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Gordon Shumway posted:You've got some good advice on this already, but I'm gonna suggest that you should do Admiral Kahoku's side quest if you want your first exposure to Cerberus. Depending on if you stumble across it while searching for Liara or talking to Dr. Michel, it'll initially look like a normal UNC or Citadel side quest. I found this guy in the Council Chambers on the way to try and get Saren busted for being a dickwad, but he didn't have any "real" dialogue.
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Mar 3, 2013 20:21
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From memory he doesn't kick off that quest line, I think another person does and then you go to Kahoku later on?
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Mar 3, 2013 20:23
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E: /\/\/\ Nah, he does start the questline if you talk to him, you just need to get your ship before he does.Knuc If U Buck posted:I found this guy in the Council Chambers on the way to try and get Saren busted for being a dickwad, but he didn't have any "real" dialogue. Talk to him again after you've become a Spectre.
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Mar 3, 2013 20:23
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M_Sinistrari posted:I know this is from a bit back but no one's responded yet. 
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Mar 3, 2013 20:34
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Dan Didio posted:Do whatever side-quests you want, but if at anyone point during one you're not having fun, throw it away and go do something else. Generally, the side-quests that slot into future games are pretty much on the main path and you practically stumble over them, but some of those random planet, etc. etc. ones do get referenced going forward. In my opinion, there's one side-quest worth doing that doesn't come up ever again - it's a derelict freighter side-mission (I forget where, it's been ages since I played ME1), where you board the freighter and it seems completely abandoned except for one guy who is being kept alive by life support. Reading journals you discover that the guy's spouse/girlfriend wanted to get him help but she was going a little nuts from the side effects of her biotic implant and kills the rest of the crew. That one haunted me for the longest time, mostly because one of the possible outcomes was after you kill the woman who killed off the crew. you can choose to either disconnect the man's life support or not. Just the thought of leaving that person alive on life support, floating alone in a derelict ship, gave me the chills for the longest time. As much as I enjoy the series in general as cheesy space opera, little moments like that make me wonder what else they could have done with it if they'd taken a different tack or handed it to a stronger writing team. I was sort of disappointed by some of the side-quests that didn't pay off in the later games, like the Consort or the rebellious biotics. Wouldn't have even needed anything huge, but maybe having them pop up in asset capacities in 3 would have been nice. Or, you know, they could have been part of the story in 2 instead of making it Shepard: Gritty Antihero and Cerberus Agent against the whole brief of the series otherwise and relegating a bunch of poo poo to one-off cameos and email updates.
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Mar 3, 2013 21:57
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Craig Spradlin posted:In my opinion, there's one side-quest worth doing that doesn't come up ever again - it's a derelict freighter side-mission (I forget where, it's been ages since I played ME1), where you board the freighter and it seems completely abandoned except for one guy who is being kept alive by life support. Reading journals you discover that the guy's spouse/girlfriend wanted to get him help but she was going a little nuts from the side effects of her biotic implant and kills the rest of the crew. That one haunted me for the longest time, mostly because one of the possible outcomes was after you kill the woman who killed off the crew. you can choose to either disconnect the man's life support or not. Just the thought of leaving that person alive on life support, floating alone in a derelict ship, gave me the chills for the longest time. As much as I enjoy the series in general as cheesy space opera, little moments like that make me wonder what else they could have done with it if they'd taken a different tack or handed it to a stronger writing team. I just got to Illium on my most recent ME2 play through and got the message from the Rachni Queen. "Boy, I can't wait for the climactic moment in 3 where she rolls in with the Rachni fleet to save the day!"  What Summer children we all were back then.
