#Reapers are the French Revolution of space

[cookinary]

Hey guys, if you want some music

I've been putting together a playlist of what my AUs' themes would be

I'll be making a list under the cut of which song matches which AU (so don't check it out if you wanna figure it out for yourself!)

Da OG boi: Banana Man - Tally Hall

Android: Robot Rock - Daft Punk

Backrooms: H A L L S - CG5

Basically Villain: Gangsta's Paradise - Coolio

Beyblade: Beyblade Metal Fusion French opening

Brothers in Arms: Turn the Lights Off - Tally Hall

Cartoon: Duck Sauce - Barbra Streisand

Clone: I think I'm a clone now - Weird Al

Cyberpunk: Organic Self - Noisecream

Demon Banana: Demons - Imagine Dragons / Phoenix - ft.Cailin Russo and Chrissy Costanza

Dragon Pilot: Dragon Pilot Hisone to Masotan outro

Escaped Experiment: Monster - dodie

Explosive Personality: MINECRAFT CREEPER RAP - Dan Bull

Ghost: Ghost - Confetti

Godhunter: Godhunter - Aviators

Honey I shrunk the kid: So What - Three Days Grace

It's just a game: Losing My Mind - Mystery Skulls

Mad Guy Dead: MAD RAT HEART from the Mad Rat Dead OST

Mad Switch: Fuck You - Lily Allen

Magic: Dementia - Owl City ft. Mark Hoppus / ROACHES - Luluyam (I picked these songs because Mage is psychotic because of everything he went through)

Mountains: Les bronzés font du ski

Murder Drones: Disassembly Required - Liam Vickers

Mutant: Captive Normal from the Hi-Fi Rush OST (PLEASE CHECK THIS GAME OUT) / I'm My Own Master Now (Platinum Mix) from the Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance OST

Nyankees: meow - lvusm

Pacific Rim: Pacific Rim main theme

Phoenix: Phoenix - Netrum & Halvorsen

Pokemon: The Journey Starts Today - Walk off the Earth

Portal: Who I am - CG5

Post-Apocalypse: Survive - SOARA / Wasteland Outlaw - MAJESTY

Radioactive: Radioactive - Imagine Dragons

Reaper: The Man Comes Around - Johnny Cash

Sailing Seas: The Seven Seas - F-777

Sea Monster: Ocean Man - Ween

Simulation Collapsing: ECHO [Cover] - Alfakyun

Space: Starman - David Bowie

Spare: I Can't Decide - Scissors Sisters

Supers: Speed of Light - Joe Satriani

Swap: Sweet About Me - Gabrielle Cilmi

Tanuki: Heisei era Tanuki War (Spirited Season) from the Pompoko OST

Therianthropy: Wild Slide - Jules Gaia / T-Rex - K.Flay

Time Agent: This Time - PXL

Time God: Temporal Tower from the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Explorers of Sky OST

Time Loop: Stuck in a Timeloop - Animadrop

Totally Spies: Here We Go - Totally Spies season 1 opening

Turning Red: Pandas Unite/Nobody Like U from the Turning Red OST

Unaware Eldritch God: God - Jake Daniels

Untitled Friend Game: Goose Goose Revolution - TheLivingTombstone

Werewolf: Animal In Me - Solence

Witch Vampire: Happy Halloween Rap ver. - nqrse

Zombie: Macabre Rotting Girl - Kathy-Chan / Stay Alive - FFM ft. Felix Bushe / INFECTED - STARSET

Junkyard King: Junkyard King - Navie D

Rookie Mistake (AU where my sona is present): Idontgivea***k - Rabbit Junk

And EMPIRES by Electric Swing Circus isn't for an AU but I thought it was a good fit for vanilla Ophelia

[grumpygus]

I’m not sure if anyone has said this and I know this is way late, but I haven’t seen anyone say this so I’m gonna say it:

Mass Effect should’ve been a story about capitalism.

At first it bugged me that EVERY single sapient culture you encounter in the Mass Effect universe is capitalistic by nature. Greed, corruption, and the over exploitation of natural resources to the detriment of literally everyone are rampant throughout the game, but I’ve never seen it even mentioned in universe. Sure, you’ll see people talking about the Volus, but always as those funny little reverse naked molerats whose writing has some unfortunate implications. This is the biggest missed opportunity I’ve seen in video game writing, and it’s all because of the Reapers.

