Spoiler Warning S4E15:
Welcome to Junktown!

By Shamus Posted Tuesday Dec 21, 2010

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 233 comments

Enjoy your stay.


Link (YouTube)

Everyone is so worried about the recent Mass Effect 3 trailer, complaining about how bad the next game will be. So I sat down and interviewed Mr. Scruffy, who is actually the Creative Director of Creativity at BioWare and not a sock puppet on my left hand. He gave me the following details on the upcoming game:

In Mass Effect 3, Cerberus no longer believes that the Reapers exist, and abandon Shepard. Shepard is then forced to work for “The Secretive Man”, who is the shadowy leader of the Blue Suns. When confronted with the fact that all of his men have been hapless mooks, he’ll explain that those men were rogue elements of the organization, and the real Blue Suns are actually all cybernetic Ex-Navy SEAL Ninja biotics in power armor. He’ll give you the Normandy 3, which looks exactly like the other Normandi except it’s even bigger on the inside. There will be a little pet house where you can play the Tamagotchi-style space-hamster game. There will be a disco where you can play Japanese-style dating sim with your harem of collectible Yeomen. There will also be a Mako racing circuit.

The rest of the game will take place in bombed-out New York, the linchpin of the entire galactic invasion. The only way to stop them is to find someone who is bad ass enough to hunt down the gigantic bio-mechanical Reaper King, who has taken control of the Statue of Liberty and bombed the city with highly toxic Brownium-5.

How does the final battle end? Do the Reapers win? You’ll have to wait until the game launches to find out!

 


From The Archives:
 

233 thoughts on “Spoiler Warning S4E15:
Welcome to Junktown!

  1. X2-Eliah says:

    Nice ideas, there, Scruffy.

    However (and I’ll probably get stoned for this), this section:

    “The rest of the game will take place in bombed-out [typical big city like NY or London here], the linchpin of the entire galactic invasion.”

    ..actually seems very likely – at least for the final half or third of the game.

    1. Aces McGee says:

      You know what’s sad, I’d play a game like that. Based solely on the idiocy of the concept.

      1. Klay F. says:

        Its good to know I’m not the only one who would play the shit out of that game. Especially the Mako races. I would never admit to such a thing though. STOP LOOKING AT ME LIKE THAT I WOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH SUCH A GAME…. *cough*

        1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

          Imagine the mako races, without the mako being fixed in the least. Then have the race tracks be mountain rangey. The chaos would be impressive. And no doubt fun.

          1. Klay F. says:

            The goal would be to get to the end of the track without smashing into each other and dying in a spectacular ball of flame. AWESOME!

            1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

              With no time limit average play time for a single race would be ~56 minutes. More if everyone decides to take a shortcut over a mountain and end up getting stuck somewhere.

    2. Robyrt says:

      As silly as this sounds, this is probably the best way to go about it. The storyline stresses an attack on Earth, the mechanics require the linchpin of the invading fleet to be somewhere accessible by Shepard and a couple friends on foot, and fighting in an imaginary place (like Halo’s New Mombasa) doesn’t get people as fired up as a big Western city with bombed-out landmarks. (Hence the continuing popularity of New York and DC as overrun by bad guys.)

      1. Piflik says:

        I’d rather have some Deus Ex Machina or Chekhov’s Left Slipper to get rid of the Reapers (some kind of superweapon…or even older beings helping, who until now kept quiet, because they didn’t see a reason to intervene, just like the Nestbuilders/Slugs from Alastair Reynolds’ Revelation Space helped humans to defeat the inhibitors), commonly referred to as asspull, than having some arbitrary Head Vampire that has to be killed to get rid of all ‘lower’ Reapers, because that would be all kinds of stupid…

        Actually I would have preferred the Reapers to stay a threat that has to be prevented instead of overcoming it…since dealing with such a threat toe to toe would need to introduce something even more powerful than hundreds of Reapers which is quite hard to pull out of your ass in the first place without badly hitting several millions of tropes that should better stay avoided, but will later also disrupt the balance between the different races in the galaxy (or between that powerful thing and all races in the galaxy, if it isn’t part of one of these races) and cause all kinds of problems, preventing the story to even remotely come to a conclusion. It’s a bit like choosing the lesser evil, but in this case it would be the greater evil…

        Considering the ME3 Trailer…I really hope that this is the opening cinematic and about 15 minutes later Earth will be destroyed…but I guess that would be to bleak for Bioware…

        1. eri says:

          I think you have way too much faith in BioWare’s writers these days. The guys responsible for Mass Effect 2 and 3 have no fucking clue what they’re doing.

          1. Avilan says:

            (Sarcasm) Yes, because the story is clearly inferior to the generic RPG story (IN SPACE!) that is ME1. (/Sarcasm)

            Seriously, I just don’t see it. I would rate the craftsmanship of the story in ME1 slightly higher, but not the story itself. Say ME1 story is 7/10, and ME2 is 6.5/10. Dragon Age: Origins, who also have a generic RPG story, is probably 7/10 too.

            Are the writers really totally clueless, or is the story just not going in the direction you expected it to go?

            I *still* giggle at those who are surprised that Earth will be attacked in ME3. To me it is one of the biggest “duh” moments ever; it’s like being surprised that Frodo would be the one choosen to carry the ring.

        2. Craig says:

          Actually, there *is* a mention of a possible superweapon if you explore enough in ME1. I want to say it’s the planet Klendagon (or some similarly spelled location) where its data entry reads that a giant fissure along one portion of the surface is believed to have been caused by what could be considered a cross between a mass relay and huge mass accelerator cannon. Maybe you’ll get to hunt that down? Either that or just slap a Thanix cannon on all of the ships, since that sucker seems to take down Reaper tech pretty quickly.

          1. Topazwolf says:

            There is also that gun that disabled that one reaper by that one unknown race. So yeah, an asspull superweapon is entirely possible.

            EDIT: Oh, and there is also the Leviathan of Dis, where they found the remains of a once living starship. Maybe one of those will make an appearance.

            1. Klay F. says:

              Didn’t they make a mention in ME2 of the cause of the Klendagon fissure and the gun that shot straight through the dead reaper being one and the same?

              EDIT: According to the Mass Effect wiki, Klendagon and the dead reaper, are indeed in the same region of space (Hawking Eta cluster).

              1. daveNYC says:

                Yeah. Cerberus tracked the projectile back to its launch point, and then figured out that it had managed to hit the reaper on the way. The BFG is dun busted though.

          2. guy says:

            I’m pretty sure that’s from the gun that killed the deralict reaper, and is very exploded. The Thanix cannon isn’t enough of a superweapon; the reapers have more and bigger versions. Mind, the Destiny Ascension refitted with a Thanix cannon or the Turian “That Treaty Is Now Void” fleet combined with clever tactics might pull it off, but then Shepard wouldn’t be the sole savior of the universe.

            1. Retlor says:

              Well personally I hope that the Reaper Lord downloads into a special armoured mech in a room filled with chest high walls, and then we get to ping his one weak spot (a big glowing orb that the game labels “weak spot” probably on his chest) with gunfire until he explodes, while being assaulted by lesser mechs being piloted by the consciousnesses of lesser reapers.

