"I'm 32 Shepard. You don't serve as long as I have without coming to terms with yourself."
-Kaidan Alenko, Mass Effect 1
occasionally subtle

if i look back, i am lost

Andulka

★
Cosmic Funnies
Xuebing Du

No title available

⁂

No title available

❣ Chile in a Photography ❣

Love Begins

Kiana Khansmith
Claire Keane
ojovivo
DEAR READER

titsay

@theartofmadeline
Sade Olutola
Stranger Things

izzy's playlists!
seen from Bangladesh
seen from Bangladesh
seen from Bangladesh

seen from Türkiye
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States

seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States

seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Malta

seen from France

seen from United States

seen from France
seen from El Salvador
@shiniest-spectre
"I'm 32 Shepard. You don't serve as long as I have without coming to terms with yourself."
-Kaidan Alenko, Mass Effect 1
there’s an educational trivia game at the citadel on the exhibits on different planets called “Dog or Not?” that shows pictures of various four legged mammals and asks if they’re a breed of dog.
it was mainly for kids to learn about the diversity of earth’s flora and fauna but it became popular with adult aliens too and had to be shut down after almost causing no less than three diplomatic incidents.
they brought it to the nexus and it’s caused two more so far
“That’s definitely a dog.” “Incorrect. This is actually an animal called a ‘raccoon’” “What? No! It’s got the ears and the tail!”
“Okay, okay, I got this. That’s not a dog. It’s way too big it’s uhhh I think humans call them bears.” “Incorrect. This is a dog breed called a ‘newfoundland’”
And when it becomes such a cultural obsession that they run tournaments and the final rounds are displayed live on the worldswide hologram system …
Somewhat cocky contestant (who heckles the others for wrong answers) looks at the hologram on display: “I’ve read up on a lot of Earth animals, even visited the Earth zoo, so you can’t fool me. It’s a picture on a farm so that’s the first clue. It’s white, fluffy, got a sloping forehead and no distinct… muzzle.. if I do remember the term correctly. It’s most definitely a sheep.”
Trivia host (attempting to hide their joy at finally being able to tell the contestant they’re wrong): “I’m sorry, that is a dog called a Bedlington Terrier. It is actually bred to look like a sheep, but notice the lack of keratinized tissue coverings on the extremities that make contact with the ground. You missed quite an obvious difference there.” (after the contestant stutters a bit and protests about dogs made specifically to look like not-dogs) “Let’s take it to the judges then” (after consulting small podium-top hologram of judging panel, now grinning and dripping with sarcasm) “Awwww…unfortunately it is a dog and rules of the game do not allow us to award partial credit… toooooo baaaaaad” (super cheerfully) “aaand… next image please!”
Shepard loves “Dog or Not?”. The human crew never misses a tournament airing. They get it on a vid screen in the mess hall and all crowd around. Some people bring blankets and pillows. Some make snacks to share. Eventually it becomes like a Superbowl party.
Dog or Not becomes a sort of inside joke on the Normandy, one that the non-human crew members still kind of get - they’re always invited to the viewing parties and sometimes sit in - but don’t really understand. Tali especially doesn’t understand when a snickering Shepard elbows her and, pointing to a varren being taken for a walk, asks, “Hey, Tali - dog or not?”
“That’s…that’s a varren, Shepard,” Tali responds, bemused. “You know what a varren is.”
Shepard is still giggling, and Kaidan, who heard the exchange, joins in.
-
Liara, Ashley, and Shepard go to recover the lost data drive at Admiral Hackett’s request. They eventually find themselves surrounded by the strange monkey-looking organisms.
With a straight face, Ashley comments, “Wow, sure are a lot of dogs on this planet.”
Shepard doubles over. Liara isn’t sure whether or not to laugh. She’s watched “Dog or Not?” before, so she knows these creatures aren’t dogs…right?
-
Garrus accidentally joins in on the fun after they discover a new species on a fog-covered planet. They’re bright red, they have carapaces, and they breathe fire. The team is examining one’s corpse when Garrus asks hesitantly, “So…is that a dog?”
Shepard’s head whips up and they stare at him for a full five seconds before breaking down. Garrus has to half-carry a wheezing, crying Shepard back to the shuttle. Jack’s eyelashes are wet from her own mirth.
-
They’re driving full speed over the scorching desert of Tuchanka. They’ve just called Kalros, the mother of all thresher maws, to deal with the Reaper destroyer in their way. All faces are pressed to the windows to see the fight.
Kalros bursts from the sands with an unearthly screech and tackles the Reaper. The two grapple in the sands, both representing the might of organic and synthetic, respectively.
“Garrus,” Shepard says in a low, awed voice.
Garrus has been around Shepard for too long not to know when they’re about to make a joke. “Shepard, I swear on all the spirits of Palaven - “
“That’s the biggest dog I’ve ever seen.”
Garrus quietly regrets all his choices that led him to this moment, then sighs. “Which one?” he returns.
I have never played a Mass Effect game, yet this was very amusing.
@justice-turtle
Dear God, reblog this version everyone
remember when shepard jumped across the galaxy in the mako?
good times
#the mako is the true mvp of the first mass effect game #who would win one (1) scaly bird lizard cyborg pumped with future tech or a 4x4 but for space #the car that truly deserves to go to heaven
my absolute favourite tags of this post thank you @laegolas
if you write your Ryder as into breathplay you are just horrifically wrong.
Got this idea a few days ago and I can`t stop thinking about Mordin & seashells. I wish I got Mordin`s lines in character, he is hard to write
Reyes Vidal is a hardcore drama geek; hear me out
