Mass Effect 3: It's not the endings, its the final battle (And synthesis)

[JellySlimerMan]

The element of surprise is gone after Shepard finds out their plans and thwarts them. We find out that conventional arms actually do work against the reapers; Sovereign may not have even been able to take the Citadel without a Geth army supporting him.

Ah yes, overlooking the fact that Sovereign was able to soak up fleets' worth of damage while decimating everything in its way, and was only brought down by "conventional arms" because the destruction of Saren's husk which Sovereign was controlling disabled the Reaper. Which, as it so happens, is a flaw they have apparently rectified, according to the Codex of Mass Effect 3.

If you're going to put this much effort into writing a rant, you should probably verify your information before you spout a rant which falls apart in the first few sentences.

And once again, you make no mention of the people that told you before that there are weapons that CAN destroy Reapers but never mentioned what happened to those, or we are using them at all:

A few examples presented after the death of Sovereing and the research of his body by ME2 are:

1)The Thanix Cannons, that can ignore all shields and by the time of ME3, they have been already mass produced by all ships. Do they work or not? we never get info about it

2)The Klendagon Weapon. It killed The Derelict Reaper so it means that having more of those would be great. We get the mentioned in passing that the weapon was defunct, but that doesnt excuse the idea of at least research it to see if we can reproduce the same results.
http://masseffect.wikia.com/wiki/Klendagon

3)Cain. We killed a Spider Reaper in London with that thing in a single shoot. Why we dont use it more often? at least to kill the Spider Reapers on ground battles.

Also, if the plot wasnt railroady in ME2, we could have the option of researching The Derelict Reaper. And if THAT isnt enough, then at least it would have been logical to research the Spider Reaper on Rannoch on ME3, too see what can penetrate its shields and armors (and make one of those for our own)

Or even BETTER!! why not use the Geth Virtual Reality Machine of ME3?? research if there is a way to use it to infiltrate the Reaper hive mind (or the Catalyst, who is the collective intelligence of all Reapers) and shoot down their code to leave them braindead and easy to kill.

 

[JellySlimerMan]

SNIP

You know what else is wrong in the final battle? the cutscene of the fleet fighting the Reapers makes it look like the shoot missed the Reapers and kept going until they hit Earth (11:43):


CONGLATURATION!! YOU HAVE COMPLETED A GREAT GAME. AND BLEW UP EARTH FOR GREAT JUSTICE. NOW GO AND REST OUR HEROES!"

They could have probably fixed the whole ending by not cutting Javik out and selling him as day-one DLC. The original plan was that Javik was the Catalyst, which sounds a whole lot better than space kid.

And I'm going to take a guess and say that you have no proof of this because it's complete bull invented as an excuse to complain, just like everything else ending-crybabies whine about.

You mean this?

http://www.holdtheline.com/threads/datamining-the-trilogy-aka-things-that-were-cut.2073/
http://rabidgames.wordpress.com/2012/04/23/mass-effect-3-the-leaked-story-and-the-final-plot/
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Trivia/MassEffect3
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/WhatCouldHaveBeen/MassEffect

It all there in your game, if you are willing to datamine it to prove US wrong. But of course that will never happen. Delucions are easily shattered.

 

[risue]

Ive said this quite a few times.. The biggest misstep that Bioware took was making the point of Mass Effect 3 to save Earth. They took a game that was built off of the idea that the galaxy is bigger than any one thing, and then turned it into a "aliens are attacking earth, stop them" game. I think it would have been intersting if the "fight for earth" happened about midway through the game, and it was a fight that could not be won.

 

[Olas]

I disagree, I liked the ending the way it was.

It would have been pretty cheesy and contrived of them to try and shoehorn every noteworthy (surviving) Mass Effect character into the ending somewhere just to try and make them all seem important and integral in some way. The Mass Effect series has enough of that fluffy stuff already. It made sense in ME2 to include them all somewhere because you were working together as a small covert team, but in ME3 it was the entire galaxy fighting at once in a huge multi-front war. It was already implied that all the (surviving) characters up to that point were helping out in the fight somewhere.

It would have been unnecessary too, each (surviving) character already had their story arc brought to a conclusion at some point during the actual game (several of which dying in the process). In fact, the body of ME3 was largely about tying up loose ends and wrapping up each character so that the final act could be just about the reapers. It's convenient enough that Shepherd runs into every (surviving) character he knows somewhere during the course of ME3, bringing them all back yet again would just be overkill. Besides, the game does throw you a bone, you get to have one last chat and say goodbye to each (surviving) character via the vidcom before going off to your final confrontation. While feeling a bit forced, it doesn't break the realism too much.

