Last Game You Played

Okay, here's how you do a Renegade playthrough, as I've always been frustrated with the internet's mistaken belief you have to be 100% all or nothing with the series.

ME: max out Intimidate. There, that's all there is to it. You barely kill anyone, you just yell and browbeat your way (at total arseholes 90% of the time who have it coming anyway) into getting what you want. I finish Mass Effect with a 100% Renegade bar and a 75% Paragon one, Wrex is alive, the Council is alive (to hang up on some more), no reporters are punched, no desperate Biotic terrorists or traumatised veterans are killed, no racists are appeased or sympathised with, and xenophobic admirals are put firmly in their place. The only people who are dead are dickheads who either had it coming anyway (corrupt cops, corpo scumbags, pirate slavers, warlords and, awkwardly, Cerberus guys), or the unfortunate engineers on the asteroid because you are out of your fucking mind if you think I'm letting a terrorist who almost destroyed an entire planet walk away to do it all over again. Congratulations, you now have a huge amount of points to import into...

ME 2: .. which will give you all the leeway to make almost any dialogue choice you want, bar maybe one or two near the end, in which case just go with Charm instead. Anyway, the golden rule of ME 2 is if you don't take every single Renegade interrupt, you are a simpering chump ass loser and I have no respect for you. Damn right, I'm throwing mercs outta windows and blowing them up while they're trying to negotiate, shooting shifty merc chicks going for a gun, shanking gunship engineers in the back with a arc wielder, asking every store owner to give me a discount, headbutting rude Krogans, yelling at Jack, Miranda, and dickhead Quarian admirals, and I am absolutely playing Bad Cop with some PoS rich guy trying to have a politician assassinated. Still, much as I adore Zaeed, I'm won't let the factory workers die over a revenge mission, and Morinth isn't hot enough to be worth betraying her mom over.

ME 3 is a different kettle of fish, they heavily dial back the whole system somewhat so there's only a handful of choices and there's no way I'd ever shaft my boy Wrex or disappoint Mordin. But again, anyone who doesn't take the Renegade interrupt when Kai Leng's sneaking up behind them is a chump ass loser, fuck your Paragon status!

Being a Paragon too often means sucking down Titanic amounts of shit from total jerks. Shepard, she ain't about that yo. Be good to your pals and folks in need, kick everyone else's ass.
 
Regarding people not talking to each other being the driving force in television - yes! As a kid it drove me insane that every 30 minute show could have been resolved before the opening credits if someone just admitted what they'll have to admit anyway at the end. I think that plus my natural anxiety is why I'm an "oversharer" to this day. In my head secrets always lead to bullshit unnecessary complications I don't have energy for.
 
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