s-so I rule 63'd Olivia, tweaked the result a bit... and then popped him into ME2. and then tweaked it even more gdi how do face code work |: So now I'm playing Oliver Shepard. And making up backstory because why not!

Hannah Shepard had two children. Olivia, the younger of the two, is a soldier through and through. She's the Hero of Elysium, the perfect soldier, the media darling. Everyone loves her. Oliver, two years Olivia's senior, is a grumpy space wizard who wants to do the right thing except people are stupid and make it hard. ): He lost his crew on Akuze and he never quite recovered, but he's pretty good at faking it. He feels overshadowed by his younger sister, but he doesn't mind at all; he hates people anyway and she deserves it.

So, naturally, when it came time to choose the candidate for the First Human Spectre? It's Oliver who gets pulled.

...yeah, he doesn't like it either.

Both Shepards are on the Normandy, but despite his best arguments he's the one who ends up in charge of the ship and he's the one who ends up with Spectrehood. (He's the one who ends up defeating Sovereign... although he sacrifices the Council to do it. Oops. Well, it's not like he liked them very much anyway.) Suddenly it seems like the Alliance might have themselves a new poster-Shepard - for about a month. Then it's suddenly as if everything's swept under the carpet.

And then Mass Effect 2 begins, and Oliver Shepard dies. And that brings us to my current playthrough! :D Obviously the game doesn't account for two Shepards, nor does it allow for a whole lot of variety in 'new ME2 Shepard states' (in fact I ended up save editing my current Oliver save and... well, I hope it sticks. I won't find out until after Freedom's Progress, when I talk to TIM about my crew. If it worked, I should be able to ask about Kaidan instead of Ashley. I'm not playing that tonight, though.)

Part of me wants to start writing all this crap. Then, part of me doesn't - mostly because it's late and I'm tired. But they're all playing in my head so nicely! Ugh. I really didn't need this right now.

(o-obviously for the Olivia!protag version she's the, well, protagonist, but Oliver is still her grumpy space wizard older brother who solely survived Akuze and is all pissy with Cerberus and everything that's the same here, except that he won't have been on the SR-1 and he's not the First Human Spectre and all that.)

ugh ugh ugh halfway through suicide mission had to stop and study kept getting distracted by @alliancenewsnet and #solcomms LIVETWEETING THE REAPER INVASION will finish playing later tonight after class

I spent like ten minutes last night asking my mum whether I should stay faithful to Kaidan or go with Thane, because Kaidan grew on me and I just couldn't decide. I had to explain the whole situation to her, of course... we decided that since Kaidan said he was dating some doctor chick that it meant he'd moved on, and that meant Cam should, too, so that's what I did. Then today I realised I legitimately did not know which Shep I wanted to run through ME3 first, so I loaded up Pokémon Diamond, thinking I had the coin flip app. I didn't, but I did have the roulette one, so I split up the wheel between Liv and Cam and it landed on Cam, so I'm running her first.

I tried running Liv through Arrival the other day, and I just could not get the hang of playing as her again. I'm so used to Cam's abilities that I just don't even think about it, but since the only abilities Liv has really got are ammo powers, I found myself mashing 4 and 5 (geth shielding and shockwave) and having, uh, nothing happen. Which really sucks when you're getting shot at from like three different directions, your shields are down, and you're at less than half health!

It's probably just as well. Over in the comm people were suggesting running through ME3 first with a renegade Shep so that the ending might hurt less. ): I don't know what the ending is, but I've heard there's do not want stuff in all of them, even the very best one, so... I'm kinda scared, ngl. But no matter how bad things are, I want to find out for myself. I've been on the ride this long, after all; it would be a shame not to see it through to the end, no matter what that end is. (This is my ultimate excuse to myself for not going to the midnight release, beyond all the other excuses I've made - between leakgate and the space editions, there are probably gonna be all kinds of assholes spoiling things.)

I have an astronomy midterm today! Don't really want to, but I missed class last Wednesday, and anyway, I kind of have to take the test if I want to pass the class. That's how college works. I'll probably be catching up on #solcomms before/between classes tonight anyway (trying not to scream or anything in class, since it's kind of frowned on) and... man, idek what I'll be doing tomorrow. Glued to my twitter feed (if there's even anything still going on) and trying not to freak out all day or something... ugh ugh why I gotta have so many classes D:

(I don't even have that many classes, not really - only twelve units. That's the bare minimum to qualify as a full-time student. It's just enough to get in the way of my Mass Effecting, heh.)

