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[edisnooM]

 
This word shall be my Magnum Opus, my great contribution to the English language.

"Reaperduction"

noun

The act or process of creating a Reaper.

"HEY EARTH, LAY BACK AND RELAX. HARBINGER'S GONNA ROCK YOUR WORLD ALL NIGHT LONG. THIS WON'T HURT YOU."

Ugh, I think the Mass Effect ending broke my mind.


Edit: And this really shouldn't be at the top of the page

Modifié par edisnooM, 18 mai 2012 - 12:21 .

[drayfish]

Hawk227 wrote...

* Totally unrelated, but I've always thought it would be cool to have GTA style sandbox game based in Omega or Illium, where the entire game was based within a really detailed version of that location. You could play as an up-and-comer in the Blue Suns or Eclipse, or even one of the squad-mates in Garrus/Archangels Omega gang.

Yes! Yes, this always yes. Yes.

[delta_vee]

Hawk227 wrote...

I agree that ME3 could not accomplish this by leading with the Reaper invasion, but I'm not sure if that's really a bad thing. One of the things that made ME3 successful (until the ITM) was that forward momentum, that urgency. There was this constant sense of "I need to unite the galaxy now, or there will be nothing left of Earth". It added the tension that played such a big role in papering over some of the... exeptionally odd... choices.

I think they still could have easily kept the Reaper invasion for the third act. Instead of spending months under house arrest, let us do what we ended up doing anyways - gathering allies, pieceing together lost superweapons, ending wars by yelling.

Then bring the Reapers down on our heads, as promised, and watch as our options and our hub worlds are closed off one by one.

* Totally unrelated, but I've always thought it would be cool to have GTA style sandbox game based in Omega or Illium, where the entire game was based within a really detailed version of that location. You could play as an up-and-comer in the Blue Suns or Eclipse, or even one of the squad-mates in Garrus/Archangels Omega gang.

ME was conceived as a sandbox. It would certainly be cool if they could achieve it. Once this whole decimation-of-the-galaxy thing is figured out, of course.

You talked about the game rewarding completionism, and players who are not completionist are playing it wrong. I realize this is an unfair judgement, but that's kind of how I feel about people that liked synthesis. I feel like they're engaging with the text... wrong*. I feel like there's a disconnect between what the game is telling them, and what they're hearing. The only parts of the text that relate even remotely to synthesis within the game are effectively arguments against it (Saren, etc.). Since the exposition provided by the catalyst is so vague, you have to incorporate your own notions and prejudices**. You almost have to actively replace stuff that is in the text, with stuff that is not in the text. Consequently, a lot of people were picking Synthesis for reasons that were completely separate from anything within the ME universe. That just seems inappropriate, I guess.

I don't think you're quite wrong here, but that's a product of the execution, not the intent. I think it's useful to differentiate those two things here.

[edisnooM]

delta_vee wrote...

You talked about the game rewarding completionism, and players who are not completionist are playing it wrong. I realize this is an unfair judgement, but that's kind of how I feel about people that liked synthesis. I feel like they're engaging with the text... wrong*. I feel like there's a disconnect between what the game is telling them, and what they're hearing. The only parts of the text that relate even remotely to synthesis within the game are effectively arguments against it (Saren, etc.). Since the exposition provided by the catalyst is so vague, you have to incorporate your own notions and prejudices**. You almost have to actively replace stuff that is in the text, with stuff that is not in the text. Consequently, a lot of people were picking Synthesis for reasons that were completely separate from anything within the ME universe. That just seems inappropriate, I guess.

I don't think you're quite wrong here, but that's a product of the execution, not the intent. I think it's useful to differentiate those two things here.

I'm not sure if this has already been mentioned (it's kind of hard to keep track of all the things discussed here), but it also seems as though the game rewards lack of completion as well. Someone who never activated Legion in ME2, or did the Consensus side quest in ME3, and still saw the Geth as the enemies from ME1 and thus sided with the Quarians could arrive at the end feeling that Destroy was perfectly fine.

This also seems to be the case for someone playing ME3 without any prior Mass Effect experience. They would enter the game not being able to make peace even if they wanted to, and really would they care about the Geth at all without any background? This again leads to them getting to the end and Destroy being (most likely) more palatable.

