What I dislike about ME 3 (other than the ending)

[Slycne]

5. Anderson obviously didn't want the damn job, why wouldn't he give it to the more politically minded guy? He was councilor in ME2 what more do you want?

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that the OP, like myself, picked Anderson over Udina because Udina backstabs you and grounds the Normandy in ME1. He stops you from going after Saren to garner political favor for not letting you chase down your "dream visions" and almost doomed everyone because of it.

Heck, George Washington never wanted to be the first president of the USA and that turned out pretty well.

 

[Xathos]

5. Udina as the human councilor: Thanks Bioware for making my choice from ME 1 mean absolutely nothing. There is a point when it is discovered that Udina is an undercover Cerberus agent. (Wow, who saw that coming, except everyone.) And there is an assassination attempt on the council. During this whole sequence, I just kept repeating: "This shit wouldn't have happened if Anderson was councilor, like I picked him to be". It just feels contrived.

-snip-

My understanding was that in the books, Anderson steps down for Udina. He did so because, let's be honest, Anderson isn't a politician and hates political BS while Udina is political_BS.characer

It would have been better for them to explain that though.

Technically they explain it in the codex. Though you probably mean no one really spoke about it, to which I agree. But like you said, it was apparent Anderson hated, or at the very least found no joy in being a councilor.

Had no problem with James, and felt that out of all the Human Party Members, he was probably my favorite. Didn't really use him too much in the second half of the game though...

And while I was a little disappointed that we couldn't have temporary party members, I don't remember Bioware ever promising that some would be that. They just said that they would show up in ME3 if they survived, either as a cameo or Temp. I could be wrong though, so feel free to correct me! Still, I felt that ever member was done correctly, and no one felt really out of place. Wish some of them had a tad bit more dialogue though. The only ones I were really surprised about not being party members were Wrex and Legion, since Wrex is extremely popular with the fanbase, and Legion didn't exactly get much use due to ME2's structure. Again though, it didn't really bother me.

The Crucible I don't really have a problem with. They told us in other games that there were some Prothean stuff on Mars that they are still going through. It made sense to me that you would only really know about the Crucible if you were specifically looking for it, which is exactly what Liara was doing. The Catalyst? Yeah, that I can sort of see being a bit out of place and whatnot, but it didn't truly bother me until the end for obvious reasons.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

The only thing I didn't like (besides the endings) is an expansion on the fifth statement. A lot of my choices from the previous two games didn't seem to matter.

Udina become Councilor regardless of choice.

Blowing up Collector base does nothing, as the Iluusive Man still gets the tech.

Quarians still go to war with the Geth.

Geth still side with the Reapers--although I do like how the flipped it on its head and made the paragon choice in 2 turn out to be the wrong choice in 3.

Sparing Sadonis' life does nothing, but sparing Aresh's life gets an e-mail. So, why doesn't Sadonis get something?

What's the point of maxing out the fleet when the final battle doesn't involve them at all? Maybe I missed something as I had a high fleet readiness, but it looked to me that like made no difference how much you bring with you.

I know there are little things throughout the game that are affected by my choices--Conrad's entire scene was amazing--but it felt like the main ones, the important ones, just got streamlined, and that's something I didn't care for. Still had a blast playing the game though.

 

[Abedeus]

Very limited team member options, Vega, Chobot (WHY IS SHE EVEN IN THE GAME, HER CHARACTER IS POINTLESS AND DUMB). Multiplayer takes sometimes long times to find a game and the unlock packs are freaking random - I've been wanting to play an Asari Adept or Krogan Soldier for a while and I keep getting SMG upgrades.

 

[Pumpkin_Eater]

You left out a bunch of my grievances with the game, but I mostly agree.

Blast Vanderhuge was necessary, because Bioware wrote themselves into a corner with the suicide mission. The human survivor of Virmire, Liara, and Wrex (who's too busy to come with you), are the only old squadmates that are guaranteed to be alive, so they had to shoehorn in some newcomers to guarantee you had access to a well rounded crew (Vega is your tank, Edi is tech, Liara is biotic). Aside from his looks and a couple annoying mannerisms he was an okay character over all.

