What Happens If You Recruit NOBODY In Mass Effect?

[@Jarsia]

Kaidan "I can see you're about to make a big decision. I'm gonna argue both sides of the problem, so I can say I was on whichever side is most convenient later"

[@alexvirtanen439]

And so, after the Reapers were defeated, Kaidan became an Alliance senator

[@1000-Baby-Oil]

I f*cking hate Kaidan. If I had the choice, I'd let him and Ashley both die on Virmire.

[@sanderhoogeland9161]

In the other two games, this can only get more hilarious. can Shepard complete the suicide mission on his own?

[@kred792]

Canonically, no. You need at least one surviving crew member + Joker to pull you back into the Normandy. Without that, you fall to your death and that's it.

[@sanderhoogeland9161]

@@kred792 I know, but I would like to know what the game does, or tries to do, when you show up at the start of the mission without any squad members to kill off. I guess it wouldn’t even get past the selection screens, but what happens when you force it to?

[@sethowen6984]

No, he'd just die at first gate

[@nnightkingj]

@@kred792 Joker cant die though no matter what even the worst possible ending hes the sole survivor

[@altec003]

Of course he can! Commander Jenkins is a Goddamn hero!

[@GuyPaddock]

As an Unreal dev, I am more impressed that this didn't cause an assertion error or straight-up crash. That's a testament to BioWare's devs at least not assuming pointers are going to be set. Ironically, can't tell you how many times I've had ME 1 crash on me with an assertion error as I approach the elevator on Virmire, related to some file not having loaded.

[@Shifter-1040ST]

I always got stuck in elevators on Noveria

[@BrotherMag]

Without Garrus, its sure to be a rough ride!

[@xironevarus576]

How would you go into the final fight without your cannons calibrated

[@SReaper]

Hahaha no calibrations

[@Albukhshi]

With no style whatever!

[@Shifter-1040ST]

You're going to regret it when the bottles revolt

[@TheMrjleezy]

Kaidan arguing with himself at the end like Dafoe's Green Goblin is amazing.

[@k0ziolRD]

Older biotic implants caused problems, so Kaidan have double personality disorder. Sometimes he thinks he is young army woman, that is racist.

[@DRGeralt]

Found the liberal that ignores her character progression.

[@inserisciunnome]

Ah, the Damn LIBERALS at It again!

[@dreamer_of_hiraeth]

What character progression? She never changed, at least not in my playthrough. Can't stand her ever since.

[@imthatguyhere]

@@DRGeralt Progression? Nothing happens in ME1 (aside from her explaining her Terra Firma stance) and on the Citadel she still says "I can't tell the aliens from the animals" for the visits. ME2 it doesn't really touch it iirc. ME3 she's become less racist off screen depending on past paragon choices. But it's far from good progression unless you romanced her, and even then that's kinda... Ew. ("I f***d the racism out") The backstory behind some of the prejudice did ok, but as someone who rarely left her on Virmire because Kaidan never stops moping, she is not well handled.

[@admiralampere5513]

@@DRGeralt did you play the game? Ashley only becomes worse in every single way when she becomes a spectre. I suppose you just wanted to rip on liberals

[@eefer5416]

I love idea of Jenkins being Shepard with just kaidan and doing the entire trilogy with them doing some awkward buddy cop banter with the occasional schizo dialogue.

[@Wh173c0c0]

I love pushing games past their intended limits too, so this was very fun for me. Watching Kaidan freak out and try to talk himself out of his own ideas is absolutely hilarious. I really like seeing how games handle it when you do something that isn't meant to happen; watching them try to "figure things out" can be an absolute blast. I'd love to see more of this for the other games in the series.

[@Linkforlife199]

"There's no Shepard without Vakarian."

[@ImpulseACE]

Friendless Shepard talking to mute Kaiden at endgame: "To think Jenkins died yesterday."

[@larrackell]

Kaidan was having a MOMENT trying to figure out what to do with the council. 🤣

[@krazy-mouse]

No, no, make no mistake I love Mass Effect, probably too much. I am not ashamed to admit that it's my favorite game on the Citadel.

[@icetrail180]

9:18 I like how Kaidan on squad is moving his mouth while kaidan on dialog is doing the body movement LOL

[@MaynardCrow]

The real mission was the friends you didn't recruit along the way. I'd have made it head canon that the invisible squadmate is Shepard's imaginary friend that everyone pretends is real to humor him. They arw afraid to piss him off cause he has powers like time warping, levitation, and teleportation. Sometimes he breaks reality, so best not to engage him by ignoring his only friend, no matter how fictional.

