5087 réponses à ce sujet

[KitaSaturnyne]

As far as making favorites of the endings, I'll simply say that I find each of them equally repugnant on every conceivable level, morally or otherwise. They balance each other out in this way, at least to me.

Destroy forces a race we just made friends with to be offered as an unknowing sacrifice. It apparently extends far beyond that, as simply cybernetic technology like that used to reconstruct Shepard will also be rendered useless. This seems to imply in itself that all working technology will be rendered useless, including the technology driving the suits that keep everyone's favorite Quarian alive. Also, this would leave millions upon millions of space craft floating in outer space without even a working calculator. No heat, no air, no way to prepare food.

Control works solely on the basis that if you're not heavily indoctrinated a la The Illusive Man, you're automagically able to bend deadly machines to your will, despite the fact that they're far beyond your understanding or ability to comprehend. The more I think about this option, the more it reminds me of the Nihilanth from Half-Life. The Crucible + Citadel design even resembles the damn thing.

Synthesis forces a very profound transformation on all living things, and masks this egregious theft of freedom of choice as the frontier of a brave new world. Furthermore, the Reapers just fly away unscathed, so the central conflict of the entire trilogy isn't even solved. It doesn't feel at all like a job well done, it feels like I didn't even do anything, aside from giving everything in the galaxy some strange circuit tattoos.

@CGG

Please tell me if this math is correct. Y is your distaste/ dislike for the listed ending.

For Destroy, Y = 100%
For Control, Y = 100%
For Synthesis, Y = 99.999999999999999999999999999999999%

EDIT: Aw, hell. Okay, this time sing that song that first plays during the credits to ME 1.

Modifié par KitaSaturnyne, 15 juin 2012 - 08:06 .

[Seijin8]

That would be Faunts "M4, Part 2". Love that band and was glad they used another Faunts tune in the credits of ME3 (was maybe the only thing I was happy about at the end).

[BigglesFlysAgain]

Seijin8 wrote...

That would be Faunts "M4, Part 2". Love that band and was glad they used another Faunts tune in the credits of ME3 (was maybe the only thing I was happy about at the end).

I suppose your right, though they do come right on the tail end of the supposedly "Epic" crescendo at the very end... the kind of "durrr Duuur Daaurrrr" bit...  the bit where I imagine most people realised when playing for the first time that that  really was it...

I can't fault the the music of the game though, but given they farm that out to a composer your can't really give bioware that much credit for it lol

[Jorji Costava]

@Hawk227

Going to snip here if you don't mind:

Hawk227 wrote. . .

When you pick destroy, you are saying there is an extreme situation in
which genocide is okay*. But you are not necessarily making a judgment
about the worthiness of synthetics as a whole. In Synthesis you are
making a judgment about the relationship between organics and
synthetics. You are agreeing that they cannot co-exist peacefully.

Excellent points here. My only minor disagreement is this: Someone who chooses synthesis might rationalize it in much the same way you explain destroy: I'm not really endorsing eugenics, I'm simply acknowledging that extreme circumstances may arise in which it may turn out that eugenics is the least bad option. I believe that synthetics and organics can peacefully co-exist, but because of the extremity of the circumstances, I don't have an opportunity to let that possibility play out without risking the lives of everyone. I don't say this to suggest that one ending is better than another (indeed, I'll argue below that this is largely a waste of time). Rather, I simply want to suggest that picking any of the choices does not necessarily indicate tacit agreement with the ideas behind that choice. We mostly agree that the ideology behind every choice is deeply flawed, but the context indicates that if we don't make a choice, the Reapers win. We're forced to choose one of these perverse options, which is why the endings make us all feel a little dirty (or maybe it's just that I haven't taken a shower in 6 months).

