Mass Effect 3 Spoiler Thread so we can talk about [REDACTED]

[Destarius]

I recall Proteans weren't just one race but a collection of races collectively called Protean. Perhaps my recollection is wrong though.

[ReptileHouse]

A bit of both, IIUC. The core Prothean race were Jarvik's race, but they assimilated other races into their empire thoroughly enough that they were generically called "Protheans" after 50k years of history muddied the waters sufficiently. That is to say, nobody was really sure wtf all that was about until they talked to Jarvik.


I've been debating since I finished the game ages ago, and I still can't decide whether to write up my thoughts on the ending. It's a topic of great interest to me, but I don't know that anything I have to say will really be all that useful in furthering the conversation. The horse looks pretty dead to me, and even if it's not, do I really want to wake up and smack around the poor beast during its last, tortured hours?

[RickH]

The Adventures of James Vega

[scharmers]

The Adventures of James Vega

Pure Brogan love.

[ARogan]

I've been debating since I finished the game ages ago, and I still can't decide whether to write up my thoughts on the ending. It's a topic of great interest to me, but I don't know that anything I have to say will really be all that useful in furthering the conversation. The horse looks pretty dead to me, and even if it's not, do I really want to wake up and smack around the poor beast during its last, tortured hours?

Oh why the heck not. My thoughts:
http://blog.arogan.com/2012/05/mass-...-xbox-360.html

[RickH]

nice write-up.

[Fenris99]

You know what the ending sorta reminds me of, at least the lazy "three different ending that look the same"? Dark messiah of might and magic. Same thing: "Four different endings" but they were pretty much the same movie. If memory serves.

[mrcjhicks]

You know what the ending sorta reminds me of, at least the lazy "three different ending that look the same"? Dark messiah of might and magic. Same thing: "Four different endings" but they were pretty much the same movie. If memory serves.

I really enjoyed Dark Messiah and have absolutely no recollection of the ending. I guess it didn't involve kicking things. Mass Effect should have had more kicking things - like in the ending you just walk up behind Joker and give him a boot.

[Patrick S.]

I just finished ME 3. I thought it dragged a lot once I arrived on Earth, and the firefights were too long and frustrating. Any other game in which I die 6-7 times in the same spot, I usually uninstall it and don't come back to for months, if ever.

I wasn't really angered by the (blue) ending, and then, when I read the other endings are basically the same but with a different colour, I didn't think this was to be taken literally at first. I suffered through the last, awful, Banshee fight again (died another 5-6 times, too, turned XBox off and continued the next day), and had my big WTF-moment when I realized that yes, the other ending is REALLY just another colour. Wow. Even the Buzz Aldrin speech is the same.

I definitely expected something else. Different endings that reflect at least some key choices I made playing through the trilogy.

The question that's occupying my mind now is this; if Shepard really chooses the synthesis option, how will this synthesis actually happen? Will the reapers build processing plants where all organics have to stand in line to get their chips installed? What species qualify as organics to be synthesized? Do more unintelligent species like, say, space hamsters, get to stay unmodified? How exactly will the Geth be synthesized? Will there be organ-growing farms that mass produce hearts that are then to be hooked up to the Geth somehow?

Or is there just a loud and bright bang and all organics in the universe are magically modded?

In both scenarios; really?

[CaldeDan]

I just finished ME 3. I thought it dragged a lot once I arrived on Earth, and the firefights were too long and frustrating. Any other game in which I die 6-7 times in the same spot, I usually uninstall it and don't come back to for months, if ever.

I wasn't really angered by the (blue) ending, and then, when I read the other endings are basically the same but with a different colour, I didn't think this was to be taken literally at first. I suffered through the last, awful, Banshee fight again (died another 5-6 times, too, turned XBox off and continued the next day), and had my big WTF-moment when I realized that yes, the other ending is REALLY just another colour. Wow. Even the Buzz Aldrin speech is the same.

I definitely expected something else. Different endings that reflect at least some key choices I made playing through the trilogy.

The question that's occupying my mind now is this; if Shepard really chooses the synthesis option, how will this synthesis actually happen? Will the reapers build processing plants where all organics have to stand in line to get their chips installed? What species qualify as organics to be synthesized? Do more unintelligent species like, say, space hamsters, get to stay unmodified? How exactly will the Geth be synthesized? Will there be organ-growing farms that mass produce hearts that are then to be hooked up to the Geth somehow?

Or is there just a lought and bright bang and all organics in the universe are magically modded?

In both scenarios; really?

It's the latter, there's a magic space wave of green energy and all biological life, including plants, become part machine ~somehow~. Presumably the equal but opposite effect applies to the Geth.

