9972 réponses à ce sujet

[durasteel]

If you open your birthday present and find a turd in a box, that is a problem. It really doesn't matter if you subsequently receive a lot of clarity and explanation about who gave you the turd, and why. You've still, after all possible exposition, got a turd in a box.

After the end of Mass Effect 3 is changed to something that makes sense and relates coherently to the rest of the trilogy's story, I'll be happy to pay attention to the clarifying explanation of how a talented team of game designers dropped a turd into the box, but until then the main focus should be the fact that we don't want the turd.

Also, Casey needs to be aware that if the "game content initiatives" amount to little more than a shiny coat of polish for the turd, they will not be well received. Again, the team needs to devote themselves to turd removal, before any other efforts have a chance of meeting a warm reception.

[Doug M]

Jessica Merizan wrote...

Hey guys,
I just wanted to clarify a few things.

1) The twitter account is my personal one. No one is paying me to tweet on it and considering how much people are trying to extrapolate from replies I make that are meant for certain people (Twitter operates in a way that it's assume that while replies are public, people don't see them on their feed unless they follow both individuals -- or unless they camp on someone's profile which is what people are currently doing on mine). There's not a script I'm following and I'm not being "told" anything by PR. PR actually has very little to do with this situation, but I doubt you will believe that.

2) I was speaking to a person who enjoyed the ending (which is very much a personal opinion that I respect just as I respect someone else's opinion that they did not like the endings or even that the endings ruined their ME experience. All opinions are valid.) and I indicated that people who like things do not talk about it enough. People took this to mean that I was indicating that people don't talk about things when they're happy or that word of mouth isn't discussing things. That was not my intention.

2A) Twitter is terrible about having forum like conversations but currently I'm finding that's how people are trying to use it. After sending thousands of tweets this week (no small feat, try it) yes I get fatigued and don't always say exactly what I mean. But it's worse when I know that everyone is camped out on my feed just waiting to pick apart something I've said and prove me to be a liar or the harbinger of hope. Neither of which I am. I am a community manager who is a trained anthropologist and I feel that at times like this having a dialogue is more important than ever. It would certainly be easier if I didn't say anything at all, but I don't think that's the right thing to do.

2B) My intention to that person was to say that more people need to vocalize their opinion, positive or negative. When we insulate ourselves in tight-knit communities, it's harder to see that most people aren't doing that. Not the same most people however, just most people in different situations. An example I used is the 90-9-1 principle or the 1% rule (which is all over the internet and I studied it during my master's coursework in media consumption at University College London, namedrop intentional as people have recently accused me of being unable to read and interpret statistics or data, something I'm very good at and pride myself on).

3) The above rule is quite simple. 90% of consumers will passively engage in the product through consumption (such as playing a video game). They might lurk on forums or read articles. 9% of these people will take it a step further and actively engage in discussions and talk. These are the people that you rely on for WOM sales (word of mouth). They'll "like" a post on Facebook, share it to their wall, reply to a forum thread, RT or reply to something on Twitter. Then you have people who take it one step further and create content based on the original product. These are your fan artists, cosplayers, and even as simple as someone who starts a forum thread or makes a youtube video.

3A) An example I gave of this on Twitter is 3 products that I enjoy: Dominos pizza, the television show The Venture Brothers, and the Mass Effect Franchise. While I spend an embarrassing amount of money on Dominos every month, I don't discuss my purchase online with my friends. I haven't "Liked" their page on Facebook and I'm not a member of their community. I'm still an important consumer and I vote with my wallet. However I'm in that 90% that Dominos is constantly trying to engage with pizza ordering widgets to share on my Facebook wall etc. But I'm not biting. On the other hand, I'm a much more vocal consumer of the Venture Brothers. I'm in the 9% there. I've been a member of several fan sites, tuned into their livestreams and donated money during their charity drives, I tweet quotes from the show and am involved in discussions with other fans I met online. And finally, long before I worked for BioWare, I was in the 1% of this community. Even though I didn't go on the forums much (other than lurk), I created costumes, spread my love of their games at conventions, actively participated in their facebook initiatives etc.

3B) This doesn't just apply to people who like something. This applies to consumption as a whole. The 9% vocal minority isn't a bunch of naysayers. It's literally just the vocal bunch out of the entire group. It includes people who like, dislike, and are neutral. The media has just latched onto "vocal minority" as if it's a bad thing. It's not. It's just the way consumption works. Go look at any Facebook page, specifically their "People Talking About This" (PTAT). We consider 10% a great number. 20% is off the charts. But it rarely goes above that. It's just the way things work.

4) Honestly, if you want people to communicate more, you have to stop ripping apart everything. I'm speaking in generals here, most people don't do this but we remember those people who do the most. I have devs who don't want to write blogs for me because they don't want to lovingly craft a nice post and then watch it get picked apart and analyzed to death. There have been countless times this week that I wanted to stop talking because people were misinterpreting things I said such as my tweet in reply to one specific person that was taken out of context. One tweet that I made when I was tired and it was poorly worded. And seeing people rip it apart in the forums made me want to stop tweeting for good. Make my account private and just use my public one for generic information and boring updates. But I didn't because I know that it's awful when a few people ruin it for everyone.

