Why do you not believe the indoctrination theory? *Major Spoilers*

[Varrdy]

Not trying to offend here, it's just so far no-one has taken any of the theory and actually examined it.

Like you, I feel like I am pissing into the wind. The people who say we are wrong just will not accept the evidence we put before them, despite it being plainly obvious for all to see.

I only really looked into the Indoctrination Theory today and, while would have never spotted the evidence had it not been laid out in that article you posted and a very good video I watched earlier, I have to say that it makes a lot more sense than the sodding ending itself does.

Yes I am sad that the ending was such arse-seepage that we have to come up with theories like this, even though this one holds a hell of a lot of water!

I would also like to say this: No matter if BioWare intended this to be the case or not, it really is a no-brainer for them now. With this theory, the people who came up with it have pretty much written BioWare out of a corner. While I still assert that the ending needs to be expanded on rather than outright retconned, BioWare could do worse than to roll with the Indoctination theory as the evidence, which certain trolls refuse to accept, is already right there, in the game as it stands.

I'm not saying it would be a small and easy task to make because I am 99% sure it would take a lot of work but I sill maintain that I am not entitled by asking for it because we were promised it.

If BioWare intended this theory to be the case, the evidence is there after all, and we worked it out then aint we just the smart-arses? If not but BioWare went "Eureka! That's it!" and ran with it anyway then I'd still be happy.

While I would like a happy ending (or one that gives me hope) as I put in a hell of a lot of effort, an ending that makes sense and gives me closure would do!

 

[SpaceBat]

I do believe in the theory, as there is simply too much evidence that supports it. In fact, it makes more sense than the endings do as they are now. I can't help but cringe every time stupid people claim that it's just fans desperately trying to cling to something other reality. Although to be fair, I had immediately thought the same the moment I heard about this theory.

I was, after having followed this clusterfuck for the past week or two, under the impression that our community was simply too young childish to actually even consider and discuss another theory (although this theory doesn't really deliver any closure whatsoever either). While this may still be true to a degree (as it is with any other medium), I'm glad to see that people actually have the common sense not to automatically dismiss things like this.

Is the indoctrination theory true? I don't know. I hope so, but it cannot be anything more than a theory for now. And that's the point of it, isn't it? Subtlety of it and the sheer effectiveness of the indoctrination would disappear if they kept shoving the idea that it might be indoctrination into your face. That's why I keep getting baffled when people keep saying that it's false, because it's a theory and hilariously compare it to nutty conspiracy theory's. Yes guys, the idea that a form of entertainment might force you to not take everything at eye-value is totally the same as nutty conspiracy theory's. Because books, movies and games never do these things.

Anyway, I'm glad to see that people are still capable of common sense and are open for discussions, rather than foaming at the mouth indefinitely. Keep it up guys and please ignore Zeel. No matter what the truth may be, Mass Effect still deserves at least some thought to be put into it.

Spoiler: An excellent summary of the theory, although it misses a couple of things

 

[Savagezion]

Zen, I liked your response. Everyone should know, I am not against the indoctrination theory, I just don't see the reason to care one way or the other. My stance is the ending sucks, indoctrination theory or not.

I took a look at your video, and here were my thoughts:

Part 1 is taken care of by "dude, it's a hallucination". Shep wants Joker and crew to survive. This applies to 2 and 3 (Mass Relay explosion), and besides even the video maked admits it could be a different type of explosion that DOESN'T murder everyone. Lots of people would still die though, thanks to the sudden and unexpected loss of the mass relays.

I don't buy that it is a different kind of explosion. I just can't get behind that as I don't see any type of support for such an argument. The shockwaves from those explosion could actually alter orbits of nearby stars and planets. The only reason that supports that it is a different kind of explosion is "because it doesn't make sense to have it be the same kind."

Plot hole number 4 (the Stranded Victory Fleet) isn't so much a plot hole as a "What happened to the Mouse?" situation, because it doesn't work at all against established canon. Also, for someone who's such a stickler for canon, "hundrids of different races"? We don't even have 50 races mentioned in the series, and Shep didn't recruit all of them anyway.

I agree that isn't a plothole. Its just a really strong dose of "bitter" for the "bittersweet". It's a setup in the writing for the "bittersweet" ending
meaning there needs to be some payoff of a good dose of "Sweet" to balance it out. It never gives us that.

Number 5 (What's up with not seeing all my War Assets in action?) is a good point though, and a serious flaw in the ending even if Bioware waves it's magical free DLC that reveals the ending was [indoctrinated]Shep.

Agreed.

Number 6 (no closure) and # 10 (player choice didn't matter as promised) WOULD be taken care of if there's magic Bioware free DLC, but otherwise this is totally valid.

Agreed.

#7 (another Twist Ending? Really?) is mostly complaining, and not a horrific way to end the series.

I just really like that point. It is just complaining for the sake of this video but I take that one more as a message to the people saying "People are just crying they didn't get a rainbows and unicorn ending." Some people are even saying Bioware broke a mold and are innovating storytelling with this ending. I have seen stuff like this before that was written way better throughout it and the ending confirmed your suspicions.

Now, as you said #8 is totally solved by the Indoctrination Theory, #9 is pretty much solved (if you go with destroy, you are saying "hey, what you're saying is lies and doesn't make sense. I'm killing all of you, now and forever!", and if you go with the other two options Shepard is falling prey to indoctrination and is at least partially accepting the Reaper King's BS.)

I can see where you are coming from but to have Shepard NOT be able to tell the starchild he is wrong? That is such a kick in the balls to the player. Especially when the entire series has been about proving this kid's ideology is wrong. As Indoctrination theory suggest's the kid represents ghosts of the past. (A.K.A. old ways of thinking) Example:
KKK says racial harmony is impossible so
A) Destroy - You kill them and a bunch of other innocents. (That's the right one)
B) Control - you become grand master and issue KKK orders.(It's a trick anyways)
C) Synthesis - make everyone same race. (It's a trick anyways)

The whole thing could be good. But it's not. It's nonsensical.

Yeah, the ending wasn't perfect even if the Indoctrination Theory is established as canon and Bioware releases magic [free]DLC, but the two things it doesn't cover (What happens to the Victory Fleet & What about not seeing my War Assets in action?) are MOSTLY minor points comparatively.

Well, how minor is based on the player, to that end, I will agree. But if the entire ending sequence of Mass Effect was all a hallucination, with only one "right choice", none of which was the real ending... what the hell is that? That is a terrible ending for the series. Either way, the ending sucks. It's either "a bunch of random shit happens" then the game just cuts off, or "Shepard has an indoctrination attempt" and the game cuts off.

 

[Murmillos]

If the Reaper can influence the possible choices, they would always leave you with the control one.