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Mar 3, 2013 22:03
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Craig Spradlin posted:In my opinion, there's one side-quest worth doing that doesn't come up ever again - it's a derelict freighter side-mission (I forget where, it's been ages since I played ME1), where you board the freighter and it seems completely abandoned except for one guy who is being kept alive by life support. Reading journals you discover that the guy's spouse/girlfriend wanted to get him help but she was going a little nuts from the side effects of her biotic implant and kills the rest of the crew. That one haunted me for the longest time, mostly because one of the possible outcomes was after you kill the woman who killed off the crew. you can choose to either disconnect the man's life support or not. Just the thought of leaving that person alive on life support, floating alone in a derelict ship, gave me the chills for the longest time. As much as I enjoy the series in general as cheesy space opera, little moments like that make me wonder what else they could have done with it if they'd taken a different tack or handed it to a stronger writing team. Yes, that one is really good. The thing is, there are many sidequests that have neat little storylines like that one buried in there somewhere, it's just that all of them take place in one of three prefab buildings or the same exact type of space freighter that get recycled over and over. ME2 was a lot better here. In fact, similarly to the quest you mentioned, the one with the derelict ship that had its crew killed by the ship's computer was really good, giving this chilling System Shock vibe. Or that freighter that was captured by Blue Suns. There were so many possibilities for neat little stories to be told in the ME universe. Such a shame they tore that universe apart like that with ME3. Burning Mustache fucked around with this message at 22:06 on Mar 3, 2013 |
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Mar 3, 2013 22:03
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DrNutt posted:I just got to Illium on my most recent ME2 play through and got the message from the Rachni Queen. "Boy, I can't wait for the climactic moment in 3 where she rolls in with the Rachni fleet to save the day!" I think I was angrier about this than I was about the endings.
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Mar 3, 2013 22:09
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Craig Spradlin posted:In my opinion, there's one side-quest worth doing that doesn't come up ever again - it's a derelict freighter side-mission (I forget where, it's been ages since I played ME1), where you board the freighter and it seems completely abandoned except for one guy who is being kept alive by life support. Reading journals you discover that the guy's spouse/girlfriend wanted to get him help but she was going a little nuts from the side effects of her biotic implant and kills the rest of the crew. That one haunted me for the longest time, mostly because one of the possible outcomes was after you kill the woman who killed off the crew. you can choose to either disconnect the man's life support or not. Just the thought of leaving that person alive on life support, floating alone in a derelict ship, gave me the chills for the longest time. As much as I enjoy the series in general as cheesy space opera, little moments like that make me wonder what else they could have done with it if they'd taken a different tack or handed it to a stronger writing team. That's one of the ones that is sort of so easy to stumble across and so quick to complete that I can't imagine someone not doing it. I think I end up forgetting about it a lot of the time, then just stumbling onto it straight away whenever I play Mass Effect again. It is a really nice sidequest, though.
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Mar 3, 2013 22:10
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Was it ME1 or ME2 where you get tricked into entering a set of tunnels with a giant bomb in the middle? You can defuse the bomb and then sneak outside and ambush the guys who left you there. If I remember right, it's a low gravity planet so you can use your biotics to lift enemies hurtling into the upper atmosphere
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Mar 3, 2013 22:17
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Jerusalem posted:Was it ME1 or ME2 where you get tricked into entering a set of tunnels with a giant bomb in the middle? You can defuse the bomb and then sneak outside and ambush the guys who left you there. If I remember right, it's a low gravity planet so you can use your biotics to lift enemies hurtling into the upper atmosphere It's ME1 and not only do they want to blow you up with a giant bomb, they also steal your Mako <  >
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Mar 3, 2013 22:20
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DrNutt posted:I just got to Illium on my most recent ME2 play through and got the message from the Rachni Queen. "Boy, I can't wait for the climactic moment in 3 where she rolls in with the Rachni fleet to save the day!" Oh, god. This, this, this. For all of the stuff it did better than 1 in terms of mechanics, ME2 wrecked a lot of my hopes for the overarching story of the trilogy. Lots of "...wait. That's it?" moments in that game. Even Lair of the Shadow Broker - it makes no loving sense for the Shadow Broker to be an evil space gorilla from a race that nobody ever mentioned before and gets exactly one call-back in 3 as a punchline to what happens in 2. I liked the rest of that DLC, but that was another baffling decision on top of so many others. Burning Mustache posted:The thing is, there are many sidequests that have neat little storylines like that one buried in there somewhere, it's just that all of them take place in one of three prefab buildings or the same exact type of space freighter that get recycled over and over. ME2 was a lot better here. In fact, similarly to the quest you mentioned, the one with the derelict ship that had its crew killed by the ship's computer was really good, giving this chilling System Shock vibe. Or that freighter that was captured by Blue Suns. Agreed - One of the things I did like about ME2 was how made the sidequests a lot more like miniature quests of their own in varied locations, rather than "Go into [BUILDING/SHIP], then [STOP TIMER/KILL ENEMIES]." quote:There were so many possibilities for neat little stories to be told in the ME universe. Such a shame they tore that universe apart like that with ME3. There's still potential, if they handle it right. That's a big "if", I know. But regardless of which ending you picked in 3, you end up with the galaxy in roughly the same state (I'm going to ignore the obvious problems with the "green" ending), and the focus now isn't on defeating the giant cosmic Big Bad, it's just putting the pieces back together - reconnecting colonies, returning stranded people to their homeworlds, repairing the relays, repairing the Citadel - and potentially dealing with all of the threats to those efforts. Stars from the previous trilogy, like Garrus and Liara and Wrex and Tali become legendary figures, taking the place of people like Anderson and Hackett. There's still troublesome technology and artifacts to deal with, and discovering the truth about Shepard, and the Leviathans are still out there, waiting. As a platform on which to build a long-term franchise over multiple game types, it probably works better than what preceded it. Or it'll be a complete loving mess in ways I can't begin to imagine. Until details are made public, I choose to be an optimist. An optimist who secretly hopes Obsidian are developing a sci-fi IP of their own.