Maybe I'll bring my sketchbook with me and try to draft the first page or two of Ririka. Or maybe I'll write out what my Sheps are doing - you know, their reactions to all this what's going on. I bet Liv's glued to the feeds and worrying about, uh, everyone, whereas Cam's alternately checking feeds and raging at anybody in earshot. I bet the first thing she's gonna do once she gets the hell out of Sol is call up the Council and chew them out big time. "The Reapers aren't real, huh? Just a fairy tale, you said? Well, that fairy tale took out the Batarian homeworld, and now it's ravaging Earth! How much longer do you think it'll be before they show up here?!"

--ohgodohgod Europe's gone dark and none of the NA rescue shuttles made it out D:

I'll just be over here, sobbing in a corner and screaming intermittently if you need me. There is not enough sadface in the world
 

I should probably actually start tagging things; it's not like I don't have a stupid number of tags. I guess I just always forget.

Anyway, I'm on Noveria with Cam - Port Hanshan, specifically. I haven't gone and done much yet except the smuggling assignment; I'm not sure how I want to play out the garage pass part. I think I might just do Qui'in's thing and leave it at that. It feels like that's the kind of thing Cam would do. I'm still trying to get a feel for her character, really. It's not too hard to figure out what Liv does; she's the hopelessly hopeful paragon hero except for when there's a renegade interrupt, because those are always really badass. I can rationalise that as her being, well... a hopelessly hopeful paragon hero who's become a bit jaded since her death and subsequent revival. She still wants to do the hero thing, but she's not going to take shit from anyone, either.

( words about role playing and characterisation )

(And then I realised I only have icons of Olivia. Oops.)

edit: now with bonus Cam icon!

Was playing me some Lair of the Shadow Broker earlier (I would be still, but my mum called and said she was leaving work so we could go buy the few things I still need for my trip). I finally finished the stupid car chase (thank you, checkpoints) and now I'm on the Broker ship. Which is full of scenery porn. The ship's in... orbit? atmosphere? anyway, it's nearby - this one planet where the seas boil during the day and flash-freeze within ten minutes of sunset. The ship follows the sunset, so it stays nearly undetectable - because there are these huge lightning storms where the heat of the day meets the cold of the night.

You spend a lot of time on the exterior of the ship, where you can see the storms. They're really pretty. They must be; I took 29 screenshots and I think half of them are the background.

So, before you find out where the Broker ship is, you have to fight Vasir. There's some pretty awesome dialogue before you do that ("I sacrificed hundreds of lives to save the Destiny Ascension. I unleashed the Rachi on the galaxy. So I hope your escape plan doesn't hinge on me being unwilling to shoot a hostage!" - and that's the paragon option! Idk what the renegade option is, I didn't have enough angry points to find out.) and Liara brains her with a table, which was pretty cool, and then you fight. She's got a barrier and armour. I didn't have any ammo that could cut through a barrier, so that took a while! So once I got through it I tried to find something that could easily take down armour.

Incendiary ammo burns through armour.

I'd never used incendiary ammunition before that fight. I think I like it.

Also, after the Vasir fight there's a scene where you talk to Liara, and Vigil's theme is playing through it (the title theme in ME1). I hit all the paragon interrupts in that one, so those + that music were pretty epic, in a heartwarming kind of way. (Well, the kind of heartwarming that Garrus's romance path is. Which is really more heartbreaking than heartwarming, but still.)

Today I read a ridiculous amount of Harry Potter fanfiction. I also got my eyes examined, ordered new glasses, and cooked dinner. All in all, I'd say it was a vaguely productive day.

I am supposed to wear reading glasses, although I haven't been for over a year. This is because my old glasses went rogue last May, and I haven't seen them since. Now, I got through the end of junior year and all of senior year without them, first because the insurance wouldn't cover a whole new set of glasses until the start of this year, and after that because my mum was a bit busy trying to put in as much work as possible at her job so that she could stay employed. Let me tell you, being farsighted and spending most of your time either reading or on the internet is not fun. (I can see just fine at any distance, but it's harder for my eyes to focus on things that are up close, like a book or a computer screen, so I get tired a lot and get crazy headaches when I don't wear glasses. Which is funny, because people always say that television and video games will make you dumb and also nearsighted. I guess I'm just contrary.)