    3. MAtthias the elf jedi (Cheddar knight) says:

      Another nice idea: STOP FUCKING SCREAMING MUMBLES! You nearly made me deaf!

      1. Mumbles says:

        ehheheheh

        1. MichaelG says:

          Seriously, your microphone problems seem to be chronic. Can’t you work on that a bit? Record your own voice a few times until it works right?

          1. Dude says:

            I’m telling you guys. Compress her channel. Squash it like she squashes rockets.

    4. Cody211282 says:

      I would love to play a game like that as long as it is still fun. Hell the only thing I care about in a game is that it is entertaining, so why not spend most of the end game saving Earth, that would be bad ass.

  2. Aces McGee says:

    Is it just me, or is Mordin the only good Salarian in the ME games?

    Also, in ME1, if they had the paragon/renegade interupt, would shooting Ashley to save Wrex be a paragon interupt?

    1. X2-Eliah says:

      Nope.. I’d say Kirrahe was pretty “bad-ass” good-guy.

      1. jdaubenb says:

        “Hold the line, men!”
        “Sir, we are like 80% cartilage. Those guys are Krogan – soooo…”
        “HOLD. THE. LINE!”
        “:'(“

        1. Klay F. says:

          It is just me or was Kirrahe an unusually large cloaca? :)

      2. Hitch says:

        I don’t know if it’s come up in Spoiler Warning but one of Mordin Solus’ dialog options leads to him talking about Kirrahe and making fun of his inspirational speeches, “Hold the line!” *snicker* Then, when I took Solus on a mission, in the middle of combat Mordin calls out, “Hold the line!” I nearly ate a rocket looking around to see if I had the right Salarian.

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          That dialogue option is in this episode at about 3:55.

        2. Tzeneth says:

          Another interesting fact is that if he dies on the final mission he says as he’s dieing, “Tell them, I held. the. line.” or something along those lines if my memory serves me right on one of my failed attempts.

          1. Avilan says:

            I love Mordin, but I almost never uses him. My groups depends on what class I am (duh) but usually it consists of Kasumi + Someone.

        3. Aldowyn says:

          Yeah, they HAVE to have been poking fun at themselves there.

      3. eri says:

        You know, for a relatively minor and not even very memorable character, that’s a hell of a lot of references to him.

        1. guy says:

          I’m pretty sure “Hold The Line!” is a quote from the Rachni wars or something that everyone uses. Kirrhae is just the most remembered one. He was also involved in the incident where Moridin killed a dude with farming equipment.

    2. swimon says:

      Your argument seems to imply that there are bad Salarians, where? Personally I saw a race of awesome, they all kick ass ^^

      1. Jakale says:

        Well there was that one that was trying to cheat the casino.

    3. Cyanide says:

      I’d say it’s just you. There aren’t any good Salarians in the Mass Effect series. Pretty much every one you meet is some shady black-ops style character that I wouldn’t turn my back on.

      …I didn’t like Mordin much. Can you tell?

      1. Tank Williams says:

        I agree, Mordin was the only Salarian I could tolerate. Perhaps if they fleshed out some more Salarians I would look at it differently. I hated the guy on the council, and Kirrahe was annoying.

        Cyanide, I wouldn’t so much call them shady, just pragmatic. They do what they think needs to be done in the best way they feel they can.

      2. Bret says:

        You know who else doesn’t like Mordin?

        Batarians. Batarians and Cerebus lovers.

        Know what we do to Batarians around these parts?

        1. Jarenth says:

          If Mumbles is any indication, heal them from deadly plagues.

          1. Wiseass says:

            And then kill them in cold blood.

      3. Felblood says:

        They just love Mordin because he’s a character who employs renegade like tactics without being an abrasive, kill-crazy thug. He represents the interesting direction they wanted to take Shepard, but weren’t able to, due to stupid writing.

        1. Cyanide says:

          I guess I can see that perspective, and it is nice to have a crew member who’s a bit more erudite. But “thug” is exactly how I’d describe the Salarians. Their whole military culture is based on them trying to avoid a fair fight as much as possible. And Mordin is among the worst of them.

          It’d be like if Josef Mengele or Shirō Ishii joined your squad, and thanks to a few witty lines and a cute song, they got most players to forget all the people they killed in their “research.” Mordin is responsible for the deaths of more people than everyone else in your squad combined, and it irritates me that BioWare doesn’t just allow you to shoot him when you find out what he did.

  3. Yerushalmi says:

    Last night I made some sauteed rockets in sweet-and-sour sauce. Came out great.

    1. Deadpool says:

      NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM!

  4. kikito says:

    Samus, I believe you are mistaking the next Mass Effect with the next Crysis.

    1. X2-Eliah says:

      You still hope that there will be a noticeable difference?

      1. jdaubenb says:

        My PC won’t be able to run Super Crysis II Turbo. That is a very noticable difference.

  5. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Well that guy did say “fuck it”,so he deserved to die for swearing at least.

    Sniper rifle eh?Seems like a job for the infiltrator class.

  6. Jarenth says:

    If ‘I want a cheeseburger’ is code for ‘Commander Shepard is here with two dudes’, the code ‘I want a cheeseburger, with extra pickles‘ is obviously code for ‘Commander Shepard is here, and she brought Miranda, for the love of Space some bring a flamethrower‘.

    EDIT: Also, Josh. Garrus has a sniper rifle. He’s not using it right now because you haven’t told him to use it. Which means you deserve any and all long-range woes inflicted on you.

    1. X2-Eliah says:

      If Garrus doesn’t know when to use his sniper rifle – and doesn’t have the *reproductive organs of a Turian* to choose without being told to..

      Then I really have to snicker at all the Garrus fangirls.

      1. bit says:

        Nah, He just likes to troll Shepard.

        “GARRUS! Why are you sniping people with a SHOTGUN!? Take out your rifle and do something already! I’ve got Krogan swarming all over me!”

        “Can it wait a bit? I’m in the middle of some calibrations.”

    2. BanZeus says:

      It’s true, at the end of Zaeed’s loyalty mission if you let him die you find out he and Vido are descended from the guys who run the lolcats site.

    3. Vect says:

      Wouldn’t it be “I want a cheeseburger, with extra-large buns”?

  7. poiumty says:

    A japanese dating sim with Kelly Chambers?

    I AM SO INCREDIBLY SOLD

    Also, goddamnit Josh you were walking around the ammo your enemies dropped and had 2 spare bullets in your pistol. I was practically screaming at you, but 10 seconds later you’re like “where’s all the ammo, i haven’t seen any ammo around”.
    Do you realise how bad you’re playing, mister?

    1. Robyrt says:

      In all fairness, it’s pretty hard to see dropped ammo if you’re trying to keep the camera focused on interesting things instead of just the floor and your ugly space suit.

      1. poiumty says:

        The space suit wouldn’t be so ugly if he’d change the color tbh.

        1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

          So you think the color is B-quality?

          1. Joe says:

            Maybee we should slap on a hexagon motif and just play haze. A real B-game if I ever saw one.

            1. bit says:

              I can’t tell if these are BEE puns or just accidents.

              I suppose they’re the former now.

              1. Irridium says:

                I thought we put this beehind us…

                *sigh* Why did this have to happen. Now it’ll turn into a wretched hive of horrid puns.