I respect that even if I personally disagree with the end goal of RetakeME, their means to be heard are noble. Even if they have a demand, they aren't coming across as demanding. They try to be polite and fight stereotypes about fandom. And as their community manager, I'm advocating for their opinions to be heard. But this BioWare PR damage control stuff is ridiculous. How can we expect to have a conversation about this when people are slinging around jargon that frankly none of our PR professionals have ever even heard of. You're making yourselves paranoid and rejecting anything we have to say. It's one thing to be skeptical (as a consumer, it's smart to be an informed buyer) but it's another thing to lead yourself to believe that someone is actively trying to pull the wool over your eyes. We aren't. I'm not. I'm losing sleep over this and regardless of what you may think I'm not getting paid to sit and type this out. And any PR person would tell you this entire post is a mistake to write and publish.

Thanks.

P.S. Since I'm trying to be informative, a disclaimer about "this is my personal Twitter. Opinions are my own." don't actually hold up or keep someone out of hot water, so it's a waste of precious characters to have that in your description.

P.P.S. Yes, as someone previously mentioned we are actively monitoring how many people are finishing the game and comparing it to ME2 as a standard. This is the primary reason that we have held off on discussing the endings, for better or worse. You can expect fuller details later, but when I ask you to be patient it's not because I hate you or am scrambling to find the right words to say. I will tell you that I'm really encouraged by the feedback I'm getting and what I'm hearing from the team and I look forward to when that can be shared. Also, multiplayer numbers are a completely separate metric so you don't need to worry about us conflating the two.

Jessica, if you see this, I'd love a response (as would everyone else, I know).  I hear what you're saying, and it sounds genuine, so I want to try to have a small genuine conversation with you.

I know you're not a developer and aren't privy to the development process, but when you and other BW employees finished the game, was there anyone who was left scratching their heads, or who were generally apprehensive?  Did you hear anyone say something like, "Wait... what?" 

This isn't some kind of trap that I'm trying to set for you to get you to admit that the ending is bad.  Rather what I've been reading from Casey Hudson and now Ray Muzyka is that the current ending is the one that the developers intended to give us all along.  A lot of other posters in this thread and on these forums have pointed out how the current ending is objectively poor writing, and I'm not going to repeat them.  What I'm more interested in is the psychology of the development process towards the end.

I'm sure you've heard of the psychology term "groupthink".  For anyone reading this who isn't familiar, groupthink is a phenomenon where an isolated group of people stress group cohesion, unity, and conformity over individuality, disagreement, and creativity.  Oftentimes the result precludes rational criticism or realistic alternatives to the final product.  What you usually end up with is an outcome that everyone in the small group thinks is wonderful, but people outside the group are critical of.  And the more I read, the more I think that's what happened at BioWare.  I hope I'm wrong, but I don't know.  Jessica, any word if there were any big blowout fights among the developers while making the ending?  Also, the fans need to guard against groupthink as well, and all the calls for group unity run the risk of squashing valid criticism.  I think we've been doing a pretty good job of staying reasonable, though, all things considered.

The other psychological phenonemon that I'm curious about is confirmation bias.  If anyone here watches TotalBiscuit's videos, you know what confirmation bias is.  For anyone not familiar, it's the habit of only seeking out those things which support your point of view.  This happens all the time, all over the internet, and to just about everyone.  It's happening with the Retake Mass Effect movement, where some people only listen to others who agree with them that the ending is bad and needs to be remade while discounting people who disagree, and it's happening with BioWare, who tells us that there are a lot of "people who love the ending and consider the thought of changing it an affront", and use that to support their side of the conversation.  The impression that it gives is that BioWare is discounting those people who want a different ending, though any rational examination of BW's PR this last week will show that BW is most definitely not discounting their upset fans.

What ends up happening is that both sides don't take the time to honestly examine what the other side is saying.  This is really difficult to do, because BioWare has to be extremely cautious with every bit of text that it makes public, thanks to those few rabid fans who refuse to be happy with anything and will tear any statement from BW to shreds, and so the rest of the fans don't get very much to honestly examine.  By the same token, it's difficult for BW to honestly examine what it is the fans are saying because, well, there's tens of thousands of us writing walls of text like this one.  There's simply too many of us writing too much for BW to be able to read, and certainly too many divergent threads, which is why having a unified message will help.

So Jessica, let's talk.  Between you, me, and the internet, you know the rational arguments for why the endings are objectively poor writing, right?  Are these points valid?  If you think they're not valid, and that we're just not "getting it", then can you help us make sense of the ending?  What was it about the ending that you think was good?

If the arguments that people have been making about objectively poor writing don't seem like they're reasonable, I'll be glad to talk about them.  If BW's rationale for the endings hasn't yet been clearly presented, now is as good a time as any (except for PAX, I suppose)

To be clear, this is me trying to demonstrate how to try to get past confirmation bias.  I really want to get to the point where the fans and BW can have a genuine conversation, and personally I think that of the two groups, BW is less prone to overreaction and hyperbole, but also more prone to confirmation bias and groupthink.  Oh, and Jessica, does BW have anyone on board whose job is specifically to point out when something is a bad idea?

