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[Eain]

Does anyone else have the same problem I'm having? Even beyond the other problems with the ending, I just do not want to do anything the Catalyst offers me. As a result, I never choose and just turn the game off.

I prefer to let the choice remain unmade, because no matter what I do I end up having to betray something about my Shepard or the people in the galaxy. I don't want to do that, at all.

I allowed the Geth sentience, so I simply won't destroy them, period.

I killed the Illusive Man because I did not believe in controlling the Reapers, and I still don't. It's an option that came out of left field anyway, and the only reason that console seems to be there is because there is a plot character that wants to do it. How convenient. Why should controlling them be an option at all? Why couldn't TIM just have been delusional? It makes no sense.

I'm not gonna commit to synthesis either. In its essence synthesis attempts to speak to transhuman themes, but as it stands its just forced rape of the galaxy. Why would Shepard work to defeat the Reapers the entire series only to end up making the people she fought to protect part of the Reapers' species, as that appears to be why the Reapers suddenly lose interest and leave Earth.

I never choose an ending because no matter what I choose it's horrible. None of the endings have any redeeming factors. I always play up to the end of Rannoch because up until that point the game still makes sense. Sort of. Beyond that I prefer to just leave it up to the imagination.

Shepard gathered the fleets and kicked Reaper ass.

The end. 

[Allan Schumacher]

Eain wrote...

Does anyone else have the same problem I'm having? Even beyond the other problems with the ending, I just do not want to do anything the Catalyst offers me. As a result, I never choose and just turn the game off.

I prefer to let the choice remain unmade, because no matter what I do I end up having to betray something about my Shepard or the people in the galaxy. I don't want to do that, at all.

My impression was that this was probably the idea, so in that sense the goal was probably achieved.  And in JMO, this is probably what was meant when it was stated at PAX that "we weren't expecting [the response]."

What I personally enjoyed about the endings was that every choice had a difficult cost associated with it.  It reminded me of Legion's loyalty mission in ME2, which is one of my favourite missions in the entire trilogy.

I never choose an ending because no matter what I choose it's horrible. None of the endings have any redeeming factors. I always play up to the end of Rannoch because up until that point the game still makes sense. Sort of. Beyond that I prefer to just leave it up to the imagination.

Shepard gathered the fleets and kicked Reaper ass.

The end. 

I don't know if we can say that there is nothing redeeming about them.  You've made it clear that you feel the cost with each choice outweighs any potential benefits though, which is maybe what was unexpected as well.

Whether or not the choices have any redeeming value is inconclusive given the current state of the ending, and it is something that I feel can be remedied with the ending DLC since it'll provide an aftermath of the choices made during the final scene.  Or at least it sounds like it will.


Cheers.

Allan


EDIT:  Posts like yours make me think that had the ending offered a 4th solution of rejecting the Catalyst's different solutions, might have helped mitigate some of the outrage.  Though I should reiterate from past posts that I personally would have had this result in the cycle being fulfilled and the Reapers winning.  JMO and probably why people want me as far away from the design pit as possible 

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 27 avril 2012 - 07:38 .

[Allan Schumacher]

Eain wrote...

Hi Allan. And well, rejecting the Catalyst would've gone a long way. But here's what I really feel: destroy is the only legitimate ending and they included an arbitrary drawback to it so that it wouldn't be as easy to pick. There's no doubt that if Destroy simply killed Reapers and nothing else, everybody would pick it.

That probably is the case in that I agree it'd be a no brainer choice if only the Reapers died, though I disagree that it's truly arbitrary.  If it was, then you could put any species in place of the Geth and it'd still make just as much sense.  That the Geth are the most similar to the Reapers (synthetic life), and coupled with things that the Catalyst says regarding the destroy ending, I felt they were more "collateral damage."  Though I've had this conversation with another on the board and he did say it really felt like the Catalyst was saying "Synthetics are bad, so you can destroy them all to save yourself from being destroyed by them later!"  So in that sense the level of openness is probably detrimental.

Control and Synthesis really exist only as solutions for people who don't want to kill the Geth. It's as Shepard said: if you reduce war to math it becomes murder. Am I gonna kill off an entire sentient species simply because that stops cycles? From a utilitarian POV that may make sense, but utilitarianism is a deeply flawed moral system.