                1. ehlijen says:

                  AbHOR NET the puns, for they are delicious.

    2. BanZeus says:

      lol

      Shepard: Tell me more about Varen, Kelly.
      Kelly: *cries* “Shepald-chan… Shepald-chan no baka hentai!” *runs off*

      (+2 Renegade)

  8. Irridium says:

    Scruffy? I’ve never heard of him before…

    Also, the city wasn’t brown. It was grey. Because the difference totally matters.

    1. psivamp says:

      He’s the janitor.

      1. Irridium says:

        Well I’ve never seen him before.

        1. Avilan says:

          Scruffy is going to die like he has lived.

          1. MrWhales says:

            And Zoidberg

            1. Jarenth says:

              With my last breath, I curse him.

  9. Reach says:

    Wow…I almost wet myself laughing at “the secretive man,” Thanks for making me laugh so early in the morning.

  10. psivamp says:

    “Kick a twelve year old in the nuts…” Would that give you Paragon or Renegade points? Or does it depend on the twelve year old and the situation?

    1. Josh says:

      Hm. What if it’s a Bethesda twelve-year old?

      1. jdaubenb says:

        Are there even children in Bethesda games?

        1. poiumty says:

          Little Lamplight.

          1. jdaubenb says:

            I said children, not impish little monsters that are in no way, shape or form connected to rational thought!

            1. Hitch says:

              We know they’re children because you can’t shoot them and they just bounce harmlessly around the cave when you lob the mini-nuke.

              1. jdaubenb says:

                I have fought more than one boss in my time that was impervious to bullets until I destroyed its mooks and/or MacGuffin.
                Its probably just a bug that you can’t destroy Mayor McCreedy’s phylactery to rob him of his immortality.

                1. Klay F. says:

                  Yeah but if they fixed that bug, he’d turn into a revenant and you’d get an automatic TPK.

            2. MrWhales says:

              The town in Fallout 3 with the Cannibals

              They are pretty cool, except for the whole cannibal parents thing

      2. Integer Man says:

        I swear the legion kids outside the Fort in New Vegas are there just to taunt the player. I did a full on assault on The Fort and they just have these little kids running around in legion uniforms. If it weren’t for Boone (hostile targets glow red when he’s around) I would have shot those buggers.

        1. Kanodin says:

          I did accidentally shoot them, they were as immortal as ever.

          1. Will says:

            There’s a mod for that.

  11. swimon says:

    The genophage thingy is a retcon but it’s a retcon that makes some sense. It’s not hard to believe that the krogan see the genophage as an extinction even if they aren’t really falling in numbers. After all when you have to bury 1000 children for every one that survives the actual satistics seem rather irrelevant.

    1. bit says:

      I don’t think that Wrex ever states that the Genophage kills everything; remember, the Krogans birth in HUGE numbers (aka. thousands) and what the Genophage does is kill MOST of them (aka. thousands). And why would he keep saying, even in the first game, that they should concentrate on breeding if breeding were impossible? I see it as less of a Retcon and more just looking at it from a different angle.

      1. BanZeus says:

        I get the feeling Shamus is trolling us.

        Wrex isn’t a geneticist, he’s hardly unbiased, and he’s certainly not an omnipotent source of exposition. People have beliefs that they accept as true, that doesn’t make it fact. Crying retcon every time someone in ME2 contradicts someone in ME1 only dilutes the actual/intentional fuck-ups in continuity.

        [troll]

        Or, y’know, maybe he doesn’t know or care about that. :P

        [/troll]

        I can’t wait to read his rant after you catch Harbinger. Shepard goes, “Now let’s see who you really are!” and when he pulls off the mask you see that the Reapers was just Old Man Udina all along!!1 He says that he was trying to take over the Citadel so he could charge tariffs on all galactic trade and that he would’ve gotten away with it if it weren’t for those (Shepard & Co.) damn kids.

        “Well, we couldn’t have done it without our Quarian engineer!” Shep replies and gives her a Tali-Treat. Then Garrus swallows an entire sandwich in one gulp and everyone except a sullen Udina starts laughing.

        *credits*

        In loving memory of Councilor “Air Quotes” Velarn

      2. Patrick says:

        I agree with bit and BanZeus

        It’s not a retcon if Mordin characterizes the genophage differently than Wrex did. The perpetrators of atrocities usually assess them differently than the victims.

        I think it’s curious that the SW crew harps on Cerberus being a terrorist group but approves of Mordin calling the Special Tasks Group “well-respected.” STG is secretive, has very little accountability and commits murder (which Mordin sanitizes as “wet work.”)Either STG or an affiliated group developed a biological weapon that was deployed against an entire sapient species. All sounds pretty horrible to me.

        I think Mordin is a better apologist for his group of terrorists than Miranda is for hers. But I don’t see her comparision of Cerberus to STG to be so far off.

        1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

          “It's not a retcon if Mordin characterizes the genophage differently than Wrex did. The perpetrators of atrocities usually assess them differently than the victims.”

          As do scientists and non-scientists. (So I agree that it doesn’t look like retcon, just different view/wording.)

          Which brings me to a point that amuses me. ‘Sanitizes as “wet work”‘. Like how “shellshock” is ‘sanitized’ as “post-traumatic stress disorder” I’m guessing? Nevermind that in both cases it’s job related jargon. I don’t really get how using a more “polite” term about something bad is so often taken as an attempt to make it look better. The writer might’ve used “wet work” to down play it, but it would make sense for Mordin to use it just because that’s what he’d be used to calling it.

          Also, “wet work” is murder for money. “Murder” doesn’t have a motivation included. I guess he could’ve called it “assassination”, but “wet work” is faster.

          1. Patrick says:

            Oh, I agree that Mordin calls murdering people in the line of duty “wet work” because that is the term he is accustomed to using. But the term still means murder. So does “targeted killing.” “Extraordinary rendition” means kidnapping. And so on.

            I would suggest that “wet work” is not exactly comparable to “postraumatic stress disorder.” PTSD is a clinical term that was coined by scientists for the sake of precision. “Wet work,” while it is likewise jargon, is a euphemism, not a technical term.

            Mordin may see his wet work as something different than murder, but I would suggest this is exactly why military and intelligence agencies use such jargon. In that case, it’s not a matter of Mordin sanitizing his work for your benefit, but rather the people who come up with these euphemisms have already sanitized Mordin’s behavior to him.

            The fact that Mordin is so comfortable with what he does is, perhaps, what makes him a better apologist for his gang of government thugs than Miranda is for her gang of corporate/NGO thugs. It probably helps that many people consider murderers working for a “good” government more acceptable than other kinds of murderers.

  12. Electron Blue says:

    I’m not sure I get why everyone’s so convinced of ME3’s imminent failure. Didn’t everyone expect the Reapers to attack in ME3? Who knows how far into the game that trailer takes place, or what exactly we’re going to do to stop it?
    Seriously, it’s a one-minute trailer depicting exactly what is supposed to happen. I don’t think judging it at this point means jack.

    1. bit says:

      I’m hoping that they’ll try to stay away from earth in ME3; an ideal plot for me would be less running to save earth and more trying to coax the other races of the galaxy to band together and go kick the Reaper’s synthetic behinds. We’ll see.

