278 réponses à ce sujet

[LordRaptor]

Turran wrote...

Hm, yeah this is a lot more interesting than IT.

 Then please keep it alive and spread the word.  People need hope and ways to speculate lol.

Modifié par JustinElenbaas, 15 avril 2012 - 06:06 .

[brain_damage]

BUMP! For great justice!

[Vorodill]

This thread deserves to be bumped. Let's speculate!

[SuperVulcan]

Question: This may have been asked already, but what if Shepard doesn't do Arrival? A marine squad does the mission instead, how does this possibility fit into this theory?

[LadyWench]

SuperVulcan wrote...

Question: This may have been asked already, but what if Shepard doesn't do Arrival? A marine squad does the mission instead, how does this possibility fit into this theory?

Check out OP's post here: http://social.biowar...4403/8#11309591
He addresses this question (from shortly after first paragraph to about midway down), among other things. Hope that helps! :happy:

[LordRaptor]

FemaleMageFan wrote...

How is it possible that all these theories make sense?

Because we believe in something more than what was shown to us...

That our fears be for naught,

and our hopes not be in vain.

[SuperVulcan]

LadyWench wrote...

SuperVulcan wrote...

Question: This may have been asked already, but what if Shepard doesn't do Arrival? A marine squad does the mission instead, how does this possibility fit into this theory?

Check out OP's post here: http://social.biowar...4403/8#11309591
He addresses this question (from shortly after first paragraph to about midway down), among other things. Hope that helps! :happy:

Thank you for the help; this is an interesting theory, no doubt.

[Freckle Face]

Very interesting theory!! I like it better than IT, and personally I find it less of a stretch. I still wouldn't call it likely, but it's very cool. It makes me wish that the first half of ME3 was following Hackett's orders, and the last half/climax comes when you realize he's indoctrinated, and Shepard has to find a way to undo what he's done/find a new way. That could have been SO cool. I liked the Cerberus story arc but It would have been awesome to tie Hackett in (as a source of info for Cerberus). Total mindf*ck moment

[Fingertrip]

Grasping at straws.

[kyleshuey]

I'm Commander Shepard and this is my favorite theory on the Citadel!

[LordRaptor]

Fingertrip wrote...

Grasping at straws.

Fair enough.  Remember Bioware wants us to speculate, so we are speculating.  If you feel there are errors in the logic of this theory by all means please share them.  It makes for great debate and criticism can help strengthen a theory beyond what it originally was.  Please share your thoughts as to why it seems we're grasping at straws instead of coming to a logical conclusion.

[LordRaptor]

Corather wrote...
If you do arrival before you finish ME2,
then it makes perfect sense that Hackett would sit on it. Shepard is
the best bet to deal with the Collectors. So they added a throw away
line to have that make sense. We never see Hackett come aboard Normandy
in arrival. All we see is him in Med Bay with Shepard. An easily
secured area where he could have easily asked for privacy.

Honestly,
you are taking a character with limited screen time (compared even to
TIM) and making a large assumption about him. And they sure as hell
dropped major clues about Kenison being indoced. I was pretty sure she
was the moment she mentioned object Rho. To then find it easily
accessible sealed the deal. There is no similar foreshadowing for
Hackett. Nothing even remotely similar where he could've been indoced
is even discussed. Continuity errors happen because writers are human.
I see nothing in your theory that is strong enough to not be a minor
continuity error.

And probably the biggest part of the theory is
the Crucible. Everyone ignores that elephant in game because it's such a
giant crock up writing wise. By choosing to ignore dark energy, they
made the crucible not fit in story wise. By choosing to ignore dark
energy they had to come up with something beyond a dark energy weapon to
beat the reapers with. Stretched for time they then just attempted to
paper over the cracks this caused by doing a fast nod to the oddness of
the crucible and then have everyone ignore it.

More importantly
why would an indoctrinated Hackett let them ever deliver the completed
crucible to the Sol system? We have thanix cannons, the worst possible
thing for the reapers at this point is a straight up fight. Indoc makes
you view enemies as friends...taking Sword and Shield fleets to Sol is
not friend like at all. He also wouldn't make the speech about it being
all or nothing when you initiate the attack. Those just aren't the
type of speeches we've seen from ANY indoced character.

