MintyCool wrote...
Those who can't do, teach.
The battlecry of the cretin.
"All Were Thematically Revolting". My Lit Professor's take on the Endings. (UPDATED)
Débuté par
Made Nightwing
, avril 16 2012 04:43
#1001
Posté 27 avril 2012 - 05:32
Kyrick
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The battlecry of the cretin.
Retour en haut
#1002
Posté 27 avril 2012 - 05:33
KainrycKarr
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The arguments people are presenting against the OP are just....pathetic.
If the theme of the ending is to have an impossible, unwinnable choice, then it contradicts all of the previous themes of the entire storyarch.
"Those who can't do, teach."
^^ a pathetic, cheap, overly used stereotype that has no bearing on the discussion.
There have been several, several mentions of cases of even classics being changed in response to criticism.
If the theme of the ending is to have an impossible, unwinnable choice, then it contradicts all of the previous themes of the entire storyarch.
"Those who can't do, teach."
^^ a pathetic, cheap, overly used stereotype that has no bearing on the discussion.
There have been several, several mentions of cases of even classics being changed in response to criticism.
#1003
Guest_Vurculac_*
Posté 27 avril 2012 - 09:11
Guest_Vurculac_*
Guest_Vurculac_*
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MintyCool wrote...
Those who can't do, teach.
Your post is laughable....and unoriginal as well.
#1004
Posté 27 avril 2012 - 10:31
withneelandi
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Those who can't do, teach.
And those who can't come up with a well thought out counter argument trot out lazy cliches.
The OP is excellent. I hope someone from bioware reads it. It is too easy to dismiss those who don't like the ending as angry fanboys who didn't get the happy ending that they wanted and don't understand the grand story telling vision presented by bioware.
Frankly, some probably are but many played through Mass Effect 3 and saw a flawed narrative. They didn't expect blue babies, or a beer with Garrus on a beach in Brazil, I honestly didn't expect Shepard to survive the conclusion. We did, however, expect a satisfying conclusion which followed the games own internal logic.
Similarly, there is a definate issue with the flow of the narrative at the games conclusion. The games final scenes seem disconected from the rest of the narrative. The shift in presentation style, movement of character etc breaks immmersion and kills the drama of the conclusion.
In short, post laser beam I felt that I lost controll of Shep, and thus lost control of my part in the story. That killed part of the emotional investments in the events on screen.
And those who can't come up with a well thought out counter argument trot out lazy cliches.
The OP is excellent. I hope someone from bioware reads it. It is too easy to dismiss those who don't like the ending as angry fanboys who didn't get the happy ending that they wanted and don't understand the grand story telling vision presented by bioware.
Frankly, some probably are but many played through Mass Effect 3 and saw a flawed narrative. They didn't expect blue babies, or a beer with Garrus on a beach in Brazil, I honestly didn't expect Shepard to survive the conclusion. We did, however, expect a satisfying conclusion which followed the games own internal logic.
Similarly, there is a definate issue with the flow of the narrative at the games conclusion. The games final scenes seem disconected from the rest of the narrative. The shift in presentation style, movement of character etc breaks immmersion and kills the drama of the conclusion.
In short, post laser beam I felt that I lost controll of Shep, and thus lost control of my part in the story. That killed part of the emotional investments in the events on screen.
#1005
Posté 27 avril 2012 - 02:52
-Spartan
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Hmmm.. I was thinking the other day that this situation would be interesting to Ed Bernays. After all EA is using his philosophy to market ME3 and in fact it is the central point of the product promotion for that extra special irony. Yet EA public relations and it seems BW in turn via its public relations dimension are not getting it or they are and simply chose to ignore it in the hopes that the next big thing will (also from Mr. Bernay's philo) replace the alienation, disempowerment and disenfranchisement of the fan base.
Consequently, my thinking about "what would Eddie do?" concluded he would laugh then laugh some more.
@Our literary faculty - do yourself a favor and learn about Mr. Bernay if you are not familiar with his writings. He is after all probably the most powerful or I guess I should more clearly state “influential” none famous person in US history if not
the world; no hyperbole.
Consequently, my thinking about "what would Eddie do?" concluded he would laugh then laugh some more.
@Our literary faculty - do yourself a favor and learn about Mr. Bernay if you are not familiar with his writings. He is after all probably the most powerful or I guess I should more clearly state “influential” none famous person in US history if not
the world; no hyperbole.
Modifié par -Spartan, 27 avril 2012 - 03:01 .
#1006
Posté 27 avril 2012 - 03:40
Reorte
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And what have the pro-enders offered in return? Little but insults. It speaks volumes about the type of people on either side of the debate (I admit that this sounds rather like that but I grow tired of their complete and utter unwillingness to actually engage in debate to defend their position).KainrycKarr wrote...
The arguments people are presenting against the OP are just....pathetic.
If the theme of the ending is to have an impossible, unwinnable choice, then it contradicts all of the previous themes of the entire storyarch.
"Those who can't do, teach."
^^ a pathetic, cheap, overly used stereotype that has no bearing on the discussion.
There have been several, several mentions of cases of even classics being changed in response to criticism.
Apologies to the odd one or two who have offered intelligent and reasonable points.
#1007
Posté 27 avril 2012 - 06:50
Warrior Craess
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ohh now I know who to blame for the current problems with america.. PR is one of the worst ideas ever... Sad that it's so freaking effective.
#1008
Posté 27 avril 2012 - 07:43
EthanDirtch
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Great essay on dissecting the thematic discrepancies of the endings v. the rest of the series. Wonderfully thought out, and I just found myself nodding in agreement the whole time. As others have said, I do hope BioWare has read the OP in its current form. Even if it amounts to no change, or not even acknowledgement, at least it provides a clear and eloquent insight into what a lot of people feel regarding the end of the trilogy.
#1009
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 11:02
Sable Phoenix
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"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan, 'press on' has solved, and always will solve, the problems of the human race."