    2. X2-Eliah says:

      The Reapers were millions of light-years away from the galaxy without their precious ‘jump-right-into-it’ thingie.

      Logical assumption would be that the Reapers are coming – slowly – from a great distance – and will be here in a few thousand years at best.

      If they can get to the galaxy in less than 5 years, why the whole mess about the citadel relay in the first place?

      1. Craig says:

        The Citadel relay wasn’t a question of being able to make it into our galaxy quickly, it was a question of making it here *undetected*. The Citadel was left to be discovered and formed as most governments’ seat of power and to store all of their data, not to mention give them main control over all mass relays. Striking from the Citadel before anyone could really get an idea of what was going on meant no risk of a large enough force being able to fight back. Logically speaking, we haven’t heard any data that states they couldn’t have just come from the outer edges any time they choose, other than it just wasn’t the most tactically sound option.

        1. Ringwraith says:

          “Dark Space” is basically anything outside a cluster of stars, so they could simply be sitting on the edges where the galaxy ends and where no-one would have any reason to travel to or otherwise investigate.
          Would still take them some time to trudge to the nearest relay however.

        2. daveNYC says:

          Not just undetected, it allows them to get in a decapitation strike on whatever amount of galactic level government has been setup.

          1. Ringwraith says:

            Not to mention the fact that the Citadel is where all the relays lead back to, so they also have complete freedom of movement while locking down everyone else’s. So they can pick off the isolated groups much more easily as they can’t band together.

            1. Will says:

              I’ve always wondered why the Reapers don’t just have mass relays built into themselves, i mean, they invented the tech.

              1. Daemian Lucifer says:

                I dont think mass relays can transport themselves.

                Still,I dont think it would take the reapers that long to reach our galaxy,even without using the relays.However,one of the points is that many relays are still undiscovered,so its quite possible for them to have one lying next to them just waiting to transport them to any of the already active ones.

                1. Will says:

                  It’s never addressed, but i don’t see why they couldn’t. I mean, the guns on all the ships use exactly the same principle as the relays, just smaller, and they transport just fine.

                  Worst case scenario, if for some illogical reason a Relay cannot transport itself, have one reaper (or two, for a backup) with Relays built into them, now no matter where the Reapers are, if shit hits the fan and they’re all stuck, they only need to leave one guy behind (the guy with the Relay in him). The rest can all get back at any time.

                2. Daemian Lucifer says:

                  I think it has something to do with mass.Like “a relay can transport only x% of its own mass”,or something like that.

  13. Alex says:

    God, the Empire Strikes Back is such an awful movie. They blew up the Death Star, why are they still fighting the Empire in the 2nd one? Stupid Lucasfilm. It’s not enough to blog about it, I need to band together with other people and make a multi-episode series so we can miss the point and focus on all of the most trivial, meaningless stuff from the last one nobody cared about, as if they were crucial to the success of the franchise COOL KIDS CLUUUUUUB

    That said, yours still isn’t the most bizarre knee-jerk reaction to entertainment I’ve seen in regards to Mass Effect 3. I have a friend who’s going to boycott Bioware if they so much as think of including multiplayer. Or husks. In a Mass Effect game. Because he thinks they’re just in there as a cheap way to cash in on the zombie craze.

    1. Deadpool says:

      Well, someone got sand in their panties…

    2. Electron Blue says:

      Except all of these people actually like the game.
      Pay a little more attention, would you? Didn’t you notice their undying praise for Mordin, Omega and Garrus? Josh liked the warden of Purgatory, too. This series isn’t all negativity, and you’re really just being a jerk by coming here and setting up a strawman.
      And they’re allowed to be skeptical of the Cerberus plotline considering it was the backbone of the entire last game. Besides that, he was just doing it for humor. Calm down.

    3. Irridium says:

      This series is about Shamus and others complaining about games.

      Thats it. So getting angry that they’re complaining about games in a series where they complain about games is just silly.

    4. Integer Man says:

      That IS a good point. They should never have made any Star Wars sequels.

      1. Felblood says:

        All sequel should be banned everywhere FOREVER.

        In fact, all writers should be shot as soon as they produce something good, so they can never disappoint their fans.

    5. krellen says:

      ESB was the low point of the original trilogy, that’s certainly true.

      1. Piflik says:

        What?! The Empire Strikes Back is certainly the highpoint of the complete Star Wars Universe…why you ask? Because it had setbacks for the good guys.

        The first Star Wars was good (albeit a bit stupid…why didn’t the Empire just blow up Yavin 4?), the second was great, the third had Ewoks, so you can forget about that one…and the new trilogy is a mindless FX-fest…

        1. PurePareidolia says:

          I just figured the fact it was a gas giant might nullify the usefulness of that somewhat – no matter what you still have a giant smokescreen that will screw up your laser

        2. krellen says:

          This is why we get all this dark, gritty, “realistic” crap now.

          Also, how is the death of Obi-Wan not a “setback”?

          1. BanZeus says:

            Because now he’s more powerful than you could possibly imagine?

            1. PurePareidolia says:

              Yeah, he says that but being a blue ghost doesn’t strike me as all that powerful.

        3. Daemian Lucifer says:

          They didnt blow yavin 4 because of this:
          http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/519.html

          1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

            The previous one in the Star Wars theme has more reasons in the annotations.

            http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/comic.php?current=512

            Really, so many things to complain about the original trilogy, and everyone seems to get hung on that one. It’s like the edited versions. Everyone is only talking about Han shooting first, but why the heck is Jabba outside and taking shit from Solo in a later scene? How does that fit the character?

      2. Khizan says:

        The Empire Strikes Back is easily the best of the Star Wars movies, both the new ones and the old ones. It has things like “character development” that the other movies completely lack.

        1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

          Like Han Solo growing from a scoundrel to someone who actually gives a damn? Like Darth Vader shedding the Dark side and his fear for the Emperor?

          Much better reasons to prefer the ESB, is because New Hope felt like they were just testing the waters and Return of the Jedi has Ewoks.

          Talking of them, is anyone else perplexed why the edited versions, since they’re supposed to be “as the trilogy was meant to be”, still have Ewoks despite they were originally meant to be Wookies? Or is that last part just a myth?

    6. Just don’t watch this season of Spoiler Warning. That’s what I’m doing. It’s a series where they complain endlessly about every little thing in a game, so it makes sense not to watch it when they’re doing a game you love.

      1. PurePareidolia says:

        On the contrary, every spoiler warning season has been about a game I love and I really enjoy it.

      2. Retlor says:

        Well I loved MOST of Mass Effect 2. A couple of the characters were a little cartoonish for the ME universe and the main plot was claptrap, but the recruitment and loyalty missions were generally spot on.

        But I’m still loving this season of SW.

      3. Daemian Lucifer says:

        Didnt you hear that people hurt the ones they love?

  14. Integer Man says:

    “If Mordin is pointing his gun at it, it’s still alive”. Briefly.

    You guys are showing all evidence of having learned the primary lesson of Mass Defect 2: Mordin is awesome.

  15. bit says:

    One thing I always wondered about the Mass Effect universe; Why does everyone try to make armies of Krogan, and why does it seem so easy? They have five sets of organs, a ridiculous amount of muscle and natural scale armor, and take a ton of resources to outfit. The Genophage thing might be a problem too. Why not breed, say, Turians? You could get them out cheaper, faster, needing less equipment and probably smarter and with better reaction times.

