Anyone else think Horizon might impact MEA's review scores negatively?

You don't like "Mary Sue"? How about this: Ryder is a Mary Sue.

Hold me to that. (Hint: Inquisitor was also a Sue. ME3 Shep was also Mary Sue)

Ugly? No... well, she's not my type, but at least her face is aptly made.

For the record I'm for feminism... in a sense. First picture I saw of Sara Ryder in gameplay before that awful-looking animation in the TGA trailer spoiled me I was like, "dude, this is dope. I'm playing FemRyder first thing!"

Ever since I played Metroid Prime 3 Corruption on my Wii I've craved more games with women featured. Dunno why, I think it's just the novelty of it because it happens too rarely, but I just think Horizon is part of the "wave of pop-feminism" that I can't stand because it's so attention-seeking about it. I've already seen 3 reviews mention how it's an amazing sight that there are so many different colors of skin in one picture in a video game and they can't help themselves from refering to Aloy as a "strong female protagonist". When the game was first shown at E3 the first thing that popped up on my google search was a Playstation top-10 list over best new protagonists and Aloy was No 1 "because she's a badass female", and to me there's an agenda right there that goes in line with the stuff you hear all over TV, on Facebook, particularly on Tumblr and even in the street. Maybe I'm really just some kind of asocial guy, I think I'm a bit of a perfectionist but I really don't like bandwagoning and to me a lot of Horizon's praise is just that... except for however the gameplay actually is (pretty amazing from what I heard).

But regardless it's one big tangent. My main point was actually to say that I think the quality of what HZD does as a AAA action-RPG with an open world and hectic combat is going to make Reviewers feel let down by Andromeda because they're playing that game one month after Horizon so the contrast is going to be obvious to their memory.

That term is just so badly overused. A lot of characters (both male and female) in both video games and movies can do crazy stuff without any explanation. It should be expected at this point. Look at Uncharted, Nathan Drake is a pretty average looking dude, yet he can do stuff I could only dream of doing. 

Shepard's not a sue. He/she is an N7 operative and whatever backstory you choose already establishes them as a total badass. They are the best of the best humanity has to offer. I'm sceptical about the Ryder twins, but I'll wait for the lore explanation for their awesomeness that they keep teasing.

Rey is a mary sue because she's perfect at everything without an explanation. That's just lazy fucking writing.

Rey was dropped into a brutal struggle for survival as a toddler and forced to constantly call upon the force, at least subconsciously, in order to eke out a precarious, impoverished existence.  Near as I can tell she's supposed to be a Mary Sue because with this background she manages to pull off the Jedi mind trick once against a guy brainwashed from infancy to obey orders.

Luke Skywalker blew up a space station the size of a moon using the equivalent of a single torpedo after a happy childhood and a few hours of training by a cryptic mentor...during which Luke spends virtually all his time whining about how impossible it all is.

Seriously, who is the Mary Sue here?

Any critic that let's Horizon affect their review score for ME:A, is a hack that's not worth their salt. ME:A differs enough from Horizon that comparisons should not be made. If they can't judge ME:A based on it's own merits, their review isn't worth taking seriously. That said it is possible some critics will make comparisons, and I think that's unfortunate.

I think people should absolutely be expecting a lower metacritic score for ME:A than ME1-3, but a part of that is because critics are harsher these days and it's incredibly difficult to crack 90 nowadays.

Sorry, but sex with aliens trumps Pocahontas with robot dinosaurs. No contest. Besides, have you seen the terrible voice acting and facial animations in HZD?

Yup, wooden is an understatement... another indication this game was not a "labor of love" like Wticher 3, but a carefully calculated mainstream blockbuster. However - the main characters face still beats Sarah's right now, if for nothing else then how it's modeled really well... and yes, as far as I can tell, it's no face scan, just motion capture.

www.keziaburrows.com/large-grid?lightbox=image1svi

Dragon Age 2 has been the only Bioware game that didn't review well, far as I know.

Are you conveniently forgetting the fact that she can expertly fly the Millenium Falcon despite never having flown a ship like that before, manages to fix it instead of Han, is an expert with a blaster, defeats a trained force user in a lightsaber duel despite never having trained with a lightsaber before (while he was trained by Luke fucking Skywalker) and can withstand Kylo's mind-reading attempts? Ma-rey sue indeed.

And I didn't even mention Luke in my post, why are you bringing him up?

Point is they're both Sue's to some degree. But honestly who cares?