131 réponses à ce sujet

[elitehunter34]

ZLurps wrote...
I guess they wanted to re-create Drew's vision of very difficult choises regarding life and stuff. Perhaps they wanted people to stop for a second and weight their choises, so consequences of choises had to be huge.

And I don't give a damn about choices when the consequences are contrived.  Because the choices come from the Crucible, which is a fictional device operating on fictional principles, then the meaning of the choice is completely lost because there is no reason why the Crucible has to do anything.

Good choices are ones that flow organically from the narrative.  A choice emerging from a mysterious device changes the focus from the morality of the choices themselves to the mechanics of the consequences.  Instead of saying, "I don't know what I should do," which is what good choices like in Legion's loyalty mission did, I'm saying "Why can't the Crucible do x instead of y?"

[dreman9999]

elitehunter34 wrote...

dreman9999 wrote...
No, It makes sense. AI are tech and depend on tech and programing to be alive. If you have a weapon the effect tech, how does it not effect and kill AI's?
It's not hard to uderstand why it only attacks AI's with emps in excictance.
Saying that a weapon that effect tech kills off AI's maked no sense is like saying poison killing of organics makesno sense.

Dreman where did I say it doesn't make sense in my post?  Please answer me.  Stop your damn strawmanning.  I'm not saying "it" doesn't make sense, whatever "it" is.  I'm saying theres no good reason to kill the Geth and EDI in destroy. The writers could have easily said that the Crucible is precise and only targets Reapers, and no one would have batted an eye at that.  I'm not going argue the mechanics of a fictional device that operates on fictional principles.

Now we're goingafter thestate of the plot? Yes. the writers can write what ever they want as long asit makes sense. But the thing is with you complaint you missing a keey point to ME's theme. 
ME asks the question of what lenghts the player will go to stop an unstoppalbe force and it done in a way to bring the player to moral conflict. We can say BW could of written away for both Kaiden and Ashley to servive virmire. For us to save the cuncil and not lose any of the allice fleet. There are lostof conflictsin the game bw could of resolved to make all the parties involved in it happy but it would miss the point of what they wanted to do...Putting the player into moral conflict. All the way the ending choice were was done on perpose to fallow the theme of the series. A question of how far you would go to stop an unstoppable force.

Modifié par dreman9999, 22 juillet 2012 - 08:11 .

[dreman9999]

elitehunter34 wrote...

ZLurps wrote...
I guess they wanted to re-create Drew's vision of very difficult choises regarding life and stuff. Perhaps they wanted people to stop for a second and weight their choises, so consequences of choises had to be huge.

And I don't give a damn about choices when the consequences are contrived.  Because the choices come from the Crucible, which is a fictional device operating on fictional principles, then the meaning of the choice is completely lost because there is no reason why the Crucible has to do anything.

Good choices are ones that flow organically from the narrative.  A choice emerging from a mysterious device changes the focus from the morality of the choices themselves to the mechanics of the consequences.  Instead of saying, "I don't know what I should do," which is what good choices like in Legion's loyalty mission did, I'm saying "Why can't the Crucible do x instead of y?"

But the choices at the end of the game do flow organicly.

[ZLurps]

elitehunter34 wrote...

ZLurps wrote...
I guess they wanted to re-create Drew's vision of very difficult choises regarding life and stuff. Perhaps they wanted people to stop for a second and weight their choises, so consequences of choises had to be huge.

And I don't give a damn about choices when the consequences are contrived.  Because the choices come from the Crucible, which is a fictional device operating on fictional principles, then the meaning of the choice is completely lost because there is no reason why the Crucible has to do anything.

Good choices are ones that flow organically from the narrative.  A choice emerging from a mysterious device changes the focus from the morality of the choices themselves to the mechanics of the consequences.  Instead of saying, "I don't know what I should do," which is what good choices like in Legion's loyalty mission did, I'm saying "Why can't the Crucible do x instead of y?"

I'm just trying to point out, that both, you and Dreman are trying to find some sort of sense from things BW never even thought were important to make sense.