Didn't mean for this post to get so long winded, but there you have it.  Jessica, if you respond to this, I'll be very grateful.  If you don't, no worries, I know you've got fifty thousand other people trying to get you to respond to their long winded posts, too.  Take care!

Modifié par Doug M, 21 mars 2012 - 07:20 .

[DoctorCrowtgamer]

Please people if Bioware releases DLC that just extends the depressing ending that don't reflect our choices don't assume it's the best we can do because that just means that they are desperate to get us back and if we hold on a little longer we can get new endings that reflect our choices. please don't let this all be for nothing. please please please hold on until we get what we were told would be in the game and what we have been fighting for. please please please don't touch anything made by A or Bioware until we get new endings that reflect our choices not just extended versions of the ending we have that the series pointless. We can win and this proves it we just have to stick togehter,not get tired,and not fall for buying DLC that doesn't fix the real problem with the ending which is that they don't reflect what our shepard would have done and that the only endings are depressing. thank you.

Please we winning,read the damage control thread this is just another stage of that I feel like all the work we did is going to be for nothing because everyone is falling for it. i really thought we smarter then to fall for something like this. please prove me right and don't stop holding the line until we get new endings that give us more options.

Please stick together. We have almost won If bioware does release DLC that just extends the depressing endings we have please don't buy it,that just means they are desprate and that if we hold out just a little longer we can get ending that reflect our choice please don't let this all be for nothing by falling for spin.
Please check out this group and join in.

http://social.bioware.com/group/7102/

Thank you for your time.

[Janus382]

To those who don't feel like reading a whole lot:

So Ms. Marizan rolls up in here, and is quite personable and makes a lot of sense, but ultimately says a whole lot of "nothing" and "maybe in April". Thank you though, personally, it was an enjoyable read.

Then Doc Muzyka (BW CEO/co-founder) says "Yeah, we recognize your concerns (though we don't really understand them, LOOK AT THESE REVIEWS!), and surely you just want more 'clarity' and 'closure'. So we're probably just gonna add some dialogue and maybe a few scenes. Let you know in April. Afterwards, you should happy."

Sorry Doc, that's not enough for me. It's like polishing a turd... still a turd, and one that sucks away everything that was attractive about the whole series.

Hold the Line.

[Vap0ur_Snake]

So regarding the blog by the co owner dude. I can respect all of what he says really, he's pointing out that the critics have given the game high scores, that's fair enough but we all now that the real critics are the fans as we're not bought and paid for already.

We just need to keep on as we are, civil, constructive, intelligent input and we'll get there.

So we're looking at April for a proper response then.

HOLD THE LINE - our choices should matter.

Modifié par Vap0ur_Snake, 21 mars 2012 - 07:54 .

[Lil One]

DoctorCrowtgamer wrote...
<trim>

Please stick together. We have almost won If bioware does release DLC that just extends the depressing endings we have please don't buy it

<trim>

That you don't have to worry about on my part, and I shall hold the line if that turns out to be their offering.

[G0ldmember]

Good evening all. Glad to be here again.

Phoenix NL wrote...

In case this hasn't been posted - an article on the BBC -
http://www.bbc.co.uk...nology-17458208

You can see the BBC is truly independent. Why I say that?

Large numbers of fans had complained that the finale to the popular saga did not live up expectations.

Large....finally...someone calls our group large. Keep it up all!!!! HOLD THAT LINE!

Modifié par G0ldmember, 21 mars 2012 - 07:27 .

[durasteel]

ericjdev wrote...

I really appreciate how patient and fair she has been especially in regards to not throwing out all of our opinions over the agressive and inappropriate responses of a few. She does a good job under challenging conditions and I personally trust her completely. I've been trying all morning to figure out why so many of us are acting so negative and paranoid when we just got the best news we've had since the beginning of all this. I remain very optimistic and hopeful. I also remain convinced that poor treatment of Bioware staff does not advance our goals.

There is no doubt that Jessica has been great throughout this process. I think any negativity and paranoia you might be perceiving might come from the fact that Dr. Ray's statement may be reasonably perceived as dismissive and condescending, however. I certainly think he was trying for exactly the opposite effect, but his tone implies that he thinks the problem lies with the fans, not with the ending. To summarize, the ending was "art" that we simply don't understand, so we need some explanation to clarify it for us.

I believe that this is a result of trying to stick up for his designers, which I admire, and to stop short of promising a complete re-write of the ending, which I respect as necessary at this point in the process. I think he could have chosen his words better.

[Apathy1989]

Thank you Dr. Ray Muzyka for the fair and honest reply. Its good to finally get a concrete reply about what Biowares intentions are towards the ending.

Ask (almost) anyone here, and we will all say that ME3 was a fantastic game until the end. No one doubts that. But its also what makes the ending so unbelievable. So close, yet so far from being perfect.

