Yeah, that's purely just some speculation on my part. But it's pretty believable in general, I think.GBlair88 said:
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Out of Sight Out of Mind (Mass Effect 2)
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or as it's also known ... literary license.Starke said:
so you never heard of the Illusive Man in ME1. that doesn't mean he didn't exist. the same could be said of the justicars, the blue suns, omega, the omega 4 relay (seems odd no one noticed a red relay amongst all of the bluish-white ones though), any of your new team mates, the collectors, branches or factions of cerberus, factions in the Geth, etc.
stories evolve and change -- deal with it. and at least there is some continuity between ME1 and ME2. the same can't be said for many other se(pre)quels out there (CAN YOU HEAR ME LUCAS!?!).
Justicars don't leave Asari space generally.
Omega, none of your missions went there, so you didn't need to go
Cerberus was in ME1, but you weren't involved with it enough to hear about the illusive man.
And to answer all of your questions with the real answer - they wrote it all after Mass Effect 1. It happens. Sequels are written AFTER the original. More stuff is introduced. Bioware did a pretty good job of not contradicting anything in the earlier game. There were plenty of omissions and things that existed prior to ME2 that were absent (the Drell weren't even concepted visually until Thane was created for instance), but the story and setting isn't hurt for them. Space is a big place.
Omega, none of your missions went there, so you didn't need to go
Cerberus was in ME1, but you weren't involved with it enough to hear about the illusive man.
And to answer all of your questions with the real answer - they wrote it all after Mass Effect 1. It happens. Sequels are written AFTER the original. More stuff is introduced. Bioware did a pretty good job of not contradicting anything in the earlier game. There were plenty of omissions and things that existed prior to ME2 that were absent (the Drell weren't even concepted visually until Thane was created for instance), but the story and setting isn't hurt for them. Space is a big place.
1) We weren't told about the Illusive Man for two reasons. One, it wouldn't have affected the Mass Effect 1 storyline at all. Two, nobody knows who he is. What possible benefit would there be in mentioning him?Starke said:
2) I'm not sure if the Collectors are a fresh addition or not, but it shouldn't be any surprise that nobody mentioned them in Mass Effect. Never once did we go into the Terminus Systems in ME1 and that's specifically where the Collectors operate. In fact, up until the events of ME2, the Collectors were abducting extremely small numbers of colonists.
Really, I don't understand why people are getting mad at Bioware for not informing us of these things beforehand. There was absolutely no reason to tell us about them in the original game. I personally don't care if these details were known before or during the development of ME2, all I know is that they work very well.
As was stated in ME2, Asari Justicars are rarely seen outside of asari worlds. (You never went to one in ME1...)Dylan Berger said:
Omega is in the Terminus systems, again where you never went...
The Bloodpack and other mercenary groups are not big in council space (where ME1 takes place) because they are not lawless, like the Terminus systems.
Cerberus was in ME1, a few side missions involved rogue Cerberus cells.
Basically, you are on the other, lawless side of the galaxy in ME2 that nobody wants to admit exists (which is the reason for the slowness of reply to colonies vanishing).
Whether Wrex refers to Aria is debateable, as Wrex actually refers to an Asari commando turned mercenary called Aleena, who he knew as an assassin. It can be speculated that Aria and Aleena are the same person (she makes references to having previous identities), but even if they are, Wrex would not necessarily know this, and so would have know idea that she ran Omega.Starke said:
Well pretty much the entire game is in the Terminus Systems, which you never went to in ME1. They never thought you'd information about an area you would never be traveling to.
Also known as "Poor planning".Ascarus said:
Starke's central charge is that ME2 suffers badly from the Chris Carter Effect -- The sense that, while promised an intricately pre-planned plot, the series is in effect being made up as it goes along.
There is plenty of evidence that most of ME2's plot was thought up wholesale after ME1's. Bioware flubbed the 'pre-planned trilogy' concept.
Which doesn't make ME2 a bad game. But the series will be worse than it could have been due to Bioware's failure to plan properly.
On one hand, you're right, the Illusive Man isn't necessary information in ME1, the same way we don't need to know who Jabba the Hutt is in Star Wars. But, we've heard the name, so when Return of the Jedi rolls around, the name's familiar, and now we have a face to go with it. In contrast with Mass Effect we have no mention of him, and then, out of nowhere, we have the leader of Cerberus.JeanLuc761 said:
It's an additive thing where more information reinforces the world. An example of this at work would be if we were drafted to work for the shadow broker at the beginning of 2, and he actually has a secret agenda we're cued into. This is material that's hinted at in 1, rather then creating new material out of whole cloth. As a result it would feel more like a organic addition instead of a new completely unknown figure coming out of nowhere.
Sorry, I'm rambling a little bit. What I'm saying is, Mass Effect fails to foreshadow Mass Effect 2 on almost every count, so we can kinda infer that either this isn't what was planned.
You do make a very good point about the collectors. They are very rare. They have only targeted sample sizes in the dozens, and then Sovereign. At the same time they have a boogie man like quality, that make them an interesting texture, the kind of thing Mass1 could have puked into your codex, then, 2 years later, suddenly that random codex entry is relevant. To be fair, Mass1 has a very Chekhov's Gun quality to it's content. Everything that's in it gets used, so there isn't a lot of background material that we get about the setting that isn't relevant to the game itself. (Even the batarians are relevant to the plot of 1, (before Bring Down the Sky) in their absence, and in a few quests.) It's just a bit of a shame that in all this world building, they didn't lay out the ground work for the rest of the trilogy there.
BTW: Good idea, I should have numbered the headers... mybad.