Edit, in depth you take your analysis.

Modifié par ZLurps, 22 juillet 2012 - 08:13 .

[dreman9999]

ZLurps wrote...

I'm just trying to point out, that both, you and Dreman are trying to find some sort of sense from things BW never even thought were important to make sense.

How is an emp something that doesn't make sense?
Last time I checked, The crucible effects all tech. AI are alive based on the tech they have and there programing, that is housed in tech. If you attack the tech you kill the AI. Howis that hard to understand?

[elitehunter34]

AlanC9 wrote...

elitehunter34 wrote...
I'm saying theres no good reason to kill the Geth and EDI in destroy. The writers could have easily said that the Crucible is precise and only targets Reapers, and no one would have batted an eye at that.  I'm not going argue the mechanics of a fictional device that operates on fictional principles.

OK, so the argument is that Destroy should have been written to be cost-free?

If so, I disagree. That would just make the final choice a no-brainer. Letting the player always have an easy out is a bad thing about Bio's style, and shouldn't be elevated to a design principle.

Was saving the Geth and the Quarians the easy way out?  Was saving Wrex the easy way out?  Was saving everyone in the suicide mission be the easy way out?

I'm not arguing for Destroy to be cost free, sorry if I implied that.  What I should have said is that the Geth and EDI should be spared if you have a high enough EMS.  I don't want the choices at all because for  the choices are contrived.  They don't need to exist.  No one would have minded if you simply pressed the Crucible button and depending on your EMS would have a range of effects from destroying only the Reapers to destroying the galaxy.  That is what the ending should have been.  No Star Child, and no contrived choices.  Choices for the sake of choices are meaningless.

[AlanC9]

elitehunter34 wrote...

And I don't give a damn about choices when the consequences are contrived.  Because the choices come from the Crucible, which is a fictional device operating on fictional principles, then the meaning of the choice is completely lost because there is no reason why the Crucible has to do anything.

Good choices are ones that flow organically from the narrative.  A choice emerging from a mysterious device changes the focus from the morality of the choices themselves to the mechanics of the consequences.  Instead of saying, "I don't know what I should do," which is what good choices like in Legion's loyalty mission did, I'm saying "Why can't the Crucible do x instead of y?"

And if the Crucible was just a magical Reaper Off Switch, you won't have anything to question so it wouldn't come up?

Modifié par AlanC9, 22 juillet 2012 - 08:16 .

[ZLurps]

dreman9999 wrote...

ZLurps wrote...

I'm just trying to point out, that both, you and Dreman are trying to find some sort of sense from things BW never even thought were important to make sense.

How is an emp something that doesn't make sense?
Last time I checked, The crucible effects all tech. AI are alive based on the tech they have and there programing, that is housed in tech. If you attack the tech you kill the AI. Howis that hard to understand?

There is science, the real one just out there somewhere but not in ME Anti AI Beam. Anyway, Crusible does what it does because writers need it to do what it does to get player in certain situation. Anything else is really irrelant, no matter how much you argue about it.

Modifié par ZLurps, 22 juillet 2012 - 08:23 .

[AlanC9]

[quote]elitehunter34 wrote...
OK, so the argument is that Destroy should have been written to be cost-free?

If so, I disagree. That would just make the final choice a no-brainer. Letting the player always have an easy out is a bad thing about Bio's style, and shouldn't be elevated to a design principle.

[/quote]
Was saving the Geth and the Quarians the easy way out?  Was saving Wrex the easy way out?  Was saving everyone in the suicide mission be the easy way out?[/quote]

Yes, sort of, and absolutely.

The problem with Rannoch is more about how ME3 handles dialog skills  than the actual dilemma. Like EMS, it's essentially a reward for completionism. A player who's doing sidequests will pass the dialog check.

Wrex in ME1 is better, because ME1's dialog skill setup is better. If you don't take enough dialog skill and don't do that single sidequest, you fail. It's a much narrower window. And I'm OK with the player being able to avoid situations sometimes.