Um, but anyway! Then I went grocery shopping, ended up buying a ton of chicken (individually wrapped breasts, in fact), and when I got home lathered two of them in bbq sauce and baked them. They were good. The bacon mac and cheese I made (from a pouch, last time I do that) was not so good, but I've had worse. In all, it was a meal rather reminiscent of prom (at which there was tri-tip, garlic mashed potatoes, bbq chicken, and mac and cheese with bits of ham mixed in).

Plus, you know, the chicken was good. One more thing I can cook! :D

I still want to go see the new Transformers film, and as I actually have money to spare now, I shall probably see if anyone would like to go do that. (Perhaps they would not, though, as I've asked people out to do things almost every week of summer so far. Still, I can always ask.) And in the meantime, I've got me some Lair of the Shadow Broker to play. ♥

In honour of Atlantis's safe launch, today I watched a documentary about the shuttle program, intend to watch another one later, and beat Mass Effect 2.

No, really.

I have so many screenshots from going through the Omega 4 relay to the end of the game. 150, in fact. For the record, I took 217 through the whole game. That means that almost seventy percent of the screenshots I took are just from the endgame sequence; only 57 of those 217 are from before. (Additionally, I only took 54 through all of ME1.)

I'm not posting them all, of course, but somehow I still get the feeling that my tumblr followers (all two of them) are going to hate me. All I can say is, I'm pretty thankful for the queue.

(As I sat through the credits I saw that Claudia Black apparently did some voices in ME2! I hadn't noticed, but on subsequent playthroughs I'm going to have to keep an ear out.)

I still have some DLC to finish (Overlord, Arrival, Lair of the Shadow Broker, maybe Firewalker) but I think I want to go back to ME1 for a bit first. Though... I have a male Colonist Sole Survivor Infiltrator who's going to go renegade, and a female Earthborn War Hero Vanguard who I'm going to play properly paragade and I'm not sure which of them I should play first. (Then I also want to do another playthrough with my Soldier... but that's later, I suppose.)

Well! That's enough Mass Effect-ness for now, I think.

So the party yesterday turned out kind of weird, and I could write about it, but then I'd just get pissed off again, so I don't think I will.

I did get the rest of the ME2 dlc after that, though, so that's all good. And then I found out that the Collector beam weapon wreaks havoc on Collector barriers. Took down a praetorian with it right quick, and Harbinger doesn't seem to like it all that much, either. New favourite heavy weapon? I think so!

And then I've also been playing more DQIX. (Not at the party, though. Mostly while waiting for all the dlc to download.) I started a new adventure log earlier in the week, because I am an idiot and - for some reason - decided that starting a new game was the best idea! :D So I kind of only just got to Stornway and am grinding for cash and levels for my new party members. /: It's not all that bad, though, so I can't really complain.

Going to dad's later today; I wouldn't, but I get food out of the bargain, so that's cool. I was debating whether I should bring my laptop like usual or just my DS (should I play Mass Effect, or Dragon Quest?); I think I've basically decided on the DS, because I really don't need to spend forever and a day playing Mass Effect, as I kind of already do that.

(I like how Shepard tells Hackett "I'll make this a priority." Fuck no I won't, I'm not doing Arrival until after the suicide mission. And as I just got the IFF mission but still have to pick up Tali and do seven loyalty missions and a ton of random assignments, I ain't doing the suicide mission any time soon, either.)

Somehow, events that have me in the sun and/or heat for more than about an hour always end with me dehydrated, no matter how well I worked to avoid that.

What this means is that I probably shouldn't have gone to the grad night party, because I was really not doing all that well after four hours of being stuck in the sun or, alternately, being crammed into a room that was never meant to hold nearly three hundred people. I was tired, I was cranky, I was nauseated, and I had a killer headache. But I went to the party anyway, because I'd put $20 toward it and there was supposed to be a Pokémon jumper house. (There was. It was Destiny Deoxys.) I only stayed for two hours, though, because I couldn't knock the feeling that I was constantly about to throw up. /:

Of course, now I'm at home, having slept for seven hours and lounged about for another three, and am wondering what the hell I'm going to do with myself. I've completely revamped my tumblr, complete with random not-poetry description (and more-accurate description describing exactly what I post that sounds disparaging but is absolutely true). What I should do is just suck it up and play more ME2, get the hell off of Horizon so that I can recruit me a justicar and an assassin, and do some loyalty missions so that maybe everybody doesn't die at the end.

