Octopus Overlords

I don't dislike evil play throughs of games, but very few games actually support it with real motivations for bad guy characters or evil actions that advance those motivations (as opposed to the usual video game evil of rude or greedy.) . The Mass Effect story, for instance, makes no sense if Shepard is evil. A good guy savior, sure. A hard ass military career man, sure. But evil? It just doesn't work.

Want to make games with great evil options? Make the evil choices easier than the good choices. Want the infected planet for colonization? Make curing the plague to earn the natives' support for a treaty difficult, but make letting them die off while you work on something else easy, giving even better access to the planet.

That's how 'evil' happens in real life. It's always a temptation to take the easy route or the route that benefits you the most at a cost to others when the option that benefits everyone is hard work.

pr0ner wrote: ↑Mon May 10, 2021 12:42 pm

coopasonic wrote: ↑Mon May 10, 2021 11:45 am Is there where I mention I was happy to see I get to play this on day one on Gamepass along with Biomutant?

I haven't seen anything indicating this game hits Game Pass on Day 1. It'll get there eventually, but EA games generally don't hit Game Pass the day they come out.

Yeah I guess I was getting confused between EA Play and EA Play Pro. The app shows me Pro games but I guess I don't get them.

KOTOR had great evil. Was the first game where once I played my good guy I replayed as evil. Made me regret it a few times.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Mon May 10, 2021 2:43 pm I don't dislike evil play throughs of games, but very few games actually support it with real motivations for bad guy characters or evil actions that advance those motivations (as opposed to the usual video game evil of rude or greedy.) . The Mass Effect story, for instance, makes no sense if Shepard is evil. A good guy savior, sure. A hard ass military career man, sure. But evil? It just doesn't work.

Want to make games with great evil options? Make the evil choices easier than the good choices. Want the infected planet for colonization? Make curing the plague to earn the natives' support for a treaty difficult, but make letting them die off while you work on something else easy, giving even better access to the planet.

That's how 'evil' happens in real life. It's always a temptation to take the easy route or the route that benefits you the most at a cost to others when the option that benefits everyone is hard work.

Dragon Age 1 did a great job of this. The 'evil' options weren't comic book evil (you were still saving the world), but they were more ruthless. Like for the quest line at the mage tower, the trouble there was that some mages got possessed by Demons and the paladin order was threatening to exterminate all of them to deal with that. The 'evil' option is essentially to let the Paladins do that. The 'good' option is to go in and fight the demons and undo the possession that way.

Think you still had to fight all the way through the damn tower to exterminate the mages, though. So in practice, it was basically "do I want Templars or Mages on my side", and you know what, the Templars always struck me as giant dicks so...

But yeah, maybe if there was actually a game time element to it (like, if you go off and do every side quest and help every random schmuck who give you a sob story, you might find that you actually get a "sub-optimal" ending because while you were retrieving Mary-Jane's pink pantaloons, the Great Devourer was eating more cities).

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Mon May 10, 2021 1:27 pm My biggest sticking point: I played male Shephard. Shephard, to me, is male Shephard, default look.

So, do I play that way again, varying it with different classes? Or do I switch to FemmeShep just to make it completely different - or would that alienate me. First world problems!

Jennifer Hale's voice work as femShep is superlative. You really can't go wrong with a femShep playthrough for that reason alone.

- Ash

NickAragua wrote: ↑Mon May 10, 2021 4:18 pm Think you still had to fight all the way through the damn tower to exterminate the mages, though. So in practice, it was basically "do I want Templars or Mages on my side", and you know what, the Templars always struck me as giant dicks so...

But yeah, maybe if there was actually a game time element to it (like, if you go off and do every side quest and help every random schmuck who give you a sob story, you might find that you actually get a "sub-optimal" ending because while you were retrieving Mary-Jane's pink pantaloons, the Great Devourer was eating more cities).

Yeah, I meant more that the 'evil' options in Dragon Age weren't like "pushing an elderly woman and a cute dog in front of a truck while cackling" that you see in some other games. They're just more cold blooded routes to saving the world.

So-called femShep was my only experience (mind you I never got past the original), and yeah, I thought Jennifer Hale was amazing. I'm sure dudeShep has some nuance that isn't immediately evident, but to me he just seems so generic. I was pissed off by femShep's redesign in ME3 though. Again, I didn't actually play the game, but from what I saw they made her appear younger and thinner for no reason, and she just didn't look the same at all. The box art, at least, was horrendous. Apparently a tweaked redesigned femShep character model will be available throughout the remastered trilogy, so yay? I'll just close my eyes and listen to her voice.