This is necessary because all synthetic life will inevitably destroy biological life, despite 2 major themes in ME3 being peaceful co-existence with synthetics. It will also somehow prevent the creation of new purely-synthetic life, which would have the exact same supposed issues with their hybrid creators as they did with biological creators, if you believe the Catalyst's explanations.

It is considered by the writers as the "best" ending.

[Patrick S.]

Wow. Then the Reapers really ARE beyond our comprehension, no kidding.

I'm curious where they got the power to do something like that.

I mean, I don't dislike the idea of omnipotent beings in (non-interactive) science fiction. I loved the "Q" Star Trek TNG character. But in Mass Effect, I feel it doesn't fit, and it seems like a cheat.

[Khelavaster]

Finished this yesterday, and still cannot get it out of my head, so forgive me if I wax lyrical for a bit.

First: what an incredible series. Each installment had its very obvious flaws, but as a whole, it stands as one of the most satisfying gaming experiences I've had and one of the very few examples IMO of what it means to take the medium seriously to produce quality storytelling.

For all the hoopla about the infamous ME3 ending, I found myself barely bothered by it. Indeed, the Starchild's inclusion and explanations seemed cheap. His stated reasons, capricious and illogical -- or maybe suitably alien? The actual epilogue, more than a bit confusing and frustrating. I actually had trouble placing all of the characters's fates, who had died or why or where. But...

...by then it mattered little. By that point the game had released its full emotional payload, and settled on a clear ending several scenes before the actual, controversial one. The only thing I was sure of is that it wasn't going to be pretty. I was already in a funny mood because of the crescendo of unremitting bleakness that had plagued the latest missions, which I think was handled expertly; but what really got me was Shepard's team's final, suicide run. It's a hellish sequence crowned by a marvelous synergy of visuals, sound and fury as one by one the team members are exterminated in their desperate push against impossible odds.

Next thing I know a wounded Shepard is lifting himself from the ground -looking complete and utterly defeated for the first time, his usually impeccable uniform in rags- and starts limping towards the Beam amongst the corpses of his friends, still stubbornly trying to reach its immediate goal but with basically nil chances of making past it, with barely strength left to hold a gun, let alone affecting the ultimate fate of the galaxy. I found the segment extremely successful in conveying the full horror of this realization, to the point that I kept pushing forward in dread, step by excruciatingly slow step, rebelling against the hopelessness of it all, and wishing it would end soon.

And all the time I'm thinking "this is it, they're really gonna end this on such a grim note". And I discover I'm amazed, thrilled, emotional. This is it.
When Shepard actually gets to the Citadel, it's been transformed into some kind of red maw filled with the corpses of all the species in the galaxy. Will there be no letup? What follows isn't as thrilling, although there are a few punches still in store.

Enough has been said, I guess, about the last few minutes. But as I said I was mostly OK with it. In a way, plot holes and inconsistencies aside, the obscurity made sense to me. The denouement pretty much ignores the decisions made along the game to present a dying Shepard with three preset ending options. The reason it didn't bother me that much is that by that time I had accepted that all bets were off and indeed there was no point in anything we had done before -- no point in all the war assets that seemed so vital at the time, all the sacrifices, all the struggle, all our carefully nurtured relationships. There had never been any hope. That was it. The nihilistic writing had been on the wall all the time, no matter how much I had wanted to believe Shepard's and Hacket's reassurances that we had a chance of winning the war or turning the tide. That's what was so hard to swallow -- both for the characters and for me as the experiencer. There wasn't going to be a "happy" ending for the characters, but especially for me as a gamer. This was it. The joke was as much on me as on them. I wouldn't even get my beloved closure.

Right before the end there is an amazing scene that I think has been brought up some posts earlier in this thread. Shepard lies on the floor half dead, for all we know, and Hackett comes up on the intercom. The Crucible is not firing, it's not doing anything actually. Must be something on your side. Shepard lifts his head and after a pause asks dutifully, with a cracked, thin voice, "What do you need me to do?". The galaxy is about to be turned to dust, but damned if he's not going to invest his last blood cell into preventing it, like a true hero of legend should. It's a touching, gut-wrenching scene, and I find myself thinking that this resonance is one of the reasons why I love video games. And the Mass Effect games, warts and all, rank IMO among the best ever made.

[scharmers]

Right before the end there is an amazing scene that I think has been brought up some posts earlier in this thread. Shepard lies on the floor half dead, for all we know, and Hackett comes up on the intercom. The Crucible is not firing, it's not doing anything actually. Must be something on your side. Shepard lifts his head and after a pause asks dutifully, with a cracked, thin voice, "What do you need me to do?".