So said Calvin Coolidge, the man most responsible for the incredible boom of the Roaring Twenties and one of the most undersung presidents in United States history. Why do I bring up the words of a statesman who spoke so rarely that he was known as Silent Cal? Because when he did speak, he had something important to say, and I feel that what he said here (one of my favorite quotes of any President) directly applies to Shepard and the unifying main theme of the Mass Effect trilogy.
Shepard could be an uneducated kid from the slums. Shepard could be an orphan from a backwater farming colony. Shepard could have been raised a spacer with never a home to call her own. She could be of average intelligence or a MENSA level genius; a talented technician or an arcane biotic or a simple grunt with a gun. All of that is immaterial; the Alliance and every other race in the galaxy has thousands of soldiers that duplicate the skillset, education and intellect of Commander Shepard. What makes Shepard special, what pulls others into her orbit like moons in the gravity well of a gas giant, is the force of her personality. Specifically, it is her ability to knuckle down and push forward no matter how dire the situation grows that makes her irresistible, both to her friends and to her enemies. She is a beacon of hope because she simply will not give up, because she perseveres, and that is the one thing that makes her such a threat that the Reapers themselves sit up and take notice.
In the more concise words of Ferdinand Foch, Marshal of the Allied forces in World War I, who, during the Battle of the Marne in which his entire battle line was collapsing, famously declared the situation "excellent" and initiated a full attack in response: "The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul afire."
The more I consider the problem of the ending of Mass Effect 3 and why it is so negatively received, the more conviced I am that the central theme of the entire Mass Effect trilogy, and the main theme that the ending betrays, is that of perseverence. Many people have lamented how Shepard quietly acquiesces to everything the Catalyst apparition tells her. I think this is because it's more than a betrayal of Shepard's character; it's a betrayal of the character of the game, of the trilogy as a whole.
Here is a character who has, at times through simple stubbornness, faced down the greatest dangers of the galaxy and refused to die. Here is a character who has died and refused to stay that way. Here is a character who sets her teeth into her goal like a pit bull and never relinquishes her hold.
Here is a character who, at the end of it all, simply gives up.
If God himself came down to deliver a set of stone tablets to Shepard, she would at the very least have a snappy retort or two handy, floating in curious red and blue text in the back of her mind. But somehow this glowing vision of a child renders her lambent personality inert. It offers its own set of options, none of which fit what Shepard has been fighting to reach for three games, and she simply accepts this without a single word of protest. Shepard has no reason to take the Catalyst's words at face value except for writer fiat. The writers are telling us here that resistance is futile, much as another famous set of science fiction villains says about their own forcible indoctrination -- er, sorry, I meant assimilation.
"Thematically revolting"? Yes, and more besides: the final message of the game is also, to a stolid libertarian like myself, deeply offensive.
"The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul afire... which will burn itself to ash without result."
So said Calvin Coolidge, the man most responsible for the incredible boom of the Roaring Twenties and one of the most undersung presidents in United States history. Why do I bring up the words of a statesman who spoke so rarely that he was known as Silent Cal? Because when he did speak, he had something important to say, and I feel that what he said here (one of my favorite quotes of any President) directly applies to Shepard and the unifying main theme of the Mass Effect trilogy.
Shepard could be an uneducated kid from the slums. Shepard could be an orphan from a backwater farming colony. Shepard could have been raised a spacer with never a home to call her own. She could be of average intelligence or a MENSA level genius; a talented technician or an arcane biotic or a simple grunt with a gun. All of that is immaterial; the Alliance and every other race in the galaxy has thousands of soldiers that duplicate the skillset, education and intellect of Commander Shepard. What makes Shepard special, what pulls others into her orbit like moons in the gravity well of a gas giant, is the force of her personality. Specifically, it is her ability to knuckle down and push forward no matter how dire the situation grows that makes her irresistible, both to her friends and to her enemies. She is a beacon of hope because she simply will not give up, because she perseveres, and that is the one thing that makes her such a threat that the Reapers themselves sit up and take notice.
In the more concise words of Ferdinand Foch, Marshal of the Allied forces in World War I, who, during the Battle of the Marne in which his entire battle line was collapsing, famously declared the situation "excellent" and initiated a full attack in response: "The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul afire."
The more I consider the problem of the ending of Mass Effect 3 and why it is so negatively received, the more conviced I am that the central theme of the entire Mass Effect trilogy, and the main theme that the ending betrays, is that of perseverence. Many people have lamented how Shepard quietly acquiesces to everything the Catalyst apparition tells her. I think this is because it's more than a betrayal of Shepard's character; it's a betrayal of the character of the game, of the trilogy as a whole.
Here is a character who has, at times through simple stubbornness, faced down the greatest dangers of the galaxy and refused to die. Here is a character who has died and refused to stay that way. Here is a character who sets her teeth into her goal like a pit bull and never relinquishes her hold.
Here is a character who, at the end of it all, simply gives up.
If God himself came down to deliver a set of stone tablets to Shepard, she would at the very least have a snappy retort or two handy, floating in curious red and blue text in the back of her mind. But somehow this glowing vision of a child renders her lambent personality inert. It offers its own set of options, none of which fit what Shepard has been fighting to reach for three games, and she simply accepts this without a single word of protest. Shepard has no reason to take the Catalyst's words at face value except for writer fiat. The writers are telling us here that resistance is futile, much as another famous set of science fiction villains says about their own forcible indoctrination -- er, sorry, I meant assimilation.
"Thematically revolting"? Yes, and more besides: the final message of the game is also, to a stolid libertarian like myself, deeply offensive.
"The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul afire... which will burn itself to ash without result."
Modifié par Sable Phoenix, 28 avril 2012 - 11:07 .
#1012
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 01:18
JadedLibertine
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Sable Phoenix wrote...
"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan, 'press on' has solved, and always will solve, the problems of the human race."
So said Calvin Coolidge, the man most responsible for the incredible boom of the Roaring Twenties and one of the most undersung presidents in United States history. Why do I bring up the words of a statesman who spoke so rarely that he was known as Silent Cal? Because when he did speak, he had something important to say, and I feel that what he said here (one of my favorite quotes of any President) directly applies to Shepard and the unifying main theme of the Mass Effect trilogy.