Perhaps for many people it is, but at the same time in a different ending thread a poster asked me if I felt that controlling the Reapers might actually be the most ideal solution.  I asked him to elaborate and he essentially said that controlling the Reapers allows Shepard to utilize the Reapers to help rebuild after the war, and maintains a lot of the core technology resulting in significantly less galactic upheaval.  It was so well thought out that I really couldn't tell him no.  And it's situations like these that I think was the goal by leaving the end the way it was, because I HAVE been finding the discussions fun and entertaining.

What I think is really bothersome about the whole thing is the fact that the lead writer seems to have a certain idea about the future of synthetic life that the fanbase simply does not agree with. When I hear the Catalyst talk, I feel like I'm listening to Mac Walters. I have strong suspicions that either he or Casey Hudson remain convinced that organic and synthetic life are inherently irreconcilable. And while they're free to believe that, I am someone staunchly convinced of the opposite and so the ending feels forced to me. When the Catalyst (wrote Geth here, edited) starts talking about how the conflict is inevitable, I really feel that he's just talking out of his ass, because the fact alone that I don't agree with what it's saying means that it is NOT inevitable at all.

It just bothers me that there's this vicious anti-synthetic streak underscoring the series at the last possible moment. It just seems like covert racism to me, and it really killed some of the glory of the Mass Effect series. Rejecting the Catalyst would at least help me say no to that vision, but if saying no to a philosophical premise equates to dooming trillions to extinction then again we're talking about a price that's too high to pay.

I think it's a bit tricky to start reading toooo much into the writer's motivations.  I don't usually comment on them but I will go to bat for my colleagues and say that I do not believe that the endings were intended to come across as statements of condoning racism or genocide or anything like that.  I do think that the goal was to kind of make players think about the consequences of their actions though, and will also say that I think it reflects really well on the fanbase that does feel that killing the Geth is too high of a cost, or that forcing evolution doesn't seem right, and all those things.

Now I'm probabl just being all dramatic here, but I sort of saw the choices provided at the end as striking me very similiarly to Legion's loyalty mission where it made me think about what I, Allan, really feel about the ramifications of those choices.  Very, very few games have ever made me reflect on the person I am like that.  Though this does open up the ending to critique because the idea of it being a roleplaying game is to allow the character to take on a role while allowing the player to distance himself from it somewhat.

[Allan Schumacher]

Allan I'd like you to promise me something.

If there is ever a position of some kind of quality checker or story quality checker for the mass effect franchise please apply for it. You've presented a better face for this whole discussion than anyone else at bioware. You really should have some kind of story checking role.

Haha you flatter me. I'm not entirely convinced I'm wholly qualified. I think it's a bit easier for me to come up with some ideas for how the ending would have worked better because it's impossible for me to remove the influence of reading up on what fans have said. I am trying to be more proactive in seeing the bigger picture of the DA franchise though, as it can be easy to forget that I'm making a game as I spend the vast majority of my time working on the tools, pipelines, and whatnot to help content creators work their magic.

Yes Allan, I fear that I dislike your way of running game stories. Haha.. I'd argue for a spectrum of outcomes, nothing fancy, but certainly not running from grimdark to grimdark, and then jumping tracks with Shepard's character at the last.

Hahaha. I like a spectrum of available endings as well, although while I like the idea of "choice and consequence" I think I have different ideals for choices and consequences.

I like the ability to make choices, but I also don't mind that somethings are outside of my influence and will always happen (especially since it often requires meta knowledge that the player wouldn't have). I love consequences, which is basically the game reflecting on my choices, but I tend to prefer that they are distanced from the choice itself.

For example, take Virmire. Shepard is provided with making a choice to have to save Kaiden or Ashley. I like that I don't have perfect control of the narrative and cannot save both, even if that means I have "less choice." What I would have loved to have happen, though, is for the game to allow any two party members to take those positions, because for the first playthrough it would ultimately lead to the majority of players having to choose between their two favourite squadmates. Which I think makes the scene more powerful!

