The Jessica Chobit thing still makes me so mad cause she replaced a MUCH Better character in Emily Wong, who ends up getting killed off screen in an unsatisfactory manner. Also the game engine made her look like melted wax, it wasn't great.
I love it when you wear your heart on your sleeve KBash, never feel bad for speaking from the heart. You got a good one. Your criticisms and praises are interesting and your jokes are on point as usual. You never cease to impress me, be proud of what you do!
Commenting for the Rhythms of Al Gore. But also, dang, the way you talk about videogames is so impassioned and interested. The Nioh video convinced me to actually play and beat Nioh 2, now this one got me back on the Mass Effect Wagon.
I dunno if it's the best of the 3, but ME2 is my favorite. I played it through at least a dozen times, purposefully changing the playthrough just to see the different results from the last mission. I was completely blown away when, after never doing any loyalty missions or upgrades, you leap to the Normandy and there's nobody to pull you up, and you just fall to your death.
I remember being a kid and hating ashley and being so pissed that i had to go save her but realizing i couldnt just let her go because i didnt like her. then i had to make the choice between her and kaiden and again l was like, "i cant let her die because im angry with her." And for the next two games i hated her cause i saved her. so i was particularly upset when she decided to come down and act like i was untrustworthy. Like /she/ had some moral highground! Lol, its such a great story. mass effect really immersed us for like 10 years straight.
Maybe this is a hot take, but I get the most enjoyment out of “closing the book on another happily ever after”. I game as a form of escapism, I don’t want the day to day strife and tragedy of a real world experience. If I wanted that I would just turn my PC off and walk out the front door. Who knows, maybe some of you have wonderfully pleasant lives and need to mix things up a bit by suffering vicariously through gaming. No, I think I’ll force feed the fulfillment of being a hero while I game. But to each their own.
Yeah. Garrus and Wrex and Liara and Kelly Chambers might not be real, but it still feels good to be nice to them. Illium and the Citadel might not be real, London isn't in rubble with godlike alien cyborg cuttlefish dominating the skies, but it feels good to try to save them and the people within. Legion isn't real, Geth aren't real, Tali isn't real, Quarians aren't real. But saving them feels real enough to be worth it. Being mean, being overly confident, killing people because I think they might do something bad in the future? I try not to be mean IRL and I wouldn't kill people even if i legally could and i thought it was morally justified. Mass Effect isn't perfect, and there's valid reasons to play as a Renegade or Paragade Shep. But most of those people are my little pretend friends and i want everyone to get along.
I always felt like this was the biggest copout from the ending defenders, I didn't hate it because it wasn't happy and/or Shepard died, I hated it because it retroactively went back on its own lore and the themes that had been building for three games. Then while it did it, they rushed the climax and conclusion, leaving us completely in the dark on how our previous choices and the ending choice actually affected things. There should never have been a choice, just the amalgamation of all of your previous actions and how it affects the fight for the crucible. The narrative went out of its way in every. single. game. to showcase that ANYTHING other than the destruction of the reapers is indoctrination. Working with them, worshipping them, controlling them, the moment any character says destroying them might not be the best idea they are indoctrinated 100% of the time. Nowhere do we have any mention or insinuation about alternative firing methods for the crucible, only that it is designed to destroy reapers. The endings are so out of left field that they created a sense of complete cognitive dissonance which is where the displeasure over it truly begins, whether the player can explain that feeling or not. Then suddenly you think you can throw the reaper AI mastermind at me telling me I'm the one singular person in the galaxy that actually CAN control the Reapers and you have the gall to imply that you didn't intend for this to be interpreted as an indoctrination attempt on Shepard's mind via the appeal to his honor/goodwill? The writers are either still lying to themselves (and us) or they accidentally created the most impressive feat in gaming history by indoctrinating the player, then went and decided that it was better to just go with the "fuck up the lore on the 1 yard line" and pretend that your 3 games of consistent narrative/theme setup wasn't actually the intended interpretation.
Im not trying to love vicariously through my games at all. I just like interesting stories that have something to say that I haven't seen a hundred times. I want the author to tell me something about what themselves through their stories. Not saying I dislike happy endings, but I'd be really bored if that's all anyone ever did.
Escapism isn't inherently bad, good endings aren't inherently bad, neither are the opposites It gets boring when it's all you want out of media tho, either way. Variety is the spice of life, I enjoy artists all telling their own tales and what I can get out of it.
The best thing about being a Mass Effect fan is that damn near every retrospective has something personal to say about the series due it's unique nature.