Shepard could be an uneducated kid from the slums. Shepard could be an orphan from a backwater farming colony. Shepard could have been raised a spacer with never a home to call her own. She could be of average intelligence or a MENSA level genius; a talented technician or an arcane biotic or a simple grunt with a gun. All of that is immaterial; the Alliance and every other race in the galaxy has thousands of soldiers that duplicate the skillset, education and intellect of Commander Shepard. What makes Shepard special, what pulls others into her orbit like moons in the gravity well of a gas giant, is the force of her personality. Specifically, it is her ability to knuckle down and push forward no matter how dire the situation grows that makes her irresistible, both to her friends and to her enemies. She is a beacon of hope because she simply will not give up, because she perseveres, and that is the one thing that makes her such a threat that the Reapers themselves sit up and take notice.
In the more concise words of Ferdinand Foch, Marshal of the Allied forces in World War I, who, during the Battle of the Marne in which his entire battle line was collapsing, famously declared the situation "excellent" and initiated a full attack in response: "The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul afire."
The more I consider the problem of the ending of Mass Effect 3 and why it is so negatively received, the more conviced I am that the central theme of the entire Mass Effect trilogy, and the main theme that the ending betrays, is that of perseverence. Many people have lamented how Shepard quietly acquiesces to everything the Catalyst apparition tells her. I think this is because it's more than a betrayal of Shepard's character; it's a betrayal of the character of the game, of the trilogy as a whole.
Here is a character who has, at times through simple stubbornness, faced down the greatest dangers of the galaxy and refused to die. Here is a character who has died and refused to stay that way. Here is a character who sets her teeth into her goal like a pit bull and never relinquishes her hold.
Here is a character who, at the end of it all, simply gives up.
If God himself came down to deliver a set of stone tablets to Shepard, she would at the very least have a snappy retort or two handy, floating in curious red and blue text in the back of her mind. But somehow this glowing vision of a child renders her lambent personality inert. It offers its own set of options, none of which fit what Shepard has been fighting to reach for three games, and she simply accepts this without a single word of protest. Shepard has no reason to take the Catalyst's words at face value except for writer fiat. The writers are telling us here that resistance is futile, much as another famous set of science fiction villains says about their own forcible indoctrination -- er, sorry, I meant assimilation.
"Thematically revolting"? Yes, and more besides: the final message of the game is also, to a stolid libertarian like myself, deeply offensive.
"The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul afire... which will burn itself to ash without result."
Yes, yes, a million times yes.
The ending is hateful nonsense on so many levels but this single thing is what sent me into anaphylaptic shock.. It wasn't just in the final 10 minutes but throughout the entire game, the writers got Shepard wrong and forgot what made her so magnetic and so compelling. The final shots of ME2 are of Shepard restlessly striding through the Normandy, checking on her crew and squadmates who are busily preparing for what they know is coming, a vast mass of Reapers in deep space heading remorselessly towards them. Except this time they will be facing an unstoppable force of nature who will be calling on every ally and former squadmate, cashing in every favour, restlessly organising, charming ,threatening and cajoling every race so when the Reapers come they will be facing a galaxy prepared. Yet at the beginning of ME3 Shepard seems to have spent the entire preceding six months staringly listlessly out of a window in Vancouver. And when the attack comes, the focused warrior and calculating battlefield pragmatist the previous games so carefully established becomes an illogical and emotional mess. When the game reluctantly deigns to give you a dialogue option nothing Shepard is allowed to say makes any sense, as Harrison Ford said "You can type this s*** George, but you can't say it".
Since the Catalyst smashed my rose tinted spectacles into a million pieces. the flaws have become glaringly apparent. Though ME3 is excellent for certain stretches, the writers often refuse to trust the player to use their own imaginations or feel their own emotions. I could sense Hudson and Walters standing over me and very loudly and very slowly telling me exactly what I was supposed to be thinking and feeling while jabbing their fingers insistently into my chest. It would be grating and unsubtle even in a Stalinist propaganda movie.
Though regrettably I may have lowered the tone by posting here, I do love this thread. It is like sitting in a Viennese coffee house in 1900 and witnessing an intense intellectual and philosophical discussion. Now I shall settle down with my Turkish coffee and my sacher torte and let the real heavyweights continue the debate while I stroke my beard and appreciatively nod my head in thoughtful silence.
#1013
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 01:40
drayfish
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Dear God, so many fantastic descriptions I want to print out and staple on my walls...
And JadedLibertine, if you can write material this good when you think you're 'lowering the tone', I demand that you email me your comments ahead of time so that I can claim them as my own.
Welcome to the conversation.
Beautifully said, Sable Phoenix. Truly.Sable Phoenix wrote...
Shepard could be an uneducated kid from the slums. Shepard could be an orphan from a backwater farming colony. Shepard could have been raised a spacer with never a home to call her own. She could be of average intelligence or a MENSA level genius; a talented technician or an arcane biotic or a simple grunt with a gun. All of that is immaterial; the Alliance and every other race in the galaxy has thousands of soldiers that duplicate the skillset, education and intellect of Commander Shepard. What makes Shepard special, what pulls others into her orbit like moons in the gravity well of a gas giant, is the force of her personality. Specifically, it is her ability to knuckle down and push forward no matter how dire the situation grows that makes her irresistible, both to her friends and to her enemies. She is a beacon of hope because she simply will not give up, because she perseveres, and that is the one thing that makes her such a threat that the Reapers themselves sit up and take notice.
JadedLibertine wrote...
The final shots of ME2 are of Shepard restlessly striding through the Normandy, checking on her crew and squadmates who are busily preparing for what they know is coming, a vast mass of Reapers in deep space heading remorselessly towards them. Except this time they will be facing an unstoppable force of nature who will be calling on every ally and former squadmate, cashing in every favour, restlessly organising, charming ,threatening and cajoling every race so when the Reapers come they will be facing a galaxy prepared. Yet at the beginning of ME3 Shepard seems to have spent the entire preceding six months staringly listlessly out of a window in Vancouver.
