What?s Wrong with Mass Effect 2?

[Hoplon]

Investigating the disappearances as a spectre since it may pose a larger threat is totally logical, especially if they want shepard to be off in the remote places not banging on about the reapers.

Why kill Shepard and have Cerberus resurrect at all?

It was such a hamfisted way to do things.

 

[LiquidGrape]

I'm confused by the flippant, back-handed remarks regarding the writers at the end, especially in relation to Dragon Age 2.
Whether one likes it or not, I thought it obvious that Dragon Age 2 had the most cohesive and focused storyline of any BioWare game to date. (I'd also call it the most thematically relevant, but that's neither here nor there.)

Furthermore, it's always been perfectly clear that the core group responsible for the writing on that series is David Gaider, Sheryl Chee and Mary Kirby, with the aid of Jennifer Hepler and Lukas Kristjanson. All of them BioWare veterans, some of which having a history with the company dating as far back as Baldur's Gate.

"Junior writers"?
I think not.

P.S
That said, I really do take issue with the trite "humens r speciul" scenario which Mac Walter's and team seems to have in mind for ME3.
I wish Brian Kindreagan would come back. He wrote the two best characters of Mass Effect 2, and now he's been lost to Blizzard...
D.S

 

[Worr Monger]

ME3 will have plot holes.. it's inevitable. But as long as they tie everything up well enough, and present it as if it all makes perfect sense like in ME2.. I'll be happy.

I like to think of it in terms of all the fancy science talk in Star Trek that you don't understand... but you have to buy into it anyway for the sake of the story.. because it's science fiction and you need to just accept it... so go with it.

****BEGIN SPOILERS****

Mass Effect 2 opens with the death of Commander Shepard. This is an inept way to begin a story. Shepard dies, there's a cutscene, and he's alive again. Begin tutorial. If you do kill a character in the opening scene, then you'd expect the game to be that character working through the experience and growing as a human being. But Shepard is up and capping robots in seconds, and the whole "I was dead" thing has no impact on him as a character.

Opinion... to each his own. But I actually liked this element of ME2 for numerous reasons:

1. It allows for an excuse to change something about your existing Shepard (god knows why you'd want to.. but it's convenient).
2. I think it helps elevate Shepard above his Spectre status. He's officially recognized as KIA, his ship is gone, and his ties to the Alliance and Counsel are severed for 2 years. When he returns, he's like a ghost and really doesn't answer to anyone (except the whole Cerberus railroading, blah blah). And he's got cybernetic enhancements now... maybe that will lead to something later.. maybe not.
3. The first teaser trailer with him being KIA really fucked with people's minds.
4. It allowed for one of the best opening scenes in recent years.
5. If Shepard had died at the end of ME... bringing him back at the beginning of ME2 would have felt like a copout... At least with doing it within the same game, it didn't feel like they chose to make a sequel after the fact.
6. Though bringing him back may have seemed too easy... they at least tried to make it seem like an incredibly difficult and costly procedure... so the argument of "constantly cloning Shepard if he dies" never really becomes an issue.

Again... this is just my opinion... you made some good points, but most of the plot holes you named didn't really bother me because they just presented it so well.

 

[cystemic]

bit of a **SPOILER** here so ignore me if you havent played the two of them. but wouldnt it have made more sense to kill shepard at the end of the first game, i remember after the final battle with saren, the entire place comes down and your 2 squad members get out of the wreckage and shake their heads as if shepard didn't make it. i was half accepting that this was their completely logical way of ending it, even if its sad but then shepard comes bounding out of the wreckage as though it was just a scratch. Like why would they do that if they were gonna kill shepard in the second game, i think its pretty obvious that the writing was handed over to someone else at that point and they may have not used their power to the full bioware standard but i still enjoyed the second game, there are sooooo little games with actual story behind them and mass effect has always been a fave. seriously looking forward to 3

 

[Woodsey]

I have raged against the railroading (I have to work with Cerberus?),.

I have to work with the Alliance? I have to become a Spectre? I have to oppose Saren?