See a game like this is kind of funny for me, today I was just talking to my friends that games with the tag "choices matter" are an active deterrent for me lol. When I play a game I want to get all the way to the "point of no return" trigger, turn around collect everything from the beginning of the game even a collectible I might have missed chapter 1, filling out all the other abilities that I didn't get on a skill tree because instead of limiting the the resources forcing you to stick with a kind of build you're really just picking your favorites and flushing out the rest later. Then I beat the game with 100% completion and put it down. Replay value is usually not something I even want to look into 😅. (Kind of like Kingdom hearts) But again we all get into games for different reasons 🎉
Mass Effect is one of those franchises that you watch videos on from everybody not just a couple. If someone makes a video about the mass effect series and you are a fan of the games you are going to watch every one and not just throw them up as second monitor listening while gaming yourself
Welp, I commented on a video of yours a while back that if you did a Mass Effect retrospective I'd join your patreon. You delivered so... "o captain my captain" (stands awkwardly on flimsy office desk).
Kaiden was so badly mishandled. In the first game I really appreciated how he seemed very cautious and questioned what was happening and why. He was willing to follow orders and was trying to do the right thing, but he was always just very concerned that he didn't actually understand something and it was going to come back to cause trouble. That cautious attitude played well for the 5 minutes you see him in the second game, I suppose, but it disappeared in the third game. He just blindly followed Shepard like lost puppy. No more introspection, no more honest questions about stuff, just bland, vaguely sexy dude. Even if you rank low with him to coming into conflict in the 3rd game, he never actually expresses that caution or skepticism I found endearing in the first game. I think the devs thought that made him more confident or something but it really just erased his personality.
I feel like reuploading this video suppressed its outreach because this is wildly delicious content and suffers from seriously low view count compared to subscriber count.
Maybe it's my autism but I've always found it incredibly easy to empathize with synthetic life. I've always had deep empathy with robots and AIs and androids and cybernetic characters - like Data and 7of9 and Evie and the Geth. I can't imagine a playthrough where I don't work towards achieving full equal rights for the Geth. I can't imagine a time where I'd watch Star Trek TNG and argue against Picard when he defends Data's humanity. Because, although we now live in a time where "AI" is real (at least to most people's beliefs... LLMs aren't true, hard AIs in the way sci-fi imagines them), AIs and robots have always been narrative shorthand for neurodivergent people - like myself, someone who's autistic. That was clear to me from age 9 or so when I first encountered Data in Star Trek. I saw ME. Heck, I've been CALLED a "robot" by my own mother (and not in a nice way). So yeah. I'll always and absolutely identify and empathize with synthetic characters and i think it's great that Mass Effect lets me do that.
The synth vs organic conflict became central because that's all that was left after none of their other ideas for a possible motive befitting the Reapers panned out. Really, ME2 pivoting toward even more mainstream appeal and not actually doing anything for the central plot is what set them up for failure in ME3. They couldn't land that plane, it exploded mid-flight.
damn hearing kbash's love for mass effect is making me want to replay it and try to appreciate it now that i'm older, i really just remember mass effect 1 and exploring with the mako and feeling existential lol
Commenting as I start the video, future me, can we handle it? Some strange fear gripped me when I've seen this upload from you, an anxiety about this game that defined my early 20s when I was truly lost. I try very very hard not to think about it anymore.
Wrex's explorations on the effects of the Genophage on Krogan society as he has watched over the past thousand years is a conversation most games would shy away from. He notes how Krogans themselves cling to violence and individual accolades which hurts their capacity to organize, and there is some responsibility on them as well for their slow extinction.
I very much agree with the KBash who essentially says, in the Andromeda segment, that we should review games as they are NOW - not what they once were at launch or whatever. Which is why I strongly DISAGREE with the KBash who kept on dismissively trash-talking the elements of ME2 and 3 that were originally DLC. Those stories, characters, and extended endings are now all intrinsically built into the modern experience. DLC no more - they’re just THERE, permanently.
I got excited at the Steambot Chronicles mention then almost immediately remembered you're the only creator I've seen actually make a video on that game lmao Also interesting thing with the Geth vs Quarian part of ME3 is it's entirely possible to be locked out of the peace option regardless of your ParaGade score. It has its hidden point system that pulls from certain choices from 2 and 3, and if you don't have enough points either the Quarians refuse to stand down and get wiped out or the Legion attacks you and the geth are wiped out. I got this result when I played for the first time, and heartbreakingly lost the Quarians and Tali despite my efforts. Then it got weird cause the game bugged and Tali (who was super dead) showed up for the end game romance scene cause she was my love interest in 2...
I think we reached very similar conclusions about Mass Effect overall, to the point where I wondered if you had read my backloggd review for ME1 while writing this video (not trying to take credit for anything said or anything like that, lol). I ended up feeling that Mass Effect is surprisingly prescient with its vision of the Reapers as a species that harvests life and sets it back to square one, which is similar to the role capital plays in gaming. Extrapolate that to real life, where the world is being bled dry majorly for the consumption of tech, which has a lot to do with video games, and the allegory/metaphor/whatever becomes strangely circular. That's not exactly what I said, but Mass Effect truly does have a weird relationship with itself, itself as a cultural and capitalist object, and it really does feel like a flashpoint for analyzing and talking about all of those things. You released this video 2 days after I finished ME3, too, somehow. Maybe we also caught the same sale for the Legendary Edition. This was a cool video to watch in this moment.
