54 replies to this topic

[Domine Nox]

Okay, thoughts on the ending from anyone that has completed their play through. I was a little caught off guard, and a tad bit disappointed maybe is the right word on the way it ended. I've only tried 1 of the 3 possibles, and am now working towards the others to see what happens there, but all in all I was expecting something with more... substance?

Thoughts?

[Apulo]

I finished. Next time we're on Live at the same time, I'll tell you which option I chose.

[CruciasNZ]

I chose the paragon option (control) but got screwed on the Master and Commander acheivement. Turns out the multiplayer percentage is a modifier applied to the War score. So my 7250 points x 55% rating means I got 3988/4000 needed for the acheivement. Sigh

[Domine Nox]

Apparently I should have chosen destroy on my play through. Shepard can live if you choose destroy.

[Gerhart]

I choose to join the two groups into one. Not really my choice though, I had no idea what I was doing and walked towards it then he jumped into it. I was kinda pissed about that. I wanted to kill them off and save the humans, not make them some goofy elusive man looking people.

The ending was so lame, really the machines do it to save organics from themselves. Fuck off with that. I figured it was eluding to something like that with all the organics and machines working together, then Jokers STUPID AS FUCKING SHIT LOVE INTEREST!

Loved the game other then a paragon Shep is forced to be PC, *CENSORED* that loves everyone. So really Paragon Shep is a Lib that can fight and Renegade is a conservative. So lame the entire story has been like that.

Like in the first one when Global warming was all the rage, they included that in some of the codex for earth. Keep real politics out of my fucking games please.

I hate how any time you protect or defend yourself its a renegade option like Udina and the Lang.

[sonofultramar]

The ending completely destroys the trilogy. in the end your choices mean nothing. 

[NightWolf889]

Personally I didn't have a problem with any of the endings, I just wish there had been MORE.

Things that should have been in the final cutscene (my opinion):

I do not recommend clicking the view button unless you know or have seen what all 3 of the endings are.

Spoiler

-Speech from Hacket on the heroism of humanity and the galactic community.
-Scenes from other planets showing the Reaper's destruction/leaving along with cheering Asari/Krogan/ect...
-Memorial of Shepard with your character's love interest mourning at it.
-Little hint as to how the races are going to deal with the Relays being gone.
-Not including the Normandy's crash on some unknown world.
-Closure as to what happens to your squadmates. Did you REALLY lose the two people you took with you to the conduit when Harbinger showed up or were they wounded and evacuated? Were they still on the Normandy when it crashed?

And depending on your ending:

-How does the synthesis thing affect every day organics now?
-That firestorm that engulfed Earth at the end of the destroy ending, does that mean Hacket, Wrex, Grunt, ect... are dead?
(Edit): Just did the destroy ending on my Infiltrator and the firestorm didn't kill organics like they did in the version I saw.
-If Shepard is in control of synthetics, how does this affect the Geth? The Reapers themselves? What becomes of the Citadel?

[RDSFirebane]

5 reasons why the endings sucked. All plot holes and other issues addressed.

http://www.gamefront...ns-are-right/4/

[Domine Nox]

5 reasons why the endings sucked. All plot holes and other issues addressed.

http://www.gamefront...-e...e-right/4/

I agree with some of his points, but disagree with others. I feel people are putting way too much stock and time into complaining about the ending not being what they wanted. Did I find it a bit of a let down of an ending? Yes, but the ride to get there was still great and wonderful and I don't let the end jade my opinion of it. If Bioware gives in to all the negativity and makes new endings for the fans I will be disappointed actually because at that moment it is no longer their vision in place and it opens the door for the fans to bitch and moan about anything and everything thinking they will get their way.

It's a game. People should get over it.

[RDSFirebane]

It's a game. People should get over it.

Well as you say its a game. If they admit they screwed up the end and Fix it for the people who noticed and cared. you should get over it.

-polite.

Also you've already started this fight with me once I'm not doing it again sir.

[CruciasNZ]

I'm afraid I have to agree with every single one of those points the guy writing the linked article makes.

[Domine Nox]

If they admit they screwed up the end and Fix it for the people who noticed and cared

Pardon? They released the game. There is no screwed it up and admit they were wrong. "Fixing" implies they made a mistake. They released what they chose to release. And changing something opens the floodgates for every upset fan forever in the future. As a business they should stand strong.

And in the article....

Even conventional faster-than-light travel means decades before any of those ships makes it home, or even to another star system. It’s more than safe to assume no one, not the Quarians, not the Turians, not the krogan, Asari or Salarians, no one is going see home again.

