Spoiler Warning S4E39: A Rogue Element

By Shamus Posted Thursday Feb 17, 2011

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 111 comments

We got so caught up in joking around about Samara’s loyalty mission last time that I never got a chance to say that I really liked it. I like the idea of a non-combat mission. And when I objected about us not being able to shoot Morinth outright, I wasn’t saying “We should be allowed to shoot Morinth”, I was just thinking that the game didn’t really do a good job of explaining why you couldn’t. (And why using your biotics would be useless or unwise.) I bring this up because it was a minor quibble that took up a good portion of the episode.

And now we begin Jack’s loyalty mission…


Link (YouTube)

I wrote 600 words on Jack’s loyalty mission back when the game was still fresh in my mind. That might be worth reading now that we’ve reached that point.

This is another place in the story where the good part of the game (loyalty missions) is at odds with the central premise of the game. The plot insists that we work with Cerberus and accept this “rogue elements” excuse, but all of the previous game and half of this one are dedicated to showing what an obviously preposterous idea that is.

1) If the “Rogue elements” excuse is a lie, we are idiots to believe it.
2) If it’s the truth, we’re idiots to trust TIM.

No matter which way you look at it, Shepard is required to behave like a moron for this plot to work.

 


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111 thoughts on “Spoiler Warning S4E39: A Rogue Element

  1. Sucal says:

    How would you even be able to tell if the Krogan is half naked? I mean, would they only have half their armor, rather then all of it. Aren’t they all armor?

    Anyway, if there is one part of Dragon Age I’m glad they didn’t keep, it was the approval system. I mean, most people would be expecting Jack to be difficult, and ending up treating her like Space Morrigan… only to realise that unlike Morrigan, Jack does have a slightly softer side… only by softer, we mean incredibly breakable in a way that would destroy the entire ship.

    Plus, unlike Morrigan, Jack wouldn’t leave if she was pissed. She’d simply bunch half a dozen holes in the ship, then use the power of her magical breast melt to fly back to Omega or Illum, where she would start killing Cerebus. Or we can assume that Shrek… I mean Miranda is slipping her antibiotics.. to stop her doing so.

    1. Raynooo says:

      Appreciate the pun on antibiotics, it even work in other languages yay !

    2. PurePareidolia says:

      I WISH we had a Morrigan in ME2 – I’d bring her along on missions with Miranda just to hear the constant barrage of snide insults.

      1. Aldowyn says:

        This game has a lot less of the side conversations between team members.

        I miss that, those were pretty good. Nice use of elevator wait time. (Wait, I’m not supposed to say that word, am I?)

        1. Luhrsen says:

          I personally preferred elevators to long loading screens. Still don’t understand why people would rather sit through the same long boring loading screens rather than listen to their teammates talk for a minute or some random news story about what you just did. The news never seemed to change in this game no matter how high profile your actions. :(

  2. Starwars says:

    I have to say that I agree with what Rutskarn is talking a bit about at the start of the episode. Now, I didn’t really like Jack’s whole “yeah, I’m the bad-ass bitch” thing from the start, but when playing through her story it’s like… It literally felt like I was just watching the stereotype bits of the puzzle fall into the place. The final piece was when you do the “good way” romance with her and show her the beauty of love, opening her soul to softness, cuddly bears and all this stuff.

    Now, I don’t know why this disturbed me so with Jack in particular. Perhaps it was just the cup running over when it comes to the whole “help, I have personal problems that you must solve mr player!” and I actually found myself thinking that… Wow, it’d actually be nice to have a character in a Bioware game that was just an annoying bitch and didn’t have the whole “unlock her golden heart” arc. I mean, once you see the first sign, you can easily see down the path of her character and what it’s all about.

    1. Mumbles says:

      I was talking about this with one of my friends and he implored me to check out her horrid romance scene. I have to say post-show with the romance option in mind, I find the whole thing very contrived. She can have a messed up past that made her a bad ass, but there’s no reason for her to turn into a blubbering, makeup smearing kitten at the first sight of loving arms.

