Liara: Lair of the Shadow Broker

You know what? Let's light this candle. Let's go after the Shadow Broker. Quickly, to Illium!

Come for the art, stay for the writing, that's what I say.

Hey, all of you remember Feron!

(I bring Tali on this mission just for the pure Mass Effect 1 Brosquaditude of the situation. Who am I kidding, I'm the only person on the Internet that loves Miranda anyway.)

gurl~

Pretend asari turn dark blue when they get all ~bothered~, okay? Just pretend for me. I don't think Bioware ever specifies, and damnit, I'm working in MSPaint here!

This happens in the damn game, by the way. It's a game play thing, they just want to give you some time to get your shit together before you go help Liara, but it's still odd: why the hell do we take separate cars? Does Shepard smell?

It gets even worse when you find out what happens next.

Fuck! Someone tried to shoot Liara! Tela Vasir was hunting for clues, but she's an incompetent NPC, so it falls upon Shepard to do police work. Again. All right, let's search Liara's apartment for shit.

You know what's funny? My husband knows, like, off the top of his head where Liara got her degree. How much of a big damn nerd can you be? He's going to come home from work and tell me what it is, too. I'm not going to look it up, just to fuck with him.

Eventually:

... I guess TVs work on USB drives in the future. Odd, you'd think they would have streaming video.

Shit, you guys, did Bioware correctly predict Netflix tanking?

But! We'll have to do it next time.

Postponed Again

Okay, so that memory trick that Thane does -- does it just happen at random?

And, can it be any topic?

Because that would be unfortunate.

After the fertilizer explosion in Texas, I'm going to give up on any sort of violent MSPixel this week. Every one of you promise me you'll stay safe, and we'll go after the Shadow Broker on Wednesday.

But here, since we're on Illium right now, let's look at my favorite sidequest:

Meet Char the krogan, who's so totally in love with this asari named Ereba. He's decided to win her heart by reciting krogan poetry, which is a thing he just made up.

This is the full text of the poem, from the Mass Effect Wiki:

Oh Blue Rose of Illium, let your roots dig deep into the hot soil of Tuchanka. Let our scorching sun and sheeting rain turn your supple beauty into strength. For if our love is to survive, it must grow thorns to pierce the hand of any that would uproot it!

Blue Rose of Illium, you have blossomed in a tower of glass and plastic. But beauty under glass is untested and weak. Where are your honored dead, to fertilize the ground that you might grow strong? On the rocky plains of Tuchanka, I will build you a garden from the bones of my ancestors.

Blue Rose of Illium, leave eternity unembraced and grapple in the glorious struggle that is us, here and now! I am speechless, not with blood rage, but with love, and I stand here, humble and mute, to offer you a home. Come to me, Blue Rose of Illium. Let our three hearts beat as two.

Shepard has the option to interject, but sadly, they don't have the dialog option that they need:

Inthane in the Membrane

As Shepard goes along, she keeps finding rooms full of Salarian workers hiding from all the chaos.

So anyway, let's go get to Nasana Dantius, and by extension, Thane.

Shepard and pals have to cross this windy bridge, and I think it's supposed to affect gameplay? Maybe if you're a sniper person. Vanguard overhere don't notice a difference.

Nasana lives in this big ass tower, and rolling up to it is not at all like rolling up to the final castle in a fantasy game. Don't forget Bioware's roots, kids. I mean, look, there was a drawbridge and everything!

You know, Mario can eat it, when I think of The Final Level of a video game, I always think of Pete's castle at the end of The Magical Quest Starring Mickey Mouse. That was a HELL of a game, you all ought to take an afternoon to play it. That was the first game I ever bought with my own money. And beat! The sequel was pretty good too. What was that one called, The Great Circus Mystery or something? It was spectacular, go play it. It's two player co-op, too, which PS WHY didn't Mass Effect 3 have?

That is a hell of a derail, good thing no one ever reads the text!

I think you're supposed to take cover and shoot the mercs down off the balcony, but like I said, vanguard. Those mercs can eat area pull.

Some one will argue that I should have gone for heavy pull, but I love area pull ever so much.

And now, finally, Shep and the Shepettes come to Nasana, who is frantically fighting for her life.

Meanwhile, in the vents:

WELL! Mr. Krios can take care of his own shit, that's for sure!

(I know you can tell from my delicate renderings that look exactly like they were carved scrimshaw, but just in case, Thane is a drell. You can probably figure out where this is about to go.)

Thane lays Nasana out on her desk.

Well then!

We're going to have to air this out right here: I've got no beef with Thane personally, but you've already figured out that I didn't plan on doing him. He's the third romance option, and you can totally do him, by the way. I guess if you're going to do an alien, he's not awful looking? Then, I wouldn't have sex with a turian either, so.

I don't do Thane's romance path because ... okay, when people blink they look like --, right? Thane does this thing where he blinks, and his eyes shut like ||. It freaks me out so badly that I couldn't have Shepard flirt with him if I wanted to. Sorry, I know there's people out there who are big Thane fans.

More for Tali I guess.

Every character, once recruited, gets a lovely scene in the conference room where Shepard welcomes them to the Sex Boat Normandy. It serves as a solemn reminder that I can't draw the conference room.

Horny ass game.

NEXT TIME: A little bit of T and A. You know, like always.