There's always some railroading, and you at least have the chance to play it as if you are undermining them or agree with them (or a mix).

Those are different. My Paragon Shepard wouldn't work with Cerberus. He destroyed three of their bases, his whole team was killed because of them, they are radically pro-human. And I never worked with the Alliance. I did missions they gave/suggested to me, but I made it clear that I was a Spectre now (like saying fuck you to the ship inspection guy).

OK, so do missions Cerberus give you until you no longer need them.

I never needed them. What stopped me from taking the Normandy and high tailing it back to the Citadel?

"Shepard! We have information on a threat targeting the galaxy, no one else knows of this but us!"

"Nah, fuck off."

Very Paragon-y.

I very much doubt my renegade Shepard would join the military in the first place, but there you go.

"Threat to the galaxy"? They were just abducting colonists from a place that the Council has no authority in.

Oh fucking hell, potential threat to the galaxy then. If someone's picking off 10s of 1000s of humans and trying to hide it, that may be a bit of cause for concern. Remember they were weary of Reaper involvement also.

And that's still not a paragon-y approach from you. (You know the blue bar is for goody points, don't you?)

Because it's much better to work for a terrorist organization vs. confiscating their resources or working as a double agent?

But, honestly, this didn't hit the main problem with the Mass Effect games. The romance options are all with people who take orders from you. Fraternization, IRL, is unethical for a variety of reasons, and a lot of your dialogue options in the game would be seen as, IRL, sexual harassment. Bioware does not appear to be aware of this.

You can effectively pose yourself as a double agent, and then act upon that in the final moments.

"Fraternization, IRL, is unethical for a variety of reasons, and a lot of your dialogue options in the game would be seen as, IRL, sexual harassment. Bioware does not appear to be aware of this."

And I almost took you seriously for a second there.

Yeah, which is why it's such a huge storytelling failure that there isn't the addition of a paragon path where you actually become a double agent. It would be easy to create, wouldn't be obtrusive in the context of the rest of the story, and would completely fix that particular plot hole.

IRL military commanders don't engage in romantic relationships with their subordinates, and there are reasons they don't do this. A character-driven and relationship-driven game completely missing this fact is pretty strange.

Just as well it isn't real life then. And considering Shepard's role as a Spectre overrules his role as Alliance Navy, its all dandy. He can do whatever the hell he wants because he no longer has to abide by military rules.

Its not such a huge storytelling failure, I just told you how they fucking accommodated it. You're gone for 2 years and then you reappear working for a shady-ish group, no one official trusts you anyway.

 

[stranamente]

I completely agree with you Shamus, and I feel relieved as someone finaly and clearly pointed out some of the most obvious problems with this game.
Great work, and I can't imagine how could you make yourself stop just listing all of the problems...

 

[-Drifter-]

You know what I cannot stand about people that go "I hate Bioware, they killed my Pa!"?

You guys are always criticizing. That's your problem. It's good to point out the flaws in a game, yes. But it's just annoying to watch a miserable git constantly whine and moan about said flaws. Can you guys at least acknowledge that ME2 is leagues better than most other games nowadays (in terms of characters/plot and immersion) and then tell us about what can be improved? At least then, I'd love to listen to you.

So, you don't want to hear anyone make criticisms unless they agree with your opinion and give the game a nice tongue bath first?

 

[___________________]

What's wrong with Mass Effect 2? I dunno. The only thing I don't like is the planet mining. Everything else is pretty much ok. If they don't trash Mass Effect 3 like that other team did with Dragon Age 2 I'll buy the 3 games and bam just like that I FINALLY find a new series that I can be a fan of. Yay and all that jazz. I like Mass 1 and 2. I think the changes were nice and didn't ruin the game. They could have kept the armor things and weapons but I'm divided on that...I like both systems. The 2 games worked out pretty cool. Dragon Age 2..........I think those hackers that screwed up the PSN should try to erase every single mention of that game from the Internet. The only cool thing was the combat part....everything else was just bland on white bread with a side of lukewarm water.