Love this review of the good and bad of the series. I’ve seen folks in critical circles lamenting the over-streamlining and reliance on cinematics from the Mass Effect series, and how it would inspire other RPG’s with similar prioritizing. To me, that sounds like the threat of a good time, and that threat was largely unfulfilled. The Mass-Effect-likes never really materialized.
Good video, I knew nothing of Mass Effect and only really knew of it through EA sucking the life out of the series, and I'm glad to have this show me the life that was in it
It was more of an explosion, haha. People cared a LOT about the series (including me), so the letdown was immense. It ripples to this day, in mostly unfortunate ways, tbh. They went out of their way to salvage this when they really shouldn't have.
I feel like I should revisit this game series. A friend got me the trilogy WAY back in the day on the PS3, which was the console I owned at the time. Actually, I still have that PS3 hooked up to the TV. I only played through it once and really enjoyed my time with all the characters. I recall how excited he was to analyze the narrative with me as I was making my way through the game; back then I wasn't too plugged in to games so the only thing I knew about Mass Effect was that I saw the box on the shelf in the store sometimes. It was fun talking about the different choices we made at certain points and why. I mean, it's not the most complex narrative out there, but it certainly has enough going that it can sustain multiple conversations about its different aspects. A lot of the clips in this video I don't even recognize or remember. I wonder if the graphics will be serviceable enough on the PS3 or if I'm so used to modern graphics that I'll get all snobby about the textures? It's funny how back then we thought graphics couldn't possibly get better, but I played something on my PS3 recently and was like, "damn...I could have sworn these games were sharper than this..." Time's a funny thing like that, huh?
It's gotten a remaster collection at a decent pricepoint with all the DLCs. 50/50 chance you will see it go on sale in the december steam sale for $10 too. If you have a PC, it'll be able to run the game decently almost no matter what. Pick up an 8bitdo controller and you'll be ready to rock. I think displays getting sharper also does something, to what you are saying about graphics. A lot of effects or lighting looked way more impressive you were on 1680x960 laptops etc.
It's probably time for me to play all these games again.... I barely remember my impressions of these games when I first played all of these. I do remember generally feeling disappointed in ME2's distilled and refined combat compared to ME1, yet ME3 felt the best to play even though it was clearly built off of ME2. You are exactly right about the Citadel DLC; that was my favorite part of the trilogy. I loved seeing how my crew had developed after three games. And I remember feeling, as a player with a favorite romance option, utterly let down that there was no real option for a "happily ever after" with your romance and the crew. The reapers were my least favorite part of the whole series in large part because of the ME3 endings. It felt like their existence meant the inevitability that my Shepard would never have that happily ever after no matter what you did. Andromeda... I played through that pretty much day 1. I remember going fem Ryder and romancing Jaal. I still remember the moment where he stands down the barrel of a gun and manages to only get a cheek scratch out of it. I had a hard time not taking the Renegade interrupt in that moment, but I was glad I trusted him in the end. But this was the only game I didn't play through again a second time
as someone who isnt a mass effect fan, but is a fan of kbash I will respectfully mute and play the full thing and give it a thumbs up and a comment for the engagement. Love what you do (parasocial) pal, keep up the good work.
I'll always give credit to Bioware when it comes to the Renegade path, cause man is it boring. It really plays into the banality of evil and how evil isn't exciting or meaningful it's just the path of least resistance. Paragon has you being more focused and at times taking tougher challenges, but it always feels more rewarding.
ME2 really disappoints me, which then makes me mad at ME3 and ME3’s abysmal ending. ME2’s main campaign could’ve/should’ve been dlc. I won’t go into much detail but ME3 had way too much to cram in there but I did enjoy my time in that game.
It's not where other things in the universe are it's when the odds of existing at the same time and being that type of civilization scene a lot more remote, yeah?
Watched 3 separate roommates complete full trilogy play throughs in my age, I can say it’s a damn good video game space opera, but as a general space opera it peters out
ME2 was my first game in the series. I loved it. I had no idea what to expect, because at the time, it was like the fourth shooter I had ever played. I didn't know it was going to have all the rpg elements, and the fun party members, (Thane is absolutely the best character in the series no one will change my mind) and I didn't even think I would get a second playthrough out of it at the time, much less the eight or so that I've had. It turned me onto this series. I played 3 on launch, and yeah the ending was ultra wonky, but I enjoyed the rest of it. I went back and played the first game after, and I was less impressed. I liked the story, but the gameplay was a bit off for me in a way I can't rightly describe. I almost feel like the first Mass Effect would've been a cooler movie or tv series than a game. And then we have the bright pink triple A elephant in the room. Andromeda. I had high hopes for it, and they were kicked right in the balls at first. I got it on console, and as everyone knows, it was kind of a huge mess. It was during a period that EA was ruining absolutely everything they put out for a few years. They even managed to screw up a game where you and your friends got to fly around and fight monsters wearing iron man suits. That takes effort. I didn't get far in Andromeda at first, I was super busy in life at the time, and I got just about to where you meet the Angara. I came back to it about two years ago after all the fixes. I've gotta say, I kind of love it. The whole face animation thing is still iffy, but the rest of the game surprised me. I enjoyed the exploration, the gradual unlocking of planets, and the interactions with the other people in the Initiative. It just makes it even more sad that corporate greed and general ass hatedness shot it in the knees before release like so many other EA titles at the time. On the whole, I'm still in love with this series. I do hope we get something more down the line. I'd like to go back to either of these galaxies a few hundred or thousand years down the line, and see what kind of crazy shit is going on now. Here's hoping the Krogan being cured is the canon they go with.
