210 réponses à ce sujet

[KingKhan03]

Our_Last_Scene wrote...

wheelierdan wrote...

so you didnt feel the need to say anything substantial but did feel the need to make a thread?

Just like the bazillion "I hate the ending" threads.

Atleast they tell you why they hate the endings.

[hector7rau]

Our_Last_Scene wrote...

wheelierdan wrote...

so you didnt feel the need to say anything substantial but did feel the need to make a thread?

Just like the bazillion "I hate the ending" threads.

More like the "I LOVE DA ENDINGZ THEY SO AWESOME Y U NO GET DEM?" threads.

[KingKhan03]

hector7rau wrote...

Our_Last_Scene wrote...

wheelierdan wrote...

so you didnt feel the need to say anything substantial but did feel the need to make a thread?

Just like the bazillion "I hate the ending" threads.

More like the "I LOVE DA ENDINGZ THEY SO AWESOME Y U NO GET DEM?" threads.

^ lol so much win.

[Clayless]

KingKhan03 wrote...

Our_Last_Scene wrote...

wheelierdan wrote...

so you didnt feel the need to say anything substantial but did feel the need to make a thread?

Just like the bazillion "I hate the ending" threads.

Atleast they tell you why they hate the endings.

The best part is they try to derail threads that isn't about hating the ending, and call people who like the endings trolls. Even better, try finding a thread in this section that's at least 6 pages long, that isn't about the ending, where no one from the Retake movement tries to derail it and lead it back to the ending.

[KingKhan03]

Our_Last_Scene wrote...

KingKhan03 wrote...

Our_Last_Scene wrote...

wheelierdan wrote...

so you didnt feel the need to say anything substantial but did feel the need to make a thread?

Just like the bazillion "I hate the ending" threads.

Atleast they tell you why they hate the endings.

The best part is they try to derail threads that isn't about hating the ending, and call people who like the endings trolls. Even better, try finding a thread in this section that's at least 6 pages long, that isn't about the ending, where no one from the Retake movement tries to derail it and lead it back to the ending.

I never call someone with a valid argument a troll and alot of people that are in the retake movement present facts and debate. There are occasional mishaps like there are in any thread.

[Ajna]

I am KROGAN wrote...

If you have an explanation on the ending, honestly, I'd love to hear it. If you don't wanna post it because of trolls, PM it to me or something? I really want to at least understand the ending. I don't care about liking the ending, I just want to understand.

This.  Since I was a big fan of your previous thread regarding the reapers, I'd love to hear your thoughts

[zarnk567]

But.... it was not intellectual.... it tried to be and failed....

[Clayless]

A lot of these facts use misguided circular logic that isn't actually present in the ending. If the Retake movement would actually stop and try talking about the ending, rather than going "LOL SPACE MAGIC" and cluttering up threads they would see this.

Even worse is most threads go:

"I liked the ending"

"I didn't, here's why"

"Oh, I still like the ending though"

"YOU STILL LIKE THE ENDING YOU'RE A TROLL OR A BIOWARE EMPLOYEE OR YOU'RE ATTACKING ME HOLDTHELINE!"

[Xandurpein]

It's not that I don't tthink I understand the ending. I have a fair idea of what they tried to say. I just think it was said very poorly, and it didn't fit the rest of the story. It was bad narrative that killed the ending more than anything else.

[Imp of the Perverse]

wheelierdan wrote...

so you didnt feel the need to say anything substantial but did feel the need to make a thread?

So I have to admit I didn't read past the first page or two of this thread, but did scan through the rest to see if the OP ever posted again, which he didn't. Kind of reminds me of the endings - very little concrete information, but enough to seem profound, and somehow managing to spawn a great deal of dialog.

[Hendrik.III]

zarnk567 wrote...

But.... it was not intellectual.... it tried to be and failed....

Plus, the game didn't need an intellectual ending. I'm all for intellectual disputes and discussions, but I thought it just didn't fit the story at all. 

[nomoredruggs]

BadlyBrowned wrote...

Remember, Bioware wanted "SPECULATION FROM EVERYONE!"

So, we're all right!! Or maybe we're all wrong....

[FOX216BC]

 Someone forget to watch this vid.

[SimKoning]

 
Okay I started this thread to make a point, and it was made. I didn't even really share anything about what I thought about the ending, and this thing is already 7 pages long. Yet when I tried to post threads about the ending that were't about indoctrination theory, or how much the ending sucked, it got buried immediately. I honestly wasn't even planning on coming back here, but when I checked my e-mail I noticed several private messages asking for more information. I haven't checked, but I'm willing to bet there were at least a few posts calling me a troll. 