And then the designer troll in me considers distancing the choice, so the player doesn't make the choice of who goes with them on Virmire (because metagamers will just pick a party member they hate), but the game determines it by keeping track of the choices the player makes on which party members they have with them the most. Players will still game the system, although ironically some would likely be mad at me for "forcing" them to play with an NPC they don't like just so they can kill them off. But to me, I think it's a real and reasonably fair consequence. It might be too heavy handed because Shepard should probably have the opportunity to choose his squad while on Virmire, but I like the idea of the game providing a heavy consequence for the choices they were making earlier.

That's just me though. :]

[Allan Schumacher]

Eain wrote...

Alright well then riddle me this: why does Control not also allow control of the Geth? Accepting the fact that neither the red nor blue endings are in fact space magic (I think that the only true qualifier for space magic is synthesis, as blue is just a visualisation of a control signal and red is just an explosion if you will), we have to ask ourselves why it is that the signal emitted by control is advanced enough to claim the fused-together minds of the species in Reaper hulls, and thus the Reaper code, but ignores the comparatively simple 1's and 0's of Geth programming.

If the red option is somehow harmful to anything that could be classified an AI, then why is the blue option not? Nevermind the fact that we're never given elaboration on how the energy waves work exactly, even if we focus just on the Geth being a victim of the red choice but not of the blue one, we're seeing a lack of consistency. That makes me feel the Geth's inclusion in red is arbitrary, and therefore yes, it could've just aswell been the Turians or Salarians or any other race.

The mechanism itself seems to be different.  The Red option needn't only be harmful to anything that could be classified as an AI.  If you have Low EMS, the destroy ending obliterates organics too (see: people getting disintegrated on Earth).  This is also indicated by the fact that Shepard's death is also dependant on the EMS score.

Just like how the mechanism for the synthesis affects different beings.


As for "why" the control ending doesn't affect the Geth, I have no good answer.

[Allan Schumacher]

I also think it hurts the story quality for sequels because it vastly limits what the devs can do with previous characters. My favorite dragon age character from the entire series was Alistair, but I've accepted he'll never be anything beyond a cameo because he was a possible death from DA:1. The only exception to this I've seen was Mass Effect 3 with Garrus and Tali, and even ME:3 did it with the rest of the ME2 squad. Each one had their own personal quest where you got to meet them and they would wave at you then disappear for the rest of the game. Those quests proceeded almost exactly the same regardless of whether or not that party member was there.

Instead of having everyone killable I'd like to have a few killable so that those who lived can still have a meaningful role in the future stories.

It's a challenge if you're wanting to make a full trilogy, for sure. I think the idea works better if you're not planning on making a sequel, or if you're using the setting in different ways for sequels (like Dragon Age)

[Allan Schumacher]

Eain wrote...

Still interested in your take on one particular hypothetical I posed, though: if we ever do create synthetic life and self-aware AI, how do you think they would feel about our (perhaps rudimentary) treatment of them in Mass Effect?

It's almost an impossible question to answer because I'm not sure what to expect from a genuine AI.

I'm not worried about an AI looking at it and raging at us, if that's what you're curious about.  If they are intelligent enough to assess that our treatment of them is rudimentary, then I'm even less concerned that they'll be bothered with it.

In the end it's still a work of fiction, and any hypothetical AI that gets mad would more likely be mad at the Catalyst rather than see it as a reflection of what humanity thinks about synthetics.  The smarter they get the less likely I think it would be an issue.

[Allan Schumacher]

a.m.p wrote...

Now I am curious. I have a feeling that there is a lot of disconnect between what the starchild was meant to be and what the audience percieved him to be. How do you, as a player and a Mass Effect fan interpret that character?

Do you feel it is a benevolent entity that is generally on our side and presents us with the three choices? Or is it an ancient mad AI, whose mistake we are supposed to rectify by activating the crucible and rebooting the galaxy? Or do you think it is the chief reaper with whom we are for whatever reason forced to make a deal?

Because the ending did make me think too. A lot of moments in Bioware games do make me think, that's why I play them. My general thought process this time went along these lines: here is my enemy who says a lot of nonsense and wants me to kill myself and destroy my civilization to solve this problem that I don't think is a problem. What would I do in that situation? I would not do what my enemy wants me to do. But I don't get the option to.