    1. Avilan says:

      Because you have to tell them NOT to fight? They are good at it, very hard to kill, and don’t complain if they get to die in battle.

    2. RejjeN says:

      It probably has something to do with the way Krogan develop that make them ideal for mass production. Considering they can apparently breed thousands of children in a short time (before the genophage at least) perhaps the cloning process mimics that… other than that I see your point though smarter isn’t always a good thing.

    3. Daemian Lucifer says:

      You dont need to outfit krogans.They dont need armor,nor do they need wapons.You can just unleash them on your enemies.Everything else you give them is just a plus.

    4. Neil Polenske says:

      One word:

      KEKEKEKEKEKEKEKEKE

  16. The Dark One says:

    Josh. I just realized that a lot of your squad mates are going to die in the finale.

    1. X2-Eliah says:

      I bet they’ll cheat preemptively with all the upgrades etc. to succeed at that mission.

      1. Ringwraith says:

        They won’t, they don’t use cheats or mods or anything of the sort. They play the game as it comes.

        1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

          They got, at least, the “ultimate” shotgun in Mass Effect 1 for the final mission.

          1. Ringwraith says:

            Though didn’t they just buy it?
            As that’s what you can do with the best gear, the only way to get it in fact.

            1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

              I’m pretty sure one of the items was something you find in a mission. And I got the impression, quite possibly incorrectly, that they had already done the mission and missed it. So they had to spawn it with cheats.

              But I can’t really remember and I’m feeling far too tired to go and check. What I think is that they’ll at most cheat items to show how broken they are, but not relations with characters or similiar that might bug out the game.

          2. Vipermagi says:

            They’ll probably do the same as they did then; off-screen grinding.

            1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

              Likely, but as I said above (repeating for your convenience), I got the impression that some of the items were lost due to missing them on previously done quests. And that they had to spawn them in order to get them.

        2. daveNYC says:

          I think they’ll have to upgrade the ship at least a little, otherwise you lose a lot of characters even prior to taking on the Collector station, which means the odds of losing Mordin during the ‘hold the line’ battle go way up.

          1. Daemian Lucifer says:

            They still can do upgrades between episodes,like they did with inventory management in 1.

          2. Bodyless says:

            The best way to keep mordin alive is to do his loyality mission and then not having him hold the line. So either use him for the escort mission or against the end boss.

        3. Irridium says:

          Nah, they’ll probably edit it to keep Mordin alive. Like they did with Wrex.

          1. Ringwraith says:

            They only ‘edited’ Wrex ‘in’ as they had to recreate the save they finished ME1 with, which was lost somewhere down the line. They only changed the gender of Shepard.

  17. Topazwolf says:

    What I got from the trailer was that the battle would start on earth. The final battle. So I am willing to wager that the vast majority of the game will be you running around recruiting armies to help fend of the reaper menace. And depending on your choices in the first two games will depend on the final amount you have. If legion is alive, you can recruit the entire geth armada. If tali is alive you can recruit the migrant fleet. If miranda (shudder) is alive, maybe Cerberus is going to help (probably not). And so on.

    And you will probably have lots of massive scale quests to recruit less likely allies. Like uniting the krogan homeworld under Wrex and Grunt to use. Or maybe forcing the forces of Omega to help. If the game is really awesome, you will go to the Hanar homeworld and recruit both the Drell and the Hanar. You will probably even have to recruit races such as the Yahg and Raloi that were mentioned but not really elaborated upon. All in all, an epic game.

    As for earth, it will probably be something silly, like the reapers landing there and contacting Shepard with an ultimatum. Surrender or we destroy the earth. If you fight you will destroy not only a few of us, but also the world that gave life to your species.

    1. Chuck says:

      That sounds hammy and over the top enough for the Reapers.

      You forgot the rachni, btw.

      1. Klay F. says:

        You know, I bet the rachni are that super-secret super-weapon that Shepard has up his sleeve. Shepard saves the rachni is ME1 and he’s all like “you owe me” to the rachni queen. Then cut to earth with the reapers invading and then the rachni show up and they are like “sup bitches?” Bam! Win Game!

        Yes I realize how utterly stupid that would be, yet I wouldn’t put it past Bioware.

        1. Avilan says:

          The Rachni queen has already pledged her support in ME2, remember?

        2. Desgardes says:

          But what happens if you killed the rachni queen?

          1. Ringwraith says:

            They’re extinct. Simples.

          2. Dude says:

            Then she gets resurrected by Arachnid, a super-secret pro-Rachni splinter group.

            1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

              And in the process they will implant her with cybernetics. To make her better than she was before. Better, stronger, faster.

              Until, of course, she joins Shepard’s team and becomes one of the new potential love interests.

    2. Markus says:

      I wonder if the Collector Base decision will have any effect or if it’s gonna be some lame cop out like the council decision.

      1. Irridium says:

        Wouldn’t it be hilarious if the Reapers one because you destroyed the base?

        Everyone: “Shepard, how do we fight the Reapers?!”

        Shepard: “Um… well you see, I kind of blew up the only place that would give us that kind of knowledge. So… yeah…

        Just shoot them from chest-high walls. That seems to work with everything else.”

        Everyone: “…”

        Then everyone dies.

        1. Dude says:

          That would be ballsy and awesome. And if the game becomes infinitely more difficult to win because you did nothing to save other species throughout the games (Rachni, the Krogan genophage cure data, the geth, etc), I would highly commend them. Stupid story or not.

    3. bit says:

      This is pretty much what I’m hoping to be the plot. We’ve already solidified that yes, humans are badass and Shepard is awesome, so now can we please concentrate on the parts of the game that are interesting?

      As for the Reapers… I don’t know, maybe, like, that’s just a fringe fleet, and they’re building a Mass Relay to connect to the one the Citadel connected to, so that all the rest of them could come through? Seems fairly Mass Effect-y.

      1. unnamednpc says:

        “As for the Reapers… I don't know, maybe, like, that's just a fringe fleet”
        You mean, like rogue elements? :)
        Oh, I get it! In ME3, you will learn that the Reapers of the first two games are actually only a fringe group called the “Eevil Reapers” and the actual Reapers are a race of giant super peace loving extra huggable hippies. So Shepard will be working for a shadowy badass Reaper called The Clandestine Reaper against the True Enemy, a race of giant nanobots called The Harvesters.
        Sovereign jr. – a scruff but sexy Reaper mercenary – will join your party to atone for the sins of its father/mother. It will be romancable, and have more cleavage – and more jawline – than all other characters from the first two games combined.

    4. Felblood says:

      I’m sure Cerberus will TRY. I’m just not convinced they should contribute as much to said fleet of rescuers as they inevitably will.

      Protecting Earth from alien threats is basically their thing, but even then, I predict that Shepard will need to jump through some hoops and open a plot door to get them to be part of the “help” she brings.

      I suspect most of the game will be recruiting a team from various races, and then using them to get the fleets of their respective races to go rescue the besieged planet earth.

      Here’s hoping that the endgame gives you the option to sacrifice one of your allied fleets for an advantage. TIM and his goons would be my first choice.