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Mar 3, 2013 22:43
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That guy had boss-like defences. Last playthrough, I did a lift + throw combo and after killing everyone else, didn't get the mission complete pop up. About 10 seconds later, he's shooting at me from the other side of the planet.
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Mar 3, 2013 22:43
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Craig Spradlin posted:There's still potential, if they handle it right. Yeah, I mean, without anything meaningful announced about the next ME game other than that they're developing it, there's not much point in speculation. It's certainly possible they'll completely ignore that one ending and somewhat manage to salvage the franchise, or completely retcon the most glaring problems, or whatever. I'm incredibly curious about what they're planning to do, but I'm not exactly getting my hopes up for now :I
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Mar 3, 2013 23:02
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Burning Mustache posted:Yeah, I mean, without anything meaningful announced about the next ME game other than that they're developing it, there's not much point in speculation. They don't need to ignore or retcon anything. They don't even need to deal with the ME3 ending at all, considering that the any future ME game doesn't have to take place after it. Seriously, the obvious way to to move forward with the franchise would be through prequels and interquels, with completely new sets of characters doing their own thing, unrelated to Shepard's story.
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Mar 3, 2013 23:32
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Well, yes, that comment was made under the assumption that the next game would take place after ME3. I don't think they would do a prequel after fans have been speaking out against one pretty vocally (after they specifically asked whether the next ME game should be a prequel or a sequel) but beyond that anything is possible, including them just doing a game that takes place during the war with the Reapers in ME3 or possibly even before that. Or something completely and utterly different and bizarre. Again, as I said, it's fairly pointless to speculate on what they have in mind, I'm just saying that if the next game hast to acknowledge the ending of ME3 one way or another, I'm drat curious about how they plan to wrap that up.
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Mar 3, 2013 23:43
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Future games only being prequels would be the one thing that would make me stop looking at the Mass Effect series. There's a lot of interesting stuff they could do with a post-trilogy game series. Limiting such an expansive galaxy to a very thoroughly pre-explored and detailed time would be a really depressing move.
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Mar 3, 2013 23:49
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I just got to ask to Jennifer Hale if she would come back as Shepard if BioWare reneged on their decision to have no more Shepard. Her answer? "In a hot second." She also mentioned that she's already working on some next gen projects that she can't talk about. Also she had leather pants and sat on a table. Jennifer Hale. 
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Mar 3, 2013 23:50
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Craig Spradlin posted:Agreed - One of the things I did like about ME2 was how made the sidequests a lot more like miniature quests of their own in varied locations, rather than "Go into [BUILDING/SHIP], then [STOP TIMER/KILL ENEMIES]." I think the exact opposite. 2's sidequests were almost all 'go into chest high walls, then stop timer/kill enemies'. There were maybe three exceptions. 1 sent you through the same three buildings, but for the most part it was more than just killing mercs. You might have to talk down a hostage situation, or choose the fate of rogue scientists, or be lured into a booby trapped cave, or save a besieged marine outpost. Of course there were exceptions, especially the godawful asari writings style collection quests, but there was usually something to find other than mercs doing A Bad Thing now go kill.
