Mass Effect 3: Extended Cut is not victory.

[Iwata]

*sighs*

Well, I guess nothing is going to please you then.

Honestly, would it have earned them any more respect if they changed the ending from where it stands? I don't think they should change it, just give a bit more explanation on the events that happened and some more insight into what happened to the characters. And from what I gather, that's exactly what this is setting out to do. If they explain everything well, I don't think they should change the ending at all. I wish the indoctrination theory was true, because it would more easily allow for further continuations of the game, but as it stands I think an explanation is the best thing that they could offer without changing the ending just because we say so.

People are going to complain no matter what, so maybe they should just ignore everyone anyway.

What she said. At this point, I just want this to be over and done with so people can stop whinning and go back to playing games.

 

[Limecake]

What she said. At this point, I just want this to be over and done with so people can stop whinning and go back to playing games.

I'm fairly confident that most of the reasonable RME members consider the fact that EA/Bioware is going to add closure to the final few minutes a victory.

I've heard a lot of people comment that they simply wanted closure on what happened to the aliens/teammates/reapers/shep. I assume those people are now satisfied and the other half of the 'movement' were thinking something completely different when they wanted a 'better ending'.

Just be happy that EA/Bioware won't be charging for it, they are working for free to make you (the fans) happy. It still not enough?

EA may as well go all-out evil now, apparently no matter what they do they won't make people happy.

 

[Whateveralot]

Alright, something that annoyed me for quite a while now.

"Everyone starves to death".

Really, guys?

Quarian lifeships are in orbit of earth. Generally speaking, they kept these way behind of the rest of the fleet. In fact, the Quarian fleet warped in as one of the latest fleet in the battle, so they wouldn't be as damaged as they would of normally.

So, the lifeships could possibly quite easily sustain whatever there's left of the population.

Just my speculation, but it's very likely explanation.


BUT

I think the guy in the vid (I don't even remember his name) has no credibility any more. Let's blame EA...yeaaa.... Also, he's blinded by fanrage.

 

[Legion]

People honestly expected Bioware to have the balls to admit that they screwed up the ending? When they have EA as their publishers?

I don't buy this whole 'EA' are evil crap, but their priority is profit and profit alone, they will never admit they made mistakes, and they will always speak in PR double-speak to try and make it sound like they are a company that cares what we think.

Personally I have stopped caring for the most part. Mass Effect is shelved and I am going back to games that had some proper effort put into them, made by companies that know what the fuck they are doing.

The best thing to come from Mass Effect 3 is that I am finally getting into Skyrim, whereas before I never could.

 

[SajuukKhar]

People honestly expected Bioware to have the balls to admit that they screwed up the ending? When they have EA as their publishers?

I don't buy this whole 'EA' are evil crap, but their priority is profit and profit alone, they will never admit they made mistakes, and they will always speak in PR double-speak to try and make it sound like they are a company that cares what we think.

Personally I have stopped caring for the most part. Mass Effect is shelved and I am going back to games that had some proper effort put into them, made by companies that know what the fuck they are doing.

Yes because admitting several times how much they fucked up on Da2 is not admitting to their mistakes?

 

[Legion]

People honestly expected Bioware to have the balls to admit that they screwed up the ending? When they have EA as their publishers?

I don't buy this whole 'EA' are evil crap, but their priority is profit and profit alone, they will never admit they made mistakes, and they will always speak in PR double-speak to try and make it sound like they are a company that cares what we think.

Personally I have stopped caring for the most part. Mass Effect is shelved and I am going back to games that had some proper effort put into them, made by companies that know what the fuck they are doing.

Yes because admitting several times how much they fucked up on Da2 is not admitting to their mistakes?

They did not learn from it though, did they.They still rushed out another game, full of bugs and incoherent plot-lines.

They still made another game where they promised X, Y and Z and did not deliver them.

And actually, from my experience on the Bioware forums, they always denied any mistakes. They told the fans to more or less get over any dislikes, and in other cases they repeatedly stated that people were mad as a knee-jerk reaction, and so they need to cool off before criticising the game.

I would very much like links to them admitting mistakes were made (genuinely), because from what I have experienced, they never have. Not without using PR talk ("We can see why some people might not like it" etc.)