I don't think the Catalyst is benevolent nor malevolent.  I feel the Catalyst is imperfect though, and for whatever reason it believes that there is an innate problem with respect to Synthetics and Organics, and it feels its solution is necessary to prevent the destruction of all life.  Why it feels this way we don't know, and unless the EC expands dialogue with it I doubt we will know.

I don't think he's a Reaper in the way that Sovereign or Harbinger are there.  I think he just the creator, and one that believes it knows best but ultimately is imperfect.  I think that Shepard's ability to survive, the variability of the Crucible's effectiveness based on EMS, and the resolution of the Geth-Quarian conflict are things that exist to help doubt the Catalyst.

I don't trust him though, and I am leery about Control and Synthesis as being traps.

[Allan Schumacher]

Aquilas wrote...

Most of my Renegade Shepards--and even a few of my Paragons--would tell the Catalyst to stuff its crap sandwich up its glowy little nose.

My Renegades wouldn't eat the crap sandwich with any of the condiments offered: ketchup, lettuce, or bleu cheese. They'd let the bet ride and roll the cosmic dice. Just because the Reapers had always won before doesn't mean they'd win this time. Probabilities don't cut it. Remember Mordin and the genophage? The Catalyst itself notes Shepard's presence as unique, an event which invalidates a solution that has worked for eons.

As Emiliano Zapata said, "It is better to die upon one's feet than to live upon one's knees!" Shepard tells Saren as much a couple of times. Shepard even says a version of that to the Catalyst.

The fact that Shepard doesn't have the option to do nothing at all tramples the notion of free will, of making choices with cosmic significance--literally, in this case--and being willing to live with the consequences. And I'm not talking about standing around and waiting for the event timer to expire. I'm talking about giving Star-jar the finger. That precept has underpinned Shepard's character throughout the trilogy. Except in the last 10 minutes. Huh?

How would your renegade Shepards have approached the choices if they were presented by some other means than the Catalyst.

For example, imagine the Crucible has been hooked up, and EDI analyzes it and determines the three choices that Shepard can make with the Crucible?

[Allan Schumacher]

Aquilas wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Aquilas wrote....

How would your renegade Shepards have approached the choices if they were presented by some other means than the Catalyst.

For example, imagine the Crucible has been hooked up, and EDI analyzes it and determines the three choices that Shepard can make with the Crucible?

Why would I imagine that?  That scenario is irrelevant to the matter at hand.  And I'm not dodging the question.  BioWare has already said you're not changing the ending, so we must deal with what's there.

Why not?

Seriously though, I pose the question because I think that when people are upset about a certain aspect, they become more critical about other aspects.  Many people find the Catalyst jarring and I'm curious how many people carry over the interaction with the Catalyst onto other aspects of the ending, and even the entire game.

By imagining the exact same choices and exact same outcomes presented to the player through different (and perhaps more agreeable) means, we can start to examine whether the choices themselves are intrinsically bad or if other aspects help sour you on them.

You discuss how the choices trample any notion of free will, and how your renegade shipeards would have flipped the Catalyst the bird, and I'm curious if you feel your convictions would still be as strong if the choices were presented in a different way.  Just digging deeper to see if there's some conflation going on or if it's the choices themselves, as they stand, that our found abhorrent.  (Note: I understand that this is purely hypothetical, and I'm not asking anyone to "excuse" the choices or anything since, as they are presented in game, the Catalyst is what presents them to the player)

Here's a simple question for you Alan, as well as anyone at BioWare.
Like you said, I agree that people would have much prefered a 4th option
to tell the star kid to screw off and refuse all of his offers. But you
say that this would inevitably lead to the cycle continuing and the
Reapers winning. You seem to imply that it would be impossible to have
some alternate option where you can tell the kid to screw off and still
end up winning everything. So my question is simple. Why the hell not?

Why the hell do writers insist that you can't have a happy ending and still be considered a serious game?
Why the hell are we forced into one horrible ending or another for the sake of artistic integrity?

I'm being serious here. What the hell is wrong with a happy ending?

