Malevolent Effect – Edentity Crisis

In space, no one can hear you punch a man in the face.

Well, OK – that’s a lie. They can. Especially when you’re playing Mass Effect. Taking the role of Commander Shepard, This feature is going to detail playing through the game taking the meaner of the two paths the game offers you: Renegade. As an obvious disclaimer:

MASSIVE MASS EFFECT SPOILERS AHEAD.

If you haven’t played it yet, I do recommend you do so, especially if you were a fan of Bioware’s earlier game, Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic. I’m primarily going to be writing about the main plot specific points of my adventure, but will more than likely take in many of the side-quests, anything interesting or entertaining occurrences that spring up will of course be mentioned. So without further ado, please enjoy for your consideration:

Malevolent Effect. Or Punching People in the Face in SPAAAAAACCCCCCEEEEE!

In creating my version of Shepard, I of course decided to go with a female. One because she’s nicer to look out for long periods and secondly because her voice acting quality (the always reliable Jennifer Hale) is far superior to the male version. In being highly unoriginal I shall be keeping with the theme of naming all my characters with the letter B (not that her first name is ever important for anything other than save games). A ruthless soldier born on Earth, Bitch Shepard will be portrayed by the most evil woman in the world – Davina McCall. Or perhaps Courtney Cox. You decide.

Crew of the Normandy, this is Davina. Please do not swear.

Our adventure begins in a dark void of emptiness. But it’s not the contents of the head of your average Big Brother contestant, it’s space. Of course I’m doing what every good anti-hero does before a mission – staring into space. Only quite literally in this case. This Shepard is dangerous, she’s a loose cannon. She’ll do anything and live up to any tired rebellious cliché in order to get RESULTS. And it’s good to know her reputation precedes her:

So, we’re flying to Eden Prime on our first mission of this adventure. Eden Prime was apparently one of the first human settlements, so it seems like a good place for Shepard to mess around with. However, there’s a lot of crew chatter about the SPECTRE agent travelling with us. They’re the equivalent of the intergalactic A-Team and we appear to have Mr T travelling with us. If Mr T was a member of the Alien race known as the Turians and was named Nihlus. Mr T then informs Shepard he’s going to be observing her like some sort of space inspector. Recieving a message just before we leave, it appears the planet is under attack from a Giant Claw machine as seen in Toy Story. Invoking painful childhood memories of seaside disappointment from one too many toys falling just short of the prize giving chute, McCall/Shepard is compelled to go down and kick some metallic grabbing arse.

Everyone's A Winner! Except the population of Eden Prime.

Touching down, Shepard is accompanied by goody-two-shoes Alliance lover Kaiden and a character whose name is so unimportant I shall only refer to him as Redshirt from now on. Mr T seems to have gone off on his own, I guess he had some fools to pity or something. In the meantime, the team proceeds to act like true tourists by making the natural wildlife explode for the hell of it. Before long we run into our first few enemies – some attack droids – who quickly make short work of Mr Redshirt. He shall be missed. Well, actually he won’t – I tell Kaiden to forget about him and we continue with blowing as much shit up as we can. Which proves to be a great success, but not before we witness another redshirt become the latest meal in what appears to be some sort of human kebab house. Declining their offer of extra sauce, we partake in the age old diplomatic process of human/robot relations using assault rifles.

Geth Acupuncture. Because death cures all ails.

Talks seem to go well, right up until we meet Ashley, a soldier whom was originally stationed on Eden Prime. I think she was trying to tell me something important, but I quickly interrupted her by telling her to stay put while we did the far more important task of carrying on ahead. Unfortunately, old Mr Wet Behind the Ears wrecked the day by insisting she came with us. Reluctantly, she became the third member of the Malevolent Posse. Which is my new name for the group, should we end up becoming popular and releasing rubbish pop songs to the universe; like Blazin’ Squad with guns. Dispatching a few more angry robots leads us to field full of former humans turned into emotionless, robotic cyborgs – again, like Blazin’ Squad – whom we decide to welcome into the sweet embrace of our comforting hot lead.

The Husk Pole Dancing night was not as erotic as expected

Exploring the debris the trio came across a locked cabin, whereupon Shepard’s years of experience in random puzzles that have no real relation to the action being performed paid off. Opening the door revealed a research scientist and her assistant. Helpfully, she informed us of the beacon we were originally sent to recon, and a bit of background history. However, her assistant started feverishly gibbering on about the end of the world and chaos that was soon to occur. Shepard does not like being told about her impending doom. So she dealt with Nostrawimpus in the only way she knew how:

She punched him in the face. This mission was going brilliantly.