874 réponses à ce sujet

[James2024]

Op that was well put and spot on.

[Sashimi_taco]

Some people are like this, and some people are like that. That created racism, sexism, homophobia, and pretty much hatred of the other.

If only everyone was the same, then there would be no fighting. Hey everyone, lets all be exactly the same, surely this will result in never having wars or hate again.

Great message, bioware.

[Dormitorius]

It's not a lack of us getting what we want. It's the total disregard for our choices throughout the game.

Does it matter if you save Wrex? No, cause you'll still get the same 3 endings. Does it matter if you unite the Quarians and Geth? No, cause you get the same 3 endings. Does it matter that you saved the collector base, or the council? No, cause you get the same 3 endings. Does it matter if you lose some teammates in the suicide mission in ME2? No, cause you get the same 3 endings.

A simple solution would of been to do a quick and easy epilogue after those 3 endings either through cutscenes or even DA1's end text to show us what happens. They violate the established reader-writer contract of ME. Mass Effect as a series has been all about how your choices will affect the next game/story/choices, and so on. To ignore our choices, and thereby consequences upon the ending(s) is heresy.

99% of the game is extremely well written, but at the end our 5 year long experience of making choices is rendered moot, and we are given an ending in 3 different colors.

Also, the synthesis ending is ridiculous considering how hard Bioware's writers tried to anchor the series in some form of realistic scientific logic. No magical beam will somehow fuse your DNA with synthetic components without irreparable harm. Like radiation.

A story cannot end so ambiguously in a game like ME. All the emotion gamers have been building around this series is brought to a peak durning ME3's final moments. Then we are given an ending that does not allow emotional catharsis or closure to the story. Thus the gamers are forced to unleash this build-up the only place they can, here.

It is not good writing, it's a total disregard for something everyone learns in Writing 101, you never have an ending that contradicts the theme of your story. Removing our choices, and giving us a blanket ending that fails to answer more questions then it raises is terrible.

A "TRULY" great piece of writing would of been the writers successfully weaving our choices (which they wrote anyways) into the ending. Showing all of us how our choices mattered, how our hard work saving characters or letting them die affects the ending.

That OP, would be applaudable writing.

Modifié par Dormitorius, 13 mars 2012 - 05:45 .

[JasonTan87]

Arad-Tzui wrote...

You sound like a first year philosophy major. Frankly, the "grand themes" introduced didn't impress me much. They just sounded preachy. I'm far more interested in the human condition and how these relationships evolve, and seeing that my actions lead somewhere. As is, the whole overly theme of causality and being able to shape the universe by your actions, taking an active part in it all, is entirely lost as the final mission and onward entirely disregards your past actions.

Arad is correct. 

You have to consider how these themes are carried through the narrative on to the audience.  This means that all these philosophical ideas are subject to the delivery of the narrative.  The narrative, in turn, is governed by a framework of rules, the most important of which is the reader-writer contract.

These philosophical grand themes mean nothing if the writing is unable to convey these themes effectively and clearly through the medium.  

As it is now, the narrative is unable to even support a suspension of disbelief, much less deliver a meta-narrative on the philosophical ideas you have stated.

[Spectre_Shepard]

glad you found closure.

I didnt.

[Mandemon]

I'm sorry but I have to disagree with OP. Having us at first seek out revenge and then prevent galactic extinction, then having second game teach us whenever or not end justifies means, then third game have us unite galaxy for survival does not justify shoehorning some philosophical debate that was not present anywhere else in the last 5-10 minutes of the game and have it override everything that we were told previously is NOT good writing,

There is nothing "brave" or "bold" in this ending. It bad writing, nothing more. Ending must be consistent with the series. Would Star Wars been better if it's last 5 minutes would have been taken from 2001: Space Odyssey? Would it have been brave and bold?

Or would it have been "WTF?" moment for everyone, a case of bad writing?

[JasonTan87]

Spectre_Shepard wrote...

glad you found closure.

I didnt.

I think first-year philosophy majors are immune to bad writing. I'm jealous of the OP.