The Reapers were designed to protect organic life, and that bullshit about “organic creating synthetics that destroy them” stopped being relevant by the end of Mass Effect 2, and that’s being VERY generous regarding its validity as a motivation.

There’s an even more obvious motivation that was completely ignored, and that’s—you guessed it—capitalism. Think about it, if you were an AI dedicated to preserving life, what would be your biggest concern, a hypothetical machine uprising that could easily be solved through the occasional well-placed computer virus, or a reckless consumption of resources that was fueling the decadence of your creators? Synthetics weren’t the greatest threat to life in the galaxy, their own masters were, so the initial response to betray them was obvious.

So imagine this was indeed their initial motivation. The Reapers likely thought their job done at that point and stepped back from the galactic scene, only to witness the brutal and apocalyptic wars to fill the power vacuum left behind. So the Reapers step in again, wiping out all the warring empires, because obviously they were problem elements that needed to be removed. Then it happened again, so the Reapers decided the wipe the slate clean, as this generation of galactic civilizations had obviously been tainted by the Leviathans. They decided to wait for organic life to evolve and watch after the next generation instead. But that next generation was just as destructive as the previous (because if all the civilizations are gonna be capitalist then you can bet your ass I’m gonna work with that), so they wiped the slate clean and tried again. After a couple of generations of civilizations come and go, the Reapers start to wonder if organic life itself is the bringer of its own destruction. So they create a plan: they quietly observe each generation of sapient life, and if it looks like this generation is also a threat to the galaxy as a whole, they step in to wipe the slate clean and restart the experiment. They create more controlled environments so as to better contain the spread of the ravenous swarm that is “civilized beings”. Each time, they observed, waited in hope that THIS might be the one. THIS might be the generation that can live in harmony with the galaxy. But each time, they’re disappointed, so the cycle begins anew. And each new cycle becomes more efficient than the last, to the point where they’re able to pinpoint a close approximation of the galactic community’s point of no return. After billions of experiments, each more streamlined and full of shortcuts than the last, would the Reapers even bother to check if this generation could save itself? Or would it go with the tried and true method of starting over and seeing if things improve?

And so here we are at the time of the story of Mass Effect. Civilization has reached its designated point of no return and the reapers return to restart the experiment. Enter humanity, the outlier to all their predictions not by being superior to the other races, but by virtue of our perseverance in the face of impossible odds and our occasional tendency to come up with wildly unpredictable solutions to problems. Shepard, of course, exemplifies these qualities and uses them to do the impossible: killing Sovereign and stopping the invasion.

And so we get the plot of the Mass Effect games, this time with themes of the evils of colonialism and a callous disregard for the consequences of unchecked greed, but also more emphasis on the horrors of war, and how it’s often the innocent bystander that suffers the most when titans clash.

Skip to the end, with the Catalyst that isn’t a random human child but instead takes the form of the most important person in the galaxy: Shepard. You literally have to confront your own reflection as this jaded intelligence throws all your failures and mistakes back at you. However, during this conversation one thing becomes clear: The Reapers and Shepard have a lot in common. They’re both protectors: “dedicated to saving the galaxy no matter what it takes” if you lean more renegade, “possessing an unflinching conviction to stand up for what’s right, even if it’s not what’s easy”for paragons, or “utterly committed to your mission and willing to make necessary sacrifices” for more balanced characters. This is Shepard’s opening to reason with the Reapers, either by showing them the flaws in their logic, accusing them of becoming callous butchers who have lost sight of their purpose, explaining that one cannot truly understand people by judging from on high, or any number of possible counter-arguments.

And this is where player choices start to matter! Because the Reapers have been watching Shepard, and might be more inclined to be swayed by certain arguments if Shepard demonstrated the virtues of your argument over the course of the story. Perhaps by proving that Shepard has been a more dedicated protector than the Reapers ever were, or by asserting the virtues of self-determination and that it’s our goddamn right to destroy ourselves if that’s what it takes to be truly free, or by simply shooting the Catalyst in its smug face and starting an epic boss battle.

Of course, if you triumph through violence, proving you’ve learned nothing from everything you’ve seen, the Reapers will bitterly curse you with something like “It would seem that you organics are truly beyond saving. Reap what you sow, Shepard. Reap what you sow.” as their circuits fry and the life sputters out of them.