Its a two way battle. The Reapers are trying to convince you to take one direction, while your mind is trying to lead you from it. So in a way, there is still choice from within the battle of the direction of Shepards mind/will.

Tho, even tho the indoctrination/dream theory does make sense of the end, you are right it still doesn't make sense of the end choices.

Because if you poor War Assets, you get only the destroy choice (red) (which is the theory that you are fighting against them).. if you have marginal War Assets, you have the control (blue) choice and if you have really good War Assets, you get the middle merge (green) choice.


wait..

wait..

I have it! The better your war assets, the longer you've been hanging around the affects of being indoctrinated, which means the Reapers ability to avert control is taking a stronger hold. Which means they could present the ability that "hey, taking control of us (or even merging with) is the better path you want to take; which is the goal of the Reapers to finally control/end Shepard - having him give into their subversion, which is basically accepting synthetics as equals by accepting them or merging into as them.

And then that explains why even with the best war assets, even if you still decide to destroy them, despite being so warped by their control, and so willing to stop them, so hell bent on saving organics above all else, even at risk of throwing way "friendly" synthetics; we see that scene that we believe is Shepard taking that breath. Despite fighting against the best offers that the Reapers had to give, Shepard would rather give up it all up for a chance to just even have a chance, and thus broke the indoctrination.

Going in weaker war assets still allows you to break their hold, but still at the cost of your own life because you haven't willed yourself strong enough to deal with force of dying.

 

[xorinite]

I got snips, on a plane!

And what rate of attrition would you place on it? We have evidence that perhaps 3 reapers have died in the previous cycles, based on bodies found. They hibernate in dark space between cycles - I cannot think of a safer nest. Furthermore, as machines they have no age limit. Any attrition is negligible, surely? Besides, taking the billion year old idea, for this to work we'd have to assume that at least 850 or so Reaper corpses are floating around for the galaxy to stand any chance. The only reason ANY reapers are dead in this cycle is because of the Prothean warning.

Sure during hibernation they may be safe. However its during the cycles themselves they are at risk. A single alliance fleet managed to kill one using conventional missile weapons which we know from the story are inferior to the prothean weapons of the day. I don't see us having any particle beams.

Very well. I'll point out you're making your decision on incomplete evidence, but fine.

Accepting something to be what it appears doesn't require additional evidence. Saying its something other than what it appears to be does. If we see lightning hit a tower and I say, that looks like lightning hitting a tower and you say, nope alien space ship beam weapon. Only one of those requires additional evidence.

Ok. Give me more. Then give me all the small plot holes in ME1 and 2. What we should see is a general trend of more plot holes per hour of gameplay as it goes on, and a demonstrably worse general plot as a result. This does not happen. Also, you are ignoring my point about this being the climax of the story, and the usual changes that take place (besides giving me one small plot hole and telling me there are more). If you want to compare the ME series to some imaginary perfect tale and use that as evidence be my guest, but it convinces no-one. Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, hell, even Harry Potter, all include this slight change in lore in the final instalment.

I've given you loads already.
Why exactly do I have to provide exhaustive evidence of every single story in the history of story telling?
So, what you are now saying is ALL stories tend to fall apart a bit when they get to their final installment, which supports who's argument. Mine that the story fell apart, or yours which is that it didn't and was intentionally like this?

But that is EVIDENCE of a lack of time. If you don't want it to seem poor and rushed you do not include half of a cutscene.

Which fits what I suggested perfectly.

Also, I don't buy for a second that that cutscene ever had anything more to it. Wanna know why? (apart from the clear way it hits the credits) Cos Shepard is supposed to die in the Red ending. "You will destroy all synthetics. Even you are partly synthetic". To make it more plausible, all they had to do was NOT implement it. You are proposing ACTIVE stupidity here, not passive stupidity.

Incompetence explains it better than they intended it. Easily explained as rushed cobbled together nonsense in the final hours when nobody had time to double check and go over everyones work since everyone wanted to leave on their holidays.

What possible reason could you have for not believing him? If it's literal you have no reason not to. Everyone has this vague distrust, but when you're presented with a reason, no-one accepts it. It's weird.

I have enough reason in this; he speaks in tautologies. It doesn't matter if you are a giant space robot or a self aware bacteria colony, if your logic is fallacious its fallacious.

The renegade ending also has features like punching the female reporter in the face, over words. it indulges in unnecessary violence, something paragon never does. It DEFINTELY results in more death. You're arguing semantics here.

I am not arguing semantics.
I paragon punched Zaeed, was that necessary?
I paragon threatened to break someones legs, was that non violent?
I renegade punched gerrel, and you know what, I think it was absolutely right to do so.
Hell, even telling him, just TELLING him that he was being unnecessarily violent is considered renegade and gains you renegade points.

I set up this whole thread under that idea. It's easily shown to be false. Give me someone who talks to the kid. Give me a conversation when Shepard mentions the kid, even in passing. Give me any hint AT ALL that the starchild exists. Give me a scene, or sentence, in the ending that goes against the morality of the theory. Give me an explanation for the scenes in the Citadel. Show me where Shepard is at the end of the red. Show me some combination of variables that gives the extra scene in the blue or green. Give me a single end choice that does not fit into the categories I've already stated (with regards to EMS and the collector base). Show me that Shepard was bleeding profusely BEFORE he shot Anderson. Give me a reason the last dream is different from the previous ones. ANY logical gap will do.

You need evidence for, not evidence against it for it to be reasonable.
Oh and nonsense to that argument that joker was running away because shepherd liked to imagine them being safe.
If you pick the red, first the reapers are killed THEN joker runs.
Why is he still running away, because shepherd liked to imagine joker being a moron who is stranded on an alien jungle when the threat had effectively passed already?

Oh and we know shepherds indoctrinated all along, because he always seems to have an avenger assault rifle during cut scenes despite the fact I only ever send him out with a pistol.

Your theory is more unfalsifiable than mine. "They were lazy/stupid/rushed". Despite all the objections, short of dlc, your theory is not falsifiable.

Of course its falsifiable.

If the development team weren't rushed, lazy, stupid etc, you would expect to see an ending that makes sense and is complete, even with indoctrination theory its still not.
You would expect to see the same development and writing team, we don't.
You would expect to see no developers mentioning they had to pull things due to not being ready, we have developers saying that they had to pull things due to not being ready.

I mean even the indoctrination theory itself relies upon the idea that the ending delivered isn't sufficiently elaborated on its own and thus rests on my rushed/stupid/lazy theory. Yet it requires ADDITIONAL assumptions, Occam's razor says more assumptions makes it less likely.

Edit: fixed the uh, quote boxing. Something went weird but fixed now.

 

[Asita]

Your theory is more unfalsifiable than mine. "They were lazy/stupid/rushed". Despite all the objections, short of dlc, your theory is not falsifiable.

