5087 réponses à ce sujet

[edisnooM]

@Fapmaster5000

Good post.

I'm really not sure why they didn't take that route, they had done similar things in the previous two games, save the council or not, keep the base or not. They let people make their choices with each option having pros and cons and it merely came down to what the player thought was the right choice to make. Also it helped that we understood what would happen in either choice, and the game didn't fade to black after we had made it.

And the tiered ending for each choice is a good idea as well, they did do something like that with the Earth being glassed or untouched, but making it more in depth for each choice would have been good.

Also I've never played Dragon Age, but I thought I read something about a DLC that effectively made one of the choices at the end canon regardless of what the player chose. I could be wrong though.


Also going back to Fable 2 I just remembered that in the Knothole Island DLC you could get your dog back if you didn't save him. So that sort of lessened the impact of the choices a bit after it came out, it then became do you want to be a hero or a millionaire. And since gold wasn't very hard to come by the only reason I can think to pick the gold is if your character is evil or you want the achievement.


Edit: Again? Ok this time hum the 2001 A Space Odyssey theme.

Modifié par edisnooM, 05 juin 2012 - 12:31 .

[KitaSaturnyne]

edisnooM wrote...

Also going back to Fable 2 I just remembered that in the Knothole Island DLC you could get your dog back if you didn't save him. So that sort of lessened the impact of the choices a bit after it came out, it then became do you want to be a hero or a millionaire. And since gold wasn't very hard to come by the only reason I can think to pick the gold is if your character is evil or you want the achievement.

Edit: Again? Ok this time hum the 2001 A Space Odyssey theme.

Buuuhhhh.... BUUUuuhhhh... BUUUUUHHhhh.... BUH BUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

I wanted to comment on a side note that bring Aeris back in FFVII would have cheapened her death. And it's possible that the above-mentioned DLC lessens the impact of the dog's death. But why is the death of the Lone Wanderer in Fallout 3 not cheapened by the Broken Steel add-on?

[Fapmaster5000]

edisnooM wrote...

@Fapmaster5000

Good post.

I'm really not sure why they didn't take that route, they had done similar things in the previous two games, save the council or not, keep the base or not. They let people make their choices with each option having pros and cons and it merely came down to what the player thought was the right choice to make. Also it helped that we understood what would happen in either choice, and the game didn't fade to black after we had made it.

And the tiered ending for each choice is a good idea as well, they did do something like that with the Earth being glassed or untouched, but making it more in depth for each choice would have been good.

Also I've never played Dragon Age, but I thought I read something about a DLC that effectively made one of the choices at the end canon regardless of what the player chose. I could be wrong though.

That would be "Witch Hunt", which makes the Morrigan ending canon for sequels.  Well, not that you chose to bang her before the battle, but that she somehow managed to spawn the demon/god-baby.  I'm not exactly pleased with that, but it doesn't make the other endings incorrect to choose, simply not the universe they chose to continue.  I'd honestly rather have that than four endings that had to be all true to continue (thus making them too similar) if they felt the need to keep making sequels.

[KitaSaturnyne]

@Fapmaster5000

My little story aside, I do agree with your post, ESPECIALLY on the incredibly divisive nature of the endings. Instead of Mass Effect bringing people together as a community, this (lack of an) ending has created great divides between people. I'm sure there's more than one story on these forums of friends becoming enemies over this.

As Gray Nayr's post illustrates, we can't even agree on the basic concepts of these choices because they're so vague, we have to fill in the blanks ourselves, which is just ammunition to make these divides even bigger between us.

[edisnooM]

@KitaSaturnyne

Awesome story idea on the previous page.

I think the death has to make sense. With Aeris her death led to the her being able to do that fancy bit of magic at the end. Which sort of implies that she knew what would happen and planned on her death. Side note why didn't Cloud use a Phoenix Down: http://www.vgcats.co...s/?strip_id=176.

With the Lone Wanderer I had a giant radiation immune super mutant standing right next to me, who had a few hours earlier done something very similar to get me a GECK. Damn you Fawkes, Why?!