I personally think there is way too much groupthink at work here. On one hand you have people that go out of their way to pick apart every single perceived flaw of the ending, and practically cover their eyes when they see any argument to the contrary, while on the other, you have indoctrination theorists that would make a 911 thruther blush. Now I'm not trying to be an arrogant ***hole, it's just a general observation, and I'm certainly no better than any of you. Group mentality just tends to rub me the wrong way when I realize its happening, and so does intellectual dishonesty. I asked myself, am I really giving Bioware a chance, or am I getting so caught up in this "movement" that I'm deliberately ignoring what Bioware was trying to say with the ending without force spoon feeding me? I realized the answer is no, which meant I had to swallow my ego and give this thing a chance.   

I suppose you could call it bad writing since they left so much up to the imagination, but then I'm reminded of this old movie called 2001: A Space Odyssey, one of the best science fiction movies ever made. If you think Mass Effect 3's ending was extremely vague and confusing, then I suggest you watch that movie. I love the ending of that movie by the way...------------------------------
Since I was asked, I'll share some of my speculations regarding the ending.
The biggest problem most fans have with the ending is the so called Starchild, or Catalyst. Now the fist thing you need to remember is that this thing IS the Citadel, meaning that when you are talking to the Catalyst, you are actually talking to the mind of what is basically the 27 mile long mother of all Reapers. This is made clear when it says that not only is the Citadel its home, it's actually part of it; it also used the word "we" when referring to the Reapers and itself. It's analogous to how EDI is basically the mind of the Normandy. So, the Catalyst is NOT just some ghost kid. 


So why am I calling it the "mother" of the Reapers? Well, it's made quite clear in the end that it's where baby Reapers are made. This is the primary reason why it came to Earth, parked in orbit, and set up a conduit beam on the surface which was being used to harvest bodies. Now remember, this is a race of living machines, so it really shouldn't have been a surprise when it turned out that the Citadel had a mind of its own. 


So it's basically a giant member of the Reaper's species, if you can call them a species, it makes baby Reapers, and it controls them. This basically means that the Reapers are eusocial, and the Catalyst slash Citadel is basically the Reaper Queen bee, and the Reapers are the workers bees. Of course the Reapers harvest civilizations, not pollen. 


But what about the entire plot of Mass Effect 1? If you remember, the whole reason Saren was trying to find the conduit was because the Protheans sabotaged the signal that told the Keepers to activate the relay to intergalactic space. Why didn't the Catalyst activate the relay itself since the relay is basically part of it? The answer might simply be that what the Keepers were really suppose to do is wake up the Catalyst. It's possible that the Catalyst's AI core goes into a dormant state and is separated from the rest of the Citadels systems, perhaps as a way of making absolutely sure that it will not be detected or tampered with in-between cycles. If this is the case, then it would also explain why the Prothean scientists were completely unaware of the Catalyst's existence. 


It's quite possible that at the end of Mass Effect 1 what Sovereign was actually trying to do was manually activate, or "wake up" the Catalyst. Once the Catalyst, which is Citadel, woke up, it would have opened up the relay to dark space, while at the same time trapping its inhabitants inside its arms like a giant Venus flytrap. The council would have been indoctrinated, and everyone else would have been converted into organic sludge for baby Reapers. From there, the Citadel would probably go planet to planet, harvesting entire populations of worlds, just like it was doing above Earth. All things considered, I find the fact that this monstrous thing appeared to Shepard as a child more than a little disturbing. It also means that this thing was inside Shepard's head to some exant.


Now this has some interesting implications about Mass Effect 2 and Harbinger. I'm guessing that Harbinger took on the leadership role of the Reapers when the Catalyst failed to wake up. It seems as though the Collector base was co-opted to serve as a sort of surrogate Citadel while the Reapers were walking it to the Milky Way. So does this mean that if the Catalyst were destroyed that Harbinger would have replaced it? This opens up some interesting possibilities if the writers choose to make the "control" ending canon, because as far as I know, Harbinger was still alive at the end. Will Harbinger obey this new Catalyst/Shepard combined entity? Or will we get to see Harbinger rebel and return as a villain someday?   


