BSN still has some of the background to the infamous 'Tali's Sweat' thread. :-)
This article deserves a short introduction (and possibly a justification). Often cited as an example of 'everything that was wrong' with BioWare fans and the 'BioWare Social Network', the "T
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As much as people make fun of the Tali's Sweat thing, I am reminded of another thing that ME2 did that put a huge smile on my face.
And, well, that was making Tali and Garrus romance options.
To be blunt, I remember a lot of discussion after ME1 at how, well,
boring the limited options were for ME1 players. MaleShep got "space-racist" Ashley and "nubile innocent alien babe" Liara, with FemShep getting "insomnia-cure" Kaidan and "I'm not a lesbian if I'm monogendered" Liara again. While all the characters had their fans, a lot of players gravitated towards intriguing alien characters like Garrus and Tali as their closer companions throughout the adventure, and grew to like them more. I remember entertaining conversions about the fun and freaky prospects of a relationship with more
alien aliens, of the interesting ideas of how a relationship would work.
When ME2 launched, there was no confirmation of which characters showing up would be romance options or not. Hell, a character like Garrus wasn't even confirmed to be a permanent party member going into the game (isn't that crazy?) and none of the marketing showed him in during the Suicide Run.
So as I played through the game and in my initial playthrough, I did feel that sort of intrigue popping up when I bumped back into Tali. Yeah, I realized, I did like her more than my last hook-up with Ashley. Tali seemed stronger, more capable, more well-defined and developed as a character, but I still wasn't convinced Bioware would permit a less-traditional hook-up compared to the more standard fare. But as I progressed... well, I started to smile when I saw her goof and accidentally express interest.
The reason something like this really made me happy - beyond just having a fan-favorite character from ME1 jump from comrade to love interest - was that Tali in particular was a character that was designed wearing a mask and a full-body suit, with three fingers and chicken legs. Unlike a character like Miranda who had the benefit of being "genetically perfect" (and being, you know,
Yvonne Strahovski ), any real interest in her was mostly generated through the strength of her writing and voice acting, because without easily readable expressions or overt sexually appealing physical traits that was all players had to go on.
But through the sheer strength of that writing, Tali grew to become one of my favorite teammates and my default love interest (and every playthrough as MaleShep where I tell myself I'll play differently, I always end up back with her). It was a weird romance - one that was at times goofy, ridiculous, awkward, uncomfortable, but at its heart driven more by the bonds of trust and respect than sheer physical attraction. It was honest.
ME2 didn't knock every romance out of the park ("heavy risk, but the priiiiize"), but the strength of the relationships between Shepard and new characters - be they Miranda, Jack, Thane, Garrus, or Tali - seemed a step above the mere flirty banter from ME1, where the benefit of a previous adventure certainly made those romancing Garrus or Tali feel like it was worth it to play the long game. It wasn't perfect (and ME3 continued to do better), but it's almost bizarre to replay ME1 and find the romance options there so very vanilla and restrictive.
Knowing that characters like Jack were planned to be pansexual and that Jacob could've been a gay romance option stings a bit, because ME2 was already a step up, and it could've been an even bigger one.