 

[MahMahnator2992]

They explain why Udina betrayed you in the codex. Go to Codex (Secondary) - The Reaper War - The Cerberus Coup. It reads as follows,
"Councilor Udina's attempted coup will no doubt be analyzed for generations to come, but a clear picture is beginning to emerge. Udina had contacted Cerberus to coordinate what was intended to be a bloodless takeover of the Citadel, in which he would force the other councilors to grant him emergency powers so that he could command the Citadel Fleet. He would then direct the fleet to liberate his homeworld, Earth.

The plan fell apart early when Executor Pallin and the salarian councilor caught wind of it. In defense of the plan, the Illusive Man dispatched his top assassins, commanded by Kai Leng, to kill them. Udina had little choice but to support the assassins with an armed force sufficient to hold the Citadel. Captured confidantes have indicated that Udina and Leng's alliance was relatively fragile: Udina may have planned to turn on Cerberus once the fleet was his to command, and Leng departed when he calculated that Udina would not succeed.

Persistent rumors suggest that Udina might have been a high-functioning victim of Reaper indoctrination. His actions played right into the Reapers' plans: even if the coup failed, it would damage Citadel governance. If it succeeded, his plan to retake Earth would likely have turned into a military blunder that Council forces could ill afford. However, there is no direct evidence of his indoctrination, nor obvious opportunity. It is more likely that Udina acted out of desperation, and in doing so, cost humanity its councilor."

tl;dr: Udina betrayed the Council so he could use the council forces to retake Earth. He most likely loathed having to work with Cerberus and was probably going to betray them. It is possible, but very unlikely that he was indoctrinated by the Reapers.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

5. Udina as the human councilor: Thanks Bioware for making my choice from ME 1 mean absolutely nothing. There is a point when it is discovered that Udina is an undercover Cerberus agent. (Wow, who saw that coming, except everyone.) And there is an assassination attempt on the council. During this whole sequence, I just kept repeating: "This shit wouldn't have happened if Anderson was councilor, like I picked him to be". It just feels contrived.

-snip-

My understanding was that in the books, Anderson steps down for Udina. He did so because, let's be honest, Anderson isn't a politician and hates political BS while Udina is political_BS.characer

It would have been better for them to explain that though.

Explanations? In Mass Effect 3? You must be new here...

Okay, I think I've got it all out of my system now (and before anyone pounces on me the game is very good regardless).

 

[Richardplex]

I have only two complaints besides the ending:
Shepard speaks way too much on his own: From start to finish, this was jarring for me. Why did they do this? I get to decide what Shepard is like, down to how inquisitive he is (my main Renegade Shepard rarely "investigates" anything. It's not in his nature). This really bugged me.

Textures/Models failing to load: I'm usually not picky about graphical issues, but these happened in big moments and made some key scenes a bit silly. Garrus was invisible during all of Thessia's dialogue. So his voice would come out of a wall. And then Shepard would kind of...skip around during some scenes (notably during one with Liara).

Edit:

One more thing: The collector's edition robot dog sucks.

Another thing: I originally typed "robot duck". That would have been awesome.

I'm going to guess your a console player? See, "big moments" makes me think reapers, and that's the console problem, not MEs. The console simply cannot handle something as a big as a reaper interacting with the world, and something had to give. And the robot dog did not suck. That would imply it did something.

OT: Most of the ME2 characters had really good stories, they handled it very well, in my opinion, far better than I'd expect. Besides, I can't hear your complaints over the sound of me Squee!'ing from Kahlee Sanders being in the game.

Spoiler: spoilers for the books

and you know, the raging at the lack of Gillian and Hendel. I would totally buy DLC revolving around Gillian

I read the books and the comics, so all the characters cameoing and the stories coming together was amazing for me.

 

[DustyDrB]

I have only two complaints besides the ending:
Shepard speaks way too much on his own: From start to finish, this was jarring for me. Why did they do this? I get to decide what Shepard is like, down to how inquisitive he is (my main Renegade Shepard rarely "investigates" anything. It's not in his nature). This really bugged me.

Textures/Models failing to load: I'm usually not picky about graphical issues, but these happened in big moments and made some key scenes a bit silly. Garrus was invisible during all of Thessia's dialogue. So his voice would come out of a wall. And then Shepard would kind of...skip around during some scenes (notably during one with Liara).

Edit:

One more thing: The collector's edition robot dog sucks.

Another thing: I originally typed "robot duck". That would have been awesome.

