Tech
Almost Nobody Played A Bad Guy In Mass Effect – Kotaku
One of the key appeals of playing the Mass Effect series at its time of release was the way, like BioWare’s older games, your in-game decisions and actions would propel you towards the ends of a binary good/evil scale, potentially changing the game’s story. Turns out BioWare almost needn’t have bothered, since so few players went to the dark side.
Responding to very good tweet by @Mewd462, former BioWare cinematic designer John Ebenger revealed this:
That’s a bit of a shame (at least in terms of the unseen work) but also, not? Just because BioWare gave players the choice to be either good or bad didn’t mean they were of equal merit. The problem with binary morality systems in games, and this has been true from KOTOR to Fable to Red Dead Redemption, is that the bad side is always fighting against the grain of not just the game’s design, but its story as well.
You could be as bad as you could possibly be in Mass Effect, but where would it get you? Your end goal in each game is still to save the day as part of a team, and while bring a prick about it might get you a few cool dialogue sequences or encounter outcomes (and some that haven’t aged as well), it also cost you relationships and crewmates, which are the foundations of the series’ success, especially in Mass Effect 2.
Newer games (specifically The Witcher 3 and Red Dead Redemption 2 here, along with Mass Effect’s own Andromeda) have learned from BioWare’s earlier work and found out it’s a lot more interesting, and a lot more fun, to make your moral choices a murkier proposition, to make the experience about the agony of your reasoning itself, not the narrative outcome.
UPDATE: Here’s a 2013 look at some Mass Effect 3 statistics which say that, for the third game in the series at least, 35.5% of players were Renegade. Both that statistic and the one Ebenger cites are short on necessary context though, like does this count all playthroughs or just first ones? Does it count completed games or just dabbles?
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@juanhall: I gotta say, this was the most interesting bike in this post….love that Intense is experimenting with gearboxes…I can see it have a huge effect on DH bikes….thank god there’s still people pushing things. Now, they need to make an Enduro bike with the Pinion MGU!
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The City of Pointe-Claire would like to inform you that the Bob-Birnie arena will be closed for its annual maintenance as of Monday, April 29. The Annex rink will reopen to the public on Monday, May 13, and the arena’s Main rink will be accessible as of Monday, June 3.
Public skating will resume on May 13, and the summer public activities programming will begin on June 3 when both rinks have reopened to the public.
In addition to the annual maintenance of the facility, two renovation projects are also scheduled to start at the same time:
Installation of new sound systems
The City will be replacing its current sound systems in both the Main rink and Annex rink, to offer arena visitors a better overall experience, whether watching from the stands or participating in on-ice activities. This project is expected to be conducted throughout the month of May.
Renovation of locker rooms in the Main Rink
The City will also be renovating the five locker rooms located in the Main rink, to bring up to date the amenities currently available to participants. These renovations are expected to begin in early May and will be completed by mid-August.
For all information about the Bob-Birnie arena, visit the arena’s page on our website.
We haven’t seen a new iPad in years, but Apple seems likely to change that in just a few weeks. All signs point to the release of new iPad models in the first week of May.
Apple CEO Tim Cook posted this GIF for the virtual event to X on Tuesday morning.
This morning, I received an email invite for a virtual Apple event, scheduled for May 7 at 7 a.m. PT (10 a.m. ET). The invite, which says “Let Loose,” shows a drawing of a hand holding an Apple Pencil. Considering the iPad is the only device that uses the Pencil — that doesn’t leave much to the imagination.
Apple’s been expected to release new OLED-screened iPad Pros with newly designed Pencils and Magic Keyboard cases. New iPad Airs are also expected, including a larger-screened 12.9-inch model. Apple’s iPad Air lineup tends to be slightly redesigned versions of previous-model iPad Pros, so just look to the M2 iPad Pro lineup for a sense of what the next Airs could be. These would be the first new iPads since the iPad Pro M2 model arrived in late 2022.
Watch this: What to Expect at Apple’s May 7 iPad Event
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