 

[Drago-Morph]

What did you expect? Honestly.

They would've lost their face completely if they actually knuckled under and changed the ending outright, they were never even thinking to do that.

Best we could've hoped for was a last renegade/paragon option to let the battle make its course, but everything else was, CLEARLY, going to stay.

Plotholes included.

I'm not happy with this, but then again what were they supposed to do? If they did cave, the rest of the industry's foot would've lodged itself so far up their collective ass they would've felt the heel rubbing the back of their throat. It was the only logical outcome. Honestly ,at least we will get a semi-decent ending cinematic. And i doubt anyone will seriously consider buying any DLC to further enrich the experience leading up to the shitty ending nobody likes, so the market has spoken on that.

Let's just hope Bioware employees start running and creating new companies soon, so EA will only have a meaningless brand name in their hands, for them to completely run into the ground.

And on the subject of indoctrination theory, I want to get something off my chest:

You people sound like those FF8 fans that couldn't accept that, yeah, final fantasy often makes no sense, and came up with that pipedream of an explanation about how Squall clearly dies during the assassination attempt and the rest of the plot if actually just him delirious in the moments before his death. That is retarded, and so is indoctrination theory.

"But it is consistent and it would explain the plotholes and blahblahblah!" You know what also explains all of those? Stupidity. Kerpyshyn was booted off the project, he was the only one with a shred of an idea on how to end the series, Hudson decided he was going to make his masterpiece and fuck what anyone else thought and voilà, the perfect storm of stupid. Humans are hardwired to see patterns, regardless of there actually being patterns to see.

I understand that it is more comfortable an idea, dealing with a brilliant trickster rather than an honest fool, but NOBODY woul go to those lenghts to fuck with the public, especially when they've got that big a shitstorm on their hands.

And even if it turns out that indoctrination theory is right, i will bet my ass and that of anyone who happens to be in the same room as me at the time the DLC comes out that they adopted it after you people came up with it. Which they will not do, because it's even worse than Shamalayan's shitty twist endings.

They made a shitty ending because they couldn't be arsed to do a proper one. There is no great plan. Deal with it.

This is what I continue to not understand. Who cares if BioWare intended the "Indoctrination Theory" or not? They gave us a nonsensical ending riddled with plot-holes. The Indoctrination Theory was clearly not intended by BioWare, but it does function as a consistent and logical explanation of the events that we're given in the game, whereas the writers did not provide one. Whether or not it is "official" is meaningless; if the "official" ending doesn't make sense and the fan ending does, then the one that makes sense is more valid to the fictional world than the one that doesn't. That's it, end of story. In the Mass Effect fictional universe, the Indoctrination Theory is more credible than BioWare's ending, and as such we can treat it as the real plotline (if we choose to) over BioWare's ending until BioWare adequately explains their own plot. Who introduced both concepts it irrelevant; the only thing that matter is which one makes sense in-universe.

 

[Awexsome]

It is a victory. That's not even a question. People wanted Bioware to respond to their discontent with the ending and they got them to work and put time into trying to improve it and release it for free like everyone wanted. It might not win the war for some people but to say that anything gained doesn't matter unless everything I want goes my way... well it would back up the valid entitlement accusations thrown at the movement.

What amazes me more is how much a lot of people think they deliberately screwed up and act like the phenomenal writing of the other 29 hours 50 minutes of the game didn't happen. They wanted to do more with the ending than just give it a cliche' outcome and ended up fucking it up. Whether that's the fault of the whole team or allegedly the leader guy who wanted his vision we don't know for sure.

As for one of the plotholes that just kinda bugs me when people complain... everyone does know the ships have FTL travel right? All the races can go back to their own worlds only it'll take longer than with a Mass Relay. Sure it'll probably take days, weeks, or even months to travel across the galaxy but they're not stuck in the solar system like modern humans are now guys.

We already know communication can be done pretty much instantaneously with that new Normandy system so everyone's not gonna live in isolation.

Well aside from that topic I did wish in hindsight they just took the ending everyone could've seen coming, but really wanted. High war assets - Reapers defeated by the crucible (as a weapon not some magic space lamp) Low war assests - Reapers win. Cycle continues, bad ending. Let this be a reminder to people who tend to jump on cliche's in game stories quickly as flaws. As a certain website says... tropes are tools.

