Somewhere previously in the Human Covenant war Cortana found Halo's co-ordinates on a Covenant ship after it was hijacked or something like that. The details are hazy for me. Either way, the jump wasn't so much 'blind' as it was just sort of unknown where said co-ordinates led until they jumped.
Mass Effect 2: Let's see if I can do this from memory.
1: How did the collectors find the Normandy? I know they're hitting colonies and ships and whatnot, but they freakin' ambush the Normandy from FTL.
2: If Joker is as fragile as he claims, how did he not break something when Shepard was yanking him up out of the chair?
3: How did Shepard's body not burn up on reentry? Okay, so technically the armor could be rated for reentry, but this is something we've never heard before or since, and it also leaves us with another immediate plothole.
4: How can you make a cyberzombie Shepard if you didn't recover the head!? If Shepard's armor was rated for reentry, and they did find the corpsicle that way, why the hell is Shepard's helmet still at the crash site!?
5: Why is Shepard's helmet still at the crash site!? If the site was looted for Shepard's body then it should have been, you know looted. We're told this was by Shadow Broker agents who aren't the most subtle of individuals, and generally not inclined to leave boxes of Ezo around for Shepard to snarf up later.
6: (...and finally moving on past the opening credits.) "How does Shepard know how to use the disposable thermal clips?" has been brought up before, so has "What happened to the reusable heat-syncs?" so here's a fresh one: Ejecting a heat-sync off of any electronic component isn't a way to make it cool down faster, it's a way to make it crack. So how is this any more beneficial than simply letting the heat-sync cool off naturally? ...maybe it's a geth plot...
7: Why did Wilson try to kill you? This would make perfect sense if the collectors used intermediaries with any frequency and had a way to find out Wilson was pissed off at his job.
8: Why is Wilson pissed off at his job? The only hint we get is that he'd like to see a little more cash. I'm sure we've all been there, a job that isn't quite worth the pay, but most of us don't immediately decide to go into the security office and start gunning people down by remote control.
9: In an audio log Miranda observes that Shepard needs to be the same man/woman/escaped football captain that he/she/it was before. Which is all well and good until you realize the game just had you rebuild your character basically from scratch 10 minutes earlier. Now, I understand that the re-spec retroactively changed who you were in the previous game, but it's still an incredibly stupid comment to make, and it isn't the only one. None of this explains where (potentially) 55 of your levels just went.
10: Miranda says Shepard needs to have the same morals... er, what? This leads into a thing, in Mass Effect: Paragon was roughly Jean-luc Picard while Renegade was roughly Jack Bauer on the way to the bathroom. But in ME2 that's not quite the same thing, Paragon is now more in line with Jeffery Sinclair (good to a fault, but dumb as a brick, while pretending to be cunning), while Renegade has changed to the goddamn Joker.
11: Unless it was Miranda (and not Wilson) was secretly behind the attempt to assassinate Shepard, why did she execute him without even trying to decipher his motives? When asked, she responds that, he was too dangerous to keep around. Oh yeah? Dangerous to whom?
12: How can you adequately judge someone's mental state by asking three questions? (Or worse yet, two if you didn't import a save?).
13: How did Cerberus afford all these new toys? In the first game you run across one Cerberus "space station", and that's it, in point of fact it's a re-purposed collection of freighters which has been converted into a kind of depot.
14: Why did Cerberus start custom building stations? Big Stations, with distinctive architecture, and a Corporate friendly Cerberus Logo on everything? You see, in the first game they're a rogue operation, most people don't even know they exist, and part of the reason for that is because they run out of small prefab bases, like the station mentioned in 13. And that's the smart way for a covert ops organization to run. Why are they suddenly posting up calling cards everywhere and making their own unique stations when their entire goal used to be being invisible?
15: Where the fuck did the Illusive Man Come from? Seriously, we raid 4 different Cerberus operations in ME1. In ME2 we raid precisely two Cerberus facilities. In Mass Effect we get outgoing messages to someone, but they're never named. Two years later and the Illusive Man is now getting his code name splashed everywhere and everyone has heard of him, whereas two years ago no one even knew he existed.
16: Why can't you tell the Illusive Man to go fuck himself? If you're a survivor background character he fucking destroyed your life, if you're not you've certainly seen the wreckage he created. He waves this off with a claim that they were rogue splinters, but when you think about it, if every encounter you had with an organization involved their "rogue" membership, and you're as (allegedly) well educated in black ops as Shepard, the term that comes to mind isn't so much "rogue" as "plausible deniablity".
17: So why are you working for this guy? You can't stumble back to the council half dead and ask to work with them?
18: How come the only time anyone activates the robotic defenses in this game is when they're trying to kill you?
19: How is it, the first thing you do after leaving is run into Tali? I know she's a popular character and all, but it's been two years, you've been dead, and literally the first living person you run into after coming back from the dead is an old buddy?
20: Why was a civilian colony outfitted with multiple anti-vehicle attack drones?
21: Where were Freedom's Progress' Drones during the collector Attack?
22: Why does Shepard mock us with an Assault Rifle in the cut-scene before facing down against the YMIR Mech? And, more importantly where does that rifle go afterwards?
23: How did Cerberus manage to build an advanced version of one of the most advanced star ships out there. In fact the SSV Normandy explicitly used alien technology that humans hadn't been able to get their hands on yet... how the hell did Cerberus manage to build that ship, and do it in secret?
24: How is the new Normandy not seized by C-Sec the instant you dock at the citadel? This is the equivalent of al Qaeda landing at an airport with a B2 and then being allowed to leave with it, coming and going at will.
25: Why wouldn't you work with the Council? Or, put more clearly, why the hell other than a plot hole the size of Wisconsin would you not agree to switch allegiance back to the council from Cerberus!?
26: Why the hell did Chakwas sign up with Cerberus? Remember, she was there with you, she saw reports on the things you saw, and all the hideous things Cerberus did. The justification she gives is she was bored by living planet side. Really? That fuckin' bored!? So she signs up with the people that were engineering bio-weapons and testing them on humans?