      Look at a character like Sage from X-Men who was made to be a spy at a young age for Professor Xavier to Hellfire Club asshole, Sebastian Shaw. She had a tough time growing up and it made her cold and calculating, but she doesn’t break down at the first sight of friendship (with Bishop and various other X-Men). She’s still a bad ass and admittedly one of my favorite comic book characters, but mostly because her character development is believable for the universe she lives in.

      1. DanMan says:

        Wait, you mean Mumbles reads a comic that’s not Batman?! And not even DC…Traitor!

        1. Mumbles says:

          Spoiler Warning: I’m reading a Powergirl comic book as I type this.

          1. Hitch says:

            You’re just looking at the pictures of her chest. She’s the comic book hero with the most in common with Samara.

              1. Deadpool says:

                Because that’s what everyone who buys her comics do. No one actually READS them…

                1. Hitch says:

                  I read the Gray/Palmiotti run, but dropped the title when Judd Winnick took over.

                2. krellen says:

                  Powergirl can talk?

                3. Desgardes says:

                  Powergirl comics have words?

                4. Irridium says:

                  Why did this make me think of the Powerpuff Girls?

                5. Phill says:

                  I had the same response: “Mumbles if reading a Powerpuff Girls comic”. Awesome. I was somewhat disappointed to discover on second glance that it was something else entirely.

                6. GiantRaven says:

                  @Hitch

                  Did you try the Winick stuff? I’m not reading it but it’s supposed to be pretty good.

    2. Integer Man says:

      Gotta agree with the comments: I hated Jack just from her attitude and marked lack of a shirt. Doing the loyalty mission and getting her a shirt did help my perception of her.

      I love the idea of the Krogan character like that. Maybe he could even read Krogan poetry occasionally. Either that or be the equivalent of a Krogan redneck.

      1. Mumbles says:

        Or a female krogan who’s infertile and has to take on different gender roles. I’d love to see that.

        1. wtrmute says:

          The problem with exploring a race-of-hats by presenting an individual breaking their role is that we risk having the race BECOME the exception. For an example, let me just point you to (AIEEE! I said it) Drizzt Do’Urden.

          1. Mumbles says:

            FAIR POINT, GOOD SIR. PS I didn’t know who that was, so I just read an entire wiki page to get the reference.

            1. Aldowyn says:

              … you really are missing out on the D&D references, hmm? He was even in one of the Baldur’s Gate as an unlockable (through cheats, I think) character!

              1. TSED says:

                Actually, no. He was in both games as an NPC, and the cheats were unrelated to his existence. You could talk to him and everything.

                In the first game, he would ask for your help with a bunch of gnolls (that he’d just SLAUGHTER by himself) and in the second… ehh, I didn’t care, it was friggin’ Drizzt and I never bothered tracking him down. I remember him running down Bodhi’s lair with me once, though. Stupid elves.

                1. ehlijen says:

                  In the second one you’re told to gather allies at one point to assault a vampire lair…that you’ve already stormed once before…anyway. Right after getting that quest the game throws drizzt at you in a random (pft, yeah) encounter basically screaming ‘go hire him!’.

                2. krellen says:

                  IIRC, despite taking place in the very area he supposedly adopted, Drizzt doesn’t appear at all in either Icewind Dale title.

          2. Dromer says:

            Drizzt must never happen again, for the sake of every GM’s sanity.

      2. Jekyll says:

        I assume, that Krogan poetry is only slightly better than Vogon Poetry?

        1. krellen says:

          There’s a Krogon who recites poetry to his Asari girlfriend on Ilium.

          1. Kavonde says:

            It’s actually not bad. Not really good, I grant you, but not bad.

            I’d imagine the Krogan version of Beowulf is pretty awesome.

            1. Fnord says:

              Keeping in mind that he wrote that poetry himself, so it’s not exactly the great sagas of the krogan species. I’ve certainly know love-sick humans to write poetry little better than the stuff he produces.

    3. Alexander The 1st says:

      Morrigain seems to be as close as they’ll get to it, in part because of the approval system and the fact that she seems to dislike everything you do unless it’s opportunistic.

      Honestly, it feels like that when they do a character that’s meant to be cynical, they try and make them more developed over time, especially after their character mission.

