The simplest, easiest, cleanest way to fix the ME3 ending.

[EclipseoftheDarkSun]

Didn't read the spoiler,because I don't want to spoil myself. However,my argument isn't on the game. It's on the basis of the "Retake Mass Effect" movement. Which is utterly baseless. However,I have played and beaten the first two games,and I have emotional investment in a lot of the universe. I want a good ending. However,I also know that the galaxy is fucked,since the Reapers are already attacking Earth and quite possibly Tuchanka and Palaven,considering those planets are home to the galaxy's racial badasses. So I know a happy ending will be very hard to get.

But that's not the point. My neutrality is on Mass Effect 3,and the Retake Mass Effect movement. You are the CUSTOMER. Your say in a finished product ENDS after funds exchange hands. There are probably a million and one reasons as to why people don't like the endings to the game. And personally,I don't want to know them because they're not worth knowing,because knowing your reasoning will not change the fact that you are attempting to browbeat a continuity change from the producers of product after you have purchased said product. You have no power in the consumer-producer relationship after you pay.

The movement is in the wrong. The people of the movement have paid and played. Therefore,they have forfieted their power in the relationship in order to consume the product. After that,your say is done;once money exchanges hands,you imply that you will accept the product,flaws included.

Let me propose an alternative method of voicing your displeasure over Mass Effect 3's endings.

You calmly and politely inform BioWare that you were dissatisfied with the endings of Mass Effect 3,and desire to see them put more effort into the endings of future products.

Same message,but far more reasonable.

Actually, the movement isn't in the wrong. They're entitled to take whatever lawful actions they choose to take, regardless of your opinion on the matter. Maybe their actions will backfire, but if so, hopefully they as well as the ME3 production team will learn some lessons from this.

 

[Darkmantle]

I have an even better solution:
When shit starts hitting the fan just have the reapers kill everyone and win. This would take very little time to implement and would fix all of the plot holes.

I think that would be a good ending if you had a pitifully low Galactic readiness

 

[Something Amyss]

Give the fans what they want as a DLC/expansion. What they want will be expensive, so charge a reasonable amount of money for it.

Yes, they shouldn't be penalised at all for an act of false advertising.

Oh wait, SPESHUL SNOFLAEKS! I forgot.

Maybe, but at least it's something.

Not in any meaningful sense. It's "something" in the same sense that throwing gasoline on someone who's burning to death is doing something. I'm actually pretty sure "nothing" is the better alternative between "nothing" and your "solution."

I think they can fix the game by not bringing ANY of the actors back. Just give us additional scenes with music and sound effects--no talking. It was done in Mass Effect 2's ending when Shepard was running back to the ship. Granted, Harrbinger was talking, but it proved that you could still have a good, dramatic scene without any of the crew talking.

Except they need explanations that won't fit into that unless they just do text boxes to explain it. In that case, you're still not talking the same kind of scene.

Assuming the only problem was that the ending was too short or not to fan specification (Moviebob's strawman), then this would work. Given the major issues that people actually have, just having a silent climax probably won't solve any issues of consequence.

 

[Samantha Burt]

What about a Fallout 3/NV ending? Ron perlman talking about shepherds exploits and then says "War never changes"

This is pretty much exactly what I was expecting. "Under Wrex and Eve's rule, the krogan found a new age of prosperity and were eventually accepted amid the galactic community." Obviously less cheesy and cliché if more stuff got blown up.

 

[Something Amyss]

I have an even better solution:
When shit starts hitting the fan just have the reapers kill everyone and win. This would take very little time to implement and would fix all of the plot holes.

Genius! I love this idea.

 

[Vuljatar]

The simplest, easiest, cheapest way to fix the ending is to declare the Indoctrination Theory canon and then leave it at that. No epilogue, no continuation dlc, no sequel, just a cliffhanger ending. It wouldn't make everyone happy, but it would be better than what we got, and better than what we're getting.

 

[Vault101]

Never have Shepard go up on the glowing elevator platform and meet the god-child.

I would've had the game end with Shepard and Anderson, and in the last moments of their lives the mentor tells the student, as possibly the only father figure Shepard's known, that he's proud and the two look off at the view of earth and the crucible fires; the Reaper's can be seen all across the system getting destroyed one by one as Shepard knows now once and for all that Earth and the galaxy has been saved.

