Years ago I had someone tell me that I was a romantic. Not the "ooooh flowers leading to champagne and candles" sort of romantic but the sort of person that gravitates towards either idealized concepts or stories that bleed into your imagination and let it run away. At the time I thought it was a small complement and nothing more. As I've grown since then I've found that it is less of a compliment and more of an observation. IE: "You've got jam on your shirt".
Thinking back on it I feel kind of dumb because it is that blindingly obvious that I am a romantic. From the games and movies I enjoy to the books and music. It is no more mysterious than when someone cold reads an audience and finds that someone knew someone who died recently, ala psychics. Just someone picking up the clues and putting two and two together. Does it lessen my enjoyment of fantastical things? HEAVENS NO. It just means that I can recognize a pattern.
In that vein I'd like to talk about the Romantic movement in art. (1800-1850ish)
This period was defined by people breaking rules or telling more obtuse stories in their pictures. Something that by the virtue of a pose and some props would allow the viewer to ponder upon what may be happening or just be lost in the spectacle. This is probably best illustrated by Caspar David Friedrich's painting "Wanderer above the Sea of Fog"
Apparently the French enjoyed showing doomed heroes or useless struggles.
Both paintings, in their way and just by the virtue of being, tell a similar story but the kicker as with most Romantic art is that you choose that story. Maybe that is why I like Mass Effect. We might know where it goes, but how it gets there is up to us. I don't know. I think I may be done for today.
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