If anything it seems the completionists or long term fans who have been playing since ME1 (or ME2 for PS3) are given the short end of the stick for knowing more about the Mass Effect universe.

Modifié par edisnooM, 18 mai 2012 - 12:47 .

[drayfish]

@ delta_vee:

Fantastic summation of that irreconcilable tension between the Quest narrative and the War story.

delta_vee wrote...

This tension is shown in the dissociation of Crucible and armada mentioned earlier, as well as the absurdity of the eavesdropped fedex quests, and the difficulty the writers seemed to have encountered constructing meaningful side missions. The bounds of the war story limit the quest to the detriment of both. We have so little of the freedom we found in the previous games, and at the end this game orders us into the heart of the enemy (both literally and metaphorically) and presents us with a conclusion more suited to Heart of Darkness than Gilgamesh.

Perfect.

p.s. - And I should say that in Hawk227's GTA-Effect I am imagining Garrus as a quest-giver sitting in a Godfather-style leather-backed chair, mumbling his missions at me while bathed in slashes of light from the Venetian blinds.

'Someday,' he says, 'and this day may never come, I will ask you to do a series of fetch quests and timed racing scenarios. And there will be a rudimentary police force that you can easilly evade. Also, you can probably sleep with the Asari dancers for HP. Just sayin'.'

Modifié par drayfish, 18 mai 2012 - 01:07 .

[KitaSaturnyne]

@delta_vee (Change in velocity, isn't it?)

I just mean that the ITM is so disconnected from the rest of ME3 that it's like someone threw in the beginning to a completely different story onto this point and called it the ending to ME3.

"Have you got the ending to ME3 yet?"

"No, but Johnson has the opening to this other project we were doing that needs your approval-..."

"Excellent. Tack that on ME3 and call it the ending."

drayfish wrote...

p.s. - And I should say that in Hawk227's GTA-Effect I am imagining Garrus as a quest-giver sitting in a Godfather-style leather-backed chair, mumbling his missions at me while bathed in slashes of light from the Venetian blinds.

'Someday,' he says, 'and this day may never come, I will ask you to do a series of fetch quests and timed racing scenarios. And there will be a rudimentary police force that you can easilly evade. Also, you can probably sleep with the Asari dancers for HP. Just sayin'.'

Just don't get with Morinth.

The traffic is airborne, isn't it? How would carjacking work? Yikes.

[delta_vee]

Hawk227 wrote...

The only parts of the text that relate even remotely to synthesis within the game are effectively arguments against it (Saren, etc.).

To expand on this, I'm not quite sure you're accounting for everything. As was put forth by someone upthread (apologies, forgotten-by-me poster) the process of synthesis is already in progress. Everyone's got an omni-tool. Biotics are a product of implants. Shepard is chock-full of cybernetics. The geth inhabit quarian suits once peace is made. The Shepard-VI (and it's possible Lazarus Project cousin) suggest a hybrid intelligence. There are probably more I'm missing.

That said, forcible synthesis is the realm of husks and deluded turian collaborators. So yes, there's a gulf there between intent and text, and the Synthesis option is still a Bad Idea. But I think we've already established a whole host of ways in which the (exceptionally odd) developers misread their own text in a number of places, so in this case I can't color myself surprised in how they misread this.

edisnooM wrote...

I'm not sure if this has already been mentioned (it's kind of hard to keep track of all the things discussed here), but it also seems as though the game rewards lack of completion as well. Someone who never activated Legion in ME2, or did the Consensus side quest in ME3, and still saw the Geth as the enemies from ME1 and thus sided with the Quarians could arrive at the end feeling that Destroy was perfectly fine.

This also seems to be the case for someone playing ME3 without any prior Mass Effect experience. They would enter the game not being able to make peace even if they wanted to, and really would they care about the Geth at all without any background? This again leads to them getting to the end and Destroy being (most likely) more palatable.

If anything it seems the completionists or long term fans who have been playing since ME1 (or ME2 for PS3) are given the short end of the stick for knowing more about the Mass Effect universe.

You have a point, certainly, and I'm honestly not sure how much to chalk up to conspiracy and how much to claim is accidental. I don't think it's entirely unintentional that Destroy is the base option for unimported characters. From what I've seen of ending supporters, however, many if not most of them have played as much as those of us on the opposite side. It's an interesting observation about the construction, but I'm not sure the attitudes and histories of pro-enders necessarily support it.