Also I think you may have had to sacrifice someone to get your dog back in the DLC so there's that, but to do the quests in Knothole Island you kind of need your dog. I guess you don't get your sister back if you don't choose your dog, but since you never see her I don't know what impact that would have for people on the choice.

[KitaSaturnyne]

@Mani Mani

Point. I guess Fawkes's words at the time made sense to me. Project Purity was the legacy of your parents, their dream. Who better to take up the mantle and see it through to completion?

I wonder if something like that could have been done successfully as the ending to ME3.

@Fapmaster5000

Regarding the divisive nature of the endings, that is some HEAVY AS HELL IRONY right there.

Modifié par KitaSaturnyne, 05 juin 2012 - 12:53 .

[frypan]

@Kita

Nice story - wish I could use work hours the same way sometimes. I'm not much of a gangster fan though, and can never really empathise with the characters. The closest I ever got was watching OZ, where they were all so rotten that it didnt matter who copped it.

That's why I'd utilise the Godzilla clause at the end. Godzilla turns up, uses radiation breath or stomps everyone crooked, and then returns to his lair under the sea.

At the end of ME3, I would have preferred it if Godzilla, Gamera, Rodan, Mothra and all the rest of those adorable rubber creatures turned up to end Reapers and Starchild alike. A thematically rubbish, jump-the-shark meta-ending about space monsters that would have still left me happier than the one given.

EDIT @Fapmaster.

Nice analysis of some issues when comparing the endings of the two games. Just quickly - I always choose the "shag your way to victory" option in DAO, as it is the least miserable. I headcanon a discussion with Leliana to explain-  though it does not go well.

Modifié par frypan, 05 juin 2012 - 12:57 .

[edisnooM]

@KitaSaturnyne

Yeah, I accepted what Fawkes said as well and I could see what he was saying, but I couldn't help feeling that he was sending me to my death.

"OK Fawkes, but if I turn into a feral ghoul I'm coming after you first." :-)

@frypan

Or Kalros, Mass Effect's own resident super monster.


Edit:

@Fapmaster5000

Yeah I can see what you're saying about all the different endings. If they try and do ME4 as a sequel it could be a right mess. They might have to do something like after TES: Daggerfall, where pretty much all the endings happpened at once, and give it fancy name like Warp in the West.

But that would require "Space Magic". :-)

Modifié par edisnooM, 05 juin 2012 - 01:17 .

[frypan]

KitaSaturnyne wrote...

@Fapmaster5000

My little story aside, I do agree with your post, ESPECIALLY on the incredibly divisive nature of the endings. Instead of Mass Effect bringing people together as a community, this (lack of an) ending has created great divides between people. I'm sure there's more than one story on these forums of friends becoming enemies over this.

As Gray Nayr's post illustrates, we can't even agree on the basic concepts of these choices because they're so vague, we have to fill in the blanks ourselves, which is just ammunition to make these divides even bigger between us.

I think the issue is not so much the content of the ending but the very legitimacy that has divided the community. Many don't even accept that these have a place in the game, they are that repugnant.

If it was just a matter of arguing over which choice was best it would be a lot more civilised - we are instead arguing over their right to exist - hence the retake move and such like.Thats got to be a precedent for bad endings.

[BigglesFlysAgain]

frypan wrote...



I think the issue is not so much the content of the ending but the very legitimacy that has divided the community. Many don't even accept that these have a place in the game, they are that repugnant.

If it was just a matter of arguing over which choice was best it would be a lot more civilised - we are instead arguing over their right to exist - hence the retake move and such like.Thats got to be a precedent for bad endings.

I know what you mean, people have always debated some of the choices like saving the council or not, and destroying or capturing the collector base ect, (not that they ammounted to much in the end) and while things could get heated I doubt anyone would say that doing one of those things had no logic at all, they were just points of view, but in the case of the endings choosing any of the choices (if you could bare to) can inspire horirfying rage from people on the other side that their choice has no merit whatsoever and they are idiots.