      Now maybe it’s because I’m playing as a female commoner dwarven warden in DA:O right now, but I like the fact that despite my doing her mission, she still dislikes everything I do because it’s not what’s she’d do.

    4. lurkey says:

      I, too, would love to get a character whose evil cynical bitch (or bastard) facade hides equally evil cynical bitch/bastard inside. I would also love to see a believable romance with such a person – and by believable, I mean not the “Oh noez, it appears I can haz feelings! Gotta dive into Denial real fast before they completely destroy my badassness!” or “♥I was Chaotic Evil now I’m Lawful Good because I’m in love whee!♥” kind. In Bioware’s games so far, only Zevran of DA was something remotely alike – horrible childhood and all that, at least he eventually came to terms with this dreadful thing called love and remained a sociopath.

      1. Nyctef says:

        I haven’t tried it myself, but apparently you can do a Renegade romance with Jack which is pretty much like that.

      2. Daemian Lucifer says:

        Play hordes of the underdark and romance aribeth.You can even get in a situation where shes all “I love you babe,but Ill go with this devil here and murder you because thats who I am”.

        1. Veloxyll says:

          I prefer the true name dialogue where she tells the demon to sod off because the demon ISN’T EVIL ENOUGH

      3. Mantergeistmann says:

        Viconia from BGII isn’t bad… as I recall, she remains rather a sociopath, unless you actually really, really work to make her turn neutral rather than evil.

        1. lurkey says:

          Doesn’t Vic eventually dump your arse anyway if you don’t bother to neutralize her? But yeah, her romance storyline is one of the best I’ve experienced so far.

  3. Sydney says:

    Of the three uses of “I have all this power, but I didn’t earn it” in ME2, Jack’s was the best. Miranda just waves her arms about wailing the line whenever you give her the chance. Grunt mutters it once and then goes back to being The Violent Krogan, Rawr. Jack doesn’t realize it at first; all that ego comes from thinking she made herself stronger than the other test subjects and chose her own fate. Then she finds out that Cerbe–a rogue element, shut up made her that way.

    More of this, please.

  4. Sucal says:

    Something else I wasn’t able to edit in, before other people posted. One thing I do like about Jack’s character is her tattoo’s. I mean at first it just looks like Bioware was trying to show off, basically doing it to prove that their animators/design team are quite skilled, or that the character was a badass.

    Then you listen to some of her stories, about things that had been done to her over the years. Especially if you realise that many people who had endured sexual and other similar types of assault often had tattoo’s done to themselves, as a method of proving they were in control of their own skin. Even her rather casual attitude to sex, and how her ‘love scene’ is just shepherd holding her has similar meaning, based on the documented experiences of real life people who had gone through similar things.

    Of course, then you go from the Bioware animators showing off their skills, to the people who did their research… a much better proposition in many ways, considering how often graphics are put fist these days

  5. Sydney says:

    Also, obligatory: The Teltin facility did produce workable research. Aresh talks about using what was learned to restart the project. And even though he doesn’t get to, Cerberus proper manages to use the results from the Teltin facility to supercharge Gillian Grayson at the Ascension Project.

    Which, of course, makes the “rogue element” excuse even more laughable.

  6. Alexander The 1st says:

    To be fair, Jack used to be sort of the “I hate Cerberus” type, so I suppose Bioware thought you’d all like her.

    What’s the worse part of the Rogue cells is that you never see a non-rogue cell, except for that one operative holding information that got tortured for the cypher in that one side mission.

    Instead, you see rogue cell after rogue cell, and then the game pulls a REALLY sketchy reveal.

    Later on, when you get to the end-game, you can ask EDI about the number of Cerberus cells at a time. “No more than twelve.”

    To which Joker responds “Yeah, so apparently he’s a control freak” [Apologies for any paraphrasing, but it’s been a while.].

    …So…er…The Illusive Man is SO INCOMPETENT that he can’t keep twelve cells of Cerberus from going rogue at any one point and time? He’s been doing this “Rogue cell” thing since Shanxi, and he STILL can’t keep twelve projects running smoothly!