And JadedLibertine, if you can write material this good when you think you're 'lowering the tone', I demand that you email me your comments ahead of time so that I can claim them as my own.
Welcome to the conversation.
Modifié par drayfish, 28 avril 2012 - 01:42 .
#1014
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 01:56
JadedLibertine
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drayfish wrote...
Dear God, so many fantastic descriptions I want to print out and staple on my walls...
Beautifully said, Sable Phoenix. Truly.Sable Phoenix wrote...
Shepard could be an uneducated kid from the slums. Shepard could be an orphan from a backwater farming colony. Shepard could have been raised a spacer with never a home to call her own. She could be of average intelligence or a MENSA level genius; a talented technician or an arcane biotic or a simple grunt with a gun. All of that is immaterial; the Alliance and every other race in the galaxy has thousands of soldiers that duplicate the skillset, education and intellect of Commander Shepard. What makes Shepard special, what pulls others into her orbit like moons in the gravity well of a gas giant, is the force of her personality. Specifically, it is her ability to knuckle down and push forward no matter how dire the situation grows that makes her irresistible, both to her friends and to her enemies. She is a beacon of hope because she simply will not give up, because she perseveres, and that is the one thing that makes her such a threat that the Reapers themselves sit up and take notice.
JadedLibertine wrote...
The final shots of ME2 are of Shepard restlessly striding through the Normandy, checking on her crew and squadmates who are busily preparing for what they know is coming, a vast mass of Reapers in deep space heading remorselessly towards them. Except this time they will be facing an unstoppable force of nature who will be calling on every ally and former squadmate, cashing in every favour, restlessly organising, charming ,threatening and cajoling every race so when the Reapers come they will be facing a galaxy prepared. Yet at the beginning of ME3 Shepard seems to have spent the entire preceding six months staringly listlessly out of a window in Vancouver.
And JadedLibertine, if you can write material this good when you think you're 'lowering the tone', I demand that you email me your comments ahead of time so that I can claim them as my own.
Welcome to the conversation.
I've earned an appreciative nod from the Professor. :happy: I'm feeling so validated right now.
Modifié par JadedLibertine, 28 avril 2012 - 01:57 .
#1015
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 02:07
DarkBladeX98
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This is legit. Makes me feel good knowing that my anger was well-placed and felt by so many others with far more reason. Seriously, I couldn't have worded it like that if I tried. And its all true what he wrote. Nice.
#1016
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 02:15
GorrilaKing
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This is by far one of the best threads on the endings I have seen so far. I am simply in awe. You actually managed to put into words exactly what I was thinking but could not be bothered to post.
#1017
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 02:18
Traim Eisenblut
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Dear Dr. Dray,
thank you for the great and entertaining read. I probably couldn`t summarize the issue so well spoken in my own language.
I have one question left:
What about the autistic integrity of BioWare regarding the debate? I would really like to know how that subject is reviewed from a professional, scientific viewpoint and sadly my medical literature does not provide any answers to that question (I haven`t found a bloodprotein to value artistic integrity yet...still searching).
thank you for the great and entertaining read. I probably couldn`t summarize the issue so well spoken in my own language.
I have one question left:
What about the autistic integrity of BioWare regarding the debate? I would really like to know how that subject is reviewed from a professional, scientific viewpoint and sadly my medical literature does not provide any answers to that question (I haven`t found a bloodprotein to value artistic integrity yet...still searching).
#1018
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 02:26
Lupus Canivus
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The most fantastic thread on the ending I have read so far. Fantastic! Professor, Sable, Jaded and all, a great understanding of whats wrong with the ending
#1019
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 04:45
antagonist99
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MintyCool wrote...
Those who can't do, teach.
Reported for trolling.
Also, study literature yourself if you don't like the conclusions someone who wrote a dissertation on it came to.
#1020
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 07:16
SkaldFish
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Well, I was on the fence regarding perseverance as central theme; I've seen it misapplied so many times I think I was running from it. But you've certainly convinced me. Incisively argued and eloquently expressed.Sable Phoenix wrote...
<reluctantSnip/>
The more I consider the problem of the ending of Mass Effect 3 and why it is so negatively received, the more conviced I am that the central theme of the entire Mass Effect trilogy, and the main theme that the ending betrays, is that of perseverence. Many people have lamented how Shepard quietly acquiesces to everything the Catalyst apparition tells her. I think this is because it's more than a betrayal of Shepard's character; it's a betrayal of the character of the game, of the trilogy as a whole.
<evenMoreReluctantSnip/>
...and +10 for use of "lambent."
"Some men give up their designs when they have almost reached the goal; While others, on the contrary, obtain a victory by exerting, at the last moment, more vigorous efforts than ever before." - Herodotus
#1021
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 07:28
JadedLibertine
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I really hope those who worked on the Mass Effect series read this thread. Not because many of the posts here so incisively critique where they went wrong but the fact their creation has provoked such exciting and stimulating debate here should be taken as a huge compliment to them, it demonstrates how many things they got right. The main storyline of ME3 is seriously flawed but it's packed with superb side-stories, engaging sub stories and wonderful characters. As Sable Phoenix so beautifully argued above, unfortunately they just happened to get the most important character seriously wrong.
#1022
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 07:57
MetalGear312
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To that end the best ending would be to Destroy the Reapers though it is morally wrong to punish EDI and the Geth, it still promotes organics to evolve to the lack of synthetic life. Then recreate or reinvent the synthetic cycle.
#1023
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 08:24
Sable Phoenix
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JadedLibertine wrote...
Sable Phoenix wrote...
>self-snippage<
Yes, yes, a million times yes.