Some more general comments: I've had some thoughts that I've been bouncing around in my head, and I haven't figured out the best way to express them until recently. Hopefully they can be used to strike a conciliatory note about everyone's different views of the ending choices. My considered judgment is that extended argument about which choice is 'best' is a dead end, on a par with trying to discover the higher-order truths of chmess.*

Imagine reading a book called The Big Choice, set in the present day, where in the last 10 pages, our protagonist finds out, from a newly-introduced omniscient being, that the fundamental existential crisis of our time is Charles Manson's Helter Skelter scenario. The being then gives our protagonist three choices, all in some way directed towards solving this 'problem.' We could have an elaborate discussion about which choice our protagonist ought to have made. We could even abstract away from these choices' connection to the Helter Skelter scenario, and ask which of the outcomes is best, based purely on their own merits. Still, it seems to me that extended discussion of this sort is in some way giving too much credit to the writers of The Big Choice. That work really doesn't deserve this kind of discussion.

I think the situation isn't much different with the ending of ME3. If our experience of synthetic characters through the three games had largely been something on the order of Skynet, I probably would have been able to roll with the idea of an inevitable conflict between synthetics and organics. But because the games, especially ME2 and ME3, go so far out of their way to make us sympathize with their synthetic characters, the final reveal, in the context of that story, is problematic in much the same way that The Big Choice is problematic, although not to the same extent. Further, the final choices are too vaguely defined to be of much independent interest as a philosophical exercise. This ain't Judith Jarvis Thomson's violinist we're dealing with, here. So the more I think about it, the more I think that the whole debate is misspent energy. Either we're giving a poorly-written conclusion more consideration and analysis than it deserves, or we're debating a thought experiment with almost no actual content. Neither of these activities strike me as particularly fruitful. So perhaps side-stepping this whole debate will allow us to direct our energies more usefully in the future.

*The link is to a short paper by Dan Dennett. He's also the guy I borrowed my earlier use of the term 'deepity,' from, although he uses it to mean something more specific than I did. Anyone who wants to find out more about deepities should feel free to click here.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

@KitaSaturnye

It's more complex than that... less math, more implied headspace.

The starchild and the Reapers have three main philosophies:

1. It is acceptable to commit mass murder and genocide for the "greater good."
2. We are right and know better than you (Hubris)
3. Synthetics and Organics cannot live in peace

For me, the ending like/dislike is all about what a Shepard making that choice could reasonably be thinking, and what the action implicitly affirms if completely separated from the Starchild's rhetoric. In every single one other than synthesis, Shepard must explicitly internally condone one of these three philosophies.

It is illogical for Shepard to pick destroy without thinking "in some situations, genocide is acceptable." (Unless they don't believe synthetics are life, or the geth are dead and they're ignorant of the existence of any other synthetic lifeforms.) If Shepard thought that genocide was fundamentally unacceptable, she'd just bleed out or pick one of the other options.

It is illogical for Shepard to pick Control without thinking "well, this will work for me, because I'm [SOMETHING]." If Shepard believes that there's a substantial chance that the control option will indoctrinate her or make her eventually agree with the Reapers, she'd pick one of the other options or bleed out.

It is entirely rational, logical, and reasonable for Shepard to pick Synthesis without agreeing with the philosophy that homogeneity is an improvement. There's no logical contradiction in Shepard saying "I believe that the homogeneity thing will make the universe worse, yeah, but not as much worse as the other options, including bleeding out and leaving the universe to get reaped."

To make either of the other two choices, Shepard must explicitly agree with one of the Reaper philosophies. Shepard could disagree with the idea that homogeneity will improve the universe and still choose synthesis, if she merely believed that homogeneity was a really bad stupid thing, but not worse than genocide.

I'm not sure if I'm making this clear enough. It's a very fine line...

If you're forced to make the decision about whether or not to commit genocide, and you do it, that action conveys that in this circumstance you considered it acceptable.

If you're forced to make the decision about whether or not to make everyone slightly more homogenous, and you do it, that action conveys that in this circumstance you believe homogeneity is acceptable. It does not in any way, shape, or form indicate that you think homogeneity is better, or a solution, it only implies that you think it's an acceptable loss in this situation.