I'm going to guess your a console player? See, "big moments" makes me think reapers, and that's the console problem, not MEs. The console simply cannot handle something as a big as a reaper interacting with the world, and something had to give. And the robot dog did not suck. That would imply it did something.

OT: Most of the ME2 characters had really good stories, they handled it very well, in my opinion, far better than I'd expect. Besides, I can't hear your complaints over the sound of me Squee!'ing from Kahlee Sanders being in the game.

Spoiler: spoilers for the books

and you know, the raging at the lack of Gillian and Hendel. I would totally buy DLC revolving around Gillian

I read the books and the comics, so all the characters cameoing and the stories coming together was amazing for me.

No...Reaper scenes were fine. It wasn't some console limitation thing.

Spoiler: The best example of the graphical error

On Thessia, when you get to to where all the relics are kept, Garrus' model failed to show up. So while he was tossing out all this wonderfully witty dialogue about how obvious it was that the Asari "goddess" was a Prothean, and while we were speaking with the Prothean VI, the camera would cut to this empty space where Garrus was supposed to be. It looked so silly. It happened elsewhere in the game too.

Another one was Shepard jumping around in Liara's quarters while they were having a rather intimate conversation.

I agree about Khalee being in the game. I got excited. Deception really screwed up Gillian and Hendel, though. Like...terribly. Gillian was too old and somehow grew out of autism. Hendel wasn't gay and started acting like Nick Nolte.

How did you like Kai Leng in the game? Having read the books, I was already ready to kill him. I think they did a good job with him.

 

[Jodah]

5. Anderson obviously didn't want the damn job, why wouldn't he give it to the more politically minded guy? He was councilor in ME2 what more do you want?

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that the OP, like myself, picked Anderson over Udina because Udina backstabs you and grounds the Normandy in ME1. He stops you from going after Saren to garner political favor for not letting you chase down your "dream visions" and almost doomed everyone because of it.

Heck, George Washington never wanted to be the first president of the USA and that turned out pretty well.

This^

In fact, early on in American history any politician that openly wanted to be President was doomed to never get the job. Jefferson had to hide the fact he wanted to be President. It was thought that political office is a duty and anyone who actually WANTS to do it is power hungry (see Udina.) If you pick someone who has served their country (or in this case race) for all their life, they are more likely to put said country (or race) above their own personal wants.


What got me pissed off was the Thessia fight. When the assassin jerk uses his gunship to blow up the pillars and then gloats about "beating" me. I was just thinking "*****, you barely scratched me...All you did was slow me down so you can run away like a coward."

Also too much info from the expanded universe that isn't explained or is only mentioned in passing. Who the fuck is Grayson? Why is he a big deal? Why did Anderson have to step down? Couldn't he just put Udina in charge while he is away?

 

[DarkestBlue]

What got me pissed off was the Thessia fight. When the assassin jerk uses his gunship to blow up the pillars and then gloats about "beating" me. I was just thinking "*****, you barely scratched me...All you did was slow me down so you can run away like a coward."

Oh so much this... I shot the guy in the head from stealth with a Javelin. NO ONE gets up from that. >>

 

[Elamdri]

1. The Crucible: Why the hell have we never heard of this thing before? It was never mentioned once in the entire series, and then gets introduced so casually, as if most people knew about it all along. That and the Catalyst. Bioware said several times pre-release that there wouldn't be "some magical Reaper off button." Basically meaning no Deus Ex Machina plot device; yet that's exactly what we got.

They needed a magic off button. I knew it was coming. I was really thinking it would be like in Independence Day or something with a Virus. The problem was that Bioware billed the Reapers as some completely unstoppable killing force and then was like...well crap.

I mean, you gotta realize that no matter how big a fleet you could potentially build in ME3, there is NO WAY that they could have stopped the Reapers. None.

Reapers you kill in Mass Effect:

1. Sovereign in ME1, who pretty much annihilates most of the entire Alliance fleet that kills him.

2. The human reaper on ME2 that isn't even done yet.

3. The mini-reaper on Tuchanka that you need THE BIGGEST AND OLDEST THRESHER MAW IN HISTORY to kill it.

4. The mini-reaper on Rannoch that you kill by blasting it from orbit WHILE it's distracted by you.

It's just not possible. They would have either had to have seriously broken with the established continuity of the Reapers or did what they did, a magic McGuffin that stops the Reapers.