You may also notice I keep emphasizing that this applies to the "surviving" characters. That's because by the end of Mass Effect 3 there's no saying who's still alive and who's dead. While having all the surviving characters play a final role would be a nice reward for keeping them alive, it's just not very practical for the writers to have to sort through that enormous mess. At the end of ME2 they knew for a fact that everyone in your squad was still alive, but at the end of ME3 they have no such guarantees. Perhaps they could still have made it work, it would still seem unfair to characters like Thane who wouldn't get to show up.

I agree with you on the Synthesis part though.

 

[JellySlimerMan]

But I've heard plenty of people (some in GameInformer, some elsewhere) that believe the EC was the worst possible thing BioWare could've done. I personally think it does more good than whatever harm some people think it may have done.

They probably say that because people still believe that there is any integrity left on Bioware. That its the same Bioware that made Baldurs Gate and KOTOR, who can do no wrong and never fuck up a plot. Therefore, the fans are making bullshit up because they are entitled (It seems like An Appeal to Tradition. Since BW always made good plots before, they couldnt possible have fucked up this hard. Therefore, its not their fault)

Well, I suppose to clarify, I'm not directly getting stuff from the game, I last played a month ago, what-not. The implications I got from what I believe I remember him saying, is what I mean. Regardless. From what I remember, he said he was created by the creators of the Reapers. I didn't interpret the "embody the collective intelligence of all Reapers" part as being a part OF them, or one OF them. I took it more as you would a database. A computer may have information on other computers, doesn't mean it IS those computers.
On second thought, though, I realize that was a rush of the moment interpretation during the game. But regardless of his alignment with/against/neutral towards the Reapers, I firmly stand by the opinion that he ISN'T one.

As for the "we" thing, 1) We could start using "we" whenever we want, doesn't mean we're the Reapers. 2) The Geth use we, doesn't mean THEY are Reapers. Likewise for him. The Geth/Legion used "we", the Reapers use "we", it stands to reason that an A.I. that encompasses the whole of THE CITADEL would have several smaller programs, and would refer to itself as "we" to be technically correct.

Catalyst: Harness the Crucible's energy. Use it to take control of the ones you call the Reapers.
Sheperd: So the Illusive Man was right.
Catalyst: Correct... though he could never have taken control, as we already controlled him.


"WE" already control him. TIM was indoctrinated by the Reapers >> Catalyst is the collective intelligence of the Reapers AND uses "WE" suggesting more than one entity (plural) related to having TIM controlled >>> Catalyst IS the Reapers or part of them, who also control TIM by extension.

Secondly, the video doesn't say he (Starchild) blew up the Crucible, intentionally or not.

I know, it sucks when its only text on the screen that its even MORE ambigous than the ending itself. But since the Reapers tried to blow the Crusible up before it docks, AND the options of endings are more limited the more damage it takes, its easy to assume that they finished the job (even when they really shouldnt since this is the ideal solution to their problem)

 

[JellySlimerMan]

Machines aren't necessarily known for being flexible in strategy, as practically every Machine Vs. Man sci-fi has implied ever, such as Battlestar Galactica (and I'm talking about the original, not the remake).

I know you arent going to reply but i will forget if i dont do it now.

Why WOUDN'T the machines wont be flexible with strategies? arent they the BEST in taking perfectly logical decitions based on empirical data and execute it in efficient ways?

Also, isnt using a cliche of Machine Vs Man of OTHER Sci Fi a form of headcannon?? all works must be self contained, meaning that we must evaluate the work tropes on its own rather than assume that its just copypasta other people efforts. We need to look at the narrative of ME itself that shows the audience if the machines arent flexible as all.

So far, before the writting of ME2 and ME3 took place, the Reapers where pretty self sufficient and pretty adaptable to their situations.

 

[blaize2010]

The up spin of all this, though, is that the Catalyst is a Reaper. It's entirely possible it lied about a whole bunch of stuff. After all, with high enough EMS, Shepard survives. And, though we don't see any geth, or EDI, in the summary slideshow, we also don't hear any confirmation they died. So it's pretty easy for me to watch the destroy ending, see Shepard and the crew all survive and imagine that the geth at the very least made it too. EDI is an acceptable sacrifice for that ending, much as I grew to like her in 3.

Claiming the Catalyst is a Reaper despite it being blatantly obvious that the Catalyst is not "a Reaper" simply so one can pretend it is unreliable and that there really isn't any price to pay in the Destroy ending.