For me, the belief that a slight increase in homogeneity is preferable to galactic extinction is less abominable than the belief that commission of genocide is preferable to galactic extinction.

Or, to pare down further, you must believe that reducing diversity by committing genocide is preferable to reducing diversity through transformative inexplicable magic that doens't kill anyone.

The hubris angle is a different one altogether. If it weren't for the hubris thing, control would be the "obvious" choice... nobody has to die, Shepard pilots the Reapers into the sun, Reapers dead, no geth genocide, everyone is happy. I just have a really weird mental relationship with that kind of hubris, so I fear it beyond reason.

But to sum up, it is easy to create an in-character, rational headspace where Shepard explicitly rejects all three of the Reaper conceits, but still chooses Synthesis.

A similar headspace cannot be constructed for destroy, except for in cases where there are no living AIs, or if the player feverently believes that no AIs will die, (which represents another form of unreasonable hubris.)

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 15 juin 2012 - 10:01 .

[KitaSaturnyne]

@Seijin8

Yeah, that one.

@CGG

... Okay then. I stand corrected.

On a separate topic, I wanted to correct something I'd consistently stated earlier. I said that Mass Effect offered us the chance to guide the narrative of the games, to a certain extent. I think that this was inaccurate, though.

In the opening to Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, the narrator in the opening says,

"Like it or not, believe it or not as you will, your perceptions will not change reality, but simply color it."

It was this that made me realize that what we are allowed to do in Mass Effect amounts to quite a bit less than being offered the chance to tell our own versions of the story.

In Mass Effect, Shepard is called forth to stop a rogue Spectre, which ends with a massive battle at the Citadel.

In Mass Effect 2, Shepard is brought back from the grips of death to investigate the meaning behind a new threat, culminating with the suicide mission through the Omega 4 relay.

In Mass Effect 3, Shepard is sent out into a suffering galaxy to unite its many races in a desparate bid to save everyone from extinction.

Each time we play, no matter what we choose, core of the story remains the same. It's become clear to me that the choices we can make are more about giving us a chance to color the reality of the game in ways we see fit.

I used to think we were able to choose whether the chicken would be fried or broiled, but in reality, we're just choosing whether or not to add paprika or chipotle as the seasoning.

[BigglesFlysAgain]

@CGG

I think your thought process is sound (though perhaps its could argued that it would also be arrogant for Shepard(s) to assume that their DNA is the perfect tool to create the ultimate biological and machine blend) but I think it relies too heavily on having 100% faith that each option works as advertised, even if each option is true to form shepard can't know the extent they go to, synthesis could result in clanking monstrosities that leave the victims of both previous states of life in permanent agony (ok, from the crew we assume that doesn't happen, but for a thought process of Shepard argument you can only use the data he has).

Perhaps if Shepard was an ardent believer in the rights of A.I, would he have to weigh in the fact that synthesis could preclude the creation of future A.I., and kill a lot more than the geth. Though none of this solves the problem that if he does nothing the reapers would definitely win, and even if all three options somehow twist their intent like wishes granted by evil genies, nearly anything could be better than the reapers continuing their cycle.


Disclaimer...

No ending preference!


Edit...

@KitaSaturnyne

Your right that the games have only ever been filling in the blanks between several pre - ordained set pieces, there's no "what if shepard stopped for a drive through on the way to Ilos?" causality type things, but on the whole I don't think people minded too much, when to a certain extent the majority of people were satisifed with the limited flavouring available, and obviously the only taste for this game being sour means more people question things they would just shrug at before and try to find some pattern of "failures" on biowares part.

Modifié par BigglesFlysAgain, 15 juin 2012 - 10:24 .

[KitaSaturnyne]

@BigglesFlysAgain

I don't find the mechanics behind the choices we were allowed to make a particular failure on BioWare's part, I was just pointing out my misconception regarding their purpose.

[BigglesFlysAgain]

KitaSaturnyne wrote...

@BigglesFlysAgain

I don't find the mechanics behind the choices we were allowed to make a particular failure on BioWare's part, I was just pointing out my misconception regarding their purpose.