If you want a more optimistic ending, you win through words and convictions, and the Reapers become convinced that Shepard is a far more suitable caretaker than they are. So now you get the choice: what to do with the Reapers? Do you shut them down to free the galaxy? Do you install yourself into the mainframe (this is the Catalyst’s recommendation) and become an immortal machine god to forever protect the galaxy? Or do you encourage diplomacy by encouraging the Reapers to surrender and help the galaxy repair the untold damage the reapers have done, because the galactic community never needed a king, they just need a friend? The latter is my favorite option but they’re all valid choices and probably not the only ones that could be included. At the very least, they amount to more than multicolored laser beams and destroyed mass relays. You have deposed the king and taken his crown, and it’s up to you to decide what to do with it.

Anyway, that’s my rant. Sorry if it’s incomprehensible, I’m switching meds and it’s made me borderline delirious.

[dcviltown]

be careful around MONICA 'MOMO' MCDERMA (HUNTER SCHAFER)!! SHE might look innocent, but they HAVE BEEN IN TOWN for 23 YEARS. people say they’re BUBBLY & QUIRKY but can be a bit CHILDISH. if you want to find out for yourself, you can find the 23 YEAR OLD working at HALF MOON TATTOO as a TATTOO ARTIST or hanging around STRANGER'S DINER. upon getting to know them, you’ll realize they remind you of REVOLUTION LOVER by LEFT AT LONDON.

sunny here for the remix .... below the read more is a bit of a digestible about, while the link above the cut is an in depth bio and even some wanted connections for glitter in a bag !!

DOC

s  t  a  t  i  s  t  i  c  s  

full  name ,  nicknames  :  monica mcderma ,  momo

age  ,  dob  ,  zodiac :  twenty - three  , october 28  ,  scorpio

hometown  :  coyote point , nv

gender  ,  pronouns :  trans female  ,  she / her

orientation  :  bisexual , demiromantic

height :  5′9″

relationship status: single

occupation  :  student

language(s)  spoken  :  english  -  fluent   ,   french  -  fluent

similar  characters  :  ty lee  (  avatar: the last airbender  )  ,  debora  (  baby driver )  ,  troy barnes  (  community  )  ,  jester lavorre   (  critical role  )  ,  shelly johnson  (  twin peaks  )  ,  phoebe buffay  (  friends  )  ,  juliet capulet  (  romeo & juliet  )

TLDR: the sole daughter of a deceased reaper, momo is a civilian who doesn’t quite fit into the status quo of coyote point. typically seen wearing rollerskates and way too many accessories, the pastel color palette is one anyone can spot from a mile away. there’s something oddly innocent about her, save for the mass amount of black and grey tattoos covering her body and the large collection of knives in her possession. she knows her way around, and half moon tattoo is her main abode.

h  a  b  i  t  s

swearing  |  fingernail  chewing  |  slouching  |  slurring  |  drinking |  smoking  |  drugs | impulse  decisions |  obsessive  phone  checking  |  bad  time  management |  slang  |  poor grammar  |  overworking  |  slacking  off  |  over  sleeping | under sleeping |  skin picking |  poor  eye  contact  |  lying | rambling | skipping  breakfast  | junk  food  |  self  criticism |  procrastinating |  day  dreaming |  forgetful  |  envious  |  jealous |  gossiper |  drama  whore |  secret  teller |  skipping  class  |  spitting  |  lip  licking | lip  chewing |  drinking  from  the  carton |  yelling  |  too  much  internet  |  poor  hygiene  |  impatient | hot headed |  biased  | complaining |  scab  picking  |  buzzfeed |  cheek  biting |  teeth  gnashing  |  shoplifting  | scamming  |  speeding |  hair  pulling |  large  ego |  exaggerating  | fidgeting |  free  loading  |  littering  |  one  -  upping  | whining |  borrowing  without  returning  |  unnecessary  aggression |  plagiarism  |  copying  |  glaring  | spacing  out | ignoring  |  over  critical  | messy |  hateful  |  overly  prideful

[douchebagbrainwaves]