Could someone explain what you mean by unfalsifiable/falsifiable? (I might be misunderstanding, as english isn't my first language -_-).

They're terms used to describe the capacity (or lack thereof) of an idea to have evidence against it. One could think of it simply as whether it's even hypothetically possible to make a point against it.

A Falsifiable idea is one that can - in principle - be proven wrong, and thus a well-developed idea that has definitive criteria for and against it. For instance: Gravity is a falsifiable idea because we can imagine criteria that would bring its conclusions into question. If one day everything on earth started floating up like a balloon without any evident cause, that would be a point against our current understanding of Gravity. Put differently, you could think of it as "Heads I win, Tails you win" in terms of logic. There are conditions which work for the idea of 'you win' and conditions which work for the idea of 'you lose'.

An Unfalsifiable idea is one that effectively lacks 'lose conditions'. Essentially, it is an idea that is impossible even in principle to prove wrong, which points to poorly defined criteria and equally poor definition. Using the former analogy, you could perhaps think of it as "Heads I win, Tails you lose". This renders the notion useless as, lacking any notion of evidence that would act against it, there necessarily exists no evidence that actually implies the idea.


Summing it up the terms basically boil down to your ability to determine the truth value of a given claim. If a claim's falsifiable then contrary evidence should indicate its falsehood. If it is unfalsifiable then there are no criteria under which contrary evidence could even hypothetically exist.

I hope I explained that well enough, but in case I didn't: this link might be worth checking out

 

[SS2Dante]

a)You misunderstand the reading of the indoctrination process. I'll say again - the Reapers are NOT creating this reality. SHEPARD is. It's not a rebellion, it's the mind showing us the indoctrination process in visual terms. Therefore no matter the intensity of the indoctrination we always see it the same, because the indoctrination process is always the same. It would make no sense if it changed. What changes are the choices (how Shepard reacts to the process).

I never said the reapers were creating it. I said that according to IT it was the embodiment of his efforts to rebel. A personification of the struggle, if you will. With that in mind, Shepherd's mental state would logically effect the mental world in general rather than just miniscule details. What I'm saying is that given the radical difference in effort IT claims the reapers are spending trying to indoctrinate Shepherd, the consistency of his mental world makes no sense, especially given the inverse relationship between mental capabiltiies and indoctrination. And seriously, you just took the opposite position with your argument again. Literally, in the last post of yours that I responded to you said, and I quote: "What DOES change is the options you are given - this is completely in line with what we'd expect. If the reapers are pushing hard, or your Shepard is mentally weakened, we get the other options, if they are not we don't. They only push hard if you are an actual threat to them.". That's exactly what I was talking about when I said you were employing double-think. You are expousing two mutually exclusive premises as support for the same argument at the same time. Pick a stance and stick with it. You don't get to jump back and forth between them like that.

b) This problem you have comes from the mistaken interpretation. As I said, the choices are based on how weak Shepard is, based on your collectors base choice, and how much of a threat he is, based on your EMS. Do you think this is a large leap? Considering it explains every single possible combination of EMS and choices?

Yes, I do think it's a large leap, based on Bible Code logic, no less. As to the last rhetorical question, allow me to posit one of my own: Hypothetically speaking, what criteria wouldn't IT be able to justify? For comparison: How would you prove that you aren't in the Matrix right now? It's not that IT explains anything, it's that IT is an undisprovable hypothesis and thus anything can be shoehorned in and called 'supporting evidence' (despite the fact that if a hypothesis cannot be disproved then rationally no objective evidence for it exists)

Double think? The positions are as follows - low EMS, the Reapers do not try hard. Hence you only get the fight or control. High EMS, they are trying hard, because they are unable to physically kill you and fear your army. Reapers do not need to 'target' someone for indoctrination, since they do it through sound waves and such. They cannot be distracted in the way you believe I am implying. You are misunderstanding my position. When I say they can't focus on you I mean they can't physically attack just you. They're busy with mako's and stuff

You mean despite the fact that you were just directly attacked by a reaper before this supposed head-trip? Really?
And again, I'm noticing cognitive dissonance here. You were the one who posited the distraction in the first place, remember? And I quote: "If your EMS his high then Hammer is still attacking and the Reaper can't focus just on you. if not, it can." Those are your words, from the last post I responded to. As I said, you are treading over your own arguments and espousing mutually contradictory positions to try to make this idea work.

Ok, Andersons and the Illusive Man. Did you really not see the symbolism in that scene?(there's actual material evidence for this one, give me a moment). Two characters that logically should not be there together at that time, one standing for corruption, the other the heroic father figure? Listen to what you've said:

"You actually take it a step further than that though, by later insisting that Anderson is the embodiment of your will...which is an inconsistent premise as that logically requires that his death should railroad you towards more reaper-friendly options as you thereafter lack the will to resist, and being shot by the indoctrinated under those premises has pretty obvious implications."

This is exactly what happens, and what I've said happens. You defeat the indoctrinated part of you, but the effort destroys the last of your will (THIS is the material evidence. Watch the scene again. Shepard shoots Anderson in the lower left stomach. After Anderson dies, your Shepard puts his hand onto his stomach in the same position, and pulls it away. His hands are now COVERED in blood. The blood was not there before, nor was your Shepard wounded in that region.).

Problem is that only justifies one variation, and its symbolism is rendered completely irrelevant in others due to the lack of option to follow through. Here's the thing, if the embodiment of your will is destroyed by the embodiment of indoctrination, the symbolism ONLY works if you succumb to that indoctrination. If you don't, then the scene is rendered meaningless in that context as your will is still alive. And the point is further muddied by the fact that you can only ever progress if you kill the Illusive Man, regardless of Anderson's fate. If you could only choose the reaper-unfriendly options if Anderson lived, then you might have a point. But that's not what happens which very strongly implies a certain line attributed to Freud: "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar". A confrontation like that does not have to be a metaphor and should not be viewed as such if you have to cherry pick endings like you do in this case to make the symbolism work.

Anderson dies and you are instantly railroaded into the final scene, which as I've explained is the choice to give into the Reapers, but this time far more appealing. This has been my position from the very start, I'm not twisting it at all. Go back and check.

Yeah, no. If Anderson embodies your will and the scene is symbolic and metaphorical of Shepherd's mental state, his death necessarily means that Shepherd's will must die with him. That is not what we see, and thus we are necessarily forbidden from interpreting the scene thusly.