[UnbornLeviathan]

Yuoaman wrote...

I'm sorry, but I disagree. Agreeing with the Reapers is not how I want my Shepard's story to end.

Bam.

[Fatso8686]

MintyCool wrote...

TheOptimist wrote...

http://social.biowar...06/polls/28989/

Welcome to the 2%. Good luck with your topic.

A poll created by a vocal angry minority. Do you really feel this random forum poll actually has any real significance what-so-ever?  Or is it simply a prop to make you feel better about your disappointment with the story?

Insignificant poll is insignificant.

Lol, OP clearly doesn't read the forums. For every one of "you" who were happy with the mediocre ending that only took 7 minutes to play out and close an entire trilogy 5 years in the making, there are about a dozen threads where those of us who wanted a happy ending felt like we deserved it. This game was about CHOICES my uninfomred friend. You opinion is fine, and if you liked the ending, good for you. I liked me1 and 2 because you could choose whether you had a good ending or not. You had to work hard for the good ending, and I did in 1 and 2. And how were we rewarded by our hard work? A linear ending with no other possible options. Yeah we had three choices, but they all end the same essentially. Reapers die/leave, mass relays blow up, normandy crashes on a random planet.

THIS DOES NOT CLOSE OUT A TRILOGY! This only started about a dozen more questions.

[Fatso8686]

Dormitorius wrote...

It's not a lack of us getting what we want. It's the total disregard for our choices throughout the game.

Does it matter if you save Wrex? No, cause you'll still get the same 3 endings. Does it matter if you unite the Quarians and Geth? No, cause you get the same 3 endings. Does it matter that you saved the collector base, or the council? No, cause you get the same 3 endings. Does it matter if you lose some teammates in the suicide mission in ME2? No, cause you get the same 3 endings.

A simple solution would of been to do a quick and easy epilogue after those 3 endings either through cutscenes or even DA1's end text to show us what happens. They violate the established reader-writer contract of ME. Which has been all about how your choices will affect the next game/story/choices, and so on.

99% of the game is extremely well written, but at the end our 5 year long experience of making choices is rendered moot, and we are given an ending in 3 different colors.

Also, the synthesis ending is ridiculous considering how hard Bioware's writers tried to anchor the series in some form of realistic scientific logic. No magical beam will somehow fuse your DNA with synthetic components without irreparable harm. Like radiation.

A story cannot end so ambiguously in a game like ME. All the emotion gamers have been building around this series is brought to a peak durning ME3's final moments. Then we are given an ending that does not allow emotional catharsis or closure to the story. Thus the gamers are forced to unleash this build-up the only place they can, here.

It is not good writing, it's a total disregard for something everyone learns in Writing 101, you never have an ending that contradicts the theme of your story. Removing our choices, and giving us a blanket ending that fails to answer more questions then it raises is terrible.

A "TRULY" great piece of writing would of been the writers successfully weaving our choices (which they wrote anyways) into the ending. Showing all of us how our choices mattered, how our hard work saving characters or letting them die affects the ending.

That OP, would be applaudable writing.

++++++++++++++1

[EgoMaster]

I agree everything OP says about the game, but not the ending. My problems with the ending is not the road they've taken. In fact, I would be angry if they tried to pull off a Hollywood style, "and they lived happily ever after" kind of thing. It's how they did this that bugs me.

1. Quarian - Geth conflict undermines the ending: The Child God says "The created will always rebel against the created. Synthetics will wipe out organics" but the Geth stopped before wiping out Quarians and didn't let it turn into a genocide. The only evil Geth throughout the series were the ones indoctrinated by Sovereign. Also the fact that the Geth on the Quarian Homeworld are trying to jump start immune systems says a lot about the relationship between them. You don't strengthen your enemy's soft spots, you try to exploit them. Geth don't do this.