[Fapmaster5000]

BigglesFlysAgain wrote...

frypan wrote...



I think the issue is not so much the content of the ending but the very legitimacy that has divided the community. Many don't even accept that these have a place in the game, they are that repugnant.

If it was just a matter of arguing over which choice was best it would be a lot more civilised - we are instead arguing over their right to exist - hence the retake move and such like.Thats got to be a precedent for bad endings.

I know what you mean, people have always debated some of the choices like saving the council or not, and destroying or capturing the collector base ect, (not that they ammounted to much in the end) and while things could get heated I doubt anyone would say that doing one of those things had no logic at all, they were just points of view, but in the case of the endings choosing any of the choices (if you could bare to) can inspire horirfying rage from people on the other side that their choice has no merit whatsoever and they are idiots.

Not just idiots.  Also genocidal anti-progressive reactionaries who make Pol Pot look like Dana Carvey's Church Lady, Illusive Man fluffers who suffer from hydrocephalus, and/or closetted jackboot polishing brownshirts with a hard-on for ethnic cleansing and galactic rape.

Modifié par Fapmaster5000, 05 juin 2012 - 01:36 .

[edisnooM]

Indeed the endings have inspired a great deal of creativity in name calling. :-S

[BigglesFlysAgain]

Fapmaster5000 wrote...


Not just idiots.  Also genocidal anti-progressive reactionaries who make Pol Pot look like Dana Carvey's Church Lady, Illusive Man fluffers who suffer from hydrocephalus, and/or closetted jackboot polishing brownshirts with a hard-on for ethnic cleansing and galactic rape.

Why its safest to say you hated all three exactly the same... :happy:



Or maybe I am a fence sitting scum sucking opportunist, with caligulan pseudo madness levels of self grandio...

Modifié par BigglesFlysAgain, 05 juin 2012 - 01:55 .

[Fapmaster5000]

BigglesFlysAgain wrote...

Fapmaster5000 wrote...


Not just idiots.  Also genocidal anti-progressive reactionaries who make Pol Pot look like Dana Carvey's Church Lady, Illusive Man fluffers who suffer from hydrocephalus, and/or closetted jackboot polishing brownshirts with a hard-on for ethnic cleansing and galactic rape.

Why its safest to say you hated all three exactly the same... :happy:



Or maybe I am a fence sitting scum sucking opportunist, with caligulan pseudo madness levels of self grandio...

Well, I actually have an opinion, I just prefer to insult everyone equally.  I've seen some very smart people defend each choice as "theirs", and I've seen some really obnoxious people do likewise.  I'll engage the latter and respect the former, but overall, this was brought on by the information vacuum and SPECULATION, so I'm not going to introduce tribalism into this thread.  It's a bastion of clear thought, thusfar.  I will not be the one to spill blood in the sanctuary, so to speak.  :innocent:

[KitaSaturnyne]

Aw, shucks. You guys keep complimenting me, and I'll have to write the story and subject you guys to it.

I'd call the endings "destructive", rather than the product of "artistic integrity". Hey, I wonder if that puts any extra merit in the destroy ending?

Oops, probably shouldn't have said that!

[Seijin8]

"Not just idiots. Also genocidal anti-progressive reactionaries who make Pol Pot look like Dana Carvey's Church Lady, Illusive Man fluffers who suffer from hydrocephalus, and/or closetted jackboot polishing brownshirts with a hard-on for ethnic cleansing and galactic rape."

@Fapmaster5000: That's gold, buddy. Absolute gold.

[delta_vee]

Fapmaster5000 wrote...

I will not be the one to spill blood in the sanctuary, so to speak.

THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!

@Kita

Yep, you're gonna have to go write the damned thing now. Aw.

As for particular ending opinions:

I must be in the minority or something, but...I don't have a preferred ending. I hate them all equally. I can see what's behind each curtain, why someone would choose it (several versions of why, actually), and sort-of see what the devs were thinking in the construction of each one. But I don't favor any of them. I can't. I don't even think defiant rejection (and the attendant loss) is the right answer. I just see a failure (and it's not mine as a player nor a member of the audience).

