Mass Effect Andromeda comes out in seven days, and that means you have to hear all about it. Or hear all about my excitement, at any rate, because I’m fairly unspoiled, and maybe if I pour all my time into designing a character and planning a Space Larder, I’ll resist the mounting temptation to click on various spoiler-ridden videos.
I feel like I should add a little more here – maybe explain what I’m talking about for those of you who don’t play videogames – but I’m working on a brutal combination of insomnia and daylight savings (I needed that hour!), so I’ll wait until I’m coherent. Space, though, right? Everyone likes space.
marianchurchland.com 
I am so ready for space adventure. And also space make-outs. Please Mass Effect save me from my (so)lavellan hell (unlikely.)
I’ll accept some sweet alien love as a distraction! But wow, yes, if this were DA4 being released in a week, I’d be completely incapacitated. I’d be too excited to form sentences.
Speaking of, I took your advice and made playing Trespasser a priority, Marian. I just finished it a few days ago. OOOOOOHHHHH MMAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNN ~! You were right, it was awesome, and now I’m counting the days to DA4…
Yes, right!??? Pitch perfect slice of game. It’s almost cruel that they gave us that, only to make us wait – whatever it turns out to be – five years, or something.
I bet that stolen hour is used in time travel experiments but somehow we get it back, dusty in the post with no postcard attached to tell of its travails.
This has actually redeemed daylight savings for me, thank you! I’m going to think of it from now on as my annual donation to science.
The one feeling I really like in video games is that I’m getting away with something, and that’s something I miss about old mass effect, it was fun being a bad guy. I couldn’t refuse the siren song of sarcastic asshole dialogue that came with the territory. I loved this about kotor too, I was like the skeletor of the galaxies, it gave me a small sinister glee that I was actually getting away with being a baddy. But now I feel that’s gone missing, the suave jerk has departed, and you’re made to feel like a real ass if you choose the dark side to the point that it’s kinda sucked the fun out of it for me. I’ll play this, but that was a special time.
It is that magic time! My sci-fi meter has been pinging lately for the same reason. I did break down and watch some videos introducing changes, your squaddies, and other stuff, because I just couldn’t resist. I’m looking forward to interacting with some of these characters (and hoping for at least as many romance options as DA:I had).
I’m also excited to see your Ryder! You always inspire me to think more deeply about my protagonist for these games with your character sheets, and it’s resulting in a more rewarding game experience, I think.
Oops – I don’t know why the site decided I should post this in response to you, Shanna. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I watched some of the earlier (official bioware) ones, but I cut myself off when the longer gameplay streams started to emerge. And thank you! That pleases me to no end, because I also get really inspired looking at other people’s characters (how they’ve developed them, etc.).
I feel you. At least, I personally miss the larger range of RP choices you’d get in games that weren’t limited by a voiced character (though I also like the voices, and I wish that budgets were bottomless so I could have it all); the broader scope made all the options more meaningful by contrast. But I also think I get what you’re saying about suave jerk vs. the meaningless jerk, which isn’t budget dependent at all, and more of a writing issue. Though I’ve never actually played KOTOR. Is it worth picking up this many years on, do you think?
Anyway, I’m curious to see how MEA’s dialogue system works.
Okay so I actually went back and watched this clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m00OEow8v5Y and this is hd! I’m pretty sure I finished both games too, which for me is a lot cause I’m not even sure I’ve ever finished any of the ME, but I still like playing cause space??
It’s interesting because the protagonist here didn’t have any spoken dialogue, and I’m wondering if that helped in some way whether with budget or allowing for crazier dialogue. I’m not sure, but some of it is pretty ridiculous, and I think that’s also what tickles me a bit, even with this video I can’t help but laugh at the choices, it’s so silly, everything feels breakable and that made choices feel more important. It felt based on personal character whims in the moment, your character could simply be a chaotic person that people thought were coming to their aid which doesn’t feel in spirit of the game. That it goes against script and that the choices had gravity is what fascinates me so much, because I feel like this pretty much never happens in games. Also having the wrong character in your party would have them butting into dialogue and questioning choices that went against their character, I can’t remember if this is still a thing. So you did have a choice of the type of jerk you wanted to be instead of simply being A or B. It’s been so long that I’m sure some of this has been romanticized a bit, but overall I have a more positive impression of my experience with the kotor games. Yes I would recommend it, I’m almost tempted to go back myself!
Yeah, Dragon Age Origins was a lot more like this, in terms of your character often having the option to be randomly hilariously awful!
I’ve read, in other contexts, that adding voiced dialogue to the game is one of the most expensive things, both in terms of actual money budget and memory budget, so I can see how the voiced protagonist would force them to be much harsher about cutting out options. I guess there would be cost/benefit considerations, in terms of how many players will choose a certain thing, and how many extra companion/npc responses it will prompt, and so on. But I do miss that stuff – I’ll check out KOTOR in the summer, when I need a game to distract me from the heat!
Having played Andromeda now, I’d say the silver lining about the current system is that I can jump around between different tones much more readily on the same character, as the situation demands. It doesn’t have the weird Jekyll and Hyde effect that the Paragon/Renegade system (or DA2’s tone system) sometimes gave me. But yeah, your motivations and intent are pretty much pre-established as For The Good – no leeway, there.
Oh man, I was really hoping you’d post a space larder/character sheet! I cannot wait to finally get back out into the galaxy and make out with all those new aliens (I miss you Garrus).
Oof, Garrus is a tough act to follow! But I’m ready, and so is my body.
Hiya, I usually feel like I ought to introduce myself before remarking upon another’s post (though I never in fact do…that). I’m Robert.
Something really caught me in this post: I see that you endorse insomnia. You DO endorse insomnia, yes? Anyhow, I’m all about insomnia. Partial insomnia. More than one person more than one time has actually told me that lack of sleep can kill. But I’m still alive and apparently you are/were as of “1 day ago”. When it hits me, most often, I get about 2 – 3.5 hours of sleep. Hows about you? Have fun with Mass Effect Andromeda.
I’m an earthling and nature mystic – and just setting up my website (final name undecided – I started with the wrong title) to share the practise of re-alignment with nature, seasons, and light. This gets rid of depression and makes you feel great. ps the function of sleep is to regenerate the vital organs. To get the best out of this try going to bed at 10pm and sleeping through until 6am for a month. Use a blue light bulb for sedating effect, and focus on your breath – in….out….in…out. i am a visual person so hold the image of a cave entrance as I do this – and soon I feel like a small boat bobbing up and down on the sea…..then sleep. Good luck.