27: How did Miranda throw you out of your office? (I kid... sorta...)
28: Is Shepard being oblivious or darkly sardonic when they tell the looters in the quarantine zone that he/she doesn't like grave robbers, while (probably) having spent the better part of their trip there doing exactly that?
29: Why are the collectors working with the vorcha? This is the only time in the entire game we see the collectors working through intermediaries. Now, if you're following the sequence the game recommends for recruitment, the significance of this isn't immediately apparent. This is the only time we see the collectors doing this. Throughout the rest of the game they act directly or don't involve themselves. With the exception of this, the collectors are a bit like the Borg. They don't care about the details the individuals or what you're doing, so long as it isn't getting in their way, or you aren't something they want.
30: So what is the point to this entire vignette? The collectors have no follow up, and aren't involved in any other recruitment missions.
31: Every time I play Mordin's recruitment, I could swear there are krogen in with the Bloodpack, but they aren't immune to the plauge, so what gives?
32: So when Shepard asks the Illusive man to help him/her put his/her team back together, the one from the first game and he blows Shepard off, why does he then turn around and send him back out after Garrius immediately? Either he is genuinely incompetent (which is possible) or he was messing with Shepard (which is more likely) or someone dropped the ball (which is the reasonable explanation.)
33: If you take Zaeed on the Archangel mission you get some wierd blue suns dialog. It's not really a plot hole, but it is a crappy play at keeping the reveal for Zaeed's loyalty mission a secret.
34: (slightly out of sequence) why can't anyone patch up Garrius' armor? Now, I get that his face is pretty baddly messed up from the blast and all, but there's a freakin' hole in his armor now, and no plausible reason not to repair that, even if it's a patch job. What's more his loyalty mission gives you a palette swap of the exact same armor with the exact same hole in it. The only way to fix it is to spend three bucks on one of the alternate appearance packs. I know plot holes aren't supposed to be literal holes, but goddamn.
35: What the hell was TIM smoking when he thought getting Jack would be a good idea? I don't mean she's supposed to be dangerous, or unstable, though there is that too. She brings nothing to the table you don't already have, in the range of specialists.
36: Jack. Just fuckin' Jack. There is nothing about this character which makes sense in any way shape or form. She is a walking plot hole. As 35 mentioned there's no reason to recruit her. She's more of a liability than an asset. She actually wants to kill everyone on the ship. Oh, and she's psychologically impossible. The back story that's presented for her does not make sense. I don't mean I'm missing parts of it, I mean her experiences would not, and could not, produce someone with her psychology.
37: How stupid (on a scale of 1 to 350) is Warden Kuril? He knows Shepard has his/her weapons. He knows Shepard is so bad ass that even a little thing like being fucking killed couldn't stop him/her, he knows that Shepard is being backed by someone very fucking powerful and resourceful. What the hell was he thinking? Bonus points if you bring Zaeed along, in which case you've got his former boss along for the ride as well.
38: What kind of a stupid prison even includes an "open all cells at once" button!?
39: Why don't the Blue Suns on Korlus have duress codes? Okay, that actually kinda makes sense, but anyway.
40: How can a krogen be put down as easily as Okeer? Maybe he had some kind of condition? But with the psychotic ecosystem that produced him, krogens should be incredibly resistant to toxins.
41: How much brain damage did Shepard have to suffer before opening the tank and letting Grunt out? There's overconfident and then there's suicide. This is not the former.
42: Where did Mordin get those seeker bugs to play with? This really strikes me as there's a cut mission someplace in here where you went in and got these things from someone, (maybe Okeer?) that got cut.
43: Where are Horizon's Robot Defenders?
44: Characters who were not party members in the first game will talk about your experiences on Eden Prime. If it's Miranda, Jacob or Mordin, this makes some sense, but how the hell would Jack and Grunt know what you faced where. Jack's lucky if she can remember what she had for breakfast and Grunt may not even be literate (or housebroken) yet.
45: Assuming Direct Control.
46: How is "I was dead" not a legitimate reason not to ring up your old buddy? Seriously, it's entirely possible to spend the first few hours trying to find out where Kaishley is only to be stonewalled by SpawnAnderson or Udina.
47: Why the hell would Tali care about how Shepard got to Liara in her recruitment mission in ME1... and more importantly what the hell does it have to do with anything regarding her recruitment? To explain, she talks about using the mining laser in Liara's recruitment in ME1, but that doesn't have any applicability to this situation where Tali is using demolition packs to clear away rubble.
48: So the sun fries all electronics, but not the geth, and not your weapons, but it does fry the quarian's weapons? Oh, and bugs, it fries bugs good too.
I'm going to cut it here, I've still got plenty of material to munch through but I'm actually getting tired, so I'll pick this up again later.
Why doesn't the Mushroom Kingdom have an army? Every nation has an army, but somehow they seem to remain obliviously unprotected despite the numerous kidnappings of their monarch
It's never exactly explained why Willie Wompa took Von Clutch's Black Power Gem, or how Crash become sadistic toward chickens and Park Drones, or where Aku Aku or Uka Uka are during the game's storyline.
That only lists afew of them, and frankly, as good as I thought the gameplay was, the Crash francise probubly would've been better stopping at Crash Twinsanity (though that would mean Nina Cortex would remind silent.)
I'm pretty sure that the neurotoxin flooder mechanism was a total black comedy joke (i.e. it's not really a plot hole because it's not supposed to make sense.)
Okay, perhaps that was a bad example. But here's another: In Half-Life 2 (or pretty much any game where rag-tag rebels overthrow an evil government) what are they going to do after overthrowing the regime? Do they have any alternative lined up? After all, evil order is better than no order at all (and yes, that is highly debatable, but this thread isn't the place for that).
Most of your items are not plot holes, just lousy plot writing, lazy character development, bad scripting work, silly odd inconsistencies, and at worse, developers getting in over their head and not being able to fix the problems they created.