Actually, arguments like "Dumbledores not dead" are what made me believe this. They're always flimsy and easily destroyed. In Dumbledores case, people were ignoring the fact that Avada Kedavra is always lethal. Always. We see it happen. Snape says the words out loud. See? Easy to take down. Furthermore, this theory is a bad parallel, because I'm trying to explain existing plotholes. Dumbledores death had no reason to be interpreted, as it was perfectly sensible in the narrative. The endings of ME3 are not. Not even close. Basically I'm not trying to add stuff here, I'm trying to take away all the fake bits.

Actually, you're trying to add quite a bit of unneeded complexity which necessarily culminates with the series ending before the climax does.

You say it doesn't make sense for the red blue endings to be missing in any scenario? Like I said before, you are overestimating how much indoctrination has actually happened. They are TRYING to get Shepard, beginning with the child, but hallucinations and agreement with their goals are a hell of a distance from each other. You are ignoring the idea that the Reapers are not actively putting the pressure on Shepard at this level of EMS. You are removing the argument from context.

No, I'm saying it doesn't make any sense for the BLUE ending to be missing under any circumstances since the key premise of IT is that Shepherd's mind had already been significantly altered by indoctrination and the scene with the catalyst was a visualization of his reaction and ultimate rejection or acceptance of it. When any situation lacks the blue option (which IT presents as reaper-friendly), the concept of the final level being essentially a battle inside the mind falls apart completely, as the effects of indoctrination under that interpretation are completely glossed over despite the fact that IT claims the scene itself is a reaction to indoctrination.

Truth be told, I feel I'm doing a better job of keeping the premises consistant than IT does, which is one of the many reasons I despise the concept.

Hey, I love TLA too. Can't wait for Legend of Korra.

Did you see the leaked episode or did you miss it? Personally I'm a bit skeptical about the changes to the setting, but I'm willing to give it a shot at least.

Ok, I appreciate that you think the ending was bad, but what you're ignoring is that the partitions exist. Do you believe the designers were so rushed that they rolled a dice to determine them? A team of programmers probably spent a few weeks on this sequence. They could have shortened the time considerably by simply leaving all three options in, no matter your EMS. This is logically better, if they didn't care or have a reason to make the partitions anything special. But it IS partitioned. Someone did take the time to carefully decide the cutoff points and variables that decide your ending. Lazy design DOES NOT explain this.

Actually, it likely took far less time than you think. The cinematics are what would take the most time and those use the same footage almost frame for frame. The partitioning itself isn't that difficult in concept, merely a set of nested if-then statements. As someone with a very basic knowledge of programming, I know I could write a code that does something similar in C++ in less than an hour (in basic non-code form: If war assets < 1750, run ending1 (ending1: if collectorbasesaved, run cinematic1 else run cinematic2)....) Honestly, what I think is that they ran out of time, made some slight tweaks to certain frames and identified them as the variants they'd originally planned to make more distinct. Lazy doesn't explain it, rushed most certainly does, especially given the leaked Dark Energy-ending that ostensibly was the original cut, and the fact that retooling the Javik subplot apparently caused a bit of a chain reaction that forced them to reconsider a lot of plot points and crunched them for time which was already scarce.

Em, honestly yes that last bit may have been directed at someone else. You may not have noticed but the thread got rather busy Was trying to respond to everyone. Apologies!

S'alright. Just wanted to make sure.

You are positing that Shepards mental world doesn't change enough. That, apart from being impractical in execution, is simply your opinion on what indoctrination does. You are saying that the dream is isn't dreamy enough. I don't understand your logic. Shepard is given a view of the entire battle, and earth. You can literally see everything that is at stake. This stays consistent throughout each ending. What else do you want? Floating objects? Upside down stairs?

Also, I have said several times now, it is NOT his attempting to rebel. It is him considering the choices given buy the indoctrination. Only in retrospect could it be labelled a personification of choice to rebel. Before this scene, our position is that Shepard is not indoctrinated, unless you chose to keep the Reaper base, and then barely even. Nor is he indoctrinate DURING this scene.

Also, explain these two mutually contradictory positions I am apparently taking. I can see no contradiction in my explanations, so I think we may have crossed wires here. Possibly this is caused by you thinking that I assume physical attack and indoctrination to be the same thing, or have the same requirements with regards to focus? Not sure.

This part is the EASIEST to prove wrong. If you can find me some combination of variables that does not follow the logic I have given, fine, it's wrong. If you have high EMS and cannot do control or something, I am wrong. I did not know all positions at the start, gave my scale for predicting the results, and thus far everything has followed that pattern. Also, if we briefly assume that this theory is correct, can you prove it wrong? Just saying, that if it is actually correct, then there should be no contrary evidence to beat it. Imagine trying to convince me logically that Quirrel did it in Hp 1 Before the end scene it'd be easy to get close to disproving, after the end scene it's be utterly impossible to disprove. I've given my conditions in another post, but thus far the evidence works.

You're missing the point of the Anderson scene. The Illusive man represents the part of Shepard succumbing to the indoctrination, Anderson represents the part that can resist. Because Anderson is alive, you always win. If you allow the indoctrinated part to kill him, you lose as surely as if you'd skipped to the control ending. But the effort of the struggle kills him every time (literally, the indoctrinated part forces you to shoot him. COME ON). Anderson is the last part of you utterly sure that what you're doing is right. That is why in the next scene everything is more palatable. Besides, which, can you explain the blood on Shepards hands?

Again, you misunderstand. Shepards iron conviction is gone. Shepard has no 'will'. WE are Shepards will. Without Anderson, we see the whole thing differently. This is key to the whole theory - it's not about tricking Shepard, it's about tricking US.

Ending before the climax does? How?

Ah, right, sorry, had this conversation before with other, people, keep forgetting which bits I've talked about with whom. There is only one situation my theory says that you could not get the option for blue. Apart from this I agree, blue should always be a choice. The one time you don't get blue should be at low EMS, having saved the collector base. This is the only situation where your Shepard has willpower and they are not actively trying to indoctrinate you. Conversely, if you kept the Collector base, you've got low willpower, so you should only get the blue ending.

I tried to link to a guide that shows the ending you can get, but every one I've seen seems to be wrong. They either show ONLY the 'best' option at each war asset level, or don't show the split between the collector base choices. Here's the 3 I saw.

http://uk.ign.com/wikis/mass-effect-3/Endings

http://www.justpushstart.com/2012/03/mass-effect-3-endings-guide/

http://www.rarityguide.com/articles/articles/1739/1/Mass-Effect-3-Endings-Guide---HEAVY-SPOILERS/Page1.html

(as I read the second one I was on the verge of admitting my theory had just developed a huge hole. Then I noticed that it said on my game type (over 5k, collector base kept) only the DESTROY option. Since I know I can choose all 3, waiting for a more comprehensive guide.

