Hey soon to be people reading this (because i just started). I havent posted in a little while, but thats only because of two reasons:
a) spring break is over and im busy now
b) Im debating what to write about and im actually taking this whole blog idea thing seriously haha.
Thing is though, I do have an idea that I feel Im just gonna rant on about and see where it goes.
Namely, the Mass Effect 3 ending.
I had completed Mass Effect 3 late at night on about the second day it was out, and I was absolutely depressed with the ending. I had gotten the digital deluxe edition, and played it nonstop for two days (it was spring break). And all that was in vain since the ending had no closure, was utterly confusing, AND WHATS WITH THE NORMANDY? But instead of ranting like a raving lunatic, let me approach it calmly and discuss all my ideas.
First things first, Mass Effect was probably the best game I had ever played until the ending. The gameplay was so much fun, battles were great, dialogue was perfect as ever, the enviroments and just overlying sense of reaper destruction was perfect. Then came the ending.
First of all, Im going to point out that for a series based totally on player choice, and one that stressed different endings, there was almost none of that. In fact, wasnt everyone extremely excited for ME3, because the endings could be really different from each other since they dont have to worry about a sequel? My shepard survived! Whoop dee doo, and now he's on a planet of rubble, while his love interest and (questionably) fiercely loyal crew ran away from the fight and crash landed on some other planet. Now theres a theory out there that the ending was a hallucination/indoctrination. First of all, it would possibly make sense, the Normandy fleeing because the only hope in the universe was just disintegrated. Plus we dont know how much time it took while he was out for any hallucinations to occur. What doesnt make sense in this theory to me is that if Shepard just got fried, how the heck can he be hallucinating/fighting indoctrination? Even if that were the case, how could the crucible fire when Shepard, presumably on Earth, was fighting indoctrination? How could a mental battle activate the crucible when the citadel still had to be opened? I feel that there are so many holes in that theory that i cant believe it. To go a step further, if everything was a hallucination, that means the Reapers won no matter what Shepard chooses. Why not just show the Reapers winning and have an amazingly heroic death scene for Shepard and his crew? Which brings me to my next point, the lack of any epilogue.
Even the ending that Bioware gave us couldve had closure if they provided an epilogue of what happened afterwards. Im not asking for something large either, some confirmation that either civilization is rebuilding on Earth or something like that, or that enough people survived and its all good, so I know that what I did matters. Or even that the Reapers won and the cycle is starting over again. It could literally be a slideshow for all I care, how long would that have taken to make? Barely any time I feel. I just want to know. Also to add to it, almost none of the questions about the Reapers or anything were answered. To go back to the indoctrination theory, Saren was indoctrinated by the Reapers convincing him to join him. In order to convince anyone subtly, they would have to at least make up some story to make their cause more believeable. But they didnt with Shepard, they gave a terrible reason to him that no one would really believe (especially with the geth around...) This made the game have absolutely no closure and thats why everyone is freaking out. Its not what the bs official reviewers say its because the series was supposed to give us closure, but instead they didnt. Even with the little grandpa ending there, you dont have any knowledge of what happened to anything important, just that humans are alive.
For me, the endings would go something like this:
1) Crucible fails because it wasnt ready in time/you didnt recruit enough people to make it work properly. Reapers win.
2) Crucible destroys the system because the people you recruited were not trustworthy and sabotaged it (due to indoctrination), or a malfunction causes it to destroy itself.
3) Shepard makes it to the crucible and sacrifices himself to save the universe.
4) Shepard makes it to the crucible, and in the ensuing destruction of the Reapers, falls down to Earth on a piece of the Citadel, only to be found later by the crew and L.I.. Happiness at last!
5) The might of the galaxy actually overcomes the Reapers through conventional force.
6) Forsaking the crucible, Shepard sacrifices his humanity to become a Reaper of Reapers using Cerberus technology. The L.I. then tranfers themselves onto the Reaper platform as well so they can be together forever. (this is a huge departure from the established plotline already, but I like it too much to not say it. Plus, i havent thought out everything yet so how he does it is still a mystery)
7) Realizing all is lost with this cycle, Shepard and the crew go into hiding/stasis (much like the Protheans) to prepare the next cycle (meaning there would be more adventures with Shepard)
8) The endings that are in the game right now EXCEPT the normandy crashes on Earth. I feel its incredibly random and a slap to the face of your Shepard to strand them on some unknown planet.