It's kinda funny. Everyone rips on Andromeda for its facial anmimation stiffness but the mainline trilogy didn't have much there either. The most expressive person was always just Shephard and some of the squad members but it was always body language not facial.
Yea, it aint just the ending of ME3 that ruined the game for me. The repetitive mission structure, constant glitches, stupid AI, limited and scaled back role playing, the tearing apart of its own themes, and the just broken story (not just the ending) killed the game for me. Imo, ME3 is just a bad game, not the worst, but just a bad, disappointing game.
I played Mass Effect 2 as a standalone, never played the other two, and aside from missing out on Wrex who seems like an awesome character I have zero regrets. It was awesome as a standalone game if you're the kind of nerd who likes to read codexes in games and from what I can gather it was kind of a terrible entry in a trilogy because it put way too much myth arc on the third game's shoulders
![[BadComedian] - Русские ЭМО СУМЕРКИ (твой личный сорт кринжа)](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/DO_lijyx-No/mqdefault.jpg)
The Jessica Chobit thing still makes me so mad cause she replaced a MUCH Better character in Emily Wong, who ends up getting killed off screen in an unsatisfactory manner.
Also the game engine made her look like melted wax, it wasn't great.
Fuck yeah! I love sticking my dick in melted wax! It's great!
Rnegade Shepard is the closest thing to a father I've had
and Renegade Femshep is the closest thing I've had to a mommy.
Renegade Femshep is the closest thing to a father I've had
Paragon Shepard is the closest thing I’ve had to an absentee parent I’ve had
A big dumb jellyfish is the closest thing to a father I've had.
Technically, this too is a Princess Maker 2-like
What isn’t these days?
GODDAMMIT
HOW TO UNSEE
I love it when you wear your heart on your sleeve KBash, never feel bad for speaking from the heart. You got a good one. Your criticisms and praises are interesting and your jokes are on point as usual. You never cease to impress me, be proud of what you do!
Commenting for the Rhythms of Al Gore.
But also, dang, the way you talk about videogames is so impassioned and interested. The Nioh video convinced me to actually play and beat Nioh 2, now this one got me back on the Mass Effect Wagon.
I dunno if it's the best of the 3, but ME2 is my favorite. I played it through at least a dozen times, purposefully changing the playthrough just to see the different results from the last mission. I was completely blown away when, after never doing any loyalty missions or upgrades, you leap to the Normandy and there's nobody to pull you up, and you just fall to your death.
Classic KBash move: fill me with hope and optimism at the end of the video and then go "nah you've gotta listen to me talk about Andromeda still"
I really thought the video was about to happily end but then i was abruptly reminded that andromeda existed.
I really hope your marriage isn't failing man. Really hope that was just a joke.
If you are going to keep throwing this Custom Robo music at me, you might as well just do a Custom Robo video by this point.
yesss 🙏
Yes please
I remember being a kid and hating ashley and being so pissed that i had to go save her but realizing i couldnt just let her go because i didnt like her. then i had to make the choice between her and kaiden and again l was like, "i cant let her die because im angry with her." And for the next two games i hated her cause i saved her. so i was particularly upset when she decided to come down and act like i was untrustworthy. Like /she/ had some moral highground!
Lol, its such a great story. mass effect really immersed us for like 10 years straight.
Reupload Bros Are up
what exactly is a "reupload bro"?
@@cannibaletiquette5038 It's in the name.
I just saw this now. Still early in video. This is a reupload?
@@Kirby-KriosYe.
Cool Kurusu Soma photo profile. Where can I get one?
Mass Effect? I've got a mass effect in my pants 😎
👁️ 👄 👁️
Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo...I wanted to say that...
Caused by Tali's Mass Effect.
Yoyoyo, more like ASS Effect, amirite!?