As for "evil choices", I'm sure a few games have done a decent job, but in Bioware games it's mostly been window dressing, hasn't it? Yeah, there may be some major plot divergences that individual choices build toward, but it's hard for them to devote design time to truly branching paths. In open-world games a lot amounts to reputation changes with various factions. I started a KOTOR evil playthrough, but it felt horrible even though it was more of a "muahaha" evil. But even in the Star Wars universe where good/evil, light/dark is well defined, it still didn't seem realistic because outside of some admonishments, most of the good-leaning companions would stand by you.

If we're talking true evil rather than "grumpy/selfish", I doubt many players are going to opt for that path. Mostly it will be those who are doing a new game+ type of run and want to see any content they missed. I think I'd rather have a Machiavellian/sociopathic alternative to a chaotic evil one.

most of the good-leaning companions would stand by you.

Some would try to leave you. Until you killed them. Or had their best friend kill them for you.

muahahaha enough?

Sudy wrote: ↑Mon May 10, 2021 11:18 pm If we're talking true evil rather than "grumpy/selfish", I doubt many players are going to opt for that path. Mostly it will be those who are doing a new game+ type of run and want to see any content they missed. I think I'd rather have a Machiavellian/sociopathic alternative to a chaotic evil one.

There's certainly a space between rude/greedy/petty and Jeffrey Dahmer/Hitler. There is a middle ground wherein lie the Mitch McConnels and Christopher Columbuses (people who achieve their ends regardless of human cost - they aren't driven to make people suffer, they just don't take it into account as long as their side wins), or even the fringe cases - the Thomas Edisons and George Pattons (people who did achieved important things despite (because of?) being terrible human beings.) Movies are starting to get bad guys right. Killmonger from Black Panther was a great example. Magneto in the X-Men. Let us play a sci-fi early James Bond, who casually executed people because the evil act was the smart move. Let us play a fantasy Jack Bauer who saved the day with incredibly terrible acts! Give us Roy Batty dilemmas!

To add to that, bring in cultural differences more, and let it go both directions. Let the classic hero's clear choice involve something seen as pure evil by the people he wants to save (I'm seeing some Babylon 5 here.) Let the traditions that the traditional hero sees as awful be seen as absolute expressions of the greatest good and love by people he's dealing with (like so many cultures saw human sacrifice - as a heroic act that saved lives.)

Put the hero in the position of having to decide whether to force his 'classic' morality tropes on others, and have there be consequences. Let him act heroically (in his mind) and become the villain to the people he saves. There is so much interesting storytelling that could be done here.

But instead we get to ask for an extra five gold. Or insist on keeping the farmer's heirloom sword for ourselves. Or give smarmy answers.

El Guapo wrote: ↑Mon May 10, 2021 11:00 pm Yeah, I meant more that the 'evil' options in Dragon Age weren't like "pushing an elderly woman and a cute dog in front of a truck while cackling" that you see in some other games. They're just more cold blooded routes to saving the world.

Yeah, agreed, especially on the large-scale decisions.

My copy is preloaded and I'm ready to go! (once it unlocks) It's funny that I'm so excited about a game I finished a long time ago but I really enjoyed the relationships formed in the game. And the long silences and snippets of conversations in the elevator!

Also scanning for elements in the Normandy was so simplistic but relaxing, like fly fishing.

They sped up the elevator. Going to miss Tali telling Garrus she has a shotgun when he annoys her.

$iljanus wrote: ↑Thu May 13, 2021 12:59 pm My copy is preloaded and I'm ready to go! (once it unlocks) It's funny that I'm so excited about a game I finished a long time ago but I really enjoyed the relationships formed in the game. And the long silences and snippets of conversations in the elevator!

Also scanning for elements in the Normandy was so simplistic but relaxing, like fly fishing.

Same here. I've been putting off another playthrough for a long time now, and am quite excited to revisit this universe with the graphics and gameplay improvements.

I'm getting my 2nd vaccine shot tomorrow morning, and took the rest of the day off just in case I had a bad reaction. Here's hoping I don't, and I can just spend the day with ME instead.

Daehawk wrote: ↑Thu May 13, 2021 1:52 pm They sped up the elevator. Going to miss Tali telling Garrus she has a shotgun when he annoys her.

I believe they made that an optional choice along with improved Mako controls. But my nostalgia stops at the crappy Mako controls and I'll opt for the improved Mako handling.

Played the first hour last night. Felt really good to be back in the ME universe, as it's been a loooong time since I've played one.

This new version seems to run very smoothly and looks great overall. The animations feel a little jankier than I expected...I was hoping they could have smoothed that over a bit. Especially the lip synching. I vaguely remember that being one of the strong points of the original, but that may just be the nostalgia talking. I also keep accidentally leaving conversations when trying to advance the dialog, will need to get used to that.