      1. Topazwolf says:

        I would sacrifice Tim (Yes I call him Tim, not T I M) even if I didn’t get an advantage. And when I did it I would say, “By the way, I don’t work for Cerberus, you work for me!”. Then I would steal his cyborg eyes just for the lols.

  18. Herman says:

    Did you mean “Yeoman,” Shamus? Also why would that soldier be waiting for Shepard, of all people? Either way, if more than a single mission of the game takes place on Earth, I’m going to blow a gasket.

    1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

      Maybe he meant “yo-men”. You know, men who go “yo!”

  19. Rosseloh says:

    Perhaps my biology is outdated, but wouldn’t sterility imply no fertilization happening in the first place? Stillborn isn’t sterile, and from what I’ve seen in the conversations regarding it, that particular plot point was carried over rather faithfully.

    Note that I am NOT a biologist, and I haven’t played ME1 for some time. So I might be misremembering.

    1. Jarenth says:

      No, I was wondering more or less the same thing. I remember the genophage from Mass Effect 1 causing only one in a thousand (or so) pregancies to reach term, and that seems to be the way it’s handled in Mass Effect 2 as well. It’s the main source of Mordin’s character conflict, too (but more on that when this series reaches Mordin’s loyalty mission).

      No retcon to see here, folks. Move along.

  20. Christopher M says:

    I am most amused by the fact that Scrapyard Planet (Korlus, according to the Wiki) is apparently full of human military spaceships. (Note the English letters and numbers!) Since humanity has only been expanding for about 30 years, and has only had two real military activities during this time (First Contact and First Reaper) one can only assume that they dumped every single one of their dead ships in this one spot. (And that pretty much everybody else (Turians, Asari, etc.) used different planets to dump their casualties.

    1. Ringwraith says:

      It does actually also say that it’s been used a a dumping ground for centuries, so not just humans use it.
      They also tend to strip all the ships of anything useful before sending them down to get them out of the way of any shipping lanes.
      It’s all explained in its description and its codex entry, both of which are on the wiki.

      1. Christopher M says:

        This does not explain the prevalence of human vessels or insignia, however. Even if every dead ship from the Mass Effect 1 climax was dumped here, human insignia should be a minority.

        1. Ringwraith says:

          Humans probably dumped all their ships in clusters, so they’re probably several different areas with different prevalences of each race’s ships. If you’re going to go to the trouble to towing ships out there to strip and then dump you’re just going to tie them all together and shove them down in one great big tangled mess rather than try and send each ship down individually.

  21. Slothful says:

    Something that bugs the hell out of me about Mass Effect is that, if the alien spacebeasts that you’re fighting happen to be GIANT SENTIENT SPACESHIPS, how exactly are you supposed to have any idea for how much of a threat they are if you spend the entirety of the games as just some schmuck on the ground with a gun shooting other schmucks with guns?

    The real reasons for the collectors in the game is to give you something you can shoot at, rather than spending much time pontificating on the severity of the threat, only to either: A. Activate superweapon to explod da reaper or B. Attack the invincible reaper’s weakpoint for massive damage.

  22. Wolfwood says:

    Wow so ME3 is the same as ME2 with a bigger ship. Spectacular! XD

    FYI i believe the linchpin city would be london less that trailer was only for show! >:O

    1. Ringwraith says:

      Which is interesting as it’s not usually the first choice for showing off an alien invasion of Earth unless it’s Doctor Who.

      1. krellen says:

        If ME3 includes the Doctor, I shall forgive it of all its sins.

        1. ehlijen says:

          Well, Shepard has come back from the dead at least once with a new face so far (at least in spoiler warning)…

    2. Daemian Lucifer says:

      A trailer depicting a scene not in the game?What a ridiculous notion.

      1. Ringwraith says:

        The last time they showed a scene which does happen in the game, 5 minutes in in fact, when they said that it wasn’t going to be in it as an end to the game. So they didn’t actually lie either.
        They’re sneaky like that.

  23. 13 CBS says:

    I found the “shoot guy on radio, other Blue Suns arrive” bit believable. The guy on the other end of the radio could be heard cursing about Krogan, and given that the Blue Suns mercs in the area were fighting Krogan it seems likely that the enemies you encountered immediately afterwards were sent to take out the so-called Krogan that presumably wiped out Outpost 4.

    1. Neil Polenske says:

      Or maybe the fact they heard a panicking lackey’s voice silenced by the sound of a GUNSHOT. Hell, it’s not like we see the radio get turned off either. They could probably hear her talking after she shot the guy.

  24. Leviathan902 says:

    I noticed “be professional to a crew member” wasn’t an option when my male shephard practically fell into Jack’s vagina by not being an asshole during conversation.

    Overall the romantic relationships in ME2 felt a lot less “earned” than they did in ME1. By the end of ME2 I had my pick of Liara, Jack, Tali, or Samara. Literally 4 different possibilities, every single one an option. It felt like more of a multiple choice question than a relationship.

    In ME1 I really felt like I had to work a bit to court favor with one over the other and it wasn’t as simple as “bag this broad instead of that one”. Like you might get either, or maybe neither. It could have been an illusion, but if so, it just piles more evidence into the “ME1 writing was so much better”.

    1. Entropy says:

      I’m not sure thats true. Umm…at all. It is ludicrously easy to accidentally have Ashley/Liara proposition you in ME1 without any real action on the players part. I know it happened to me. Same thing in ME2.

      1. Avilan says:

        Agreed. Liara basically tells you she has the hots for you within 5 minutes of rescuing her.

        1. bit says:

          Well… I think it’s justified. It’s clear that you’re fairly good friends with Kaiden from the start, and Liara and Ashley are both young, rambunctious, and clearly quite a pair of romantic fantasizers. Plus, you’re the protagonist in an RPG. Everybody wants to get in bed with you, everywhere, all the time; that’s just how it works.

          1. ehlijen says:

            True, how come, with a boat full of apparently lusty and eligible people, many of which get left alone on the ship for long stretches of time when shepard goes off with his favourite buddies, no one ever falls for one of the other sidekicks?

            Shepard should come home from a grunt slaying mission one day to find a sock on the airlock button…

            1. Dude says:

              Kasumi has the hots for Jacob.

              I think it comes down to production limits. You can only stuff so much dialog and assets into a game. Even if, in ME2’s case, a lot of it is unnecessary.

              I’m falling for something like Sleep Is Death these days. No such limits, because the “game” is another player.

        2. Irridium says:

          Thats essentially the same with any Bioware game.

          Countless times I was just nice to my team and they wanted to make sweet passionate love to me.

          1. Avilan says:

            This is my point; I see no difference in the difficulty to get a relationship going between ME1 and 2, unlike Leviathan902.

      2. Felblood says:

        Plus, there was the consort in ME1.

        I asked her some questions and she gave me the standard BS game hero prophecy, about how I had the potential to be good or evil. I was like, “That’s it? That prophecy was obvious and trite.”

        This conversation option lead directly to Shepard being in bed with her.

        There’s plenty of stupid floating around in both scripts, it just wasn’t quite so front loaded, directly into the main plot.

    2. Avilan says:

      Oh and I forgot… If you actually have sex with Jack, you can’t romance her.

  25. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

    Oh god. The mental image. It is silly.

