356 réponses à ce sujet

[Kunari801]

I'll still take a Red ending to go with a Diet Coke.

[Destructorlio]

Bill Casey wrote...

Control working out runs concurrent to base themes. Control of this type is doomed to folly in the Mass Effect universe, from Miranda and Tali's respective fathers, to the Illusive Man, Project Overlord, to the Salarians and their uplift program, to the Prothean separatists to the Prothean Empire itself. Any attempt to Control the Reapers has led to indoctrination. Shepard repeatedly chastises The Illusive Man's methods regardless of options picked, and your crew repeatedly calls him crazy for thinking he can control the reapers. The theme is prevalent. This level of overreach shouldn't be rewarded just because Shepard does it...

This is compounded by the fact that the Reapers themselves are a force of corruption. Legion describes their minds are incomprehensibly powerful. It isn't like the Nautilus whose power itself corrupts Nemo; The Reapers themselves warp minds. Shepard is hearing voices, seeing shadows on the screen, and he just shot Anderson against his will a few minutes ago. Now he's going to control all of the Reapers. That's insultingly stupid from a conceptual standpoint. The fact that Anderson was yelling warnings and the Catalyst says "you will lose everything you have" turns this option from incredible dumb to "Schmuck Bait". Control working out turns the whole thing into a "Violation of Common Sense"...

Then we have Synthesis and I don't even know where to start. We've been fighting forced transhumanism for three games now. It spits in the face of the themes of working out our differences, self determination against fatalism, the socio-technological balance, and diversity. It alters all life in the galaxy under the assertion that there is something fundamentally wrong with us. It's beyond cynical...

This is again a recurring theme with unfortunate implications. The Reapers see themselves as the final evolution of life. Saren has been mentioned enough, but the Illusive Man is forcing transhumanism to bring humanity to the "apex of evolution", in his own words. The Collectors and the Zha'Til are examples of Reapers fusing man and machine, and then altering their genetic material at the deepest level to form something new. Pretty much your entire squad in Mass Effect 2 tells you rewriting the heretics is the same as killing them...

The way the Geth and EDI are presented has severe racist undertones for the assertion that synthetic life will inevitably destroy organic life. The Geth tackle hot button issues of slavery and basic civil rights, and the Geth Consensus had scenes straight out of Germany in the 1940s, where martial law is declared and Quarians are shot for "harboring synthetics"...

It's established through talking to EDI that peace between the Reapers should not work. World Leaders are being called into Reaper super structures to negotiate peace, but it's a ruse to indoctrinate them and pacify the populace. The leaders will soon enact laws that prevent attacking the Reapers, which will again be done in the name of peace. EDI makes certain to reiterate this. When the master control reapers says "we need eachother to make this happen", it red flags the entire situation and makes it working out another violation of common sense...

In fact, Destroy is the only option whose viability fits the narrative presented. If you talk to James Vega in your quarters, he will tell about how he destroyed a collector ship, but sacrificed most of the abducted colonists and his team in the process. There is no option to say anything other than James made the right call. Paragon or Renegade, Shepard says this was the right thing to do...

Lieutenant Victus doesn't want to sacrifice his men for the mission, and all Shepards talk him into it...
Hackett sacrifices the entire second fleet, and Garrus has to make some extremely unpleasant tactical decisions...

It's a dynamic that might work in Deus Ex, but it fundamentally does not here...

This is great.

[Zulmoka531]

Destructorlio wrote...

Bill Casey wrote...

Control working out runs concurrent to base themes. Control of this type is doomed to folly in the Mass Effect universe, from Miranda and Tali's respective fathers, to the Illusive Man, Project Overlord, to the Salarians and their uplift program, to the Prothean separatists to the Prothean Empire itself. Any attempt to Control the Reapers has led to indoctrination. Shepard repeatedly chastises The Illusive Man's methods regardless of options picked, and your crew repeatedly calls him crazy for thinking he can control the reapers. The theme is prevalent. This level of overreach shouldn't be rewarded just because Shepard does it...

