The Biotic Bubble

Before we do anything! THERE IS MSPIXEL FAN ART TO ATTEND TO.

The obviously sexy and well-groomed @Buildabearatron, an actual factual art student, drew this for us:

I love the entire thing, but I nearly fell out of my chair when I realized Miranda was sewing Shepard's asshole back in. Buildabearatron's website is Long Siesta, and I'm assuming he won't mind the plug.

And now, the rest of today's entry.

It's our anniversary, and husbando~ said this to me when he saw last time's MSPixel, so I felt it fair to let him explain himself.

... and I felt it fair to post my reply to him, too.

Okay, so who's coming with us under the biotic bubble with us?

I'll talk about this in a second, but if you're not rolling with Legion and Tali under the bubble, you're working too hard.

Did anyone else think this was shitty of Shepard? "Hey, the seeker swarms will kill us. So anyway, y'all have fun running through the seeker swarms, which will kill you, while we stay under the nice safe bubble." Just take everyone!

While group B stays and drinks hot cocoa, I swear.

By the way, the game asks you to make this choice. I always pick Garrus because I can remember him, but Jacob and Miranda will work too. Anyone else eats it.

So, the bubble.

This part is the original Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for Game Cube. Holy shit that game was amazing. Anyone else play it? I always went selkie.

Jack generates this huge thing of biotic power that the seeker swarms can't penetrate because ... uh, space magic. She's busy, though, so the fighting is left to Shepard, Legion and Tali.

Meanwhile, Shepard, Legion and Tali can walk through the bubble because ... uh, space magic, but don't do that. The seekers will overtake you. And whatever you do? Don't charge out of the bubble. Learned that one the hard way.

However!

Legion's drone and Chiktika can penetrate the bubble because ... uh, space magic, so just let them slip through and do all the hard shit. Easy. I mean, after that, you can toss out the occasional pull, and --

This happened while I was replaying this part for MSPixel. No joke.

So once you reach the end, Jack takes care of the seekers for you.

Whoever lead the second team gets shot.

... when did the seeker swarms get guns? Or did Garrus get friendly fired?

Miranda, Jacob and Garrus will survive the gut bullet, though, and get up like it ain't a thing.

... does anyone else wonder about this? Like, first of all, the Normandy must broadcast the strongest LTE signal in the universe for Joker to be able to make all of these crystal clear calls to this uncharted ship that no one's ever survived on. And then? It's an UNCHARTED SHIP, how are we mysteriously charting it all of a sudden?

Stay with me for a second, the game does some fucked up math.

The game assigns each character a number. Garrus, Zaeed and Grunt are the highest numbers (I think they get a 4, but I'm not sure) while Kasumi, Jack, Tali and Mordin are lowest on the scale. If the characters are loyal, the game will give that character a bonus. The game then adds up all the characters. If you've got enough defense points, everyone lives. If you don't, the game starts offing people, starting with anyone unloyal and then prioritizing Mordin, Tali, Kasumi, Jack, Miranda, Jacob, Garrus, Samara, Legion, Thane, Zaeed, Grunt.

Don't do math, though, math sucks. If you want to save everyone, there's an easy way to do it:

• Send Mordin back with the crew to the Normandy. If he's not on the line the game can't kill him.
• Have at least Garrus, Zaeed or Grunt on the line and loyal. One of the three is usually enough to jack the defense score high enough to where you don't have to worry. If you've got two loyal, the game won't kill anyone. We've got all three loyal, we are golden.
• Take either Kasumi, Jack or Tali with you to the final battle, assuming they're loyal. If they're not loyal, leave them on the line and hope that Grunt will take a bullet for them

It's possible to have a character survive being on the line while not being loyal by the way, you've just got to have a loyal Garrus/Zaeed/Grunt around to run interference with them. The first time I played, I didn't have Miranda's loyalty and she was fine. If you bring someone unloyal with Shepard, they will die.

I always bring Jack and Kasumi. Tali's a big girl, she's got Chiktikka. ... and Zaeed.

If Mass Effect 2 was being made today, this is totally where the dude you was doin' would say something. Lie to me, tell me I'm wrong.

NEXT TIME: I think I can end this shit in one entry! Let's see!