I agree that this was the most powerful scene in the game, but not because Shepard shows greatness and resolve at this point, but because the character is shown as a pathetically-broken dog still desperate to obey its masters' commands, regardless of what is going on around it, regardless of the fact that it can no longer carry them out. Only the desire to serve is still there. Speaks volumes about player agency and the nature of games themselves, if you like.

[Pogue Mahone]

Picked a bad day to stop taking antidepressants, scharmers!

[malkav11]

I'm so pissed off by the end of the game precisely because it essentially diffuses all that emotional payoff into a damp squib.

[Khelavaster]

I agree that this was the most powerful scene in the game, but not because Shepard shows greatness and resolve at this point, but because the character is shown as a pathetically-broken dog still desperate to obey its masters' commands, regardless of what is going on around it, regardless of the fact that it can no longer carry them out. Only the desire to serve is still there.

Oh, absolutely. I failed to stress this. His question is mechanical, and absurd -- clearly his training kicking in in the form of an appeal to the chain of command when every sense of autonomy has been lost. A shadow of the former, impossibly driven Shepard, at least for a moment. I agree that's what lends the scene its pathetic quality and makes it poignant. We were witnessing the genesis of a legend that would last for generations, but I appreciate that the game didn't sugarcoat the bitter end and was thankfully above investing the real Shepard with the traits of the heroic mythical figure he would inevitable become.

[Tim James]

You guys are making me resent that scene like I resent this series (at least until the third game). Because it didn't affect me much at the time, and now everyone is ascribing deep meaning and powerful emotion to it. Once again, I miss out on what everyone else gets from it.

Tom (I think) had a great quote in this week's podcast about The Witcher 2: "now I know what other people feel like when they talk about Mass Effect." It's still painfully true. At least I appreciate a lot more of the series thanks to ME3.

[Destarius]

Next thing I know a wounded Shepard is lifting himself from the ground -looking complete and utterly defeated for the first time, his

You played male Shepard? Zero credibility1!1!!

[Slumberland]

Oh snap, the next splash of gas on this fire is coming SO SOON.

http://www.theverge.com/gaming/2012/...-dlc-june-26th

[Balasarius]

1.9GB? They could totally fit the indoctrination theory plot-line in that!

Wishful thinking, I know.

[Woolen Horde]

1.9GB? They could totally fit the indoctrination theory plot-line in that!

Wishful thinking, I know.

Hey, now those the different color explosions are in HD!

(Speaking of which, one reason I *really* hated those explosions was how fast the shock waves flew through the galaxy. We're talking millions of times faster than light speed.)

[Pogue Mahone]

Well, they were exploding from mass relays. Explosions have mass, so ...

[Murbella]

Well, it seems like the Mass Effect 3 Restoration Patch comes out tomorrow. Bioware is already preparing for people not to like it which makes me nervous as it sounds like what they originally said about the ending.

This might be enough for me to continue my vanguard play through, even though i doubt they will be spending much time on this patch.

[Tim James]

I wonder how long it will take to run through this again. I want to try Vanguard. I will probably do the big side quests but none of the short ones on the Citadel.

If the extra content is skimpy I may just wait until some other time.

[Murbella]

If you skip the side quests, you will likely also skip the (good?) ending.

[Tom Chick]

Well, it seems like the Mass Effect 3 Restoration Patch comes out tomorrow. Bioware is already preparing for people not to like it which makes me nervous as it sounds like what they originally said about the ending.

Oh, look, a link to an NG4 headline that goes to a story on some site I've never heard of that regurgitates the content of an OXM article. Do you just read news aggregate headlines?

Here, let me help you, in case your click finger is somehow paralyzed. This is where you can read the actual comments Casey Hudson made instead of three layers of headline writers failing to get you to click through to any actual content. As you'll see, Bioware is preparing for no such thing. Instead, Hudson is rather patiently explaining to someone that Bioware isn't rewriting the ending, which we all already knew from when the DLC was announced.

-Tom

[Slumberland]

I am legitimately excited for this (perhaps because I am a fool) but am scared to see what my galactic readiness rating will be after a couple months away. It goes without saying that I demand the best, most complete revised and/or expanded ending.

[sangkancil99]

I hope the dlc ending kills the indoctrination theory once and for all.

[Destarius]

I hope the DLC ending validates the indoctrination theory.

[Murbella]

I hope the DLC validates the "This was all a dream and you're really a normal high school student in modern day New York" theory.