It makes no sense to leave the data.  Hackett cannot order Shepard back to Earth.  Shepard is not Alliance in ME2.  He has no authority over him.  This does not excuse him relinquishing control of vital intel.  Shepard can continue to hunt the Collectors with or without Hackett's consent.  The leaving of the data does not factor into that argument.  They are separate.  The data is not inclusive in Shepard's mission to stop the Collectors.  Providing that data to the Alliance would not force Shepard to surrender himself/herself over to the Alliance.  Hackett could just as easily; take the report, classify it for an indefinite amount of time, leaving it accessible only to the highest Alliance clearance and then reveal it in Shepard's defense at a later date.  This would provide the Alliance with vital intel regarding a time frame for a Reaper invasion and Hackett could just as easily keep the Alliance off Shepard's back.  In fact keeping the Alliance witch hunt off Shepard would be made invariably easier by having data that can be distributed through the necessary channels to justify Shepard's heinous actions to the right sources.

Each argument you raise is based on excusing, peculiar moments/comments simply as repetitive poor writing and continuity errors by Bioware, in Arrival and all through ME3.  Now I do feel the ending was a joke, but not all of the writing is that poor or atrocious.  Stating bad writing as a defense against a theory may work as a passing excuse to ignore a theory, but it will not hold up in an argument based off points in the story.  There are very intentional moments and comments made by Hackett, about Hackett or in relation to Hackett that raise very valid questions.  These are not isolated, as you would suggest, as MT points out and they are not trivial points.  That is an attempt to disregard them without actually debating them.

MT takes a vital character with far more dialogue credited to him than TIM ever had through ME1, ME2 and ME3 and pointing out curiosities that raise questions.  We are made to believe by a video on Cronos station that TIM's indoctrination is due to him having Reaper tech surgically implanted into himself.  There are numerous debates that would argue TIM's eyes are a sign of his indoctrination even before ME2, which we are never given any information on, yet in the end he of ME3 he is clearly indoctrinated. 

Kenson states after being rescued "Shepard...it's you.  Hackett must have gotten my message."  At this point Kenson is undoubtedly indoctrinated.  She would have had to been indoctrinated before being arrested by the Batarians, therefore an indoctrinated Kenson has had unknown, unspecified interaction with Hackett before the events of Arrival.  There is clear allusion to a set up for Shepard when Kenson calls her project base.  The man on the receiving end states "Oh...Shepard's with you...We will have everything prepared for you Dr." in a very cryptic tone.  This is neither unintentional or a minor continuity error.  I suppose you can argue Hackett is an unwitting fool in this plot, but then that would require you to assume Kenson requested Hackett send Shepard specifically.  I do not believe the good Admiral would find such a request less than suspicious.

Again you pass the Crucible off as terrible writing that needs to be acknowledged then glazed over.  I prescribe to the belief that the Crucible was intentionally absurd and deliberate in its delivery by Bioware.  This can be due to me attributing more faith to the writers at Bioware or for some other reason you feel their writing is just that poor.  Yet again claiming, "it's just poor writing/bad continuity/writing errors." does not carry weight because Bioware has proven the are capable of delivering high quality writing, themes, stories and in the past...twists.  Remember nothing in the ending of ME3 is stated, everything is suggested.  It has been proven through Mac Walter's Dev notes in Final Hours that this ambiguity was intentional to leave the ending open for interpretation and speculation.  Though this may be poor storytelling, this is not a writing error/continuity oversight.  For the Crucible to be as bad as it is, in such a quality game has to be intentional.  The game was peer reviewed by the writing team.  They all signed off in QA on the Crucible.  That is not oversight.  I will not argue the quality of Bioware's writing again.  If you can just pass off a theory by bad writing then you might as well ignore it.