Sorry, but you're speaking to a computer scientist here. Trust me, these partitions are not simple if then else statements, or CASE statements. The amount of testing alone necessary to make sure the right endings happen correctly every time is...large. *sweats just thinking about it*

I do agree about the possibility of the ending having been changed. Thing is, according to this theory, they got the stuff they'd already done out the door and added this clever, but sudden, ending on. This gives them time to work on the proper ending.

EDIT - didn't see it, no. Gonna wait till it's officially out. Very excited

 

[mdqp]

Thanks Asita, your explanation was perfectly clear.

P.s. I love your posts, xorinite, may I have your blessing to marry them?

 

[xorinite]

Thanks Asita, your explanation was perfectly clear.

P.s. I love your posts, xorinite, may I have your blessing to marry them?

Oh well, uhm thank you, I accept your request as a heart warming compliment. Just make sure any kids don't grow up to be youtube comments.

Edit: That might be length based discrimination comparable to heightism so for the moment I will retract that requirement. So long as they do their best if they are happy being youtube comments its okay.

 

[mdqp]

Oh well, uhm thank you, I accept your request as a heart warming compliment. Just make sure any kids don't grow up to be youtube comments.

Edit: That might be length based discrimination comparable to heightism so for the moment I will retract that requirement. So long as they do their best if they are happy being youtube comments its okay.

Yay! We'll name the first one after you... "Dad"! ^_^

 

[SS2Dante]

I got snips, on a plane!

And what rate of attrition would you place on it? We have evidence that perhaps 3 reapers have died in the previous cycles, based on bodies found. They hibernate in dark space between cycles - I cannot think of a safer nest. Furthermore, as machines they have no age limit. Any attrition is negligible, surely? Besides, taking the billion year old idea, for this to work we'd have to assume that at least 850 or so Reaper corpses are floating around for the galaxy to stand any chance. The only reason ANY reapers are dead in this cycle is because of the Prothean warning.

Sure during hibernation they may be safe. However its during the cycles themselves they are at risk. A single alliance fleet managed to kill one using conventional missile weapons which we know from the story are inferior to the prothean weapons of the day. I don't see us having any particle beams.

Very well. I'll point out you're making your decision on incomplete evidence, but fine.

Accepting something to be what it appears doesn't require additional evidence. Saying its something other than what it appears to be does. If we see lightning hit a tower and I say, that looks like lightning hitting a tower and you say, nope alien space ship beam weapon. Only one of those requires additional evidence.

Ok. Give me more. Then give me all the small plot holes in ME1 and 2. What we should see is a general trend of more plot holes per hour of gameplay as it goes on, and a demonstrably worse general plot as a result. This does not happen. Also, you are ignoring my point about this being the climax of the story, and the usual changes that take place (besides giving me one small plot hole and telling me there are more). If you want to compare the ME series to some imaginary perfect tale and use that as evidence be my guest, but it convinces no-one. Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, hell, even Harry Potter, all include this slight change in lore in the final instalment.

I've given you loads already.
Why exactly do I have to provide exhaustive evidence of every single story in the history of story telling?
So, what you are now saying is ALL stories tend to fall apart a bit when they get to their final installment, which supports who's argument. Mine that the story fell apart, or yours which is that it didn't and was intentionally like this?

But that is EVIDENCE of a lack of time. If you don't want it to seem poor and rushed you do not include half of a cutscene.

Which fits what I suggested perfectly.

Also, I don't buy for a second that that cutscene ever had anything more to it. Wanna know why? (apart from the clear way it hits the credits) Cos Shepard is supposed to die in the Red ending. "You will destroy all synthetics. Even you are partly synthetic". To make it more plausible, all they had to do was NOT implement it. You are proposing ACTIVE stupidity here, not passive stupidity.

Incompetence explains it better than they intended it. Easily explained as rushed cobbled together nonsense in the final hours when nobody had time to double check and go over everyones work since everyone wanted to leave on their holidays.

What possible reason could you have for not believing him? If it's literal you have no reason not to. Everyone has this vague distrust, but when you're presented with a reason, no-one accepts it. It's weird.

I have enough reason in this; he speaks in tautologies. It doesn't matter if you are a giant space robot or a self aware bacteria colony, if your logic is fallacious its fallacious.

The renegade ending also has features like punching the female reporter in the face, over words. it indulges in unnecessary violence, something paragon never does. It DEFINTELY results in more death. You're arguing semantics here.

I am not arguing semantics.
I paragon punched Zaeed, was that necessary?
I paragon threatened to break someones legs, was that non violent?
I renegade punched gerrel, and you know what, I think it was absolutely right to do so.
Hell, even telling him, just TELLING him that he was being unnecessarily violent is considered renegade and gains you renegade points.

I set up this whole thread under that idea. It's easily shown to be false. Give me someone who talks to the kid. Give me a conversation when Shepard mentions the kid, even in passing. Give me any hint AT ALL that the starchild exists. Give me a scene, or sentence, in the ending that goes against the morality of the theory. Give me an explanation for the scenes in the Citadel. Show me where Shepard is at the end of the red. Show me some combination of variables that gives the extra scene in the blue or green. Give me a single end choice that does not fit into the categories I've already stated (with regards to EMS and the collector base). Show me that Shepard was bleeding profusely BEFORE he shot Anderson. Give me a reason the last dream is different from the previous ones. ANY logical gap will do.

You need evidence for, not evidence against it for it to be reasonable.
Oh and nonsense to that argument that joker was running away because shepherd liked to imagine them being safe.
If you pick the red, first the reapers are killed THEN joker runs.
Why is he still running away, because shepherd liked to imagine joker being a moron who is stranded on an alien jungle when the threat had effectively passed already?

Oh and we know shepherds indoctrinated all along, because he always seems to have an avenger assault rifle during cut scenes despite the fact I only ever send him out with a pistol.

Your theory is more unfalsifiable than mine. "They were lazy/stupid/rushed". Despite all the objections, short of dlc, your theory is not falsifiable.

Of course its falsifiable.

If the development team weren't rushed, lazy, stupid etc, you would expect to see an ending that makes sense and is complete, even with indoctrination theory its still not.
You would expect to see the same development and writing team, we don't.
You would expect to see no developers mentioning they had to pull things due to not being ready, we have developers saying that they had to pull things due to not being ready.

I mean even the indoctrination theory itself relies upon the idea that the ending delivered isn't sufficiently elaborated on its own and thus rests on my rushed/stupid/lazy theory. Yet it requires ADDITIONAL assumptions, Occam's razor says more assumptions makes it less likely.

Edit: fixed the uh, quote boxing. Something went weird but fixed now.

Like I said, you seem to be assuming that every cycle goes like ours. It doesn't. No other race ever got warning of them, that we know of, before the Citadel was jumped to. Governments were cut off, armies were destroyed before being mobilised. People didn't know they HAD to fight the reapers till it was too late to fight. The point of ME3 is that even with advance warning uniting the galaxy to fight them is still a seemingly impossible task.

