doing it that way gives extra XP.
But also, shout out to Kai Leng's final bossfight in ME3. Because I don't so much have actual difficulty beating him as I just think it's a poorly designed fight that's predicated on boring powers. He just...freezes up and becomes immune to everything to recharge a set number of times, which like, fine, okay I guess, except it doesn't feel like I can really tell if I'm hurting him or wearing him down in between because he's so flippy and hard to grab. So you just swap the annoyance of swatting and swatting at something ineffectively with the frustration of not being able to affect something at all. It's alternately annoying and boring and you're fighting a character who's already annoying and boring. It's just a bad combination all around.
I still think the role of Kai Leng should either have been given to Shepard's clone, brought to "life" after Cerberus fell down the well of indoctrination from top to bottom, to sow propaganda and dissent, or it should have been an indoctrinated Jacob, who, depending on loyalty and romance situation, you have to kill him, or you can talk him into regaining control of himself long enough to rescue him and put him in stasis til the Reapers are beaten. Cus GAH imagine if Jacob killed Miranda. We would have cared about what happened so much more than Kai Leng. We would have cared about Jacob more because Jacob is basically the One Stable Person on the Normandy in ME2, but now he actually needs us. And The Illusive Man would have been brutalising one of our friends, exploiting him against us in a terrible and cruel way. And it certainly would have been a more dramatically substantive role for Jacob than the one he got, you know, the...side-mission one-off, "Hey Shepard, look! I still exist! Laters!"
23. Saddest Moment of the Game.
Wait, I get one?! Can I pick, like, the entirety of Mass Effect 3?
No, but really, I think one of the reasons that I love the third game so much is the way it manages to achieve such a consistent, underlying tone of quiet sorrow. I never was a huge fan of the "GIVE THEM HELL!" military bravado stuff, but in this game it all felt like a desperate piece of self-deception. Hackett keeps talking about needing to "increase the tempo" of the war and "chalk up some wins" or it won't go well for us, and I'm like, Space Dad, it's okay, you can just admit we're fucked. Honestly, we'll both feel better for it.
In terms of specific moments, I think Shepard closing her eyes as the boy's shuttle gets downed, paired with her simple, quiet description of that event to Garrus, later, is really affecting. Likewise after Thessia when she is avoiding that call to the Asari Councillor. And, of course, the final scene with Anderson. I think Jennifer Hale's delivery was just perfect in this scene. It's one of those scenes that I find iconic for Femshep, I think, because of the way Anderson subs in "son" for "child", which I wish were a unisex line because "child" is so much more tender and devastating. And then, Hale's almost murmured, exhausted, "Thank you, sir." You know she's devastated by his death, but also, there is nothing left to do or say.
If I had to pick only one, though, it would be Thane's death. I've spoken about it before in this meme. But. "Goodbye, Thane. You won't be alone long."
Hardest part of the game.
Well, I generally shift the difficulty rating down low enough I can play casually (though GO ME, I'm finally actually upping the difficulty level and you know, it's not so bad), so difficult in terms of getting killed all the time?
I find the stuff in the Mako when you have to shoot at stuff in general kind of frustrating because I'm just not good at aiming that thing. I find the targeting reticule often blends into the background and I really miss the ability to panic pause the game with the power-wheel. But dudes, I find it easier to get OUT of the car and take on Geth Armatures or even a Colossus on FOOT when you can't even get hit once without dying, than I do to kill them in the Mako sometimes because I'm that bad at it. Plus doing it that way gives extra XP.
But also, shout out to Kai Leng's final bossfight in ME3. Because I don't so much have actual difficulty beating him as I just think it's a poorly designed fight that's predicated on boring powers. He just...freezes up and becomes immune to everything to recharge a set number of times, which like, fine, okay I guess, except it doesn't feel like I can really tell if I'm hurting him or wearing him down in between because he's so flippy and hard to grab. So you just swap the annoyance of swatting and swatting at something ineffectively with the frustration of not being able to affect something at all. It's alternately annoying and boring and you're fighting a character who's already annoying and boring. It's just a bad combination all around.
