I actually replayed the entire ME trilogy with the Shepard I wanted to write fic about, because I really wanted to see her choices playing out. (Then the only ME fic I've gotten around to finishing and posting so far only has Shep as a background character, gender and details deliberately unspecified. :P)
I find it interesting how I often I come across ME fics where Shepard strikes me as OOC. There's so much freedom when characterizing a customizable protagonist, but in the case of ME, at least (with a selection of defined major life events and voice-acted lines), it's not quite a case of there being a total blank slate to work with. I really like "a broad space of possible canons" as a description for this sort of thing.
Whereas with, say, Elder Scrolls fic, where the protagonist has no defined lines or backstory or anything at all, and the game is so open-ended that you really don't have a specified set of options for major decisions that must be made to advance, I don't think it would be possible for me to find fic about the protagonist OOC. There's "flexible" and then there's "here's a lump of clay, have fun!"
Also, I really love how people tend to write about their Shepard, to the point that I have little interest in fic where the writer is trying to portray some kind of "default" Shep. (Every time I hear about the potential for a Mass Effect movie with default BroShep, I cringe a little. Just... not what I'm here for, in this fandom.) Watching people get creative within that broad space of possible canons is a lot of fun for me.
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I find it interesting how I often I come across ME fics where Shepard strikes me as OOC. There's so much freedom when characterizing a customizable protagonist, but in the case of ME, at least (with a selection of defined major life events and voice-acted lines), it's not quite a case of there being a total blank slate to work with. I really like "a broad space of possible canons" as a description for this sort of thing.
Whereas with, say, Elder Scrolls fic, where the protagonist has no defined lines or backstory or anything at all, and the game is so open-ended that you really don't have a specified set of options for major decisions that must be made to advance, I don't think it would be possible for me to find fic about the protagonist OOC. There's "flexible" and then there's "here's a lump of clay, have fun!"
Also, I really love how people tend to write about their Shepard, to the point that I have little interest in fic where the writer is trying to portray some kind of "default" Shep. (Every time I hear about the potential for a Mass Effect movie with default BroShep, I cringe a little. Just... not what I'm here for, in this fandom.) Watching people get creative within that broad space of possible canons is a lot of fun for me.