I look forward to april, until then I will continue to hold the line.

[l00kash]

Untill recently (finishing ME3) I never posted on this forum. I was 'silent majority'. Seeing how BW treated us, gamers, just made me furious. So I'm with you on this 100%. My wallet is sealed untill all this gets resolved.
As for Dr Ray Muzyka's response I will quote a classic:

Keep civil, keep holding the line!

[BigglesFlysAgain]

Anyone seen this apparently from Patrick Weekes. apparently posted somwhere and then removed soon after though, so no way of confirming it.


"I have nothing to do with the ending beyond a) having argued
successfully a long time ago that we needed a chance to say goodbye to
our squad, having argued successfully that Cortez shouldn't
automatically die in that shuttle crash, and c) having written Tali's
goodbye bit, as well as a couple of the holo-goodbyes for people I wrote
(Mordin, Kasumi, Jack, etc). 
No other writer did, either, except
for our lead. This was entirely the work of our lead and Casey himself,
sitting in a room and going through draft after draft. 
And honestly, it kind of shows. 
Every
other mission in the game had to be held up to the rest of the writing
team, and the writing team then picked it apart and made suggestions and
pointed out the parts that made no sense. This mission? Casey and our
lead deciding that they didn't need to be peer-reviewe.d 
And again, it shows. 
If you'd asked me the themes of Mass Effect 3, I'd break them down as: Galactic Alliances Friends Organics versus Synthetics 
In
my personal opinion, the first two got a perfunctory nod. We did get a
goodbye to our friends, but it was in a scene that was divorced from the
gameplay -- a deliberate "nothing happens here" area with one turret
thrown in for no reason I really understand, except possibly to
obfuscate the "nothing happens here"-ness. The best missions in our game
are the ones in which the gameplay and the narrative reinforce each
other. The end of the Genophage campaign exemplifies that for me --
every line of dialog is showing you both sides of the krogan, be they
horrible brutes or proud warriors; the art shows both their bombed-out
wasteland and the beautiful world they once had and could have again;
the combat shows the terror of the Reapers as well as a blatant reminder
of the rachni, which threatened the galaxy and had to be stopped by the
krogan last time. Every line of code in that mission is on target with
the overall message. 
The endgame doesn't have that. I wanted to see
banshees attacking you, and then have asari gunships zoom in and blow
them away. I wanted to see a wave of rachni ravagers come around a
corner only to be met by a wall of krogan roaring a battle cry. Here's
the horror the Reapers inflicted upon each race, and here's the army
that you, Commander Shepard, made out of every race in the galaxy to
fight them. 
I personally thought that the Illusive Man conversation
was about twice as long as it needed to be -- something that I've been
told in my peer reviews of my missions and made edits on, but again,
this is a conversation no writer but the lead ever saw until it was
already recorded. I did love Anderson's goodbye. 
For me, Anderson's
goodbye is where it ended. The stuff with the Catalyst just... You have
to understand. Casey is really smart and really analytical. And the
problem is that when he's not checked, he will assume that other people
are like him, and will really appreciate an almost completely
unemotional intellectual ending. I didn't hate it, but I didn't love
it. 
And then, just to be a dick... what was SUPPOSED to happen was
that, say you picked "Destroy the Reapers". When you did that, the
system was SUPPOSED to look at your score, and then you'd show a
cutscene of Earth that was either: 
a) Very high score: Earth
obviously damaged, but woo victory  Medium score: Earth takes a bunch
of damage from the Crucible activation. Like dropping a bomb on an
already war-ravaged city. Uh, well, maybe not LIKE that as much as, uh,
THAT. c) Low score: Earth is a cinderblock, all life on it completely
wiped out 
I have NO IDEA why these different cutscenes aren't in
there. As far as I know, they were never cut. Maybe they were cut for
budget reasons at the last minute. I don't know. But holy crap, yeah, I
can see how incredibly disappointing it'd be to hear of all the
different ending possibilities and have it break down to "which color is
stuff glowing?" Or maybe they ARE in, but they're too subtle to really
see obvious differences, and again, that's... yeah. 
Okay, that's a lot to have written for something that's gonna go away in an hour. 
I
still teared up at the ending myself, but really, I was tearing up for
the quick flashbacks to old friends and the death of Anderson. I wasn't
tearing up over making a choice that, as it turned out, didn't have
enough cutscene differentiation on it. 
And to be clear, I don't even
really wish Shepard had gotten a ride-off-into-sunset ending. I was
honestly okay with Shepard sacrificing himself. I just expected it to be
for something with more obvious differentiation, and a stronger tie to
the core themes -- all three of them."

[Roll Equals Cute]

As one who's been here every single day watching and waiting for news, supporting the line being held...I do agree with some of the above comments, that there seems to be way too much negative backlash in regards to Dr. Muzyka and Jess Merizan.

We should definitely continue to be vocal, but some of us do need to stop tearing apart everything that's said by Bioware/EA and their employees. Every bit of "non-news" they release is NOT an attack on us.