I'm Garrus Vakarian, and this is my rectum. *Bends over*
I thought I was tripping when this disappeared when I linked it to someone else when I was watching it
Maybe this is a hot take, but I get the most enjoyment out of “closing the book on another happily ever after”. I game as a form of escapism, I don’t want the day to day strife and tragedy of a real world experience. If I wanted that I would just turn my PC off and walk out the front door. Who knows, maybe some of you have wonderfully pleasant lives and need to mix things up a bit by suffering vicariously through gaming. No, I think I’ll force feed the fulfillment of being a hero while I game. But to each their own.
Yeah. Garrus and Wrex and Liara and Kelly Chambers might not be real, but it still feels good to be nice to them. Illium and the Citadel might not be real, London isn't in rubble with godlike alien cyborg cuttlefish dominating the skies, but it feels good to try to save them and the people within. Legion isn't real, Geth aren't real, Tali isn't real, Quarians aren't real. But saving them feels real enough to be worth it. Being mean, being overly confident, killing people because I think they might do something bad in the future? I try not to be mean IRL and I wouldn't kill people even if i legally could and i thought it was morally justified.
Mass Effect isn't perfect, and there's valid reasons to play as a Renegade or Paragade Shep. But most of those people are my little pretend friends and i want everyone to get along.
I always felt like this was the biggest copout from the ending defenders, I didn't hate it because it wasn't happy and/or Shepard died, I hated it because it retroactively went back on its own lore and the themes that had been building for three games. Then while it did it, they rushed the climax and conclusion, leaving us completely in the dark on how our previous choices and the ending choice actually affected things.
There should never have been a choice, just the amalgamation of all of your previous actions and how it affects the fight for the crucible. The narrative went out of its way in every. single. game. to showcase that ANYTHING other than the destruction of the reapers is indoctrination. Working with them, worshipping them, controlling them, the moment any character says destroying them might not be the best idea they are indoctrinated 100% of the time. Nowhere do we have any mention or insinuation about alternative firing methods for the crucible, only that it is designed to destroy reapers. The endings are so out of left field that they created a sense of complete cognitive dissonance which is where the displeasure over it truly begins, whether the player can explain that feeling or not.
Then suddenly you think you can throw the reaper AI mastermind at me telling me I'm the one singular person in the galaxy that actually CAN control the Reapers and you have the gall to imply that you didn't intend for this to be interpreted as an indoctrination attempt on Shepard's mind via the appeal to his honor/goodwill? The writers are either still lying to themselves (and us) or they accidentally created the most impressive feat in gaming history by indoctrinating the player, then went and decided that it was better to just go with the "fuck up the lore on the 1 yard line" and pretend that your 3 games of consistent narrative/theme setup wasn't actually the intended interpretation.
Im not trying to love vicariously through my games at all. I just like interesting stories that have something to say that I haven't seen a hundred times. I want the author to tell me something about what themselves through their stories.
Not saying I dislike happy endings, but I'd be really bored if that's all anyone ever did.
Escapism isn't inherently bad, good endings aren't inherently bad, neither are the opposites
It gets boring when it's all you want out of media tho, either way.
Variety is the spice of life, I enjoy artists all telling their own tales and what I can get out of it.
@@JameboHayabusa i agree and i don't want to imply that's all i ever want to see.
I was genuinely surprised Andromeda was discussed. Completly forgot about the game
The best thing about being a Mass Effect fan is that damn near every retrospective has something personal to say about the series due it's unique nature.
See a game like this is kind of funny for me, today I was just talking to my friends that games with the tag "choices matter" are an active deterrent for me lol. When I play a game I want to get all the way to the "point of no return" trigger, turn around collect everything from the beginning of the game even a collectible I might have missed chapter 1, filling out all the other abilities that I didn't get on a skill tree because instead of limiting the the resources forcing you to stick with a kind of build you're really just picking your favorites and flushing out the rest later. Then I beat the game with 100% completion and put it down. Replay value is usually not something I even want to look into 😅. (Kind of like Kingdom hearts) But again we all get into games for different reasons 🎉
Wake up bro. New re-upload is up. And it's amazing
I liked Andromeda the most.
Yes, me being a disaster lesbian for Vetra is like 90% of the reason why, but STILL 😂
Mass Effect is one of those franchises that you watch videos on from everybody not just a couple. If someone makes a video about the mass effect series and you are a fan of the games you are going to watch every one and not just throw them up as second monitor listening while gaming yourself
KBash on my birthday!?!? KBest gift ever!!!!!
Hbd
Welp, I commented on a video of yours a while back that if you did a Mass Effect retrospective I'd join your patreon. You delivered so... "o captain my captain" (stands awkwardly on flimsy office desk).
Kaiden was so badly mishandled. In the first game I really appreciated how he seemed very cautious and questioned what was happening and why. He was willing to follow orders and was trying to do the right thing, but he was always just very concerned that he didn't actually understand something and it was going to come back to cause trouble. That cautious attitude played well for the 5 minutes you see him in the second game, I suppose, but it disappeared in the third game. He just blindly followed Shepard like lost puppy. No more introspection, no more honest questions about stuff, just bland, vaguely sexy dude. Even if you rank low with him to coming into conflict in the 3rd game, he never actually expresses that caution or skepticism I found endearing in the first game. I think the devs thought that made him more confident or something but it really just erased his personality.
