ME2: How can I get rid of Cerberus?

[AC-Darth]

I know that the majority of the community loves Mass Effect 2. I don't. I actually dislike it because of its story and the missing RPG elements from the first game.

I don't want to start a fight and hope that we can have a friendly discussion.

There will be spoilers!




Cerberus in Mass Effect 1 did some really horrible things. Feeding Alliance soldiers to thresher maws, rachni and thorian creepers. They also killed Admiral Kahoku and turned an entire colony into husks.

My paragon Shepard would never work with cerberus yet I am forced to do so in Mass Effect 2. I usually play my Shepard exactly the same in every playthrough (on Xbox). I never experiment with other option after I found out how to get the best endings.

But now after I just finished ME1 again I dread playing ME2 again. There are just two Squadmembers that I like. Garrus and Tali. As well as one DLC that I like. It's called Arrival.

That alone can't carry the game for me. But I want to keep playing.

So I thought I would like to try something new to keep me entertained. Is there a way to kill the entire Cerberus crew as well as Miranda and Jacob while everyone else survives?

It would be interesting to see how that would effect Mass Effect 3.

[Canadian Ninja]

I'm curious why only Tali and Garrus are worth saving to you? What has Legion, or Thane, or Samara, or Grunt or others done to deserve that?

[AC-Darth]

Canadian Ninja eredeti hozzászólása:

I'm curious why only Tali and Garrus are worth saving to you? What has Legion, or Thane, or Samara, or Grunt or others done to deserve that?

I wrote in my original post that I want everyone to survive except cerberus.

Everyone includes Legion, Thane, Samara, Grunt and the others.

I just want to experiment with getting rid of cerberus to see how that changes ME3 and because I want to try something new.

[Aenno]

Samara is a gal who is saying: ok, I don't care who you are, what your authority or obligations are, are you good or wrong, would I bring harm or not. I have a book. If I follow a book, I'm just by definition. If that means killing dozens of people I know are innocent, so be it. I'm not obliged to think about my actions. I'm not deciding anything.

When person with this mindset have weapons and law enforcement powers, that's scary.

[AC-Darth]

Aenno eredeti hozzászólása:

Samara is a gal who is saying: ok, I don't care who you are, what your authority or obligations are, are you good or wrong, would I bring harm or not. I have a book. If I follow a book, I'm just by definition. If that means killing dozens of people I know are innocent, so be it. I'm not obliged to think about my actions. I'm not deciding anything.

When person with this mindset have weapons and law enforcement powers, that's scary.

I fully agree with that.

And because of such things it is hard to build a bond with the squadmates in ME2.

I want them all to survive and I hope that they turn their lives around for the better.

Zaeed is a cold blooded merc and psychopath. You summed up Samara pretty well. Kasumi while she is nice and all is still a cat burglar.

Miranda comes across as mentally unstable. Jacob is ... well ... boring?

Grunt scares me. He is not your typical Krogan. That I would like. But Grunt is all about killing.

Legion is obviously a geth. He is cool. But I feel there is not enough character there to get me emotionally invested. Mordin was ok. I liked his singing. But I just didn't manage to build a bond with him.

Am I mising someone? Oh Thane. Not sure what to say about him. If I remember correctly he was in the life support room. I can't remember anything else about him. Mass Effect 2 had way too many Squadmembers.

I fell in love with the characters in ME1. While I didn't like everyone I still respected them and wanted to learn more about them. In ME2 it felt more like "oh cool, another one for the collection." Now I can visit every room on the ship and have a reason to go in there.

[Champ Paper]

glorfindel1983 eredeti hozzászólása:

Nord Supreme eredeti hozzászólása:

I've played it that much as well and I can guarantee you the tech specialist is narrowed down to only Kasumi, Tali, Legion, Garrus, Thane, Mordin and Jacob. Might have missed someone else, but you definitely can't choose from everyone for that specific job.

Biotic specialist have to be, well, biotic; but Vents are all in, at least for Miranda, as I personally send her in and she died!

Nah. I don't believe it for a second without proof.

[alexander_dougherty]

Aurellios eredeti hozzászólása:

alexander_dougherty eredeti hozzászólása:

Did you listen to the logs in ME3, the ones in the Illusive Man's base?

If you did you would find out the entire crew of the Normandy is selected to give you a good impression of Cerberus, this means THEY ARE ALL GOOD GUYS. None of them have ever done anything dodgy, they all think Cerberus is doing good things for Humanity and the bad things they hear about are either lies or rogue cells.

Miranda is the only one with enough clearance to know most of the news stories are true... well maybe Jacob, but he's a soldier who did all his dodgy stuff while in service with the alliance, he's only done good PR stuff since joining Cerberus.

Ok. I must have missed or forgotten about those logs.

That makes things even more tragic. How can they be so oblivious to the truth about cerberus.

So if Miranda is the only one with enough clearance than is she the only bad guy aboard the SR-2?

