(spoilers) Opinion: Mass Effect 2 has some of the weakest writing around (spoilers)

[rcs619]

the main plot is pretty unoriginal. I'd even say that it's a weaker version of the Halo plot.

Wait, the Mass Effect and Halo plots are nothing alike. One is about humanity fighting a group of space-catholic aliens who hate humans because of their religion and try to exterminate them. Oh, and on the way a bunch of headcrab zombie aliens are introduced. Its the story about one super-soldier who somehow changes the entire course of an interstellar war.

Mass Effect is about a soldier and his/her crew coming across the knowledge that the people of the galaxy have been manipulated and tricked by a super-advanced race of what are essentially mechanical lovecraftian horrors, who intend to kill and harvest them all. Of course, everyone thinks Shepard is crazy, and these warnings fall on deaf ears. You also have the whole "humans are the new kids on the block and are trying to earn the older species' respect as they interact with them more".

The stories are completely different in tone and themes dealth with.

The reapers are the flood.

...Okay, this is just stupid. You can't really compare a bunch of mile long cosmic horrors to a swarm of headcrab zombies.

One is a heavily lovecraft inspired race of massive intelligent space-faring organisms who manipulate mortals, drive them crazy and turn them into mind-slaves before coming around and harvesting every intelligent species in the galaxy to make more of themselves. They are interesting, they are intelligent, and they have distinct (albeit still somewhat mysterious) motivations.

The other is *gasp* an alien bio weapon/plague thing that got out of hand and turned on its creators. Like that hasn't been done before (and better) in starcraft, the alien series, and warhammer40k decades before Halo was a thought in anyone's mind.

The tyranid and zerg were the flood before the flood were the flood. Hell, headcrabs from halflife were the flood before the flood were the flood. Don't accuse a series of being unoriginal by comparing it to another series that has heavily borrowed elements from everything from 40k to halflife.

To be fair, no sci-fantasy setting is completely original. The whole point of sci-fantasy is to take fantasy elements and reinterpret them within a futuristic setting. Execution trumps originality. Take the original Star Wars trilogy. The plot was really just the classic hero's journey reinterpreted in a futuristic setting. It is FULL of tropes and cliches, but they were executed well, and had enough on a new spin on them to avoid feeling completely rehashed.

 

[Imbechile]

Fallout 3

Oh dear, oh dear, ..........
Way to shoot yourself in the foot.
If you said Fallout New Vegas then ok, but you mention the game with one of the shittient stories, characters and dialog of this generation.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Want a video-game example? Fine. Fallout 3. Red Dead Redemption. Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Dead Space. LA Noire. Assassin's Creed 2.

Oh LORD. Assassins Creed 2, with its grating and borderline offensive faux "Italian" voiceovers? LA Noire? You complain about biotics not making sense in story terms, but I can run down 30 pedestrians in my car and get promoted to traffic cop? And fucking FALLOUT 3?

Yeah okay. Before I only thought you MIGHT have been trolling. Now I know you are.

 

[Choppaduel]

Your right.
ME2 was a huge disappointment for me in both the plot and game play departments.
[hr]
Shamus Young has explored this topic [a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/experienced-points/8868-Experienced-Points-What-s-Wrong-with-Mass-Effect-2"]to[/a] [a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/experienced-points/7161-Experienced-Points-Gears-of-Mass-Effect"]death[/a].

 

[RedDeadFred]

No it doesn't.
It has IMO very well fleshed out characters. The main story didn't have much of a story to it but I thought the characters were great.

 

[northeast rower]

I dunno, I liked KOTOR's writing. I think that it relied on most of the aforementioned Bioware tricks (oh no, my family!), but I still enjoyed getting to know Carth, Bastila, etc. And I thought that the plot was absolutely great, and not just for the twist (which, strangely, didn't affect me that much).

