Garrus is In, Kaidan is Out

It looks like I’ll have to re-order my list of top 3 Bioware boyfriends to include Garrus Vakarian, who as an in-game love interest has just blown Kaidan Alenko out of the water. For an alien, he’s proving to be much more adept at satisfying my video game romantic needs than I could ever have imagined. I’ve just passed through the Omega 4 Relay to start my suicide mission, and who should I find waiting for me at my quarters but my favorite Turian, who’s just in time for our blowing-off-steam session.

And what a sweet and utterly adorable scene that was. It’s much shorter and low-key than the racy love scene we were treated to in the first Mass Effect, but the beauty here is in its subtlety — Shepard and Garrus do not even share a kiss (though I admit it wouldn’t have been a very pretty sight getting lip-locked with a character that, well…doesn’t even have lips) but this is still one of the most romantic and touching moments I have ever witnessed in any video game. The chaste scene is for the best…lest we forget the good Dr. Mordin’s warning about chafing (and um…ingesting) when it comes to Human-Turian sexual relations.

So, while Alistair of Dragon Age still takes gold when it come to being my best Bioware boyfriend, Garrus can claim second place, and thus his royal whiny-ness Kaidan Alenko gets booted out of the top three (that’s for Horizon, you dirtbag!). See, Garrus? The galaxy may be messed up place and you’re quite possibly the most awkward and weird-looking alien thingy that ever existed, but yes, there are still some things in this life that can go just right.

When Good Bridge Officers Go Bad

What is the dumbest, most screwed up thing you’ve ever seen your bridge officers do in Star Trek Online?

For me, it was an altercation aboard another ship that devolved into an all out firefight with the bad Klingons. Blademasters were getting in my face, phasers were going off left and right, and grenades were sending everyone flying.  I still ended up decimating the enemy, but when I emerged from the chaos to celebrate my triumphant victory with my team…only three of them stood with me. “Um, guys, what happened to Donny?” His character frame was still there, showing all was well…but he was no where in sight.

I finally found him, near at the end of the instance, lying dead in the middle of a raging engine fire. In the confusion of combat, I hadn’t noticed that he had run on ahead, managed to get past several hostile groups of mobs and for all I knew, might have kept going if the fire hadn’t stopped him. This isolated bug has only happened to me once, but it sure was a quirky one.

The wayward bridge officer, ruined and extinguished.