 

[Vuljatar]

A goddamn DLC cutscene that fixes nothing about the ending and precludes the only theory that allowed the ending to not suck?

 

[SajuukKhar]

They did not learn from it though, did they.They still rushed out another game, full of bugs and incoherent plot-lines.

They still made another game where they promised X, Y and Z and did not deliver them.

And actually, from my experience on the Bioware forums, they always denied any mistakes. They told the fans to more or less get over any dislikes, and in other cases they repeatedly stated that people were mad as a knee-jerk reaction, and so they need to cool off before criticising the game.

I would very much like links to them admitting mistakes were made (genuinely), because from what I have experienced, they never have. Not without using PR talk ("We can see why some people might not like it" etc.)

Mass effect 3 wasn't really rushed, it had a ending change at the last minute, large difference.

Secondly most games say they are gonna do X Y and Z and end up not doing themm especially in RPG world.

thirdly http://www.computerandvideogames.com/303679/bioware-admits-dragon-age-faults-discusses-the-future/
"Commenting on the forum, Gaider said: "I am absolutely aware of the concerns voiced here. Issues like level re-use, the implementation of wave combat, concerns about the narrative and significance of choice and so on have all been not only noted, but examined, inspected and even aided me (and many, many others on the team) in formulating future plans."

He adds: "Further, I'm not only aware of the concerns, but I agree that there are aspects of DA II that not only can but must be improved in future installments. And that is precisely our intent.""

 

[Thammuz]

This is what I continue to not understand. Who cares if BioWare intended the "Indoctrination Theory" or not? They gave us a nonsensical ending riddled with plot-holes. The Indoctrination Theory was clearly not intended by BioWare, but it does function as a consistent and logical explanation of the events that we're given in the game, whereas the writers did not provide one. Whether or not it is "official" is meaningless; if the "official" ending doesn't make sense and the fan ending does, then the one that makes sense is more valid to the fictional world than the one that doesn't. That's it, end of story. In the Mass Effect fictional universe, the Indoctrination Theory is more credible than BioWare's ending, and as such we can treat it as the real plotline (if we choose to) over BioWare's ending until BioWare adequately explains their own plot. Who introduced both concepts it irrelevant; the only thing that matter is which one makes sense in-universe.

On that reasoning then, who cares about the ending? Who cares about the plot? Why can't i pretend that Shepard was saving the galaxy from the Emperor and his space marines, instead of the reapers?

Sure, you can make your own shit up. You can make better shit up. What you honestly can't think is that made up shit without recognition will ever be satisfying. Sure, you can pretend that shepard was indoctrinated, what you will know, however, all along, is that he really wasn't. he was just a victim of bad writing.

Also, If you do that, you should also take into account that whenever this setting gets expanded upon you will have to either accept the shitty official version or stay away from anything Mass Effect that takes the ending into account.

So yeah, you can make shit up, if you're good enough at self deception. I, on the other hand, will just accept that sometimes an ending will suck and get on with my life. It takes too much effort pretending this is not just the fans trying desperately to make sense of something that does not.

 

[ralfy]

It's not an issue of most games "say they are gonna do X Y Z," it's ensuring that C&Cs made throughout the game affect the ending. That's been an integral part of the "RPG world."

 

[JediMB]

Mass Effect 3 doesn't need an Extended Cut.

It needs a Renegade Version [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highlander_II:_The_Quickening#Home_video_releases].

Okay, let's not say things we can't take back. ME3 had a cruddy ending. Highlander II completely sodomized a series within the first 30 minutes. ANY comparison between the two is unnecessary.

He means it needs to be recut, he`s not comparing it to Highlander 2. Highlander 2 had a fanmade recut that made the plot make sense and removed all the continuity errors. He`s just saying make a recut of ME3 thats more renegade.

Indeed. Like Highlander II was recut to remove all references to aliens, ME3 needs to be recut to remove all references to the Star Child (and that entire final area).

Most of the other problems can be fixed if the game simply attempts to explain the inconsistencies... although it would also benefit from a few entirely new cutscenes to make the Citadel-napping less illogical and the state of your fleet more accurately represented.