100% of your questions about Cerberus has been answered and explained by the books written after ME1 came out; they both provide back story into the history of ME and also Cerberus at large. Mostly Cerberus has been around for at least 60-75 years by the time of the events of ME1/ME2 - slowly siphoning off resources from the Alliance. Cerberus is about as close as you can get to a tin-foil hat wearing conspiracist wets dream.
22: A lot of games suffer from this; your holding item X, cut scene goes to you holding item Y... boils down to bad scripting. But since this is ME2 and only profession gets to use an AR - lazy incompetent developers is what it is.
29: Again, not in game development - books & comic books - There has always been rumors that the Collectors would occasionally request for some odd item in exchange for a little bit of technology. Perhaps the Vorcha was able to obtain something for the Collectors in exchange they got something to reclaim Omega as their own.
34: Garrius Armor: Garrius states he wants his armor to remain damaged, to remind himself of the people he lost to the betrayal.
36: Its called, the lead developer doesn't know when to cut something when its a bad idea, so instead of looking back at the big picture, and saying "ya.. she was a cool concept but suffers from bad implementation", they just tried to stuff her into the game at the expense of everything else.
In Final Fantasy X (a shit game to be sure) after Yuna gets kidnapped for the 40th time, Rikku confesses to the party that the al bhed's job is to kidnap summoners so they can't sacrifice themselves to destroy sin...What the hell about the people that are going to die if they don't let her do it?! Sin is supposed to be a great big godzilla thing, and they're just going to let it go on a rampage on the whole world, killing everything it sees!?
In the book, The Fall of Reach
>She [Cortana] rechecked her calculations. Under the Cole Protocol, they would be jumping away from Earth . . . but it would not be a totally random heading.
Before the war with the Covenant (and during) the UNC had discovered some alien relics; after running thru years of ONI decryption (and just in time for the plot), they determined that some of the relic writings was a set of coordinates to a location in space [the Halo ring]. The relic writings indicated that a great weapon is located there; but of what type of weapon was still unknown. We later play the game to learn the weapon is Halo itself.
Fallout 3's main story has a few.
-The motivations behind the Enclave's invasion of the purifier (there are two, due to an unnecessary plot twist)
-Why (in the pre-DLC version), your character MUST die or be regarded as Hitler Reincarnate.
-How Colonel Plot Hole survived being microwaved to death in front of your very eyes.
-Why the water purifier is magically about to self-destruct the moment you take it back.
All of this is was considered to be award-winning material.
Cripes, a 7th grader could write better plots than this shit.
ZeroMachine said:
Hm... Maybe "where the hell is Magus in Chrono Cross?" I understand why they ended up changing Guile into a separate character, but I still wish he had more of a presence, considering the boss of the game is the thing he set out to search for at the end of Trigger.
Magus wasn't left running around in the 1000AD timeline after you remove Lavos from the timeline. It's entirely possible that he started his search in 12000 BC (or indeed, another timeline beyond that).
It isn't a plot hole so much as it was a deliberate sort of ambiguity left at the end of Chrono Trigger. You are correct about Guile though; he was originally supposed to be Magus, but for reasons still unexplained it was changed.
Perhaps they were afraid of Magus stealing the show...again.
Hm... Maybe "where the hell is Magus in Chrono Cross?" I understand why they ended up changing Guile into a separate character, but I still wish he had more of a presence, considering the boss of the game is the thing he set out to search for at the end of Trigger.
Magus wasn't left running around in the 1000AD timeline after you remove Lavos from the timeline. It's entirely possible that he started his search in 12000 BC (or indeed, another timeline beyond that).
It isn't a plot hole so much as it was a deliberate sort of ambiguity left at the end of Chrono Trigger. You are correct about Guile though; he was originally supposed to be Magus, but for reasons still unexplained it was changed.
Perhaps they were afraid of Magus stealing the show...again.
Actually, they did explain... they said that his story would be too complex to include along side what was already happening. A bit understandable. And yeah, he would steal the show, too.
Actually, they did explain... they said that his story would be too complex to include along side what was already happening. A bit understandable. And yeah, he would steal the show, too.
I know that's the explanation Square eventually provided, but it's little more than a dismissal argument because it says effectively nothing.
Why? Well, Magus's story isn't complicated at all; Magus's ultimate goal is effectively accomplished at the end of Chrono Cross, even though he wasn't part of it.
The main rationality I can come up with is that at one point, Square/Squeenix was planning on doing a Magus-centric spinoff.
Most of your items are not plot holes, just lousy plot writing, lazy character development, bad scripting work, silly odd inconsistencies, and at worse, developers getting in over their head and not being able to fix the problems they created.
...and actively sabotaging the setting the created three years earlier.
You're right, this is a grab bag of stuff, a lot of it is just random sloppiness on the part of the writers. Of course it would be easier to discuss the plot holes in Mass Effect 2 if the game actually, you know, had a plot.
Murmillos said:
100% of your questions about Cerberus has been answered and explained by the books written after ME1 came out; they both provide back story into the history of ME and also Cerberus at large. Mostly Cerberus has been around for at least 60-75 years by the time of the events of ME1/ME2 - slowly siphoning off resources from the Alliance. Cerberus is about as close as you can get to a tin-foil hat wearing conspiracist wets dream.
The problem there is that the books, basically by definition can't be prerequisites to understanding the game. If you're working on a project and an element of the plot does not work unless your audience has experienced X, Y, and Z: stop.
I get the point of these things, the novels are there to fluff out the setting, but when your game's narrative becomes dependent on the fluff you've got a serious writing problem. If you can't explain why Cerberus went from baby eating to the good guys in the game then it has no business being in the game. And none of this addresses why Shepard can't take their heads off, both figuratively and literally. It's sloppy writing you can drive a MAC truck through.
Murmillos said:
22: A lot of games suffer from this; your holding item X, cut scene goes to you holding item Y... boils down to bad scripting. But since this is ME2 and only profession gets to use an AR - lazy incompetent developers is what it is.
There's actually funnier examples elsewhere. If you have one of the non-starter SMGs equipped during the paragon interrupt at the recruitment station for Archangel you'll see Shepard take the gun away from the kid, beat on the side of a completely different gun, and then hand his/her SMG over to the kid, only to see it return to the basic SMG all in one scene.