I don't get this. I respect your opinion and do not dismiss it or anything of the sort, but I simply don't understand the love for Kotor's story. Could you explain it to me if you have the time? I mean seriously,

- It relied on so many clichés (not only just ALL the bioware tricks, but other cliche's in general as well) and was, aside from the plot twist, predictable as hell.
- The plot itself is just...average. Very little background story is given, even though that would have been a phenomenal story in itself.
- Characters, aside from HK-47 and perhaps Bastilla, are just as clichéd as most of the ME characters and often get even less character development than them. I mean come on, don't tell me that Carth, Zaalbar, Juhani, Mission and T3-M4 were actual deep and fleshed out characters. Not even HK is deep, but he just makes up for that by being absolutely awesome.
- Gameplay was incredibly broken, as it is easy to become overpowered and just destroy everything in your path.
- The Soundtrack is just your average SW soundtrack
- Although the plot in itself isn't entirely black and white, it does handle the story in black and white manner (I have yet to see a single REAL grey choice in KotoR). And this is actually the worst aspect of the entire story. Everything...EVERYTHING is black and FUCKING white as it can possibly be. Even when the stuff that they slap you in the face with is grey, it's still looked at in b&W. What the fuck?

When I played it for the first time, I enjoyed the story as well, including the twist. Then I started to think more and more about it, talk about it with people and in the end nearly nothing was left but just a weak, predictable, bland, black and white story with decent characters. Don't get me wrong, KotoR's story is still better than 90% of all games ever, but as you said, screw gaming standards. In itself, it's an interesting story, but nothing and I mean absolutely nothing about it is deep.

Which is why I'm pissed off at Kotor 2 for being so goddamn incredibly incomplete and rushed, because that game, if it was complete and not rushed (gameplay, ending et cetera) would have absolutely destroyed the first game.

Well, I didn't play KOTOR 2 so I don't know about that. As for KOTOR:

I know that it relied on cliches, but I think that it utilized them better than Mass Effect 2, if that makes any sense. Maybe it was just that it takes place in the Star Wars universe, and I love that universe.

Okay, I'll admit that the characters aren't that deep, but I still cared about them more than ME2's.

I really love the soundtrack. If you listen closely, you'll notice that most of the soundtrack is original. Just a matter of opinion.

Gameplay is broken, but for me opposite the reasons they were for you. For me it just became a matter of "charge in, STIMPACK STIMPACK STIMPACK, win".

 

[Eveonline100]

Well, no. Because balance is necessary.

Alright, you caught me. I was hoping to be lazy and include all other probable causes such as balance, time to make the game, inclusion of too many varying mechanics, etc. in my 'and some such' statement.

You're right, though. I can't help but too often see the cutscenes as the game the designers wanted to make and the gameplay as what they were forced to turn it into for whatever reason.

i can't help but feel asthough that the cutscens were created before the gameplay was finished

 

[northeast rower]

Fallout 3

Oh dear, oh dear, ..........
Way to shoot yourself in the foot.
If you said Fallout New Vegas then ok, but you mention the game with one of the shittient stories, characters and dialog of this generation.

Hurr durr durr, opinion. Granted, that's what this thread is about, but I personally believe that Fallout 3 had some of the best stories, characters, and dialogue of this generation. Like I said, matter of opinion. I actually think that New Vegas was the other way around- completely unoriginal, with no soul to it.

Want a video-game example? Fine. Fallout 3. Red Dead Redemption. Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Dead Space. LA Noire. Assassin's Creed 2.

Oh LORD. Assassins Creed 2, with its grating and borderline offensive faux "Italian" voiceovers? LA Noire? You complain about biotics not making sense in story terms, but I can run down 30 pedestrians in my car and get promoted to traffic cop? And fucking FALLOUT 3?

Yeah okay. Before I only thought you MIGHT have been trolling. Now I know you are.

Assassin's Creed 2: I was talking about the STORY. The STORY, not the voiceovers.