    Then again, I’m guessing you’re going rogue in ME3, so perhaps he really just has bad team morale. Happens when you’re a terrorist organisation, yeah?

    I can’t wait to find the rogue Cerberus cell that spends its hours playing Starcraft II all day “for the betterment of humanity. We’re trying to create a human with in-human reflexes, and the best strategic commander ever to live.” I think that’s the only cell of Cerberus I could ever be okay with joining. And even that’s pushing it.

    1. Caldazar says:

      “…you never see a non-rogue cell…”
      I guess all the others are competent. But you do meet one, Lazarus Cell.

      1. Sleeping Dragon says:

        I would actually dispute this claim. After the destruction of the facility where you were resurrected and the slaughter of the staff there we are generally meant to believe that Normandy, its crew and Shepard’s squad are the “Lazarus Cell” in its entirety… now consider how many characters actually claim that they are “not loyal to Cerberus but to you”. Effectively the entire team pretty much supports your decision to give Cerberus a finger at the end of the game if that is what you decide to do. Even if we assume that most of the crewmembers with whom we didn’t talk during the game are die-hard Cerberus followers it is perfectly possible that they won’t be present after the credits and even if they are I bet a lot of them are also grateful to Shepard personally at this point. Even EDI’s loyalty is focused towards her “crewmates” than Cerberus… In fact, if you go paragon for the final choice (putting aside how dumb it is) what you do from Cerberus’ point of view is precisely go rogue.

  7. Irridium says:

    So… if the logo on the side of your ship is just “your logo”, like your particular Cerberus Cell’s logo, then why the hell is it on all the doors in a decades old base? Its also on Hammerhead, Overlord, the base where you were rebuilt, and the base where you get the Normandy.

    So either thats the main Cerberus logo, and they plaster their logo everywhere which make them idiots at being a secret group, or someone at Bioware cocked up.

    1. Kale says:

      The rogue elements didn’t want the researchers to lose motivation, since they were being all rogue cell and not the regular altruistic Cerberus, so they stuck the Good Ol’ logo everywhere to improve team spirit.
      Meanwhile the Illusive Man was saving money for his star installation and didn’t want to waste resources on a re-branding campaign. Really, he would have changed it, but things just kept coming up.

    2. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Where does it say its just your logo?I think the game always identified it as the official cerberus logo.

      1. Kojiro says:

        I think he meant it was the logo of “your” Cerberus. Anyway, even if they’re rogue, they can still pretend to be “legit” Cerberus, assuming that they would have to pretend and this isn’t another lie.

      2. Irridium says:

        I was told a couple times that Cerberus uses different logos for different cells(or no logos at all). I believe I read it in the comments here on an earlier video, and a few other places across the internet.

        1. ehlijen says:

          And yet in Jack’s recruitment mission she instantly recognises the symbol on the Normandy as Cerberus. So either it’s a generic Cerberus logo or her cell and your cell use the same logo. They might be recycling them, but the far more easily believed explanation is that it’s just a generic Cerberus logo.

  8. Someone says:

    I have a feeling that being a “Rogue Cell” in Cerberus is less about being rogue per se, and more about operating on a “Don’t ask don’t tell” kinda basis. And if you screw up, TIM just cuts you loose, which really raises the question of why anyone would ever want to work with him.

    1. Sydney says:

      Revelation and Retribution paint a picture of most Cerberus operatives as either idealists or racists or both at once. They believe in advancing humanity, and they believe Cerberus is doing it best. Jacob, Miranda and Chambers are good in-game examples of the idealist types.

  9. Dev Null says:

    No matter which way you look at it, Shepard is required to behave like a moron for this plot to work.

    Funny, isn’t it? TV shows and movies have been getting away with this for years – forcing the main characters to act like idiots in order to keep the plot going – and noone seems to mind much. And yet it bugs us in games. I expect the difference is between watching _someone_ act like an idiot on the screen, and watching _yourself_ act like an idiot in a game.

    1. krellen says:

      Actually, the Idiot Ball is a large part of why I avoid most popular media.