The ending is hateful nonsense on so many levels but this single thing is what sent me into anaphylaptic shock.. It wasn't just in the final 10 minutes but throughout the entire game, the writers got Shepard wrong and forgot what made her so magnetic and so compelling. The final shots of ME2 are of Shepard restlessly striding through the Normandy, checking on her crew and squadmates who are busily preparing for what they know is coming, a vast mass of Reapers in deep space heading remorselessly towards them. Except this time they will be facing an unstoppable force of nature who will be calling on every ally and former squadmate, cashing in every favour, restlessly organising, charming ,threatening and cajoling every race so when the Reapers come they will be facing a galaxy prepared. Yet at the beginning of ME3 Shepard seems to have spent the entire preceding six months staringly listlessly out of a window in Vancouver. And when the attack comes, the focused warrior and calculating battlefield pragmatist the previous games so carefully established becomes an illogical and emotional mess. When the game reluctantly deigns to give you a dialogue option nothing Shepard is allowed to say makes any sense, as Harrison Ford said "You can type this s*** George, but you can't say it".
Since the Catalyst smashed my rose tinted spectacles into a million pieces. the flaws have become glaringly apparent. Though ME3 is excellent for certain stretches, the writers often refuse to trust the player to use their own imaginations or feel their own emotions. I could sense Hudson and Walters standing over me and very loudly and very slowly telling me exactly what I was supposed to be thinking and feeling while jabbing their fingers insistently into my chest. It would be grating and unsubtle even in a Stalinist propaganda movie.
Though regrettably I may have lowered the tone by posting here, I do love this thread. It is like sitting in a Viennese coffee house in 1900 and witnessing an intense intellectual and philosophical discussion. Now I shall settle down with my Turkish coffee and my sacher torte and let the real heavyweights continue the debate while I stroke my beard and appreciatively nod my head in thoughtful silence.
Your point is very well-taken, Libertine. The narrative troubles start with the very first scene of the game. Not only is the writing atrocious (some of the lines of dialogue just do not even follow logically from the lines directly preceding them... I actually sympathize with the admiral who says, "That's it? That's our plan?" because most of the dialogue in that scene is utter nonsense), but Shepard is so out of character it's ridiculous. Not only, as you say, has she apparently sat in a room for six months doing nothing, but now when it's "Game over, man!" and the Reapers actually land on the planet, she stupidly wants to stay an fight them? Anderson has to order her to go and do what she's spent two games trying to do already (and then even more stupidly, stays himself in direct opposition to what he's telling Shepard to do)? Is the Savior of the Citadel really someone who can't do anything without explicit intructions?
I'll ignore other niggling details like a dreadnought hovering in-atmosphere at the bottom of a gravity well when the codex of the previous games specifically states they can't do that, since such technical details don't directly impact the thematic content of the narrative, but it does serve as one of the many examples of rushed, sloppy writing. And that sloppy writing takes its worst toll on the characters themselves, most notably and most destructively on the two who have been driving the narrative forward from the very first moments of the very first game, Anderson and Shepard.
Once you get off Earth we are treated to a return of the Shepard we know and love (I mean, she stops a war by yelling), but as you mentioned, the ending shatters any illusions of competence on the part of the lead writer and magnifies all the previous narrative weaknesses under the microscope of hindsight.
Modifié par Sable Phoenix, 28 avril 2012 - 09:52 .
#1024
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 10:01
drayfish
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Opserbest asked:
Hi Osperbest (sorry I missed your post at first, and apologies in advance for another long one):
I must admit, I'm not familiar with the Final Hours app., so I can't speak in detail about anything within it, but I will say – and again this is without knowing any of the circumstances of what actually went on in the development of the game – I would find it pretty alarming if anyone involved in producing a narrative-heavy artwork such as Mass Effect considered anything in the conclusion of the work to be superfluous.
That's not to say that a story such as this should offer a tedious data-dump of exposition for the audience to wade through in its final moments, but it does require that the dénouement be consistent with the intellectual and emotional investment that has built to the finale. Otherwise (as it does here) the conclusion is not illuminatory, but instead muddled – offering not wiggle room for speculation, but gaping holes that demand plugging lest the whole ship sink.
A few days ago –Spartan name-checked an early gaming console called the Odyssey on this thread and it got me thinking about the book of that name, and the similarities that can be drawn between it and Mass Effect... So set your brain to 'bored', and keep your hands and arms inside the carriage, because I'm about to embark upon yet another tedious tl;dr ride filled with all manner of logical fallacies that you should probably ignore.
In the past few days I've been reading an unsettling amount of articles in the gaming press decrying fans unsatisfied with the endings as being unjustly obsessed with one small element of the game. Indeed, one of the principle refrains I have heard from the people who criticise those unsatisfied with the endings is that ultimately 'it's all about the journey, not the destination', implying, somehow, that it doesn't matter if the endpoint is nonsensical, or detached from the greater framework – you've had fun along the way so that's all that matters. So I would like to take this opportunity to firmly, devoutly, over-adjectively call nonsense on that whole line of argument. You may defend the endings, you may think that people misunderstood them, but no self-respecting human being who has any sense of the history of narrative can ever claim that endings do not matter.
The first (rather snarky) response to such a statement is that while many people might enjoy hearing a child tell a story, they wouldn't want to invest over 100 hours listening to one, nor turn it into a global franchise (...unless it's the Twilight series. Bam! Take that, author-I've-never-met-and-whose-success-I-shamelessly-envy). A child's story can be filled with colour and adventure, can go in all manner of directions, but it lacks the coherent order necessary for a resolved, satisfactory fiction. Form and theme are fundamental for a story to endure; the beginning, middle and end of a tale must have some kind of structural integrity; and it is arguably the conclusion that is most crucial for providing this unity.
The second (more helpful) response is to explore exactly what kind of narrative we are dealing with, and to examine why leaving the ending vague, contradictory, or dependent upon an unwarranted twist, undermines the whole negotiation of journey and destination at the core of the text, resulting in the audience feeling misled and the expedition meaningless.