If Garrus dies I'm so replaying the entire damn thing. ...of course, I was already planning on replaying the whole thing anyway, between wanting to do a tech run and a biotic run and playing as male!Shepard just so I can see if Kaiden is less boring when he's not trying to get in my pants. Plus I don't have all the ME2 DLC yet; mum's buying it for me as a graduation gift, but I probably won't get it until the end of the month. Which is totally cool, because at the rate I'm playing, I might not even have my first runthrough done before then. /:

So then I decided to draw Clow Reed's magic circle on the back of my yearbook, just to see if I could.In the process I learned that 'permanent marker' isn't actually all that permanent, if you apply moisture and friction. My hand was starting to sweat about halfway through, so I need to redo some of the earlier lines I did. (On the plus side, this means that when the sun magically ended up with fourteen rays instead of twelve, I could erase the extra two.) The poor little metroid I drew on the front cover suffered much the same fate. ): But that's okay, because I redrew him. I don't know what I'm going to do with the rest of it yet (probably at least a Samus on the lookout for metroids) but I'm sure I'll think of something, or at least someone else will.

Mass Effect 2! So I started playing yesterday, got to Omega, decided to pick up my bro, and then... promptly died at the second shutter three times in a row. Every time, I got to the shutter button and pushed it, but some damn krogan decided to get all up underneath it, and then varren decided to eat my legs, and then I died. Every time. So then I loaded an earlier save and tried doing the Aria thing over again, couldn't actually get her to talk to me, and then went to the Citadel instead.

I didn't think that the Council could be bigger assholes, but they managed it somehow. At least it's balanced out with "Uh, I'm sorry, but my records are saying that you're dead." "That's all right, I understand. I was only mostly dead, but try finding that option on government paperwork."

I can't wait to go back to Omega and get my bestest bro, then take him into the quarantine zone. "A quarantine zone for a plague that only affects turians. Why don't we ever go anywhere nice?" Garrus, why your recruitment mission so hard? D:

(I really need to stop watching ME2 videos on youtube, because all the best lines won't seem all that great once I get to them if I keep watching them over and over before.)

Anyway, I spent an hour drawing Clow Reed's magic fucking circle on the back of my yearbook, so now I'm kind of tired and also have a headache. (I lost track of how many times I said "Fuck you, Clow Reed" while I was doing it. /: ) I should probably go to bed now.

Mass Effect: if at first it doesn't work, try again with a smaller resolution.

Last night I had to race to the Conduit. I tried three times and failed each time. Surely this can't be right! I raged. Then today I watched some videos of people doing the exact same thing and realised something... their Mako moved faster than mine. Now, I knew that the game lagged a little when I play - I don't get accurate lip-synch, that kind of thing. But I didn't think it lagged all that badly.

Then I loaded my last save and played in windowed mode at the smallest resolution. (Hey, it worked for Feros!) Wouldn't you know it, through the Conduit with seven seconds to spare! Autosave on the Citadel, and... back to normal resolution for me.

In completely unrelated news, I didn't expect physics class to come back and bite me in the ass, but it has. Today we got our check-out forms, which come with a handy little list of all the books you have checked out to your name - if you don't turn them in, you don't walk. The AP Gov book, Econ book, and precal book I expected.

The physics book I did not expect.

Now, it turns out that what happened was, when we turned our physics books in to our teacher at the end of the last term, he didn't check them in like he was supposed to, and instead just distributed them out to his next class. So basically everybody in my physics class has overdue physics books to their name and doesn't know who's running around with them. And the teacher is no help at all - a friend in the same boat went and asked him about it, only to be told, "Well, you can come back tomorrow and look through the books to find yours, I guess." Which is not only supremely unhelpful, but also only works if nobody else has the book - and somebody probably does.

I'll put up a plea on facebook tonight, though I expect nothing will come from it.