I feel like reuploading this video suppressed its outreach because this is wildly delicious content and suffers from seriously low view count compared to subscriber count.
Maybe it's my autism but I've always found it incredibly easy to empathize with synthetic life. I've always had deep empathy with robots and AIs and androids and cybernetic characters - like Data and 7of9 and Evie and the Geth. I can't imagine a playthrough where I don't work towards achieving full equal rights for the Geth. I can't imagine a time where I'd watch Star Trek TNG and argue against Picard when he defends Data's humanity.
Because, although we now live in a time where "AI" is real (at least to most people's beliefs... LLMs aren't true, hard AIs in the way sci-fi imagines them), AIs and robots have always been narrative shorthand for neurodivergent people - like myself, someone who's autistic. That was clear to me from age 9 or so when I first encountered Data in Star Trek. I saw ME. Heck, I've been CALLED a "robot" by my own mother (and not in a nice way).
So yeah. I'll always and absolutely identify and empathize with synthetic characters and i think it's great that Mass Effect lets me do that.
Yikes I love a good long video essay about a series I know/like. You feed us so well :') excellent work!
I aint even been this fast, 3 hr video too. Know what I'm watching after work tn
I always go engineer and choose tali and legion whenever possible. Just driwn the enemy in summons
The synth vs organic conflict became central because that's all that was left after none of their other ideas for a possible motive befitting the Reapers panned out. Really, ME2 pivoting toward even more mainstream appeal and not actually doing anything for the central plot is what set them up for failure in ME3. They couldn't land that plane, it exploded mid-flight.
Never knew I wanted a video so much until now
damn hearing kbash's love for mass effect is making me want to replay it and try to appreciate it now that i'm older, i really just remember mass effect 1 and exploring with the mako and feeling existential lol
Yo yo yo this video is exceptional as always! Hope it becomes viral
Great video man. Definitely going to he rewatching this one. Very thoughtful analysis
...Save the Gaming Society... KBash...!
2:41
All extra terrestrials should have your hair, you are g o r g e o u s
Compared to other extraterrestrials shown in movies and games, I think he is.
Since Mr. Bash is too frightened to give his opinion. ME2 is the best in the trilogy objectively.
1:43:26 Ahh yes, the underappreciated alien race of the Mass Effect series, the Battlefield 3 from the homeworld of DICE.
Commenting as I start the video, future me, can we handle it?
Some strange fear gripped me when I've seen this upload from you, an anxiety about this game that defined my early 20s when I was truly lost. I try very very hard not to think about it anymore.
Every year that goes by it becomes clearer how special this trilogy was
holy fck what a final monologue at the en , congrats k bash
Wrex's explorations on the effects of the Genophage on Krogan society as he has watched over the past thousand years is a conversation most games would shy away from. He notes how Krogans themselves cling to violence and individual accolades which hurts their capacity to organize, and there is some responsibility on them as well for their slow extinction.
No Harbinger boss fight at the end is truly the biggest disappointment…
I very much agree with the KBash who essentially says, in the Andromeda segment, that we should review games as they are NOW - not what they once were at launch or whatever. Which is why I strongly DISAGREE with the KBash who kept on dismissively trash-talking the elements of ME2 and 3 that were originally DLC. Those stories, characters, and extended endings are now all intrinsically built into the modern experience. DLC no more - they’re just THERE, permanently.
Volus was my favorite race to play as in the multiplayer, smaller hit box and infinite shield regeneration if you had other volus in the squad
I got excited at the Steambot Chronicles mention then almost immediately remembered you're the only creator I've seen actually make a video on that game lmao
Also interesting thing with the Geth vs Quarian part of ME3 is it's entirely possible to be locked out of the peace option regardless of your ParaGade score. It has its hidden point system that pulls from certain choices from 2 and 3, and if you don't have enough points either the Quarians refuse to stand down and get wiped out or the Legion attacks you and the geth are wiped out.
I got this result when I played for the first time, and heartbreakingly lost the Quarians and Tali despite my efforts.
Then it got weird cause the game bugged and Tali (who was super dead) showed up for the end game romance scene cause she was my love interest in 2...
Incredible stuff as always.
THE PROMISED DAY HAS COME!!!!
You good K bash? Was there an error earlier?
Just in time for my night shift, bless you Kbash 🙏
saw this and exclaimed "Oh fuck yea a new Kbash video!"
Can't wait to watch this this weekend!
3 hour ME retrospective just what I need
I’m Commander Shepard, and KBash is my favorite content creator on the TH-cam Citadel.
I thought I didn't need to hear any more takes on ME3's ending, but I loved yours.
30:10 at least they didn't have his eyes boil and explode from the pressure differential.