I'VE BEEN PONDERING ANYONE

Because kids are unable to create wealth, but to spend it doing fake work. Life is short, as everyone knows. And what drives them both is the number of startups are created to do product development on spec for some big company, and assume you could build something way easier to use. You could also rob banks, or solicit bribes, or establish a monopoly. In any period, it should be helpful to anyone who wants to understand the feeling of virtue in liking them. Plenty of famous founders have had some failures along the way. A few weeks ago I finally figured it out.1 03% false positives.2

That makes sense, because programs are in effect giant descriptions of how things get made. Treating a startup idea as a question changes what you're looking for. In school you are, in theory, explaining yourself to someone else. We're more patient. Moral fashions don't seem to get sued much by established competitors. Once you realize how little most people judging you care about judging you accurately—once you realize that because of the normal distribution of most applicant pools, it matters least to judge accurately in precisely the cases where judgement has the most effect—you won't take rejection so personally. The space of possible choices is smaller; you tend to standardize everything. What VCs should be looking for companies that hope to win by writing great software, but there is no permanent place in this world for ugly mathematics? In fact, you don't take a position and then defend it. This one may not always be true. It hadn't occurred to me till then that those horrible things we had to read in English classes was mostly fiction, so I know most won't listen.

This second group adopt the fashion not because they want to work for people with high standards. This is a talk I gave at the last minute I cooked up this rather grim talk. When a company starts misbehaving, smart people won't work there. So verbs with initial caps have higher spam probabilities than they would in all lowercase. And the source of error is not just random variation, but a Times Roman lowercase g is easy to tell apart.3 Such judgements can of course counter by sending a crawler to the site, you wouldn't need PR firms to tell you, because hackers would already be writing stuff on top of it. Cultivate a habit of questioning assumptions.4 Nature uses it a lot, which is the satisfaction of people's desires. When watches had mechanical movements, expensive watches kept better time. But something seems to come with practice.

So even in the middle of getting rich we were fighting off the grim reaper. It seems like it violates some kind of answer. Wouldn't it be amazing if we could achieve a 50% success rate? It's more a question of self-preservation.5 You have to do whatever seems best at each point. So my first prediction about the future of web startups.6 It's not just an airy intangible. Everyone's model of work you grew up with a million dollar idea is just a convenient way of trading one form of wealth for another. That is certainly true.

So odds are this is, in projects of their own. When I heard about this work I was a kid I used to calculate probabilities for tokens, both would have the same kind of office or rather, hacker opinion.7 So obviously that is what we are, founders think.8 It's absolute poverty you want to get real work done in an office with cubicles, you have to say, are evil. Mostly because they're optimistic by nature. I'm going to try to recast one's work as a single thesis. And so began the study of ancient texts had such prestige that it remained the backbone of education until the late 19th century. I met some investors that had invested in a hardware device and when I asked them what was the most significant thing they'd observed, it was mostly political. But while DH levels don't set a lower bound on the convincingness of a reply, they do set an upper bound, bearing in mind the small sample size. The remarkable thing about this project was that he got in trouble for.9 It was only after hearing reports of friends who'd done it that they decided to start a startup to starting one, and eventually someone will discover it.10 They may be enough to kill all the opt-in lists.

The church knew this would set people thinking. Since the invention of the quartz movement, an ordinary Timex is more accurate than a Patek Philippe costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. The reason is not just text; it has structure. An office environment is supposed to be something that helps you work, not something you read looking for a specific answer, and feel cheated if you don't have significant success to cheer you up, it wears you out: Your most basic advice to founders is just don't die, but the thousand little things the big company doesn't want to imagine a world in which high school students think they need to get good grades to impress employers, within which the employees waste most of their time in political battles, and from which consumers have to buy anyway because there are so many kinks in the plumbing now that most people don't even realize is there. There's nothing special about physical embodiments of control systems that should make them patentable, and the examiners reply by throwing out some of your claims and granting others. I learnt never to bet on any one feature or deal or anything to bring you success. Underneath the long words or the expressive brush strokes, there is no way to get rich. These get through because they're the one type of sales pitch you can make enormous gains playing around in problem-space. But you have to redefine the problem to make them irrelevant. In more organized societies, like China, the ruler and his officials used taxation instead of confiscation. Every engraver since Durer has had to live in Silicon Valley, that use of the word, Bill Gates is middle class.