I was not trying to say  you were "people", in the sense you did everything I mentioned, but the realisation of your misconception fits into a general theme of people taking a second look at things.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

It's definitely possible for Shepard to have various hubristic or monstrous thoughts when choosing Synthesis, I have no doubt. My point wasn't that there are no monstrous thoughts associated with Synthesis, merely that it's possible (and, it seems to me, common) to pick synthesis without any of those monstrous thoughts in your mind. Most of the people I have spoken with who favor synthesis are more of the "this is the least bad, and may actually turn out to not be an unmitigated disaster" stripe than the "making us all the same will bring about peace" stripe. I haven't heard anyone ever say the whole "Obviously Shepard has the perfect DNA to do this" thing you outline, which would indeed be supremely hubristic.

As for how much you believe the Starkid is accurately describing the effects of the three options... down that road lies madness. Let's say there's a scale of "how accurate you believe the Starkid is when explaining the consequences of the buttons." If you believe he is lying completely, then you might as well roll a die to decide which one to pick. If you believe he's only lying about some aspects, but you have no way of predicting what aspects he's lying about, it doesn't change things much.

Most people have chosen to believe the Starkid is lying... but that his lies correspond directly with things they wish were or were not true. That's... troubling.

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 15 juin 2012 - 11:00 .

[BigglesFlysAgain]

@CGG

By monstrous thoughts I assume you mean choosing any of the options with particular glee? I.e a Shepard who choose destroy and saw it as a good opertunity to get rid of the "troublesome" geth would be "monstrous", while a Shepard who picked destroy out of pragmatism and wished that the geth would not be destroyed, but feels its the only way would be non monstrous? Or am I missing something.

Just as a thought, would it be better for Shepard to be a monster, in choosing destroy, to preserve some life as he knows it in some form, than be a fool and going with an option that seems to be better just thinking about it, risking everything he knows for an unproven change? (you can apply this to any choice of course)

I am just being a nay-smith really, not really endorsing anything I say.


Edit, if you are just analysing the story its on its own, and ignoring the alternate reality game bioware seem to be playing with what actualy may have happend, then of course you can't just say, well bioware said the starkid may be lying

Modifié par BigglesFlysAgain, 16 juin 2012 - 12:01 .

[Hawk227]

osbornep wrote...


Excellent points here. My only minor disagreement is this: Someone who chooses synthesis might rationalize it in much the same way you explain destroy: I'm not really endorsing eugenics, I'm simply acknowledging that extreme circumstances may arise in which it may turn out that eugenics is the least bad option. I believe that synthetics and organics can peacefully co-exist, but because of the extremity of the circumstances, I don't have an opportunity to let that possibility play out without risking the lives of everyone. I don't say this to suggest that one ending is better than another (indeed, I'll argue below that this is largely a waste of time). Rather, I simply want to suggest that picking any of the choices does not necessarily indicate tacit agreement with the ideas behind that choice.

I actually disagree with this, and hopefully I can actually articulate why*. The thing to me is that Synthesis does nothing to the Reapers. It turns all life (even the leaves) into an organic/synthetic hybrid (like the Reapers) and it only eliminates the Reapers as a threat if they were genuinely created to prevent organic/synthetic conflict. By choosing Synthesis, we are acknowledging their "purpose". If I pick destroy, I may be saying that I'm willing to sacrifice/murder one (innocent) race to save every other life that ever lives, but if I pick synthesis I am saying that the Reapers weren't actually the problem all along (synthetics were). The thing about synthesis (as it relates to diversity) is that it eliminates diversity on two fronts. There is no longer organic life, nor synthetic life. There is only hybrid life. Additionally, destroy does not set out to reduce diversity, EDI and the Geth are apparent collateral damage. The purpose of synthesis is to reduce diversity.