First, I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with a happy ending (Shawshank Redemption is my favourite movie).  As for your first question, the main reason why I wouldn't allow for a conventional alternative to allow for success is because it ends up becoming the clearly superior choice.  Choice is meaningless if they aren't all, in some way, relatively equivalent.  Picking the other options is akin to sabotaging your game simply to see the other outcome.  This is something I actually didn't care for in ME2 (I think ME2's ending is a good example of demonstrating consequence, but ultimately not a very good example of providing the player with choice).

Furthermore, if the Reapers CAN be defeated conventionally, I personally think it'd involve rewriting a lot of the story.  People already criticize the Crucible as a questionable plot device, but if it isn't even required then it just becomes an epic waste of time and, IMO, shouldn't be included in the game at all.

So unless we're changing aspects of the story, I wouldn't allow for the 4th option to allow for victory because, as an avid RPG gamer, it'd make the game's ending less interesting for me.

But I don't think the writers are saying you can't have a happy ending and be a serious game.


Cheers.

Allan

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 28 avril 2012 - 03:51 .

[Allan Schumacher]

See, this is where I disagree. The fact that you can save everyone in ME2, if you do everything right, it a big (possibly the biggest) selling point of the game for me. It feels like I'm really having an impact on the world around me. If it's not possible for me to pull things off in the end (which is how it feels in ME3), then I end up feeling like the amount of effort I put into it is pointless. How much does driving up you war readiness and assets really change? Nothing, beyond minor changes in the cutscenes at the end. That's not satisfying at all to me. It would be better if the illusion of choice and impact hadn't been there in the first place.

I think that this is actually a different issue.  I can understand the idea of player reactivity.  My big problem with the ME2 ending is that it's almost trivial to satisfy the prerequisites to achieve the perfect ending.  Even then, ultimately my first ending where Thane died was significantly more satisfying to me, even knowing that I can accomplish a superior ending, because to me the superior ending just comes across as being TOO badass.  It's too perfect which, for me, actually compromises the narrative because the variability of the ending ends up coming across as more "Did you play the game right" as opposed to "did you make difficult choices."


Something like Tuchanka works so much better for me, because the only way you can save Mordin is to have made different difficult choices in ME2 (which means that the consequence and choice are far enough removed that it isn't as foreshadowed nor as easy to "game the system.")  I personally feel that brokering the peace between the Geth and Quarian (which IS probably my favourite moment in the game) is probably just a smidge too easy to accomplish too.

[Allan Schumacher]

iakus wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

I think that this is actually a different issue.  I can understand the idea of player reactivity.  My big problem with the ME2 ending is that it's almost trivial to satisfy the prerequisites to achieve the perfect ending.  Even then, ultimately my first ending where Thane died was significantly more satisfying to me, even knowing that I can accomplish a superior ending, because to me the superior ending just comes across as being TOO badass.  It's too perfect which, for me, actually compromises the narrative because the variability of the ending ends up coming across as more "Did you play the game right" as opposed to "did you make difficult choices."

Ah but the problem here isn't that you can get a perfect ending, but that it's too easy to do so, yes?  I don't particularly disagree with that sentiment, but I do like that it's possible to keep everyone alive.

I'm certainly more receptive to a perfect ending if it's difficult to achieve.  At the same time, though, I was more defining the perfect ending as the crew all surviving, which wouldn't exclude a prerequisite of having to make a very hard choice affecting a non-party member (or something on a larger scale) in order to happen.

Remember, I'm the guy that finds the Virmire more interesting if it required you to choose between your two favourite party members (determined by some metric such as most frequently used).

I think what I've kind of noticed while talking with people is many people like their choice to be purely the ability to drive the narrative.  Meaning, if they want to make a "suboptimal" choice, then it's interesting for them to have that narrative flexibility.  What I look for in choice is more along the lines of "provide me with a choice where the outcomes are unclear, or at least evaluated to be equivalent."  Which I think is just a difference in what I like out of an RPG narrative.  (I'm not all nihilist and am totally okay with a standard heroic romp Baldur's Gate style though haha).  

Tuchanka actually goes back to ME1 decisions, as I'm pretty sure you can't save Mordin if Wrex is alive.

True.  Though I think that just helps reinforce my point of consequences significantly later than the choice hehe.