Week in Review, Feb 15 to 21

The Week in Video Games

Lots more Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 this week. I completed my 30-hour second playthrough of Mass Effect on the Hardcore difficulty, beating the Pinnacle Station DLC for the first time, and then transferred my renegade character (ie. bad guy) into Mass Effect 2 to experience the impacts of the different moral choices. My first playthroughs of both Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 were with a paragon character (ie. good guy). It's funny that I often have a difficult time making the renegade choices, and almost always feel bad about making them afterward, even when I'm specifically playing that angle. There were a couple renegade choices in Mass Effect that I absolutely couldn't make. But, likewise, I didn't make all paragon choices in my first playthroughs. Most notably, the choice I made at the end of Mass Effect 2 on my paragon playthrough is considered the renegade choice. I felt it was the smarter choice to make for the story, so I didn't let my dominant alignment influence my decision. At the end of my ongoing renegade playthrough of Mass Effect 2, I will probably make the paragon choice in that moment, so I'll be able to experience the impact of both options in Mass Effect 3.

I love that Mass Effect 2 let me switch the class of my character at the beginning of the game, so I could play as a Vanguard this time instead of another Engineer. I've only ever played the original Mass Effect as an Engineer, although I will have to play as an Adept at some point to complete the Achievements. So far, I really miss the Engineer's attack drone, and am having a hard time getting used to the Vanguard's close combat attack style. But it's definitely fun to play the game in a completely different way, while also making all the different moral choices.

For "fun," I also simultaneously started up third playthroughs of each game with my original paragon character, but on the Insanity difficulty level. It's called Insanity for a reason. Mass Effect might be beatable on Insanity, with some patience and tenacity and strategy, but Mass Effect 2 has been completely ridiculous on Insanity so far. Thinking about some of the battles that are coming up in later missions, I've already convinced myself that it will be impossible to complete.

The Week in Television

With the Olympics providing me with some breather room from my typical weekly series, I had some time this week to try to catch up with a couple of BBC series, namely Torchwood and Merlin. While Merlin series two is actually showing some pretty significant improvement from series one, Torchwood so far has been pretty weak. Torchwood has the Doctor Who cheese factor, but without the wit and humour that makes Doctor Who's cheesiness enjoyable.

Tuesday, February 16th
Loved: Lost (6x4)

Locke episodes are typically above average for Lost, and "The Substitute" was no exception. The off-island Locke scenes were emotionally engaging and loaded with interesting unexpected character appearances. The on-island Not!Locke scenes were even better, with some fascinating revelations (still more new questions than answers, though), cool Smokey-vision, Sawyer being awesome, and the return of the numbers. Also: the weirdest damn funeral.

Thursday, February 18th
Liked: Survivor (20x2)

The best thing about all-star seasons of Survivor is how invested I get early on in the voting. In a normal Survivor season, there isn't enough time to get to know the first few people to get the boot, so I don't care who goes at this stage. But there are a number of people that I want to see stick around in this all-star season of Survivor, so I'm actually nervous about who is going to get voted out each week. So far, so good. But some of my favourites are definitely in a shitty spot right now, unless the standard tribe shakeup comes soon.

Friday, February 19th
Loved: Spartacus (1x5)
Liked: Caprica (1x4)

"Shadow Games" was an excellent episode of Spartacus, easily the best to date. A slow, quiet build-up led to an amazing climax in the gladiatorial arena. Forcing bitter rivals Spartacus and Crixus to team up to fight the giant Theocles was brilliant. For a bonus, Batiatus went to a surprising place morally.

Caprica's "Gravedancing" was an okay episode, focusing on the not really all that interesting Graystones. A tense sequence with Sam and Amanda was easily the the highlight, although the Zoe dancing scene was memorably fucked up.

Saturday, February 20th
Liked: Legend of the Seeker (2x12)

Legend of the Seeker's "Hunger" was an obvious filler episode, even though the story primarily involved banelings. There were a number of questionable moments in the plotting, but the episode was otherwise pretty good.

Sunday, February 21st
Liked: The Amazing Race (16x2)

I spent most of Sunday watching the Olympics for the first time since the opening ceremonies, enjoying some curling, speed skating, ski-cross (pretty fucked up event, there), and hockey, but took an one hour break in the evening to watch this otherwise unremarkable episode of The Amazing Race. I am surprised by how much I like the cowboy team.