[BigglesFlysAgain]

Fapmaster5000 wrote...


Well, I actually have an opinion, I just prefer to insult everyone equally.  I've seen some very smart people defend each choice as "theirs", and I've seen some really obnoxious people do likewise.  I'll engage the latter and respect the former, but overall, this was brought on by the information vacuum and SPECULATION, so I'm not going to introduce tribalism into this thread.  It's a bastion of clear thought, thusfar.  I will not be the one to spill blood in the sanctuary, so to speak.  :innocent:

Well even if you don't spill the blood, the splatter will show up nicely on your avatar...
Lol don't worry I am not sure what my point is.


Any way I was impressed by Dray's original post and I am pleased he is still happy to continue discussion about the ending.

I do wonder if there is some truth in his post a few pages ago about the enidng being a unintentional in joke about the nature of story in gaming, I myself have not relaly been able to engage with any game with a serious story since playing me3, resorting to stratergy games where there is not really a story, or somthing like portal, that does not take its self to seriously.


I also agree with his view on red dead, I have often thought it a good example of why gamers can take sadness in gaming, to counter people saying the only reason we did not like me3 was because it was too "sad".

Modifié par BigglesFlysAgain, 05 juin 2012 - 02:14 .

[Fapmaster5000]

delta_vee wrote...

Fapmaster5000 wrote...

I will not be the one to spill blood in the sanctuary, so to speak.

THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!

*hands out a cookie*

[delta_vee]

BigglesFlysAgain wrote...

I do wonder if there is some truth in his post a few pages ago about the enidng being a unintentional in joke about the nature of story in gaming,

"Maybe..."

I think CulturalGeekGirl was at least partly right when she said it was an attempt to distill something of the essence of the game, and I believe that includes the layout of the choice as a giant dialogue wheel and the subversion of the paragon/renegade dichotomy (both of which have been mentioned before). But I didn't want a gods-damned choice at the very end. I wanted something which took the choices I'd already made and spun them into something that was mine - an accounting, of sorts. I wanted a funeral scene out of Speaker for the Dead, with the Shepard I'd fashioned laid bare.

Maybe that's just me, though.

I myself have not relaly been able to engage with any game with a serious story since playing me3, resorting to stratergy games where there is not really a story, or somthing like portal, that does not take its self to seriously.

That's a common sentiment around these parts.

Fapmaster5000 wrote...

*hands out a cookie*

C is for cookie. Cookie is for me.

[Seijin8]

Drayfish's suggestion from a few pages back may well be correct, but I think there is such a wide chasm between authoral intent and player experience now, and the vitriol has been cranked to feverish proportions, that we are unlikely to ever get a candid view of what the original intent was.

Careers are dangling over a precipice now, and regardless of what Walters/Hudson's intended experience was, it either didn't manifest as planned, or it did and their judgment is highly questionable. It is sad, since I admire people who take risks with artistic mediums, but the tail end to something that was on track to be the greatest sci-fi epic in gaming history is really not the place to get experimental. If they were looking at BSG and Lost as sources of inspiration, then they had to be aware of potential fan backlash, and either didn't care or failed to assess just how bad it might be.

Unless the EC is downright amazing (I hold some small, unrealistic hope of this), then I imagine that I will keep track of Hudson and Walters' projects, and studiously avoid anything they are associated with.

[GoldBTM25]

Had seen this post before and was curious about it. Glad I got around to read it. Laughed at the Matrix/Godfather dig.

He nails precisely every problem I had with the ending. For me, it wasn't as much about the lack of choice, which unquestionably is an big problem, as it was the jarring disconnect with the rest of the series.