[@Andre25980]

Funny things happen when you remove Zaeed from the party during his loyalty mission. When you get to the refinery your other party member gets possessed by Zaeed's spirit and starts talking like him. And then at the end of the mission when Vido is supposed to get away, nothing happens and you can't finish the mission, but you can explore the area that cutscene takes place in.

[@SReaper]

That actually gave me a fun idea for a video for Mass Effect 2, what happens with taking out each character out of their respective loyalty missions lmao

[@sirsaltytampon4379]

I thought you couldn't remove correlating characters with their loyalty missions?

[@Andre25980]

@@sirsaltytampon4379 you can with gibbed save editor and other means. But like I said it breaks the mission

[@peterversionone]

Damn, I gotta try that

[@Chilllaxxinn]

this just proves that Kaidan is our One True Pairing

[@SReaper]

I am famously not a Kaidan fan, so this realization pains me greatly. Lol

[@DirtyBlueDahlia]

another fact to spit to the Kaidan haters 😌

[@theoverride7912]

I love it when games try to move forward and not crash or get you softlocked when you broke it. I also like the idea of only two bros saving the galaxy.

[@CarlosFreitas99]

2:05 I haven't laughed this hard in a KZbin video in a long while. If was a bit fun but most was relief that there wasn't a sponsor 😂

[@FreelanceDev4life]

10:38, When a schizoid argues with himself. Apparently, the stress of the reapers broke him.

[@serijas737]

At the end with the Council Kaidan was just having a nervous breakdown because he couldn't morally handle the decision he didn't have to make.

[@lewisvargrson]

10:37 Kaiden's L2 implant is acting up.

[@michaelconner9208]

Kaiden the radical centrist

[@shyper17]

4:20 They are reaching a consensus...

[@ResaRestart]

Kaiden alone in squad is litterally the guud guy kaiden saving galaxy with decision maker and button busher Sheppard.

[@jasperzanovich2504]

I love how Shepard sprints into the beacon for no reason.

[@ChanceDraws]

This was a fun watch! Learning unreal to play around with redesigning games like this and it's actually really helpful to see how these plot flags were put together. Thank you!

[@SReaper]

Glad to hear that! Thanks for watching!

[@GuyPaddock]

Also -- what happens if you load the save from this into ME2?

[@kred792]

That's a great question, I know they accounted for not recruiting Wrex (it's as if he never existed) and Garrus (one stupid throwaway line of dialogue on Omega) but canonically you have to recruit Tali (Udina forces you if you refuse) and Liara (can't get to Ilos without her); so It'd be fun to watch the missions on Freedom's Progress, Haelstrom, and Ilium with this save state.

[@GuyPaddock]

@@kred792 In that case the game just might not even look to see if they were recruited and start with them being there.

[@sandrogamer30018]

I can't see myself playing the games without Tali and Wrex... They were always my picks.

[@matthew-005]

When I first played Mass Effect I thought Ashley could handle herself so I helped Kaiden thinking she would be OK without my help so her death surprised me.

[@ChaviChoffChop]

5K subs now. I'm somewhere there wishing you to get many more. I had a good laugh watching this video and it's not so easy to get. Maybe it's just me but Shep being confused about where to look is funny as heck. And with a pinch of humour it can turn into gold 😄

[@BKPrice]

Eventually so many Kaidan's were created that they filled the entire galaxy and blocked the Reapers from returning.

[@highwaysstar]

This is hilarious! I hope you will do one for ME2 as well, just to see how the suicide mission goes!

[@FakeAmerican]

yo how in the FUCK, since playing mass effect since 2007, did I only just now recognize Nihlus as a nod to Darth Nihilus

[@Soulie81]

What happens if you import this save into ME2 and so on?

[@christianroy5663]

Indeed. I'm curious myself. I'm guessing it will revert to some default things as if you started a new ME 2 game without importing, but that still lives Ashley being both alive or dead. It's like Schrödinger's cat!

[@wursthanz5518]

No sponsor? Instant subscription!

[@Mech299]

Pfft xD Haha. MPD Kaidan is my favorite part of this video during the citadel arms section xD

[@SReaper]

I openly cackled when he immediately contradicts himself lol

[@Jolan61]

I found that way funnier than I probably should have

[@jacobobobo4404]

2:38 PJD could also be Pre-Jenkins Death. Be careful to specify as to not confuse anyone with ALL the important stuff that happens in the series before Sir Jenkins' passing

[@axelnilsson5124]

I expected this to show how Virmire would play out with just Ashley, Kaiden and Tali along with everything else

[@user-hi4sm3ig5j]

Really enjoyed the video. A funny bug is that sometimes even with two teammates in the sacrifice the council choice debate, Tali will argue both sides anyway while the other person just stands there and doesn't have an opinion, I guess.