 

[Agayek]

Does the phrase "That was the first time I died" mean anything to you? Death as an opener happens all the time in games. The Darkness, God of War 2, Final Fantasy X - there is nothing to suggest it does not work perfectly.

Generally, as a literary device, killing the main character is used as a "reboot" of sorts. It allows for a character growth and the like. I'll give you that games don't adhere to that nearly as much as they should, but that's where he's coming from with it.

So you think its impossible for someone to break off from a competent group to pursue their own goals? Try looking at how many rogue cells broke off from the KGB.

Yet Cerberus, a completely ruthless organization with nigh-unlimited funding and manpower, allows these rogue cells to operate completely unimpeded, under their name, without retaliation?

Look up those rogue KGB cells and see how many tried to actively claim to be KGB and weren't killed.

Or establishing Sheperd as completely badass. Getting out of a situation thats engineered to be impossible doesn't make the guys who designed it idiots, it makes you awesome.

Generally, when someone lays a trap for a specific individual, they take that individuals abilities into the equation. If the trap fails, that's usually an indicator of a poorly laid trap than any special property of the target. It's not always like that, and it could very well be that Shepard is just that good, but it certainly didn't come across that way.

Obtaining vital data. Pay attention.

And what data is that exactly? They gained, literally, fuck all from doing it. There was nothing to gain from exploring the stupid thing, and everything to lose.

Yeah, thats sensible. Let your enemies cultivate a legion of unstoppable superweapons that are engineered to wipe out all life in the galaxy and then try to meet them head on when they attack at full force. Like trying to block a bullet with your forehead.

Except you can just sit there with nuke mines ringed around the relay. Once the collector's come charging out, detonate the mines and problem solved.

Or better yet, evac the system and destroy the stupid relay. Problem solved forever.

Mass Effect 2 is considered Biiowares best work bar none for a reason.

Except it's not. Baldur's Gate 2 is their best game, followed shortly by KOTOR.

 

[Kahunaburger]

I have raged against the railroading (I have to work with Cerberus?),.

I have to work with the Alliance? I have to become a Spectre? I have to oppose Saren?

There's always some railroading, and you at least have the chance to play it as if you are undermining them or agree with them (or a mix).

Those are different. My Paragon Shepard wouldn't work with Cerberus. He destroyed three of their bases, his whole team was killed because of them, they are radically pro-human. And I never worked with the Alliance. I did missions they gave/suggested to me, but I made it clear that I was a Spectre now (like saying fuck you to the ship inspection guy).

OK, so do missions Cerberus give you until you no longer need them.

I never needed them. What stopped me from taking the Normandy and high tailing it back to the Citadel?

"Shepard! We have information on a threat targeting the galaxy, no one else knows of this but us!"

"Nah, fuck off."

Very Paragon-y.

I very much doubt my renegade Shepard would join the military in the first place, but there you go.

"Threat to the galaxy"? They were just abducting colonists from a place that the Council has no authority in.

Oh fucking hell, potential threat to the galaxy then. If someone's picking off 10s of 1000s of humans and trying to hide it, that may be a bit of cause for concern. Remember they were weary of Reaper involvement also.

And that's still not a paragon-y approach from you. (You know the blue bar is for goody points, don't you?)

Because it's much better to work for a terrorist organization vs. confiscating their resources or working as a double agent?

But, honestly, this didn't hit the main problem with the Mass Effect games. The romance options are all with people who take orders from you. Fraternization, IRL, is unethical for a variety of reasons, and a lot of your dialogue options in the game would be seen as, IRL, sexual harassment. Bioware does not appear to be aware of this.

You can effectively pose yourself as a double agent, and then act upon that in the final moments.

"Fraternization, IRL, is unethical for a variety of reasons, and a lot of your dialogue options in the game would be seen as, IRL, sexual harassment. Bioware does not appear to be aware of this."

And I almost took you seriously for a second there.

Yeah, which is why it's such a huge storytelling failure that there isn't the addition of a paragon path where you actually become a double agent. It would be easy to create, wouldn't be obtrusive in the context of the rest of the story, and would completely fix that particular plot hole.