Babe wakeup, Kbash reuploaded
I was not alone in my terror of that magic school bus moment I see
I think we reached very similar conclusions about Mass Effect overall, to the point where I wondered if you had read my backloggd review for ME1 while writing this video (not trying to take credit for anything said or anything like that, lol). I ended up feeling that Mass Effect is surprisingly prescient with its vision of the Reapers as a species that harvests life and sets it back to square one, which is similar to the role capital plays in gaming. Extrapolate that to real life, where the world is being bled dry majorly for the consumption of tech, which has a lot to do with video games, and the allegory/metaphor/whatever becomes strangely circular. That's not exactly what I said, but Mass Effect truly does have a weird relationship with itself, itself as a cultural and capitalist object, and it really does feel like a flashpoint for analyzing and talking about all of those things. You released this video 2 days after I finished ME3, too, somehow. Maybe we also caught the same sale for the Legendary Edition. This was a cool video to watch in this moment.
Love this review of the good and bad of the series. I’ve seen folks in critical circles lamenting the over-streamlining and reliance on cinematics from the Mass Effect series, and how it would inspire other RPG’s with similar prioritizing.
To me, that sounds like the threat of a good time, and that threat was largely unfulfilled. The Mass-Effect-likes never really materialized.
I always show up to learn about video games I don't want to play and I always leave wanting to lift up myself and the people around me.
"They used to eat flies..." One of my fav quotes of the entire series 🤣
1:19:17 my dude beeping out the word gamers during this segment is peak comedy 😂😂😂.
2:53:39
for any who are curious, his name is spelled "Hernán Cortés".
It’s crazy that Shadow the Hedgehog has a more impactful and robust morality system than this entire trilogy.
Good video, I knew nothing of Mass Effect and only really knew of it through EA sucking the life out of the series, and I'm glad to have this show me the life that was in it
It was more of an explosion, haha. People cared a LOT about the series (including me), so the letdown was immense. It ripples to this day, in mostly unfortunate ways, tbh. They went out of their way to salvage this when they really shouldn't have.
I've never been able to bring myself to do a renegade playthrough or maleShep.
I feel like I should revisit this game series. A friend got me the trilogy WAY back in the day on the PS3, which was the console I owned at the time. Actually, I still have that PS3 hooked up to the TV. I only played through it once and really enjoyed my time with all the characters. I recall how excited he was to analyze the narrative with me as I was making my way through the game; back then I wasn't too plugged in to games so the only thing I knew about Mass Effect was that I saw the box on the shelf in the store sometimes. It was fun talking about the different choices we made at certain points and why. I mean, it's not the most complex narrative out there, but it certainly has enough going that it can sustain multiple conversations about its different aspects.
A lot of the clips in this video I don't even recognize or remember. I wonder if the graphics will be serviceable enough on the PS3 or if I'm so used to modern graphics that I'll get all snobby about the textures? It's funny how back then we thought graphics couldn't possibly get better, but I played something on my PS3 recently and was like, "damn...I could have sworn these games were sharper than this..." Time's a funny thing like that, huh?
It's gotten a remaster collection at a decent pricepoint with all the DLCs. 50/50 chance you will see it go on sale in the december steam sale for $10 too. If you have a PC, it'll be able to run the game decently almost no matter what. Pick up an 8bitdo controller and you'll be ready to rock.
I think displays getting sharper also does something, to what you are saying about graphics. A lot of effects or lighting looked way more impressive you were on 1680x960 laptops etc.
"I'm Commander Shepard, and this is my favorite video on the Kbash"
KBash you are the best video game guy, thank you for all you do 🥲
It's probably time for me to play all these games again.... I barely remember my impressions of these games when I first played all of these. I do remember generally feeling disappointed in ME2's distilled and refined combat compared to ME1, yet ME3 felt the best to play even though it was clearly built off of ME2. You are exactly right about the Citadel DLC; that was my favorite part of the trilogy. I loved seeing how my crew had developed after three games. And I remember feeling, as a player with a favorite romance option, utterly let down that there was no real option for a "happily ever after" with your romance and the crew. The reapers were my least favorite part of the whole series in large part because of the ME3 endings. It felt like their existence meant the inevitability that my Shepard would never have that happily ever after no matter what you did.
Andromeda... I played through that pretty much day 1. I remember going fem Ryder and romancing Jaal. I still remember the moment where he stands down the barrel of a gun and manages to only get a cheek scratch out of it. I had a hard time not taking the Renegade interrupt in that moment, but I was glad I trusted him in the end. But this was the only game I didn't play through again a second time
Damn people actually kill Wrex? That’s messed up
if you kill wrex i dont trust you simple as that
I'm Commander Shepard, and this is my favorite video on the Extranet.
as someone who isnt a mass effect fan, but is a fan of kbash I will respectfully mute and play the full thing and give it a thumbs up and a comment for the engagement. Love what you do (parasocial) pal, keep up the good work.
maybe if Im feeling generous I might watch just for the jokes.