[@swgohreal-talk5790]

What if you use killbiopawn?

[@norbucso]

I was ready to move my fingers when you mentioned sponsors to speed ahead. Fell for the joke. Well done mate.

[@orzorzelski1142]

Hold on... But what happens if you sacrifice Kaiden?

[@GethPrime]

Alenko is your only squadmate lol you can’t really make it empty unless it’s the sequels

[@maestro4111]

Shep and Kaidan on Eden prime think about the situation. SUDDENLY the beacon activates. Sheppard: MR EASTER BUNNY, NO!! Later On Vermire Kaidan: I must stay, Sheppard! : ...! Kaidan: NO, DON'T LISTEN TO IT! GO! When deciding about Rahnee RQ: ermmm... is your companion always like this??? Shep: Don't worry, you'll get used to it. And finally while thinking about "saving" counsil Shep: It's a tough choise. Kaidan: [goes on like always] Joker: Oh, here we go again...

[@sylvanhealer8440]

what's hilarious about the nonexistent ashley during the beacon is that happened to me on my first ever playthrough but it was on the 360 and it was a bug (obviously) but i was so confused as to why the camera focused on the ground then shep grabbed the air and threw it and then she appeared tposing briefly before resuming the normal scene.

[@CameraObscure]

Very Amusing 🙂. I am currently doing a playthrough (on ME3 now) where i dont talk to my squad members, and being very cut throut in my actions. It dosent brake the game but brings forth some interesting interactions.On my conversation with Samara on the Citadel she reminds me of the oath she took serving me and be careful about my actions iam taking saying she will still have to kill me if i do immoral actions. Traynor dosent present evidence of where Kai Leng is, Leaving Edi to tell me here he is whilst Traynor has her head held down looking meek. Basically most my crew on the Normandy reacts very fearful of my Shephard. I am hearing Dialougue i never see in any playthroughs. Meaning they voice acted for such types of playthroughs rather amazing really. It is Interesting seeing what Bioware provided for players as choices and repercussions. So many play all out Paragon or Renegade which is IMHO silly condiering the whole time the game is telling you nothing is Black and white and there is a lot of grey in Decisions no right or wrong just different ways to achieve the same goals. so being both at different times works mostly. When you reutrn to the Normandy after Cernerus Coup, rejecting Kaiden/Ashley to come aboard instead telling them they should be a Specter for Hacket Causes Joker to Salute you when you come aboard and go to the Flight deck. I am always finding subtle variations each time I play through. Though as I understand it its impossible to get from ME2 to ME3 with no squad the game wont load if you import that save file. Because I guess some characters are needed to move the game on might be a good challange for you to find if just one character probably being Garrus (though suspect Thane also needs to survive along with Mirander ). might get it to start ...theres your next challange 🙂

[@j0ann]

Excellent video sir!

[@SReaper]

Thank you!

[@Deception975]

8:08 You let Kirrahe die? You monster, lol

[@arcadeinvader8086]

oops all k a i d a n

[@st0ox]

Changing one line (or even less) can easily change everything in a game. I'm sure a lot of the bugs you encountered could be triggered with a different initial change.

[@ResaRestart]

i kind of wish there was actually hidden interactions with Jenkins trout ME as if bioware intended to include him for rest of the game.

[@keith3278]

Many a True Nerd did do a "similar" video for this idea but his was "Kill every companion" through the plot of the 1st 3 games.

[@salmonsdontdie4952]

I literally just finished playing through the trilogy for the first time, and I can truly understand why it's so beloved. I never got around to playing when originally released, but very glad I finally have. I'm still Haunted by the loss of my boy Grunt in ME2 😢

[@Jordanschannel64]

I thought you could play without a party, figured it was an extra hardcore mode. I am still working through my first playthrough!

[@halfslashmoon]

ok obviously the full cast of mass effect is great and the game will always be missing something not having them, but i would love a sort of buddy cop shepard and kaidan adventure take on mass effect

[@DarthWampa_]

would be interesting to have only Wrex at Noveria with the Racchni queen

[@dozzy9984]

Isn't Kaidan on top of paragon morality amongst companions, so he is never supposed to suggest sacrificing the council or killing the Rachni? Or is that Liara?