    Also one about the dropping and Jack. It is also silly.

    Edit: And this was meant for the lower one, which didn’t exist for me until posting this. Also before his editing. The first part is about a Shepard acting inappropriately for a work place (“How you doing?”).

  26. Irridium says:

    Somewhat related:

    It seems there was going to be some sort of Grunt/Mordin confrontation similar to Jack/Miranda and Legion/Tali.

    http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/105/index/4391808

    Shame it got cut. You should check out the other audio files the guy found. Interesting stuff. Most notably(to me) is a paragon Conrad file. Which explains why he always seemed to think I pulled a gun on him when I didn’t…

  27. Daimbert says:

    Of course Mr. Scruffy is not a sock puppet.

    He’s a kitty-cat, and the real ruler of Azure City.

    (See “Order of the Stick” for the reference.)

  28. RTBones says:

    When Mumbles launches into her “NOM NOM NOM….” I had this very silly image in my head of a cat wrapped around the tip of a rocket trying to eat it with the caption: My Rock-et has a first name, its NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM! in a very I Can Has Cheeseburger sort of way.

    Very silly, I know, but there it is.

  29. Velkrin says:

    Here’s my theory for how ME3 will go:

    First the game will inform you that you used to work for the Earth Military/Government.
    Then you died and started working for a terrorist organization which isn’t really a terrorist organization.
    After Shepard does his/her thing at the end of ME2, he’ll be captured by the council for working with a known terrorist organization.
    Shep will try to defend themselves by pointing out the reaper connections which will trigger Councilor Velarn to spontaneously say
    “Ah Yes. ‘Reapers.'”
    This will be extremely awkward because he was in the middle of ministering a wedding.

    Shepard will be taunted by Udina who will bugger off shortly afterward.
    Shepard will then be contacted by EDI who is shutting off the power to break him out of C-Sec jail, which is totally new because we haven’t seen it before.

    Shep battles his/her way through the legions of non-C-Sec goons and has a quick chat with Captain Bailey and Anderson.
    As it turns out Joker is waiting for you at the docks. Turns out the ship is locked down again, so Shepard asks EDI to unlock it.
    EDI does unlock it, but then she’s attacked by Vigil who has been corrupted by the Council. They merge into the new AI with a significant name. Then they absorb Legion.

    Joker flies you to New York wherein the Reapers are attempting to do unspeakable things to the Statue of Liberty because they’re giant tentacle monsters and she’s a giant womanly statue.
    Joker positions the ship over one of the Reapers, opens the airlock, and shoves you out because, well, it’s Joker.
    After fighting your way to the Reaper’s core you find out their leader is none other than Councilor Velarn! When confronted with this fact he says “Ah yes. ‘Reapers.’ This is his response to every dialog choice. Including interrupts.

    For the end battle you’re given the choice of three options:

    1. Kill Councilor Velarn and hand the reapers over to Cerberus
    2. Blow up the Reapers and the Mass Effect relays, effectively forcing the universe to start over.
    3. Merge with the AIs, take over the reapers and rule the galaxy as a benevolent semi-organic god.

    This storyline is totally made up by me. Any relations to previous video game stories released around the year 2000 is purely coincidental.

    1. bit says:

      This is the most ridiculously stupid thing I have read in my entire life.

      I love you.

    2. Jarenth says:

      After fighting your way to the Reaper's core you find out their leader is none other than Councilor Velarn! When confronted with this fact he says “Ah yes. “˜Reapers.' This is his response to every dialog choice. Including interrupts.

      Somebody needs to make this happen. Pronto.

      1. Irridium says:

        I’d much rather have the option of letting the Reapers attack the Citadel, him calling for help, and you responding “Ah yes, “Reapers”. Super-intelligent life hiding in dark space coming to destroy all life in the galaxy. You’ve dismissed that claim.”

    3. Joneleth says:

      Preorder! I’ll buy eight!

  30. Milos says:

    Josh, for the love of everything that’s crispy use Mordin’s incinerate in long ranged combat – it’s a bad-ass skill!

    1. PurePareidolia says:

      Seconded. I started a new game as an engineer and it’s pretty much all I ever use, it’s just so handy.

      1. Daemian Lucifer says:

        Except against robots.Why burn them when you can turn them against each other?Hacks0rz for da win!

        1. Ringwraith says:

          Though to get them to get them to a hackable state, you need to fry them with overload.

          1. PurePareidolia says:

            Yeah, but it’s well worth it by the time you do

            1. Ringwraith says:

              I was doing it a lot, having two engineers in the squad has that effect.
              It’s even worse when you end up with three of them.

  31. Zak McKracken says:

    I see exactly one good thing here: Lots of posts on this site picking the story apart, which at this point already has no choice than be a hilariously retconned variant of the first two games.

    The part I like about the trailer: It’s neither the statue of Liberty nor the White House, it’s Big Ben! Hurray for good old Europe :)

    1. Specktre says:

      Yeah, I came back from a vacation to London and one month later the ME3 trailer is blowing the crap out of it. I was thinking, “Bwuahaha! U srs?!” And, “BIG BEN!!! NOOOOOOOO!!!”

    2. Chuck says:

      I’ve always wondered why gamers pick apart games so vociously, especially before they’ve even played them.

      My personality must be different from other gamers, but considering my mental instability I’m not surprised.

  32. Double A says:

    Hm… maybe someone should tell Josh that he has Biotic powers besides charge.

    You know, ones that can do long range stuff?

    1. Felblood says:

      Shush!

      Everyone knows you should only ever use your single best ability, regardless of the situation.

      What if he needs to recharge his shields, by charging one of the guys in the no-charging zone?

  33. Neil Polenske says:

    “The only way to stop them is to find someone who is bad ass enough to hunt down the gigantic bio-mechanical Reaper King, who has taken control of the Statue of Liberty and bombed the city with highly toxic Brownium-5.”

    Actually that’s misinformation. It’s actually about finding a bad enough dude to save the President.

    1. Irridium says:

      Or his daughter. In Spain.

    2. BanZeus says:

      At least two posts this week reference the Statue of Liberty… I take it not everyone has played the Kasumi DLC?

      1. PurePareidolia says:

        That’s just it’s head – they could still be using the body, then Shepard can be all “YOU MANIACS! YOU BLEW IT UP! DAMN YOU! DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!”
        and the reapers will be all “what a shame”.

  34. anaphysik says:

    These shorter episodes have been a huge success, methinks. For one, I’m actually watching them.

    But I’ve got to ask: has anyone mentioned that anytime someone crouches behind a chest-high wall, thy conspicuously leave their head out in the open as a target. That… that can’t be healthy.

    [Edit: now this is weird; my stand-alone comment appears above Sumanai’s much earlier one O_O]

    1. Avilan says:

      If you have a really steady hand, you can snipe enemies when they hide. They are not as skilled, except for certain power-users.

      1. Rosseloh says:

        Yes, I’ve commented on this before. My sniper rifle loves those moments where someone crouches and forgets to take their cranium along for the ride.

        Now if only I could get Shepard to take cover properly….

    2. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

      Probably because mine is a reply to a comment that was deleted (double post). And likely then Shamus bumped it down for being non-sensical (pointless), which it is. Only way to get it to make sense in the correct context, would be for me to recreate the original on which it is based, and I don’t see the point. Everyone just assume I’m going crazy-er.

