Quick Mass Effect 1 Spoilery Question:

[theweaselking]

I can't find my old saves, so I'm starting ME2 fresh. They point out that I saved the station but lost the council - I don't remember doing that. WAs that inevitsable, or was there an option to save the council that I might have taken the first time?

Comments

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

I saved the Council with the character I'm using right now in ME2, so yes it's possible. It has some interesting consequences. Dunno how they contrast with not-saving the Council, which I also suspect has some interesting consequences.

-- Steve also saw some interesting fallout from not killing the Rachni, though not to the extent of triggering new missions. Nothing quite as interesting yet resulting from bumping uglies with Liana...

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I'm slightly annoyed at my missing saves - I released the Rachni, saved the Council, and a bunch of other things that now haven't happened in 2 - like, I saved Ash and left That Other Guy to die, and I didn't kill Wrex.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

Well, there's one advantage to playing the console version... it's much tougher to lose the game-saves.

-- Steve has a second end-game saved from ME1, that he calls the "jackbooted junta ending", that he's not certain he wants to explore in ME2... though it would be interesting to see how different that galaxy would be, and how badly NPCs would hate/fear that Shepard.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

It occurs to me that I may have misunderstood the question; if you were instead asking if it's possible to have saved the Council in ME2's backstory without having done so in a ME1 game-save, then I'd have to answer, "I don't know."

-- Steve may have jumped to the wrong conclusion here.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

No, no - It's just, I remembered saving them in 1.

And the default ME2 is that you didn't save them.

And I was wondering if that was me *misremembering* ME1, or if it was just the default if you don't load a ME1 character.

[absynthe77.livejournal.com]

There's someone who has made available all (or most, anyway) the possible endings for download.
It are here: http://www.annakie.com/me/home.htm
SO far, probably 30% of the way through, at a guess, there have been references or events associated with damn near everything I did in ME1. Very cool. Also some easter eggs and a fair bit of geek humor.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

I laughed 'til it hurt after getting that "Krogan enhancement" note in my message inbox.

-- Steve thought it made the ME galaxy that much more real.

[pyroofone.livejournal.com]

Considering I'm playing a character heading a task force stomping on Mercs, I wanted to find the spammer and drop an assault team on his doorstep.

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

If you don't import a save, the game makes a lot of assumptions about how things went in ME1. You get a conversation after the tutorial area where they ask you a couple questions - I think just "Which of your people did you hate less on Virmire" and something else, but other than that it's set pretty much in stone.

Was pretty irritating, to me. I played a FemShep through the first game, and wanted to play a ManShep through this one so I could try to kill Tali with my virulent seed, but the only way to have the Council have not died is to have played through ME1 and saved them.

I suggest that site that other guy linked.

[pyroofone.livejournal.com]

I had a few mixed things happening from my Saves from me1 too. It all fit with what I had done before though so that worked out. The starting with piles of cash was very helpful.

Having the council is sorta underwhelming, so I don't imagin you're missing much by not having them.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

The presence of the Council is itself not much benefit... they're just as indecisive as in ME1. That you saved them, though, leads to NPCs having entirely different views of Shepard (and in some cases Humanity in general) and I think that makes some conversation trees easier to climb.

-- Steve's wondering if his offing the Batarian in "Bring Down the Sky" (DLC level) will lead to any long-term effects in the storyline.

[lafinjack.livejournal.com]

Mass Effect (either one): worth playing?

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Yes.

So far, Mass Effect 2 is a better game. It's smoother, the levels are better designed (no more spending minutes running from place to place!), and the "sub-missions" aren't as repetitive. There's a couple of good interface fixes, too.

At the same time, there's so much neat stuff from 1 that 2 *depends* on, being a continuation of the same game, that I really have to suggest playing 1 first, saving your game, and importing your character into 2.

[lafinjack.livejournal.com]

Reminds me of Austin Powers. I liked the third one the best, but it wouldn't be funny at all if it weren't for the first two.

Time to wait for a Steam deal...

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Mass Effect 1 is a decent game, but you kind of want to *avoid* the side tracks and sub-missions. I kept doing them, expecting them to be as good as the main quest, and they really weren't.

The main quest was entertaining and fun. And getting to spot the SS Chekov's Gun in the early game is always great, especially when it gets fired in the late game.

[publius1.livejournal.com]

You do want to do the side tracks and sub missions with the one character you plan on importing, because there's some REAL carry-over to the new game that is just pure awesome. But yeah, they're boring as all fuck, for the most part.

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

Mass Effect 1 in isolation, no. It's not a good game. Some bits are just mediocre, but it's incredibly terrible for the most part.

But a lot of Mass Effect 2 is gonna be dependent on having played 1, and 2 is pretty okay so far. So, really, depends if you're willing to sit through a terrible game to be able to understand what's going on in a decent one.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

I'll disagree with "terrible". (As would many critics.) ME1 had flaws, in particular the clumsy inventory management and the cookie-cutter sidequests, but the basics and the main storyline were well executed; well-enough that I missed a New Year's Eve party because I popped the game in at about 1pm on the 31st and then suddenly it was 11:30pm.

I don't have too many "why is it dark now?" games.

-- Steve will agree that ME2 is an improvement upon its predecessor, though he's not certain that trading the "elevator sequences that act as loading screens" for actual loading screens is a net plus. (Still, they're shorter.)

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

Any game with a decent budget will get rave reviews, these days. It's meaningless.

The setting presented in Mass Effect 1 is flat and generic, the characters are 1-dimensional and dull, the story is little more than a string of cliches, the action is about as shallow as a third-person shooter can get, and the Mako was unforgiveable. A bad story with weak gameplay does not make a good game.