9) Reapers win, and make a Human Reaper as a consolation of the fight that the humans/galaxy put up.
10) Heres another total plot change idea, Shepard forces the Reapers hand by uplifting every species in the known galaxy. This will provide a place to show the motivations of the Reapers. Just think, like a Burn and Run tactic, you get rid of everything so the Reapers will either harvest everything and leave the galaxy totally empty or do nothing. Just the thought of uplifting another civilization should have been an awesome idea for the ME3 people to investigate. Just think, you could uplift the Yagh (the shadow broker's species I cant remember the spelling), which runs the risk of them taking over the galaxy. From the way Ive seen it, the Krogan deserve their uplifting, even though they were a little slow to get to the point of deserving it, the Yagh dont at all, and it would provide some very hard decisions as well as some awesome Squad Member conversations/actions as well.
11) Shepard sacrifices himself, and depending on the love interest, either they get pregnant with Shepards child in the romance scene, or they do something to honor Shepard (like building a house on Rannoch or something like that).
12) Shepard suffers sever wounds from the blast, gets helped by Anderson, or a squadmate, or the L.I., or even the whole squad, and together with everyones help activates the Crucible/saves the galaxy. That ending would have the whole cooperation themes prevalent everywhere else in the story and be a perfect tie in/tear jerker if anyone dies.
13) Same as before except as they activate the Crucible, they all huddle together as they sacrifice themselves for the universe. It'd be so perfect I feel.
14) (this is one added later) The Crucible acts as a giant EMP that disrupts all technology in the system. Since the Reapers are tech they are shut off as well. Engineers Donnelly and Daniels figure a way to jump-start our tech and so everyone is all good. Then we find out that the Charon Relay has been shut down because of the EMP. Its the perfect time to study how they actually work with all those Crucible scientists! This raises us to the level of awesomeness as the Reapers, but at the same time we are using them for good.
Notice how none of my endings involve the Catalyst little boy VI thing. My opinion was that its a good idea, but Bioware just threw it into the mix leaving it an underdeveloped mess. I also want everyone to notice the fact that I just wrote up 12 semi unique endings. This variety could have been Mass Effect 3, but instead we get to choose our own light show and the same confusing/heartbreaking ending for everyone. And thats including the Shepard surviving endings. Which leads me to another rant, they say that there are 16 endings, but thats a lie because they are all the same. I would also like to mention that the Refuse ending that was thought up is another awesome idea, BUT i didnt want to include anything that involved the catalyst little boy VI thing. On a side note, I feel that its perfectly acceptable that the Mass Relays are destroyed, since they are also Reaper tech and technically are the remnants of their influence. On a random note as well for coping with the Normandy crash ending, theres still quantum communication right? So the Normandy crew could still be in contact with the rest of the universe right?
But now back to the main rant about the ending haha. I also feel that many characters dont get that good of a sendoff or even appearance in ME3. Some of these characters you grew to know and love, and now they just appear for a short time and thats it. If the former squadmates that arent squadmates now had better stories, then think of the awesome storytelling they could have done. There were so many people that deserved more, maybe even some deaths, or maybe there could have been more contact after you saw them initially? It just all seems like lost ground to me. Speaking of dieing, the ending is just unnecessarily bleak as well. What about the others you know sacrificing themselves like squadmates? If Bioware wanted to make a sad but awesome ending, have some people die heroically right? None of this meta crap writing. Think of it this way, there is a select group of people with the right mindset to enjoy those kind of endings. There is another group of people that would enjoy those endings if it was all explained to them. But they arent the majority and Bioware should have known that. Thats another reason why everyone is mad, they went in the wrong direction with the ending. As I stated before, some of us need closure. The number of closure seekers is WAY greater than the number of people that like the ME3 ending. Inversely though its the exact opposite reason of why I think ME3 failed.