This did get on my nerves though because no one except the soldier gets the AR. To be fair to soldiers, the SMG pops up quite a few times as well. Now, ME1 did the same thing, but they always used the pistol, a weapon that every class gets.
Murmillos said:
29: Again, not in game development - books & comic books - There has always been rumors that the Collectors would occasionally request for some odd item in exchange for a little bit of technology. Perhaps the Vorcha was able to obtain something for the Collectors in exchange they got something to reclaim Omega as their own.
Yeah, I'm sorry, but that's fan wank. You and I both know there's no basis for that in the actual content of the game. It makes sense, it's logical (under the setting's rules), but there's no actual confirmation of it, so it's left as a thread that is never addressed again. There isn't an explanation given for why they would behave this way, and it is out of character from every other presentation of the collectors in the game.
Murmillos said:
34: Garrius Armor: Garrius states he wants his armor to remain damaged, to remind himself of the people he lost to the betrayal.
Okay, see, I'd never actually heard that dialog, so, my bad.
Murmillos said:
36: Its called, the lead developer doesn't know when to cut something when its a bad idea, so instead of looking back at the big picture, and saying "ya.. she was a cool concept but suffers from bad implementation", they just tried to stuff her into the game at the expense of everything else.
That's entirely the problem with Jack on a lot of levels, and to an extent a problem with the game's structure as a whole.
With just Jack it informs why her personality is so artificial, why her tattoos are so jumbled they turn into a muddy mess, why the writers think they want a psychopath, turned scared little girl, turned lizard girl, and can't seem to realize that none of this works. Not the art direction, not the character, and she has absolutely no involvement with the alleged main plot beyond being there.
I remember someone looking at the characters and trying to consolidate them, and their take on Jack was that the only way to make her work was to roll her up with Miranda. Instead of being a rich ***** who escaped from daddy, she was engineered by Cerberus, so the conflict for her is internal between loathing the organization and everything it's done to her and it being the only home and family she's ever known. I can try to find the character study videos if you really want.
The problem there is that the books, basically by definition can't be prerequisites to understanding the game. If you're working on a project and an element of the plot does not work unless your audience has experienced X, Y, and Z: stop.
I get the point of these things, the novels are there to fluff out the setting, but when your game's narrative becomes dependent on the fluff you've got a serious writing problem. If you can't explain why Cerberus went from baby eating to the good guys in the game then it has no business being in the game. And none of this addresses why Shepard can't take their heads off, both figuratively and literally. It's sloppy writing you can drive a MAC truck through.
I agree its bad practice, since you pointed it out - I just did then realized how much of Cerberus development isn't in game - but was developed out side of the game, but then suddenly was the main binding glue of the storyline arc. I guess as a frequent BioWare forum goer, the flow of information just seemed naturally known. Yet Cerberus is never really regarded as the good guy in ME2, thus why you are at odds with the Alliance and Citadel Council and the problematic, never quite understanding why, tap dance that we are forced to play for the entire game.
Also there is the problem due to the limitations of writing - (surprisingly at odds with their fan base) - they decided we can never go; "You know what.. thanks for bringing me back to life, but really, screw you Cerberus - and keep your damn ship." So its sloppy writing of choice that we are pinned against Cerberus butt for "one step forward, 20 steps back" story of ME2.
Also the writers also decided that everybody else in the Galaxy except for Shepard and the Illusive mind doesn't believe in the Reapers - maybe sans Anderson but he "can't help you"... Making Shepard more like a desperate crazy loon chasing after pixies and ghosts then a Galaxy renown hero.
I remember someone looking at the characters and trying to consolidate them, and their take on Jack was that the only way to make her work was to roll her up with Miranda. Instead of being a rich ***** who escaped from daddy, she was engineered by Cerberus, so the conflict for her is internal between loathing the organization and everything it's done to her and it being the only home and family she's ever known. I can try to find the character study videos if you really want.
Well, technically the idea was that Miranda didn't actually know (maybe a mind wipe?) and that her mission would have had her discover that everything she's known about her life and Cerberus is wrong (give her Jack's backstory) while at the same time replacing Jacob with Zaeed as the grizzled Cerberus veteran and have him know what happened to Miranda. Which would put those two former allies at loggerheads with Shepherd having to sort out the mess.
I personally really like this idea.
The one thing I couldn't forgive about ME2 was that it actually never got me any closer to solving the mystery of the Reapers or discovering any information that might be helpful. All in all, what was really the point of chasing the Collectors?
Mass Effect 2: Let's see if I can do this from memory.
1: How did the collectors find the Normandy? I know they're hitting colonies and ships and whatnot, but they freakin' ambush the Normandy from FTL.
2: If Joker is as fragile as he claims, how did he not break something when Shepard was yanking him up out of the chair?
3: How did Shepard's body not burn up on reentry? Okay, so technically the armor could be rated for reentry, but this is something we've never heard before or since, and it also leaves us with another immediate plothole.
4: How can you make a cyberzombie Shepard if you didn't recover the head!? If Shepard's armor was rated for reentry, and they did find the corpsicle that way, why the hell is Shepard's helmet still at the crash site!?
5: Why is Shepard's helmet still at the crash site!? If the site was looted for Shepard's body then it should have been, you know looted. We're told this was by Shadow Broker agents who aren't the most subtle of individuals, and generally not inclined to leave boxes of Ezo around for Shepard to snarf up later.
6: (...and finally moving on past the opening credits.) "How does Shepard know how to use the disposable thermal clips?" has been brought up before, so has "What happened to the reusable heat-syncs?" so here's a fresh one: Ejecting a heat-sync off of any electronic component isn't a way to make it cool down faster, it's a way to make it crack. So how is this any more beneficial than simply letting the heat-sync cool off naturally? ...maybe it's a geth plot...
7: Why did Wilson try to kill you? This would make perfect sense if the collectors used intermediaries with any frequency and had a way to find out Wilson was pissed off at his job.
