472 réponses à ce sujet

[Zolt51]

Zix13 wrote...

hosen17 wrote...

Most of us here on the forum, I'd assume.

This. All three options are stupid. My shep would rather die fighting. 

It's not just your shep. It's everyone else too. You will sacrifice everyone because there is no perfect solution that suits your taste?

[chevyguy87]

I want the option to kill the reapers and ONLY the reapers. Give me that and I'll be a happy individual.

[Eain]

Zolt51 wrote...

Zix13 wrote...

hosen17 wrote...

Most of us here on the forum, I'd assume.

This. All three options are stupid. My shep would rather die fighting. 

It's not just your shep. It's everyone else too. You will sacrifice everyone because there is no perfect solution that suits your taste?

Problem is simply that people don't feel like what's happening with the Catalyst is meaningful within the universe. We don't feel like this takes place in the ME universe we know and love because it doesn't resemble it in the slightest.

The whole trilogy is basically redundant because if Bioware wanted to confront us with this rather amateurishly created dilemma they could've done so with a forum post.

Like this:

Suppose that there's a universe in which many different alien species live. And in this universe there's also an evil force of angry robots that destroys all advanced life every 50k years, returning the galaxy to the stone age. Suppose that you're the hero in this conflict when this force returns yet again, and you have three ways of stopping them:

1) Destroying the evil force, but thereby also destroying all other types of sentient robots who never were hostile.

2) Assuming direct control of the evil force, killing nobody and making them your slaves to be used however you please.

3) Merging all synthetic and organic life meaning that there's no longer a distinction between regular people and robots, thereby invalidating the existence of the evil force and ending the necessity of an extinction cycle.

Which would you pick?

That little bit of text is basically all the information we need, and the choices are just as meaningful. Prefacing this with a whole sci-fi setting and an elaborate storyline and engaging characters is just so bloody redundant, so meaningless. There was just no point to it at all. Bioware could've posed us this question on the forum and then design an ending that actually flows logically from events in the games.

Because admit it. What additional information do you need here? Do the choices become more meaningful if I start explaining that there is a race called the Asari who have carthilage-based scalp crests that grow into place and do not flop around? Or that there's a hostile race of Krogan who suffer from an artificially induced condition called the genophage that alters their reproductive rate? Does it help if I explain that one of the Citadel wards is called Zakera Ward and that there's a man working there called Armando-Owen Bailey who's quite awesome? How does any of that relate to the main choices?

That's all peripheral information, and if I were to present the dilemma above to you in such a way that I would preface it by explaining all these intricate details then you would come to expect a proper bloody dilemma where all this information was relevant and meaningful, not one that I could've posed to you without going through all that info.

There's a complete, total and utter disconnect between the Catalyst and his three choices and the rest of the galaxy.

Modifié par Eain, 28 avril 2012 - 11:10 .

[a.m.p]

Noelemahc wrote...
And, to reiterate: I hate how stupidly oblivious everyone is to the fact that Vendetta practically  flat-out states that the Reapers may have had a hand (claw? tentacle?) in designing the Crucible.

I think we can sum this up in a very simple statement:
For the crucible plot to work the way it is presented now everyone involved has to be a moron.

The reapers have to be morons and fail to use their proven strategy that worked the previous N cycles (or be morons that are unable to fix their own tech).

The galactic leadership have to be morons and put their trust into that unproven untested unknown device.

And most importantly, Shepard and through them the audience have to be morons. And as a general rule audiences don't like being treated like morons. Yet we're asked to forget half of the plot of ME1. We're asked to forget half the lore of ME2. We're asked to accept everything we are are told without question, regarless of how much time we spent learning about this universe.

This is important. We aren't the ignorant new players anymore who eagrely accept new information about a new universe we are exploring. This is the last part of the trilogy. We have spent hundreds of hours replaying the previous games. We know how stuff works. And how it doesn't work.

