If we're complaining about mass effect, can I just say, it's so fucking strange that Garrus and Jack in me3 always act the way I'd expect them to act if you got the paragon outcome to their quests in me2. Especially Jack. Girlypop why are you calling me "queen of the girlscouts" I kill people for fun. It's one of those things that really makes me2 feel like some sort of random side quest that doesn't matter in the overarching narrative.
i think mass effect overall has a big issue with how its cast react--or rather don't react to shepard's choices overall and to how you interact with them. @bimboficationblues said a while back that me2's finale in particular is really let down by how your cast basically barely react to your final choice re the human reaper including if you DON'T have their loyalty and it's particularly egregious with miranda in that sense considering her history with cerberus.
but to my surprise i'm gonna be a bit kinder to me3 and how it treats past squadmates than i expect considering my million issues with it. part of the problem with me3 is simply how difficult it is to make a game with a gazillion different little outcomes for choices made in two previous games--they had limited time and imo budget for it, like when you think about it three years is not nearly long enough for a game as deeply ambitious as me3 was in its scope. and honestly i do want to give the game SOME credit because i do think that with the time and budget it had, they DID do some really interesting alternate scenes or even whole alternate characters for paths they knew that 95% of players wouldn't bother with. like, how many people actually played in a way to get mordin's I MADE A MISTAKE or know about padok wiks through videos online versus actually meeting him?
but for the me2 cast characters who didn't have huge presence in big priority missions, like jack or grunt (jacob's treatment is egregious and its own whole different thing, thane's dying no matter what feels kinda sad and insulting for his romancers but i don't feel v strongly about it or him as a character tbh) it really does feel like they were kinda handwaved in the writing. like imo there ARE some good writing moments in there, for example i love samara at the ardat-yakshi monastery (even if there is some definite retcon here)--it's just that in the end it feels like they were only written with variations for romance or their loyalty being completed (or being alive at all) versus whether shepard tends towards paragon or renegade. and uh, even in just writing this down--these are still some p complicated things to implement in themselves, so i can kinda *understand* why, since me3 itself partly abandons much of its roleplaying in favour of more natural dialogue and cinematic scenes (and you can argue about its benefits or not, i ultimately think it was the right choice for what the little time they had bc as frustrating as it is the game's best aspects come from it and i do not think from mass effect's own previous writing fully leaning into the roleplaying would have been strong enough to hold up the game)
so as a result many of the previous cast's characters in me3 are supposed to have followed their own arcs, near completely removed from shepard's own influence on them or shepard's path besides for ticking "loyalty" or "romanced". in some cases it can be to its own advantage. i think tali's arc is one of the strongest throughout the entire series and it remains relatively coherent because she v much has her own life without shepard. i've said before that i find the virmire survivor's arcs kinda bland but they do at least remain coherent in their opposition to cerberus and loyalty to the alliance, fandom throwing a fit about how they won't blindly trust shepard nonewithstanding. liara is more complicated imo, in that i love her me2 evolution but did not buy into her character in me3 at all UNTIL she started interacting with javik and then i became much more fond of her. i think for me2 side characters like jack or grunt, who aren't playing big roles in priority missions and all, they get that default paragon arc evolution no matter who shepard was or how they treated them or what else is happening in the galaxy (again, loyalty/romance seem to be the big checks only). and like, the choice for that default paragon is partially bc like 80% of players go for paragon usually but it also shows in how the renegade path in me3 is written which is its own thorny topic.
to go back to criticisms of me3 and where its cracks and lack of choice shows more strongly, i'm just gonna go back to garrus (sigh) bc as i said in a previous post it is a huge frustration for me bc there is a compelling arc in there that doesn't really.... happen, bc by default in me3 garrus is written as Shepard's Best Friend Who Is Now A Cool Leader. and like, i do think he is well written AS shepard's friend and brandon keener is a phenomenally charismatic VA, which helps---though i will say it's kinda telling how people react to liara's devotion to shepard versus garrus's---so most people buy into it bc it feels real too. garrus HAS been the most present squadmate in all three games, besides tali who comes in relatively late in me2 and me3 (which imo is a great choice bc unlike garrus tali actually has a life and shit to do outside of shepard lmao). but in many ways, garrus is the character who ought to have been the most influenced by shepard's own morality. in me1 he is literally written as "i am a brash young asshole cop who will be convinced to change my morals at the drop of a hat" and in me2 his loyalty mission is one of the few that has different outcomes outside of "loyalty gained/failed" and seems to indicate that by the time of me3 he will be a wholly different person depending on the path shepard has sent him down. which he isn't. yes i'm aware of the cut content with sidonis and his family, but tbh even that wouldn't have cut it but it'd have been SOMETHING. neither does his arc in me3 feel v satisfying even as a paragon option imo. again, he's just there to validate all of shepard's choices while reminding you he is very cool with war crimes no matter what (which also kinda contradicts his paragon path tbh). hell, garrus won't even get mad at you if you get the quarians and tali killed. he's just.... the most proeminent squadmate in all the games, for better or worse, (and like it's funny that people say this about liara bc imo garrus is far more 'shoved down your throat' that way fandom just finds him more tolerable) and yet his relationship to you in me3 is always the exact same. which is also why i haven't shut up about him lmao i find it a fascinating weak point
it's basically as egregious as miranda choosing to quit cerberus in me2 no matter what you do. don't get me started on how miranda's lack of presence in me3 outside of sanctuary is genuinely bizarre, how poorly written the entire sanctuary thing is especially in how to keep miranda alive or not--it makes absolutely no sense, it feels like another way to up kai leng as the Cool Evil Guy and your shepard foil even though he sucks ass. so many of the big story issues in me3 feel tied to the role of cerberus and to the fact that frankly mass effect as a series is incredibly thematically inconsistent except in its shittiest of reactionary politics of "military might makes right, the bureaucrats and politicians don't understand what REAL SOLDIERS know", as well as the fact that they clearly never had a proper ending planned or the original plans went out the window halfway through which is CRAZY for a trilogy of games whose constant marketing was based on how Personal and Well Written They Are.
there are in the end some things in me3 i am more forgiving about bc i can't imagine how much of a nightmare this shit was to develop especially with the revolving door of writers and directors and in fucking three years + a whole multiplayer mode that was clearly supposed to be EA's big thing. i think me3 had to make some very tough choices considering how it was being developed + written into a corner from the previous two games, along with issues such as getting big voice actors to return to their previous roles to record and rerecord a whole lot of small and big variations. i think its best aspects are also the things that ultimately let it down; me3 IS good at making you feel part of a galactic conflict that feels unwinnable and where people slowly are beginning to lose hope and collapse in despair. some of its best writing are in its npc background conversations (the asari with ptsd at the hospital talking about tiptree is still utterly devastating to me) and the squad's dialogues feeling that much more natural and entertwined. its big cool action sequences were genuinely jawdropping in 2013. but a lot of what it did right comes at the cost of essentially giving shepard a much more fixed character come me3 no matter what, and at choosing to prioritize certain characters which make it v clear which the fandom and writers preferred or how they thought would appeal more to players, because ultimately shepard always has to be Right (except when going down the very obvious evil path and even then! your squadmates must continue treating you the same and not yknow, abandon you.)