This is compounded by the fact that the Reapers themselves are a force of corruption. Legion describes their minds are incomprehensibly powerful. It isn't like the Nautilus whose power itself corrupts Nemo; The Reapers themselves warp minds. Shepard is hearing voices, seeing shadows on the screen, and he just shot Anderson against his will a few minutes ago. Now he's going to control all of the Reapers. That's insultingly stupid from a conceptual standpoint. The fact that Anderson was yelling warnings and the Catalyst says "you will lose everything you have" turns this option from incredible dumb to "Schmuck Bait". Control working out turns the whole thing into a "Violation of Common Sense"...

Then we have Synthesis and I don't even know where to start. We've been fighting forced transhumanism for three games now. It spits in the face of the themes of working out our differences, self determination against fatalism, the socio-technological balance, and diversity. It alters all life in the galaxy under the assertion that there is something fundamentally wrong with us. It's beyond cynical...

This is again a recurring theme with unfortunate implications. The Reapers see themselves as the final evolution of life. Saren has been mentioned enough, but the Illusive Man is forcing transhumanism to bring humanity to the "apex of evolution", in his own words. The Collectors and the Zha'Til are examples of Reapers fusing man and machine, and then altering their genetic material at the deepest level to form something new. Pretty much your entire squad in Mass Effect 2 tells you rewriting the heretics is the same as killing them...

The way the Geth and EDI are presented has severe racist undertones for the assertion that synthetic life will inevitably destroy organic life. The Geth tackle hot button issues of slavery and basic civil rights, and the Geth Consensus had scenes straight out of Germany in the 1940s, where martial law is declared and Quarians are shot for "harboring synthetics"...

It's established through talking to EDI that peace between the Reapers should not work. World Leaders are being called into Reaper super structures to negotiate peace, but it's a ruse to indoctrinate them and pacify the populace. The leaders will soon enact laws that prevent attacking the Reapers, which will again be done in the name of peace. EDI makes certain to reiterate this. When the master control reapers says "we need eachother to make this happen", it red flags the entire situation and makes it working out another violation of common sense...

In fact, Destroy is the only option whose viability fits the narrative presented. If you talk to James Vega in your quarters, he will tell about how he destroyed a collector ship, but sacrificed most of the abducted colonists and his team in the process. There is no option to say anything other than James made the right call. Paragon or Renegade, Shepard says this was the right thing to do...

Lieutenant Victus doesn't want to sacrifice his men for the mission, and all Shepards talk him into it...
Hackett sacrifices the entire second fleet, and Garrus has to make some extremely unpleasant tactical decisions...

It's a dynamic that might work in Deus Ex, but it fundamentally does not here...

This is great.

I agree. Bill Casey, that was without a doubt one of the greatest things I've read on these forums since pre-ME3 release. Thank you for literally ripping a giant hole into this pile that was called an "ending". The EC has so much riding on it's shoulders, and even then I don't think it will be enough to salavage this.

[Makrys]

Great! Now I can once again use the words of Bill Casey to fight the dark forces of stupid people!

[lillitheris]

Ieldra2 wrote...

Your high-end Destroy ending has no significant downside. Your setup is unbalanced.

Yes, it does. The inevitable threat of synthetics. I don’t want to get into a long argument about it, but this threat is how you justify Synthesis, so it’s obviously a huge downside. (Also, possibly destruction of relays/geth/etc. which I personally don‘t consider necessary.)

I’ll reiterate once again: Destroy isn’t the best choice, but when it’s not artificially ‘balanced’ against, it’s the one most of us would pick even though we’d like to think ourselves better persons than that. And, again, that’s exactly my point. Meaningful sacrifice.

Modifié par lillitheris, 14 juin 2012 - 08:18 .

[lillitheris]

I have to say that, upon reflection, I loved Bill Casey’s rant (in the best sense) — see the previous page for the entirety.

Still, I don’t think the “theme” argument is a trump card. It’s absolutely a valid counterargument, especially if you try to make the ending about philosophy rather than an ending to a story.

What it boils down to — and I see some merit in this approach if made explicit — is that it is what it is. When a psycho gives you three options, it doesn’t matter how crazy the reasons for the existence of those three are; they just are, and that’s that. You do the best that you can, you apply your themes to it the best you can.

[lillitheris]

The EC is coming out. On the off-chance that they didn’t just implement everything verbatim, it’s interesting to see if there’s anything that I/we might have guessed right (or less humbly if they actually listened to this input…)