[a.m.p]

Kreidian wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

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

Ah but here there is a bit of a disconnect. We're not asking for a 4th option that is clearly better, we're just asking for a 4th option. Technically we're taking about any other option that makes more sense. It doesn't have to sacrifice the whole rest of the story, and it doesn't have to be a perfect win every time. Because as most of us have said on this thread, the current three options are just terrible.

This so much. We're perfectly aware of the necessity to balance any new options with the existing ones. I think the problem is in a big misunderstanding.

We don't mean the options are terrible because they have consequences. We mean the options are terrible because they make no sense on multiple levels. And limiting the options to these three makes no sense on multiple levels.

Why can't we have another option with dire consequences that makes sense?

Why can't we overload the crucible, which would blow up the citadel and weaken reapers and then beat them in a long costly war? That way the importance of the crucible sort of remains.

I keep repeating. If I have to sacrifice Shepard, the team, the Normandy, the whole Earth to acieve that, I'll do that. I don't want unicorns. I want my favourite scifi game series to make sense again.

Modifié par a.m.p, 28 avril 2012 - 11:28 .

[Peranor]

The reason I won't pick and ending isn't because it's a supposedly tough choice from a moral standpoint.
I don't want to pick an ending because they don't make any sense and destoys the spirit of Mass Effect. I'd rather never complete my game end pretend it never happened.
Maybe the EC can make me continue playing past Cronos Station. But as it stands right now I will never finish Mass Effect 3. The mere thought of finishing the game makes me nauseous.

[Dianjabla]

Thanks Allan, I actually feel a whole lot better about the choices given in the ending now. Amazing what a calm and thoughtful discussion can achieve. Hell, I felt better about DA2s story in general when I realized it had nothing to do with the marketing of the game. (Still couldn't bring myself to play it again but there are other reasons for that.)

Both it & the mass effect series have in parts tried to give a slightly more cerebral experience and make players think. If the average age of players is as some suggest 30-35 then maybe we should start acting like it. Embrace the hard descisions and difficult ethics. Realise that there will actually be times when no matter what you choose, some one some where has to get screwed and no, you can't save them all.

I remembered while reading your posts that way back around the time when NWN was recent, I posted on a poll on the old message boards something along the lines that I'd like the consequences of actions not to be obvious right away and not to bite you in the ass until much later, and that it should be hard to choose. You should be careful what you wish for, I guess.

I'd still like the extended cut to give the choice to tell glowy kid to stick it - even if his response is these are your options, choose or do nothing and Reapers win. Could failure in that way be an option? Also some sort of epilogue that explains the consequences of the decisions a little more especially as it pertains to crew and major characters/races in the series. Were there enough Elcor/Hanar/Drell left to continue the species and things like that? The epilogue slides from BG, DAO or Fall Out might be cliched and non-cinematic but they were effective and gave some sort of closure.

Edit: Turns out phones aren't good for rambling posts.

Modifié par Dianjabla, 28 avril 2012 - 11:46 .

[Noelemahc]

That little bit of text is basically all the information we need, and the choices are just as meaningful. Prefacing this with a whole sci-fi setting and an elaborate storyline and engaging characters is just so bloody redundant, so meaningless. There was just no point to it at all. Bioware could've posed us this question on the forum and then design an ending that actually flows logically from events in the games.

As the age-old joke goes:
"A teacher presents her class with a problem to solve: "The air speed of a thrown stone is 15 m/s. The incoming wind speed is 8 m/s. What is my age if the stone has been thrown in Panama?"
Little Johnny gets his hand up. "Is it 24?"
She looks at him in surprise. "Why yes, it is! How did you come by the answer?"
"Well, my dad always said I was half an idiot, and I'm 12 years old.""

Non-sequitur endings only work in a specifically narrow list of genres AND mediums. While video games do allow such endings (Eversion is a marvellous example, particularly once you unlock the second and third endings, although even THERE the twist was actually set up long in advance), they have to be handled very carefully. For example, most people didn't react to the ending of Conduit 2 well, even though I've found it refreshing and not all that unexpected.

This is important. We aren't the ignorant new players anymore who eagrely accept new information about a new universe we are exploring. This is the last part of the trilogy. We have spent hundreds of hours replaying the previous games. We know how stuff works. And how it doesn't work.