A lot of people have put Shepard into the category of a 'tragic' hero – perhaps tempted to approach this series as a tragic arc because it exudes such an ominous tone. Again, I'm offering nothing new to this discussion, I'm sure, but it should be acknowledged that Shepard is not in fact a character who by thematic necessity has to die. I was more than prepared for him/her to die in my play-through, but that does not mean that this death was predestined; indeed, despite what people might suppose, classic literary tropes of death for the focal character are relatively rare. We see them frequently in Shakespearean tragedy, or Greek theatre – but Shepard is not a tragic hero. He/she has no fundamental fatal flaw like hubris, or jealousy, or rage that condemns him/her to the inexorable inevitability of thematic consequence. Even the most Paragon-y Shepard is not allowed the luxury of being a Hamlet-style procrastinator; and the most Renegade-y Shepard struggles to be fuelled by personal ambition like Macbeth, or jealousy like Othello. He/she is a cipher onto which we project our own interpretations in a feedback loop of player and text. And so we get CulturalGeekGirl's 'Crow' Shepard (who will steal your lunch money and sleep with your mum), or my Tess Shepard (who rescues pets from animal shelters and is polite to telemarketers ...And yes, I admit it, is named after Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Shut up.) But in all of these cases Shepard is driven to fulfil a larger goal, not by a personal failing that will be his/her Achilles heel.
Shepard is instead more of an epic figure – a reading that Bioware itself wants to endorse with that obnoxious Stargazer ('Can-I-haz-another-story?') scene that concludes the game, placing the character and his/her universal struggle into the confines of mythology and folklore. And mythology has no such requirement of death. When Perseus returns home to get married after defeating the wicked Gorgon, he doesn't also have to then set himself on fire and fling himself into a ditch, just for the hell of it. Or to use the example of Homer's Odyssey (the foundational text that has, in one permeation or another, inspired every quest narrative in the history of Western Literature), not only does Odysseus not die in the end, but his return home to reclaim what is his is by necessity profoundly centred on reiterating everything that he has learned on his journey.
On his quest Odysseus has developed patience and ingenuity in dealing with the Cyclops; outwitting Circe he has gained poise and cunning; with Nausicaa he has discovered humility, charm, and how to look all sexy while emerging from the surf, James-Bond-style; in the underworld he has found fortitude, hope, and just how self-involved dead people can be (sure, let's talk some more about you then...) The conclusion of the Odyssey is thus the culmination of everything that he has learned or experienced in his preceding adventures: he carries with him new truths on how to be a better hero, King, father and husband, but it is only by proving the growth that he has attained on his journey at home that his worth is measured and his quest, finally, fulfilled. His journey was great (actually it was horrible for him; great for us), but it is only the destination that validates the ride.
And the analogies that can therefore be drawn to Mass Effect are already pretty obvious... Shepard's final journey, like Odysseus' quest, is about returning home (leave aside the fact that for many people's Shepard's home probably wasn't Earth; it's clearly meant to be symbolically important); we are being compelled, just as Odysseus was, to 'Take back' what is ours. And like Odysseus, Shepard's journeys are not only about who you shot in the head, or who you romanced, or whether you bought that space-hamster, they are about the whys: the who you met along the way, what you learnt from them and their individual struggles in order to choose the path forward. The game is about developing yourself and your relationships throughout the galaxy: learning about the Genophage; the Geth/Quarian conflict; the downfall of the Protheans; the advancement of AI. You smite physical and ideological monsters (the Thorian, the Shadow Broker, whatever the hell Jacob's father was doing on that horrible planet); you descend into the underworld to gather intelligence (the Reaper Base); and each time you glean more information about this universe and Shepard's place within it. You literally and figuratively bring back everything you have learnt and assembled on your quest to aid you in the final push...
And so when Shepard (read: Odysseus) returns to Earth (Ithaca) to clear out the Reapers (the suitors are plaguing his land and smashing stuff up good), we expect him/her to employ all of the life-lessons gathered on the journey up until that point.
We see Odysseus show poise and humility, disguising himself as a beggar and awaiting the right time to strike. He outwits his opponents by cunningly devising a trap in which to snare his enemies. He proves his bravery and tenacity by facing insurmountable odds. He exhibits, through each of his actions and choices, the proof of the personal growth he has attained over the course of this quest...
In contrast, when Shepard returns to Earth he/she... well, has a conversation with a creature that reveals itself to be the cause of several millennia of devastation, then does one of the three things that this creature says – each of which appear to contradict the sum total of his/her experience up to this point.
And again (although I'm sure everyone is sick of hearing this), that's why I found the endings so disconcerting. They seemed to be superficially connected to the intellectual principles teased out throughout the remainder of the story – synthetic and organics; control versus domination; sacrifice for the greater good – but the actual application of these notions was in stark contrast to everything that had come before it (unless you were renegade humanity-first destroyer, apparently). The three options with which the game concludes, at the point of the text in which the sum total of these lessons should be reaffirmed, force Shepard to be sacrificed in order to initiate an act that sits in complete opposition to all that he/she has previously experienced. Unity in respect of diversity; the validity of artificial life; the right to autonomy; all are summarily ignored as Shepard dissolves in an ideological self-immolation. The destination undoes the entirety of the journey – at least thematically – leaving the quest itself void and the character's growth stagnant.
To argue that 'it is the journey not the destination', is to actually entirely misunderstand the structure of all quest narrative. The journey is indeed where the heart of the text lies, but until the lessons gleaned from this expedition have been confirmed by the endpoint of the tale, they are merely a series of things that happened to one person, without resonance and coherency, failing to unify into a cohesive narrative whole.
Again, maybe the Extended Cut, though clarification and expansion, will be able to flesh these final options out further, to tie them to the thematic threads that have operated up to this point and return the sense of urgency and propulsion that (up until this moment) have defined the series – but I'm not exactly sure how that could work in the narrative's current form.
p.s. – Oh, I forgot to mention: Spoiler Alert for the Odyssey. Although, I guess since it is almost three thousand years old maybe I'm in the clear.
p.p.s – But you know about The Sixth Sense, right?)
I have just finished my perusing of the Final Hours App. And in it there's a portion that talks about the endings and how Casey and Mac made the decision to cut out portions of the ending to keep the story on a "higher level" instead of giving the player superfluous information at that point, an example Mac uses is the origin of the Reapers.