[Seijin8]

KitaSaturnyne wrote...

The traffic is airborne, isn't it? How would carjacking work? Yikes.

Well.. Kai Leng seemed to have some ideas on this.

As an aside on that scene:  I can hack a Geth Prime so it kills its buddies, but I can't override the safeties on the aircar to make it barrel roll to dump a-hole off the roof?  Geth need to upgrade their software apparently.

[delta_vee]

KitaSaturnyne wrote...

@delta_vee (Change in velocity, isn't it?)

It is, yes. I love me some rockets.

I just mean that the ITM is so disconnected from the rest of ME3 that it's like someone threw in the beginning to a completely different story onto this point and called it the ending to ME3.

I agree, certainly. Maybe it's more like something of Dickens, though, instead of Melville. Dickens was a little cheerier.

The traffic is airborne, isn't it? How would carjacking work? Yikes.

We saw that scene. It had Kai Leng in it. Let's not go there for now.

[KitaSaturnyne]

delta_vee wrote...

It is, yes. I love me some rockets.

Do you have a significant other who goes by delta_tee?

We saw that scene. It had Kai Leng in it. Let's not go there for now.

Was I the only one who thought "Ugh, Attack of the Clones" during this part?

Does he jack a car in that scene? I just remember him hopping onto one that had more or less been sent for him.

[delta_vee]

KitaSaturnyne wrote...

Do you have a significant other who goes by delta_tee?

I prefer more mature relationships. With logarithms.

Was I the only one who thought "Ugh, Attack of the Clones" during this part?

No, you were not.

Does he jack a car in that scene? I just remember him hopping onto one that had more or less been sent for him.

He tries a carjack. He hops on the hood and waves around his stupid arm swords.

Modifié par delta_vee, 18 mai 2012 - 01:34 .

[edisnooM]

delta_vee wrote...

You have a point, certainly, and I'm honestly not sure how much to chalk up to conspiracy and how much to claim is accidental. I don't think it's entirely unintentional that Destroy is the base option for unimported characters. From what I've seen of ending supporters, however, many if not most of them have played as much as those of us on the opposite side. It's an interesting observation about the construction, but I'm not sure the attitudes and histories of pro-enders necessarily support it.

Sorry I wasn't meaning to suggest that the only reason that people like the ending was because they hadn't played the other games thoroughly. But for me at least the knowledge I had gained from playing through the series seriously impaired my ability to enjoy the ending.

[delta_vee]

edisnooM wrote...

Sorry I wasn't meaning to suggest that the only reason that people like the ending was because they hadn't played the other games thoroughly. But for me at least the knowledge I had gained from playing through the series seriously impaired my ability to enjoy the ending.

I wasn't suggesting you were suggesting that. The fact that the game's construction can be seen to support this is...curious. I just can't figure out exactly how intentional that was.

[Hawk227]

delta_vee wrote...

Hawk227 wrote...

The only parts of the text that relate even remotely to synthesis within the game are effectively arguments against it (Saren, etc.).

To expand on this, I'm not quite sure you're accounting for everything. As was put forth by someone upthread (apologies, forgotten-by-me poster) the process of synthesis is already in progress. Everyone's got an omni-tool. Biotics are a product of implants. Shepard is chock-full of cybernetics. The geth inhabit quarian suits once peace is made. The Shepard-VI (and it's possible Lazarus Project cousin) suggest a hybrid intelligence. There are probably more I'm missing.

That said, forcible synthesis is the realm of husks and deluded turian collaborators. So yes, there's a gulf there between intent and text, and the Synthesis option is still a Bad Idea. But I think we've already established a whole host of ways in which the (exceptionally odd) developers misread their own text in a number of places, so in this case I can't color myself surprised in how they misread this.

Yeah, I was speaking specifically to synthesis as it relates to the Crucible, rather than transhumanism.

You have a point, certainly, and I'm honestly not sure how much to chalk up to conspiracy and how much to claim is accidental. I don't think it's entirely unintentional that Destroy is the base option for unimported characters.

