Ranking Every Mass Effect Squadmate Ever
I’m Commander Shepard, but who’s the best squadmate on the Citadel?
Across the four Mass Effect games, there have been some absolutely amazing characters to choose from. While the original trilogy got more love from the fanbase, Andromeda was better than initial coverage of the buggy face animation suggests. All in all, there were 25 permanent squadmates to choose from.
While fans will always have their individual favourites and individual reasons for ranking, this list takes into account general popularity, impact on the story, gameplay led by the characters (loyalty missions and the like) as well as their effectiveness in battle. Only permanent, selectable squadmates count; no one-offs like Aria T'Loak or non-combat crewmates like Samantha Traynor. No Jenkins either, given that he unavoidably dies three minutes into the first mission.
That still leaves a huge roster though; some that span entire arcs and some that are only by your side a short while, yet still manage to garner a huge connection with players. Ranking characters is always a slightly contentious issue, given how subjective it is. But with Mass Effect, some players will view a low ranking for one of their favourites as deep, personal scorn, so don't forget to leave your own rankings in the comments below!
25. Jacob
Someone has to be last, and honestly there won’t be too many objections here. Jacob’s loyalty mission is one of the darkest Mass Effect has ever done, but that’s pretty much all he has in his favour.
He’s like one of those army men toys kids play with; regurgitating the same, bland lines over and over, always ready for combat with no real motivation. The Alliance soldier who defected to Cerberus definitely offers some intrigue, but the game proceeds to do precisely nothing with it in a very un-BioWare way.
They have another bite at the cherry with James Vega, and by injecting him with a lot more personality, made a much more memorable character.
He’s not helped by gameplay either. Shepherd can be any of six classes, but the most popular choice renders Jacob surplus to requirements. Being one of the two default squadmates in ME2, he doesn’t even get a recruitment mission, and in ME3 they can’t seem to write him out of the story fast enough.
Mass Effect doesn’t have any truly bad squadmates. It just doesn’t have 25 great ones either.