      1. Nidokoenig says:

        I get around this by watching cartoons. A grown-up acting like they have the emotional and intellectual development of a ten year old is jarring, Ben Tennyson acting that way is… more maturity than he usually shows.

    2. Daemian Lucifer says:

      It bugs us just as much when it happens on tv as well.The same people that hate this when it happens in games will rant on and on when they see someone acting like an idiot in a tv show.

      1. Sleeping Dragon says:

        I agree with the OP that there is a difference between watching this in a show and being forced to participate in this in a game. In fact the gaming companies have been trying to shove that whole concept of “immersion” down our throats for years and I’d say that having an inventory screen doesn’t ruin it for me quite as much as gritting my teeth and pretty much screaming in my head “Why are you doing such a moronic thing?!”

        But what Daemian said, there are a lot of people who nitpick at TV shows or movies in a very similar manner. It is very difficult to watch pretty much anything with my housemate for this reason. However, those media have a broader audience and the nitpicking group also represents a smaller percentage of the whole. I think it’s all these things together that contribute to the final effect.

  10. poiumty says:

    “1) If the “Rogue elements” excuse is a lie, we are idiots to believe it.
    2) If it's the truth, we're idiots to trust TIM. ”

    So, Shamus, what you’re saying is… we should secretly break allegiance with TIM and work behind his back. Becoming what some would call a… splinter cell? Oh sure, we wouldn’t be a part of Cerberus but we’d still have the ship with the huge Cerberus logo on the side. Like these guys had the facility with all the cerberus doors. And if we play our cards right we should even be able to still be paid by him.

    Sounds like standard Cerberus procedure to me.

    1. Integer Man says:

      In that case, wouldn’t you become a rogue element of Cerberus dedicated to doing semi-good? That kinda seems more like the setup for Cerberus. Pretty evil with a few “rogue elements” who are not as evil, yet still pretty evil, and claiming to be the core.

      Actually, TIM seems only non-evil because he’s too busy watching planetoids burn up to actually get up out of his chair and go back to killing puppies or whatever he does.

    2. Kale says:

      I’m pretty sure by now they’ve hoped to break allegiance publicly and obviously, maybe even in front of TIM, preferably by punching/face- shooting him if so. A quick paint job should take care of that logo business.

  11. Specktre says:

    It’s a shame that Jack’s shirt really sucks. Better than nothing I suppose…

    Well there’s here DLC outfit which is awesome, except for the dumb silver shade things… I already started this rant so I’m going to stop.

    ANYWHO–Yeah I really did not like Jack at all. Then her loyalty mission changed my mind. Still don’t like her all that much, but she’s not a bad character.

  12. X2-Eliah says:

    I am astonished to hear that Shamus liked this mission’s story..

    I mean, it’s the oldest Bioware trope in the book – ‘bad-ass bitch with a little girl deep down’.. If anything, this mission made me dislike Jack as a character even more – it’s bad enough if you are a one-dimensional unlikable character, but if you are a two-dimensional cardboard cliché that’s unlikable..

    I’d say that if the devs had made the character, and the mission, to reveal that she is genuinely a psycho, instead of a ‘tormented soul with mental walls’, that at least would be new and interesting..

    1. Integer Man says:

      It’s a predictable storyline, but they did do a good job on it.

      1. Audacity says:

        Which is pretty much how Bioware makes its bread and butter; tried and true, well worn concepts executed in a polished fashion. Though the polish is starting to wear thin as of late in my opinion. Maybe I’ve just played too many of their games, and become overly familiar with the favored tropes?

        1. Matt says:

          I’d agree with you more or less 100%, Audacity. Bioware does tropes over and over again, but they present them with great polish, which is why I think that in most cases they still pull them off. The one recent Bioware game where I grew tired of it, though, is Dragon Age. It’s probably because I’ve played more fantasy RPGs than sci-fi ones, but DA felt really tired to me. I enjoyed Awakening a lot more, although it still suffered from tropitis.

  13. Volatar says:

    :O Shamus! Some dork posted on your blog!

    1. poiumty says:

      When i read this, i actually went and looked at the author field.

      Then i lol’d.