Yeah, thanks for catching me on that, you're right, I knew I was forgetting something when I typed this.Camarilla said:
And now, the one that needs special attention:
Uh... thanks for redacting the post down to something you could read... I guess? There was some evidence there, which is called, you know, narrative analysis, maybe you should learn about it.Ascarus said:
Uh... no, it's not. Artistic license refers to the distortion of reality or realism for the purpose of driving the narrative.[footnote]For example: Star Trek in all it's incarnations use this heavily.[/footnote] That's not what Bioware's done. What Bioware did is called "fucking up".[footnote]See: The X-Files, Lost, and Twin Peaks for more examples of this. Also known as: The Chris Carter Effect (named after The X-Files).[/footnote]Ascarus said:
They don't mention the geth schism because, surprise surprise, no one knows about it. Quite legitimately. If you want an example of artistic license in Mass Effect 2, this is it at it's finest.Ascarus said:
Not mentioning the Illusive Man isn't a complete failure, but, as I mentioned if they'd intended to include him from the beginning, you'd expect there to be some evidence of his existence in 1.
All it would realistically take would be to include recipient name on all those outgoing Cerberus communications you find in 1. BAM! Now you have a name, but no clue who he is, but you've heard the name. It's called foreshadowing, which Mass Effect 2 lacks.
If you want to turn around and argue that no self respecting organization would be that lax with it's security, that's a legitimate counterargument. But, because "The Illusive Man" is a code name, this is precisely it's purpose.
George Lucas lives in a strange world known only to himself and the voices inside his ego.Ascarus said:
I'm pretty sure you don't know about everything in our galaxy. Why would you know everything about Mass Effects? With a game that literally spans the galaxy it would be wierd to NOT find new species/things/planets/etc.
Edit: As per the whole "ME 2 was made up on the spot argument" certain people are making in this thread, frankly you don't know what you're talking about. Mass Effect was designed as a trilogy from the get go and the main story arcs were set in place before the first game was even finished. Like most developers do with large stories and big titles, Bioware has a "Mass Effect Bible" that contains the direction for all their main story arcs and which they refer back to constantly to make sure the story makes sense and fits it's intended direction. In other words, Bioware already knew the direciton the story is going to head in ME 3 before ME 1 was even complete. It, of course, doesn't contain exact specific details for every little thing, but the gist of main story is completely there.
Don't believe me? Go back and watch the extras that came in the special edition ME 1's and hear all that directly from the devs. It's pretty common for developers to plan all that stuff years in advance. It helps to ensure sequels make sense and have continuity.
Edit: As per the whole "ME 2 was made up on the spot argument" certain people are making in this thread, frankly you don't know what you're talking about. Mass Effect was designed as a trilogy from the get go and the main story arcs were set in place before the first game was even finished. Like most developers do with large stories and big titles, Bioware has a "Mass Effect Bible" that contains the direction for all their main story arcs and which they refer back to constantly to make sure the story makes sense and fits it's intended direction. In other words, Bioware already knew the direciton the story is going to head in ME 3 before ME 1 was even complete. It, of course, doesn't contain exact specific details for every little thing, but the gist of main story is completely there.
Don't believe me? Go back and watch the extras that came in the special edition ME 1's and hear all that directly from the devs. It's pretty common for developers to plan all that stuff years in advance. It helps to ensure sequels make sense and have continuity.
Then please explain why the Collectors were not foreshadowed at all, even though it would have vastly improved their reputation and menace in the sequel had they been foreshadowed.Bigeyez said:
Please explain why Cerberus suddenly shifted in both tone and back-story.
The claim that they had all this planned out just doesn't hold up to even a cursory glance. Stories of a unified plan are marketing spin and nothing more, the very definition of the Chris Carter Effect.
The word has multiple meanings. Futurism and surrealism are art styles, too, but they refer to other things.Starke said:
Yes, the word does have multiple meanings. But from a literary or narrative stand point (which is the one that applies most readily to Mass Effect), realism for stories around the fantasy/sci-fi basically means that the world itself is real (no matter how fantastical) so long as it doesn't break it's own rules. The rules that the author (or in this case authors) set out. From Mass Effect to Mass Effect 2, the game does this in a lot of places but the most obvious being the weapons systems. The very fundamental laws of the ways firearms work in the Mass Effect universe in the first game are subverted in the second game. From a technical standpoint and from the information they themselves released in the codex explains why you don't need ammo. Therefore in Mass Effect 2, you shouldn't need to reload. And then another question arises: why does Geth pulse rifle use the same thermal clip that all your other weapons do?mechanixis said:
The writers basically performed a retcon from the first game to the second and while they are supposed to be telling this awesomely epic trilogy, they've managed to fail when it comes to how trilogies are constructed. Every story should set up the next one, Mass Effect 1 does an excellent job of setting up the next story, Mass Effect 2's story is irrelevant, unnecessary, and basically fails it's job of setting up the next game because it was too busy rewriting the rules established in the first. That's why the narrative is a failure.
That doesn't mean it isn't fun or exciting, it just doesn't do what it's supposed to. The Bioware writer's style hasn't evolved from KoTOR (which is the first game I played so it may be even more stagnant than that) and Mass Effect 2 shows it. The game relies on the same character cliches that they have used over and over again, along with the same hammy dialogue. (Which doesn't mean it's not funny, it's just impossible to take seriously.) From a story standpoint (and only from a story/world building standpoint) the game is laughable, especially when put into the company of other major Sci-Fi works that Bioware themselves draw comparisons to. Mass Effect is an homage to many of those titles, but they also fail to ask the questions that they think they're asking. They want to be culturally relevant and they think that's what they're doing. Except that the values they're spouting would have been new and fresh in the 1960s but now they're out of date.