To me it appears the child isn't real. There is no evidence at all he is. Give me some one way or the other, or we're both just theorizing. We're both basing this on our default stance, nothing more.

You've given me the lasers being slightly different. And the prothean change in 2. Hardly loads. Also, yes, essentially. The point is that they back of from convention a little bit to increase drama, they don't just chuck it out the window. That is why your beam plot hole exists. It's small, and doesn't effect much. My plot holes actually destroy any semblance of plot cohesion. That is the difference. One is expected, the other is not.

Game creation is notoriously something you work on 'cos you want to. These people lived and breathed ME for years. They cared about it more than you or I EVER will. What you describe is ludicrous, and STILL doesn't explain the EXTRA, NON NECESSARY SCENE. if they wanted to leave work they would leave, not take the time to put in an extra ending no-one would EVER have noticed wasn't there.

So does Mordin

So you are really arguing that the majority of players in Mass Effect would not associate renegade with the 'bad' choice?

I have explained the endings before. EVERY member of your crew at some point has a conversation with you where they say they want to go somewhere far away, somewhere peaceful, where they can relax and be at peace. The ending cutscene is Shepard imagining his choice causes that. This is why they all end up miraculously far away, together, on a beautiful paradise world, no matter what ending you choose. You always believe it to be right.

Occams razor takes into account the number of suppositions but not the combined statistical probability of each of it's component assumptions. That is why I find it unsuitable for this discussion. You assume a small number of improbable event's, I posit a larger number of probable ones. Apples and oranges, unless we want to start getting into hyper maths

You're stating that the only way to disprove your theory is if past event's didn't happen? Also, you missed the simple one: dlc. That's the only true proof one way or the other.

 

[SS2Dante]

Your theory is more unfalsifiable than mine. "They were lazy/stupid/rushed". Despite all the objections, short of dlc, your theory is not falsifiable.

Could someone explain what you mean by unfalsifiable/falsifiable? (I might be misunderstanding, as english isn't my first language -_-).

They're terms used to describe the capacity (or lack thereof) of an idea to have evidence against it. One could think of it simply as whether it's even hypothetically possible to make a point against it.

A Falsifiable idea is one that can - in principle - be proven wrong, and thus a well-developed idea that has definitive criteria for and against it. For instance: Gravity is a falsifiable idea because we can imagine criteria that would bring its conclusions into question. If one day everything on earth started floating up like a balloon without any evident cause, that would be a point against our current understanding of Gravity. Put differently, you could think of it as "Heads I win, Tails you win" in terms of logic. There are conditions which work for the idea of 'you win' and conditions which work for the idea of 'you lose'.

An Unfalsifiable idea is one that effectively lacks 'lose conditions'. Essentially, it is an idea that is impossible even in principle to prove wrong, which points to poorly defined criteria and equally poor definition. Using the former analogy, you could perhaps think of it as "Heads I win, Tails you lose". This renders the notion useless as, lacking any notion of evidence that would act against it, there necessarily exists no evidence that actually implies the idea.


Summing it up the terms basically boil down to your ability to determine the truth value of a given claim. If a claim's falsifiable then contrary evidence should indicate its falsehood. If it is unfalsifiable then there are no criteria under which contrary evidence could even hypothetically exist.

I hope I explained that well enough, but in case I didn't: this link might be worth checking out

Bravo for being more creative than simply using the God theory as an example

 

[AD-Stu]

Actually, it doesn't. The lore in the games directly contradicts this view, as it renders much of Sarens plot points in ME1 incomprehensible. Saren specifically believes he is NOT indoctrinated, which is why he gets worried when you tell him he might be. That's why he sets up a research lab to study indoctrination. Sovereign saw this and gave him the implants. If Saren was trapped inside his own mind, none of this would made sense. He'd already know he was indoctrinated.

The lore in the game states again and again that a person, at least at first, is unaware they are being indoctrinated.

Except Saren wouldn't have done anything he did in ME1 unless he was already indoctrinated - it seems pretty obvious (to me, at least) that the Reapers had control of him long before the game started. Keep in mind that he'd been in contact with Sovereign for the better part of 20 years by that point and you can see the Reaper implants in him from his very first scene.

He is, in every respect, an unreliable narrator. He says he set up the facility on Virmire to study indoctrination, but can you really trust his word on that? Keep in mind he's trying to sway Shepard to his cause at that point: of course he's going to downplay the loss of free will. For all we know the facility was actually working on improved indoctrination methods.

How is worse than the literal one? Besides the fact it is unhappier (which is a very childish way to look at it) it makes more sense and is more consistent with the series lore in every way. I'd say that's a better ending.

Aaahhh, the old "you must have wanted a happy ending" chestnut. Sorry, but "it was all a dream" is 100 per cent the worst way you can end any story - that's a childish ending, storytelling 101 is "just don't do that shit, ever".

If it was all a dream then we go from having a lame, poorly-executed, non-sensical resolution to having no resolution at all, with an explanation that still doesn't make any sense. Seriously, how is that better?

 

[SS2Dante]

May I ask then why you think you get an extra scene if you choose the red ending?

This is pretty simple. In the green and blue endings, you see Shepard "disintegrate" on screen, so there's no way he/she possibly could have survived. In the red ending, there's a small chance that Shepard may have survived (assuming the extra scene takes place on the Citadel and not back on Earth), so the extra scene seems more plausible.

Look carefully at the ARMOR please

Besides, the indoctrination thing, while slightly better, would still leave the endings awfully inconclusive and unsatisfying. If Shepard was tripping on Reaper brain juice the whole time, then what the fuck really happened?

Battle is not won by one man. Apparently, when Shepard fainted, the other people were still fighting. The fleets from all sources were still firing on the reapers. You get to see Shepard alive if you have enough war assets because the battle would end quickly enough.

Explanation of red endings fails twice:

Citadel blows up
Shepard dies anyway because he is part synthetic. (child states this)

 

[SS2Dante]

Look, have you read the article? It explains all of this.

First - the middle option (synthesis). Even though it's blast is green, it's actually shown during the choosing scene as blue, as if it was just as paragon as control. The synthesis ending involves creating a new species - one that's a combination of synthetics and organics. the pinnacle of evolution. Their is already a species like this is the Mass Effect universe. REAPERS. THIS option is you falling totally. The control option is the easiest way to fall, because you still believe you are in control of them. The synthesis option has you actively accept their philosophy.