Though I bullet point your final question in MT's original post I'll take the time to go over it here.  MT proposes that the Crucible is a Reaper device/weapon, "We will find another way," if you will.  It is delivered to the Sol System because the Reapers need it.  MT proposes that Hackett is acting as a brilliant Reaper puppet, only through subtle suggestion, allowing him to function independently for months...even years.  The Reapers need to sell the Crucible to their enemies, this absolutely ridiculous, absurd, moronic, asinine, preposterous, ludicrous, unbelievable device that we have no reason to believe will even work or do what we hope it will.  They need to sell a device that the greatest minds in the galaxy cannot come to a consensus on "What will this do?".  They need others to create it and activate it.  This is intentional writing.

All collateral damage, and repercussions are acceptable to achieve their goal; activate the Crucible, return control of the Citadel to the Reapers and shut down the Mass Relays, effectively stranding the greatest fleet in galactic history in one strategically and tactically useless system.  This will allow them to continue the cycle relatively unimpeded by the remaining forces throughout the other systems.  Pay attention to the galaxy map just before Priority: Earth.  The Reaper forces are distributed throughout most, if not every system.  The Reaper Armada on Earth is just one Armada.  There is no actual quantifiable data that states Earth is being hit harder than Palaven, or Thessia or any innumerable worlds, or that it's value is any greater than any of those proposed worlds.

Yet by pulling a Kansas City Shuffle on Shepard, arguably the most influential force in the last 50k years, the Reapers have effectively focused the vast majority of their opposition in one statistically meaningless system against one single Reaper Armada, all the while having their enemies build and deliver and activate the Reapers' own device.  Any of the three options Shepard is presented with are acceptable to the Catalyst, regardless of the fallout because it needs Shepard to return control of the Citadel and Mass Relays to the Reapers.

I could go on further, but dinner and the woman are calling.

Modifié par JustinElenbaas, 19 avril 2012 - 12:32 .

[LordRaptor]

Bump it up.

[nicocap24]

Hackett's awesomeness makes him immune to indoctrination. And bullets. And everything.

[LordRaptor]

Heh is that what they want you to think?!

[LordRaptor]

alleyd wrote...

Want to see this theory up there competing with IT

I appreciate the sentiment and I agree, the only thing is people need to contribute their thoughts and ideas to make it relevant, otherwise it's just one crazy kook...(me)...spouting ideas lol.

I'd love to hear about any thoughts, both in defense and criticism of MT that anyone has.

[miraclemight]

Not sure if this has been discussed, but the thing that caught my attention a lot in the opening cinematic was Anderson's "Why haven't we heard from Admiral Hackett?"

Why indeed?

[The Milky Waver]

I find this theory extremly interesting, but it kind of pisses me off because, if Bioware decides to go with this theory, all of my hard work gathering thousands of EMS throughout the game was all for nothing, and I just doomed everyone. 

Modifié par The Milky Waver, 22 avril 2012 - 05:19 .

[Baihu1983]

Hackett is Zaeeds dad, True.

[Nyila]

Interesting topic! I never saw Admiral Hackett this way..

I have wondered before how Admiral Hackett got his hands on Shepard's dog tags in ME2, in the Shadow Broker DLC, Liara says he gave them to her, but shouldn't they have been on Shepard's body?

[davishepard]

Hackett is not indocrinated.

The name Cerberus relates to the Charon relay, and the need to have a "Cerberus" to guard humanity from the aliens beyond it, not to three persons ruling the organization.

Shepard is not being manipulated. He is doing what he think is right (ME2) and following his duty (ME3).

[Humakt83]

Have you considered that this theory and IT are not necessarily opposite or exclude each other?

Modifié par Humakt83, 22 avril 2012 - 06:25 .

[ProtoProthean]

This is very interesting and plausible. Especially regarding the Crucible. It's just so nonsensical to believe the Prothean VI who says its blueprints have been passed along millions of years and repeatedly improved upon, while the Reapers never did anything to prevent this from happening. It's clear to me that the Crucible must be a Reaper "Plan-B" device.

One thing though... I apologise if it's been already covered, since I only read the first post, but I've got a problem with the three-headed Cerberus theory mentioned in the last part of the original post.

If that was likely to be the case, why does the Shadow Broker (pre-Liara) did not have any information about it? Is the organisation so secret that it has managed to hide this huge fact for years?