  14. swimon says:

    Jack was a weird character for me. I think she’s a good character, she’s consistent she’s at least somewhat believable and she’s different from the other characters. That said I really don’t like her. She’s well written but the character they wrote is an asshole. She’s abrasive, annoying and doesn’t really have anything interesting to say. I understand why she’s like this but that doesn’t change the fact that she’s a pain to be around.

  15. Vect says:

    I always assumed the “Rogue Cell” thing is basically some very loose form of Plausible Deniability. TIM gives them money, tells them to get results and doesn’t really ask how they get them.

    Succeed: Score one for humanity! Oh sure there were losses and casualties but now we’ve made some life-extending miracle juice out of babies!

    *Smokes happily while looking at sun*

    Fail: They went rogue. Well, we had nothing to do with it. How was I to know that giving them ludicrous amounts of money to people with no ethical guidelines would go horribly horribly wrong?

    *Smokes nonchalantly while looking at sun*

    Cerberus Research can best be summed up by Seanbaby:

    “Every scientist dreams of a world without ethics. Whenever a scientist sees a set of twins, he or she secretly wonders what would happen if you surgically swapped their faces. They already have a chamber set up to harness the power of their screams as they gradually realize what has happened. Every day, ethics barely prevent experiments like this from being carried out.

    But what if we didn’t have these ethics? When Nazi doctors were let loose during WWII, the incredible rate of their discoveries were matched only by the inadequacy of words to atone for them. They might have been monsters, but without them, we never would have discovered the yield elasticity of the elderly, or learned what part of a prisoner’s tongue detects the taste of angel meat.”

    1. Sydney says:

      That’s how the books paint it, yeah. TIM’s (Cerberus’s) money mostly comes from a boatload of wealthy pro-human backers. But they won’t stay involved with him if too many dirty secrets can be pinned on them (since they, unlike TIM, live in society and could be arrested), so plausible deniability is TIM’s #1 concern.

      In other words:

      “We have to take care to make sure corporate always has plausible deniability when it comes to doing anything questionable.”

      “So wait, you’re saying it’s legal as long as nobody knows about it?”

      “Correct.”

      Which isn’t to say I like it, mind. BioWare always does a good job sewing this stuff up in-universe. But the out-of-universe explanation is still “They shoehorned this in and had to rationalize it somehow”.

      1. Rosseloh says:

        If nothing else, I completely love the fact that you quoted Free Radical.

        1. Aldowyn says:

          I guess I should read that sometime, hmm?

    2. Mathias says:

      Does the above count as a Godwin’s Law entry?

      1. PurePareidolia says:

        No, Godwin’s law is when a participant of the argument is compared to Hitler – ie, “yeah, well HITLER thought scrambled eggs were better than poached”. This would only be Godwin’s law if a) it wasn’t someone else’s quote pertaining to a different matter entirely and b) we were actually arguing about whether ethics were useful in science, instead of talking about Cerberus’ operating philosophy which I think we can all agree is fundamentally stupid.

        1. krellen says:

          Godwin’s Law applies to all Nazis, not just Hitler.

          However, it’s also constantly misused; Godwin’s Law only says that a long discussion will almost inevitably compare something to Nazis.

          This case doesn’t count at all, because we’re talking about actual Nazis, and not comparing anything to Nazis.

    3. ehlijen says:

      If that’s the case, surely he can come up with a better explanation than ‘They went rogue’!

      He is not distancing himself from failed projects. If he did that, he’d accuse them of being criminal imposters or something. By saying that they went rogue, he is admitting that they were once proper Cerberus and that he failed to keep them in line. I don’t think any investor would buy that line more than once, nor would any employee.

      As Shamus said, TIM’s either a lying bastard or an incompetent moron. Neither is a good source of information, but shepard still never questions his intel, even after getting burned by it twice!

      1. Vect says:

        I think he’d probably be the Lying Bastard. He bullshits Shepard whenever he can, with the benefit of Shepard being But Thou Must’d into following his orders.

        However for Project Overlord TIM gets pissy at Shep for saving the autistic savant from being hooked up to wires by every orifice from his brother (who’s even willing to kill Shepard to keep his brother hooked up) with “How dare you interrupt human progress bawwww”.