Is that true? My understanding is that whether the base option is Control or Destroy depends on whether you saved the Collector Base. If you destroyed the base, you get "destroy" first. If you kept the base, you get control first. My understanding (I've not tried it, so I'm not positive) is that the default choice for a non imported Shepard was that the base was kept.

[KitaSaturnyne]

I would like to say that I didn't know anyone could have intelligent arm swords.

That said, I just played and finished Alan Wake for about the fifth time in the last month. In the last few segments, the Dark Presence is defeated and it knows it. However, it's trying every last desperate tactic it can think of to defeat Alan Wake. It tries convincing Wake that he's back home with his wife, that his wife hates him, but like all its other efforts, these things fail. In the end, Alan really does make a sacrifice that feels like an actual sacrifice, unlike the Non-Catalyst Choice Thingy 3000™.

While I've been slagging Mac Walters, I applaude Sam Lake his is superb ability to tell a story. I want to learn to write like he does.

[Scam_poo]

Sohlito wrote...

Man....can we trade professors?

[edisnooM]

delta_vee wrote...

edisnooM wrote...

Sorry I wasn't meaning to suggest that the only reason that people like the ending was because they hadn't played the other games thoroughly. But for me at least the knowledge I had gained from playing through the series seriously impaired my ability to enjoy the ending.

I wasn't suggesting you were suggesting that. The fact that the game's construction can be seen to support this is...curious. I just can't figure out exactly how intentional that was.

It does bring up another thought, given the statements from BioWare that this was a good entry point (The final chapter? Really?), how much do you think was designed for new entrants? Was that why Rannoch was designed the way it was, to reinforce the Synthetic vs Organics aspect? Does the ending fit better when viewed as a standalone title?

To me the logic presented by the Catalyst and his explanations of the solutions still seem flawed even just in the context of ME3, but maybe that's just me and the fact that it's hard to think as you would think if you didn't know something.

[MrFob]

Wow, FTL thread is moving fast.
First off, I agree that the timing of the plot missions in ME2 could have improved the flow of the main story a lot. And I was not proposing to have all recruitment and loyalty missions directly relate to the collectors. I agree they draw much of their strength from the fact that you don't get to see them very often. However, some threads would have been nice. My best example for this is Grunt's recruitment mission which is actually Okeer's recruitment mission going bad. We want Okeer because he had dealings with the collectors and we want to know if he learned anything useful in fighting them. Turns out we don't get what we wanted and the whole scenario plays out very differently from what we expected but the connection is there. Compare that with all the missions we get in Illium: Thanes RM, Samara's RM and Miranda's LM. None of those have even the smallest connection with the larger issue. I am not even suggesting that every single mission needs this thread but Illium is especially bad in that regard because as one quest hub, you are likely to play these missions back to back which leaves you very disconnected. Again, this may be regarded as a timing issue and maybe that's all it is but nonetheless, it's there.
anyway, I don't want to drag this one out (although it might be too late to say that now).

EDIT: Uhg, silly me. While I was writing the above dribble I forgot the larger point I actually wanted to make here:
IMO the main plots of all the Mass Effect games have had the problem of introducing this inherent sense of urgency. In ME1, the main quest is actually called "A race against time". In ME2, there is the crew abduction problem and in ME3 you are confronted at every corner with the fact that while you play diplomat, thousands upon thousands of humans are harvested each day on earth.
While this of course adds a sense of excitement and tension to the plots, I think in future work, BioWare has to find some way to take a bit of that urgency out of the main plot in order to accommodate the more individual side missions. That has to be done carefully because it is very susceptible to backfire and produce a lame main plot but it would allow us to go on side missions without feeling somewhat guilty about it. The first half of ME2 demonstrated that this is possible to some extent.

And hey, I love the idea of an ME GTA. Back after the release of ME1 I was in a thread of some person who had this idea after looking out over the citadel wards. Of course Omega was unknown back then but the idea was to play a guy, being down in the rough of the wards, working his way up through the ranks of duct rats and organized crime. By the end he would be a big shot, even working for the shadow broker, finally taking over Choru's Den and take his gangster name: Fist. Tragic ending - implied.

Modifié par MrFob, 18 mai 2012 - 02:44 .

[delta_vee]

Hawk227 wrote...