2. The relationship between EDI and Joker undermines the ending: If combining organics and synthetics is indeed the ultimate step in evolution, EDI and Joker took a much bigger step in that regard than the so called Reaper "solution". Wiping out all advanced organics just resets the relationship between synthetics and organics, thus growing them apart and taking away any chance of co-existence. The presupposition of synthetics wiping out all organics borders around strict fatalism and it doesn't make sense. Why would the rebel synthetics be any different then Reapers? Why would they even touch child races or primitive flora and fauna?

3. Trying to prevent something by achieving it? Riiight: What The Child God says boils down to this: "Rebel synthetics will kill all organics at once, we killed them by installments." It completely disregards the fact that nothing changes for organics, it doesn't matter if they're wiped out by synthetics or Reapers and they don't care if the child races are spared or not. It doesn't even know the concept of free will. I think this god is a little confused.

4. All roads lead to Rome: I think the majority of fans are angry because all 3 endings completely disregard what you did in 3 games. They all boil down to a meaningless underlying reason that gives way to 3 meaningless choices, none of which gives you a sense of victory regardless of Shepard's survival. The first Fallout's ending got it right. ME3 couldn't.

5. Inconsistencies: In other news, characters that are implied dead (or supposed to be dead anyway) magically walk out of Normandy when it's stranded on Gilligan's planet. If you take EDI to the final mission and choose synthesis, it's even worse. EDI is killed by the Reapers while approching Citadel's beam in London and just 15 minutes later she walks out of Normandy, cuddling with Jeff. How did she even get aboard the Normandy?

And I'm really sorry to say this but there will be no momentum shift until these issues are adressed. The best thing Bioware can do is bundle new ending(s) into DLCs that add characters etc. I'd pay for it.

Modifié par EgoMaster, 13 mars 2012 - 06:02 .

[pomrink]

Stop debating this. let the topic die

[Gromphadelic]

MintyCool wrote...

TheOptimist wrote...

http://social.biowar...06/polls/28989/

Welcome to the 2%. Good luck with your topic.

A poll created by a vocal angry minority. Do you really feel this random forum poll actually has any real significance what-so-ever?  Or is it simply a prop to make you feel better about your disappointment with the story?

Insignificant poll is insignificant.

so this means in the future companies shouldn't listen to the feedback they actually get from customers and rather assume that "no feedback = good feedback"?

you can't deny that those who are vocal about the ending mostly give negative feedback and that this seems to be the majority of people who bother to give feedback at all.
assuming that everyone who doesn't give feedback automatically is happy about the ending is just not how business works.

that's also something that people who talk about artistic integrity/freedom and things like that seem to forget. bioware is not an artistic collective. there may be art to the creation of a computer game, but before that bw is a COMPANY. and we as players are not only overemotional fans, but mainly customers.

a company that decides to completely ignore the problems that many of their customers have with one of their products will be out of business sooner or later.
i'm not saying bw is ignoring the problems many have adressed, just wanted to state this generally.

bioware is NOT a rockband, a painter or a writer. if something like this damages their reputation in the long term, there are jobs at stake.
just wanted to remind some people of that before they go on saying bw shouldn't give a damn about the critical voices.

and i must add that the majority of those who criticise the ending have so far been a lot more civil than many of the ending-enthusiasts who often claim a lot of people are simply crybabies who are to stupid to understand the ending.

[MintyCool]

JasonTan87 wrote...

Arad-Tzui wrote...

You sound like a first year philosophy major. Frankly, the "grand themes" introduced didn't impress me much.

Arad is correct.

JasonTan87 wrote...

Spectre_Shepard wrote...

glad you found closure.

I didnt.

I think first-year philosophy majors are immune to bad writing. I'm jealous of the OP.

You keep using the term, "First year philosophy major."

I think the attempt is to be derogatory since you are unable to win the argument we are currently discussing but I'll entertain you on this topic a bit....

The themes discussed in this game are often what you would call Pop Philosophy or Layman Philosophy. Why? It's because the topics discussed usually are quite popular with the general public or the everyday layman.

You will see these popular topics discussed in every entertainment medium you watch/read. For example, some sources that may relate to you: Lost, Dr. Who, A Song of Ice and Fire, etc.