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Mar 4, 2013 00:14
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Why don't they just reboot it. Start over with the first game's setting again, no more Reapers, have other stuff going on. Movies and comics do it all the time, and they can keep the Shepard trilogy as its own thing without having to worry about canon.
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Mar 4, 2013 00:15
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Jerusalem posted:Was it ME1 or ME2 where you get tricked into entering a set of tunnels with a giant bomb in the middle? You can defuse the bomb and then sneak outside and ambush the guys who left you there. If I remember right, it's a low gravity planet so you can use your biotics to lift enemies hurtling into the upper atmosphere From memory you only get this one if you have the Sole Survivor background. The dude is really angry at you because he was part of the Blitz and wants revenge.
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Mar 4, 2013 00:18
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Two Finger posted:From memory you only get this one if you have the Sole Survivor background. The dude is really angry at you because he was part of the Blitz and wants revenge. 1. No, you get it on every character. The only thing your background changes is some minor dialogue. 2. The "Sole Survivor" background has nothing to do with the Blitz. You're thinking of "War Hero". Edit: To go into more detail: UNC:_Espionage_Probe is affected by the War Hero background. UNC:_Dead_Scientists is affected by the Sole Survivor background. UNC:_Major_Kyle is affected by the Ruthless background. Each of these quests is still available regardless of what background you pick, but the dialogue is changed a bit. VirtualStranger fucked around with this message at 00:29 on Mar 4, 2013 |
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Mar 4, 2013 00:20
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I guess I am, at that. Sole Survivor's the one that got attacked by the thresher maw, yeah? I thought there were different quests for every background...
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Mar 4, 2013 00:24
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Two Finger posted:I guess I am, at that. Sole Survivor's the one that got attacked by the thresher maw, yeah? There a different quest on the citadel for your family history (earth born, spacer and colonist) and those ones for your military career history.
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Mar 4, 2013 00:28
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There are different and unique missions for the Spacer / Colonist / Earthborn backgrounds, but the Ruthless / Solve Survivor / War Hero psych profiles merely change existing and always available missions a bit. E: Beaten.
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Mar 4, 2013 00:30
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One of these days I should get around to restarting and beating this game. I got about halfway through before I got distracted by other things, I think (or at least I don't remember dick all after Tuchanka). Unfortunately that means doing the whole 'pick a class/gender/team/alignment to roll out with' thing which I'm terrible at, so someone pick for me.  While I'm at it, couple questions--is any of the DLC worth looking at to the degree that Shadow Broker was? I already have all the free stuff on Origin downloaded, it looks like I'm missing Leviathan and Omega as far as paid poo poo goes. Also, is gibbed's save editor (or any other utilities) up to the task at this point of setting up an ME/ME2 save the way I want them in terms of story flags, or am I still going to need to trawl through masseffectsaves.com to find the one I want?
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Mar 4, 2013 00:32
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Burning Mustache posted:There are different and unique missions for the Spacer / Colonist / Earthborn backgrounds, but the Ruthless / Solve Survivor / War Hero psych profiles merely change existing and always available missions a bit. Correct. These are only available if you have the particular background required for the quest.: Citadel: Old, Unhappy, Far-Off Things (Spacer) Citadel: I Remember Me (Colonist) Citadel: Old Friends (Earthborn) Also, there are two missions dependent on you paragon/renegade score. UNC:_Besieged_Base becomes available once your paragon bar reaches 80% UNC: The Negotiation becomes available once your renegade bar reaches 80% VirtualStranger fucked around with this message at 00:46 on Mar 4, 2013 |
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Mar 4, 2013 00:36
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Dan Didio posted:Future games only being prequels would be the one thing that would make me stop looking at the Mass Effect series. There's a lot of interesting stuff they could do with a post-trilogy game series. Limiting such an expansive galaxy to a very thoroughly pre-explored and detailed time would be a really depressing move. There's probably some good stories and games to be had in prequel materials, as long as they stay away from the books and comics as sources. I'd also keep away from anything that's too fan-serviceish like Garrus's time on Omega. In my mind at least, there's more to work with post-ME3. You've got collapse of galactic as well as local governments, you could waive away the endings by saying some Reapers and Geth were outside the reach of the Crucible signal, or even the Leviathans coming back. Start off with limited systems and planets to explore, kill enemies to gain access to working relays, or make alliances to fix broken ones, with your choices making a branched path through the story with those same decisions impacting the outcomes of those missions. You could even have one set during the events of ME1-3, with the game reading your saves to help change the story along the way.