IRL military commanders don't engage in romantic relationships with their subordinates, and there are reasons they don't do this. A character-driven and relationship-driven game completely missing this fact is pretty strange.

Just as well it isn't real life then. And considering Shepard's role as a Spectre overrules his role as Alliance Navy, its all dandy. He can do whatever the hell he wants because he no longer has to abide by military rules.

Its not such a huge storytelling failure, I just told you how they fucking accommodated it. You're gone for 2 years and then you reappear working for a shady-ish group, no one official trusts you anyway.

That's also a way they could have written it, but they didn't write it that way. If you made certain choices in ME1, there are absolutely people in the government who trust you. And even if they don't trust you, you're a double agent, who often do their work without being fully trusted by the party they're working for - which is also a way they could have written it to fix the plot hole, but didn't.

Fraternization isn't bad because the military says it is, it's bad because it's:
A. Unethical to exploit a command structure for sex,
B. Disruptive to the chain of command to form ties with particular subordinates,
C. Unethical to form close emotional attachments to someone you might have to order into a dangerous situation, leave behind, order to his or her probable death, etc. (ME1 sort of gets into this, but then promptly drops it. ME2 doesn't address it at all, which is a particularly big oversight considering that you are going on a suicide mission.)

 

[Woodsey]

Fraternization isn't bad because the military says it is, it's bad because it's:
A. Unethical to exploit a command structure for sex,
B. Disruptive to the chain of command to form ties with particular subordinates,
C. Unethical to form close emotional attachments to someone you might have to order into a dangerous situation, leave behind, order to his or her probable death, etc. (ME1 sort of gets into this, but then promptly drops it. ME2 doesn't address it at all, which is a particularly big oversight considering that you are going on a suicide mission.)

A) So don't
B) So don't
C) So don't

You play it your way, the rest of us will continue with our capacity to realise its not real and do what we want.

 

[sumanoskae]

Anyone else think that Cerberus is a lot like Anonymous?

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

I'm also amused that some people expect me to admit that Mass Effect 2 is a great game, almost objectively. I don't know why.

 

[gideonkain]

Lol, thank you! - I liked Mass Effect 2, but only because the combat was more streamlined.
Every thing that happened in that game made me question it.

So ur back from the dead but you don't remember if there was a heaven or not?
Why would you fly into the center of the galaxy?
Who the hell does this Cerebus think they are?
Um...what happened to that whole "I'm the first human spectre" stuff...that was like a big deal, it's like saying "I'm the first human Jedi" -- that would be a pretty defining trait.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Fraternization isn't bad because the military says it is, it's bad because it's:
A. Unethical to exploit a command structure for sex,
B. Disruptive to the chain of command to form ties with particular subordinates,
C. Unethical to form close emotional attachments to someone you might have to order into a dangerous situation, leave behind, order to his or her probable death, etc. (ME1 sort of gets into this, but then promptly drops it. ME2 doesn't address it at all, which is a particularly big oversight considering that you are going on a suicide mission.)

A) So don't
B) So don't
C) So don't

You play it your way, the rest of us will continue with our capacity to realise its not real and do what we want.

More to the point, it is bad writing for a work that emphasizes consequences as much as Mass Effect does to fail to understand the consequences of an major (potential) part of the plot. The point is not "don't have fraternization in mass effect," the point is "demonstrate the ethical implications of fraternization in mass effect."

Arguing that breaks from how people would realistically act in a game are acceptable because a game is "not real" is essentially arguing that the game is poorly written. This is because Mass Effect's writers want to write people who act like real people, and when they write consequence-free fraternization into the story, this is a failure to do so.

 

[Woodsey]

Fraternization isn't bad because the military says it is, it's bad because it's:
A. Unethical to exploit a command structure for sex,
B. Disruptive to the chain of command to form ties with particular subordinates,
C. Unethical to form close emotional attachments to someone you might have to order into a dangerous situation, leave behind, order to his or her probable death, etc. (ME1 sort of gets into this, but then promptly drops it. ME2 doesn't address it at all, which is a particularly big oversight considering that you are going on a suicide mission.)