These ideas excite the mind with an assortment of possibilities. The science equivalent to this would be known as fringe science. Or in psychology, self help and pop psychology is popular.

This is why someone like Malcomn Gladwell is so successful because he writes about topics that the everyday person can relate to.

Obviously your intelligence and understanding is superior to ours since you find these topics discussed unfulfilling. So I look forward to your groundbreaking contributions to science, psychology, or philosophy that will change the way we look at the world. Please keep in touch.

Modifié par MintyCool, 13 mars 2012 - 06:18 .

[MintyCool]

pomrink wrote...

Stop debating this. let the topic die

That's a sure fire way to win an argument. Bioware is not going to change a thing whether this topic exists or not.

Accept that.

I made this topic to voice my support for the ending, respect that.

Modifié par MintyCool, 13 mars 2012 - 06:21 .

[Unit-Alpha]

Fatso8686 wrote...

MintyCool wrote...

TheOptimist wrote...

http://social.biowar...06/polls/28989/

Welcome to the 2%. Good luck with your topic.

A poll created by a vocal angry minority. Do you really feel this random forum poll actually has any real significance what-so-ever?  Or is it simply a prop to make you feel better about your disappointment with the story?

Insignificant poll is insignificant.

Lol, OP clearly doesn't read the forums. For every one of "you" who were happy with the mediocre ending that only took 7 minutes to play out and close an entire trilogy 5 years in the making, there are about a dozen threads where those of us who wanted a happy ending felt like we deserved it. This game was about CHOICES my uninfomred friend. You opinion is fine, and if you liked the ending, good for you. I liked me1 and 2 because you could choose whether you had a good ending or not. You had to work hard for the good ending, and I did in 1 and 2. And how were we rewarded by our hard work? A linear ending with no other possible options. Yeah we had three choices, but they all end the same essentially. Reapers die/leave, mass relays blow up, normandy crashes on a random planet.

THIS DOES NOT CLOSE OUT A TRILOGY! This only started about a dozen more questions.

Someone needs to explain sample size to the OP.

[EgoMaster]

MintyCool wrote...

pomrink wrote...

Stop debating this. let the topic die

That's a sure fire way to win an argument. Bioware is not going to change a thing whether this topic exists or not.

Accept that.

I made this topic to voice my support for the ending. The End Game Support Momentum keeps building....

Worst psych war effort ever. No one other than you wrote to this thread supporting the endings but there are many people criticizing. With valid points that you choose to ignore completely I might add. Oh, I forgot. They were the "vocal minority", weren't they? (and that's how you win an argument, by calling people who don't share your opinion "minority".)

Modifié par EgoMaster, 13 mars 2012 - 06:30 .

[EgoMaster]

Sorry, accidental double post.

Modifié par EgoMaster, 13 mars 2012 - 06:29 .

[FabricatedWookie]

Suicide mission, no casualties

Personally, I see a lot of work being done by a mind to interpret the ending positively. However, you(the player) only resolved the reaper threat, however in the ending they create many huge question marks and do not address them. This is not closure, this is prep for a new IP and the backfire is confused and disoriented gamers who don't get to see the state of their crew, their galaxy, their story after the climax. It leaves the player in the dark, and people even have to go so far as to imagine that the ending didn't happen at all and that the real ending is on the way.

Modifié par FabricatedWookie, 13 mars 2012 - 06:42 .

[JeffZero]

MintyCool wrote...

TheOptimist wrote...

http://social.biowar...06/polls/28989/

Welcome to the 2%. Good luck with your topic.

A poll created by a vocal angry minority. Do you really feel this random forum poll actually has any real significance what-so-ever?  Or is it simply a prop to make you feel better about your disappointment with the story?

Insignificant poll is insignificant.

Gamefaqs didn't like it. Reddit didn't like it. TrekBBS didn't like it. All my other sites' user bases didn't like it.

[mauro2222]

FabricatedWookie wrote...

Suicide mission, no casualties

Win

[Caz Neerg]

MintyCool wrote...

TheOptimist wrote...

http://social.biowar...06/polls/28989/

Welcome to the 2%. Good luck with your topic.