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Mar 4, 2013 00:40
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VirtualStranger posted:UNC: The Negotiation becomes available once your renegade bar reaches 80% Was and always will be my favourite mission debriefing in the entire trilogy.
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Mar 4, 2013 00:50
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Two Finger posted:From memory he doesn't kick off that quest line, I think another person does and then you go to Kahoku later on? You can pick up the quest three different ways: Kahoku can start it off if they've already given you the Normandy, or it can start off if you pick up the distress beacon in the Artemis Tau cluster and investigate, or if you overhear Dr. Michel talking to some thugs in her clinic.
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Mar 4, 2013 01:04
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Another thing I've long forgotten. Did ME3 do something to make it matter less if you were inconsistent about Paragon/Renegade choices (i.e. locking you out of certain decisions later 'cause you waffled too much)? Or am I misremembering?
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Mar 4, 2013 02:37
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Yes. The Paragon and Renegade bars got combined, so the speech checks are determined by how many total "reputation points" you have, Paragon or Renegade.
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Mar 4, 2013 02:44
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Ciaphas posted:Another thing I've long forgotten. Did ME3 do something to make it matter less if you were inconsistent about Paragon/Renegade choices (i.e. locking you out of certain decisions later 'cause you waffled too much)? Or am I misremembering? Yes, it did. BrokenKnees posted:There's probably some good stories and games to be had in prequel materials, as long as they stay away from the books and comics as sources. I'd also keep away from anything that's too fan-serviceish like Garrus's time on Omega. There is absolutely room for stories to be told during that time-frame, I just don't want exclusively to have stories during that time-frame.
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Mar 4, 2013 02:45
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Ciaphas posted:Another thing I've long forgotten. Did ME3 do something to make it matter less if you were inconsistent about Paragon/Renegade choices (i.e. locking you out of certain decisions later 'cause you waffled too much)? Or am I misremembering? Yes. In ME3, instead of separate Paragon/Renagade bars, they condensed them into a single one. Now, both paragon and renegade points go into the same bar,and the conversation options you can pick are based on the size of the bar, regardless of the type of points in it. quote:
Edit: Beaten like a prisoner at Purgatory.
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Mar 4, 2013 02:50
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Is there anything interesting in the alternative dialogue based on reputation? It's a system that I barely even notice.
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Mar 4, 2013 06:13
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I've never lacked for reputation. I don't think it's real.
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Mar 4, 2013 06:50
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Good to know I won't lock myself out of anything because neither Space Paladin nor Space rear end in a top hat fit, anyway. So thanks for that. I think I'm gonna go with Adept, it was either that, Engineer, or Vanguard; of the three I think I'd prefer to be a Space Wizard and Vanguard... well, all the screaming for Charge and Nova got old last time I played v vSo regarding Adept, what skills do I probably want to focus on?
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Mar 4, 2013 07:56
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Ciaphas posted:Good to know I won't lock myself out of anything because neither Space Paladin nor Space rear end in a top hat fit, anyway. So thanks for that. Warp, throw, and take reave or dark channel for the bonus power. Detonate everything.
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Mar 4, 2013 08:01
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Pops Mgee posted:Warp, throw, and take reave or dark channel for the bonus power. Detonate everything. I'd use my power for something useful. What's the point of taking reave/dark channel if you're already blowing things up? Personally, I'd perhaps take Barrier and spec it for power damage, or perhaps something to strip shields. However, unless a patch changed something since I played on launch, Adept is easy mode, even on Insanity, so you can't really go wrong.
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Mar 4, 2013 11:41
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Ciaphas posted:... well, all the screaming for Charge and Nova got old last time I played v  Vanguarding around the place being a total badass unkillable death machine will never get old. I always like people saying "ooooo don't charge banshees they might grab you!" NO YOU FOOLS charge them. If you die YOU WEREN'T CHARGING ENOUGH edit: Someone PRODUCE THE CHART
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Mar 4, 2013 15:31
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