I still think the role of Kai Leng should either have been given to Shepard's clone, brought to "life" after Cerberus fell down the well of indoctrination from top to bottom, to sow propaganda and dissent, or it should have been an indoctrinated Jacob, who, depending on loyalty and romance situation, you have to kill him, or you can talk him into regaining control of himself long enough to rescue him and put him in stasis til the Reapers are beaten. Cus GAH imagine if Jacob killed Miranda. We would have cared about what happened so much more than Kai Leng. We would have cared about Jacob more because Jacob is basically the One Stable Person on the Normandy in ME2, but now he actually needs us. And The Illusive Man would have been brutalising one of our friends, exploiting him against us in a terrible and cruel way. And it certainly would have been a more dramatically substantive role for Jacob than the one he got, you know, the...side-mission one-off, "Hey Shepard, look! I still exist! Laters!"
23. Saddest Moment of the Game.
Wait, I get one?! Can I pick, like, the entirety of Mass Effect 3?
No, but really, I think one of the reasons that I love the third game so much is the way it manages to achieve such a consistent, underlying tone of quiet sorrow. I never was a huge fan of the "GIVE THEM HELL!" military bravado stuff, but in this game it all felt like a desperate piece of self-deception. Hackett keeps talking about needing to "increase the tempo" of the war and "chalk up some wins" or it won't go well for us, and I'm like, Space Dad, it's okay, you can just admit we're fucked. Honestly, we'll both feel better for it.
In terms of specific moments, I think Shepard closing her eyes as the boy's shuttle gets downed, paired with her simple, quiet description of that event to Garrus, later, is really affecting. Likewise after Thessia when she is avoiding that call to the Asari Councillor. And, of course, the final scene with Anderson. I think Jennifer Hale's delivery was just perfect in this scene. It's one of those scenes that I find iconic for Femshep, I think, because of the way Anderson subs in "son" for "child", which I wish were a unisex line because "child" is so much more tender and devastating. And then, Hale's almost murmured, exhausted, "Thank you, sir." You know she's devastated by his death, but also, there is nothing left to do or say.
If I had to pick only one, though, it would be Thane's death. I've spoken about it before in this meme. But. "Goodbye, Thane. You won't be alone long."
no subject
Date: 2013-07-04 01:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-04 08:14 pm (UTC)I'm really glad you're enjoying the posts - I've really been enjoying making them. It's...satisfying to set out all my thoughts on a ton of different stuff, and so awesome to hear that you're enjoying reading it. :D
(Plus I think it's less that you're a slow reader and more that I wrote a LOT!)
Anyway, you don't need to worry, I might not be the fastest at it, but I'll definitely be finishing the meme. :) Here's hoping it continues to entertain!
no subject
Date: 2013-07-06 07:57 pm (UTC)Man, that would've been a gut punch. I really like Jacob (although not as a romance option), and dude. I would've felt that. I thought he got short shrift with that side mission (as did Grunt, but I enjoyed Grunt's mission more).
no subject
Date: 2013-07-07 08:22 pm (UTC)Because at the moment, as you say, he feels like an unimportant cameo. Jack, Samara and Grunt get the same amount of actual attention in the game but the "homes" they'd found (or in Samara's case, the resolution) felt more, idk, integral to their characters because they had clear needs and conflicts to resolve. Jacob's decision to help the ex-Cerberus scientists was certainly apt, but didn't have the emotional power of Samara reuniting with her child, Grunt finding acceptance with his people or Jack bonding with young biotic kids.
And there's just...gotta be a way to include him in a more emotionally satisfying way, and Kai Leng is there as a giant miscasting, but someone has to fill that role. And I think the war for Jacob's soul could have been a really compelling way to slap us all and pay attention to how much we actually did care about him. The guy you thought was stable and safe enough not to worry about.
no subject
Date: 2013-07-10 07:42 pm (UTC)And I think the war for Jacob's soul could have been a really compelling way to slap us all and pay attention to how much we actually did care about him. The guy you thought was stable and safe enough not to worry about.
Definitely. It would've made more sense. And if someone wrote that story, I would totally read it.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-22 02:40 pm (UTC)*cries with laughter* ARE YOU ME
(I was so upset by having to staff gun turrets in ME3 cuz NO WHEEL. Like it wasn't actually hard, it was just upsetting to have to get through a whole fight sequence with no wheel.)
no subject
Date: 2016-11-22 02:43 pm (UTC)