2. ME 2 characters (and Wrex) getting the shaft: Another thing we were promised was that other characters would return for certain missions, like in Lair of the Shadow Broker. But that didn't happen. What we got was those characters returning, being exciting by getting to use them, and then they just did their own thing in the background while you and the squad you do have handle the hard part. Bioware knew that people wanted Wrex and others like Legion as squad members, but we didn't get them. Yeah, they get to hang around on the Normandy, but why can't you take them with you as long as they're on the ship? Others just flat out refuse to help you at all, because apparently what they've got going on is more important than saving all of galactic civilization. I wanted characters like Wrex and Mordin and Legion, as well as a few others. But that goes to my next problem...

I saw that coming a mile away. And they did "Return" for certain missions, just not as squad members. Personally, I thought the way they handled the cameos was really good.

3. James Vega: Oh god... Just... oh god. Why did they feel like this character was necessary? I would have preferred... ANYONE ELSE to him. I tried to give this character a chance, I really did. But no matter what, I found him to be so irritating. Listening to Freddie Prinz Jr. trying to sound Spanish is just cringe-worthy. I remember him being described as representative of new players to the series. Well, what a nice way of pandering to new players who are starting a trilogy at the end. Some may like him, and that's okay, but I didn't care for him at all.

I wish there was an option to flush him and Javik out the airlock. Hate them both so much. Chobot's character too.

4. Everyone seems to know that Liara is the Shadow Broker: This is really only made apparent twice, but it's still noticeable all the same. Wrex makes a comment on Sur'Kesh about it in front of Liara, and I was just like "How does he know? He wasn't there. Did somebody tell him?". The Illusive Man also makes a comment on the matter later in the game. I can somewhat understand how he would know, seeing as how information is his weapon of choice and all of that, but it still seems rather suspicious. For two games straight until the ME 2 DLC nobody had any idea who the Shadow Broker was. How is it more available information now? If someone knows the answers to my questions on this matter, please inform me.

Because Liara walks around with a giant sign on her back that says "Shadow Broker." You honestly think that someone like Liara could really keep that such a secret. Don't get me wrong, I love Liara as a character, but I make no reservations about her being a gossipy *****.

5. Udina as the human councilor: Thanks Bioware for making my choice from ME 1 mean absolutely nothing. There is a point when it is discovered that Udina is an undercover Cerberus agent. (Wow, who saw that coming, except everyone.) And there is an assassination attempt on the council. During this whole sequence, I just kept repeating: "This shit wouldn't have happened if Anderson was councilor, like I picked him to be". It just feels contrived.

Yeah, I was unhappy about that, apparently it happens in one of the books, which I never read. I always felt the game was unhappy with me for picking Anderson over Udina, now I know why.

 

[Elamdri]

What got me pissed off was the Thessia fight. When the assassin jerk uses his gunship to blow up the pillars and then gloats about "beating" me. I was just thinking "*****, you barely scratched me...All you did was slow me down so you can run away like a coward."

Oh so much this... I shot the guy in the head from stealth with a Javelin. NO ONE gets up from that. >>

Unless they have Plot Armor on.

 

[Elamdri]

5. That one pissed me off, as it did piss all over what I had intended just for their own plot convenience. I didn't actually see his betrayal coming though. Udina was always a bastard, but I never had him pegged as that. Whatever else he was, he'd always done things by the book before. I also wouldn't have believed he had the balls to take such a risk.

Didn't see his betrayal coming?!?!

That man has "VILE BETRAYER" written all over his FACE! The only way they could have made it more obvious that he was evil would be to have his voice actor be Tim Curry!

(Which, btw, would have been awesome)

 

[wicket42]

I enjoyed reading about my War Assets, but none of it paid off in the ending, I wanted to see Krogans riding dinosaurs and a fat little Volus bomber smashing into a Reaper just like Porkins in Star Wars

Also hated the lack of feedback on those side quests. Never could tell if I had collected the required item - and some systems appeared to have scannable items in them, and others didn't so the whole thing just got sort of frustrating.

Also, I played on the pc so i dunno if consoles had this problem, but did anyone else ever just get stuck on the bridge when going to talk to EDI or Joker? If you stood in the wrong spot when you started a conversation it's like you were just glued to the damn ground and had to reload a save. Argh!