Asari live for great lengths of time. Salarians would have a hard time getting home, but depending on your game they might not even be there. So they can make the trip home if they really want in the manner of a Battlestar Galactica type trek across space.

It’s safe to assume that the fleets who travelled to Earth for the final Reaper battle were stocked with supplies, but with the Mass Relay network knocked out, they’re all basically stuck there. That ending’s not just bleak — it implies outright extinction.

I would beg to differ. The races dissimilar to humanity would have a difficult time, possibly impossible (would need more biological details), but the planet itself is not just a dead rock. London looked pretty bad, but that was described as the WORST on Earth, meaning that elsewhere is improved. By careful planning and cooperation between all present rebuilding and what not can be accomplished, likely in great time.

In regards to population of the alien races present, most of mankind got wiped out leaving a great population gap. Heck if Earth is as ruined as this article makes it out to be then those millions of aliens still put Earth at a lower population then it is currently.

Arguably, the overreaching thrust of Mass Effect from the first moment you meet Shepard to the landing of forces from all over the galaxy on Earth is tolerance. Humanity has worked to find its place in the galaxy, overcoming old prejudices to work forward toward a common future.

This is not what Mass Effect has been about. Mass Effect has been entirely human centric with other species issues being put in the background. You deal with other issues, but you only solve other people's problems so that they can help you solve Human problems. Hell the first game ends with "Now is Humanity's chance to take it's place." And you spend all of 3 saying "No no ditch your homeworld my homeworld is more important." You're not building anything long term in the game and changing galactic opinion, you're stringing together respites in hostility to suit your own designs for your own goals and objectives.

There is no tolerance permitted among the Reapers or by the Guardian. And in fact, the synthesis ending dismantles the idea of tolerance and unity altogether by forcing homogenization on all the life in the galaxy, synthetic included.

The guardian fully explains this. Might not like the rationale, but it has its reasons for why it is doing what it is doing. The guardian believes whole heartedly in its view of the universe. The endings are it saying that you can break the cycle by taking it out of the equation, but it believes that it will just happen again. Kind of like Skynet. You don't see John Conner going "Hey, we can get along right?" No. Because one side is firmly convinced in a way that prevents arguing. Is it necessarily right? No, but it's explained why things are like that.

But the very fact that Shepard is where he is means he has already chosen a solution — unity; tolerance. In the end, Shepard is forced to make a decision that implies that unity, working together, tolerance on a galactic scale — the very things he has been working toward and accomplishing over the span of the entire game (and all three games, really), at every step — are inconsequential and in fact incompatible with the reality of the game’s story.

Actually where (s)he is means that all the races have been convinced to drop their shit and help humanity. And the end going back to the first quoted piece shows the ultimate matter of unity. You remove all the things that seperated the races and force them to work together. Not the best way to promote unity, but really it does consolidate agendas if you're just looking to see that your efforts at bringing people together are going to be long lasting and ensure tolerance.

Legion immediately changes the synthetic/organic debate when you gain him as a character. Rather than furthering a Matrix-like view of a world in which machines eventually kill their creators, Legion proves that all forms of life can and do have value, and that it is absolutely possible for synthetic and organic life to co-exist peacefully. Throw in EDI from Mass Effect 3 and the debate changes radically again — now synthetic and organic characters aren’t just not killing each other, they’re actively hooking up of their own free will.

So by this argument the exception proves the rule. If 99% of a race do one thing and 1% doesn't then we should assume the doesn't is what is at heart. By that logic nobody in the world should ever be persecuted, no wars should be fought, and everyone should live happily side by side. EDI and Legion are awesome characters and provide a level of depth and variety to the standard synthetics portrayed in most everything. However, their individualism and depth does not completely negate the viewpoint of the Guardian. Not saying there is support for the guardian either, but his argument is not invalidated by a tiny percentage of the universe. Especially when you take into account EDI is actually an AI that was deranged at one point.

Instead, much like the victims of the Reapers themselves, the player is robbed of all free will or even the chance to make the case for it. They must do as they are told, and choose.

True it was disappointing, but not everything is able to be talked down. In fact a level of reality implies that you can't talk your way out of everything or get everyone to see your way. Also the player still has plenty of free will. You are provided choices that you have complete control over. Can it be said that I don't have free will because I cannot burrow though the asphalt outside my house with my barehands? No. Free will is being allowed to make the choices available to you. Hell if you don't like choices 1, 2 or 3, there is always the turn the game off and take it back choice. Plenty of free will.

The game ends at this point, and aside from the Normandy crash-landing, and the weird old man talking about “The Shepard” — and don’t forget the crass DLC pitch — the player never once gets to see how any of the choices they made affected the galaxy, or how the lives of people they touched continue, or don’t, after the war.