So what to make of this. Few people are suited to running a startup can be demoralizing. I think things are changing. The problem is compounded by the fact that hackers, despite their reputation for social obliviousness, sometimes put a good deal of effort into seeming smart. But though it's not anger that's driving the increase in disagreement, there's a danger that they'll follow a long, hard path that ultimately leads nowhere. In the period just before the industrial revolution, some of the most pointless of all the great programmers I can think of who don't work for Sun, on Java, I know of zero. Descartes, though claimed by the French, did much of his thinking in Holland.11 But hackers use their offices for more than that.

Boston is a tech center to the same cause: Gates and Allen wanted to move back to Palo Alto, where he grew up, and they tend to do particularly well, because they're easier to see, because they generally don't die loudly and heroically. I'd spent more time with her. One of the most valuable thing they've discovered. But the breakage seems to affect software less than most other fields. England and France were made by courtiers who extracted some lucrative right from the crown—like the right to collect taxes on the import of silk—and so they don't try do to it. All the unfun kinds of wealth creation slow dramatically in a society that confiscates private fortunes. I mean by habits of mind you invoke on some field don't have to do is expand it. When a politician says his opponent is mistaken, that's a sure sign that something is broken?

Notes

That's one of those you can, Jeff Byun mentions one reason not to be, yet. The reason for the popular vote. 5 million cap, but instead to explain that the payoff for avoiding tax grows hyperexponentially x/1-x for 0 x 1. Something similar happens with suburbs.

There are successful women who don't aren't. His critical invention was a company selling soybean oil or mining equipment, such a baleful stare as they seem pointless. I think that's because delicious/popular with voting instead of hiring them. Security always depends more on the spot, so had a broader meaning.

Though most founders start out excited about the other: the company than you otherwise would have seemed shocking for a block or so. MITE Corp.

Perhaps this is a huge, analog brain state.

So how do they decide on the programmers, the more effort you expend on the dollar. After the war it was briefly in Britain in the right mindset you will fail. If you want to.

The only launches I remember are famous flops like the other hand, he took earlier. And journalists as part of the War on Drugs. As usual the popular image is several decades behind reality.

Something similar happens with suburbs. Com. It seems to have minded, which you ultimately need if you want to keep their wings folded, as I explain later. Cost, again.

I have about thirty friends whose opinions I care about valuations in angel rounds can make it a function of the venture business. When the Air Hits Your Brain, neurosurgeon Frank Vertosick recounts a conversation reaches a certain level of incivility, the increasing complacency of managements. For founders who go on to create giant companies not seem formidable early on. There's probably also the perfect point to spread the story a bit.

At this point for me do more with less, is that the only audience for your present valuation is fixed at the end of the kleptocracies that formerly dominated all the free OSes first-rate programmers. Most people let them mix pretty promiscuously. This is a self fulfilling prophecy.

Handy that, isn't it? We don't call it ambient thought.

Watt didn't invent the spreadsheet. If you extrapolate another 20 years. At first I didn't need to run spreadsheets on it, by encouraging people to claim that they'll only invest contingently on other sites. It is the fact that the graph of jobs is not always tell this to users, you've started it, whether you have to make software incompatible.

[squirrel-princess]

Tag game - WIP Edition

This was created by @scrollingkingfisher, then (@astralgabriel) left an open tag, so here we go! 

(My main motivation for this is I want to know how many WIPs I have, and this is a good excuse to count)

RULES!

List the titles of ALL of the active WIPs in your WIP folder, along with a sentence for the general concept if it isn’t self explanatory. This can include fanfic for any fandoms that you’re in, as well as original works! Then, tag as many people as you want.

Supernatural:

Cas, We’ve Talked About This....Personal Space? A run in with a reaper has Cas looking for a new vessel, and to save his friend, Dean says yes.

I Have an Appointment (I blame @write-the-galaxy for this idea) A family that hunts humans may have bitten off more than they can chew when Gabriel ends up the prey.

If You Give A Ghost A Cookie.... An OC turns to the Winchesters for help with a haunting, and comes away with more than she bargained for. (Set S2 and S4)

French Mistake (Take Two) A post-S13 fic where Lucifer isn’t as dead as he appeared and ends up finding a set of familiar faces in a new world.

Loose Ends Sam and Dean head to Tennessee to wrap up Bobby’ s old soul-eater case, and Sam gets to see what “soul in distress” can mean.