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

5. That one pissed me off, as it did piss all over what I had intended just for their own plot convenience. I didn't actually see his betrayal coming though. Udina was always a bastard, but I never had him pegged as that. Whatever else he was, he'd always done things by the book before. I also wouldn't have believed he had the balls to take such a risk.

Didn't see his betrayal coming?!?!

That man has "VILE BETRAYER" written all over his FACE! The only way they could have made it more obvious that he was evil would be to have his voice actor be Tim Curry!

(Which, btw, would have been awesome)

Well, yes, he's a slimy bastard and he's screwed you over before, but that was just for the sake of his own petty political maneuvering. What I mean is I would have thought an all out coup on the Citadel to be more than a bit out of his league.

 

[soren7550]

My only problems (aside from the last ten minutes) are:

Earthborn Shepard Says Nothing About Their Home Being Attacked - You'd think Earth being invaded would weigh heavy on an Earthborn Shep, but they say nothing about it.

Texture Pop-In - Presumably this can/will be fixed with a patch and/or installing the game on the hard drive, but it's still annoying that this problem came back.

Shepard Not Looking At the People They're Talking To - This too may be fixed with a patch, but still annoying.

Weapons Appearing in Cutscenes This was really annoying. Kaidan would pull out an Avenger even though I have him equipped with a Mattock. Liara gains an Avenger even though she can't equip assault rifles. Whatever pistol I have anyone equipped with (or not) is replaced with the Predator.

The Citadel Still Being Wrecked - Why is everything still broken and on fire?

That's pretty much it.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

I enjoyed reading about my War Assets, but none of it paid off in the ending, I wanted to see Krogans riding dinosaurs and a fat little Volus bomber smashing into a Reaper just like Porkins in Star Wars

Also hated the lack of feedback on those side quests. Never could tell if I had collected the required item - and some systems appeared to have scannable items in them, and others didn't so the whole thing just got sort of frustrating.

Also, I played on the pc so i dunno if consoles had this problem, but did anyone else ever just get stuck on the bridge when going to talk to EDI or Joker? If you stood in the wrong spot when you started a conversation it's like you were just glued to the damn ground and had to reload a save. Argh!

Never had that problem on my 360. Maybe I just got lucky though...

 

[Richardplex]

I agree about Khalee being in the game. I got excited. Deception really screwed up Gillian and Hendel, though. Like...terribly. Gillian was too old and somehow grew out of autism. Hendel wasn't gay and started acting like Nick Nolte.

How did you like Kai Leng in the game? Having read the books, I was already ready to kill him. I think they did a good job with him.

Fair enough with the texture problem, I have a PC so I didn't have any problems, but that's what I heard as a source of the texture problems on consoles. Though more textures downgrading than disappearing. I don't know if it was just a PC thing, but all my characters were genetic mutated to become human-owl hybrids. They could turn their necks at 150 degree angles.

Kai Leng was amazing when he was in cutscenes. They did a great job staying true to his character. The fight with thane was one of those "I have no idea who is going to win this" moments. But in fights... well, the melee thing at the beginning of the last boss fight was cool, but well, pretty pants after that.

 

[Jodah]

My only problems (aside from the last ten minutes) are:

Earthborn Shepard Says Nothing About Their Home Being Attacked - You'd think Earth being invaded would weigh heavy on an Earthborn Shep, but they say nothing about it.

Texture Pop-In - Presumably this can/will be fixed with a patch and/or installing the game on the hard drive, but it's still annoying that this problem came back.

Shepard Not Looking At the People They're Talking To - This too may be fixed with a patch, but still annoying.

Weapons Appearing in Cutscenes This was really annoying. Kaidan would pull out an Avenger even though I have him equipped with a Mattock. Liara gains an Avenger even though she can't equip assault rifles. Whatever pistol I have anyone equipped with (or not) is replaced with the Predator.

The Citadel Still Being Wrecked - Why is everything still broken and on fire?

That's pretty much it.

The weapon thing got me pissed too. My character carried only a sniper rifle for 75% of the game. I tossed in a SMG for the last bit. Yet if cut scenes half the time I'm using a pistol and half the time it's an assault rifle. Furthermore, if I have a sniper rifle and some jerk has a hostage I can shoot him in the eye. I do that shit in fucking combat, why can't I do it in a cut scene.