*facepalm*

This is the message that game developers might get from ending-bashers: if you make a game where victory through sacrifice is a major theme from the beginning to the end, then people will like that theme up until the very last moment when they will hate it just because it spoiled their sunshine-and-flowers happy ending.

But did the spacekid not specifically state that his group created the reapers? I mean, that wouldn't make him a reaper, but it would make him pretty damn close. I think that is what he means.

 

[jawz13]

The Synthesis ending was my favorite ending...I rather liked the third game despite any flaws it had.
The second will always be my favorite, but the hate ME3 gets will always baffle me.

 

[King Billi]

Can I pose a question concerning the future?

Suppose for a second that the Mass Effect Trilogy is forever remembered beyond today as a landmark series and a classic epic for years to come.
Now if that happens then will Mass Effect 3 be forever held as the weakest link in the series with an ending so bad that it very nearly tainted the reputation of its precursors..?

Or is it more likely that future generations will look at this game and wonder what the hell everyones problem with it was? Will peoples(Not entirely invalid) complaints still be relevant then?

Alot of people are citing overblown hype and developer promises as major issues since it raised expectations to an unbelievable level for alot of people except the thing is that these issues only become less and less significant as time goes on, a young future gamer won't have any of this business affecting their experience. They may be aware of its reputation but will they really be able to hold the same point of view?

Have you never seen a film from years ago and wondered just how it got its reputation for being either good or bad? Was the first audience to ever watch Citizen Kane in 1941 the sole authority for how it was to be recieved in years to come?

 

[JellySlimerMan]

The Synthesis ending was my favorite ending...I rather liked the third game despite any flaws it had.
The second will always be my favorite, but the hate ME3 gets will always baffle me.

Just a simple question: What kind of complains have you seen on part of the fans regarding the ending AND the series.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

I recently went through Mass Effect 3 again, and yada yada problems with the plot and crap aside it's still a good game in my eyes. Except for one thing, the final hour, but not for the reasons you think. Allow me to explain.

To me the biggest disappointment as it stands right now is the battle for Earth. Sure, starchild is an annoying turd but I can deal with him, he's not the worst thing to happen to the series he's bearable.

But what really gets me is that there is no pay off on Earth. Jacks students aren't keeping my barriers up, I don't see grunt and wrex charge over a hill into a group of reapers, the rachni don't kill their indoctrinated cousins, Zaeed doesn't shoot a few enemies while muttering something about "guddaam bastads"

In short, there is no big moment with your friends. And that hurts because when you come down to it the entire series was about forging friendships and alliances to defeat a huge threat. Yet at the end all we got was the Alliance with a few other token members of the races added in fighting.

To me that's the biggest disappointment, not the starchild, not buzz aldrin (Though I'll get to him) its the lack of god damn pay off.

100% agree about all of this, in the final "battle" it felt like not a damn thing i did made a heap of difference in the gameplay portion of it, they could've at least visually SHOWN something, hell if you ended up getting killed/KO'd, they could've had it cut to a cutscene where *insert closest ally here* rushes in and saves you like a boss and a mixed squad of your new allies comes zerg rushing in to mow down the wave you just lost to.

also, i'm doing another playthrough right now myself after not touching the game since last may, and i am actually enjoying the game a fair bit, but that's because i'm completely turning my brain off for the story part, and more or less just enjoying the combat/defeating asshole cerberus/reapers. Also, installed a mod that gives a much better ending, so a bit excited to see how that plays out.

 

[DioWallachia]

Can I pose a question concerning the future?

Suppose for a second that the Mass Effect Trilogy is forever remembered beyond today as a landmark series and a classic epic for years to come.
Now if that happens then will Mass Effect 3 be forever held as the weakest link in the series with an ending so bad that it very nearly tainted the reputation of its precursors..?

Or is it more likely that future generations will look at this game and wonder what the hell everyones problem with it was? Will peoples(Not entirely invalid) complaints remain relevant?

I will leave this here and demostrate that the weakest link isnt the ending, nor ME3, its the whole series. Dont believe me? then enjoy the view:

http://www.youtube.com/user/smudboy/videos

Alot of people are citing overblown hype and developer promises as major issues since it raised expectations to an unbelievable level for alot of people except the thing is that these issues only become less and less significant as time goes on, a young future gamer won't have any of this business affecting their experience. They may be aware of its reputation but will they really have the same point of view?

Its not hype, its trust. BW managed to make good games back in the day of Baldurs Gate and Knights of The Old Republic. They survived the merging with EA and made the spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate, Dragon Age Origins, regarded as the best product they made EVER up to this point (and EA didnt fuck up their integrity at that point). So of course the fans took confidence that BW would keep that quality intact AND knew that BW had no reason to lie to them since its thanks to the fans that made them as powerful and influential as they are now.