      1. Jarenth says:

        Oh, Sumanai.

        That’s not possible.

        1. Sumanai - a grouchy ball of bile and cynicism says:

          Your inability to assume the inevitable will be your doom!

          (Doom and/or inevitability not guaranteed.)

  35. Jokerman89 says:

    I think that Blue sun guy is gonna be there shooting rockets at the wall until he dies of old age.

  36. Nasikabatrachus says:

    OM NOM NOM

    mumbles is awesome.

    OM NOM NOM

  37. Rayen says:

    Can i just say i don’t expect Mass Effect 3 to be any better or worse than other bioware games? It’s a trailer, it meant to be as much action as possible in the smallest timeframe. personally i’m interested now which is what a trailer is supposed to do. ME3 will be ME2 but different just as ME2 was ME1 but different. and as for the reaper invasion of earth, Last game = big set peice.

    NOw when i’m dragged to the street to be stoned all i ask is that you use large smooth stones, those jagged ones hurt more but kill less.

    1. Chuck says:

      I concur, but I add that if you come for me, I’ll be ready :)

      Oh, and I actually liked Operation Overdrive. Might as well rile people properly :)

  38. Avilan says:

    I just noticed something… This might be the greatest anti-climax. So far Josh has ignored all upgrade dialogues, which means almost everyone will die before the final mission even starts.

  39. Joneleth says:

    That’s six different Reapers in the teaser. In London only. The entire planet is on fire, all planetary defenses are destroyed or scattered, so I’m just going to assume they are not wiping out human cities alphabetically. There must be hundreds of them just on Earth.

    So, that’s pretty good strategy right there, Reapers. As opposed to, you know, a simultaneous surprise attack against key military and industrial targets of major powers. Remember when a single one of you managed to take out a chunk of the Citadel fleet all by itself? That’s superior firepower right there. You might want to use it before Reginald ‘Obvious Reasons’ Cuftbert Shepard plants a live grenade in your bio-mechanical pants or something.

  40. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Me3 will actually be just a series of boss fights against variedly coloured terminator robots like the one in the end of 2,only whole this time.And instead of the current game mechanics,each class will have just 1 weapon and 1 power,which will be asigned to your left and right mouse button respectively.

  41. Zaxares says:

    Saving Wrex in ME1: Actually, if you take the time to do Wrex’s sidequest in ME1, he will automatically stand down during the crisis point. You thus don’t need any Paragon or Renegade points to ensure he survives that way.

    On Korlus: I think Korlus’ status as the ‘junk planet’ came about incidentally. It probably started off as a place where some company set up shop as a recycler or wrecker, breaking down large ships into constituent materials and selling the scrap. Over time, similar companies moved there, the same way “steel towns” popped up during the Industrial Age, and the population expanded, and it eventually became known as the place for people to send all their trash and broken-down ships. As some of us might know, once you acquire a reputation for something, it’s darn near impossible to change it.

    12:38: You stole Garrus’ cover spot, Josh! :P Meanie!

    Also, I loved Mumbles’ “Nom Nom” commentary. XD

    1. Felblood says:

      It still makes more sense to set up your galactic Pull-n-Save district in orbit, rather than dropping the chunks down to the surface. Lifting things into space is frikking expensive.

      It’s just a matter of writers failing to wrap their heads around the fact that, in this setting people build shopping malls in space, and it becomes practical to put your junkyards there much sooner.

      1. Avilan says:

        True. However you see Normandy go in and out of atmospheres and gravity wells all the time (in ME1). I have a feeling that with a Mass Effect drive, it is far less energy-consuming to “break free” from a gravity well like a planet than it is with present-day tech.

        Edited to add: It might also be so that it is preferable to leave junk stuck on a planet, so you don’t accidentally fly right into it when appearing from a relay or something.

        1. krellen says:

          The SR1 was small enough to make entry and re-entry fairly easy. The SR2 is significantly larger, and cannot make planetfall as simply, thus why it is outfitted with the shuttle.

  42. Grudgeal says:

    You know, you actually do get to meet the ‘shadowy leader of the Blue Suns’ in one of the DLCs. To be specific, it’s Zaeed’s loyalty mission.

    Without trying to spoil much, he’s about as fearsome as the rest of the organization.

    Also, if you want to improve your paragon/renegade scores, put points in assault mastery: At the highest level it doubles your score, and you get HP, damage and cooldown bonuses to go with it. Since you basically just shoot everything all the time and don’t use powers, there’s really no reason for you to not do it.

    1. Avilan says:

      I usually wait with my “paragon / renegade boosting skill” for a while when I play, so I can use it to be sure to get 100% of whatever I am going for before the end of the game.

      1. Lalaland says:

        It’s not a one time boost but rather a permanent % boost to your alignment score so I tend to get it straight out of the gate to unlock as many conversation options as quickly as possible. You can tell as even the standard “+2” boost for conversations becomes a “+4” by the end (I think it might have been +3)

        1. Avilan says:

          Ah. okay :) Learn something new every day.

  43. Steven Rodney says:

    I’m surprised no one has made the obvious deductions. I think in ME3 Sheppard has to get the best fleet in the galaxy together, to save Earth and some of this has already been foreshadowed.

    Wrex
    In ME1 if you saved Wrex, he re-unites the Krogan clans and provides a ground force to re-take Earth.

    Rachni
    Saving the Rachni queen, who now owes you a favour will provide more forces who will want payback for ‘souring their song’.

    Quarian
    They owe you so 50 thousand ships flown by the best engineers in the galaxy.

    Dark Energy
    mentioned in ME2 while, rescuing Tali from Haestrom and linked with mass effect fields. Obviously some of the components of a super weapon.

    Spectre
    If you are re-accepted as a Spectre in ME2, Even the council has to accept the existence of Reapers. You can get the council fleet on your side

    Not to mention the favours owed by the Geth and your answer to the Illusive Man at the end of ME2

    The path has already been laid out. How we make that journey will depend on your earlier choices.

    1. Topazwolf says:

      I mentioned it up a few comments. But still awesome enough to deserve multiple posts. =D

  44. Specktre says:

    9:45 — Man, I hate the Paragon/Renegade system in ME2 soooo… much…

    It doesn’t really allow you to roleplay the way you want, you either have to go full Paragon or full Renegade it’s so stupid…

    1. Chuck says:

      I think that could be said of Mass Effect in general, really.

  45. (LK) says:

    Yomen?

    It’s an awkward word, really, but it’s “yeoman”. It’s basically synonymous with “secretary” but ranks in the military would be so much less fun if they were that straightforward.

    even more arcane fun: female yeomen used to have their own separate rank to differentiate them: “Yeoman (F)”

    Naval ranks are sort of a fascinating little labyrinth of myopic subdivisions. It’s all one big, arcane fractal.

    1. Chuck says:

      Yeah don’t there musicians have there own rank structure? How do you put that on the E-O range?

  46. Kukulza says:

    I must say, those comments on ME3 are uncannily accurate. At least the mo’ extra baddass Shepard fighting in a major city part

    Oh yeah, I’m future Kukulza and no, we don’t have flying cars in 2012 and the world isn’t ended yet.

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