Finished the first tutorial mission. I forgot how much Kaiden sucked! Well, that should sort itself out eventually...

Well, this is fun. In the last hour, I’ve had:

- Two random crashes back to the PS4 dashboard
- A bug where Tali gets stuck in the middle of a hallway and cant move. I ended up fighting a couple battles with just me and Wrex because she was stuck on something.
- Managed to get the Mako wedged into a hallway (think Austin Powers and the cart) and couldn’t get it out. Spent about 15 minutes, finally just loaded up an auto save instead.
- Corpse from one of the geth tank-things got stuck in the wheels of the Mako and won’t come off.

Skinypupy wrote: ↑Sat May 15, 2021 3:08 pm Well, this is fun. In the last hour, I’ve had:

- Two random crashes back to the PS4 dashboard
- A bug where Tali gets stuck in the middle of a hallway and cant move. I ended up fighting a couple battles with just me and Wrex because she was stuck on something.
- Managed to get the Mako wedged into a hallway (think Austin Powers and the cart) and couldn’t get it out. Spent about 15 minutes, finally just loaded up an auto save instead.
- Corpse from one of the geth tank-things got stuck in the wheels of the Mako and won’t come off.

As a comparison, I've got about 15 hours into it on PC and haven't seen anything too odd. I did get the Mako stuck once, but it's always been squirrely.

I managed to get the Mako stuck on top of a large shipping crate and had to load an old save. The Mako is gonna do what the Mako is gonna do.

Did they streamline planet scanning at all?

wonderpug wrote: ↑Sun May 16, 2021 10:51 am Did they streamline planet scanning at all?

Yes. You open up the planet screen, push X, and it tells you what's there.

I did run into a couple more bugs last night. In one of the puzzles on Novaria, it exited the puzzle (i.e. I could hear Shepard running and shooting), but the puzzle screen stayed up. Required a reload. One of the geth that I had to kill to complete a battle fell through the scenery and I couldn't shoot or hit him with melee. Couldn't finish the encounter, had to reload. Two more crashes back the dashboard.

Nothing gamebreaking (so far) and the worst inconvenience was having to replay 10-15 minutes from a previous save. I'm 11 hours in and really enjoying it, but have been saving A LOT more than I typically would, since I have no idea what new bug will be around the corner.

Skinypupy wrote: ↑Sun May 16, 2021 11:48 am

wonderpug wrote: ↑Sun May 16, 2021 10:51 am Did they streamline planet scanning at all?

Yes. You open up the planet screen, push X, and it tells you what's there.

Good grief! The total playtime of ME 2 including all DLC content has just been cut by 95%!

I think it's only a question of when as opposed to if I get this. Hearing I don't have to do all that mining again helps. It was the big wart on the best ME game.

I'm only talking about the first game. A game in which, to be honest, I don't really remember what planet scanning really involved. I vaguely remember it was a tedious process, and am mostly assuming this "open planet, press X" is a change from the original. I have no idea what they've done with ME2.

I'm finding that my (admittedly long in the tooth) PS4 is having a hell of a time keeping up when things get hectic. Just finished the Virmire mission, and it chugged down to a single digit frame rate multiple times during a couple of those battles. It also seems to really struggle with cutscenes, often making really awkward cuts in and out of the scenes that lead me scratching my head as to WTF just happened. One minute I'm mid-firefight, and the next instant there's some big dramatic thing happening.

Wow, I feel like Xmas just got canceled!

Just bought this since I just felt like some ME goodness. And, by the way.... don't tell anyone... I got it for a DISCOUNT. (Green Man Gaming has it for $8 off if you don't mind it being Origin (as opposed to Steam).

So my main thought is it looks fine - not awesome. My PC isn't going to do 4K well so I am talking about 1080p. It's incredibly frustrating not to be able to get a diagram showing you the gamepad controls. You get told once in the heat of action what a button does and that's it. Having to go online to see this is weak. They should fix this. (I am referring to the PC version.)

JCC wrote: ↑Mon May 17, 2021 9:27 am So my main thought is it looks fine - not awesome. My PC isn't going to do 4K well so I am talking about 1080p. It's incredibly frustrating not to be able to get a diagram showing you the gamepad controls. You get told once in the heat of action what a button does and that's it. Having to go online to see this is weak. They should fix this. (I am referring to the PC version.)

I couldn't find a controller map for the PS4 version either. Figured things out quickly but was surprised by it.