I know there's still a lot of anger out there, but please. We need to be patient and polite - but most importantly, we need to continue being the great community that we've been.

[QuietRiot988]

G0ldmember wrote...

Good evening all. Glad to be here again.

Phoenix NL wrote...

In case this hasn't been posted - an article on the BBC -
http://www.bbc.co.uk...nology-17458208

You can see the BBC is truly independent. Why I say that?

Large numbers of fans had complained that the finale to the popular saga did not live up expectations.

Large....finally...someone calls our group large. Keep it up all!!!! HOLD THAT LINE!

They are "independent" most likely since they do not rely on EA advertising.  Their article gave me a lot more confidence.  

[ErMacPE]

Doug M wrote...

Jessica Merizan wrote...

*snip*

Jessica, if you see this, I'd love a response (as would everyone else, I know).  I hear what you're saying, and it sounds genuine, so I want to try to have a small genuine conversation with you.

I know you're not a developer and aren't privy to the development process, but when you and other BW employees finished the game, was there anyone who was left scratching their heads, or who were generally apprehensive?  Did you hear anyone say something like, "Wait... what?" 

This isn't some kind of trap that I'm trying to set for you to get you to admit that the ending is bad.  Rather what I've been reading from Casey Hudson and now Ray Muzyka is that the current ending is the one that the developers intended to give us all along.  A lot of other posters in this thread and on these forums have pointed out how the current ending is objectively poor writing, and I'm not going to repeat them.  What I'm more interested in is the psychology of the development process towards the end.

I'm sure you've heard of the psychology term "groupthink".  For anyone reading this who isn't familiar, groupthink is a phenomenon where an isolated group of people stress group cohesion, unity, and conformity over individuality, disagreement, and creativity.  Oftentimes the result precludes rational criticism or realistic alternatives to the final product.  What you usually end up with is an outcome that everyone in the small group thinks is wonderful, but people outside the group are critical of.  And the more I read, the more I think that's what happened at BioWare.  I hope I'm wrong, but I don't know.  Jessica, any word if there were any big blowout fights among the developers while making the ending?  Also, the fans need to guard against groupthink as well, and all the calls for group unity run the risk of squashing valid criticism.  I think we've been doing a pretty good job of staying reasonable, though, all things considered.

The other psychological phenonemon that I'm curious about is confirmation bias.  If anyone here watches TotalBiscuit's videos, you know what confirmation bias is.  For anyone not familiar, it's the habit of only seeking out those things which support your point of view.  This happens all the time, all over the internet, and to just about everyone.  It's happening with the Retake Mass Effect movement, where some people only listen to others who agree with them that the ending is bad and needs to be remade while discounting people who disagree, and it's happening with BioWare, who tells us that there are a lot of "people who love the ending and consider the thought of changing it an affront", and use that to support their side of the conversation.  The impression that it gives is that BioWare is discounting those people who want a different ending, though any rational examination of BW's PR this last week will show that BW is most definitely not discounting their upset fans.

What ends up happening is that both sides don't take the time to honestly examine what the other side is saying.  This is really difficult to do, because BioWare has to be extremely cautious with every bit of text that it makes public, thanks to those few rabid fans who refuse to be happy with anything and will tear any statement from BW to shreds, and so the rest of the fans don't get very much to honestly examine.  By the same token, it's difficult for BW to honestly examine what it is the fans are saying because, well, there's tens of thousands of us writing walls of text like this one.  There's simply too many of us writing too much for BW to be able to read, and certainly too many divergent threads, which is why having a unified message will help.

So Jessica, let's talk.  Between you, me, and the internet, you know the rational arguments for why the endings are objectively poor writing, right?  Are these points valid?  If you think they're not valid, and that we're just not "getting it", then can you help us make sense of the ending?  What was it about the ending that you think was good?

If the arguments that people have been making about objectively poor writing don't seem like they're reasonable, I'll be glad to talk about them.  If BW's rationale for the endings hasn't yet been clearly presented, now is as good a time as any (except for PAX, I suppose)

To be clear, this is me trying to demonstrate how to try to get past confirmation bias.  I really want to get to the point where the fans and BW can have a genuine conversation, and personally I think that of the two groups, BW is less prone to overreaction and hyperbole, but also more prone to confirmation bias and groupthink.  Oh, and Jessica, does BW have anyone on board whose job is specifically to point out when something is a bad idea?

Didn't mean for this post to get so long winded, but there you have it.  Jessica, if you respond to this, I'll be very grateful.  If you don't, no worries, I know you've got fifty thousand other people trying to get you to respond to their long winded posts, too.  Take care!

Very well put! Let's hope that someone at Bioware sees this post, and gives a response! It would really go a long way to getting both sides to actually understand each other's view point.

[BigglesFlysAgain]

QuietRiot988 wrote...

G0ldmember wrote...

Good evening all. Glad to be here again.

Phoenix NL wrote...

In case this hasn't been posted - an article on the BBC -
http://www.bbc.co.uk...nology-17458208

You can see the BBC is truly independent. Why I say that?

Large numbers of fans had complained that the finale to the popular saga did not live up expectations.

