MovieBob's thoughts on the ME3 ending controversy

[Jabberwock xeno]

100% agree.

Just because 99% of a fanbase wants something changed doesn't mean the 99% is right.
Sometimes, the majority are wrong.

 

[Canadish]

100% agree.

Just because 99% of a fanbase wants something changed doesn't mean the 99% is right.
Sometimes, the majority are wrong.

I've yet to see a compelling argument saying why they're wrong.

All I've seen from those defending the ending (and Mass Effect 3 on the whole) is childish name calling, ad hominem and claims that Mass Effect 3 is art and thus should not be changed on that basis.
Often these are the same people who were defending Bioware acting in business interest by cutting out large chunks of content to sell as DLC.

No one has been able to come back with any kind of argument in the face of the fact that direct quotes from Bioware promising one thing are in stark contrast with the actual content on the game provided.


It feels like the gaming media is just closing ranks and defending this in the face of evidence that suggests that it is something not worth defending.

I don't know whether gaming journalism is just out of touch with gamers these days,
whether they're acting in their own business interests by not biting the hand that feeds them,
Or whether they just have friends within Bioware and are protecting their friend's interests.

I've only seen a balanced view from Forbes who have looked at both sides and have yet to resort to name calling (there have been plenty of balanced independent sources however).
They've respected the views and position of both the Fans and EA/Bioware.
As consumers/fans and as artists/businessmen.

 

[Sentox6]

I like how people use really shitty examples to prove their points. The Broken Steel DLC was released not because the ending sucked, but because of a technical fault in the game that made it impossible to play the game.

Let's not waste any time here. You're wrong. A simultaneous patch fixed problems in the game, but the point of the DLC was to change the ending options for the player and continue the game.

In an interview [http://www.g4tv.com/videos/48225/Face-Time-With-Todd-Howard/] Todd Howard actually admitted that despite the temptation to react defensively, they had to acknowledge their mistakes and fix them.

Mass Effect most definitely did have artistic integrity. If they changed the ending to appease fans (read: maintain customers), they have forfeited that integrity and it's an even greater tragedy because Mass Effect is one of the biggest projects in existence so the impact it can create is huge.

Ignoring the fact that this is a commercial product developed with a significant amount of consideration for market appeal (if this point hasn't sunk in by now, I doubt it ever will), the only impact Mass Effect 3 will leave is one of being the franchise entry that dropped the ball. It'll be the equivalent of the Matrix sequels or the Star Wars prequels. Of course, we all know how much they're respected as artistic endeavours.

The biggest thing that blows my mind in all this is people are basically saying that the horrible ending that violates all the promises Bioware made to its customers should not be amended because doing so would violate some definition of art that no one can agree on, and which doesn't actually achieve anything important if met.

That almost made me give up hope for humanity.

I missed this the first time through. Now I regret dignifying your posts with responses.

 

[Erttheking]

So something that marketed to millions can't be considered a product if it's "art"? You know, I like Mass Effect, but they whole "it's art" thing is starting to sound like a pretty weak excuse to cover up messups. If I'm writing a story about a bronze age war, I can't have aliens come in at the end and say "it's art" People need to admit when they screwed up. it holds all the same weight as "it's magic, we don't have to explain it."

 

[BloatedGuppy]

But gamers are also gonna look bad for raging, incoherently yelling, and, hell, even accusing of reviewers of being bribed. That... that's just too far, guys. That's not okay.

Uh...

I don't know how to tell you this, but...

Look. It's not a question of "bribes", necessarily. I don't think developers are sauntering up with thick envelopes full of cash. But if you can't see the incestuous nature that exists between game developers/publishers and game critics, then you're not looking hard enough. Game magazines, gaming review sites...they exist almost ENTIRELY off the revenue gained from advertising, that comes almost ENTIRELY from game developers and publishers. That is not a healthy relationship. Did you read about the Kane and Lynch debacle over at GameSpot? That's the kind of thing that happens. Only 95% of the time, the guy doesn't write an unflattering review of an advertising product and get fired. 95% of the time, the guy writes a puff review of an advertising product, which is why virtually every single AAA game released lives in the 8-10 range of review scores, and why you're seeing more "perfect" scores than ever before. It's like being asked to write a performance review for your boss, and if he doesn't like it, there's an unspoken threat that he might yank your paycheck. Think about that situation, and tell me you don't think there's a problem with the state of games journalism. Tell me you don't raise an eyebrow when gaming sites IGN and GameSpot go on the attack for Bioware, calling their audience "entitled crybabies", while non-gaming related site Forbes strangely takes up an entirely different position.