This is standard fare. They leave things hanging because that leaves unlimited license to do whatever with the franchise. That is why the announced even before the game went out to the public that there would be lots of DLC that would not effect the fact that the story would definitively be at an end.

EXPERIENCE THE BEGINNING, MIDDLE, AND END OF AN EMOTIONAL STORY UNLIKE ANY OTHER, WHERE THE DECISIONS YOU MAKE COMPLETELY SHAPE YOUR EXPERIENCE AND OUTCOME.

This is being used as them failing. However (Honestly I hate to be this petty) but if you take the crappy ending as contrary to this statement then don't ever write, don't ever do any art of any kind. Because all pottery goes into a kiln. Oh no! It all ends with a kiln that means that all the effort I did to build something unique beforehand is ruined. All books get published into the same format. Oh no! Well you get the point. The shaped experience was everything up until the last moment.

I am by no means defending the ending, as I too felt it was weak in comparison to everything else they have done, but I don't see why people need summation of what happened to everyone. I for one prefer the dangling idea of what will happen in the wake of all your decisions. You know what choices you made and can speculate on the outcome, do you really need Bioware to tell you about it all? Is imagination not adequate any more?

[NightWolf889]

You know what choices you made and can speculate on the outcome, do you really need Bioware to tell you about it all? Is imagination not adequate any more?

I do like this line Nox, I've been trying to come up with scenarios on what happens after my characters ending, possible things we might see in the future...having fun with it.

Heck the best idea I've heard on the matter was the indoctrination theory, that the child didn't exist at all throughout the game and it was Harbinger trying to control Shepard by making him give up his will to fight. That this ending did not happen.


Vid has spoilers.

I thought that was a pretty good theory and it has me wondering about the future of the game.

[Domine Nox]

[CruciasNZ]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxaJSbN12nA

It deserves it's 10/10 scores right up until the Battle For Earth.

[CruciasNZ]

http://www.forbes.co...were-listening/

[RDSFirebane]

http://my.spill.com/...-spoiler-review

http://n4g.com/news/...telling-suicide

ya Mass effect 3 is starting to get bad review's all around for anyone not basing it on the game play but instead the ending.

[Domine Nox]

These reviews are decrying the ending, not the story. And it's been universally established that the ending is not liked. This is not new information.

In fact most of the comments on the audio review mirror the "so what?" attitude.

Comment by Cabbage Monster 1 hour ago

I got the synthesis ending. I didn't have a big problem with it. EDI hugging with Joker was pleasent enough for me to be honest.

Comment by Lord Galvatron 1 hour ago

Honestly I think I was the only person alive who said "Meh...whatever it's just a video game". But still I love hearing how people are getting upset over this cos it really shows how the gaming community takes shit so seriously. I mean it's just a fucking video game okay? It's not like you guys where *CENSORED* or something like that.

Comment by Jacob D. 1 hour ago

i thought the ending was bitter sweet but its there game theyl do as they wish I REALLY hope it was biowares ending not EA pushing them to finish there talking about redoing it and i think its good only if its biowares true vision not just because the fans are bitching.

Comment by C.H. Gorog 52 minutes ago

The problem is that the game's ending is just far from as well written as the rest of the story in the trilogy.

If BioWare doesn't release DLC for an alternate ending, too bad, but I won't get my undies in a bunch and demand free DLC for the ending I thought I deserved, like some entitled *CENSORED* out there.

And in quoting from the other review you linked.

Casey Hudson, the Director of the Mass Effect series, said in a recent interview that he wanted the endings to be “memorable.”

So I think it's safe to say that the ending was intentional. Even if it wasn't liked.

[CruciasNZ]

Casey Hudson, the Director of the Mass Effect series, said in a recent interview that he wanted the endings to be “memorable.”

I think they achieved that, it was memorably the worst game ending anti-climax ever.

However, whether you like the actual ending or not, WHAT THE FUCK was the Normandy doing in the Mass Relay stream WITH MY TEAMMATE who was with me in the tank when we pushed to the beam!!!

They should have cut to credits with Shepard and Anderson siting there discussing the view. That would have been perfect

[RDSFirebane]

They should have cut to credits with Shepard and Anderson siting there discussing the view. That would have been perfect

yep but they didn't and thus is the issue hoping they fix it but like I said as time goes on they are taking more and more heat for it.

and for him wanting it to be memorable the only thing people seem to remember is all the promises he made before the game came out that turned out to be complete lies. which are being quoted all over BSN.