To clarify (hopefully), I think in all three, we are tacitly agreeing with the ideas behind the choice. If I pick destroy, I'm saying that in this most extreme of circumstances genocide is okay. If I pick control, I'm saying that I'm just awesome enough to dominate the Reapers and that's not even hubris. What repulses me about synthesis though, is that it isn't a solution to the Reaper problem (like the other 2), it is a solution to the Organic vs. Synthetic problem. The Reapers only go away because you solved the problem for them. It is the one choice of the three in which I'm saying "the Reapers were right".

*I should mention that if you think all choices are irredeemably evil and useless, you can choose to bleed out and hope the Galactic Fleet or a future cycle comes through. In so far as "The Crucible was destroyed, Resume" is an ending.

Modifié par Hawk227, 16 juin 2012 - 12:24 .

[delta_vee]

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...

The hubris angle is a different one altogether. If it weren't for the hubris thing, control would be the "obvious" choice... nobody has to die, Shepard pilots the Reapers into the sun, Reapers dead, no geth genocide, everyone is happy. I just have a really weird mental relationship with that kind of hubris, so I fear it beyond reason.

And here I invoke Gödel's incompleteness theorem, after a fashion - all choices which are made in a context of seeking the least-worst option (as opposed to at least one choice being an affirmative direction*) require rejection of at least one option using non-logical (as opposed to illogical) criteria.

If your particular fear beyond reason were removed, Control is the least-worst option, requiring neither genocide nor potential body horror and mindrape. There is no certain, ironclad logical objection to Control, after all - if the Catalyst lies, then it could be lying about everything - but instead there are suspicions borne of cognitive dissonance (we just caused TIM's death for pursuing the idea) and the common association of hubris with attempts to control eldritch monstrosities. But instead of hubris, it could be seen as a valiant attempt at "nobody dies today", at avoiding becoming a monster or foisting unasked-for changes upon all life, at wrestling with the gods so that mortals may survive intact.

Or instead, if one's fear beyond reason is of the unknowable (and its corollaries, the potentially-far-worse or the price-of-being-wrong), then Destroy becomes the least-worst if only for the certainty of its outcome, and the accompanying synthetic genocide can be treated in the manner of the "negotiating with terrorists" acceptance of externally-imposed collateral damage. The Catalyst, after all - or rather the developers - is/are the one(s) setting the price, not us.

Of course, it seems to me that the choice was purposefully designed to embody that incompleteness, that (relative) resistance to solution. And I hate it for that very reason. I'm with osbornep in considering it essentially a waste.

* The decision is incomplete even in its incompleteness. If one has always coveted the Reapers' power, if one holds no regard for synthetics, or if one leaps gladly at the chance to kickstart a new age, then one's choice is easily made. I personally hold a deep suspicion of all three perspectives.

[Addendum]

@osbornep

That chmess paper was a good read, well-taken. Danke.

Modifié par delta_vee, 16 juin 2012 - 01:01 .

[BigglesFlysAgain]

Something else that occurred to me... if a player had a low morality score or made poor choices leading up the the climax of the Geth Quarian conflict, and so was forced into choosing between them, and made the decision to choose the Quarians, and had done so without malice towards the geth, just with a sense of personal failure, then choosing destroy does not condone genocide in the same way, it seems to be the only choice that actually changes in meaning depending on story choices.

In the same vein all our discussions seem to based on the "perfect" play-through beforehand, and (obviously since we were probably all avid completionists and roleplayers while playing the game) we don't really discuss the situations where the player has two choices, or even one choice, does that really change anything? or are we to ignore such low forms of playing the game (lol)?

Modifié par BigglesFlysAgain, 16 juin 2012 - 12:59 .

[Seijin8]

Hawk227 wrote: "If I pick destroy, I'm saying that in this most extreme of circumstances genocide is okay."

Picking this quote, but aiming these comments more broadly:  Genocide against the Reapers has always been an acceptable end-goal.  Do they not count?  Have we taken the time to get to know many of them in the way that we did with every other threatening species we have encountered and befriended?  Shepard has been on the path of wiping out the Reapers for quite some time before meeting the Catalyst and being handed the means to do so.