A poll created by a vocal angry minority. Do you really feel this random forum poll actually has any real significance what-so-ever?  Or is it simply a prop to make you feel better about your disappointment with the story?

Insignificant poll is insignificant.

There is an accepted truism in the hospitality industry.  For every one person who complains about something there are ten others who have the same opinion, and just didn't bother to say anything.  There are many polls cropping up, all over the internet, on this issue.  The largest one is here, and it is large enough to be statistically significant, whether you choose to accept that fact or not.  Even the most favorable polls out there to BioWare still have 85% of respondents opposed to their ending.  It's fine if you believe that their ending is artistically appropriate.  But it's clear that, objectively speaking, it was bad business.

[Comguard2]

Finished my game an hour ago and visited the forum - by the moment I saw the ending I knew the message board would look like this.

Actually, I'm quite satisfied with the ending. Think it makes sense. Why they left out an epilogue as we know from, e.g., Fallout 1 and 2 - I don't know. That would have been an easy option to satisfy the fans. On the other hand I can understand that Bioware didn't want to explain every single detail.

The synthesis-option was not clear to me - from a logical point of view. The Reapers turn into another color, and then?

Also can't understand why some people miss the Dark Energy ending - this was never a big part of the lore. The conflict synthetic - organic life was the central theme of the games. And now they gave a logical explanation. Arguments like "but Geth and Quarians live in peace" are not valid, because they base on a very limited point of view.

What is disturbing me right now is just the fate of the Normandy. I guess this will be the connection to ME4, if there will be one. The Intro shows the Epilogue of ME3 with Joker flying the ship away, and then they strand on the planet of the "first ones" (or whatever you want to call them).

Modifié par Comguard2, 13 mars 2012 - 06:46 .

[Aulis Vaara]

MintyCool wrote...

1. Shepard, war torn and exhausted, leaped into the crucibles energy source sacrificing his life to intertwine existences between synthetics and organics.

A few hours ago, this is how my tale ended after five years of Mass Effect; and I was quite satisfied with the ending.

Do you really feel that organics and synthetics now coexist? What about all those Geth who live on servers and in Quarians' suits? And will those electronic pathways be passed down from generation to generation? Does that mean they have been encoded in the genes? Would that even work? Can they evolve? Can they actually do anything useful? If they can do something useful, will they still be able to in the next generation, as organic growth doesn't exactly work the same way as simply printing the pathways on someone's skin?

I could add a ton more question to show how this simply doesn't make sense, but I feel I've made my point quite well enough. Actually, the Geth question would've already been enough.

[Caz Neerg]

Deltoran wrote...

From a business standpoint, its not exactly smart to try to weave in major philosophical ideas that a lot of your customers might not understand. Furthermore, all this business about intellectuality and not needing a detailed resolution doesn't make much sense either. Not everyone has a Doctorate in philosophy nor would they want to see the story end in this manner.

I am in no way saying that those of us who want a different ending aren't intelligent enough to understand or appreciate Bioware's 'art', I'm simply saying that culturally, we're not all into the avant garde, thought-provoking, philosophical stuff that Bioware gave us. A lot of movies, books, and other entertainment still end with explanations, happy endings, and only limited plot holes.

If that's what consumers still desire, then, from a business standpoint, it is foolish not to give it to them. In this case especially since its all about 'our choices', and they've already made a lot of promises in that regard.

I do have a degree in philosophy.  Unless the indoctrination/hallucination theory ends up being correct, the ending isn't avant garde.  It isn't deep.  It isn't complex.  It is just a ripped off cliff notes version of the ending of Deus Ex, and it doesn't fit the thematic nature of the Mass Effect series, at all.  There are in fact numerous examples from Shepard's own experiences which would seem to indicate that the philosophy the Catalyst presents is not even consistent with the observable reality of the Mass Effect universe.  And yet Shepard just swallows it all, without question or debate, and hobbles off to do the Head Reaper's bidding.  Does not compute.  This ending was objectively bad.  I hate to say that, because I love BioWare, but it just was.