The "ignorant players" bit can be omitted. Even though ME3 was marketed as an acceptable jump-on point, which it actually is, in the same way that Alien Resurrection is an acceptable jump-on point for the Aliens franchise. You DO get the bare minimum of exposition to comprehend the plot, loosely, but you will miss out on the small details, like why Akuze is so important in relation to the Cerberus question, what's a quad and what's an azure, why does everyone fear the Rachni, why is Shepard, a supposed accused war criminal, so chummy with the head cop of the Citadel, etc, etc. Or, if you prefer, why Ripley being alive is unexpected, why Call's name is an in-joke of hilarious proportions, why does Ripley treat her the way she does, and why is Earth "such a $%#&-hole".

Even then, the non-Extended-Cut ending of Alien Resurrection makes about as much sense as ME3's to a new viewer as to an old one*. The old one gets offended at the blissful idiocy of it, the new one says "blah, why did they say this was good? this sucks!" and will never consider getting/watching/playing the preceding episodes, because his/her/its opinion of the entire franchise is now tainted.

______________
* - Which is, actually, the Director's Preferred Version, nonsensically cheery as it is. The EC ending even has THE EXACT SAME DIALOGUE, it's just done in a context so markedly different that it redeems a lot of the movie's other failings (all of which can be traced to the misconnect between Joss Whedon's ideas for the script - he basically wanted Army of Darkness in space - and Jean-Paul Jenet's vision of the movie - he wanted to outdo Event Horizon's (substitute for your own ideal horror-movie-about-space if you have different tastes) mind-wrenching horrorosity.

Well, at least the combination eventually gave us Firefly, so who am I to complain? Without Firefly, Mass Effect might've been markedly different, seeing how it was one of the many inspirations.

Modifié par Noelemahc, 28 avril 2012 - 11:54 .

[tschamp]

I picked the fourth option. Shot that little bugger until "Critical Mission Failure" appears, I win.

[Sueno]

Mr. Schumacher, I've seen you around a few threads defending the ending due to how it forces you to make hard choices. But how can options that have nothing to do with the original plot be hard to make? The catalyst could have made Shepard choose which ice cream flavor would be the only one to exist in the universe--t's a hard choice but it has nothing at all to do with the plot. This is the problem with the choices the catalyst presents.

Also, I'm curious about your thoughts on using a dues ex machina. This is a plot device that has been universally lambasted for eons. You need only go to wikipeidia to understand why the ending is recieving so much ire:

A deus ex machina is generally undesirable in writing and often implies a lack of creativity on the part of the author. The reasons for this are that it does not pay due regard to the story's internal logic and is often so unlikely that it challenges suspension of disbelief, allowing the author to conclude the story with an unlikely, though perhaps more palatable, ending.

Are you a fan of the dues ex machina? Do you believe ME3 implemented it well? If so why and how did it work in ME3?

[a.m.p]

Noelemahc wrote...

The "ignorant players" bit can be omitted.

Probably. My point was - this makes no sense, and the more you know about ME the less sense it makes.

I'd like to pose a question to the thread.

How is a conventional victory objectively better than the catalyst's options?

Let's assume the EC rumors are true and the galaxy does not descend into a dark age without the relays.
Let's not forget that a conventional victory would require more war. It would not end at Earth. More war means more people dead and more planets in ruin.
Let's not forget that in case of a conventional victory there will be even less certainty that there aren't more reapers out there than there is with our given options.
Let's arbitrarily state that it would require to sacrifice the Normandy/Shepard/the squad/whatever you feel like sacrificing to make it a hard choice.

How is a conventional victory objectively better? Other than not forcing you to make a deal with the enemy - which is the big problem that it's supposed to fix?

[Noelemahc]

Let's not forget that in case of a conventional victory there will be even less certainty that there aren't more reapers out there than there is with our given options.