8: Why is Wilson pissed off at his job? The only hint we get is that he'd like to see a little more cash. I'm sure we've all been there, a job that isn't quite worth the pay, but most of us don't immediately decide to go into the security office and start gunning people down by remote control.
9: In an audio log Miranda observes that Shepard needs to be the same man/woman/escaped football captain that he/she/it was before. Which is all well and good until you realize the game just had you rebuild your character basically from scratch 10 minutes earlier. Now, I understand that the re-spec retroactively changed who you were in the previous game, but it's still an incredibly stupid comment to make, and it isn't the only one. None of this explains where (potentially) 55 of your levels just went.
10: Miranda says Shepard needs to have the same morals... er, what? This leads into a thing, in Mass Effect: Paragon was roughly Jean-luc Picard while Renegade was roughly Jack Bauer on the way to the bathroom. But in ME2 that's not quite the same thing, Paragon is now more in line with Jeffery Sinclair (good to a fault, but dumb as a brick, while pretending to be cunning), while Renegade has changed to the goddamn Joker.
11: Unless it was Miranda (and not Wilson) was secretly behind the attempt to assassinate Shepard, why did she execute him without even trying to decipher his motives? When asked, she responds that, he was too dangerous to keep around. Oh yeah? Dangerous to whom?
12: How can you adequately judge someone's mental state by asking three questions? (Or worse yet, two if you didn't import a save?).
13: How did Cerberus afford all these new toys? In the first game you run across one Cerberus "space station", and that's it, in point of fact it's a re-purposed collection of freighters which has been converted into a kind of depot.
14: Why did Cerberus start custom building stations? Big Stations, with distinctive architecture, and a Corporate friendly Cerberus Logo on everything? You see, in the first game they're a rogue operation, most people don't even know they exist, and part of the reason for that is because they run out of small prefab bases, like the station mentioned in 13. And that's the smart way for a covert ops organization to run. Why are they suddenly posting up calling cards everywhere and making their own unique stations when their entire goal used to be being invisible?
15: Where the fuck did the Illusive Man Come from? Seriously, we raid 4 different Cerberus operations in ME1. In ME2 we raid precisely two Cerberus facilities. In Mass Effect we get outgoing messages to someone, but they're never named. Two years later and the Illusive Man is now getting his code name splashed everywhere and everyone has heard of him, whereas two years ago no one even knew he existed.
16: Why can't you tell the Illusive Man to go fuck himself? If you're a survivor background character he fucking destroyed your life, if you're not you've certainly seen the wreckage he created. He waves this off with a claim that they were rogue splinters, but when you think about it, if every encounter you had with an organization involved their "rogue" membership, and you're as (allegedly) well educated in black ops as Shepard, the term that comes to mind isn't so much "rogue" as "plausible deniablity".
17: So why are you working for this guy? You can't stumble back to the council half dead and ask to work with them?
18: How come the only time anyone activates the robotic defenses in this game is when they're trying to kill you?
19: How is it, the first thing you do after leaving is run into Tali? I know she's a popular character and all, but it's been two years, you've been dead, and literally the first living person you run into after coming back from the dead is an old buddy?
20: Why was a civilian colony outfitted with multiple anti-vehicle attack drones?
21: Where were Freedom's Progress' Drones during the collector Attack?
22: Why does Shepard mock us with an Assault Rifle in the cut-scene before facing down against the YMIR Mech? And, more importantly where does that rifle go afterwards?
23: How did Cerberus manage to build an advanced version of one of the most advanced star ships out there. In fact the SSV Normandy explicitly used alien technology that humans hadn't been able to get their hands on yet... how the hell did Cerberus manage to build that ship, and do it in secret?
24: How is the new Normandy not seized by C-Sec the instant you dock at the citadel? This is the equivalent of al Qaeda landing at an airport with a B2 and then being allowed to leave with it, coming and going at will.
25: Why wouldn't you work with the Council? Or, put more clearly, why the hell other than a plot hole the size of Wisconsin would you not agree to switch allegiance back to the council from Cerberus!?
26: Why the hell did Chakwas sign up with Cerberus? Remember, she was there with you, she saw reports on the things you saw, and all the hideous things Cerberus did. The justification she gives is she was bored by living planet side. Really? That fuckin' bored!? So she signs up with the people that were engineering bio-weapons and testing them on humans?
27: How did Miranda throw you out of your office? (I kid... sorta...)
28: Is Shepard being oblivious or darkly sardonic when they tell the looters in the quarantine zone that he/she doesn't like grave robbers, while (probably) having spent the better part of their trip there doing exactly that?
29: Why are the collectors working with the vorcha? This is the only time in the entire game we see the collectors working through intermediaries. Now, if you're following the sequence the game recommends for recruitment, the significance of this isn't immediately apparent. This is the only time we see the collectors doing this. Throughout the rest of the game they act directly or don't involve themselves. With the exception of this, the collectors are a bit like the Borg. They don't care about the details the individuals or what you're doing, so long as it isn't getting in their way, or you aren't something they want.
30: So what is the point to this entire vignette? The collectors have no follow up, and aren't involved in any other recruitment missions.
31: Every time I play Mordin's recruitment, I could swear there are krogen in with the Bloodpack, but they aren't immune to the plauge, so what gives?
32: So when Shepard asks the Illusive man to help him/her put his/her team back together, the one from the first game and he blows Shepard off, why does he then turn around and send him back out after Garrius immediately? Either he is genuinely incompetent (which is possible) or he was messing with Shepard (which is more likely) or someone dropped the ball (which is the reasonable explanation.)
33: If you take Zaeed on the Archangel mission you get some wierd blue suns dialog. It's not really a plot hole, but it is a crappy play at keeping the reveal for Zaeed's loyalty mission a secret.
34: (slightly out of sequence) why can't anyone patch up Garrius' armor? Now, I get that his face is pretty baddly messed up from the blast and all, but there's a freakin' hole in his armor now, and no plausible reason not to repair that, even if it's a patch job. What's more his loyalty mission gives you a palette swap of the exact same armor with the exact same hole in it. The only way to fix it is to spend three bucks on one of the alternate appearance packs. I know plot holes aren't supposed to be literal holes, but goddamn.