At this point after seeing that, knowing that was the case but seeing Macs smug smirky face smirk and smile as he explains that they cut that content out of the game intentionally; how best in whats presented is the issue of the endings focused around that? And, how much of the narrative there could be attributed to content that could be released at a later date? From your academic understanding.
Hi Osperbest (sorry I missed your post at first, and apologies in advance for another long one):
I must admit, I'm not familiar with the Final Hours app., so I can't speak in detail about anything within it, but I will say – and again this is without knowing any of the circumstances of what actually went on in the development of the game – I would find it pretty alarming if anyone involved in producing a narrative-heavy artwork such as Mass Effect considered anything in the conclusion of the work to be superfluous.
That's not to say that a story such as this should offer a tedious data-dump of exposition for the audience to wade through in its final moments, but it does require that the dénouement be consistent with the intellectual and emotional investment that has built to the finale. Otherwise (as it does here) the conclusion is not illuminatory, but instead muddled – offering not wiggle room for speculation, but gaping holes that demand plugging lest the whole ship sink.
A few days ago –Spartan name-checked an early gaming console called the Odyssey on this thread and it got me thinking about the book of that name, and the similarities that can be drawn between it and Mass Effect... So set your brain to 'bored', and keep your hands and arms inside the carriage, because I'm about to embark upon yet another tedious tl;dr ride filled with all manner of logical fallacies that you should probably ignore.
In the past few days I've been reading an unsettling amount of articles in the gaming press decrying fans unsatisfied with the endings as being unjustly obsessed with one small element of the game. Indeed, one of the principle refrains I have heard from the people who criticise those unsatisfied with the endings is that ultimately 'it's all about the journey, not the destination', implying, somehow, that it doesn't matter if the endpoint is nonsensical, or detached from the greater framework – you've had fun along the way so that's all that matters. So I would like to take this opportunity to firmly, devoutly, over-adjectively call nonsense on that whole line of argument. You may defend the endings, you may think that people misunderstood them, but no self-respecting human being who has any sense of the history of narrative can ever claim that endings do not matter.
The first (rather snarky) response to such a statement is that while many people might enjoy hearing a child tell a story, they wouldn't want to invest over 100 hours listening to one, nor turn it into a global franchise (...unless it's the Twilight series. Bam! Take that, author-I've-never-met-and-whose-success-I-shamelessly-envy). A child's story can be filled with colour and adventure, can go in all manner of directions, but it lacks the coherent order necessary for a resolved, satisfactory fiction. Form and theme are fundamental for a story to endure; the beginning, middle and end of a tale must have some kind of structural integrity; and it is arguably the conclusion that is most crucial for providing this unity.
The second (more helpful) response is to explore exactly what kind of narrative we are dealing with, and to examine why leaving the ending vague, contradictory, or dependent upon an unwarranted twist, undermines the whole negotiation of journey and destination at the core of the text, resulting in the audience feeling misled and the expedition meaningless.
A lot of people have put Shepard into the category of a 'tragic' hero – perhaps tempted to approach this series as a tragic arc because it exudes such an ominous tone. Again, I'm offering nothing new to this discussion, I'm sure, but it should be acknowledged that Shepard is not in fact a character who by thematic necessity has to die. I was more than prepared for him/her to die in my play-through, but that does not mean that this death was predestined; indeed, despite what people might suppose, classic literary tropes of death for the focal character are relatively rare. We see them frequently in Shakespearean tragedy, or Greek theatre – but Shepard is not a tragic hero. He/she has no fundamental fatal flaw like hubris, or jealousy, or rage that condemns him/her to the inexorable inevitability of thematic consequence. Even the most Paragon-y Shepard is not allowed the luxury of being a Hamlet-style procrastinator; and the most Renegade-y Shepard struggles to be fuelled by personal ambition like Macbeth, or jealousy like Othello. He/she is a cipher onto which we project our own interpretations in a feedback loop of player and text. And so we get CulturalGeekGirl's 'Crow' Shepard (who will steal your lunch money and sleep with your mum), or my Tess Shepard (who rescues pets from animal shelters and is polite to telemarketers ...And yes, I admit it, is named after Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Shut up.) But in all of these cases Shepard is driven to fulfil a larger goal, not by a personal failing that will be his/her Achilles heel.
Shepard is instead more of an epic figure – a reading that Bioware itself wants to endorse with that obnoxious Stargazer ('Can-I-haz-another-story?') scene that concludes the game, placing the character and his/her universal struggle into the confines of mythology and folklore. And mythology has no such requirement of death. When Perseus returns home to get married after defeating the wicked Gorgon, he doesn't also have to then set himself on fire and fling himself into a ditch, just for the hell of it. Or to use the example of Homer's Odyssey (the foundational text that has, in one permeation or another, inspired every quest narrative in the history of Western Literature), not only does Odysseus not die in the end, but his return home to reclaim what is his is by necessity profoundly centred on reiterating everything that he has learned on his journey.
On his quest Odysseus has developed patience and ingenuity in dealing with the Cyclops; outwitting Circe he has gained poise and cunning; with Nausicaa he has discovered humility, charm, and how to look all sexy while emerging from the surf, James-Bond-style; in the underworld he has found fortitude, hope, and just how self-involved dead people can be (sure, let's talk some more about you then...) The conclusion of the Odyssey is thus the culmination of everything that he has learned or experienced in his preceding adventures: he carries with him new truths on how to be a better hero, King, father and husband, but it is only by proving the growth that he has attained on his journey at home that his worth is measured and his quest, finally, fulfilled. His journey was great (actually it was horrible for him; great for us), but it is only the destination that validates the ride.