All of this begs the question: if the Catalyst is basically the mother of all Reapers, then who built the Citadel? Well, being a giant machine it must have been built by an organic species. It's very possible that the Citadel was originally an enormous, and extremely fast starship that was built millions of years ago. It's long been suspected by some fans that the Keepers were the first species to be enslaved by the Reapers. But what if the Keepers were actually the creators of the Citadel? It's quite possible that they created the Catalyst to function as the Citadel's AI, but at some point it rebelled against them. It would certainly make sense, since they have a very intimate understanding of the Citadel's systems... and of course the controls to the Crucible had 4 hand grips. 




Perhaps the Keepers originally had a queen like the Rachni, and the kind we see on the Citadel were once the workers. This would help explain the Reapers insectoid design and eusociality. It's also worth noting that the Collectors were also insectoid despite the fact that the Protheans are not. The Collectors might be hybrids of Protheans and whatever species built the Citadel. If the Keepers were the creators of the Citadel, it's possible that they were the ones that originally came up with the concept for the Crucible, which was later refined and expanded on over the millions of years and countless cycles that followed. 



If this was the Catalyst's origin, then it when it said, "the created will always rebel against their creators", it was practically speaking in the 3rd person. Perphaps this is the real flaw in the Catalyst's thinking: it is applying its anecdote to the rest of the galaxy. Maybe it's out of a sense of paranoia that some other organic species will make a "Catalyst II", and it will be ever worse? What if it's like a thief who trusts nobody because he doesn't want anyone stealing from him? The point is, if I put the Catalyst into its proper context, then it suddenly seems like a much deeper character to me. 



Well, Mac Walters wanted SPECULATION FOR EVERYONE, and so this was some of my speculation. Is the ending flawed? Yes, but I think it really does just need to be filled out a little more so people can figure out what's going on a little more easily. I mean, blowing up the relays without reminding everyone that FTL travel is still possible was probably a bad idea... and they might want to explain how exactly your crew got back to the Normandy. These are things that shouldn't be that hard to fix. 

Modifié par SimKoning, 29 mars 2012 - 02:03 .

[SimKoning]

FOX216BC wrote...

 Someone forget to watch this vid.

Actually, I did watch it... and I'm not that big of a fan of Star Trek. I liked 2001 a lot more. 

Modifié par SimKoning, 29 mars 2012 - 01:56 .

[Militarized]

*edit* and of course you write it out after I write all that. 

You seemed to have headcanoned A LOT of stuff in place, you just did Biowares job for them which is essentially why the ending fails so astronomically. Some of the evidence for your ideas goes against what we've been told as well. 

Modifié par Militarized, 29 mars 2012 - 02:00 .

[SimKoning]

Militarized wrote...

*edit* and of course you write it out after I write all that. 

You seemed to have headcanoned A LOT of stuff in place, you just did Biowares job for them which is essentially why the ending fails so astronomically. Some of the evidence for your ideas goes against what we've been told as well. 

See my point regarding 2001. I would probably have to type *more* to explain the ending of that movie. I would have to explain the firstborn, their evolution, the purpose of the monoliths, where their creators went, what David Bowman was seeing at the end... and of course the meaning of the "Starchild" shown at the end of the movie...

[Flextt]

Sad to see someone go.

I for one was at first highly emotional and after rationalizing, my resumee made me reject the ending even more. Good luck.

[wheelierdan]

So why am I calling it the "mother" of the Reapers? Well, it's made quite clear in the end that it's where baby Reapers are made. This is the primary reason why it came to Earth, parked in orbit, and set up a conduit beam on the surface which was being used to harvest bodies. Now remember, this is a race of living machines, so it really shouldn't have been a surprise when it turned out that the Citadel had a mind of its own.

----------------

you said it was made quite clear new baby reapers are made here, please share this quite clarity with the class. People are constantly saying something is clear that they think is a good idea, that doesnt make it clear in anyway other than you made it up because it sounded good in your personal head cannon.

second doesn't that contradict the entire 2nd game? They were abducting humans to turn them into goo to build a reaper inside of a collector base, which is not the citadel.

[jb1983]

SimKoning wrote...

 No, this is not an indoctrination theory thread. 

After a couple weeks of working things out in my head, I have to be intellectually honest and admit that there was a lot about the ending that did go over my head at first. It's not my fault of course, the information provided during the ending was so sparse that it did effectively become a puzzle; speculation for everyone indeed. Now that I feel that I have figured it out, I have an odd sense of accomplishment and a strange love/hate relationship with the ending. Hopefully the expansion of the ending with confirm my conclusions, but it will sort of rob the fun of figuring all of this out. 