35: What the hell was TIM smoking when he thought getting Jack would be a good idea? I don't mean she's supposed to be dangerous, or unstable, though there is that too. She brings nothing to the table you don't already have, in the range of specialists.
36: Jack. Just fuckin' Jack. There is nothing about this character which makes sense in any way shape or form. She is a walking plot hole. As 35 mentioned there's no reason to recruit her. She's more of a liability than an asset. She actually wants to kill everyone on the ship. Oh, and she's psychologically impossible. The back story that's presented for her does not make sense. I don't mean I'm missing parts of it, I mean her experiences would not, and could not, produce someone with her psychology.
37: How stupid (on a scale of 1 to 350) is Warden Kuril? He knows Shepard has his/her weapons. He knows Shepard is so bad ass that even a little thing like being fucking killed couldn't stop him/her, he knows that Shepard is being backed by someone very fucking powerful and resourceful. What the hell was he thinking? Bonus points if you bring Zaeed along, in which case you've got his former boss along for the ride as well.
38: What kind of a stupid prison even includes an "open all cells at once" button!?
39: Why don't the Blue Suns on Korlus have duress codes? Okay, that actually kinda makes sense, but anyway.
40: How can a krogen be put down as easily as Okeer? Maybe he had some kind of condition? But with the psychotic ecosystem that produced him, krogens should be incredibly resistant to toxins.
41: How much brain damage did Shepard have to suffer before opening the tank and letting Grunt out? There's overconfident and then there's suicide. This is not the former.
42: Where did Mordin get those seeker bugs to play with? This really strikes me as there's a cut mission someplace in here where you went in and got these things from someone, (maybe Okeer?) that got cut.
43: Where are Horizon's Robot Defenders?
44: Characters who were not party members in the first game will talk about your experiences on Eden Prime. If it's Miranda, Jacob or Mordin, this makes some sense, but how the hell would Jack and Grunt know what you faced where. Jack's lucky if she can remember what she had for breakfast and Grunt may not even be literate (or housebroken) yet.
45: Assuming Direct Control.
46: How is "I was dead" not a legitimate reason not to ring up your old buddy? Seriously, it's entirely possible to spend the first few hours trying to find out where Kaishley is only to be stonewalled by SpawnAnderson or Udina.
47: Why the hell would Tali care about how Shepard got to Liara in her recruitment mission in ME1... and more importantly what the hell does it have to do with anything regarding her recruitment? To explain, she talks about using the mining laser in Liara's recruitment in ME1, but that doesn't have any applicability to this situation where Tali is using demolition packs to clear away rubble.
48: So the sun fries all electronics, but not the geth, and not your weapons, but it does fry the quarian's weapons? Oh, and bugs, it fries bugs good too.
I'm going to cut it here, I've still got plenty of material to munch through but I'm actually getting tired, so I'll pick this up again later.
49: This should have been back on Freedom's Progress but, why the fuck doesn't the game ever tell you why the quarians hate Cerberus with such a fiery passion? I know this comes out of the (unreadably bad) books, but seriously, it would kill you to give me one fucking paragraph of dialog explaining this? To make matters worse, Shepard apparently gets the explanation at some point off screen, or has a really short attention span. At this point, it's a toss up between them.
50: When did Liara get a personality transplant? I know this is supposed to be the aftermath of an organic change in the character over the past two years, but instead she simply snap shifts into a ***** and then back to the character from the first game and then back to *****. Tina Turner couldn't have handled that kind of whiplash in Beyond Thunderdrome, how the hell can Liara do it without freaking exploding in meaty giblets... Yeah, I'm kinda voting for that now.
51: The Justicars. Okay, I'm being slightly snide here but the entire goddamn concept is a walking logical contradiction, and yields more than one plot hole.
First and foremost are the Justicars themselves. These are individuals invested with the power to commit summary executions on a whim, and you're telling me that no one, ever, in the entire history of assari civilization ever abused this? Never? A justicar can execute a man... well, a woman in cold blood, claim it was because of "their code" and walk away and if the police so much as say, "huh?" they can be killed as well, and assari law not only respects this but honors and venerates these individuals?
52: The Justicar code makes the word "draconian" woefully insufficient. It calls for immediate and lethal actions to people simply doing their job. So where is the honor in executing a cop for doing her job? The rules presented are so idiotically binary as to be unworkable as a code, much less a long standing and thus far (supposedly) unabused code.
Remember, the knights and samurai didn't survive into the modern age because their codes of chivalry and honor were abused, all the goddamn time. The independent orders were exterminated either by each other, or knights associated with larger factions (the church or feudal lords), and the collapse of the feudal system brought an end to the institutional support that some of them had received. But the point is, you give people the power of life and death over other people and someone, somewhere will abuse that power.
This doesn't transcend into monumental plot-hole territory until you think about the first game. Go ahead, I'll wait... The entire plot for the first game is set in motion by Saren (arguably) doing exactly this. So what makes the assari so superior that this was never a problem?
53: Why did it take Samara so long to find her daughter? Okay, I've got a theory, but it ties back to 52. She's a fucking idiot. We see her executing people without questioning them when we first meet her, and this leads to a rather reasonable and logical conclusion that she simply kills everyone she comes across who's had any kind of contact with her daughter.
54: Why did TIM send Shepard out to collect Samara at all? As with Jack and some others, she brings nothing to the table that isn't already covered by other team members. She isn't as egregious an offender as Jack because at least she's predictably homicidal, but the fact remains that there is no real reason to bring this assari along as opposed to any number of others, like say an assari commando who followed Benezia and is now struggling to find a new life for themselves or whatever. At least there we'd know why the character has an assault rifle.
-I AM A BIOTIC GOD, GREAT WIND!-
55: If a Justicar can execute you for impeding them, then why doesn't the Detective try to find a way to help Samara get what she wants without having to resort to (effectively) committing delayed suicide?