 

[Vrex360]

I'm amazed by the argument that 'art' and 'product' are two seperate things. In reality art and product can be the same thing. Art is expression, and a product is when that expression is sold to the public.
If Mass Effect had been made as a game solely for the developers to play then yes, it would be entirely artistic and they could do with it what they wanted, but they allowed it to be mass produced and mass marketted and turned it into a multi million dollar franchise.
So, now it is a product.

The argument that an author's artistic integrity still holds up after that is silly, yes they have the 'right' to decide however they want to end the story on their own intellectual property but so do fans have the right to respond negatively towards it, especially when it goes against what the developers directly promised to them.
Because that's the distinction, Bioware may have an artistic vision but it was one that was supposed to go to the audience. They are the ones who played the game and bought the merchendise and payed for the DLC's.
When an artist creates, especially when an artist sells what they create, the product of their creation belongs to society first and them second. Millions of dedicated fans therefore can be considered the true 'owners' of a product, which is why dropping the ball like this is just bad.
When the game is made for the sake of the fans and the fans don't like it, you alter it. Just like an artist would if they were commissioned to make something for someone and it didn't live up to expectations.

I want to remind Mr. Chipman that ever since as far back as 2007 Bioware have told me that this is 'my story', that Shepard is 'my Shepard' and 'my choices' will impact 'my story'. 'My Shepard' was a paragon soldier who romanced (and stayed faithful to) Ashley, he was very respecting to other alien races and he was determined to see the Reapers defeated for the sake of the galaxy.
That's why him getting an ending that undermines ALL of that (Ashley and him unavoidably seperated, the various alien races stranded apart from each other, having to destroy the relays no matter what and going against the very nature of the game itself) leaves me, the consumer, riled up.
Because I was essentially lied to. This is why it's different to things like Lost's ending or the crappy ending to Halo 2 or anything like that, because in this story we were lead to believe that this is 'our story'.

I can't say I'm as deeply involved in this as others are, I haven't signed petitions to change the ending or anything like that, but I can see the very valid reason as to why the ending pisses people off so much. It's not just that there isn't a happy ending (incidently why the hell CAN'T there be a fucking happy ending?) but that there isn't really an ending at all.
We get no idea of the ultimate fates of any of the characters, not even something like this:
Given that we spent three years falling in love with this cast (I went through hell and back in my metaphorical journey to get Ash back for instance) and how deeply invested we are in their fates, I find that shameful that we get nothing to resolve that.
Just a confusing epilogue featuring two people from the distant future that I do not know about (by the way does anyone else think it's creepy that the old man told this story to his grandson, sex scenes and all? I bet that's why they always cut to black. Kid: "So what happened after Shepard and Ashley kissed in his Quarters?" Old man: "... Then they had tea and played chess.") and a prompt to buy more DLC.
That's not a deserving ending of a franchise worth this much that people have poured enough time and love into.

On the other hand, some of the ways people are doing this is hitting below the belt. Being very obnoxious and rude to Bioware devs and harrassing them on twitter, it must be said Casey Hudson is doing very well staying stoic and calm despite all of this.
So I'm not really resigned to either side (especially given I haven't played Mass Effect 3 yet and it will likely be a long time before I do because my copy of the game and Xbox got stolen today.) and I'm prepared to let it pan out and see how it goes.
I'm honestly more interested in the Mass Effect 3 play arts kai figures of Shepard, Ashley and Garrus which are in prototype stage and are now being publicly displayed on Mass Effect's facebook page.
So I'm neutral, I hate the ending but I'm not out for Bioware's blood either.

That said, Mr. Chipman I want to address something:
I like you when you talk about political issues (it's great to have another left winger on this conservative web) and movies and comics but games aren't your hot spot and this shows. As others have said, plenty of games, movies and books have been rewritten to appeal to the audience and it hasn't caused the intellectual property armaggedon that you seem to think will happen.

Also it must be said, because it can never be said enough, METROID OTHER M IS POSSIBLY THE MOST SEXIST GAME EVER MADE. Samus has emotions, okay fair enough, but she spends the entire time worshipping and seeking approval from a man who shows her almost no affection in return and going on and on about 'the baby'. 'Other M' is just code for 'Mother' and the game is obsessed with motherhood as a theme and loves to make Samus look weak and pathetic at every turn.
Samus might have been a blank slate before this but she had her moments of character and they were better then this piddle. Somehow I think if a Halo game had been made where you were a female spartan, not allowed to use any gear or weapons unless Masterchief authorized you to, blundering into dangerous environments without protective clothing as a result, breaking down psychologically at the sight of an enemy you've killed hundreds of times before and needing rescue and spending all the tim talking about babies and how great Masterchief is... you would be railing against it utterly.

Speaking of Halo.... I'm not going to cover all of this but something recently has given me some thought:
You say Halo: Reach was just 'adding a jetpack and calling it a sequel' (there are a lot more features added to Reach in that FYI), but then you justify a whole Mario game that's just another Mario game but with the tanooki suit.
Isn't the tanookie suit basically just a jetpack by another name? And wasn't the tanookie suit where all the marketting of the game came from?