They thought wrong. Oh boy they thought wrong.

Just watch the Archengeia video that JellySlimerMan posted if you still have doubts about that

Have you never seen a film from years ago and wondered just how it got its reputation for being either good or bad? Was the first audience to ever watch Citizen Kane in 1941 the sole authority for how it was to be recieved in years to come?

No one saw Citizen Kane when it came out in 1941 because William Randolph Hearst tought that the movie was an insult to his persona, and used its power to make sure that only a few theaters had the film in question. Therefore, no one could say if it was good or bad. The reason that CK is even remembered is because the critics dought it up after 15+ years of obscurity.

Now, i will copypasta certain person opinion of CK as art, and how it relates to videogames:

CK is not art for the plot (its a simple plot) or how many tears you dropped when you knew it was his sled, its about the visuals. NOT asthetics but the visual STORYTELLING.

CK is the Most Triumphant Example of Visual Media as an Art Form. Hence the Roger Ebert quote "Its not what the story is about but HOW is about". How you tell the story as opposed to what is it about.

So what do videogames have besides looking pretty as fuck? Interactivity. Art on videogames not only needs to tell a story with its visuals, but also needs to do something with the interactivity.

Art is in player choice, how the story reacts to the input of the audience. You shouldnt look for pretty games (like Dear Esther), you should look for games like Planescape Torment, Fallout 1 and 2 but UP TO ELEVEN.

Games that have branching storylines are the key for art.

Think how The Witcher 2 has a branching storyline, or how Mass Effect was SUPPOSED to branch out after the first game as result of your choices (in the end it didnt matter, they didnt do that because they were lazy as shit)

Games like Journey, Minecraft and Deus Ex are fine but are those "The Most Trimphant Examples of Interactive Media as an Art Form"?

Without the "game" part of the game then they are just movies that you have some limited control with. The art has to come from the thing that makes games unique.

What makes movies special compared to previous art forms, like books? the visuals.

What makes games special compared to previous art forms, including film? the interactivity. Shaping the plot by pure player agency

So tell me, what is so arty or worth remembering about Mass Effect that WASNT made already by other games?? importing saves? already done before (even plot included in some cases)
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OldSaveBonus

Branching narrative? that is not true branching. Games like Sacrifice (made in 2000) and The Witcher 2 have better branching than Mass Effect, so what is your point?

So ME is worth remembering because of "authorial intent"? Ok, what WAS the intent with the ending?? do they have a clue of what they wrote?? they (Walters and Hudson alone on the ending, the other writers dont count apparently) wanted to talk to the fans personally to respond to questions in a Con Panel, but they didnt do it. Why? is it wrong to explain your art? i dont remember that such rule even existed.

 

[The Heik]

-snip-

I'll answer in bullets, or points, whatever.
A. I am, despite how much I wish, not omnipotent. Therefor I haven't seen a lot of the arguments nor been in every discussion.
B. As I have said a few times, you opened this thread for yourself. It's not hard to ignore it and if your sick of seeing it then why put yourself in a position to read it. If it annoys you, leave and ignore it and allow people who want to discuss it actually discuss it.
C. Your idea about me purposely baiting people is ridiculous, why would I write out a full opinion and discuss my opinion with others if I was just trying to start shit? Further still why would I put a disclaimer that deliberately begs people to not start some shit if I actually wanted to start shit?

Logic, use it, for the love of god please use it.

That is implying that I somehow wasn't using it before?

But fine, I'll bite and drop some logic on you:

A. You've been at the Escapist for over 2 years at this point and have 1700 posts, and considering that you like the ME series (as proven by your OP being about your second run through of the game) AND that you're very clearly aware of the main issues and arguments around the ending (as witnessed by your listing of some of the main issues people have with that should be ignored in this thread), if you've somehow managed to miss the frequent discussions on this subject (and as I mentioned before, we see threads on this subject multiples times every month), then you must have an incredibly selective memory and you're oblivious to the concept of searching first before creating a thread to prevent re-threading, because otherwise I find it hard to believe that you've somehow ignored the 11 straight months of people arguing these very subjects on what might as well be a near constant basis. Heck, in the first 3 months after ME3 one couldn't go a single day without there being a thread on the game's ending on the most recent posts, the most viewed threads and the most commented threads sections of the website. It's not like is was just hiding away in some corner.