The troubling bit is that we have no confirmation that there aren't any Reapers still in dark space or in other galaxies. You know, OUTSIDE of the reach of the relay network? So whichever colour you picked, they would be unaffected? In that regard, Synthesis suddenly doesn't look so bad, as a form of cheap-o insurance against retribution (which is obviously sure to follow in the cases of Destroy and Control), which is guaranteed as we already know the Reapers to be rather... easily angered.

The DA parallel are the darkspawn that are still running around to and fro in the Deep Roads - the blight may be over, but it sure as heck don't mean they just dropped dead. The same will apply to Cerberus and husks, BTW, if there's ever a ME4, and it's post-ME3, unless there's a large timeshift, there are sure to be stragglers around. Zombied up, because there's no more TIM and a lot less techs alive to re-grab control of the huskified Cerberus troops...

[Book buster]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

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)

It's an interesting question and, upon consideration, I probably would have reacted differently had the same choices been presented in a different context.  Because that's (one of the) the fundamental problem(s) with the ending as it stands now: context, or lack thereof.  I doubt I would have been *happy* because the choices themselves are thematically inappropriate at best and morally repugnant at worst, but changing the context could have made it more palatable.  hell, with exactly the right context, it might actually have made them work in service of the established thematic elements.

The context of the ending, as it stands, for me, is thus: an unknown, untrustworthy being that created the problem I'm trying to solve, is asking you, in a vaccum (hah! pun intended!), to chose between genocide (twice over), slavery/corruption and a really weird form of eugenics.  What makes it hardest to stomach is that the Catalyst completely lacks empathy.  It gives no indication that it understands that it is requiring you to make an absolutely staggering sacrifice.  As far as it's concerned, you're a means to an end.

Incidentally, I went with destroy in the end.  After all, I had come to the Citadel prepared to committ genocide by wiping out the Reapers.

Change the Catalyst to EDI and I'm being asked to make the same decision by a trusted ally who is uniquely positioned to comment on the conflict and who can provide the perspective of synthetic life verses my organic perspective.  Change the Catalyst to Liara and now a I'm being asked to make the same choice by a close friend/LI who understands what it means to sacrifice your ideals for the greater good, and what that sacrifice can cost you.  Change it to Anderson and, well, you get the idea.

TLDR: If it had been, say, EDI, offering the choices, the choices would still have sucked, but I'd have felt better about the whole thing.

[Kekkis]

a.m.p wrote...

How is a conventional victory objectively better? Other than not forcing you to make a deal with the enemy - which is the big problem that it's supposed to fix?

That this galaxy does not need babysitters. All major issues were created by Reapers, not us. Rachni wars and uplifting of Krogans. Geth and majority of galaxy were ignoring eachother, before Sovereign started to play god.

[eventhewaves]

A conventional victory at the end of "Mass Effect 3" of the sort many people are talking about would probably also feel more like something the player (and, by extension, Shepard) earned by actually playing this damn game, connect with victory-through-cooperation themes prevalent in the prior games,  and so forth.  Can't overstate the necessity of a video game giving the player a sense of accomplishment at the end, and right now, there really isn't -- since it looks more like the bad guys just got bored and served up "victory" on a silver platter.

Any character in the final charge could have come to the same place; and they could have done the same things based on the same information or disinformation.  The whole point of Shepard is not the super-awesome ability to pick between Suicide Booth 1, 2, and 3.  The whole point of Shepard, as we're told repeatedly, was the ability to unify the galaxy and gather the fleet; so why not use the damn thing for something other than escort duty for McGuffin the Wonder Device?

Modifié par eventhewaves, 28 avril 2012 - 01:21 .

[Iakus]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

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.

Then we get "where is the balance point"?  The main problem with these endings is that the price Shepard has to pay is too high to make these three endings seem feasible.  I don't think people want one perfect ending clearly better than the rest, but three endings people can see the benefit to and live with.

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 am probably the only person on the BSN whom Virmire does that to anyway.  Ash and Kaidan were my favorite characters.  To this day, still feel a twinge when I get to that part 

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).  

Well, Mass Effect already has the precedence of two games where Shepard gets to be a heroic character who fixes the galaxy's problems (through diplomacy or gunfire), then walks out of impossible situations.  Kinda uncool to change things up in the last 10 minutes of a trilogy, isn't it?