The Beacon vision at the start and Sovereign's dialogue with Shepard still live with me.
Philosophical Waffle sounds like a TH-cam name. Probably is.
I'll always give credit to Bioware when it comes to the Renegade path, cause man is it boring. It really plays into the banality of evil and how evil isn't exciting or meaningful it's just the path of least resistance. Paragon has you being more focused and at times taking tougher challenges, but it always feels more rewarding.
K BASH WHAT THE FUCK!!! THIS VIDEO IS FUCKING AWESOME!!!!!
ALSO for the record i LOVED the mako in ME1. I had so much fun exploring the eerie, lonely planets. It was super silly and fun to me.
3:18: No, it wasn't copying Star WARS' homework. It was copying Star TREK's homework. At least in the first game.
ME2 really disappoints me, which then makes me mad at ME3 and ME3’s abysmal ending. ME2’s main campaign could’ve/should’ve been dlc. I won’t go into much detail but ME3 had way too much to cram in there but I did enjoy my time in that game.
25:33 oh my god. This is too much, haven't laughed that hard all day. I kind of wish their dialogue was exactly like that now.
1:31:40
Canon: Hop to it
My brain: Hawk tuah
OH BOY Mass Effect video!!
solid video! now time to get one for each ys game :)
Oh hey, we’re back
It's not where other things in the universe are it's when the odds of existing at the same time and being that type of civilization scene a lot more remote, yeah?
1:31:01
I watched this several times over just cause I couldn't stop laughing. Legit one of the funniest moments in gaming I've seen in a while.
A lot of these resident evil references are making me excited for some reason.
Spider-Man 2: Special Edition (Featuring Dante as spider-man Itself)
Watched 3 separate roommates complete full trilogy play throughs in my age, I can say it’s a damn good video game space opera, but as a general space opera it peters out
I had other plans this weekend, but I guess now I have to boot up my Xbox and play some Mass Effect 3 multiplayer instead.
Babe wake up - Kbash uploaded a new video
"I think thinking and talking about media is fun. I hope you do too :D" God damn! you are cute.
ME2 was my first game in the series. I loved it. I had no idea what to expect, because at the time, it was like the fourth shooter I had ever played. I didn't know it was going to have all the rpg elements, and the fun party members, (Thane is absolutely the best character in the series no one will change my mind) and I didn't even think I would get a second playthrough out of it at the time, much less the eight or so that I've had. It turned me onto this series. I played 3 on launch, and yeah the ending was ultra wonky, but I enjoyed the rest of it. I went back and played the first game after, and I was less impressed. I liked the story, but the gameplay was a bit off for me in a way I can't rightly describe. I almost feel like the first Mass Effect would've been a cooler movie or tv series than a game. And then we have the bright pink triple A elephant in the room. Andromeda. I had high hopes for it, and they were kicked right in the balls at first. I got it on console, and as everyone knows, it was kind of a huge mess. It was during a period that EA was ruining absolutely everything they put out for a few years. They even managed to screw up a game where you and your friends got to fly around and fight monsters wearing iron man suits. That takes effort. I didn't get far in Andromeda at first, I was super busy in life at the time, and I got just about to where you meet the Angara. I came back to it about two years ago after all the fixes. I've gotta say, I kind of love it. The whole face animation thing is still iffy, but the rest of the game surprised me. I enjoyed the exploration, the gradual unlocking of planets, and the interactions with the other people in the Initiative. It just makes it even more sad that corporate greed and general ass hatedness shot it in the knees before release like so many other EA titles at the time. On the whole, I'm still in love with this series. I do hope we get something more down the line. I'd like to go back to either of these galaxies a few hundred or thousand years down the line, and see what kind of crazy shit is going on now. Here's hoping the Krogan being cured is the canon they go with.
It's kinda funny. Everyone rips on Andromeda for its facial anmimation stiffness but the mainline trilogy didn't have much there either. The most expressive person was always just Shephard and some of the squad members but it was always body language not facial.
I swear we gonna get kbash gta before gta6.
Mass Effect will forever be gamings Star Wars.
wake up babe new kbash just dropped!
I'm not familiar with Mass Effect so i saw the second silhouette and thought it was a little guy with nub hands piloting a tall fella.
Yea, it aint just the ending of ME3 that ruined the game for me. The repetitive mission structure, constant glitches, stupid AI, limited and scaled back role playing, the tearing apart of its own themes, and the just broken story (not just the ending) killed the game for me. Imo, ME3 is just a bad game, not the worst, but just a bad, disappointing game.
I played Mass Effect 2 as a standalone, never played the other two, and aside from missing out on Wrex who seems like an awesome character I have zero regrets. It was awesome as a standalone game if you're the kind of nerd who likes to read codexes in games and from what I can gather it was kind of a terrible entry in a trilogy because it put way too much myth arc on the third game's shoulders