BTW I believe you meant omniscient as in "all-knowing" as opposed to omnipotent, which is "all powerful", as the latter would not help in knowing which threads came out when and what they included. The latter would however allow you to turn those threads into cheese.

B. Considering the amount of time between ME3's release, and my now academic interest in the ME3 discussion (as an emotional interest is long gone by this point) I figured that it was a safe bet that this might be a thread that was exploring something new as opposed to treading on old ground. I was of course wrong, but human curiosity being what it is, there is no reason why I shouldn't check out a thread if it piques my interest. As for why I stayed, well that that was already covered in my previous post, and fleshed out more in the prior point A, and the following point C.

Also, the whole "you can just leave if you don't like it" is a bit cop-out. If I feel like there's something that is worth pointing out, I can do so as is my right, and it's what a good chunk of internet discussion is based upon. Hell, it's exactly what the entire Mass Effect Fiasco is based upon, so my previous post is quite fitting given the context.

C. It seems that you need to be made aware of the term "backhanded request", because despite you asking for people to refrain from the things below, the way you said left much to be desired.

Because there's literally no way to talk about this without someone getting their panties in a twist I'll just leave this "disclaimer" here
-No, I don't want to argue about Bioware being dickheads
-No, I don't care about how its multiplayers fault
-No, The indoctrination theory is not a thing
-Yes, we get it, the endings really sucked to start with

Anyway, I'm done, and since I know you can't talk about Mass Effect without having a big "SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP, WE WANT NO MORE" or "This thread again" posts by people who I'm sure think they're hilarious I'll just leave this here.

While the bolded sections are particularly overt offenders, these two sections of text are laced with negative undertones towards people with opinions regarding those matters. At best, you're simply being unnecessarily crass, at worst you're actively antagonizing the very people you supposedly want to keep away, an act akin to trying to drive sharks away by thrashing around in the water.

If you really wanted people to stay away from certain discussion points, you could have respectfully asked for that in a manner such as this:

"I'd prefer it if the thread avoided subjects such as the relationship between the game and it's dev team, the multiplayer aspects, the indoctrination theory, or the pre-EC endings"

which really wasn't all that difficult. But no, you placed veiled insults everywhere, and that's where all that baiting I talked about seems to be popping up from. If you weren't intending to bait then so much the better, but it still leaves us with some fairly negative phrasing that can cause problems than solve them.

 

[DarkLordofPancakes]

For me...Everything in ME3 fell flat on its fucking face:

The main plot itself is one huge Deus ex Machina..."Hey Guys we found the Reaper off button that the VI on illos forgot to mention."

The side quests make skyrims miscellaneous quests look like The Dark Knight, not to mention the journal is a fucking train-wreck

The devs choice to put Jessica Chobot and freddie prince junior in the game makes me contemplate suicide

The combat is inconsistent in difficulty (Cerberus troops that can be killed by a paintbrush but geth primes that take entire sniper rifle clips to the fucking face without dying) and the AI is worse than the holocaust

As for the endings....yeah their bad and it shows how rushed the game was, but its probably the games least serious problem.

 

[AD-Stu]

Can I pose a question concerning the future?

Suppose for a second that the Mass Effect Trilogy is forever remembered beyond today as a landmark series and a classic epic for years to come.
Now if that happens then will Mass Effect 3 be forever held as the weakest link in the series with an ending so bad that it very nearly tainted the reputation of its precursors..?

Or is it more likely that future generations will look at this game and wonder what the hell everyones problem with it was? Will peoples(Not entirely invalid) complaints still be relevant then?

Obviously none of us can predict the future with any real degree of accuracy, but personally I expect it's going to be viewed in the future as a great game that had some serious flaws - in much the same way we view games like KOTOR2 now.

As for the endings....yeah their bad and it shows how rushed the game was, but its probably the games least serious problem.

Unfortunately I'm not convinced that lack of time was the problem - I'm more inclined to blame lack of talent on the part of Messers Walters and Hudson.

 

[King Billi]

Ah ha. So you're just saying that my completely hypothetical question is pointless and Mass Effect will in all likelihood slip into obscurity because ultimately it's nothing special?

Well that's fine although you certainly went the long way about saying it.

 

[DioWallachia]

Ah ha. So you're just saying that my completely hypothetical question is pointless and Mass Effect will in all likelihood slip into obscurity because ultimately it's nothing special?

Well that's fine although you certainly went the long way about saying it.

Yes. But i have to say it for the people who are still oblivious of that fact. Had to steamroll the fuck out of that statement, use fire, mustard gas, Orange Agent and salt the Earth to make sure the issue was deader than dead before someone else raised it.

And besides, doing the research is fun anyway.