-I'm actually skipping the Thane recruitment. Off the top of my head nothing really sticks out as a serious plot hole beyond the: why this guy? For the most part he's plot irrelevant, though there are some weirdness with the episode's plot itself, nothing I'm too concerned about.-
56: Why the fuck would TIM set Shepard up to die? He explains that this is because he can't trust Shepard not to fuck up somehow, but seriously? His entire plan boils down to the collectors being completely incompetent at dealing with Shepard. Seriously, his entire plan is to help the collectors lure Shepard into a trap. At this point he's a more effective ally for the collectors than the Shadow Broker.
57: Why the fuck can't the collector's seal the deal? A cyber zombie and two mooks walk into a trap... how the hell can you blow this?
58: Why the hell would the collectors be examining one of their own? Okay, so, slight spoiler time: they've been heavily engineered, they know this, they even probably have access to the data to tell them exactly how they were engineered, why the fuck would they then be examining their own DNA? (As a small gripe: I'm not sure the collectors would even have DNA. As the abbreviation refers specifically to the chemical structure of our genetic data and we're told explicitly that the collectors have a very alien genetic structure.)
59: Hey, Shepard, you ever notice there's a whole lot of guns on the Normandy you don't bring along normally? Maybe you should have just grabbed an extra gun before coming on this one? Yes, no, maybe? It isn't the potential unique weapons it's the weapon training I'm objecting to. Though, as spoiler warning noted, that would be a pretty novel way to bait a trap.
60: how old are these husks they're throwing at you? I mean, we're told on Horizon that the husks aren't coming from the colonists, and as we learn husking people isn't the collector's agenda, so... what... the collector's harvested humans 50k years ago, made some freeze dried zombies and stuck them in the fridge way past their sell by date before turning them loose on Shepard?
61: Why the fuck do you keep working for TIM after this mission? I mean, this would be a pretty good point to cut your loses, and it would make sense as a lead up to the finale that you aren't working with Cerberus anymore because of this stunt... and yet all the player can do is select weak arguments against TIM and then acquiesce in the next scene with the crew.
62: Again, lack of information is lethal. How can TIM not know this? How can he trust Shepard to be the only one who can "save the galaxy" but he doesn't trust him/her to be able to operate covertly?
63: Why can't I raid the Hugo Gurnsback's wreckage for some self replenishing thermal syncs?
64: I can't decide if Miranda's inability to identify Niket as a traitor is supposed to be an homage to the line back in the tutorial where she says "most people are far too trusting" or if it's just sloppy characterization on her part. Given the likelihood of missing that dialog on the tutorial station, I'm inclined to think it was the later.
65: Jack's loyalty mission. So, TIM's name never came up in the first game, but here we are on an abandoned facility that has been partially overgrown, and is infested with Varen... and we hear TIM being identified by (code)name in the leftover transmissions. What this really is is an illustration of how sloppy TIM's retcon into existence was.
66: ...and this is probably the biggest one in the game honestly... When examining a dead human woman in the Weyrloc base Mordin talks about human genetic diversity. According to Mordin, humans are the single most genetically diverse space faring lifeform. For reference, in reality, humans are one of the least genetically diverse species on the planet (relative to our population). We have a staggering lack of diversity. This stacks on top of the fact that everything on the planet shares an absolutely staggering amount of general genetic data with everything else (As I recall the percentage is in the high 90s). This lack of diversity is why you can't knock up your cousin and expect a positive result, there isn't enough genetic diversity in the species to support it. And before you fly off the handle on this, consider this fun little fact, every domestic Guinea Pig is descended from a single litter of thirteen individuals around a century ago. In Mass Effect we have the krogen who should be psychotically diverse simply because of how aggressive their ecosystem is (supposed to be), and we have the assari who literally breed with other species (ME2 tried to retcon this claiming that they don't collect genetic data from their partner, but that is, quite frankly insane, and would mean the assari are effectively a clonal colony.) What's more we get double duty off of this because it is the reason the collectors are hunting humanity. How does that make sense?
By the way, when the Soviets shot a chimpanzee into space, they made a lier out of Mordin.
67: So in Mass Effect we were introduced to the quarians a race that lives in incredibly cramped starships stuffed to the gills with an exiled race, who need full body suits whenever they leave the flotilla because their immune systems have atrophied. So why the fuck are they wearing their suits on their own ships!?
68: How did their immune systems degrade so fast? See, there's a problem here, the theory is they've spent so much time aboard their own ships they have no acquired immunities, and that makes sense until you realize that the flotilla sends quarians away from the fleet on pilgrimages, and every quarian needs to do this. There could be an environmental explanation, something in their native ecosystem that wasn't transplanted which they were symbiotically dependent on for immunological development or the like, but there's no explanation for this in the setting anywhere, so we're left scratching our heads.
69: Why are they wearing their suits aboard their own vessels!? The only possible explanation is that they wanted to accelerate the deterioration of their own immunological systems. Also, it's worth noting that several characters including Mordin, Miranda, Thane, Zaeed, Jack, and I think Samara and Jacob do not use full exosuits. They all leave their heads exposed while they're aboard the floatilla.
70: Why would the flotilla stand down to a Cerberus vessel because it gave such a simple pass-phrase in English?
71: Is this really Bioware's definition of a cramped ship?
72: Who thought putting the geth in ambulatory frames was really a good idea? This is made worse by the fact that the geth are using standard issue pulse rifles. This makes no sense when you take into account the way geth operate on their own. The mobile platforms are not necessary for testing network propagation, and the quarians would know this (even if no one else did).
73: The paragon ending for Tali's quest. Shepard steps up, out of nowhere, says "you're wrong and bastards" and everyone cheers. Er... what? I'm sorry, was someone drunk?
74: Naval tradition has "captain" as both a title and a rank, while "commander" is strictly a rank. A captain is anyone with the rank of captain, or who commands a ship. So why does Shepard suddenly blunder about his/her rank when he/she is addressed as "captain"? Though, strictly speaking, his/her crew should have been doing that since they left the citadel in the original game.