I wouldn't care if Shepard died or not, but I do know that the final moment between Him/Her and Anderson is the most powerful moment in the game for me and I really think it's what it should've ended on.

indoctrination theory (which I am a fan of) aside thats a real good point there

except have shepard survive.....really

I mean some people are like "what? you wanted sunshine and rainbows?" to that I would say..."have you played the game?" its just one even after the other..everything turining to shit (in universe, not the game)

a sad ending is not more "arty" because its sad, a "earn your happy ending" would have fitted the ME universe just fine

also this is possibly the best fan ending
http://koobismo.deviantart.com/gallery/

 

[TorqueConverter]

Give the fans what they want as a DLC/expansion. What they want will be expensive, so charge a reasonable amount of money for it.

Yes, they shouldn't be penalised at all for an act of false advertising.

Oh wait, SPESHUL SNOFLAEKS! I forgot.

This is a topic on how to fix ME3's broken ending. How does lynching Bioware have anything anything to do with fixing the ending? I'm sure there is another topic on this forum dedicated to holding Bioware accountable to false advertising and whatnot. Lets not loose sight of the problem.

Bioware should pull a Fallout 3 Broken Steel and fix the ending through DLC. They should do this not just to appease the irate fans but do it for the sake of the game. I didn't care about Fallout 3's ending. I enjoyed that game immensely without the story driven elements. The fix-the-ending-DLC that was Broken Steel was good enough on its own merits and was a welcome expansion to my game.

Bioware should do the same. Bioware should use the indoctrination theory provided by the fans as a springboard to take the player into a ending-fixing expansion sold as DLC. The DLC should pick up where the player left off, send them on some Mass Effect 3 adventure and conclude with a satisfactory ending. Yeah, it should cost real money. How much? An appropriate amount based on the content present in the DLC.

 

[Seanfall]

I never actually finished the game, as Marauder Shields won our glourious dule.

However, I do believe in the indoctranation theory, so I'm expecting a plot filled ending this summer.

And when that doesn't happen meet me at the bar.

 

[Arakasi]

The simplest, easiest, cleanest way to fix the ME3 ending:

1. Fix the community.
2. ...
3. Profit.

 

[AD-Stu]

IMO, the cheapest/easiest way to "fix" the ending is to have Shepard bleed out next to Anderson, ditch the entire Star Child bit (am I the only one who has P-Funk play in their mind every time they hear that name?), have the Crucible fire, run the good Destroy ending footage of the Reapers being blown up (vary it based on your EMS if you like) and ditch everything else. It still doesn't do anything to reflect player choice, but it cuts out almost all of the plot holes and requires exactly almost zero additional footage

But that's not the point. My neutrality is on Mass Effect 3,and the Retake Mass Effect movement. You are the CUSTOMER. Your say in a finished product ENDS after funds exchange hands. There are probably a million and one reasons as to why people don't like the endings to the game. And personally,I don't want to know them because they're not worth knowing,because knowing your reasoning will not change the fact that you are attempting to browbeat a continuity change from the producers of product after you have purchased said product. You have no power in the consumer-producer relationship after you pay.

The movement is in the wrong. The people of the movement have paid and played. Therefore,they have forfieted their power in the relationship in order to consume the product. After that,your say is done;once money exchanges hands,you imply that you will accept the product,flaws included.

See, this is where your not having knowledge of the Mass Effect series really shows.

For three games now, Bioware has been harping on about how much it loves its fans, how it's always taking their views into consideration and how fans are basically "co-authors" of the series (their words, not mine).

They've backed that up by jumping to attention and making changes pretty much every time fans speak up about something they don't like in the series - be it the planet exploration in the first game, the planet scanning in the second game, the lack of homosexual romance options... seriously, there's a long list of this stuff.

To date, this series has NOT had the typical developer-consumer relationship with its fans that you're assuming it's had. That's a big part of the reason the Retake Mass Effect thing happened - because it's worked pretty much every other time the fans have done it and indeed, Bioware has seemed to welcome it.