  16. Kavonde says:

    The Blood Pack mercs actually do have a reason to be hanging out there. Aresh was planning to reopen the prison and continue Cerberus’ research, and brought along the mercs on the promise that there would be some good salvage at the facility. The mercs hadn’t found much so far and were actually getting about to the point of mutiny when you showed up.

    And yeah, there was no way in hell Aresh was realistically going to reopen the facility when he couldn’t even scrape together the cash to pay the Blood Pack in real money. I like to think that he was consciously all about the restoration project, but subconsciously just wanted to come back here and die like all the other kids.

  17. Jarenth says:

    Those Blood Pack soldiers hanging out in the facility were clearly rogue elements.

    Aresh too. Rogue element, clearly.

  18. Entropy says:

    Upon replaying the game, the whole rogue cell excuse wasn’t actually used as often as I seem to remember it.

    At least, Miranda says the Rachni, Husk and Thorian creeper experiments were 100% Cerberus certified. She justifies it by saying they were making ‘low cost shock troops for high risk operations’. Claiming it would save human lives or whatever.

    I can’t remember Akuze ever being brought up. Which annoyed me and my Sole Survivor Shepard immensely.

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Too bad that you never get to say to her “You know those husks you justified by being already dead,those thorian creepers you justified by being mindless,and those rachni you justified by you stopping the experiment when you find out they were intelligent?Well it seems that SOMEONE has shoved a decorated HUMAN admiral kahoku in a holding cell with these creatures to die.Justify that!”

      1. Entropy says:

        Well uhhh…playing devils advocate here, but:

        Cerberus is hardly ‘no humans should die ever’ it’s ‘human dominance’. Admiral Kahoku was investigating them. It’s pretty easy to justify killing a guy who might shut down your organisation or at least majorly hinder it, left alone.

        And yes. SMAC is awesome. I will be sad if it is never remade by Firaxis.

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          Im not saying that it doesnt make sense,Im saying that miranda cant justify it as being a good thing like she did with the rest.

          Well,there is a mod for civiv that kind of replicates alpha centauri.Personally,Id be more glad if they took a bite at spore,and made it into a game I was expecting it to be.

    2. Integer Man says:

      Unrelated, but love the avatar, Entropy. SMAC was awesome.

    3. ehlijen says:

      How do you save human lifes by sending in ‘low cost shock troopers’ made from humans rather than actual humans? You might save money, but you’re still risking (or actually wasting) just as many human lifes, aren’t you?

      1. Sydney says:

        No, you’re repurposing humans that are already dead. So instead of the living dying, the dead…uh…re-die?

        1. ehlijen says:

          Ah, of course. They are already dead because Cerberus killed them in a stupid experiment and are just being recycled (I mean what else do you do when all the thresher maws are full?). It all makes sense now!

          1. Sydney says:

            And that saves human lives the same way normal soldiers save human lives. If husks and creepers weren’t so piss-terrible, they could fight our wars for us more effectively than ordinary human soldiers, saving more civilians.

            Unfortunately, husks and creepers kinda suck. Looks like super-biotics are the next possibility on the list, considering their enormous success with Gillian Grayson.

  19. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Not connected to this episode,and I know Im a bit late,but you guys really should spoil warning one of these next:
    http://store.steampowered.com/sub/6951/

  20. Gil says:

    Shamus, I have to tell you – my 15 month old son absolutely loves Spoiler Warning! Every time a new episode begins he perks up at the intro music. He starts bobbing his head and this huge smile lights up his face. Hilarious, cute, and awesome.

    1. Nidokoenig says:

      Daww, that’s so adorable. Hop over to Kevin MacLeod’s site, he’s got over 30 hours more of royalty free music for your son to enjoy:

      http://incompetech.com/m/c/royalty-free/

  21. Alexander The 1st says:

    In hindsight, by the way, You guys should’ve named the clip “A Rouge element”.

  22. ehlijen says:

    Element Ro
    0

    All neutrons; there’s nothing positive about it.
    Densest element known to science.
    Despite being highly unstable, it is more common in nature than hydrogen as all other elements slowly degrade into Ro.