Large....finally...someone calls our group large. Keep it up all!!!! HOLD THAT LINE!

They are "independent" most likely since they do not rely on EA advertising.  Their article gave me a lot more confidence.  

I should hope so, considering people like me fork out to pay for them every year lol

[Doug M]

Apathy1989 wrote...

Thank you Dr. Ray Muzyka for the fair and honest reply. Its good to finally get a concrete reply about what Biowares intentions are towards the ending.

Ask (almost) anyone here, and we will all say that ME3 was a fantastic game until the end. No one doubts that. But its also what makes the ending so unbelievable. So close, yet so far from being perfect.

I look forward to april, until then I will continue to hold the line.

It was good to see him write, "but out of respect to our fans, we need to accept the criticism and feedback with humility."

But later on he writes, "Building on their research, Exec Producer
Casey Hudson and the team are hard at work on a number of game content
initiatives that will help answer the questions, providing more clarity
for those seeking further closure to their journey. ... We’re working hard to maintain the right balance between
the artistic integrity of the original story while addressing the fan
feedback we’ve received."

They're definitely listening to us, and despite Dr. Muzyka's response being vetted and crafted with help from the PR department, the fact that they're actually working on "initiatives" that they think will reconcile all this is a good sign.  The only thing left is whether or not BW makes something that's up to par with the quality that we've come to expect from BW and Mass Effect over the years, ME3's ending not withstanding.

[JaylaClark]

The problem is that even a question like "What do you think about the ending is good?" comes across as confrontational. There's often an undercurrent of 'seriously, what could you like about this ending?"

Admittedly, I'm one of the people who are thoroughly wary of getting to the end because of how I hear it destroys the logic. I've been contributing based on descriptions, which has, in point of fact, burned me in the past. (Case in point, Mass Effect Redemption. Most people in the Liara Discussion Group and other Liara groups took a line reported by a friend of ours, who did a page-by-page transcript of same, to mean that Liara didn't want Shepard back at all. Anyone who has the comic probably knows the line and knows the context, it begins with, as I recall, "Then ... maybe you shouldn't ..." after Miranda speaks. Anyway.)

But to be playing... am I harping on this point a lot? I am, And I don't care... the greatest game I've ever played, and to know that there's an ending that contradicts itself and in-universe logic to such a degree, makes me not WANT to see it all fall apart. You understand what I'm saying? There are some people who don't want to ruin the game with knowledge of the ending... but I ... do agree that we should press on and see for ourselves. *sighs* My EMS score was a mere 6 points under 5000 last night. Probably only one readiness percentage point to go. Then I'll dash in, and get the final mission done. Not looking forward to it, though...

[Thargorichiban]

BigglesFlysAgain wrote...

Anyone seen this apparently from Patrick Weekes. apparently posted somwhere and then removed soon after though, so no way of confirming it.


"I have nothing to do with the ending beyond a) having argued
successfully a long time ago that we needed a chance to say goodbye to
our squad, having argued successfully that Cortez shouldn't
automatically die in that shuttle crash, and c) having written Tali's
goodbye bit, as well as a couple of the holo-goodbyes for people I wrote
(Mordin, Kasumi, Jack, etc). 
No other writer did, either, except
for our lead. This was entirely the work of our lead and Casey himself,
sitting in a room and going through draft after draft. 
And honestly, it kind of shows. 
Every
other mission in the game had to be held up to the rest of the writing
team, and the writing team then picked it apart and made suggestions and
pointed out the parts that made no sense. This mission? Casey and our
lead deciding that they didn't need to be peer-reviewe.d 
And again, it shows. 
If you'd asked me the themes of Mass Effect 3, I'd break them down as: Galactic Alliances Friends Organics versus Synthetics 
In
my personal opinion, the first two got a perfunctory nod. We did get a
goodbye to our friends, but it was in a scene that was divorced from the
gameplay -- a deliberate "nothing happens here" area with one turret
thrown in for no reason I really understand, except possibly to
obfuscate the "nothing happens here"-ness. The best missions in our game
are the ones in which the gameplay and the narrative reinforce each
other. The end of the Genophage campaign exemplifies that for me --
every line of dialog is showing you both sides of the krogan, be they
horrible brutes or proud warriors; the art shows both their bombed-out
wasteland and the beautiful world they once had and could have again;
the combat shows the terror of the Reapers as well as a blatant reminder
of the rachni, which threatened the galaxy and had to be stopped by the
krogan last time. Every line of code in that mission is on target with
the overall message. 
The endgame doesn't have that. I wanted to see
banshees attacking you, and then have asari gunships zoom in and blow
them away. I wanted to see a wave of rachni ravagers come around a
corner only to be met by a wall of krogan roaring a battle cry. Here's
the horror the Reapers inflicted upon each race, and here's the army
that you, Commander Shepard, made out of every race in the galaxy to
fight them. 
I personally thought that the Illusive Man conversation
was about twice as long as it needed to be -- something that I've been
told in my peer reviews of my missions and made edits on, but again,
this is a conversation no writer but the lead ever saw until it was
already recorded. I did love Anderson's goodbye. 
For me, Anderson's
goodbye is where it ended. The stuff with the Catalyst just... You have
to understand. Casey is really smart and really analytical. And the
problem is that when he's not checked, he will assume that other people
are like him, and will really appreciate an almost completely
unemotional intellectual ending. I didn't hate it, but I didn't love
it. 
And then, just to be a dick... what was SUPPOSED to happen was
that, say you picked "Destroy the Reapers". When you did that, the
system was SUPPOSED to look at your score, and then you'd show a
cutscene of Earth that was either: 
a) Very high score: Earth
obviously damaged, but woo victory  Medium score: Earth takes a bunch
of damage from the Crucible activation. Like dropping a bomb on an
already war-ravaged city. Uh, well, maybe not LIKE that as much as, uh,
THAT. c) Low score: Earth is a cinderblock, all life on it completely
wiped out 
I have NO IDEA why these different cutscenes aren't in
there. As far as I know, they were never cut. Maybe they were cut for
budget reasons at the last minute. I don't know. But holy crap, yeah, I
can see how incredibly disappointing it'd be to hear of all the
different ending possibilities and have it break down to "which color is
stuff glowing?" Or maybe they ARE in, but they're too subtle to really
see obvious differences, and again, that's... yeah. 
Okay, that's a lot to have written for something that's gonna go away in an hour. 
I
still teared up at the ending myself, but really, I was tearing up for
the quick flashbacks to old friends and the death of Anderson. I wasn't
tearing up over making a choice that, as it turned out, didn't have
enough cutscene differentiation on it. 
And to be clear, I don't even
really wish Shepard had gotten a ride-off-into-sunset ending. I was
honestly okay with Shepard sacrificing himself. I just expected it to be
for something with more obvious differentiation, and a stronger tie to
the core themes -- all three of them."