Which brings me to what I think the fatal flaw of Mass Effect 3 was: EA trying to make the game accessible to everyone. That means that things cant get too dependant on the previous content because then the other people would be missing out. But instead of making a balance, they just shrugged it all off and made it open for everyone. If they hadnt, just think of the revenue they would get, everyone would be freaking out about the game, and convince all of their friends to get it. The thing is, they would have to get the first games, and by the time they play those they are completely sold on the whole Mass Effect series. Then they would have even more loyal fans. Instead what happened was that in order to make Mass Effect more accessible to everyone, they had to make the best endings available to even the people just starting out, AND they had to keep the level of previous game references to a minimum so the people dont get bogged down with unfamiliarity. What resulted was a failure to ride the fine line of that strategy working. In fact, James Vega, the character whose sole purpose was to keep new players in the loop didnt. I feel that despite some off comments, nothing was really explained, in fact except in the beginning, everything involving him can be skipped. So much for that.
I could go on forever, and I will if people want. Im thinking of when I post this onto my newly started blog Im going to post the link into some of the Bioware threads to see what kind of conversation it will cook up. Im just so depressed that such an amazing trilogy was ruined (in my eyes). To be honest, at the moment I cant even play that many video games because Im so disheartened. (for whoever's curious im stopping because of sleep not because I have nothing else to write about).
Anyway, ranting this out makes me feel a little better, and I made up my mind Im definitely posting this on Bioware forums.
In the meantime Im going to sleep and debate what else to put up here haha.
EDIT: did some changes in the morn and now i shall post, haha lets see how it goes!
NotCras
a) spring break is over and im busy now
b) Im debating what to write about and im actually taking this whole blog idea thing seriously haha.
Thing is though, I do have an idea that I feel Im just gonna rant on about and see where it goes.
Namely, the Mass Effect 3 ending.
I had completed Mass Effect 3 late at night on about the second day it was out, and I was absolutely depressed with the ending. I had gotten the digital deluxe edition, and played it nonstop for two days (it was spring break). And all that was in vain since the ending had no closure, was utterly confusing, AND WHATS WITH THE NORMANDY? But instead of ranting like a raving lunatic, let me approach it calmly and discuss all my ideas.
First things first, Mass Effect was probably the best game I had ever played until the ending. The gameplay was so much fun, battles were great, dialogue was perfect as ever, the enviroments and just overlying sense of reaper destruction was perfect. Then came the ending.
First of all, Im going to point out that for a series based totally on player choice, and one that stressed different endings, there was almost none of that. In fact, wasnt everyone extremely excited for ME3, because the endings could be really different from each other since they dont have to worry about a sequel? My shepard survived! Whoop dee doo, and now he's on a planet of rubble, while his love interest and (questionably) fiercely loyal crew ran away from the fight and crash landed on some other planet. Now theres a theory out there that the ending was a hallucination/indoctrination. First of all, it would possibly make sense, the Normandy fleeing because the only hope in the universe was just disintegrated. Plus we dont know how much time it took while he was out for any hallucinations to occur. What doesnt make sense in this theory to me is that if Shepard just got fried, how the heck can he be hallucinating/fighting indoctrination? Even if that were the case, how could the crucible fire when Shepard, presumably on Earth, was fighting indoctrination? How could a mental battle activate the crucible when the citadel still had to be opened? I feel that there are so many holes in that theory that i cant believe it. To go a step further, if everything was a hallucination, that means the Reapers won no matter what Shepard chooses. Why not just show the Reapers winning and have an amazingly heroic death scene for Shepard and his crew? Which brings me to my next point, the lack of any epilogue.
Even the ending that Bioware gave us couldve had closure if they provided an epilogue of what happened afterwards. Im not asking for something large either, some confirmation that either civilization is rebuilding on Earth or something like that, or that enough people survived and its all good, so I know that what I did matters. Or even that the Reapers won and the cycle is starting over again. It could literally be a slideshow for all I care, how long would that have taken to make? Barely any time I feel. I just want to know. Also to add to it, almost none of the questions about the Reapers or anything were answered. To go back to the indoctrination theory, Saren was indoctrinated by the Reapers convincing him to join him. In order to convince anyone subtly, they would have to at least make up some story to make their cause more believeable. But they didnt with Shepard, they gave a terrible reason to him that no one would really believe (especially with the geth around...) This made the game have absolutely no closure and thats why everyone is freaking out. Its not what the bs official reviewers say its because the series was supposed to give us closure, but instead they didnt. Even with the little grandpa ending there, you dont have any knowledge of what happened to anything important, just that humans are alive.