LA Noire: making this post, I was talking about the story itself, minus the gameplay. Every game has problems with this: Red Dead Redemption we feel sorry for John as he slaughters half of the world's population, Dead Space, Isaac seems to be wearing Necromorph perfume, etc. And was I talking about biotics not making sense in story terms? No. I wasn't. Read more carefully. I was talking about how they don't make sense in gameplay terms.

Fallout 3: I don't know why everyone hates this game so much. Just a matter of opinion, which this thread is about.

Now, as for trolling: I'm not trolling. Mass Effect 2 has weak writing IMO.

 

[Random berk]

ME2 may not be able to match movies or novels for plot (how can it? A story, plot and character development are basically all a novel has to worry about, games have gameplay, visual effects, and so much more) and there were definite issues that if I was in charge of remaking the game with perfect hindsight on my side, I'd tell them to fix it. However, for all its flaws, Mass Effect is easily one of my all time favourite games, and has perhaps the best writing I've seen in a game.

Also, the OP may like to think hes not trolling, but after reading all his posts, the arguments against him, and his rebuttals to these arguments, I'd say that it is wishful thinking indeed. Either that or he is a truly terrible debater.

 

[dikespies]

In Mass Effect 2 however I actually felt the weight of my decisions I knew if one of the characters doesn't make it to Mass Effect 3 than it would be my fault. This is why Mass Effect 2 succeeds at being one of the best pieces of Interactive fiction because my actions mattered and have large implications on the story [...]

Because buying every upgrade and doing linear loyalty-missions for everyone are big decisions? This is all you gotta do. Minor quests like the rachni-queen-thingy don't count if I just get a little talk for 2 minutes about how awesome I was in the game before.

 

[M920CAIN]

Well, no. Because balance is necessary.

Alright, you caught me. I was hoping to be lazy and include all other probable causes such as balance, time to make the game, inclusion of too many varying mechanics, etc. in my 'and some such' statement.

You're right, though. I can't help but too often see the cutscenes as the game the designers wanted to make and the gameplay as what they were forced to turn it into for whatever reason.

I think that can be an issue (it seems to have been the main reason behind the massive surge in QTEs a couple of years ago), but I don't think its one in ME2 overtly.

GTA IV sticks out as one of the worst in my mind.

Cutscene Niko: "I must kill this one person for $$$ even though I hate killing but I need the money."

In-game Niko: Drives through old women like bowling pins, steals a car, checks up on his $1,000,000 bank balance, murders the one guy, his family, his dog's brother's previous owner, and almost blows up an airport.

And then bowling.

That's breaking the 4th wall there buddy. I played GTA IV and my Niko didn't do any of those things you mentioned.

 

[Woodsey]

Well, no. Because balance is necessary.

Alright, you caught me. I was hoping to be lazy and include all other probable causes such as balance, time to make the game, inclusion of too many varying mechanics, etc. in my 'and some such' statement.

You're right, though. I can't help but too often see the cutscenes as the game the designers wanted to make and the gameplay as what they were forced to turn it into for whatever reason.

I think that can be an issue (it seems to have been the main reason behind the massive surge in QTEs a couple of years ago), but I don't think its one in ME2 overtly.

GTA IV sticks out as one of the worst in my mind.

Cutscene Niko: "I must kill this one person for $$$ even though I hate killing but I need the money."

In-game Niko: Drives through old women like bowling pins, steals a car, checks up on his $1,000,000 bank balance, murders the one guy, his family, his dog's brother's previous owner, and almost blows up an airport.

And then bowling.

That's breaking the 4th wall there buddy. I played GTA IV and my Niko didn't do any of those things you mentioned.

Err... no, it isn't.

"Speaking directly to, or otherwise acknowledging, the audience through the camera, in a film, play or television program, is referred to as "breaking the fourth wall.""