Ok, you say the control option shouldn't be available if you have low EMS - this applies to the synthesis ending, just as you say. As I explained, control is the easiest way you fall. It happened to Saren, Beneziah(she believed she could control Saren) and the Illusive Man. Therefore you cannot get the synthesis ending with low EMS, but you can get the control one. They aren't actively trying, but all Reapers broadcast indoctrination waves all the time, they can't stop it. So, yeah, swap control for synthesis and I and the theory agree.

Also, your idea that "it's all just a dream" is a false comparison. The only reason that that is works in the majority of cases is that it occupies a large chunk of the narrative, so we lack perspective. We then have to trawl through and look for various interpretations, all conflicting and overlapping. This theory only posits a tiny fraction of the game, with a definite start and end, and containing far more glaring plot holes than the rest of the series combined. the interpretation fits perfectly, with zero contradictions. Saying the rest of ME after 1 is a dream makes just as much sense as saying the rest of ME is NOT a dream. Saying this is true makes MORE sense than the original interpretation.

I read the article, but maybe I missed something (anything is possible).

The complete failure is possible only if you do good enough? That's odd, but this is a reasoning done completely out of the game (pure speculation on the meaning of the ending), so, even if I would find it not particularly inspired, I am not going to argue it. It's odd though that it would be the harder than simple indoctrination, as you say that the option to destroy is only available because the Reapers are "distracted" by the fight, if I understand you right. But this means that if you are losing the war, you should be able to embrace their ideas too, which I think is cool by the Reapers (you can't have it to suit your needs that well: either you get too beaten down to react, or you are doing so good that you can actively embrace them. Also, destroying appears before synthesis many times, it doesn't make sense).

I can't accept your point about swapping control and synthesis, as I think that without the Reapers trying to subvert you, should have all the options (they don't care about what you do).

My point about the dream is that I can find good excuses for the game, and probably find things here and there that seems to point out at something running deeper (as cracking the plans for the prothean weapon right when you are desperate and not before... It was clearly the Illusive man all along! He is really controlling you! And he is making you believe you killed him! He really implanted something in your brain to control you, he just was really clever in hiding his tracks...).

In all honesty, the problem with your idea is that it would allow the Reapers to control you, without you having any internal fight (all the options presented are good to reach your objective, they are all self-sacrifice first). If they could control people by having them choice what ice-cream they want in their mind, then what's the point? You might think this is different, but actually, it's not: the endings differ in what are your preferences, but they all deal with the same problem and solve it, one way or the other (even if they are all logically flawed). The fact that you identify controlling the Reapers with an evil/indoctrinated choice is just your idea, but it would actually give to all the species some benevolent guardians, ready to defend them, and possible access to incredibly advanced tech. Since you die anyway, it's a choice that it's actually really sound. I doubt that such a self-less act could represent indoctrination.

As I have said before the theory states that the higher war assets you have the more force the Reapers are using to try and control you. They are afraid. That is why you get the complete submission option on high EMS. On low EMS they do NOT need to push so hard, hence the lack of the green ending. Note that if you almost no EMS you only get the red option if you destroyed the collector base, and if you didn't you only get the blue option. This completely agrees with the notion that on low EMS the reapers do not push so hard, so if you've not been corrupted partially, you don't get the option to fall. If you HAVE been corrupted by keeping the base, you only see the option to fall, because without an army and willpower you see no other options.

The green ending is the hardest to get because it is essentially complete agreement with the Reapers, therefore the possibility only occurs when they are pushing hard (going for a fast indoctrination).

No, the option to fight is available in every ending save the one I just explained. It's all about the options Shepard can see. Fight and Fall are the easiest so are in almost every possible end.

By all means expand on your dream theory. I bet I can find a logical flaw, loophole, or contradictory event to destroy it. I fully expected some to appear for this theory. None has (most peoples objection simply boils down to "I don't believe it because it seems unlikely"). That fact alone is incredibly improbable.

Ok, the point of the endings is that it is meant to indoctrinate the PLAYER. The fact that I was presented with 3 options, 2 of which are coloured blue, yet phrased differently are what I just spent 3 games fighting, and I chose one of the blue ones, makes me laugh. It makes me laugh a lot. Just listen to his description of synthesis, then remember the collector base, or the codex definitions of Reapers. Also, of course it appears positive. Indoctrination occurs because the person doesn't realise it's happening to them. If they did know, it's not indoctrination, it's just mind control. The player's 'sacrifice' is just them giving up, watch again and you'll see you look like the Illusive man on both the green and blue endings just before you disintegrate. The magic of videogames is that they truly let you experience empathy. Evidence:

"The fact that you identify controlling the Reapers with an evil/indoctrinated choice is just your idea, but it would actually give to all the species some benevolent guardians, ready to defend them, and possible access to incredibly advanced tech."

Sorry, but you sound like the Illusive Man. Like, really.

 

[SS2Dante]

Actually, it doesn't. The lore in the games directly contradicts this view, as it renders much of Sarens plot points in ME1 incomprehensible. Saren specifically believes he is NOT indoctrinated, which is why he gets worried when you tell him he might be. That's why he sets up a research lab to study indoctrination. Sovereign saw this and gave him the implants. If Saren was trapped inside his own mind, none of this would made sense. He'd already know he was indoctrinated.

The lore in the game states again and again that a person, at least at first, is unaware they are being indoctrinated.

Except Saren wouldn't have done anything he did in ME1 unless he was already indoctrinated - it seems pretty obvious (to me, at least) that the Reapers had control of him long before the game started. Keep in mind that he'd been in contact with Sovereign for the better part of 20 years by that point and you can see the Reaper implants in him from his very first scene.

He is, in every respect, an unreliable narrator. He says he set up the facility on Virmire to study indoctrination, but can you really trust his word on that? Keep in mind he's trying to sway Shepard to his cause at that point: of course he's going to downplay the loss of free will. For all we know the facility was actually working on improved indoctrination methods.

How is worse than the literal one? Besides the fact it is unhappier (which is a very childish way to look at it) it makes more sense and is more consistent with the series lore in every way. I'd say that's a better ending.

Aaahhh, the old "you must have wanted a happy ending" chestnut. Sorry, but "it was all a dream" is 100 per cent the worst way you can end any story - that's a childish ending, storytelling 101 is "just don't do that shit, ever".

If it was all a dream then we go from having a lame, poorly-executed, non-sensical resolution to having no resolution at all, with an explanation that still doesn't make any sense. Seriously, how is that better?

Of course he's indoctrinated! But in the slow, creeping way. You ask how I know he told the truth. Like I said, after he sets up this facility Sovereign realises he suspects and forces him to get the cybernetic implants to enhance the indoctrination. If he was always under Reaper control that makes no sense, as Sovereign wouldn't have needed to do that. Plus, he kills himself if you're good enough. Couldn't have done that trapped in his own body.