Well without knowing exactly what she herself has or has not done, and she doesn't really reveal any of that, we can only guess. Jacob at least talks a bit about his past.

[Champ Paper]

Nord Supreme eredeti hozzászólása:

glorfindel1983 eredeti hozzászólása:

Biotic specialist have to be, well, biotic; but Vents are all in, at least for Miranda, as I personally send her in and she died!

Nah. I don't believe it for a second without proof.

Literally just checked the options available on a lets play and the ones I listed are the only ones that can be used. Unless you modded the game-- you're lying.

[Captain_Emeritus]

Aenno eredeti hozzászólása:

Aurellios eredeti hozzászólása:

Cerberus in Mass Effect 1 did some really horrible things. Feeding Alliance soldiers to thresher maws, rachni and thorian creepers. They also killed Admiral Kahoku and turned an entire colony into husks.

They also fed the colony on Akuze to said maws before marines come to investigate. I suppose that's worth remembering. Fifty marines was just a cherry on top.

Apparently the Illusive Man didn't know about that either, just like his company's umpteen other horrific terrorist activities.

[Captain_Emeritus]

Aurellios eredeti hozzászólása:

But now after I just finished ME1 again I dread playing ME2 again. There are just two Squadmembers that I like. Garrus and Tali. As well as one DLC that I like. It's called Arrival.

Mordin was a good addition to me. Samara and Thane were cool too, alrhough really similar. After that, it's all meh or worse in the case of Zaeed and Grunt who's biggest personality trait is that he has no personality.

[alexander_dougherty]

Captain_Emeritus eredeti hozzászólása:

Aurellios eredeti hozzászólása:

But now after I just finished ME1 again I dread playing ME2 again. There are just two Squadmembers that I like. Garrus and Tali. As well as one DLC that I like. It's called Arrival.

Mordin was a good addition to me. Samara and Thane were cool too, alrhough really similar. After that, it's all meh or worse in the case of Zaeed and Grunt who's biggest personality trait is that he has no personality.

Thane is an Assassin, a person paid to kill without asking to many questions.... I like him, but lets not forget his profession.

[Jon_Smith]

"My Shep is Paragon, how do I kill my crewmates......"
You sure about that bud?
Joker works for Cerberus, EDI works for Cerberus, Chakwas works for Cerberus.
Do you want to murder all of these people too?
How about the enthusiastic cook?
How about Gabby and Kenneth? Kenneth was forced out of the Alliance for his vocal support of Shepard, he only joined them in order to serve with Shep and fight the Reapers.

What about Jack? Jack is a mass murderer. Not only from the prison ship, but we here about all the other stuff she has done, she blew up a space station once, presumably alot of people died in that. She killed the couple she was dating, simply because she figured they would kill her first.
So you want to kill Jack too right?

Thane and Zaeed, well, they are both killers for hire, one is just more stealthy.
Samara, well as said before, because her code says so she'll kill a cop for following her orders and show zero remorse. She is more of a robot than Legion.

Legion is a good guy actually. Wishes for peace, wants to understand why the Quarians fought them in the Morning War. He just wants to live and let live but knows the Old Machines must be stopped.

Grunt, well he is just a regular Krogan, point him at something and he kills, all Krogan are like that and want to fight.

Wrex, well he has blown up space stations himself, fighting that Asari he mentioned, a former friend of his but he wanted the bounty. He also worked with Saren and engaged in piracy, taking over freighters and killing everyone on board.

Mordin, well work on the Genophage aside he kills without remorse, including innocent Krogan who discovered them on Tuchanka.

Kasumi, arguably not too bad, she doesn't kill people it seems, infact one of her paintings is from a slaver girl whom she rescued, she seems like a good egg Robin Hood type.

Liara, whilst she might not work for Cerberus, she was happy to work with them, both in getting your body from the Shadow Broker but also giving it to Cerberus so they could run experiments on it and try to revive you. She's also a vicious information broker now, when you meet her in ME2 she is threatening to flay someone alive with biotics.

Tali, good girl, enough said. One of the only pure hearted ones, one of the first Quarians to get over her hatred of the Geth.


So by my count, you need to kill Wrex in ME1, kill everyone but Garrus, Tali, Grunt, Kasumi and Legion in ME2, leave behind your crew so Chakwas dies aswell as Gabby, Kenneth, the cook etc. All because you are unwilling to overlook anything dodgy in someones past.
Miranda never worked on those evil experiments, Jacob neither. Is it questionable they sign up with Cerberus, sure, but they may not have seen the awful things Shepard did. Same for the crew.

You sound like a Renegade, not a paragon. Zero forgiveness or understanding and if you disagree, how can I kill you.

Aurellios eredeti hozzászólása:

I fell in love with the characters in ME1. While I didn't like everyone I still respected them and wanted to learn more about them. In ME2 it felt more like "oh cool, another one for the collection." Now I can visit every room on the ship and have a reason to go in there.