Is that true? My understanding is that whether the base option is Control or Destroy depends on whether you saved the Collector Base. If you destroyed the base, you get "destroy" first. If you kept the base, you get control first. My understanding (I've not tried it, so I'm not positive) is that the default choice for a non imported Shepard was that the base was kept.

Yep. Default is having destroyed the base.

edisnooM wrote...

It does bring up another thought, given the statements from BioWare that this was a good entry point (The final chapter? Really?), how much do you think was designed for new entrants? Was that why Rannoch was designed the way it was, to reinforce the Synthetic vs Organics aspect? Does the ending fit better when viewed as a standalone title?

I doubt it. With both Tuchanka and Rannoch so dependent on earlier information, I can only imagine new players going through those sequences in sheer confusion.

Also, does it bother anyone else that the Geth VI has holographic-or-something versions of Legion's hole and patch job?

To me the logic presented by the Catalyst and his explanations of the solutions still seem flawed even just in the context of ME3, but maybe that's just me and the fact that it's hard to think as you would think if you didn't know something.

I think they'd still seem flawed - unless you don't get a high enough EMS, in which case you've only got Destroy. What to make of that, I'm not quite sure.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

delta_vee wrote...

To me the logic presented by the Catalyst and his explanations of the solutions still seem flawed even just in the context of ME3, but maybe that's just me and the fact that it's hard to think as you would think if you didn't know something.

I think they'd still seem flawed - unless you don't get a high enough EMS, in which case you've only got Destroy. What to make of that, I'm not quite sure.

This is another thing that gets me in regards to IT. Apparently Harbringer doesn't even try to indoctrinate you if you are incompetent? He just lets you break free 'cause he's like "Meh, what harm could this jackhole do? He only got the minimum amount of EMS, I'll just give him some hallucinations of the world being destroyed and he won't get to see himself breathe."

"Unless he kept the collector base, in which case an equally incompetent shepard is something I want access to." 

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 18 mai 2012 - 03:01 .

[Seijin8]

A slight digression: My father is a poet. He explained to me that poetic storytelling starts with a larger text, and removes words, sentences, paragraphs even, until you reach that point where any further subtraction will eliminate the message. The principle is to leave the reader with only those elements needed to generate understanding of the premise or message, without needing any of the narrative trappings of arc, storyline, characters (but not necessarily abandoning those either).

The ultimate art of poetry is one of emotional efficacy: get a solid theme and feeling across without using a lot of words. The failed poet is the one who removes *one word too many*.

ME3's endings have several paragraphs missing. The substance is gone. There is just enough to have a clue where the writers *wanted* it to go, but the wreckage is too severe and has lost its feel (and therefore, its artistry).

[KitaSaturnyne]

When I first finished the game, I originally didn't get the stargazer scene. Since then, I've come to realize that the point of the scene was to have Buzz Aldrin in it.

[Seijin8]

KitaSaturnyne wrote...

When I first finished the game, I originally didn't get the stargazer scene. Since then, I've come to realize that the point of the scene was to have Buzz Aldrin in it.

And the joke there is that he could have easily been a support character in one of the Priority: Earth missions.  Shellshock and an "I've seen s**t that would terrify a Reaper" attitude would have covered for the apparent lack of voice-over talent.  Instead he got a meaningless scene at the end of an ultimately meaningless ending.

So, even granting that the reason was simply to have him there (which honestly, was cool), he was poorly utilized.

Modifié par Seijin8, 18 mai 2012 - 03:43 .

[MrFob]

I thought the point of that scene was to set the stage for the selling of DLC.

I guess that makes DLC the new Buzz-word.

Modifié par MrFob, 18 mai 2012 - 03:46 .

[KitaSaturnyne]

Seijin8 wrote...

And the joke there is that he could have easily been a support character in one of the Priority: Earth missions.  Shellshock and an "I've seen s**t that would terrify a Reaper" attitude would have covered for the apparent lack of voice-over talent.  Instead he got a meaningless scene at the end of an ultimately meaningless ending.

So, even granting that the reason was simply to have him there (which honestly, was cool), he was poorly utilized.

The whole stage was poorly done, we can agree. I mean, the only reason we know it's in London is all the red phone booths that mysteriously survived the destruction of their environs. No running by (or through) major London landmarks (destroyed a la ID4), or anything like that. Just a street populated by like, ten big red phone booths.