And the analogies that can therefore be drawn to Mass Effect are already pretty obvious... Shepard's final journey, like Odysseus' quest, is about returning home (leave aside the fact that for many people's Shepard's home probably wasn't Earth; it's clearly meant to be symbolically important); we are being compelled, just as Odysseus was, to 'Take back' what is ours. And like Odysseus, Shepard's journeys are not only about who you shot in the head, or who you romanced, or whether you bought that space-hamster, they are about the whys: the who you met along the way, what you learnt from them and their individual struggles in order to choose the path forward. The game is about developing yourself and your relationships throughout the galaxy: learning about the Genophage; the Geth/Quarian conflict; the downfall of the Protheans; the advancement of AI. You smite physical and ideological monsters (the Thorian, the Shadow Broker, whatever the hell Jacob's father was doing on that horrible planet); you descend into the underworld to gather intelligence (the Reaper Base); and each time you glean more information about this universe and Shepard's place within it. You literally and figuratively bring back everything you have learnt and assembled on your quest to aid you in the final push...
And so when Shepard (read: Odysseus) returns to Earth (Ithaca) to clear out the Reapers (the suitors are plaguing his land and smashing stuff up good), we expect him/her to employ all of the life-lessons gathered on the journey up until that point.
We see Odysseus show poise and humility, disguising himself as a beggar and awaiting the right time to strike. He outwits his opponents by cunningly devising a trap in which to snare his enemies. He proves his bravery and tenacity by facing insurmountable odds. He exhibits, through each of his actions and choices, the proof of the personal growth he has attained over the course of this quest...
In contrast, when Shepard returns to Earth he/she... well, has a conversation with a creature that reveals itself to be the cause of several millennia of devastation, then does one of the three things that this creature says – each of which appear to contradict the sum total of his/her experience up to this point.
And again (although I'm sure everyone is sick of hearing this), that's why I found the endings so disconcerting. They seemed to be superficially connected to the intellectual principles teased out throughout the remainder of the story – synthetic and organics; control versus domination; sacrifice for the greater good – but the actual application of these notions was in stark contrast to everything that had come before it (unless you were renegade humanity-first destroyer, apparently). The three options with which the game concludes, at the point of the text in which the sum total of these lessons should be reaffirmed, force Shepard to be sacrificed in order to initiate an act that sits in complete opposition to all that he/she has previously experienced. Unity in respect of diversity; the validity of artificial life; the right to autonomy; all are summarily ignored as Shepard dissolves in an ideological self-immolation. The destination undoes the entirety of the journey – at least thematically – leaving the quest itself void and the character's growth stagnant.
To argue that 'it is the journey not the destination', is to actually entirely misunderstand the structure of all quest narrative. The journey is indeed where the heart of the text lies, but until the lessons gleaned from this expedition have been confirmed by the endpoint of the tale, they are merely a series of things that happened to one person, without resonance and coherency, failing to unify into a cohesive narrative whole.
Again, maybe the Extended Cut, though clarification and expansion, will be able to flesh these final options out further, to tie them to the thematic threads that have operated up to this point and return the sense of urgency and propulsion that (up until this moment) have defined the series – but I'm not exactly sure how that could work in the narrative's current form.
p.s. – Oh, I forgot to mention: Spoiler Alert for the Odyssey. Although, I guess since it is almost three thousand years old maybe I'm in the clear.
p.p.s – But you know about The Sixth Sense, right?)
Modifié par drayfish, 28 avril 2012 - 10:31 .
#1025
Posté 28 avril 2012 - 10:10
JadedLibertine
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Sable Phoenix wrote...
JadedLibertine wrote...
Sable Phoenix wrote...
>self-snippage<
.
Your point is very well-taken, Libertine. The narrative troubles start with the very first scene of the game. Not only is the writing atrocious (some of the lines of dialogue just do not even follow logically from the lines directly preceding them... I actually sympathize with the admiral who says, "That's it? That's our plan?" because most of the dialogue in that scene is utter nonsense), but Shepard is so out of character it's ridiculous. Not only, as you say, has she apparently sat in a room for six months doing nothing, but now when it's "Game over, man!" and the Reapers actually land on the planet, she stupidly wants to stay an fight them? Anderson has to order her to go and do what she's spent two games trying to do already (and then even more stupidly, stays himself in direct opposition to what he's telling Shepard to do)? Is the Savior of the Citadel really someone who can't do anything without explicit intructions? I'll ignore other niggling details like a dreadnought hovering in-atmosphere at the bottom of a gravity well when the codex of the previous games specifically states they can't do that, since such technical details don't directly impact the thematic content of the narrative, but it does serve as one of the many examples of rushed, sloppy writing. And that sloppy writing takes its worst toll on the characters themselves, most notably and most damagingly on the two who have been driving the narrative forward from the very first moments of the very first game, Anderson and Shepard.
Once you get off Earth we are treated to a return of the Shepard we know and love (I mean, she stops a war by yelling), but as you mentioned, the ending shatters any illusions of competence on the part of the lead writer and magnifies all the previous narrative weaknesses under the microscope of hindsight.
I love those final shots of ME2, that scene on the Normandy needs no dialogue. Shepard's purposeful walk and determined expression says it all. She's energised and ready, a warrior about to face what she has spent her whole life preparing for. Just from a few glances and respectful nods we can tell her entire squad would without any thought or hesitation follow her into hell without her needing to ask them to, like them we as players can feel Shepard's awesome power and charisma. Then that final image. Every time I finished ME2, my brain would be fizzing and popping with ideas and anticipation for what is about to come.
Yet for some reason shortly after ME2 Shepard seems to have had a major psychological breakdown, only way to possibly explain how lethargic and irrational she is at the start of ME3. It's like watching Aliens and after being so revved up by Ripley's climactic fight with the Alien queen, going straight into Alien3. It sucked the life and spirit out of me. The momentum the previous games had generated was what got through my first playthrough.
If the writers wanted to start the game with Shepard out of action, they could have put her in a hellish Batarian gulag possibly after being betrayed by somebody she had previously trusted. Perhaps they considered Shepard an acceptable sacrifice to appease the Batarians and avoid a war just before the Reapers come. Interrogation scenes could set the scene and fill in the exposition, a potential Batarian squadmate could be introduced, then the Normandy commanded by Anderson could mount a daring rescue just before the Reapers attack and virtually obliterate the Batarian Hegemony. Then the preparations for war could begin, the attack on Earth would happen much later in the game.