Still in the midst of ME1 and the graphics are fine on my PS4. But I wonder how things will look in the later games? No complaints though and I'm thoroughly enjoying my playthru so far. There was one side mission where you had to talk down a woman who had escaped being a slave on the planet where my character's parents were killed. That was a really good non combat mission and it sat with me for a bit. Now I'm going to go out of my way to hunt down all the slaver scum I can find.

So apparently I've never played Mass Effect, I couldn't remember for sure. I know I played 3 and Andromeda but I'm not sure about 2 either... So thus far I've been really happy with the Legendary Edition. I'm playing on PC with pretty much everything maxxed out and it looks and plays fantastic.

I vaguely recall people not liking the ending of 3, was the consensus that 2 was the best of the trilogy?

I promised myself that I wouldn't buy this until I finish Yakuza 0. So either I'll see you in 900 years or I'll fold this week. I got a new HDR monitor and I really want to try it out with this. Nowhere near as bright as my tv, but it's still freaking cool.

rittchard wrote: ↑Mon May 17, 2021 12:51 pm was the consensus that 2 was the best of the trilogy?

Very much so. In fact, I'm mostly rushing through ME1 in order to get to ME2.

Part of that is also because I find the sidequests in ME1 to be generally pretty uninteresting. Most of them have the same basic structure: Get a comm about Person X or Planet Y that is in trouble, travel to the planet, Mako to the map marker, take out a dozen enemies in a big square room (that looks pretty much the same as the last 5 side quests you've done), then do a 60 second cutscene wrapping it up. They'll occasionally have an interesting bit of story involved, but most of them are meh.

The ME1 main story is really good though.

2 was great except for all that damn mining.

Skinypupy wrote: ↑Mon May 17, 2021 1:19 pm

rittchard wrote: ↑Mon May 17, 2021 12:51 pm was the consensus that 2 was the best of the trilogy?

Very much so. In fact, I'm mostly rushing through ME1 in order to get to ME2.

Part of that is also because I find the sidequests in ME1 to be generally pretty uninteresting. Most of them have the same basic structure: Get a comm about Person X or Planet Y that is in trouble, travel to the planet, Mako to the map marker, take out a dozen enemies in a big square room (that looks pretty much the same as the last 5 side quests you've done), then do a 60 second cutscene wrapping it up. They'll occasionally have an interesting bit of story involved, but most of them are meh.

The ME1 main story is really good though.

Yeah, I agree with this. I think ME1 has the best main story of the trilogy. ME2's main story is pretty lackluster, but the stories within the various individual quests (particularly the loyalty quests) are great, and the overall mission quality is better.

Skinypupy wrote: ↑Mon May 17, 2021 1:19 pm

rittchard wrote: ↑Mon May 17, 2021 12:51 pm was the consensus that 2 was the best of the trilogy?

Very much so. In fact, I'm mostly rushing through ME1 in order to get to ME2.

No, I don't think that's the consensus at all. Except for the ending, a lot of people thought ME3 was the pinnacle of the series. And some people had some issues with the reveal at the ending of ME2 also. In addition ME2 lacked some of the favorite compansion from ME1 (or they made only brief cameos). So I wouldn't say there's any consensus about which is better.

I suppose I could have misinterpreted the overwhelming outcry about how utterly horrible the ending of ME3 was as an indicator of people's general dissatisfaction with the overall game.

Going from my memory of a decade+ ago, I would actually put ME2 and ME3 about on the same level. I thoroughly enjoyed both, with ME2 getting the nod simply because the ending didn't blow goats.

ME3 would have been my favorite if they hadn't screwed up the ending. I also didn't like being forced to play multiplayer to get the "best" ending (though it was mildly fun) - which is not an issue with the LE. ME2 is awesome though. The first is great but nowhere near as good as the other two. Looking forward to seeing if the Mako is no longer frustrating.

It'll be a little while, but I'm trying to decide if I want to get it for the PC (likely better graphics, but stuck at the desk) or the PS4 Pro (lesser visuals, and I don't always have access, but I get to use the huge ass TV.)

Skinypupy wrote: ↑Mon May 17, 2021 2:17 pm I suppose I could have misinterpreted the overwhelming outcry about how utterly horrible the ending of ME3 was as an indicator of people's general dissatisfaction with the overall game.

Going from my memory of a decade+ ago, I would actually put ME2 and ME3 about on the same level. I thoroughly enjoyed both, with ME2 getting the nod simply because the ending didn't blow goats.

That's fair, my point was just about the "consensus". I loved ME3 the best even though the ending sucked. All the companions were there in varying degrees, of course. And it was such an expansive story, bringing everything to a close in a great story up until the very, very last 15 minutes. And the Citadel DLC was some of the best fan service ever in a game.

Ive heard PS4 suffers from crashes.