We already have two games worth of choices to show long term outcomes for.  The ending should be the point where the significance of these becomes clear.  Not where one final arbitrary choice gets made which leaves the galaxy in an ambiguous, but pretty unsettling, state.

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.

It does.  Just mentioning for the sake of accuracy 

Modifié par iakus, 28 avril 2012 - 08:03 .

[Billabong2011]

Got my insanity achievement and never looked back.

[a.m.p]

Kekkis wrote...

a.m.p wrote...

How is a conventional victory objectively better? Other than not forcing you to make a deal with the enemy - which is the big problem that it's supposed to fix?

That this galaxy does not need babysitters. All major issues were created by Reapers, not us. Rachni wars and uplifting of Krogans. Geth and majority of galaxy were ignoring eachother, before Sovereign started to play god.

Those are the reasons why it should have been an option.

I am asking in terms of bad consequences and the price paid for it, how is a conventional victory objectively better? Why do people think it would nullify the existing options?

[Aquilas]

*This is an exceptionally, almost obscenely long post, so be warned*

a.m.p wrote...

Noelemahc wrote...
And, to reiterate: I hate how stupidly oblivious everyone is to the fact that Vendetta practically  flat-out states that the Reapers may have had a hand (claw? tentacle?) in designing the Crucible.

I think we can sum this up in a very simple statement:
For the crucible plot to work the way it is presented now everyone involved has to be a moron.....

....And most importantly, Shepard and through them the audience have to be morons. And as a general rule audiences don't like being treated like morons. Yet we're asked to forget half of the plot of ME1. We're asked to forget half the lore of ME2. We're asked to accept everything we are are told without question, regarless of how much time we spent learning about this universe.

This is important. We aren't the ignorant new players anymore who eagrely accept new information about a new universe we are exploring. This is the last part of the trilogy. We have spent hundreds of hours replaying the previous games. We know how stuff works. And how it doesn't work.

This.

Allan, you noted many people are put off by the Catalyst itself: I'm one of them.  But I don't object to it just because it's a smarty-pants child, or glowy and translucent, almost incorporeal, therfore invulnerable.  Besides objecting to it because it's a failed plot device that breaks nearly every convention necessary for effective storytelling--and that's a whole nother thread--I object to it because it breaks ME lore and well-established ME physics and metaphysics.

Here's something I've posted several times; I'm lazy, so I'm going to quote myself:

Aquilas wrote...

Synthesis is a miracle.

It’s an honest-to-god miracle. And I do mean god. Synthesis is a divine revelation the writers have been saving for five years--because Synthesis certainly isn’t based in Mass Effect lore, physics, metaphysics or logic. We all know we can’t apply logic to god.

Here’s why Synthesis is a miracle: given ME lore, the Catalyst undermines every premise underpinning its and the Reapers’ existence with its own words. When the Catalyst meets Shepard and elaborates on the Order versus Chaos conflict and its solution (and that's a whole nother thread), the Catalyst commits a formal logical fallacy: the Appeal to Probability.

This is the logic structure of the fallacy: If A is possible/probable, then A is absolute.

When Shepard meets the Catalyst, it explains that the Reapers don’t harvest all organic life; they harvest life forms advanced enough to create synthetics. Synthetics, it says, inevitably will rebel against and destroy their creators, and then would proceed to destroy all organic life. The Catalyst's logic isn't circular; it differentiates between harvesting advanced organic life and the destruction of all organic life. Remember, it’s inevitable.

But the Catalyst doesn’t know that. It cannot know that. It asserts it. To truly know it, the Catalyst must be a god, as we commonly understand it, or at the very least it possesses god-like powers.

Just because a thing is possible or probable doesn’t mean it’s inevitable. If the Catalyst were basing its assertion on experience, then it has already witnessed synthetics destroying all organic life. If that’s the case, Shepard and his allies wouldn’t exist—the Catalyst and the Reapers would have no reason for being. That is, unless the Catalyst re-created organic life so it and the Reapers would have something to do. So we’re looking at some form of Supreme Creator.