Okay, the thing we all seem to love about Reyes Vidal is that he is so Dramatic. Lots of flirts, cheesy one-liners, finger guns, etc. And I’ve seen a ton of headcanons going around that he’s musical in some way. Regardless of the instrument, vocal or otherwise, dude loves music.
Case in point: In the romanced ending, Reyes cues up some really romantic jazz/swing type music on his omni-tool. He’s not tapping into satellite radio; if that song’s available on demand it’s because he brought it with him to Andromeda. And that’s a very specific genre to take along. He also leads Ryder on to the dance floor in this beautiful sequence if you choose the casual option and clearly is no stranger to choreographed dancing. Otherwise Ryder gets dragged up and he jokes, “It’s not the waltz.”
And think about his flair for entrances. The cave shoot-out alone is so staged, stepping out of the shadows, sporting a catch phrase that he’s specifically set up since the first time you met, leaping down into the dirt. At the Roekar base he strides down the staircase perfectly to set up a timed explosion. He knows how to make an entrance, and be remembered, far more than someone who likes to rule from the shadows logically should.
I think he’s a bit of a drama club geek, a musical theater lover. I bet he idolized the Rat Pack, and classic spy movies and has a Fedora somewhere in storage.
Therefore, I present for the jury: Reyes Vidal: Drama King of Kadara.
i love this sweet dying man with all my dead reanimated heart but this was my first impression of him
the shirtlessness is multipurpose
Wait. His jacket is open for a reason? I’d just assumed Thane was like that….
Sanity Check
This was from a ME3 only playthrough. When Kaidan starts out very unsure of Shepard. His dialogue after the coup was "It's not every day you go gun to gun with someone who used to have your back." and the conversation that usually triggers after Gellix just... didn't.
Anyway, just thought it was an interesting change from "something deeper with someone I already care about."
Idly thinking on the relationship between the Citadel Council and the Systems Alliance, as is one’s wont, and I find myself wondering if there isn’t one more reason as to why the Council bent over backwards to accommodate the Alliance.
What I already knew :
Basically the Council prefers the Alliance as a junior, foolish, reckless partner they can control rather than as a bunch of aggressively expansionist assholes they’ve antagonized. With the Alliance on a leash, they can address the Batarian Hegemony problem and stabilize the Attican Traverse.
Moreover, in the books, specifically Revelation, it’s specifically said that one of the reasons the Alliance did so well against the turians during the First Contact War is because they had very good military software getting dangerously close to AI. Since AI is a big no-no for the Council, it’s kinda imperative that they absolutely get the Alliance to agree to play by their rules, otherwise they might have a geth situation on their doorstep, if not an actual Singularity (they could also go to war and annihilate humanity easily, if they wanted to, that’s the turian option, but fortunately for humans the asari are the masters of the galaxy).
But here’s what occurred to me just now, looking at the very beginning of ME1 : the Council also wants to make sure the Alliance shares all Prothean technology it unearths with them. That would seem to be only relevant in the case of the Prothean Beacon on Eden Prime… until one remembers that humanity has an entire Prothean complex on Mars, including chambers which could not be opened until early 2186. (Probably where the Crucible came from.)
Now we know that the asari, at the very least, have profited enormously from privileged access to Prothean technology, allowing them to always keep an edge. From the Council’s point of view, in this context, there are three options in 2157, at the moment they’ve officially made first contact with the humans :
a) Hostile Takeover : absolutely destroy them, take what you want, make sure they are never a threat again - again, the turian option.
b) Play Fair : normalize relationships and treat that bunch of enormously aggressive jackasses who think they’re entitled to everything the normal way, i.e. let them prove their worth and they’ll get their embassy in the Citadel circa 2257 CE, give or take.
c) Accommodation : give preferential treatment to the humans so that they’re happy to play along, always keep them satisfied without giving them power, buying you time to enmesh them in your vast socio-economic apparatus.
Obviously, with Prothean technology at hand on Mars and the entitled jackasses feeling aggravated, b) would be an absolutely terrible idea for the Council.
Of course, c), what they actually went for, completely backfires in a Renegade playthrough with the Council betrayed and the humans politically dominant.
I suspect part of it is also that Humanity is a bit of an unknown quality, and also militaristic one, and three out of the last four times the Council tried to deal with a militaristic unknown quality they got the Rachni Wars, the Krogan Rebellions, and the Batarian Hegemony.
“I’m here to help you relax, and relaxing will help you focus” okay Kaidan “banging you is my patriotic duty” Alenko
stolen from @chiafett and @kkrazy256 and @keldabekush
like to give miz a kiss on the forehead, reblog to give him some choco chip cookie dough edibles
also seriously if a character isn’t white, i promise your only descriptive options aren’t food words and varying degrees of tan. it’s okay to say brown. pale brown! light brown! golden brown! medium brown! dark brown! deep brown! so many kinds of brown!
BROWN BROWN BROWN BROWN BROWN
#brown is not a bad word #you do not need euphemisms #B R O W N
This post by writingwithcolor might help in picking good words to use plus reading about why not to use food words! In general if you’re writing a character of color I highly recommend @writingwithcolor
Thank you!
Reblog and put in the tags how your icon would react to you kissing them
Citadel Wards: Ambush
CAT6 Merc Captain
Garrus Vakarian 02/??
Hell, Garrus, you were always ugly. Slap some face paint on there and no one will even notice. (affectionate)