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_the_fourth_wall#Breaking_the_fourth_wall

And I didn't do that either specifically, but you get the idea. At the very least, the majority of people, around halfway through the game, will have more than enough money and will have killed a lot of people.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

LA Noire: making this post, I was talking about the story itself, minus the gameplay. Every game has problems with this: Red Dead Redemption we feel sorry for John as he slaughters half of the world's population, Dead Space, Isaac seems to be wearing Necromorph perfume, etc. And was I talking about biotics not making sense in story terms? No. I wasn't. Read more carefully. I was talking about how they don't make sense in gameplay terms.

Horseshit...

Biotics are some of the galaxy's most powerful individuals, capable of manipulating the physical world in so many ways. That doesn't come across at all in Mass Effect 2. Not only is everyone's power on a universal recharge timer (Jack's biotic antics in the above video really don't work when she can only push one person at a time, then wait for five seconds to do it again), they can't work if their enemy is using an electronic shield. Confusing? Yeah. I really didn't know that kinetic barriers could undo the power of gravitational forces, but I guess they can now! Also, on a side note, the story screws with the gameplay quite a bit. According to Lair of the Shadow Broker, Thane has a million moves with which he can kill any enemies. However, you go into combat and he takes cover and shoots people with an assault rifle. Sweet moves, Thane! The same things happens with Garrus: his experience as a leader of combat squads doesn't come into play until literally the last mission.

This is a rant about how cutscenes are not aligning themselves properly with game play. "Robble robble, Thane's super cool moves in a cut scene are not reflected in a firefight. Bad writing!" In LA Noire I can go on an absolute rampage and still get promoted as if nothing has happened. Killed 50 people on that last mission, Phelps? No worries, we'll just dock you some points on your final score. Perhaps you should learn to read your own posts more carefully. Or possibly the dictionary definition of the word "hypocrisy".

I don't hate Fallout 3 AT ALL. I love it. I love it in SPITE of its terrible storytelling. Bethesda is one of the most notoriously bad developers in the world when it comes to the quality of their narratives.

I've already agreed with you that Mass Effect 2 has weak writing. I've asked you in what context it has the WEAKEST WRITING AROUND, as per the title of your post, and you've gone from name checking Ulysses to propping up one of the most catastrophically ghastly narratives of all time in Fallout 3. Yes, you're right, it's an opinion, and you're allowed to have opinions...even stupid, ill informed ones...but when you take your opinion and make a post about it on a public form...and choose a deliberately inflammatory title for that post...and then proceed to offer nothing even resembling a coherent or objective argument for WHY it has "the weakest writing around", then yes...you are trolling.

 

[omega 616]

My biggest complaint is fucking Garrus, people seem to love that huge collared dummy and beyond him being super awesome in the first game (which I don't know 'cos I haven't played it) he is a dull as ditch water moron who loves him some calibrations....


There is only one time in the whole game he never said that to me, which was to set up his loyalty mission.

I liked the ones others seem to hate, Jack and Thane (I dunno how people feel about Kasumi but I like her aswell) for example but loathe the others like Miranda and Jacob (the most boring people after Garrus), the only person worse than Garrus was Zaheed ... I killed him in the last mission.

 

[putowtin]

I really enjoyed it, I find Bioware's games to have some of the best writing (be it script or plot) going.

At least the go for more than just "hey look an alien! Shoot at it !"

 

[Thespian]

I'm sorry, props for making this thread in a calm and intelligent manner, but you use some of the most broken logic I've ever heard. Your points are paper thin. Seriously.

Now for individual squadmates. Each of them seems to follow a very specific characterization. Queen *****? You got it. Femme fatale? Yeah, she's there. Silent assassin with a deeper emotional side? We've got three.

First of all, summarizing a few characters and saying that they are clichéd doesn't make you right. At all. You know why? Because everytime someone does this, they fail to realize that absolutely every character is subject to this type of argument. Every character. Ever.
Being able to summarize them in two or three words humbles anyone, but it's not a bad thing. In fact, it's good. It means they have a good simple foundation. But I guarantee you, you could take the world's most developed, deep characters ever and make them sound like shallow machinations. Avoid that kind of pseudo argument.