For me, the endings would go something like this:
1) Crucible fails because it wasnt ready in time/you didnt recruit enough people to make it work properly. Reapers win.
2) Crucible destroys the system because the people you recruited were not trustworthy and sabotaged it (due to indoctrination), or a malfunction causes it to destroy itself.
3) Shepard makes it to the crucible and sacrifices himself to save the universe.
4) Shepard makes it to the crucible, and in the ensuing destruction of the Reapers, falls down to Earth on a piece of the Citadel, only to be found later by the crew and L.I.. Happiness at last!
5) The might of the galaxy actually overcomes the Reapers through conventional force.
6) Forsaking the crucible, Shepard sacrifices his humanity to become a Reaper of Reapers using Cerberus technology. The L.I. then tranfers themselves onto the Reaper platform as well so they can be together forever. (this is a huge departure from the established plotline already, but I like it too much to not say it. Plus, i havent thought out everything yet so how he does it is still a mystery)
7) Realizing all is lost with this cycle, Shepard and the crew go into hiding/stasis (much like the Protheans) to prepare the next cycle (meaning there would be more adventures with Shepard)
8) The endings that are in the game right now EXCEPT the normandy crashes on Earth. I feel its incredibly random and a slap to the face of your Shepard to strand them on some unknown planet.
9) Reapers win, and make a Human Reaper as a consolation of the fight that the humans/galaxy put up.
10) Heres another total plot change idea, Shepard forces the Reapers hand by uplifting every species in the known galaxy. This will provide a place to show the motivations of the Reapers. Just think, like a Burn and Run tactic, you get rid of everything so the Reapers will either harvest everything and leave the galaxy totally empty or do nothing. Just the thought of uplifting another civilization should have been an awesome idea for the ME3 people to investigate. Just think, you could uplift the Yagh (the shadow broker's species I cant remember the spelling), which runs the risk of them taking over the galaxy. From the way Ive seen it, the Krogan deserve their uplifting, even though they were a little slow to get to the point of deserving it, the Yagh dont at all, and it would provide some very hard decisions as well as some awesome Squad Member conversations/actions as well.
11) Shepard sacrifices himself, and depending on the love interest, either they get pregnant with Shepards child in the romance scene, or they do something to honor Shepard (like building a house on Rannoch or something like that).
12) Shepard suffers sever wounds from the blast, gets helped by Anderson, or a squadmate, or the L.I., or even the whole squad, and together with everyones help activates the Crucible/saves the galaxy. That ending would have the whole cooperation themes prevalent everywhere else in the story and be a perfect tie in/tear jerker if anyone dies.
13) Same as before except as they activate the Crucible, they all huddle together as they sacrifice themselves for the universe. It'd be so perfect I feel.
14) (this is one added later) The Crucible acts as a giant EMP that disrupts all technology in the system. Since the Reapers are tech they are shut off as well. Engineers Donnelly and Daniels figure a way to jump-start our tech and so everyone is all good. Then we find out that the Charon Relay has been shut down because of the EMP. Its the perfect time to study how they actually work with all those Crucible scientists! This raises us to the level of awesomeness as the Reapers, but at the same time we are using them for good.
Notice how none of my endings involve the Catalyst little boy VI thing. My opinion was that its a good idea, but Bioware just threw it into the mix leaving it an underdeveloped mess. I also want everyone to notice the fact that I just wrote up 12 semi unique endings. This variety could have been Mass Effect 3, but instead we get to choose our own light show and the same confusing/heartbreaking ending for everyone. And thats including the Shepard surviving endings. Which leads me to another rant, they say that there are 16 endings, but thats a lie because they are all the same. I would also like to mention that the Refuse ending that was thought up is another awesome idea, BUT i didnt want to include anything that involved the catalyst little boy VI thing. On a side note, I feel that its perfectly acceptable that the Mass Relays are destroyed, since they are also Reaper tech and technically are the remnants of their influence. On a random note as well for coping with the Normandy crash ending, theres still quantum communication right? So the Normandy crew could still be in contact with the rest of the universe right?