A) So don't
B) So don't
C) So don't

You play it your way, the rest of us will continue with our capacity to realise its not real and do what we want.

More to the point, it is bad writing for a work that emphasizes consequences as much as Mass Effect does to fail to understand the consequences of an major (potential) part of the plot. The point is not "don't have fraternization in mass effect," the point is "demonstrate the ethical implications of fraternization in mass effect."

Arguing that breaks from how people would realistically act in a game are acceptable because a game is "not real" is essentially arguing that the game is poorly written. This is because Mass Effect's writers want to write people who act like real people, and when they write consequence-free fraternization into the story, this is a failure to do so.

Someone will have to die in the first, potentially because the other is your love interest, and others may die in the second because you don't concentrate on them as much as your love interest.

You think its bad ethically, I don't; just because you think it'd have an adverse effect doesn't mean the writers (or most others) do. Non-perfect writing does not equal bad writing.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Fraternization isn't bad because the military says it is, it's bad because it's:
A. Unethical to exploit a command structure for sex,
B. Disruptive to the chain of command to form ties with particular subordinates,
C. Unethical to form close emotional attachments to someone you might have to order into a dangerous situation, leave behind, order to his or her probable death, etc. (ME1 sort of gets into this, but then promptly drops it. ME2 doesn't address it at all, which is a particularly big oversight considering that you are going on a suicide mission.)

A) So don't
B) So don't
C) So don't

You play it your way, the rest of us will continue with our capacity to realise its not real and do what we want.

More to the point, it is bad writing for a work that emphasizes consequences as much as Mass Effect does to fail to understand the consequences of an major (potential) part of the plot. The point is not "don't have fraternization in mass effect," the point is "demonstrate the ethical implications of fraternization in mass effect."

Arguing that breaks from how people would realistically act in a game are acceptable because a game is "not real" is essentially arguing that the game is poorly written. This is because Mass Effect's writers want to write people who act like real people, and when they write consequence-free fraternization into the story, this is a failure to do so.

Someone will have to die in the first, potentially because the other is your love interest, and others may die in the second because you don't concentrate on them as much as your love interest.

You think its bad ethically, I don't; just because you think it'd have an adverse effect doesn't mean the writers (or most others) do. Non-perfect writing does not equal bad writing.

Everyone in the military thinks fraternization is bad ethically - it's exploitative, disrupts the command structure, and creates conflicts of interest. As I said before, Mass Effect 1 briefly touches upon the issue, but does not seriously address it. IMHO, Bioware's desire to include a dating sim in every game (its almost a trademark at this point) overrode questions about whether it makes sense in this particular story. When people in a story act unrealistically for no good reason, that's bad writing. That is not to say that Mass Effect is badly written (I actually think that ME2's loyalty missions are examples of great writing for games), it is to say that this particular choice is an example of bad writing.

 

[Agayek]

I'm also amused that some people expect me to admit that Mass Effect 2 is a great game, almost objectively. I don't know why.

From a purely gameplay standpoint, ME2 was a marked improvement over the original game. There were a few things the original did much better, but overall ME2 was the better "game".

It just had a significantly worse story.

 

[ShadowsofHope]

I'm also amused that some people expect me to admit that Mass Effect 2 is a great game, almost objectively. I don't know why.

I'm amused that some people expect me to admit that Mass Effect 2 was a bad game, almost objectively. I don't know why.

OT: While some of your points are valid, Shamus, others are nitpicked situations within the game that you either didn't understand even with data and context from the actual narrative, or you just simply ignored such for sake of grasping at straws. I'm not sure which yet, as your thesis on the Thresher Maw scenario was patently false in terms of how it was explained in the game to begin with.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

Why is Shamus worried about Mass Effect 3? Because of Mass Effect 2, that's why.

Blame Cerberus's Idiot Science for Shepard. The human brain suffers irreparable and permanent damage after 6 minute without oxygen. Shepard was dead for almost two year. Given the amount of damage his brain suffered, I'm not surprised the man can no longer tie his own shoelaces.