If the Catalyst is looking forward, the only way it could know absolutely that unchecked synthetics would destroy all organic life is if it’s infallibly prescient—otherwise known as divinely omniscient. Probabilities and simulations don't cut it--remember Mordin and the genophage? When we consider the Catalyst may have the power to re-create organic life and/or infallibly see the future, we’re most firmly in the realm of godhood.

So, is the Catalyst a god? Yes. At the very least it’s a flawed, mega-powerful AI that cannot be trusted—think Hal 9000 on a galactic scale--and it possesses god-like powers. There are no other options.

If the Catalyst is a god or an AI with god-like powers, then the writers truly have cast Space Magic at the very last minute. Never before have we seen divine intervention in the ME universe. Yes, Ashley prays; and yes, the turians invoke the spirits; and yes, the asari invoke the goddess; but we’ve never seen a miracle. And I mean a classic miracle, given the Mass Effect universe's well-established physical and metaphysical principles. Oh wait--except for two pipes and a beam of light that can fundamentally change the very nature of existence on a galactic scale. So there's that. Yeah, that's the ticket: Synthesis is a miracle.

Perhaps Shepard is experiencing a revelation--the Deity is revealing itself to Shepard the Shepherd. If so, the ending truly is sad. And I don't mean tragic, or a downer. I mean it’s sad because we're seeing the end of BioWare's run as the premier storyteller in video gaming. A pity.

I've read you (BioWare) may be leaning towards the flawed, uber-powerful AI scenario: again, think Hal 9000 on a galactic scale.  Liara does say the Crucible is capable of unleashing "uquantifiable destruction."  OK, I get that.  Perhaps the Catalyst uses its new possibilities to modify the energy the Crucible releases, enabling Control and Synthesis versus pure Destruction, although Destrucion remains an option.  OK, I get that.  Perhaps it uses the relays to beam the destructive, controlling, or synthesizing energy throughout the galaxy to kill, control, or synthesize the Reapers.  OK, I get that.

But Synthesis breaks every physical, metaphysical, and scientific precept we've seen in the first two games and in most of the third.  It doesn't matter whether or not Javik gives us insight into the Prothean plan for the Crucible, as limited as his knowledge is.  It doesn't matter that Vigil gives us hints, or that the Prothean VI from Thessia tells us the Citadel is the Catalyst, so organics are using Reaper tech against the Reapers themselves.  The fact remains that the Catalyst is using heretofore unknown power and technology to merge DNA from organics and synthetics and create a new life form.  Let me repeat that: not a synthetic life form, a la the Geth and EDI, and most certainly not a new organic life form.  We're talking about a brand new life form.  Supreme Creator, anyone?

Are you going to extrapolate on Craig Venters' work, and others' work on oligonucleotide synthesis, or rDNA technology, or the like?  That sounds smart and plausible, given that ME is set almost 200 years in our future.  But that's not what you're talking about in the Synthesis option.  You're talking about merging, combining fully functional, complex synthetic and organic DNA at the nuclear level.  And that presupposes the Reapers, the Geth, and EDI, etc. have DNA at all: i.e., that machine DNA exists.  Legion calls Nazara (Sovereign) and its kin "the Old Machines." He derives that term from the Geth's direct contact with Sovereign's mind. So there's that to consider when discussing machine-organic hybrids.

Perhaps the Reapers are a true combination of organic and synthetic DNA.  That's a possibility, though it's never explicitly stated.  It seems they turn harvested organic species into slurry and build new Reapers.  That's what the Catalyst says--that's how they preserve organic life, by "uplifting" it.  If they do that at the nuclear genetic level, then why use the Cycle at all?  Why not wipe out all sentient, advanced organic species and then prevent the inevitable organic vs. synthetic battle beforehand?  Start with bacteria, viruses, or some other lower form of organic life and move on from there.  As they evolved, the new life forms would love their creators, because they're all the same species.  Right?  Of course, that assumes the new organo-synthetic life forms would evolve at all.  And oh by the way, if the Reapers are true organo-synthetic life forms, then they don't need the Crucible to fuse machine and organic DNA--they've been doing it for millions of years.  That option would apply to advanced organic species too.