But now back to the main rant about the ending haha. I also feel that many characters dont get that good of a sendoff or even appearance in ME3. Some of these characters you grew to know and love, and now they just appear for a short time and thats it. If the former squadmates that arent squadmates now had better stories, then think of the awesome storytelling they could have done. There were so many people that deserved more, maybe even some deaths, or maybe there could have been more contact after you saw them initially? It just all seems like lost ground to me. Speaking of dieing, the ending is just unnecessarily bleak as well. What about the others you know sacrificing themselves like squadmates? If Bioware wanted to make a sad but awesome ending, have some people die heroically right? None of this meta crap writing. Think of it this way, there is a select group of people with the right mindset to enjoy those kind of endings. There is another group of people that would enjoy those endings if it was all explained to them. But they arent the majority and Bioware should have known that. Thats another reason why everyone is mad, they went in the wrong direction with the ending. As I stated before, some of us need closure. The number of closure seekers is WAY greater than the number of people that like the ME3 ending. Inversely though its the exact opposite reason of why I think ME3 failed.
Which brings me to what I think the fatal flaw of Mass Effect 3 was: EA trying to make the game accessible to everyone. That means that things cant get too dependant on the previous content because then the other people would be missing out. But instead of making a balance, they just shrugged it all off and made it open for everyone. If they hadnt, just think of the revenue they would get, everyone would be freaking out about the game, and convince all of their friends to get it. The thing is, they would have to get the first games, and by the time they play those they are completely sold on the whole Mass Effect series. Then they would have even more loyal fans. Instead what happened was that in order to make Mass Effect more accessible to everyone, they had to make the best endings available to even the people just starting out, AND they had to keep the level of previous game references to a minimum so the people dont get bogged down with unfamiliarity. What resulted was a failure to ride the fine line of that strategy working. In fact, James Vega, the character whose sole purpose was to keep new players in the loop didnt. I feel that despite some off comments, nothing was really explained, in fact except in the beginning, everything involving him can be skipped. So much for that.
I could go on forever, and I will if people want. Im thinking of when I post this onto my newly started blog Im going to post the link into some of the Bioware threads to see what kind of conversation it will cook up. Im just so depressed that such an amazing trilogy was ruined (in my eyes). To be honest, at the moment I cant even play that many video games because Im so disheartened. (for whoever's curious im stopping because of sleep not because I have nothing else to write about).
Anyway, ranting this out makes me feel a little better, and I made up my mind Im definitely posting this on Bioware forums.
In the meantime Im going to sleep and debate what else to put up here haha.
EDIT: did some changes in the morn and now i shall post, haha lets see how it goes!
NotCras
Couldn't agree more mate.
ReplyDeleteSpoilers!!
ME3 was a masterpeice. I was reduced almost to tears when Mordin Solus greeted redemption heroically with that ridiculous tune on his lips, smiled when Wrex realised his species was saved, was aghast when Thessia burned and was triumphant when the Quarians and the Geth made peace. Those were just the main moments in a game filled with great moments too numerous to mention.
Then the defence of the rocket batteries in London..a great battle, a battle I was satisfied with if it was leading up to an even bigger battle as I fought to open the citadel...maybe I'd even get to do over Harbinger...
Alas it really wasn't to be. Its amazing to think that within that span of what, 15 minutes they have ruined an entire trilogy. No one is going to want to replay a game to see one of the "16" different endings because if you've seen 1 you've seen them all. No closure, no choices in keeping with your moral alignment (Indeed you are FORCED to be renegade!!)plot whols you could fit the Rachni Queen through...seriously...they couldn't have balls it up more if they tried.
I think they tried to be too "out there" with the endings, almost "Matrix" esque where in reality all ANYONE wanted to see was an concrete, well defined, glorious ending, for good or bad.
Its crazy how they got it so right with the ending of ME1 and 2 but made such a mess of it with 3...I seriously hope they release DLC!