That's what I've learned from Moviebob, totally biased fanboyism to anything that's Nintendo. Hatred of anything Halo and mixed levels of understanding on everything else.

EDIT: Also have they actually *confirmed* that they are changing the ending? I thought it was all speculation.

 

[For.I.Am.Mad]

A decade, guys, a DECADE!!!!

 

[Falcon123]

1. Bioware just forfeited their authorship to the fans to avoid controversy, thus forfeiting their claim to be artists to a large degree.

So, seriously speaking, we can no longer call Bethesda artists?

For what it's worth I read your article, and I just cannot agree with this assertion in any way, shape, or form:

Art is produced by the artist, by his or her creative vision alone.

I will borrow another post from earlier in the thread, because it already provides the obvious contradiction:

Also, many of our old art treasures (like, you know, Mona Lisa, most of what Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, Wagner etc. wrote, almost all of Raphael's and Michelangelo's sculptures and paintings and so on into infinity) were commission jobs. That means someone paid the artist to make the final product just like the commissioner wanted. If the buyer wasn't happy with how Mona Lisa smiled or how Eine Kleine Nachtmusik sounded, then Da Vinci and Mozart had to go back and change it up. If the church wasn't happy with the ceiling decoration in the sistine chapel, Michelangelo had to go back up there and make adjustments.

This notion that "true art is never changed because of criticism" and the idea that "true art is an uninterrupted personal process" are both fairly recent inventions and most of what we consider classical art would not fall within either category. Artists throughout the ages have been very pragmatical and have altered their masterpieces to fit their client, because even they had to eat.

So really, the eventual alteration of ME3's ending is not the killing blow to the concept of games as art.

Bethesda's case is different, and they didn't change the ending due to fan complaints but because they wanted to open up DLC opportunities (far more valid, imo), but I encountered your other point in the comments section before, so it's clear I didn't explain my point well.

This was my response to him: "I understand that artists have to pay the bills. But like I said, this is Bioware; they don't need to resort to something like this to accomplish that. The game was already destined to be one of the top selling games of all time. This had nothing to do with "paying the bills". If they WERE aware of what they were doing, and they had this plan in mind from the beginning, then they're not trying to pay the bills. They're trying to maximize profit. They're trying to wring every cent out of the consumer because they can.

I'm all for paying artists for great work. I was planning on buying ME3 soon so that Bioware could have my money, even with the poor ending and despite the fact that I wouldn't be able to play it for a while. This is different; they purposefully didn't finish the product (assuming the indoctrination theory is true; the other theory is still equally viable) and are getting away with that. You couldn't do that in literature. You couldn't do that in theatre. No one can do that in any true form of art, because that's not what art is about.

Trying to make sure your bills get paid is done by offering negligible DLC for other games that promote people buying other products (like the Blood Dragon Armor from Dragon Age Origins that unlocked a similar item in ME2). This is holding your own fan base for ransom, and it sets a dangerous precedent if (and likely when, considering how faithful the fan base continues to be despite all of this) this occurs."

Does that better explain what I was trying to say? I'm aware artists need to and deserve to get paid, but Bioware's not at risk here of that, and this game was not done by commission and has already sold more than well enough. To change the ending to meet player demands now would not be to meet some commission deadline; it would be to get every cent they can from the game. That doesn't sound like art to me

 

[Von Strimmer]

Everyone seems to forget that artists change their mind aswell. Hell even the Mona Lisa has about 3 completely different variations underneath the final painting. So the art analogy also falls flat :/ I prefer games to be entertainment rather than art. Also if the rumours about Casey Hudson doing the ending himself and flipping off the writers and artists are true, then I hope he fucks right off.

 

[Falcon123]

I wrote a couple articles on this (you can find them here: http://www.redshirtcrew.com/2012/03/why-mass-effect-3-has-changed-industry.html) but though I was initially opposed to MovieBob's tweets, and I hate siding with fans against the creator...I agree with everything he said. One of the following three things happened:

1. Bioware just forfeited their authorship to the fans to avoid controversy, thus forfeiting their claim to be artists to a large degree.

2. This was their plan all along, and they're holding their fans hostage for money with this DLC (because the game is NOT complete if the indoctrination theory is true), which sets a dangerous precedent.

3. Bioware misjudged how pissed off people would be by making them wait for the upcoming free DLC that fixes all of this.

Given I don't think Bioware is dumb enough for option 3, I think options 1 or 2 are the only real possibilities, and because Bioware is such a big part of what defines this industry, I believe the industry has been set back considerably either way, and I don't think a decade is a big leap in logic, sadly

Just tried to get to your article there, but the site doesn't seem to be working!

I think you make a interesting point there.