[@SReaper]

So out of all the times I’ve played Mass Effect over the years, and even playing around with the game, it’s always been based on what slot the character is placed in. I’ve had instances where Ashley is at the end game arguing to save the council, and arguing to sacrifice them. It’s not like Dragon Age where they have things they’ll accept and dislike. Basically every character has lines for both choices in almost every circumstance.

[@dozzy9984]

@@SReaper I saw a chart that had characters set from paragon to renegade according to what advice they will give. Basically I think it was from most paragon to most renagade: Kaidan, Liara, Tali, Garrus, Ashley, Wrex. And basically it was explained that in first Mass Effect game checks and then gives the companion more on the left the line to advocate for paragon option and the one to the right a line for renegade option. Which meant that Wrex and Kaidan (unless I mixed him with Liara, can't find that chart right now) will never give suggestions to pick paragon (for Wrex) and renegade (for Kaidan) options. That also means that Tali with Kaidan will advocate for renegade while Tali with Ashley will advocate for paragon (while making Ashley giving paragon options only if Wrex is the other teammate). Never tried to check that, it was explained in a reasonable way and was more or less what I thought covers my experiences with the game (and would explain why Tali sways between being compassionate to being extremist in her suggestions).

[@Severemario997]

@@dozzy9984 With different speech choices in certain conversations with kaiden you can skew his viewpoint from paragon to more renegade human oriented point of view that is when you can get the dialogue fot him to sacrifice the council on the last mission, you can do the same thing to garrus with his sidequest and some other conversations turning him from ruthless vigilante to they deserve a second chance type of vigilante

[@ferrous719]

If you play FemShep, I wonder if she shoves aside empty air at the Eden Prime beacon

[@Po3oB]

I wonder what will happen if you use a saving from this walkthrough in ME2)))

[@gamingloser5909]

I was playing as FemShep and Kaiden vanished from the cut scene but reappeared on the Normandy

[@joshuamazzuto1558]

I'm pretty sure those charges are supposed to be Thermonuclear Explosives and the colony is supposed to be smaller than your average mkdern-day city.

[@deridionentertainment]

Love ❤️ mass effect can't wait for 4. New subscriber man keep up the cool videos man

[@TheOriginalGR8Bob]

If only mass effect andromeda had option to unselect squad party on away missions it would have improved the game so much , even if you reset squad stats so they die easy they still respawn after you run away fare enough.

[@Alphaniah]

Can't stop laughing about "grabbing the air, then tossing the air to the side" hilarious!!

[@aaronsnowden6311]

Love all the Mass Effect games except for one that I will not mention and started playing them again just a few days ago. I know I am a bit late to comment on the video but your content is great.

[@Jila_Tana]

How did you get to Ilos without Liara present ?

[@paulvd8468]

Can you still interact with squadmates and npc crew members on the Normandy or are none of the conversation triggers there? For example talking to the medic about Liara or the engineer complementing Tali?

[@Thrakus]

does Mass Effect Legendary Edition have always online drm or did they remove that?

[@SReaper]

From what I read, it looks like it was patched out shortly after launch!

[@XoADREADNOUGHT]

Did you try going back farther. Far enough to trigger Ashley's cutscene, but not Jenkins? Like, falling back down about 20 feet ahead of where Jenkins dies rather than 100's of feet ahead? I'd be curious if you then had 3 NPC's following you. Including Jenkins and Ashley. You might of done that but you don't mention it or show it in the video so I though I'd ask.

[@SReaper]

Not exactly, it seems like in the video if you trigger Ashley's scene, you get some form of it, and then the game can't seem to reconcile the fact that you don't have Jenkin's gone, so it just won't have Ashley in your party, but Jenkins will be. I didn't even think to see if the game corrected itself or just had 3 people following you if you go back and try to trigger his death scene. Definitely something I want to look into. Could be fun to discuss if it uncovers anything else.

[@XoADREADNOUGHT]

@@SReaper Yeah that would be interesting. I'd be curious if you triggered them in the right order. So you dropped down past where you trigger Ashley running away, if the video shows the full story. That means you never actually triggered Ashley to appear. But you did go back far enough to trigger the conversation with her AFTER she would have appeared. There's two triggers there and you skipped the first one, not the second. And if you trigger them in order, and only actually skip Jenkin's death, the rest of the level might be playable as normal, but with Jenkins still alive.

[@SReaper]

@@XoADREADNOUGHT You've given me some food for thought. I'll have to look into that. If I find anything I'll definitely report back. Thanks for the insight!