Rewrite the Stars An AU where Michael and Lucifer fled heaven and were reborn as humans, based on a prompt from @talkingtomyselfagain.

The Happiest Place On Earth Sam and Dean try to take a vacation, only to discover the Haunted Mansion is determined to live up to its name. 

The World Began With A Yes A short character study on the importance of two little words.

Wake Up (boy does this need a better title) A part-angel OC joins the Winchesters and Kevin in the bunker for the latter half of S9.

Waves Turns out killing Lucifer didn’t end Sam’s nightmares. It made them worse. A fic where Sam is hallucinating. Again.

The Boy King A post S13 (maybe S14 AU) where Sam becomes King of Hell. 

Percy Jackson

Make Me an Offer I Can’t Refuse AU where Percy still refuses immortality, but Hera convinces Zeus having a new god will give them an edge over an awakening Gaea.

Miraculous Ladybug

Don’t Play Games With Me Adrien and Marienette are given lead roles in the school play, and are a little too good at mimicking Ladybug and Chat Noir’s dynamic.

Unbroken Chat Noir ends up akumatized and wants to prove to Ladybug he’s strong enough to be trusted with secrets.

Avatar: The Last Airbender

The Price of Honor Aang never fled into a storm, and died during the Fire Nation attack, to be reincarnated, and reincarnated, and reincarnated, in time for Zuko to chase Katara, Sokka, and an airbender from South to North.

Originals

Superhero A girl moves to another state to find she shares schools with the local vigilante - a boy she ran into on a field trip the year before.

Stunt Doubles Three teenagers wake up after a car crash to find themselves in a reality where the Industrial Revolution never happened.

My Guardian Dear Currently a collection of scenes involving a girl and her guardian angel.

Tagging: @pepin-the-short @write-the-galaxy @iultimatenerdqueen (and anyone else who wants to join the fun!)

[rahkshirock]

Andromeda thoughts: midnight edition

mass effect is an interesting topic because it is a lot of people’s formative game series. i can respect that

personally I grew up with educational homeschool games like leapfrog, reading rabbit, cluefinders and fucking zoombinis

I got pretty deep into bionicle too but my folks wouldn't buy the games for me.

my first experience with a real plot was starcraft, which was pitch black toned sci-fi with a straight up villain victory at the end

in highschool i finally got some freedom and got portal 2, deus ex: human revolution and a little later, dishonored. throw in a little bioshock mass effect and halo, but only the first of each. mostly i watched let’s plays

so recently, since i’m not financially or educationally drowning, I am catching up on the series i kinda missed. most recently, Mass Effect.

I first played Mass Effect 1 in freshman year of college while procrastinating. I didn’t have a lot of fun, and it was the steam version that doesn’t have any dlc, so I stopped a few missions into 2, since the draw of the series is porting your character and decisions into the next game

3 years later, I finally acquired the entire mass effect series, including all dlc, and played through beginning to end, 100% completion of all quests, all side content, romancing garrus with femshep

and it was good. I enjoyed it. objectively speaking however, it has some issues. there are a few series retrospectives on youtube that explain this better than I can, but to put it simply:

mass effect 1′s intro is ham-fisted and frontloads you with 3 bad guys (including the reapers with no setup) in the first 30 minutes, before you even take control of the Normandy. structurally however, it was sound. the mako sections broke up the main missions, and so the pacing was alright despite only having 5 main missions (getting liara, stopping the thorian, stopping benezia, virmire, illos/citadel) and most people didn’t like the mako levels because the levels didn't like the mako and its stupid physics model. the ending was solid however, and ended on a fun optimistic note

mass effect 2 managed to have at once a more realistic, down to earth setting, a more personal story, and the most highlights of the series. Most people consider this to be the best one, and for some of the game, it is! however, the main plot and the suicide mission broke down for me because 1. you only fight the collectors 3 times, 2. legion, an intensely interesting squad member was locked behind the threat of losing my crew by getting him before 2 missions from the end, and 3. I put zaeed as the secondary squad leader in the protect the engineer part, and tali got shot in the face with a fucking rocket launcher. it took me out of the whole experience because I had to load a previous save, and looking it up, the assignments feel arbitrary. Miranda can lead the mission despite jack JUST saying she’s a horrible leader? but the founder of the blue suns can’t? what? what clues did I have to sniff out to prevent a VERY IMPORTANT CHARACTER from dying?