Miranda: One of my favorite characters in the game and I can still criticize her. Bad. Well, to start off, let's think of her romance with Shepard. "I'm perfect, but damaged". "Beauty is more than skin deep". Rinse, repeat. Then there's her loyalty quest. For the entire game, she acts as Cerberus's top agent, loyal without a doubt and willing to kill anyone who stands in her way. Then she gets to the loyalty mission and she hesitates when given a chance to her friend who betrayed her? Jesus, she took all of .3 seconds to shoot Wilson in the beginning and she had worked with him for years! By the way, I really don't think that the game ever really resolved the opening conflict...

Seriously? Dude, you JUST complained about how Shepard doesn't change throughout the course of the game, and here we see Miranda, bred for murder, recently introduced to emotions of compassion and selflessness in order to save the universe, who has never hesitated in killing her friends or acquaintances before, in the face of her traitorous friend, in the midst of finding her twin sister, sees a new side of herself as she hesitates before dipping back into those cold, murderous depths of her personality and you think it's a bad thing?
The fact that a character has changed throughout the game is a minus for you? That makes sense.

Thane: Take away those segments where he flashes back. What exactly is so interesting about his character then? He essentially becomes a sociopath with a son who was added solely to give him some emotional depth beyond "unblinking killer". Honestly, he would be as deep as Agent 47 (read: not deep) if his son hadn't been added, and that's a pretty strong sign of weak character design. Oh wait, he can used the game's ridiculously underpowered biotics. That's cool, right?

Hey, you're right! If you remove an enormous amount of Thane's development, he's really underdeveloped! What's up with that?
Also, if you remove the last six books, the Harry Potter Series is really short!
And if you play Benny Hill music during the Silence of the Lambs, it's not that scary or atmospheric!
What the hell kind of point is that? Yes, removing all the best parts of something makes it bad. Genius.

Your points are all strawman arguments or irrelevant. Please try again.

 

[Jonesy911]

I don't agree with anything in your original post. The criticisms you make of the writing are either factually incorrect or so nit-picky that I'm not 100% convinced you not some kind of primate and you've mistaken Mass Effect for a mate you need to groom.

 

[NewfieKeir]

yeah I was always annoyed with how much weaker your squad were in practice

I think the characters were fine. The main plot is really where Mass Effect 2's writing dives into a sea of shit.

^^^

the main plot is pretty unoriginal. I'd even say that it's a weaker version of the Halo plot.
The reapers are the flood.
They both had already destroyed a far superior alien population millenia ago.
They'd been locked away in some form so they couldn't come back (except owait now they can).
And the flood are more interesting than the reapers, who are pretty plain and unoriginal. Anyone could make up a story about a super race of alien that come along every 50million years to wipe out all life forms there in a psychopathic genocide but when an FPS does it better than a story based RPG, you have to question it. I always saw the Mass Effect galaxy and backstory as it's strong point.

At your points:

1. Millenia ago a far superior civilization was destroyed. Sorry, that's happened in too many stories for this to be relevant.
2. The reapers weren't locked away, they left on their own free will and come back every 50,000 years. Were you paying attention?
3. Not million, thousand. They're not aliens either, they're sentient starships.

That said, the flood were just space zombies with a squid leading them.

 

[Lord Deathray]

I have so far only played the intro to Mass effect 2 and I after that I did not really want to play it anymore. Why? The death and reincarnation of Shepard. What can I say,for me the entire Mass Effect universe lost ALL of its credibility whit that plot element. How is that even possible, we saw that it was an atmosphere on the planet so Shepard every thing that was him/her once SHOULD have burned up on the way down.
Even if him/her did not burn up, the impact would have destroyed everything that would remain of him/her.
Then they just put him/her back together, one thing is miracles, things that i doubt Gud would be able to do is something else.
I can go on and on, about it, but what I find most surprising, is how almost nobody brings it up. Why not?
Well I probably give it another shot when I can find a game of the year edition.