[@ghostoyster]

followed just for the a word from our sponsors bit

[@donstarlancer]

I really enjoyed this

[@slisser]

1, 2, 3 or andrómeda?

[@oz0451]

i love that it just makes everyone schizophrenic

[@oz0451]

ok well really just Kaiden. poor guy

[@canadian__ninja]

Vermeier is my favourite mission.

[@SReaper]

lol. I didn't make the timestamps I have no idea why it did that It did it automatically

[@davebradburryjr5084]

This can only be achieved through the PC because you need to console command and laws but mostly console commands is the only way.. I play on the Xbox and no matter what happens I am given Paragon or Renegade choices the Xbox for some reason will always make sure that you are giving almost a 50-50 chance which means I'm trying to play Paragon but no matter what happens I will get 25% Renegade points no matter what happens because I'm forced to get it which is why I'm hoping that sooner or later Mass Effect legendaries for Xbox and Playstation gets a goddamn mod page so we can join the console commands and basically tell them on how we want to play our character without being forced to get Paragon or Renegade point when we don't ask for them

[@DaneInTheUS]

I would have thought you would still have the option to kill kaidan on Virmire and be truly alone - guess not lol. What happens if you import this save into ME2 or 3?

[@bigboss4178]

do this with Fallout or Skyrim, you'll have a field day lmao

[@klausambrass1460]

Good video, SReaper. I love the notion that you can break games. This being one of my favorites, I don't feel bad, just curious :-) What would happen if you played the whole story in this vid as a *female* Shepard with Kaiden? Would he trigger the Protean Beacon and you could rescue him with the jump? Could you romance him aswell?

[@davidfoster9041]

I really want to play mass effect sometime as a human supremacist who absolutely refuses to ally with anyone who isn't human

[@ScottishScrub]

Kaidan has multiple personality disorder

[@iHiFiAudio]

Still, more optimized than Andromeda

[@Peatore]

I skipped content in KOTOR back in the day and ended up not getting tha Tw'lik girl or her Wookie friend. Very simular outcome. Camera would just pan to where they were and nothing. Eventually it hard locked me and I couldn't progress further.

[@itsAstarte.e]

The in-game run without crew makes the plot look somewhat sadistic. Especially since they look completely overwhelmed with less crew there. It also can spark a Grand Design vs. Crew, man vs. Higher power debate really. .. Mass effect running like that looks more like jigsaw. The ending looks like it went from an of course they survived; there is crew, to a "how the heck did they survive, there's no crew!" Higher Thinking like that is why Shepard was able to become a spector.

[@x3wildcard]

If you're going to use console commands you can actually just despawn your party at the start of Eden Prime, no? I have a new respect for OG game devs. The fact that this (at least in the video seems..) is so functional is amazing. Try doing this with a game made in 2020 lol

[@rolandranc9925]

It is possible to save Kaidan and Ashley or it's just fake info?

[@taelrmade]

not possible, both cannot survive virmire

[@themoonlitquill]

Did you ever notice that the planet-side Jenkins looks nothing like the enthusiastic Normandy Jenkins you speak to before running into Nihlus? Overzealous Jenkins has bright blue eyes, whereas planet-side Jenkins has brownish, baby poo colored eyes 😂

[@rnhnrn]

Just Kaidan.

[@azarisLP]

5:38 "Thanks Pfizer"

[@baird5682]

But you CAN finish the game without companions.

[@integralhighspeedusb]

We, er I mean I should go.

[@TheNightofWalpurgis666]

#TeamAlliance baby!

[@bruhgod123]

how can you play the game without calibrations and war crimes against geth

[@JOHNSMITH-vx5yz]

That's simple. ,,,1 no one to fly your ship. 2 you won't go any where 3, you won't have an adventure. 4 you won't get any hanky panky with alien chicks. 5 ,you won't kill any. Bad guys 6,,,, it's not 🚀 rocket science.

[@MattRowland]

I legit thought this was going to be a video about how few characters you can legitimately recruit. But no, console commands. 🤷‍♂️

[@Leomerya12]

Everything is... funny.

[@j0ann]

This was so damn funny 😂😂

[@NostalgicGamerRickOShay]

I think it's rather romantic, the idea of the handsome dashing Rogue Commander Shepard and his female companion Ashley being the only two on this job. 😁

[@TGBurgerGaming]

Lol. If you need ideas nobody I know of has covered the racist Liara stuff.

[@SReaper]

Oh boy lmao

[@SReaper]

But go on….lol

[@Ahmad_L.]

New sub to the channel, the ME series is my favorite all time game series. Awesome content

[@madeofnapalm]

NovEria