Where was this posted originally?

[Thargorichiban]

Doug M wrote...

Apathy1989 wrote...

Thank you Dr. Ray Muzyka for the fair and honest reply. Its good to finally get a concrete reply about what Biowares intentions are towards the ending.

Ask (almost) anyone here, and we will all say that ME3 was a fantastic game until the end. No one doubts that. But its also what makes the ending so unbelievable. So close, yet so far from being perfect.

I look forward to april, until then I will continue to hold the line.

It was good to see him write, "but out of respect to our fans, we need to accept the criticism and feedback with humility."

But later on he writes, "Building on their research, Exec Producer
Casey Hudson and the team are hard at work on a number of game content
initiatives that will help answer the questions, providing more clarity
for those seeking further closure to their journey. ... We’re working hard to maintain the right balance between
the artistic integrity of the original story while addressing the fan
feedback we’ve received."

They're definitely listening to us, and despite Dr. Muzyka's response being vetted and crafted with help from the PR department, the fact that they're actually working on "initiatives" that they think will reconcile all this is a good sign.  The only thing left is whether or not BW makes something that's up to par with the quality that we've come to expect from BW and Mass Effect over the years, ME3's ending not withstanding.

This isn't anything concrete
yet. I'll believe something is being done when there is proof something
is being done.

Do any of you remember the big Mass Effect: Deception debacle?

Remember how they said future versions would be corrected? Remember what they've done so far?

Absolutely
nothing. No retailer has received any word about future versions. They
claimed to be fixing it to stop the dissenting opinion from making
itself be heard. Now that movement is dead and Bioware has no incentive
to correct their faulty product (Deception).

I wouldn't let them do the same with this movement. Learn from recent history.

Hold the line.

[Elios]

BigglesFlysAgain wrote...

Anyone seen this apparently from Patrick Weekes. apparently posted somwhere and then removed soon after though, so no way of confirming it.


