How to fix Kai Leng? (Spoilers)

[Kunyomi]

I've just played through Thessia again, and it was even more dire than I remembered.
Cutscene Incompetence, Cool guys don't look at explosions, the floor collapsing everywhere except a convenient straight line to Kai Leng's goal. Which of course must be approached as slowly as possible so we have ample time to witness the floundering idiots the cutscene has turned our squad into.
My god, it's almost like this was meant to be a parody with the rapid fire tropes and deus ex machinas.

I like the idea of Kai Leng, this elite N7 cerberus counterpart to shepard that's essentially TIM's replacement of you, but he's implemented / written so incredibly poorly.

So how would you fix this character, make him a proper and worthy antagonist rather than an afterthought annoyance?

[Freiya]

Maybe make him look/fight more like a soldier/mercenary (some kind of Zaeed) instead of a stereotypical "Ninja". Of course, winning the fight and then getting beaten during a cutscene with no control over it is almost always frustrating as a player.

To be honest the fights against him aren't very fun either in my opinion.

[The Commendatore]

I would just remove his character. He doesn't add anything worthwhile, or anything, to the story.

[Six of Saturn]

Every scene involving him is complete nonsense. From us just standing there as he stabs Thane to the Thessia crap. Not sure how you could improve him over being an eye roll every time he comes into scene or make him someone you really want to kill. Had he killed Thane while I was not present would have helped.

A lot of terrible cheap writing and structure in 3.

[CzechKronner]

Best way to fix him would be to make him killable in the first encounter. It sucks that the game takes away control from you and forces you to get beat by that asian looking joker guy.

[5ean5ean]

Originally posted by CzechKronner:

Best way to fix him would be to make him killable in the first encounter. It sucks that the game takes away control from you and forces you to get beat by that asian looking joker guy.

So why does Kai Lang being Asian have any kind of relevance to this discussion?

[benwaggoner]

Yeah, I literally forget Kai Leng is even in the game until people bring it up. And I even read the novel where he was introduced and featured.

I'm kinda baffled at what they were even going for with his inclusion. Even having read his backstory I'm not sure why writers thought he would be interesting, or why they were interested in him.

What do you think Kai Leng "done right" would even be like.

[alexander_dougherty]

How to fix Kai Leng?, I think you do a good job when you ram that omnitool blade into the sod.

[MrSmiley]

Originally posted by alexander_dougherty:

How to fix Kai Leng?, I think you do a good job when you ram that omnitool blade into the sod.

This.

[Weaver]

Kei Leng is a product of the time. He a big edgelord teenage angsty broody cocky...twit.
You see a lot of the same absurdity in action movies of the time, it's painful.

[Outbound]

Kei Leng was included in the game to give a named antagonist that Shepard could actually fight. TIM was a non-action character (and therefore early plans to make him into a Reaperfied boss fight were scrapped) and the Reapers themselves couldn't be fought by conventional forces.

Unfortunately, his inclusion is one of the weakest bits in the story. His initial appearance is a badly written extended cutscene where Shepard and squad are turned into drooling idiots who just stand around watching while he stabs someone, while Thessia shows just how weak a combatant he actually is since even on Insanity he himself is not dangerous, it's just that stupid invincible gunship of his that's a threat.

The developers wanted him to be a character that players would hate, but they were successful for all the wrong reasons.

[5ean5ean]

Now I thought about this alot. Who is a beloved villian who killed a beloved squadmate via a cut scene and nobody complained.

Handsome Jack.

What the main difference between Jacka and Lang. One was a full fledged character with personality and the other is a typical henchman.

How to fix him.

1. Give him a personality. Something like "I'm human evolved. A perfect combination of organic, Cybernetic, and Biotic. And make him very arrogant and talk alot of trash. Like on Thesia Kei Lang talk about killing Thane and how easy it was.
That way his death will be more cathartic.

2. Have him interact with Shepard more. He needs to be more Winter Soldier and less TIM secretary. Missions like Surkesh, Grissom Academy are perfect ways to flesh out his character and be more of a thorn in sheaprds side.

And that's basically it.

[ADhalism]

Originally posted by 5ean5ean:

Something like "I'm human evolved. A perfect combination of organic, Cybernetic, and Biotic. "

I think the opposite. One of the weaknesses of Kai Leng as a character is that he is trash talking Shepard, the deadliest man in the galaxy, and TIM is acting like it is believable. Kai Leng would only work if he was an underdog who came out left field and surprised Shepard.

But of course his main weakness was the he is a cybertronic leather clad baddie out of the nineties who is 10 years too late to be taken seriously.

[5ean5ean]

Originally posted by ADhalism:

Originally posted by 5ean5ean:

Something like "I'm human evolved. A perfect combination of organic, Cybernetic, and Biotic. "

I think the opposite. One of the weaknesses of Kai Leng as a character is that he is trash talking Shepard, the deadliest man in the galaxy, and TIM is acting like it is believable. Kai Leng would only work if he was an underdog who came out left field and surprised Shepard.

But of course his main weakness was the he is a cybertronic leather clad baddie out of the nineties who is 10 years too late to be taken seriously.

If he is a underdog or whatever that would make TIM look foolish for using him on important missions. The weakness of Kai Lang should he relies too heavily on his enhancements and Shepard is a leader who inspires everyone around him/her. It's the perfect analogy to what going on in the game. Reapers rely on Brute Force and are overcome by the galaxy uniting as one. Cerburus want humanity to dominate the galaxy alone and Sheaprd beats the ideology by uniting the galaxy. Storytelling need to work on multiple levels. Kai Lang is too 1 dimensional.

Kai Lang abilites leads to overconfidence which ends up being his downfall.

[ADhalism]

Originally posted by 5ean5ean:

Originally posted by ADhalism:

I think the opposite. One of the weaknesses of Kai Leng as a character is that he is trash talking Shepard, the deadliest man in the galaxy, and TIM is acting like it is believable. Kai Leng would only work if he was an underdog who came out left field and surprised Shepard.

But of course his main weakness was the he is a cybertronic leather clad baddie out of the nineties who is 10 years too late to be taken seriously.

If he is a underdog or whatever that would make TIM look foolish for using him on important missions.

I dunno If i can agree with that. Shepard was an underdog against Saren, and look how it turned out.

[5ean5ean]

Originally posted by ADhalism:

Originally posted by 5ean5ean:

If he is a underdog or whatever that would make TIM look foolish for using him on important missions.

I dunno If i can agree with that. Shepard was an underdog against Saren, and look how it turned out.

Shepard is the protagonist..... the protagonist need to grow and overcome adversity. Antagonist need to be at the heros level or above. Now of you want to turn Lang into a non combatant then that philosophy might work but you already have TIM for that role. Shapard needs aphysical threat that compliments TIM strategic threat. And underdog physical are not compelling to watch bc the hero will never be in danger.


Just look the first 2 avengers vs the last 2 as a perfect example.