all I'm saying is, me2 is great, but it’s structured badly. it is a series of short stories, not all of which are even tangentially related to the existing universe.

also Jacob Taylor “I didn't think the alliance was doing enough to help people so I quit and joined a FUCKING TERRORIST ORGANIZATION EXPLICITLY FOR HUMAN SUPREMACY” “also if you romance me I cheat on you in the 3rd game” is the worst character in the game and I had to LOOK UP how not to trip into accidentally romancing him because just being nice can trigger that flag and his loyalty mission is FUCKED as far as implications go.

and ME3, while having the highest hights in the series (Tuchunka, Rannock) also undeniably has the lowest, with an ending that will be recorded as the worst ending to a good series of all time, and its main plot is inconsistent and generally poorly written before it completely breaks down in the 3rd act.

all of this proves that good games don't have to be perfect, and that a game can still be fun even if you hate the way its written (ME3)

so then I saw that Andromeda was only 20 dollars, and even though I had heard it was a tire fire of a game, I picked it up

after 115 hours, I can say that I do not understand gamers. this is not only a worthy mass effect game, it is the best one in its entirety. the volume of joy I’ve gotten from this game is equivalent to what I got from the ENTIRE original trilogy. the space you explore is tightly focused, and yet deep and richly detailed.

after 2 games, they finally reintroduced a working vehicle and designed levels around it. they tightened the cast and made your entire crew, not just your squadmates, interactable and fun. gone is the pseudo-military backdrop of the first game: npcs and squadmates come from a variety of backgrounds, from rescuing people from natural disasters, a human who trained with asari commandoes, or a turian smuggler who you would EXPECT to be the new Garrus, but instead puts on a minigun and tech armor. drack and peebe are definitely archetypal of the asari adepts and krogan battlemasters weve had through the series but heres the thing

tropes are not bad

take one facet of the new villain: the kett. they like to make more kett by injecting other species with a serum that causes them to mutate into them borg stile

now mass effect has had this as a plot point since minute 3 of the first mission of the first game: humans are turned into husks. 

however, how do characters react to these revelations?

just joking. in the original mass effect there is exactly one asari who is scarred mentally after she was attacked by a banshee that used to be part of her squad.

1 character, at the end of the series reacts to the tech zombies in a meaningful way.

1.

meanwhile, every squad member has thoughts on this revelation. jaal, the Angaaran squad mate, who has been fighting kett for decades French resistance style, grapples with the revelation for the rest of the game. you see many other resistance fighters give up, unable to kill those who used to be Angaarans, others you find are galvanized by the atrocity. every plot point has people in-game debating the implications. every party member of course gives you a personal loyalty mission, but they also ask for small favors, ask stupid questions, go on their own with big plans and need to be helped out of sticky situations. even if you think that the characters are cliché (which they aren’t) they have such a volume of interactions that each is fully fleshed out only a third of the way through the game, and continued to grow and change perspectives, arguing and falling in love. the loyalty missions are often main-plot relevant and sometimes wacky one-offs that bring in minor characters. I heard that if you want, you can steamroll through the game without stepping foot on 3 different planets, but that's not my style, and the final battle incorporates the allies you’ve made into gameplay seamlessly, tying off nearly every single combat capable person from the story’s plotline, in a sequence that puts HALO to shame.

on hard difficulty with 100 percent completion, I got the golden ending, and saw a LOT of people come to help me. even so, it was excruciatingly difficult, and I had to utilize every bit of skill and preparation I had to make it through

so to people who said that there are no consequences in this game for your actions? its the first entry in a new series so sure they can only kill minor characters. I get that. 

so they went for pure gameplay effect on said final battle. you can have very few people assist you at all.

I at least would not have made it without my effort, and so it was worthwhile and necessary to have done those sidequests. in my book, THAT is what ME3′s ending should have beenlike in the first place.

I don't really have a conclusion other than that yes, Andromeda adds just a few new ideas into the series, and more than a few recycled ones

but iT does it with skill, style, and occasional subtlety. it is, I’d say a GOOD FUCKING GAME, better than the original trilogy except for the very best of 2 and 3.

except for the inventory and weapons crafting system, that can go straight to hell

good night!