And, of course, the game needs that proper epilogue.

EDIT: Also, "Renegade Version" just makes so much sense as a subtitle for a Mass Effect recut. That or "Paragon Version", of course.

Okay, that epilogue you just mentioned? First FEASIBLE request I've really seen and it's one I can really get behind. I'm not really sure why Bioware stopped making them after Jade Empire, but it would make for a good bit of closure.

While it may be the only "feasible" request, an epilogue on its own doesn't do any good if the ending preceding it doesn't make sense.

 

[Kermi]

I'm fine with the ending as is. I'd prefer Bioware not waste their time appealing to the vocal minority who will never be satisfied regardless.

 

[JediMB]

It is a victory. That's not even a question. People wanted Bioware to respond to their discontent with the ending and they got them to work and put time into trying to improve it and release it for free like everyone wanted. It might not win the war for some people but to say that anything gained doesn't matter unless everything I want goes my way... well it would back up the valid entitlement accusations thrown at the movement.

They're basically responding to pages upon pages of criticism and analysis with a condescending "oh, you just don't understand the ending, so let us clarify."

The Extended Cut would be all fine and dandy if the problem with the original ending was in its delivery... rather than the completely broken premise.

 

[Something Amyss]

At this point i just want the subject to die in a hole.

And complaining about it is SURE to make it go away.

 

[Avatar Roku]

snip

I felt the same way, but then I encountered these Fan-made epilogue slides [http://shannon.users.sonic.net/masseffect/] which really made me feel a lot better about the whole thing.

I think I can give Extended Cut a chance.

 

[IamGamer41]

This whole thing says more about the fans of the series than the company that made it. We saw this occur earlier in the year when the Mass Effect book was released and there was a petition to change various lore issues that were discovered.

Contributing to fandom does not inherently provide the consumer with creative rights to a given product. This is especially true of "art forms" which, I think, most Mass Effect fans would argue the video game is aspiring towards. Consumerism simply provides the ability to consume the product.

If you don't like the product, the only recourse you have is to ask for a refund.

This basic fact is altogether missing in the hive-mind that encapsulates the Mass Effect fan base.

Kinda hard to ask for your money back when its the end of the game.Like getting a refund of a cheese burger at Burger King after your ate 90% of it because you didn't like the heartburn if gave you.

 

[370999]

Yes because admitting several times how much they fucked up on Da2 is not admitting to their mistakes?

Can I ask where please?

It is a very poor solution to the problem but I think this is the best we are going to get. Which is a shame as, IMHO, 20 years from now when people are talking about the Mass effect series, they are always going to mention the horrible, horrible ending.

But meh, who knows, the ending could be great. I really doubt that but whatever.

EDIT: God I'm stupid.

 

[IamGamer41]

They did not learn from it though, did they.They still rushed out another game, full of bugs and incoherent plot-lines.

They still made another game where they promised X, Y and Z and did not deliver them.

And actually, from my experience on the Bioware forums, they always denied any mistakes. They told the fans to more or less get over any dislikes, and in other cases they repeatedly stated that people were mad as a knee-jerk reaction, and so they need to cool off before criticising the game.

I would very much like links to them admitting mistakes were made (genuinely), because from what I have experienced, they never have. Not without using PR talk ("We can see why some people might not like it" etc.)

Mass effect 3 wasn't really rushed, it had a ending change at the last minute, large difference.

Secondly most games say they are gonna do X Y and Z and end up not doing themm especially in RPG world.

thirdly http://www.computerandvideogames.com/303679/bioware-admits-dragon-age-faults-discusses-the-future/
"Commenting on the forum, Gaider said: "I am absolutely aware of the concerns voiced here. Issues like level re-use, the implementation of wave combat, concerns about the narrative and significance of choice and so on have all been not only noted, but examined, inspected and even aided me (and many, many others on the team) in formulating future plans."

He adds: "Further, I'm not only aware of the concerns, but I agree that there are aspects of DA II that not only can but must be improved in future installments. And that is precisely our intent.""

This maybe all well and good but fans are going to question them regardless.Bringing up all the failed promises of Mass Effect 3.A lot of them are going to be leery about buying it and I'm guessing will wait a few weeks before picking it up if at all.