    1. Aldowyn says:

      There are so many things chemically wrong with that.

      1. ehlijen says:

        Yes. It makes about as much sense as feeding thresher maws on a soylent green diet to further the cause of humanity.

        1. Aldowyn says:

          I’m in a college level chem course, so … yeah, it’s hard to ignore something so obviously wrong.

          I see your point, though.

          1. ehlijen says:

            Chem was my major in high school, so while I’m most likely not as well versed in it as you, I am aware of all the deliberate mistakes I made for the sake of comedy, yes :)

    2. acronix says:

      So it´s a pessimistic element?

      1. Nidokoenig says:

        Nah, neutrons are neutral, not negative.

  23. Cineris says:

    Samara’s loyalty mission would have been way better if:

    (a) anyone actually cared about Samara because she was an interesting character. She isn’t.
    (b) They tried to address some of the more glaring plot points the story brings up. Why Shepard can’t just gun her down or use her own biotics to defeat Morinth, one-line explain, “Morinth is special and so her special-biotics are virtually impenetrable to conventional weapons, and only the biotics of one of her kin will harm her.”
    I also kind of would’ve liked to have heard a compelling explanation why it took Samara 400 years to track down her daughter, but then with Shepard’s help she mops it up in a day. Though that question could’ve been easily avoided by bringing it down to a more manageable number – 20 years? Ok, that’s a timescale I can relate to. 400 years? Did Samara get sucked into the Asari version of WoW?

    1. Irridium says:

      Have you tried “Galaxy of Fantasy” yet?

      1. Kavonde says:

        It’s based on turian mythology, but it’s pretty fun.

        1. Aldowyn says:

          XD I liked that dude. I was disappointed you couldn’t buy one of the games.

          You should totally be able to buy one of those games and have a bunch of character sheets and dice on a table in your room.

          1. Kavonde says:

            Hell yes. And you should be able to obtain the Shepard VI to operate systems in your cabin.

            “I delete data like you on the way to real errors.”

    2. ehlijen says:

      I think she’s just too dumb to ask for help. Shepard basically has to thrust his/her help onto her in order to get Samara to actually stop killing minor code breakers for a minute and listen to his/her request for help.

      Without someone to work with her (which she seemed to never be inclined to do before, what with her self-guilt trip and all), the option of baiting Morinth just never existed.

      The moral of her story, as I understood it and in as much as there was one, was that sometimes you have to ask for help to clean up your mess.

  24. Caldazar says:

    Wait, is it me or does the scientist on the hologram sound kinda like sarevok?

  25. Zaxares says:

    @Cracked Walls: … Shamus, I totally laughed when you mentioned that. It brought back ALL these memories of the days of the original Doom, when the slightest inconsistency in a wall panel from others around it meant that there was a secret room hiding behind it. XD Ahhhh, nostalgia…

    @Mercs being here: Ostensibly, the mercs are here because Aresh, the only other survivor of the Teltin facility, came here a year ago to try to start rebuilding the place. It does seem awfully plot convenient for them to be here so the player has someone to fight though. :P

    Also, the Tron-armor krogan? That armor existed back in ME1, as the various Geth Armory suits. It was the most powerful armor a krogan could ever wear back in the first game. :D

    This episode also has officially THE best death Josh has ever shown us: “Death by inappropriate decision to hack a crate for credits in the middle of a battle while surrounded by 3 angry krogan”. XD

  26. Sydney says:

    Hey, hang on. That torture chair is adult-sized. What would the Teltin gang have used it for?

  27. Gil says:

    Cool – thanks, Nidokoenig!

  28. Alex says:

    1) If the “Rogue elements” excuse is a lie, we are idiots to believe it.
    2) If it's the truth, we're idiots to trust TIM.

    I dunno, I’ve always seen it more as Shepard not really ever trusting anything TIM says or does, but just playing along so that he can give her all the toys and powerful squad mates she could ever need for when he eventually does his big “haha i betrayd u” moment. In which case TIM is the idiot.

    I’ll just have to wait for ME3 to see if I’m giving Bioware too much credit here…

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