For the last three months I had to read the words "artistic integrity" to the point that I've developed twitch every time I see them. Thing is, I thought that the foundation for BW's "art" was their incredibly well done characters and the compelling sub-plots that all developed in an incredibly rich setting. All of which were unceremoniously thrown out the window in favor of someone's *cough cough* avant-garde "ending" that was believed would revolutionize the genre til the end of time.

Now to watch them butcher DA3.

[edisnooM]

@delta_vee

I don't think you're alone in not liking any of the endings. I certainly don't like it as is, and since the EC isn't supposed to change anything we'll probably still be presented with the Catalyst and Synthetics vs Organics as apparently the core theme of the story.

What I'm hoping is that if there is perhaps an option or "clarification" where the Geth and EDI don't die in destroy, then I can head-canon the Catalyst away as a rambling madman(boy, hologram, whatever). That's about the best I can think of for "clarification".

Though if the relays are still destroyed that's still a kick in the pants. Maybe that will be "clarified" too.

And I also thought that taking everything I had done from the trilogy (or the important bits) and giving me an ending for my universe would be good. It was implied that was what we would get, not "a bespoke ending that everyone gets". Though I'm not even so opposed to a choice at the end if it made any kind of sense at all.

[drayfish]

Whoa. I turn my head away from the thread for a second and it explodes with creativity. Fordamn. 
 
@ Fapmaster5000, I'm sorry to do this – I have nothing to add. I just love these paragraphs:
 

Fapmaster5000 wrote...

So, the ending prevents this one style of play? Why? Was it somehow against the grain of the game?
This strikes me as wrong, but I'll play devil's advocate again, and think of another angle. Perhaps this wasn't done to prevent an illegitimate style of play, but to prevent one ending from being held over the others. Bioware didn't want to have what we currently have on the forums, an ending that said, "this is right and this is wrong", with a chunk of the fanbase alienated by authorial fiat.

If this was the intent, it failed miserably. Instead, the crushing ending and sheer lack of closure has produced tribalism like I've never seen, where different segments of the community find one flavor or the rainbow to be completely appalling, and spend their time picking arguments about which is the worst, all with the tingling fear that "that one ending" will turn into the canon outcome in the Extended Cut. (I must confess, I've even taken part in this, as one of the endings, as presented, sends ethical ice through my veins with its subtext. I will not bring that into this thread.)

Even if we ignore the failure of outcome, this intent could have been solved much more elegantly with more data, not less. If "Shepard lives and the galaxy is saved" was such a golden outcome that it would invalidate every other, and all choices are equally valid, then why not allow a tiered ending for each color? Bad, neutral, and good outcomes, based on paragon/renegade flavor and EMS success metric. Boom. Instant satisfaction. Now, people who chose destroy because "fack that ghostbaby" and people who chose destroy because they denied the Catalyst's pessimism are presented endings that are satisfactory, as are people who chose control because they were Cerberus fangirls, people who chose control in order to preserve galactic civilization, people who chose synthesis because they want to be transhuman, and people who chose synthesis because they want to unite all people.

@ KitaSaturnyne:
 
I'm going to have to add to the chorus and declare: nice story. I loves me a bit of hardboiled noir, and that sounds delightfully gritty.
 
 
And @ BigglesFliesAgain:
 
I want 'Fence-sitting scum-sucking opportunist, with Caligulian pseudo-madness levels of self grandioso' on a name tag. ...Man I love this thread.
 
I will say though, I'm glad that there is one name that thankfully no one has resorted to calling anyone else. That unforgivable, horrendous, debasement that calls in the moderators – justifiably – like magnets. A name that, really, honestly, there is never any justification to call another human being. No matter how heated things have gotten, I'm glad to see that no one has sunk to that level yet, because to do so is to devalue everything that we as a peoples, in spite of our differences, hold sacred. No one has called anyone else 'Scrappy-Doo', and for that, I thank the mighty Thor. As long as we hold back from this abyss, we can be salvaged.

Modifié par drayfish, 05 juin 2012 - 03:49 .

[edisnooM]

@drayfish

Whoa now, let's not go crazy. Even when you're not calling anyone that, it's still a bit risque. :-)