No matter where you stand on the issue, or however this ends:

This whole thing is going to have major negative impacts on the industry, one way or the other.

I don't know why the link isn't working. Try this: http://www.redshirtcrew.com/2012/03/why-mass-effect-3-has-changed-industry.html

If that doesn't work, http://www.redshirtcrew.com should work just fine. It's still on the main page. And I agree with you whole heartedly: Bioware is simply too big of a player in the industry to have this go on without changing the industry significantly, and either way, I don't see a happy ending here. Though the people citing the article in which a Bioware writer may have vented on how Casey Hudson hijacked the creative process explains how we got here... :/

 

[Sentox6]

Bethesda's case is different, and they didn't change the ending due to fan complaints but because they wanted to open up DLC opportunities (far more valid, imo)

Maybe so, but then you have to discard Todd Howard's acknowledge that they made a mistake which needed to be fixed.

Does that better explain what I was trying to say? I'm aware artists need to and deserve to get paid, but Bioware's not at risk here of that, and this game was not done by commission and has already sold more than well enough. To change the ending to meet player demands now would not be to meet some commission deadline; it would be to get every cent they can from the game. That doesn't sound like art to me

So, uh... you can prostrate your art up until the break-even point and it's still art, but anything after that and it's not? I can't help but feel we're getting pretty arbitrary here.

To the point, is BioWare's only possible motivation to maximise profits? There's no room for a change simply for the sake of redressing a fanbase who feels (rightfully, imho) betrayed? You could argue that ultimately you only address customer concerns as a result of a long-term profit motive, but then again the game is only developed because paying customers exist, and the whole argument because circular.

My bigger problem goes back to the numerous quotes from Bioware that painted a very clear picture of what type of ending customers could expect from the game; a picture that was not at all lived up to. Are we really going to say that some abstract concept of the sanctity of art is a reasonable protection against the obligation for a company to deliver the product it promised to paying customers?

 

[LokiArchetype]

Funny thing, have you ever noticed that the arguments of people against the RetakeME movement fall into one of, if not all, of these categories?

1. Ad hominem attacks - some variation deriding people who complain and/or how arguing on the internet about it is silly and a waste of time (despite the fact this describes what they're doing just as well).

"Ughhh all the whining is driving me nuts! You people need to go outside and stop complaining on the internet! Don't you understand how pointless it is to complain?"

2. Straw man arguments - oversimplification or outright misrepresentation of why people want the ending changed, usually in order to facilitate the making ad hominem attacks.

"Those crybabies just want a happy ending. I know, because I've asked each and every one of them and calmly listened to exactly what they're saying."

3. Baseless slippery slope speculation - 'sky is falling' rhetoric about the damage this will cause, stated as outright fact, but lacks the tiniest shred of evidence to support it.

"This sets a dangerous precedent that will greatly damage art! Change always results in even more change that comes even more easily than the last change. Pretty soon the developers will be caving to the fans' every whim, no matter how small and insignificant their numbers are!"

 

[veloper]

The original lead-writer of the series, Drew Karpyshyn, had ALREADY left after ME2 and Movie Bob STILL ventures into the art vs product question?

That's a long passed station. There can be no artistic vision when the artist and incidently the best(or least bad) writer Bioware had, is nolonger involved.
ME3 is a commercial PRODUCT, Bob. No way around it and that's not even a bad thing in itself, because the alternative is "Art" as an excuse for bad writing.

 

[deathbydeath]

100% agree.

Just because 99% of a fanbase wants something changed doesn't mean the 99% is right.
Sometimes, the majority are wrong.

True, but that is simply not the case here. People are whining because Bioware fucked up, and Bioware is showing that they want to make something the consumers will enjoy as opposed to something they want to make. The question is: When will the line be drawn? When will developers start letting "fans" and potential consumers dictate a game, as opposed to the people who are making it take it in a direction they see fit? Sure, companies can go wrong (the ending is a perfect example), but what's going to happen when, say, a good first installment in a franchise sets itself up as an epic space opera with unconventional gameplay that manages to work, and has an unusual size, scope, and story conventions that fit it more in the opera genre than the military shooter? What is most consumers don't like that, and so, in pursuit of the bottom line, the company betrays its original vision and listens to the larger body of consumers and goes for mass-market appeal?

Oh, wait, here's an example. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_Effect_2]

 

[samaugsch]

I'm gonna do something crazy and say...I understand both points of view and am pretty conflicted about it myself.

Until the people that think [that people complaining about the ending are babies] address the fact that those same people say that Bioware lied to them, I'm siding with the latter.

 

[Appleshampoo]

I stopped caring about what Bob thought a loooong time ago. He's such an arrogant asshole, and I really wish they'd replace him with someone new to do movie reviews, the jack ass is way to narrow sighted to be informative.