MASS EFFECT TWO: GIVE GARRUS A HUG

[Mirai Gen]

On mining: Ask your crewmen about Normandy Upgrades, and get the mining tool. Makes it slightly less ear-rippingly painful.

[Solid Snake]

Originally Posted by NonCon

This game has too many fucking characters. There do not need to be this many. I'm liking the game still, but this is ridiculous. I don't want more characters I just want to chill with the ones I've got. I'd rather have two loyalty missions per character and have six characters than have character recruiting missions for twelve characters when I'll never use the majority of them.

Strongly disagree with you there. The reason why Chrono Cross sucked wasn't because of the plethora of characters, but rather because the immense number of characters simply weren't developed enough. You need look no further than the likes of the fellowship in Lord of the Rings or the likes of George R.R. Martin's immense cast of characters to come to the conclusion that sheer quantity does not always negate quality.
Mass Effect 2, like those examples, gives you the best of both worlds: a numerous and (for the most part) thoroughly well-developed group of squadmates to choose from. Even Jacob has a pretty kickass loyalty quest.

I'm not going to complain about a game that spoils me to the point that I wish there were even more missions to bond with every member of the crew.

[Mirai Gen]

I felt that way until I talked to them more. I started out finding nothing interesting about Mordin. He felt like a total gimmick, "Oh, haha, he talks really fast, it's funny." Then I talked to him more and did his loyalty mission and wow he became awesome fast.

[Arcanum]

Originally Posted by Mirai Gen

On mining: Ask your crewmen about Normandy Upgrades, and get the mining tool. Makes it slightly less ear-rippingly painful.

Also, tap the left trigger (or whatever the scan button for the PC is) while moving the scan cursor instead of holding it. Sooo much faster.

[Aerozord]

also found it helps to rotate the planet while doing it. Not much of an increase but take what you can get

[Kim]

Yeah, I already do all of those things.


To expound on why I think there are too many characters...


There are six classes in the game, and there are probably close to double that many characters. We've got a bit of redundancy, and although I'm certain someone will point out how Soldier Class Character A is so incredibly different from Soldier Class Character B, I'm honestly not going to notice the difference. I assume that the characters level in the background, but even then I don't really see why I'd switch from one party member to another party member who fills the exact same role when I've been spending all that time leveling the first. From a direct gameplay perspective, the game doesn't need these many characters.


Counter: Yeah, but you're supposed to do their loyalty missions because they have different bonus powers and that makes them play different and then Shepard can get a fancy pants bonus power via upgrades etc. (In this bit I'm assuming different characters of the same class have different bonus powers. I haven't checked.)


Okay, but I still don't see how this would not only be resolved but also improved by having two loyalty missions and two bonus powers for these characters. As bare bones as the leveling system is in this one, it certainly wouldn't have hurt.


The only reason these characters seem to be in the game is so Bioware can show off what amazing character writers they are. I'll probably like them once I talk to them, but I find I'm unable to motivate myself to get to know these characters because I'm never going to use them and the only incentive gameplay-wise to talk to them, for me at least, is so that I won't miss some fancy wonderful cutscene or mission or whatever-the-hell when I import my save in Mass Effect 3.


It's especially frustrating because I'm only ever actually using a sixth of the characters that Bioware is trying to make me fall in love with, I have quite literally half a dozen Loyalty Missions to do for these characters I'll never use, and I still don't have all the characters. In the words of Diablo II, "I am overburdened."

[Aerozord]

Originally Posted by NonCon

when I've been spending all that time leveling the first. From a direct gameplay perspective, the game doesn't need these many characters.

characters level whether they are in your party or not. So its more of a choice of who you prefer as a traveling companion.

Look at it like this, Say you prefer Legion over Tali as your tech specialist. Well some prefer Tali over Legion. You are viewing it from the idea that its better to have one person that most love then two options everyone likes. Its giving choice to the players about who they personally like more. Its why you are given more then just two people even though you can never take more then that.

[Mirai Gen]

Originally Posted by NonCon

I've been spending all that time leveling the first.

Wait, what, thirty seconds?

I mean I will admit that ME2 has a lot of very similar characters - many of them operate subtly different despite the similar classes, of course - but ME2 makes it far less arduous compared to ME1.

There's lots of subtle gameplay differences between characters, mostly in powers composition. For example, Garrus' Concussive Shot does far more damage than most of the other different Concussive Shots in the game because his is done with a sniper rifle, and he also has Overload. You could take Miranda who also has Overload, but she doesn't have assault rifles or snipers, no Concussive Shot, but she does have Warp. Or you could take Grunt, but his Concussive Shot does less damage since he doesn't have sniper rifles, despite that he doesn't have Overload, but he does have like a million hit points.

EDIT: Sides the conversations start out kinda boring but after you get in you really start to dig them. Grunt and Mordin started off boring until you got deeper into their conversations, and all Loyalty missions are more gunfights to get into.

[Kim]

Originally Posted by Mirai Gen

Wait, what, thirty seconds?

No, the time I spent playing with them in my party, but like Azis said, and I suspected, they'll still level in the background even if you don't use them.

There's lots of subtle gameplay differences between characters, mostly in powers composition.

Probably, but this is stuff I'm quite honestly not going to notice. Should I notice? Maybe. But I don't.


I'd say Azis argument about it being so you could choose which characters you like out of the classes, but that doesn't affect things, and if it does, it's almost completely unnoticeable. Maybe if the party was constantly having talks with one another during missions that were so well-written I would literally stop walking to watch them talk (AKA Exactly what happened all the time in Dragon Age: Origins), I'd say picking who you like as a character matters, but that doesn't happen so it doesn't matter.

[Azisien]

I tended to micro-manage my squad mates powers a lot, so picking between the different characters mattered to me a bit.

However, post-discussion with my other friends who've played the game, I think there's just enough characters. Reasoning? To my surprise, some of my friends didn't really like the characters I liked. It led me to the realization, that at least the slightly larger cast gives a wider spectra of people choice of personality. I wouldn't roll with Jack under any circumstances. My buddy wouldn't play without Jack. Should we remove Jack?

I mean, if there were characters we didn't like *cough Miranda* we could just not play with them. You can do their recruitment and do your best to skip their loyalty missions, and with luck watch them die!