Is it reasonable to assume that one of the Catalyst's new possibilities allows it to combine synthetic and organic DNA at the nuclear level? Across the entire galaxy? If so, then is it reasonable to assume that the asari, the Quarians, and the Protheans before them haven't developed this tehcnology across 100,000 years? Especially if we accept an extrapolation of Craig Venters' work? And he's a bumbling human.

Other problems with the ending?  Why are the mass relays destroyed in the Control and Synthesis endings--especially in Synthesis--other than out of pure spite?  You can't say we're not ready to handle the relay tech.  If organics and synthetics are merged, won't they all join hands and sing Kumbaya as the Reapers--our new buds/brothers/sisters-- give us tech lessons on the relays?   In Control, wouldn't Shepard the Shepherd guide us through the learning process on relay tech?  If organics know the Reaper/relay technology is a trap, then the tech is no longer a trap.  Or what happens to the systems in which the mass relays are found: are the explosions novas instead of supernovas, etc.?  Does the Catalyst turn down the rheostat before it unleashes the RGB energy?  Maybe the destroying/controlling/synthesizing burst is so focused it burns out the relays.  Right.  If the Catalyst can control the energy enough to avoid wiping out entire systems, then certainly it can prevent relay burn-out.  These ideas, and others, are discussed in whole other threads and articles, so I'm not getting into them here.

That's enough for now.  Even I'm tired of reading this wall of text I've written.  If anyone reads all of this, then thanks.

Modifié par Aquilas, 29 avril 2012 - 05:46 .

[Sen4lifE]

The reason this is a "Science Fiction" game is because in real life, Chuck Norris would have just round-house kicked all the Reapers back into darkspace.

[BunBun299]

I ended up choosing the control option, because it was the one I found the least appalling. I would have greatly prefered Destruction. Its the only one I would have even considered if not for the killing EDI and the Geth BS. Why can't I call for a Geth to be dropped down in here to help me reprogram the beam so it can tell the difference between friendlies and hostiles? Something like that should take minuted to program for a Geth.
Synthesis is not even worth considering. It sounds like something the Borg Queen from Star Trek would want, its even green like Borg tech, and the the most probable way for it to actually work is for Q from Star Trek to snap his fingers to make it happen. I'm willing to suspend disbelief for alot of things if they fit the setting. Synthesis does fit the setting in any way shape or form.

So, to me, Control was the least appalling action. At least once my Shepard is in control of the Reapers, they can be ordered to fly into the nearest convient Black Hole. So it becomes a secondary destroy option.

[Noelemahc]

If the Catalyst is a god or an AI with god-like powers, then the writers truly have cast Space Magic at the very last minute. Never before have we seen divine intervention in the ME universe. Yes, Ashley prays; and yes, the turians invoke the spirits; and yes, the asari invoke the goddess; but we’ve never seen a miracle.

The funny part is, at the very least the asari Goddess is revealed to be either a Prothean or a Prothean fabrication. Which sorta kinda puts into question all the other races' religions. Remember, the Quarians practiced ancestor worship... until the Geth erased their ancestors' collective uploaded memories. That's when they became a cargo cult that swears by their own homeworld. Keelah See'lai indeed.

[Garlador]

I can't tell you how much I hate every option.

No, no I can.

I hate every option.

[Averdi]

I dislike them all.

I might have found control.......tolerable if the relays didn't explode. The disconnect between previous choices and the ME3 story and ending would still be formidably frustrating, however. The other detritus like the Normandy taking off would also still be nonsensical, but perhaps I couldn't ignored that.

[a.m.p]

@Aquilas

That was an exceptionally, almost obscenely wonderful post.

You put into words my synthesis problem #14/b.

I seem to recall a quote that said that we didn't need answers to the ME universe. That is ridiculous. We do need answers to what the hell is going on. But what we definitely do not need - is to meet the god of the ME universe.