"I have nothing to do with the ending beyond a) having argued
successfully a long time ago that we needed a chance to say goodbye to
our squad, having argued successfully that Cortez shouldn't
automatically die in that shuttle crash, and c) having written Tali's
goodbye bit, as well as a couple of the holo-goodbyes for people I wrote
(Mordin, Kasumi, Jack, etc). 
No other writer did, either, except
for our lead. This was entirely the work of our lead and Casey himself,
sitting in a room and going through draft after draft. 
And honestly, it kind of shows. 
Every
other mission in the game had to be held up to the rest of the writing
team, and the writing team then picked it apart and made suggestions and
pointed out the parts that made no sense. This mission? Casey and our
lead deciding that they didn't need to be peer-reviewe.d 
And again, it shows. 
If you'd asked me the themes of Mass Effect 3, I'd break them down as: Galactic Alliances Friends Organics versus Synthetics 
In
my personal opinion, the first two got a perfunctory nod. We did get a
goodbye to our friends, but it was in a scene that was divorced from the
gameplay -- a deliberate "nothing happens here" area with one turret
thrown in for no reason I really understand, except possibly to
obfuscate the "nothing happens here"-ness. The best missions in our game
are the ones in which the gameplay and the narrative reinforce each
other. The end of the Genophage campaign exemplifies that for me --
every line of dialog is showing you both sides of the krogan, be they
horrible brutes or proud warriors; the art shows both their bombed-out
wasteland and the beautiful world they once had and could have again;
the combat shows the terror of the Reapers as well as a blatant reminder
of the rachni, which threatened the galaxy and had to be stopped by the
krogan last time. Every line of code in that mission is on target with
the overall message. 
The endgame doesn't have that. I wanted to see
banshees attacking you, and then have asari gunships zoom in and blow
them away. I wanted to see a wave of rachni ravagers come around a
corner only to be met by a wall of krogan roaring a battle cry. Here's
the horror the Reapers inflicted upon each race, and here's the army
that you, Commander Shepard, made out of every race in the galaxy to
fight them. 
I personally thought that the Illusive Man conversation
was about twice as long as it needed to be -- something that I've been
told in my peer reviews of my missions and made edits on, but again,
this is a conversation no writer but the lead ever saw until it was
already recorded. I did love Anderson's goodbye. 
For me, Anderson's
goodbye is where it ended. The stuff with the Catalyst just... You have
to understand. Casey is really smart and really analytical. And the
problem is that when he's not checked, he will assume that other people
are like him, and will really appreciate an almost completely
unemotional intellectual ending. I didn't hate it, but I didn't love
it. 
And then, just to be a dick... what was SUPPOSED to happen was
that, say you picked "Destroy the Reapers". When you did that, the
system was SUPPOSED to look at your score, and then you'd show a
cutscene of Earth that was either: 
a) Very high score: Earth
obviously damaged, but woo victory  Medium score: Earth takes a bunch
of damage from the Crucible activation. Like dropping a bomb on an
already war-ravaged city. Uh, well, maybe not LIKE that as much as, uh,
THAT. c) Low score: Earth is a cinderblock, all life on it completely
wiped out 
I have NO IDEA why these different cutscenes aren't in
there. As far as I know, they were never cut. Maybe they were cut for
budget reasons at the last minute. I don't know. But holy crap, yeah, I
can see how incredibly disappointing it'd be to hear of all the
different ending possibilities and have it break down to "which color is
stuff glowing?" Or maybe they ARE in, but they're too subtle to really
see obvious differences, and again, that's... yeah. 
Okay, that's a lot to have written for something that's gonna go away in an hour. 
I
still teared up at the ending myself, but really, I was tearing up for
the quick flashbacks to old friends and the death of Anderson. I wasn't
tearing up over making a choice that, as it turned out, didn't have
enough cutscene differentiation on it. 
And to be clear, I don't even
really wish Shepard had gotten a ride-off-into-sunset ending. I was
honestly okay with Shepard sacrificing himself. I just expected it to be
for something with more obvious differentiation, and a stronger tie to
the core themes -- all three of them."

wow where did this come from even if it was removed where was it removed from

[VigilancePress]

I think the problem here is that too many people are dividing this into "Winning" and "Losing."

It's not a contest, it's an opinion. We are expressing our opinions about a product and some of us are demanding redress for what we see as a subpar product. Those of us looking to "Retake" Mass Effect are invested in doing so, but in my own way I like to think of this as a collaboration rather than a competition. I am trying to get BioWare to place more value on delivering the content that I want to see. I want to see the existing product modified to suit my demands as a consumer so that I can continue to enjoy this and other products.

I'm basically asking them to realign their compass so that we're marching in the same direction again, instead of watching them turn left and marching away from me and my interests. My hope (and belief) is that many others share my opinions.

In the end, if we can find a compromise that makes everyone happy and allows BioWare to once again take pride in their product, I think we will *all* "win." I certainly am not in this to see someone "Lose."

I'm disappointed and angry as a customer, but I'm not here to attack people that aren't.

[marshkoala]

Trying to hold the line.

I really took Mr Muzyka statement personally and after taking a break and having lunch I still feel the same. Completely devalued and attacked. I don't understand how he could lump all unhappy customers together.
I've been polite, reasonably calm and always trying to point out the beauty of the ME universe
.
About the only thing that cheers me up is the long post from a writer that was deleted.

[cardboardarmor]

I suppose that with the recent press release, is it fair to say that Dr. Muzyka is assuming direct control? That he will direct this personally?

Is direct intervention necessary? Perhaps he saw that this silence hurts us. Sure he realizes that if he must tear this bad will apart, he will. He has invited us to embrace perfection. This is what we face. This is true power.

[jimihenrix]

Apathy1989 wrote...

Thank you Dr. Ray Muzyka for the fair and honest reply. Its good to finally get a concrete reply about what Biowares intentions are towards the ending.

Ask (almost) anyone here, and we will all say that ME3 was a fantastic game until the end. No one doubts that. But its also what makes the ending so unbelievable. So close, yet so far from being perfect.

I look forward to april, until then I will continue to hold the line.

So ture, so ture.

Holding the line.

[BigglesFlysAgain]

Where was this posted originally?

In the we cant get the ending we want thread, they said it was posted briefly on PA, but removed so no way to confirm it.