75: Morinth has spent centuries hunting people as prey. Seriously she doesn't get the slightest hint that Shepard is messing with her? By this point she should have a pretty good sense on the subject, and by "pretty good" I mean "borderline supernatural". That Shepard is basically reading off a script of Morinth's last victim should also be a pretty substantial red flag to anyone, and should be a goddamn bomb going off for Morinth.
Oh, right and you can recruit her instead... why?
76: I'm not sure "stupid and cliche" is acceptable as a plot hole, but Kolyat (Thane's son) makes me want to count it as one. Besides, if I was doing that I'd be way past 150 by now.
The problem there is that the books, basically by definition can't be prerequisites to understanding the game. If you're working on a project and an element of the plot does not work unless your audience has experienced X, Y, and Z: stop.
I get the point of these things, the novels are there to fluff out the setting, but when your game's narrative becomes dependent on the fluff you've got a serious writing problem. If you can't explain why Cerberus went from baby eating to the good guys in the game then it has no business being in the game. And none of this addresses why Shepard can't take their heads off, both figuratively and literally. It's sloppy writing you can drive a MAC truck through.
I agree its bad practice, since you pointed it out - I just did then realized how much of Cerberus development isn't in game - but was developed out side of the game, but then suddenly was the main binding glue of the storyline arc. I guess as a frequent BioWare forum goer, the flow of information just seemed naturally known. Yet Cerberus is never really regarded as the good guy in ME2, thus why you are at odds with the Alliance and Citadel Council and the problematic, never quite understanding why, tap dance that we are forced to play for the entire game.
Yeah, but it's a kind of fake antagonism. TIM literally tries to get Shepard killed (on the collector vessel) and the best you can come back with is a weak "you should have told me" before you get ***** slapped around the room by TIM, and it cuts to a scene where you (apparently) defended TIM's actions to the crew.
You may not agree with the group, I may not, but the game railroads you in such a way that this entire perspective is sealed off from you. As far as the writers are concerned Cerberus is an unimpeachable bulwark against the reaper threat, and you can't criticize them because clearly they were really the good guys all along, they were just misunderstood all this time. *Retches*
Murmillos said:
Also there is the problem due to the limitations of writing - (surprisingly at odds with their fan base) - they decided we can never go; "You know what.. thanks for bringing me back to life, but really, screw you Cerberus - and keep your damn ship." So its sloppy writing of choice that we are pinned against Cerberus butt for "one step forward, 20 steps back" story of ME2.
Also the writers also decided that everybody else in the Galaxy except for Shepard and the Illusive mind doesn't believe in the Reapers - maybe sans Anderson but he "can't help you"... Making Shepard more like a desperate crazy loon chasing after pixies and ghosts then a Galaxy renown hero.
And that works if you're talking about something like... say Issac Clarke where all he had to show for it was genetic goo on the deckplates at the end of Dead Space (the necromorphs reverted to a kind of bio slurry after the events of the game)[footnote]This isn't where Dead Space 2 ultimately went, but it was what they hinted at and it makes a lot of sense really.[/footnote] or Aliens where there is nothing left of the Xeonomorph in the first film so everyone assumes Ripley's nuts. But Sovereign freakin' attacked the citadel.
Now, I could understand the council being cynical of the idea of there being an entire fleet of those things out there because that's pretty damn horrifying, but the idea that there might be at least one or two more is impossible? What? "Ah, yes, we have dismissed that claim." Why? Because the keepers cleaned up after Sovereign? What!?
Mine has to be Dragon Age (I LOVE the game but this has always bugged me).
They only give you the option of joining one person, why just him? Like if you need a warden to kill the archdemon, you only have two wardens, and you know how to make more. THEN FUCKING MAKE MORE! Gha... stupid... sorry.
Riordan has it, that's how he can offers to do the joining.
Devias- said:
There are several problems with this plan.
1. After the events at Ostagar, Loghain branded the Grey Wardens traitors and did not hesitate to spread the word.
2. The process of the Joining Ritual includes drinking Darkspawn blood, not just anybody is going to volunteer for that. Especially not when the majority thinks that the Grey Wardens are traitors.
3. Even if you do find someone willing to join the Wardens and help them in their cause, you have to be sure that they are able to fight, not simply commoners.
Unless you mean the period when Loghain lost to you and gave up, then the only problem would be:
Riordan has the blood and offers to do the joining after you have won the landsmeet, so you are in control with the support of the people at that point. Yes you would lose some people to the joining, but you would lose a lot more lives if the last few remaining wardens died and no one there could finish the job untill reinforcments came.
Actually, I just replayed the game and made it to the point where you meet Riordan. It appears that you need a vial of darkspawn blood and a drop of archdemon blood for the Joining. An acceptable excuse, and perhaps the reason that refutes this plot hole, is that they only had a single drop of archdemon blood.
Well even if he only had enough to join one more person that could still make 33% more wardens XD But this might not be the case, cause you have some on you already. Remember the pendant(Wardens Oath) that Alister gives you after the joining? He says it contains some of the joining mixture. Personally I think this is a failsafe so that every warden can join at least one more if they have been told how to.
Haha, true enough. Did you put 'Secret Party Member' through the Joining? I didn't. I felt sorry for him at the end though. Good catch about the pendant, but it could be insufficient. It was miniscule compared to the goblet they used.
So he could eliminate all evidence that he purposely started the war between the USA and Russia so he could replace the soldiers he lost in the nuke in the last game. That's also why the American Soldier at the start did not end it and kill Makarov and his gang at the airport. Shepherd was actually working with Makarov and tipped him off that there was an American there and Makarov could frame him. Then Shepherd double crossed Makarov and went to kill him (The "Blank Cheque) and thanks to the war that were just declared, Shepherd was allowed to go all out. Once Shepherd had destroyed all pieces of evidence from Makarov (The computer thing in the mission where the two get shot) he double crossed Task Force 141 so he could get rid of every scrap of evidence that he was ever involved in this.
This is explained in little hard to see chunks and explained too fast.
In MW2 Why is Shepard the leader of the military And even say he looses 50 thousand name in the blink of an eye. Yet in MW which is what he is refrencing why is he never mentioned?
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