This ending is not "it was all a dream". this ending is that 0.2% of the game was a dream. Big difference. And your consequences carry over. If you picked wrong in the dream, everyone loses. if you picked right, Shepard lives, battle goes on, cliffhanger for dlc. Seems good to me.

 

[Something Amyss]

Because I'm not a conspiracy theorist.

Very carefully arranged, this all looks nice. It has been dissected before, and I'm vetting someone's done it here in 8 pages.

 

[SS2Dante]

Right, I'm away to sleep. Good talking with you all.

 

[xorinite]

snip, snip Severus snip, Dumbledore.

Like I said, you seem to be assuming that every cycle goes like ours. It doesn't. No other race ever got warning of them, that we know of, before the Citadel was jumped to. Governments were cut off, armies were destroyed before being mobilised. People didn't know they HAD to fight the reapers till it was too late to fight. The point of ME3 is that even with advance warning uniting the galaxy to fight them is still a seemingly impossible task.

I'm not making that assumption. I am simply suggesting, based upon direct evidence of past and present dead reapers and inference from the fact that reaper reproduction requires them to engage in genocidal wars lasting perhaps centuries at a time to gather the required people paste that they have a non-zero rate of attrition which limits their potential population growth.

Their population growth is a zero point ratio to civilizations destroyed, with attrition of just one reaper per cycle the reapers numbers would be dwindling towards extinction. Which I also thought might end up being their motivation. Their numbers dropping and desperate to find the right people paste to make more reapers having failed so far.

Oh and despite the warning, the fleets of each species still weren't mobilised anyway. (Ah yes, "reapers" ) yet they managed to hold the reapers off for a good long while anyway.

To me it appears the child isn't real. There is no evidence at all he is. Give me some one way or the other, or we're both just theorizing. We're both basing this on our default stance, nothing more.

Theres no evidence that I am real. I am actually a complex artificial intelligence designed to process tax returns, and I am on break. Can you provide me with evidence that I am real, other than that of your senses?

No then no more is required for the absurd god child, I know you don't want him to be real, I don't want him to be real. He is more horrific to me than the entire army of reapers. I long for the harsh metallic grating voice of harbinger threatening to tear me apart. Oh well, no instead I have some brat rattling on about perhaps he can do this, and maybe he can do that.

You've given me the lasers being slightly different. And the prothean change in 2. Hardly loads. Also, yes, essentially. The point is that they back of from convention a little bit to increase drama, they don't just chuck it out the window. That is why your beam plot hole exists. It's small, and doesn't effect much. My plot holes actually destroy any semblance of plot cohesion. That is the difference. One is expected, the other is not.

Which as I stated means that indoctrination theory itself relies upon my theory being true, yet then makes additional assumptions.

Also shepherd being instantly vaporized would have made a considerable difference. Maybe its not indoctrination. Maybe its purgatory and heaven. Shepherd died when hit by the beam, everything after is purgatory, if you pick red you wake up.. sure.. in hades.

why not its just as left field as everything else.

Game creation is notoriously something you work on 'cos you want to. These people lived and breathed ME for years. They cared about it more than you or I EVER will. What you describe is ludicrous, and STILL doesn't explain the EXTRA, NON NECESSARY SCENE. if they wanted to leave work they would leave, not take the time to put in an extra ending no-one would EVER have noticed wasn't there.

What I described is corporate practice. Companies are not fixed entities as you think of them.
They are pools of writers, programmers, artists and musicians which have a rate of outflow and inflow.
Many of these people haven't lived it for years, many are much newer to it. Only two of the original mass effect writing staff remain. The rest HAVE left.

If I have a broom and I replace the handle, then I replace the head.. is it still the same broom as before?

Again, poor communication does explain that extra scene just fine. This isn't the first game you had something non-nonsensical thrown in just to stir up the ant nest a little with the possibly. Oh maybe he is alive, when its most likely an off cut from another cut scene that the video editor slapped in there.

So does Mordin

You mean that guy who agreed we should sabotage the genophage cure because Wreav can't be trusted?
Or the guy who gave his life to cure the genophage because Wrex and/or Eve can be trusted.
anyways what about him?

So you are really arguing that the majority of players in Mass Effect would not associate renegade with the 'bad' choice?

I am not. I am saying regardless of what the majority of players think paragon/renegade is not equal to good/evil. Sometimes people would consider the renegade option the right one, sometimes people would consider the paragon option the right one. It just depends if you are more like Picard of more like Dirty harry.

I have explained the endings before. EVERY member of your crew at some point has a conversation with you where they say they want to go somewhere far away, somewhere peaceful, where they can relax and be at peace. The ending cutscene is Shepard imagining his choice causes that. This is why they all end up miraculously far away, together, on a beautiful paradise world, no matter what ending you choose. You always believe it to be right.

So Shepherd imagines the person he loves most in the universe abandoning him to die stranded on an alien world what if it was tali, well I know I had long conversations about Tali building a house on the homeworld, but whatever I think in my imaginings she would be happier dying on a random alien world and never EVER getting what she has wished for her entire life, ho ho, thats what I think would make her happy.

What did he bash his head real hard like the avatar in ultima 8? that was how we explained all the plot holes in ultima 9, the avatar bumping his head.

Occams razor takes into account the number of suppositions but not the combined statistical probability of each of it's component assumptions. That is why I find it unsuitable for this discussion. You assume a small number of improbable event's, I posit a larger number of probable ones. Apples and oranges, unless we want to start getting into hyper maths

Not really. I assume trees, you assume apples.
Well, while apples need trees, trees don't need apples.
You need my position of the developers didn't make the game properly, to get to your position of, which is why you can't actually tell that they wanted the ending to be about indoctrination.

Its all of my assumptions of making a poorly told ending due to time/energy/deodorant constraints, plus additional ones.

You're stating that the only way to disprove your theory is if past event's didn't happen? Also, you missed the simple one: dlc. That's the only true proof one way or the other.

DLC won't really be proof either. Its possible they will realize that this ending sucked so bad it needs to be addressed as cheaply as possible which means salvaging what is already there, or someone sitting up suddenly behind their big desk sniffing the air and asking
"what is that smell.. its.. like.. paper, old warm sweaty paper.."
$_$ *kaching* and then the DLC comes.

The things I listed could have falsified my proposal, you still haven't told me what would have falsified yours.
Additionally since your proposal requires mine also be correct I don't see how mine considered contentious by you here.

Edit: I should state, this doesn't mean I wouldn't purchase such DLC, but it would have to add substantially to the game (like broken steel) if they wanted to convince me to part with my cash.
While I am mildly in favor of price discrimination using DLC as a concept, I am loath to purchase it.. usually.
Edit 2: I would be extra reluctant in this case, it would have to be impressive, not just.. and now the endings fixed if they want me to pay, since I feel the ending should have been complete before release.