HighCastle

yukidama:

Finished LOTSB. I only have two more bits of DLC to finish up and then I can call my ME2 adventures closed once and for all.

I like LOTSB a lot, but my biggest criticism every time I play it is how forced the chumminess with Liara feels a lot of the time. I’m starting to think that unless you romanced her or headcanoned being the snarkiest BFFs of all time, Liara paid Cerberus a under the table to do some unauthorized Friendship Upgrading.  I am sure it works for some Shepards, but this DLC is best played if you romanced her IMO. I dunno, it just feels like Shepard was railroaded into being the best of friends 5ever with Liara during the DLC, when I don’t necessarily feel their interaction during ME1 and the smidge of non-DLC interaction in ME2 warrants it (at least in my head for most of my Shepards who do not romance her). Liara isn’t who I picture being my Shepard’s confidante about all her worries, it’s a bit annoying I guess.

I agree. I really liked this DLC for the emphasis it put on narrative and fleshing out both NPCs and Shepard’s personality, but the plot seemed to assume that Shep and Liara were close. Really close. There were a couple of times I worried I’d triggered a romance because of how some of the dialogue sounded. (I don’t think I did, though.)

When you have a game that touts itself about containing so many choices, I think it leaves itself open to criticism when some choices are lacking: such as the ability to be largely neutral to Liara. I suppose BioWare figured that since she recovered Shepard’s body, there’s now some great bond between the two. But since most of that occurred while Shep was dead, I suppose I just don’t see the link.

If anything, I wondered why Liara was so driven to recover Shep’s body and not one of his other companions. This is jarring especially if your relationship with her was mostly neutral in the first game, as many of my Sheps’ were. I suppose the basic answer would be: because if she didn’t, there’d be no plot. But that’s not satisfying to me. So instead we’re left with one of two options: that Liara and Shep are always friends, or that Liara’s a bit obsessed with Shepard. That still doesn’t explain why Shepard is so open and confiding to her, or gets so mopey with that “Come back soon” line at the end of her visit to the Normandy. It seemed so weighty, and completely contrary to Shepard’s relationship with Liara up to that point.