Commander Shepard (Paragon)

""We have to give everything, even if that means our lives. We will stop, at nothing. We will fight...for the lost!""

- Commander Shepard in the Mass Effect 2 trailer

""This war has brought us pain and suffering...and loss. But it's also brought us together; as soldiers, allies...friends. This bond that ties us together is something the Reapers will never understand. It's more powerful than any weapon, stronger than any ship. It can't be taken or destroyed. The next few hours will decide the fate of everyone in the galaxy. Every mother, every son, every unborn child. They're trusting you, depending on you to win them their future. A future free from the threat of the Reapers. But take heart; look around you: you're not in this fight alone. We face our enemy together. And together, we will defeat them!""

- Commander Shepard giving one last speech before the final battle in Mass Effect 3.

Commander Shepard is the main protagonist of the Mass Effect video game series. He/she is assigned in the Normandy as the leader of his/her own squad. His/her appearance appearance and skills can be customized depending on the player. The male counterpart is voiced by Mark Meer while the female counterpart is voiced by Jennifer Hale.

Mass Effect
Shepard is a soldier in service of the Citadel Alliance. His/her background depends on how the player selected him, he/she could be born Spacer, Colonist or on Earth, with a psychology also chosen by the player, be it a War Hero, Sole Survivor or Ruthless.

His/her journney started at the ship Normandy, still serving under the ship owner Captain Anderson, as he/she was sent into Eden Prime to investigate a strange beacon. The strange beacon turned out to belong to the ancient race Prothean and brought a vague warning of the Reaper invasion. In the same mission, rogue Spectre Saren Arterius killed his fellow Spectre Nihlus, and Shepard was assigned to eventually hunt down Saren and bring him to justice, inheriting the Normandy and becoming a Commander. Shepard gathered many friends of different species, aside of fellow humans Kaidan Alenko and Ashley Williams, also Krogan Urdnot Wrex, Turian Garrus Vakarian, Quarian Tali'zorah nar Rayya and Asari Dr. Liara T'soni.

Throughout the journey, Shepard faced many adversaries and was forced to make many sacrifices, but eventually he/she found out that Saren was indoctrinated by the Reaper Sovereign, his ship. Using Saren, the Reaper made the invasion to the Citadel, and Shepard followed through with the Normandy, defeating Saren and Sovereign. On the victory against those two, Shepard left off to space, knowing that the Reaper threat was very real and they needed to prepare. However, the Citadel disguised his/her actions as mere scouting missions to wipe out the Geth.

Mass Effect 2
During a certain patrol, the Normandy was attacked by surprise by a ship used by the Collectors, which destroyed the ship and Shepard lost his life. His/her remnants were brought by a pro-human terrorist organization, Cerberus, and reconstructed under the surveilance of Cerberus operative Miranda Lawson, the reconstruction was well-done and Shepard returned to what he/she was with nearly nothing missing, in a span of two years. After escaping the facility where he woke up, due to a traitor activity, Shepard met with the Cerberus leader The Illusive Man, who revived him to investigate many colonies with human inhabitants missing mysteriously. It was there Shepard learned the existence of the Collectors.

Shepard was assigned by Cerberus to investigate what was the Collectors doing, also given dossiers of people to recruit, which surprisingly include two familiar faces: Garrus and Tali, along with a new reconstructed Normandy. The rest of his/her friends were either busy with their own activities or refused to join Shepard as he aligned himself with Cerberus. Eventually, Shepard learned another thing, the Collectors were actually the Prothean turned into servants of the Reaper, this time under the Reaper Harbinger.

On a mission, the Collectors attacked Normandy again and abducted most of its crewmembers. Shepard rushed to their rescue and along the way, destroyed the Reapers' attempt to create a Human Reaper. He/she destroyed the Collector Ship despite the Illusive Man convincing him that he/she shouldn't, showing his opportunist side, or alternatively, he could also follow the Illusive Man's advice.

Mass Effect 3
After the battle with the Collectors, Shepard returned to the Alliance, convicted and put in house arrest on Earth due to his/her allegiance with Cerberus and also being forced to sacrifice the Batarian space to prevent the Reaper's arrival. During a summoning, the Reapers attacked Earth, forcing Shepard to retreat and seek help through the Citadel to bring help to Earth and quell the Reaper threat now that his/her warnings came true. However, Cerberus stood opposed to him/her now, as the Illusive Man's goals now oppose him/her.

Through many hardships and even sacrifices, Shepard managed to unite the various races across the galaxy and stood ready to face the Reapers thanks to their newly recovered weapon left behind by the Protheans: the Crucible. Making his/her way to the Crucible's core within the Citadel, he/she was confronted by the one directing the Reaper, the Catalyst. The Catalyst admitted that he would accept whatever Shepard decided to do: Destroy the Reapers, sacrifice his/her life to control them, or merge his/her DNA with the Reapers, turning everyone into a new species. At any rate, whatever Shepard decided, the Reaper's threat was quelled.

Or Shepard could refuse to play by the Catalyst's rules of defeat and died fighting the Reapers. In that case, it turned out that as a fail-safe, Shepard has ordered Liara to create a message about how to defeat the Reapers to be sent to the next cycle of life, in which the species from the next cycle would build the Crucible in an earlier time and defeated the Reaper before things went out of control.