You see now this I find odd as hell.
Tali for example, she's amazing in ME2, you get to see her struggling as a leader, you see her issues with her family, her trying her best for the fleet, her relationships with other Quarians, you see her struggle with Legion. Its truly emotional.

In ME1 she is a dumb dumb who you save, then tags along and says very little, the shipboard convos are just 'tell, don't show', which is really bad, where she just exposition dumps about what a pilgrimage is and who the Quarian race are, who the Geth are.
She as a person isn't interesting. Shes a talking codex entry.

Wrex is arguably the only interesting character in ME1 simply because he tells you quite a few stories that give an insight to his character and has the showdown on Virmire. Everyone else is dull as hell.

You say you rush through ME2, well thats why you don't like the characters nor enjoy it.
Get over your dumb bias against these characters and talk to them learn about them, show some empathy. RPG it as you are simply using Cerberus. The council and Alliance already screwed you over, they denied the Reaper threat and sent you to mop up Geth. Cerberus at least are saying 'we think this is related to the Reapers' and giving you a crew.
The Council will at best grant you Spectre status and ask you to keep quiet.

ME2 has amazing characters, you are cutting your nose to spite your face by rushing through the game and refusing to learn about them because you cannot put aside the fact you are on a Cerberus ship.

[caesar_andy]

The Mass-Effect universe is NOT plain "Black and White", you should try to accept this. In this universe, much worse things have be done in the name of freedom, or whatever.

-The turians abusing the krogans to commit genocide on the rachni.
-The salarians infecting the krogans with the genophage just because they are no longer usefull.
-The Quarians raised their robo-slaves to full-conscious beeings and just to tried to kill them afterwards.
-The Spectres are literally commiting the cruelst warcrimes of all eternity. And all of this in the name of the Council. Remember Anderson talking about Saren going rogue during his training. And still, the council has full-trust in Saren 20 years later.
-ExoGeni is abusing the settlers on Feros as lab-rats, whitout them even knowing.
-Justicars are forced to kill innocent people, just because they are doing their ♥♥♥♥♥♥ jobs.
-All politicians in the universe are just ignoring the existence of the reapers, making them resposible for the death of billions of people in the end.
-And finally, nobody really KNOWS, what bad is still going on in the most secret labs on Noveria.

During the course of MassEffect, you have to side with Aria, Mordin, Zaeed, Samara, Jack, Thane, the Bloodpack, the Blue Suns, Eclipse. And all of them have probably done much, much worse things, than cerberus ever did.

I'm not saying, that cerberus is good. Or siding with them is not a questionable decision. But if your Sheppard is going to reject any potential Ally, just because he or she is linked to someone, who has done bad things, you will end up very lonly aboard the normandy.

[alexander_dougherty]

I personally take it that Shepard either empowers or redeems them all, so I have no problem with working with Miranda and Jack, because he shows them both a better way. Same for the others.

[Jon_Smith]

OP, when in ME1, as a Paragon, do you try to kill as many of the Exogeni workers as you can because they experimented on the colonists? I think you get to shoot that lead scientist guy, I can't remember if you can let Lisbeth die. But I bet you need to punish them right?

Or on Noveria, as a Paragon, do you refuse the option for peaceful resolution with the cops cause they are corrupt?
Or better yet, in the base, do you make sure you start blasting as soon as possible, ignore the peaceful route, don't bother saving the guys in sickbay and shoot all the guards because they are experimenting on Rachni and working for Saren?

Cause I think you don't, any you are being abit of a hypocrite here and really piling in on Miranda.

[AC-Darth]

Jon_Smith eredeti hozzászólása:

ME2 has amazing characters, you are cutting your nose to spite your face by rushing through the game and refusing to learn about them because you cannot put aside the fact you are on a Cerberus ship.

You're right about that. I don't know why I can't look past that.

When I played ME1 back on the xbox360 and now the pc I'm completely paragon and forgiving and everything.

Then I run into cerberus. And unlike the others that you mentioned I saw no redeeming qualities. I saw regret among the Exogeni workers. There is also genuine regret and shame among the people on Noveria who experimentet with the rachni etc.

But when it came to cerberus in ME1 I didn't see any of that. Maybe I missed something all these years that I have been playing these games. I don't know.

I'm not piling it on on Miranda. I'm piling it on on cerberus.

Sure the Mass Effect universe isn't black and white. There are a lot of grey areas too.

But considering as how purely evil cerberus was portrait in ME1 it is just not easy to overlook that.

Sure there are some good guys aboard the SR-2. Dr. Chakwas and Joker, Kenneth and Gabby, and even Kelly. If at all possible I would turn the SR-2 over to the alliance.

The first thing I do when I play ME2 is to go to the citadel and report to the council and Anderson. Get my spectre status back. Then I would have liked the option to turn on cerberus, have them all arrested and rejoin the alliance.

The alliance isn't purley good either. I know that. They have done some shady stuff too. I will not deny that. No one is without sin in that universe but I find that the alliance is the lesser evil compared to cerberus.