Obviously, this is hyperbolic:  We are never given the means to contact "independent" Reapers, and the very nature of indoctrination means no real attempt to do so could ever have been made.

But when you put up the big picket sign reading: GENOCIDE ... you're way off the reservation.  Shepard's goal throughout the third game has been the destruction of the Reapers.  In as much as an end-goal was definable, genocidal intent against the oldest known form of life was the core of the earlier parts of the trilogy as well.

This doesn't mitigate the harm being done to allies, or the nature of the atrocities being committed, but genocide was always the game plan.

Modifié par Seijin8, 16 juin 2012 - 01:14 .

[BigglesFlysAgain]

@Seijin8,
Your right, playing and completing me2 means the player justifies the genocide of of the Collectors, Dito with the reapers once its been made clear there is nothing you can do to negotiate with them. though I imagine people are more likely to justify the total destruction of a hostile force that threatens them with destruction themselves, than our geth friend (s)

You can get out of destroying the reapers with two of the options and avoid genocide, but I don't think anyone came into the game thinking, I hope I don't have to kill the reapers, if there is an option to save them I'll take it, so most people were happy with that option to start with, even if they did not ultimately choose it.

Modifié par BigglesFlysAgain, 16 juin 2012 - 01:18 .

[BigglesFlysAgain]

darn DP

Modifié par BigglesFlysAgain, 16 juin 2012 - 01:17 .

[Jorji Costava]

Hawk227 wrote...

I actually disagree with this, and hopefully I can actually articulate why*. The thing to me is that Synthesis does nothing to the Reapers. It turns all life (even the leaves) into an organic/synthetic hybrid (like the Reapers) and it only eliminates the Reapers as a threat if they were genuinely created to prevent organic/synthetic conflict. By choosing Synthesis, we are acknowledging their "purpose". If I pick destroy, I may be saying that I'm willing to sacrifice/murder one (innocent) race to save every other life that ever lives, but if I pick synthesis I am saying that the Reapers weren't actually the problem all along (synthetics were). The thing about synthesis (as it relates to diversity) is that it eliminates diversity on two fronts. There is no longer organic life, nor synthetic life. There is only hybrid life. Additionally, destroy does not set out to reduce diversity, EDI and the Geth are apparent collateral damage. The purpose of synthesis is to reduce diversity.

To clarify (hopefully), I think in all three, we are tacitly agreeing with the ideas behind the choice. If I pick destroy, I'm saying that in this most extreme of circumstances genocide is okay. If I pick control, I'm saying that I'm just awesome enough to dominate the Reapers and that's not even hubris. What repulses me about synthesis though, is that it isn't a solution to the Reaper problem (like the other 2), it is a solution to the Organic vs. Synthetic problem. The Reapers only go away because you solved the problem for them. It is the one choice of the three in which I'm saying "the Reapers were right".

*I should mention that if you think all choices are irredeemably evil and useless, you can choose to bleed out and hope the Galactic Fleet or a future cycle comes through. In so far as "The Crucible was destroyed, Resume" is an ending.

Again, very good points. There's a possible loophole around the first one: Perhaps the person who chooses synthesis doesn't have to believe that the problem really is synthetic/organic conflict. She need only assume that the Reapers sincerely believe this. So long as the Reapers themselves believe that synthetic/organic conflict is the root problem, and insofar as the Reapers believe synthesis solves this problem, then perhaps synthesis can be counted on to end the Reaper threat. Full disclosure: I chose control when I played through the ending, because I took it to have the least connection with the singularity theme. I'm not 100% sure that's actually the case, but as I indicated, I have little interest in answering this question.

It does seem to me that the goal of destroy, from the point of view of the catalyst at least, is to reduce diversity. This is why it affects specifically the Geth and EDI; Destroy is intended to at least postpone the singularity by wiping out all synthetic life, preventing them from wiping out organics. In the leaked script, the text is "All synthetic life will succumb." They aren't collateral damage; their death is how the singularity is supposed to get solved. The Catalyst's worries about destroy have nothing to do with guilting you about killing off one of your allies, and everything to do with the perceived impermanence of the solution to the singularity. At any rate, the idea that the best method of proving that synthetics and organics can coexist is to wipe out synthetics seems highly counterintuitive.

