In which Issa saves the galaxy. And makes cupcakes.
I have two dozen mead cupcakes cooling in my kitchen. I'm doing a test run to see if these will fly for the company Family Fun Day bake-off. Instead of a rum cake, I'm substituting mead. I also made a mead buttercream icing from scratch that needs a bit of tweaking - too runny and could probably use more butter and/or cream for a richer, less powdered sugary taste. 3 tbs. of mead was also probably too much to use; next run I'll knock it down to 1 1/2 or 2 instead.
The resident baking queen from another department downstairs is also entering the contest (I don't think there's any prize or anything, just a "yay, everyone likes your baked goods!" sense of accomplishment) so I'm bringing my A-game. If the mead cupcakes don't make it past my guinea pigs (namely Mom, Marchelle, and Laura) then I'll see how well my orange chiffon cake goes instead.
Just finished Mass Effect.
1. My Shepard was 100% Paragon this go-around. Saved everybody she could, got Saren to redeem himself in the end, made Captain Anderson part of the Council.
2. Kaidan is this game's Alistair for me. I ♥ new romance stuff. The only thing I wish we could have had was more lovey-dovey interactions like we did for Origins.
2a. Jocker is the biggest cock-block in the galaxy. I love him for that. I kinda love him anyway, but the intercom buzz-kill just sealed the deal.
3. My main team consisted of Kaidan and Ashley for 90% of the game. I swapped out Ashley for Garrus the rest of the time or had Liara join in for one or two missions.
4. Since I wasn't playing with any guides, I know I missed a TON of sidequests. Kinda want to go in with another Shepard and see just what I missed.
5. The best sidequest for me? The one where you got to talk to Shepard's mom. My new headcanon says that Kira gave her a call in between missions to get some mother-daughter advice on dating one of her crew members.
5a. When Kaidan goes "it's been a pleasure serving under you" I LOL'd at the super-serious moment and outpouring of affection. My only defense is that my brain thinks I'm twelve. I'm soooo mature. *eyeroll*
6. Endgame boss fight? Damnit Saren, stay still. The dude kept on jumping all over the freaking place.
7. Pre-end of the world sexytimes? Is that all we get? *frustrated sigh* I spent half the game hoping to have new conversations with Kaidan and all I got was "I've wasted enough of your time." most of the time. Romancing Zevran was easier than this. (and by romancing, I mean getting the guy to express his feelings and all that) Not that said happy naked fun time wasn't awesome or anything, but still. Can't a Commander get at least a hug from her Wun Tru Lurve?
8. Manuvering the Mako took some time getting used to, but I think I finally got a handle on it. Firing became a LOT easier when I found out that you could zoom in using the turret view. I'm still thinking Garrus was probably going "That's it. Next time, I'm driving." any time they had to get into the thing.
9. Kira could finally hit the broad side of a spaceship with her pistol by the time we got to the halfway point of the game. A couple of glitches had both of her teammates stuck and unable to help her fight off a huge bunch of geth, but she took them on singlehandedly and didn't really get hurt all that much. There was much heroic posturing to be had afterward. *nods*
10. By the end of the game, I think I had everyone leveled up to around 45 or so. Probably could have gotten more if I'd done more of the sidequests, but I'm saving that for next go-around. Even in the 40's, my party was pretty much made up of badassitude.
In all, I give this game nine and a half gun salutes out of ten. Now off to import my game and start up a fresh round for Mass Effect 2! I haven't played this one in so long, so I completely forgot what's going on. Yay for new-to-me games!
The resident baking queen from another department downstairs is also entering the contest (I don't think there's any prize or anything, just a "yay, everyone likes your baked goods!" sense of accomplishment) so I'm bringing my A-game. If the mead cupcakes don't make it past my guinea pigs (namely Mom, Marchelle, and Laura) then I'll see how well my orange chiffon cake goes instead.
Just finished Mass Effect.
1. My Shepard was 100% Paragon this go-around. Saved everybody she could, got Saren to redeem himself in the end, made Captain Anderson part of the Council.
2. Kaidan is this game's Alistair for me. I ♥ new romance stuff. The only thing I wish we could have had was more lovey-dovey interactions like we did for Origins.
2a. Jocker is the biggest cock-block in the galaxy. I love him for that. I kinda love him anyway, but the intercom buzz-kill just sealed the deal.
3. My main team consisted of Kaidan and Ashley for 90% of the game. I swapped out Ashley for Garrus the rest of the time or had Liara join in for one or two missions.
4. Since I wasn't playing with any guides, I know I missed a TON of sidequests. Kinda want to go in with another Shepard and see just what I missed.
5. The best sidequest for me? The one where you got to talk to Shepard's mom. My new headcanon says that Kira gave her a call in between missions to get some mother-daughter advice on dating one of her crew members.
5a. When Kaidan goes "it's been a pleasure serving under you" I LOL'd at the super-serious moment and outpouring of affection. My only defense is that my brain thinks I'm twelve. I'm soooo mature. *eyeroll*
6. Endgame boss fight? Damnit Saren, stay still. The dude kept on jumping all over the freaking place.
7. Pre-end of the world sexytimes? Is that all we get? *frustrated sigh* I spent half the game hoping to have new conversations with Kaidan and all I got was "I've wasted enough of your time." most of the time. Romancing Zevran was easier than this. (and by romancing, I mean getting the guy to express his feelings and all that) Not that said happy naked fun time wasn't awesome or anything, but still. Can't a Commander get at least a hug from her Wun Tru Lurve?
8. Manuvering the Mako took some time getting used to, but I think I finally got a handle on it. Firing became a LOT easier when I found out that you could zoom in using the turret view. I'm still thinking Garrus was probably going "That's it. Next time, I'm driving." any time they had to get into the thing.
9. Kira could finally hit the broad side of a spaceship with her pistol by the time we got to the halfway point of the game. A couple of glitches had both of her teammates stuck and unable to help her fight off a huge bunch of geth, but she took them on singlehandedly and didn't really get hurt all that much. There was much heroic posturing to be had afterward. *nods*
10. By the end of the game, I think I had everyone leveled up to around 45 or so. Probably could have gotten more if I'd done more of the sidequests, but I'm saving that for next go-around. Even in the 40's, my party was pretty much made up of badassitude.
In all, I give this game nine and a half gun salutes out of ten. Now off to import my game and start up a fresh round for Mass Effect 2! I haven't played this one in so long, so I completely forgot what's going on. Yay for new-to-me games!