 

[Vrex360]

If it were me I would either scrap that god child completely or just alter it just enough to make it less depressing. I would have it so that Shepard can actually challenge the God Child's logic and actively rebel against it. The God Child seemingly impressed by this allows Shepard to actually shut down just the Reapers and leave the Relays intact. As a final action it says:
"I will return you to your world but remember without our control and regulation the galaxy will fall into disarray, some day soon the cycle will repeat."
To which Shepard can answer:
"We'll see."

So we still get the scenes of the Reapers dying and the relays transmitting the information destroying them across the galaxy but without the relays being destroyed. Shepard returns to Earth gets reuinted with love interest as shown below:

And characters reflect on the destruction of the Reapers and the uncertain future ahead of them. The dead get buried and a memorial is held to everyone who is lost, Shepard and crew put the Normandy back together and travel off into the unknown to aid in the rebuilding of the galaxy.

We can still have that old man little boy thing at the end, just provided we have some closure and relief in knowing that our favorite characters are at least okay.

 

[ablac]

Don't touch it you self-righteous entitled rube. I never played the game.

And that's why you should stop talking.

It's why I should continue talking. The outsider's opinion is always neutral. And what I think,after weighing in on everything I've seen over this whole "Retake Mass Effect" crap? The people don't like the ending because it's not what they wanted/expected. So now they demand BioWare to retcon that? I don't know about you,but it sounds like a worse argument than "I'm God because I grow broccoli". Baseless. Worthless. Demeaning. I never saw the ending,but guess what? I don't need to see the so called "horrible ending" to know that the argument for this is just flawes and fueled solely by gamers thinking that they can demand whatever they want,and be fulfilled.

Think about it. The uninformed,unproffessional consumer is demaning the very well informed and very much proffessional producer to change their work,solely on the basis that they don't like it. The magnitude of the outcry doesn't mean anything. The number of people dissatisfied doesn't factor into this. At it's core level,this ridiculous movement is just that: Ridiculous.

If I were in charge of handling this situation,I would've told the people to suck it up and deal with what they got,however their discontent will be taken into consideration for the next product.

You havent played it so you cant understand it. The ending was ill exlained and poorly done with many plot holes in both character behaviour and simply logic, eg the manin characters are shown fleeing ina an unknown part of the galaxy yet were on the battlefield minutes before, why were they running and how the hell did they get there? Most of i=us just want clarity on this stuff and for the ending to be acceptable we need to know why there were no other options to the ones given and why our choices before hand, the basis of the series, did little to affect the outcome. There was no payoff just confusion without good reason. We dont see what the writers saw and we fear the ending was rushed as it has so many flaws.

 

[Sacman]

Easy... cut out the bit with the citadel ghost whatever... have shepard die on the citadel... and the ending will be based on how big of an army you were able to amass... and it can go like whether the army is able to defend against the reapers trying to destroy the catalyst before it works... bam... your choices amount to something, the plot is tied up, and theres emotional draw with shepard and Anderson together...

 

[Vault101]

snip.

*sigh* the ending is a big slap in the face to alot of people emotionally invested in such a series

Im not going to try and convince you (or anyone) that we are being reasonable...no point

but lets imagine for a moment that the next Mario game ending with Mario shooting bowser with a gun then beating the crap out of peach for making him go through all that

peach who really loved bowser takes her own life with Marios gun..Mario...is distraught, but a portal opens up to hell..mario jumps in hoping to make up for everything

in the burning flames of hell he find peach and Bowser..now together as king and queen of hell...they unleash the forces of hell on what remains of the mushrooms kingdon as punishment to mario

Mario..now desperate for anything uses the last of his star power to turn into a bright beam of light which sweeps through the mushroom kingdom..undoing the apocolypse...but killing all of the yoshis in the process

thats what your dealing with
-sad
-depressing
-makes no godamn sense
-goes against everyhting pre established
-plot holes up the ass
-no closure

Bioware fans are a crazy demanding bucnh but we WOULD NOT have reacted like we did had the ending been ANYTHING but what we got....peopel cna trivialis it all they want

but you really have no Idea

 

[Bvenged]

Just make Maurader Shields unbeatable and roll credits when Shepard dies.

...and then the current ending plays out in an alternate universe.

No, alternate universe Shepard, Nooooooo!!

 

[Waaghpowa]

I love how people still try to act like they have a say in any of this despite not having played the game.

"I don't know anything about this, but I'm sure you're all wrong and stupid! You can't criticize my opinion because I'm objective!"