You're absolutely right that in making any choice, you are taking on substantive moral commitments about the acceptability of certain outcomes versus others. My only point is that these commitments need not coincide with the moral judgments the catalyst makes about those choices. You don't need to think that the singularity is real to choose destroy or synthesis; you need only think that the outcomes associated with them are the least bad. You don't need to be hubristic to choose control; perhaps instead you need to think that the other outcomes are so horrific that you're willing to risk the uncertainty of control. I could easily be wrong about this, and feel free to point out why, but I'm going to content myself with these thoughts on this topic for now, as any further argument would risk doing the very thing I said wasn't worth doing (Indeed, I've almost surely gone too far in this direction already).

I probably wasn't very clear about the chmess stuff. My point is not that every choice is equally bad; my point is that we should not be very much concerned about the correct answer to this question, even assuming there is an answer to be found. That was the point of the comparison to chmess. In case the article was TL;DR material, here's the short version:

You can prove a lot of interesting theorems about chess given its rules. Using Dennett's examples, there are exactly 20 legal opening moves for white, you can't checkmate with just a king and bishop, etc. Now imagine a game like chess in all ways except that the king moves two spaces in every direction, instead of one. Call this game "chmess." Like chess, there are probably a lot of sophisticated theorems you can prove about chmess. But do you particularly care to find out what they are? My guess is that this project isn't of much interest to anyone.

I think that the "What choice is best" question is like chmess; there is probably a correct answer to the question, "Which choice is least bad?", but the question is not worth answering. Either we're dignifying a work, by our extended discussion and analysis of it, that doesn't deserve to be dignified in this way, or we're abstracting the choices away from the thematic content of the ending and trying to construct a thought experiment out of them. But the choices are so vaguely defined, so without content, that the thought experiment is a poorly constructed one. In neither case are we doing something really interesting.

The only solution I have to this problem is to not play the game again, or at least, not play through this sequence. I don't have a headcanon or anything. The ending was bad and there's not much I can do about it. But I still enjoy talking about the game here, because it gives me the opportunity to have intelligent conversations with lots of people I otherwise wouldn't have had the opportunity to do so with. Thanks everybody!

[KitaSaturnyne]

Ehhh... technically, with the Collectors, they're not really a race or species unto themselves. They're pretty much a heavily genetically modified Prothean zombie army, so destroying them really doesn't really present much in the way of morality concerning genocide. If anything, it feels more like a mercy killing to me.

[delta_vee]

osbornep wrote...

The only solution I have to this problem is to not play the game again, or at least, not play through this sequence. I don't have a headcanon or anything. The ending was bad and there's not much I can do about it. But I still enjoy talking about the game here, because it gives me the opportunity to have intelligent conversations with lots of people I otherwise wouldn't have had the opportunity to do so with. Thanks everybody!

Agreed in full. The thoroughly interesting people here and the resultant thoroughly interesting discussion are the only reasons I'm still here. Oh, I'll surely poke at the EC when it surfaces, but the game itself is, well, over for me.

Modifié par delta_vee, 16 juin 2012 - 01:30 .

[Seijin8]

delta_vee wrote...

osbornep wrote...

The only solution I have to this problem is to not play the game again, or at least, not play through this sequence. I don't have a headcanon or anything. The ending was bad and there's not much I can do about it. But I still enjoy talking about the game here, because it gives me the opportunity to have intelligent conversations with lots of people I otherwise wouldn't have had the opportunity to do so with. Thanks everybody!

Agreed in full. The thoroughly interesting people here and the resultant thoroughly interesting discussion are the only reasons I'm still here. Oh, I'll surely poke at the EC when it surfaces, but the game itself is, well, over for me.