You may notice that I haven't actually posted what I have figured out. That's because the explanation will likely result in tl;dr responses. 

I'm handing over my rifle and leaving the line. It's been fun, but Bioware is more clever than I thought. I would love to share my conclusions with other fans, but if I do it here, I will likely get met with strong resistance because it doesn't jive with indoctrination "theory", or the belief that the endings are objectively bad. Maybe I'll do a video.. I'll have to think about it. 

I figured it out the first time I played it. I get it - I even "get" why the Normandy is running away and why your squadmates are on the Normandy at the end. 

Thing is, I still think it's poor writing, poorly explained, and still has holes in it (as was intended). 

But if you're comfortable with that, that's cool.

[jb1983]

I just read your explanation.

What is sad is that you don't even get it...

The Catalyst isn't a part of the Citadel. The Citadel is a part of the Catalyst. This means the Catalyst exists beyond the Citadel, yet the Citadel is a part of it. Thus, the Catalyst wouldn't need to be activated because it's more than the Citadel. It isn't THE Citadel.

Likewise, your explanations explain what isn't there. In short, you haven't "figured it out," you've just filled in the blanks. A "Catalyst of the Gaps" if you will...

Modifié par jb1983, 29 mars 2012 - 06:55 .

[LinksOcarina]

wheelierdan wrote...

So why am I calling it the "mother" of the Reapers? Well, it's made quite clear in the end that it's where baby Reapers are made. This is the primary reason why it came to Earth, parked in orbit, and set up a conduit beam on the surface which was being used to harvest bodies. Now remember, this is a race of living machines, so it really shouldn't have been a surprise when it turned out that the Citadel had a mind of its own.

----------------

you said it was made quite clear new baby reapers are made here, please share this quite clarity with the class. People are constantly saying something is clear that they think is a good idea, that doesnt make it clear in anyway other than you made it up because it sounded good in your personal head cannon.

second doesn't that contradict the entire 2nd game? They were abducting humans to turn them into goo to build a reaper inside of a collector base, which is not the citadel.

Now this is the problem where we get two different stories on things.

The first one is that the human reaper is a remnant from the original ending involving Dark Energy, and Shepard making the choice of sacrificing Earth, and subseqeuently humanity to become a reaper, or have everyone take their chances against dying stars. The human reaper was the first look at that process. Chances are, this is most likely.

The second process, and the one I like more honestly, is the fact that all of the reapers take on an appearance to something else. Each of them is part synthetic and organic already, but its twisted into something more nefarious that, lets face it, doesn't have to be explained in this type of story. The human reaper was just the first of many human reaper machines they would eventually make. The caveat I guess is they had to do it in secret because their original plans failed. 

So does it fit, not exactly. But changing your ending does that kind of thing.

[CRISIS1717]

You're wrong OP the endings are bad, cya on the forum again after the awful closure DLC releases!

[Hydralysk]

SimKoning wrote...
You may notice that I haven't actually posted what I have figured out. That's because the explanation will likely result in tl;dr responses. 
 

Wait so you're saying the ending totally makes sense but you won't tell us why? Please tell me I'm not the only person here calling BS.

EDIT: Ok just finished reading the post above, basically you just explained one possible way the starchild could have come into existance and it's reason behind the reapers.

This still doesn't explain any of the other plotholes. Why does Shepard suddenly accept this logic EVEN IF the starchild does? Why was the Normandy running away from the fight? How does blowing up a pipe kill all synthetics? Why does the starchild even bother giving you a choice since you obviously can't access the "win" buttons unless he brings you to them. ect

Modifié par Hydralysk, 29 mars 2012 - 07:09 .

[jb1983]

Here is the simplest explanation for the ending:

Someone on that writing staff is a huge Kubrick fan and wants to be like Kubrick. When he was asked why he did the ending to 2001 the way he did, his exact words were "Speculation."

And that's what we have here. The problem with this is that:

1) This wasn't a movie
2) The writers for Bioware, talented as they are, aren't Kurbick (no one is)
3) Kubrick was attempting to deconstruct plot development; it was a philosophical venture. That works great for books and movies, but not for video games where people are participating rather than watching

Again, I "get" the ending, but still think it's poorly done. I'm all for bringing philosophy into video games. I'd love to see a sci-fi game where you're basically fighting aliens who rely on egoism and have become Nietzsche's "overmen." But when it's not done properly, you get...well...you get the ME3 endings.