Ok. It's time for some extremely long-winded constructive criticism which will definitely set off your TL;DR alarms and, by it's nature, is unqualified since I'm just a blank face on the internet. But, nonetheless, here it is. First, a forward:
I would like to begin by pointing out that although my sarcasm may seem abrasive, I assure you that no malice is intended and it's all in good sport. Also, since the star-child is essentially that crotchety old man from "The Matrix", I will refer to it henceforth as "the COM", because it amuses me. I'd also like to try to qualify my opinions a little more within the context of this subject by explaining my history with "Mass Effect".
I first heard about Mass Effect from some of my friends who said it was really cool, and that I should definitely check it out. At the time, however, I didn't have an Xbox. When I purchased one, I watched some reviews for the game and decided to take a chance and by it outright. When I started playing it, I realized how awesome it was right away. But for me, the thing that made me love it was the scientific plausibility of everything in the game. If you ask "Star Trek" how warp drives work, they'll respond, "It warps space". How? "We don't know". If you ask "Mass Effect", how does a mass effect field work? They'll respond, "You run an electrical current through neutron matter and it creates negative mass". And it's plausible because no one knows what would happen if you did that. So I'm thinking, "damn, Bioware knows their sh*t". And then "Mass Effect 2" came out. By then I had already grown to care about the characters as well, and I couldn't wait to get it. I'm really stingy with my money and if I want a game, I wait a year or two until it's like $20 used. I bought that game the day it came out for full price. And, being that I was still in high school at the time, I was grounded when I bought it and couldn't play it for two weeks. That was a torture I wouldn't wish on my worst enemies. But when I played it my face was blown off. I got a "Mass Effect 2" T-shirt, and I was the biggest fan-boy. People would be like, "don't talk sh*t about Mass Effect around him, or he'll kick your teeth in". And then "Mass Effect 3" came out, and all bets were off for my wallet. I don't really by games any more. When a new one comes out, I really don't care. Man, when that game hit it was like a "shut up and take my money" moment. And it was crazy awesome until the last 10 minutes or so, which brings me to the point of this thesis statement of a post; the super-constructive criticism, which I hope is a little more qualified now.
I could talk about the original ending, but since it was mostly fixed I won't. This is for the EC. And I do appreciate the fact that Bioware did anything to fix the ending, so mad props for that, but criticism comes with the turf So first, what was good:
The part where the Normandy picks up your squad explains how they got on the ship in the first place. Although it doesn't really make sense that they would dip out when they were literally 10 feet away form the conduit, but that's being nit-picky. And who knows, maybe Harbinger is near-sighted, or reapers have black-gray color-blindness. There are plenty of reasons Harbinger could have not shot the Normandy to sh*t. So overall, win. +1
I have to say that I really liked how the COM got fixed. It really makes sense now, and I really dug it. Also the reject ending was actually really cool. Everyone wanted to be able to tell the COM to screw off, and if you tell the man to screw off in real life you get shot in the d*ck. The same holds true here. So a definite win on that. +1
Now, unfortunately, comes the time where I have to address what was not so good. It's the ending after the crucible fires. I can only speak for myself here, but the two main things I liked about this game are the science and the characters. And in the end, both of those were either broken, or mostly ignored. But before anyone decides I'm being nit-picky, allow me to elaborate:
The science has always been a big part of the franchise as a whole. Hell, the series is named after most important scientific facet in the game. Now, there have been some scientific discrepancies in all of the games, like how most of the crew can go on to the surface of a planet with an atmosphere of chlorine without skin or eye protection and not die, but those parts of science are eschewed in favor of narrative elements, and that's completely cool. The only time it isn't cool, is when the game world itself establishes a set of rules, which it then chooses to break. That is where story cohesion goes out the window. The original ending ended with the mass relays being destroyed, to which the players responded: "But an entire dlc was based around the fact that the energy released if a mass relay were destroyed is equivalent to the energy output of a supernova, and would wipe out an entire star system. We can verify this to be true, because we watched it happen. And even if people managed to survive, it was established that no one knows what makes mass relays work or how they function, aside from the fact that they get you from point A to point B. How would they even know where to start in rebuilding them"? To which the EC replied, "nah, dawg". It answered one question and opened ten more. Ok, so the energy released from the relays didn't kill everything in its vicinity. Why? How did everyone gain the knowledge of how to build a mass relay? And that isn't a small point, either. It was a large part of the series in general that no one knows how the mass relays work, or how to build them. If they figured out how, that's cool, but tell us how. What changed, and what new information did they stumble upon? And then there are the characters.
The other most important things in the game are the characters. Everyone wants to know what happened to the characters. Granted, the state of the galaxy in general was elaborated on further, but most people don't care about millions of blank faces. If your brother was fighting in a war and it ended, and you asked what happened to your brother, and the reply was that they won the war, you would reply that you didn't care and that you just wanted to know what happened to your brother. And the pictures in the slideshow didn't help. We all already knew that everyone who survived to the end of the game was still alive. And we couldn't gain any information as to what was happening because pictures have no context by themselves. The only thing I gleaned from the slideshow of the crew was that everyone really likes to sit. I mean, in Jacob’s, He could have been about to eat those children for all I know. And I didn't know that Liara and Samara are bros. Since when are they bros? The point is that it required context, and it had none. That's why everyone is talking about reunions and all that bulls**t. They just want to know what became of all those characters that they made emotional bonds with.
Now, Those were really all of MY issues, but I will address others' issues as well, mainly Shepard having to die. Mass effect is based around different outcomes, and if Shepard has to die, it veers from that drastically. Hell, even in "Mass Effect 2" when Shepard had to live because there was a third game, he could still die if you did everything wrong. Likewise there could have been a way, maybe if you did the opposite and did everything right, to survive. Making it so no matter how high your EMS is, or what option you choose at the end, or regardless of anything else you did in any of the games, Shepard has to die, is pretty Nihilistic. Hell, even Wayne's World had a really crappy ending and an ultra-super-happy ending. The point is, that in the end of this game about hope for the future, you have to become a god of machine-devils, change the genetic makeup of all life in the galaxy, doom the galaxy to destruction, or commit genocide. Each option is really depressing. And when most people are trying to play games, or partake in any other form of media like this in order to escape the realities of sh*tty, depressing life, only having the option to end it in a depressing way is extra depressing. And it wouldn't make a difference if it was a regular game where you're just along for the ride, with no say in what happens, but this game offers the choice to create an outcome based on what you do. And that is why, having every single outcome end the way it does, makes a lot of people depressed about it. The tragic hero archetype was created by the ancient Greeks to teach people a lesson, and it really doesn't apply anymore, since no one is partaking in media to learn life lessons. It's ok to not have the hero always die in the end, Sophocles be damned. It makes people happy. There's enough sad in real life. It isn't necessary to have all of the endings end that way.
But as I've said before, I do greatly appreciate the fact that the EC was made. This was just a little bit of constructive criticism.
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