+1

[BigglesFlysAgain]

osbornep wrote...

*Snip*

It does seem to me that the goal of destroy, from the point of view of the catalyst at least, is to reduce diversity. This is why it affects specifically the Geth and EDI; Destroy is intended to at least postpone the singularity by wiping out all synthetic life, preventing them from wiping out organics. In the leaked script, the text is "All synthetic life will succumb." They aren't collateral damage; their death is how the singularity is supposed to get solved. The Catalyst's worries about destroy have nothing to do with guilting you about killing off one of your allies, and everything to do with the perceived impermanence of the solution to the singularity. At any rate, the idea that the best method of proving that synthetics and organics can coexist is to wipe out synthetics seems highly counterintuitive.

I don't want to be annoying or anything [anoyingness] can we use the leaked script in this discussion? Just becuase its not technicaly part of the information presented by the game, it may be pretty obvious that it might as well be given the leaked script is similar to what we got, but in the same level we could use cryptic tweets to prove points, given that they both have the same credence [/anoyingness]


In my interpretation of synthesis, all stages of biological life become machine hybrids, so any future evolving species will be hybrids, so diversity has been knocked on the head for the forseeable future. Destroy will wipe out the geth (and other synthetic creations) but it does not seem to proclude the creation of A.I (for better or for worse) in the future, and I see the destruction of the geth as an unfortunate side effect of destroy, not the aim, even if the leak seems to show that.


I agree this discussion over which ending is worse is a bit pointless, but I just want to show how bad all of them are.

[edisnooM]

Seijin8 wrote...

delta_vee wrote...

osbornep wrote...

The only solution I have to this problem is to not play the game again, or at least, not play through this sequence. I don't have a headcanon or anything. The ending was bad and there's not much I can do about it. But I still enjoy talking about the game here, because it gives me the opportunity to have intelligent conversations with lots of people I otherwise wouldn't have had the opportunity to do so with. Thanks everybody!

Agreed in full. The thoroughly interesting people here and the resultant thoroughly interesting discussion are the only reasons I'm still here. Oh, I'll surely poke at the EC when it surfaces, but the game itself is, well, over for me.

+1

Agreed, but a good ending sure would have been nice. 

[Seijin8]

@BigglesFlysAgain: You may use whatever source of information you wish to create the things BioWare didn't think we needed. Or, to put it differently: Your speculations have documentation!

@edisnooM: You know... if the endings had been great, I wouldn't have read anything in this thread... and I am starting to think that I prefer all of *this* over solid endings to a video game.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

I have two somewhat serious questions for everyone, because I've realized something that may be unique to me...

My intent was always to defeat the Reapers and make sure they could never threaten the galaxy again... but if I reached the point where the Reapers were no longer a threat, I'd be satisfied, even if there were hypothetically a few of them out there somewhere. I mean logically, the Reapers could easily retreat into Dark Space at any time, where we couldn't get them. I never expected to be able to destroy every reaper everywhere in one fell swoop. I expected to maybe be able to destroy a bunch of them in battle before they retreated, or drive them off. Heck, I expected one of the endings to be "Reapers win, but the next cycle will cause even heavier losses, and so forth until organics beat them fair and square." 

Was everyone else just assuming that we were going to get a magical thing to kill all Reapers? 

Also, does nobody else draw a distinction between fighting and killing an enemy and and committing genocide? I always thought genocide implied a systematic killing of people who are under your power, outside the bounds of war. That is to say, if you've got a button you push that kills every citizen in your country who belongs to [SUBGROUP], that's genocide. Whereas if the [JETS] are attacking the [SHARKS], and the [SHARKS] retaliate in a way that happens to kill most of the [JETS], that's not genocide, it's war... it's fighting. It's still horrible, but not the same thing. Do you guys really all think that killing a helpless ally or citizen is the same thing as killing an enemy who is actively trying to kill you, for the purposes of "whether or not something counts as genocide"?

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 16 juin 2012 - 01:55 .