Article: ME1 has aged worse than MEA

Whoa. Whoa.

Whoa.

When you typed some stuff I liked, I felt like we were heading toward friendship, maybe even lifetime friendship. Then you posted this crazy talk. Now I feel attacked. I may be triggered. I'm questioning whether you might actually be a bad person.

I need some time to think, but I'm not taking a lifetime block off the table. All options will be considered. For now, I'm creating an alt to cast a vote for asses. Take that, sir! Take that!

<insert offended, confused, thoughtful but angry meme>

I know I hide that opinion well.

Even though I largely disagree, I upvoted you because of your thing about blocking people for life. Made me laugh.

I can come up with a ton of reasons why racism might seem to make sense from the POV of the characters. They'd recently fought a war with the turians and lost. It only really ended when the asari intervened. Now maybe that hate should have only extended to them. It's certainly the basis for whatever was going through Ashley's head. Again, not supporting racism but you could see the perspective. I would say Kaidan was the most moral person in the entire series. Even with the war, and with everything that went on with Vernus, he didn't see turians as the enemy. Instead, he saw that bad people could exist no matter what their. If he didn't follow that logic it would also mean humanity as a whole was evil. MEA already had a bunch of alien races heading off to MEA, together, to create new lives for themselves. It wouldn't make sense to have very many racists.

The main flaw in MEA, from my perspective, was open worlds. It was a huge mistake. Too much time wasted crossing the world to get something just to bring it back. Waypoints, ugh, don't get me started. I also hate crafting with a passion. I don't have a problem with the story or the characters but I do think that the foundation put in place by ME1 was the only thing that could have built what we got in the later two games. That choices made in ME1 had at least some impact in the other two games also makes it important.

I'm not actually hung up on anyone's opinion because the world would be terribly boring if we all thought the same. I'm just putting mine opinion out there.

I've had both. While tits feel nice - won't get into other details about what I've done with them - ass is definitely better. I mean, if we're making this a thing to discuss.

She did to me. Eventually my opinion changed. I was just trying to express a POV. I'm sure you know lots of people hate her because they call her racist. I don't think racism is anywhere near as prevalent in ME1 as the writer of the article seems to think. Sure, we've got an anti-alien group and Cerberus (which is presented as bad). "You humans are all racist." I don't think the writer really thought through how close to the First Contact War the game is set.

And in the end Ashley was proven right.

Is like good wine. Aged ones are always better.

'Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry'. Cyberstrike, probably.

I think she is xenophobic/bigoted even if she isn't outright racist. That's not why I dislike her though, I dislike her because she isn't smart and doesn't see the bigger picture. For example in ME2 she is so clouded by her hatred of Cerberus that she refuses to acknowledge the threat of the collectors (the same people who abducted the colonists she was supposed to protect and the same group who almost abducted her if not for Shepards rescue). Instead of being grateful she comes across as very judgemental, even insulting in the way she addresses shepard 'I would never turn my back on the alliance' I remember Garrus being in my party and after the 3rd time of her saying 'how can I trust you Shepard'. Garrus intervenes and says she is letting her emotions cloud her judgement and that Shepard is not aligned with Cerberus but merely trying to rescue human colonies that are being attacked.

This stupidity spills over in the 3rd game where she again tries to link the Cerberus attack on Mars to Shepard (more than once). If you can't trust someone then stop following them! The biggest issue for me though was how easily she was used by Udina (the man she said she hated and insinuated she would never trust). She didn't hesitate to point her gun at Shepard (the guy who literally saved her in all 3 games and specifically against Cerberus in the last game).

I was so tempted to kill her even though I was doing a paragon run, ended up choosing the renegade option to get her to back down then refused to have her on my ship

Yeah, this annoyed me about Ash in ME 2 and 3, but I also chalk this up to "bad writing". I think her original writer also left partially through ME 2? I can't remember, but I swear people have said that many times previously. But since I always take Garrus, that line about her judgment being clouded is right.

As for why she was following you on the Moon, it's more like she was supposed to be under Anderson, and Anderson gave control to Shepard, so since Ash is Alliance "through and through", she'll follow "orders" and go with Shep to Mars. She may not like it, but she's going to do it. Still, bad writing is bad. And as much as I love ME 2, the story wasn't it's selling point.