As for the SM, ME2 should have forced the Reaper IFF mission the moment it became available. So you could still get everyone to loyal, if you're willing to let your whole crew get juiced.

[quote]
I'm not arguing for Destroy to be cost free, sorry if I implied that.  What I should have said is that the Geth and EDI should be spared if you have a high enough EMS.  I don't want the choices at all because for  the choices are contrived.  They don't need to exist.  No one would have minded if you simply pressed the Crucible button and depending on your EMS would have a range of effects from destroying only the Reapers to destroying the galaxy.  That is what the ending should have been.  No Star Child, and no contrived choices.  Choices for the sake of choices are meaningless.
[/quote]

That just sounds a lot less interesting to me.

[wantedman dan]

Another thread pointing out how ridiculous the destroy option is.

You'd think that, by now, Bioware would have taken the hint.

[dreman9999]

ZLurps wrote...

dreman9999 wrote...

ZLurps wrote...

I'm just trying to point out, that both, you and Dreman are trying to find some sort of sense from things BW never even thought were important to make sense.

How is an emp something that doesn't make sense?
Last time I checked, The crucible effects all tech. AI are alive based on the tech they have and there programing, that is housed in tech. If you attack the tech you kill the AI. Howis that hard to understand?

There is science, the real one just out there somewhere but not in ME Anti AI Beam. Anyway, Crusible does what it does because writers need it to do what it does to get player in certain situation. Anything else is really irrelant, no matter how much you argue about it.

You don't have enough info on the crucible to say that. The fact that there is science out there to expline it it enough to make it not space magic. The concept magic is something that happen with out any form of an expliation. There is an expination to how destroy works.

[elitehunter34]

AlanC9 wrote...
Yes, sort of, and absolutely.

The problem with Rannoch is more about how ME3 handles dialog skills  than the actual dilemma. Like EMS, it's essentially a reward for completionism. A player who's doing sidequests will pass the dialog check.

No, you are completely wrong.  Doing side quests will not guarantee you will pass the dialogue check.  Getting peace between the Geth and the Quarians arguably quite difficult.

First of all, both Legion and Tali must be alive.  If neither one of them are alive you will fail no matter what.  Doing that requires a lot effort and making smart decisions in all of Mass Effect 2 (getting loyalty of enough members and making the right choices on the suicide mission)

You must also have 4 bars of reputation.  Having that requires you to have interacted in many conversations and making many choices.  

Tali must also be an Admiral, which is something that could have been done with a very high paragon or renegade score, and those could only be unlocked by doing numerous paragon or renegade options in mass effect 2.  If you were too neutral you would have to present the evidence, which is something that makes Tali much more likely to die in the suicide mission.

You must also broker peace between tali and legion in mass effect 2 during their argument.  This could also only be done with the nearly highest paragon or renegade score.  Again, this required you to stay either mostly paragon or mostly renegade across all of mass effect 2 because of how the reputation system worked in that game.  That's something that takes effort to do. 

You must also choose to save admiral Korris.  He needs to be alive to back you and Tali up when you talk Gerrel down.

It also seems that choosing to rewrite or kill the heretic Geth has an effect, but it's somewhat unclear.  

It also seems that you must complete rannoch: geth fighter squadrons.

So no, you don't get to save them by just playing the game.  You have to actively make the right decisions and have to stay on a mostly paragon or renegade path (at least in mass effect 2).  You can't simply do side quests and pass.  Not only that, but being able to save both is arguably a fulfillment of a core theme of the Mass Effect series, in that synthetics are a legitimate form of life and can coexist with organics. 

AlanC9 wrote... 
Wrex in ME1 is better, because ME1's dialog skill setup is better. If you don't take enough dialog skill and don't do that single sidequest, you fail. It's a much narrower window. And I'm OK with the player being able to avoid situations sometimes.

I honestly don't know how you see the Wrex choice as better.  You literally put enough points into charm or intimidate, and you can save him.  There is no side quest, I don't know what you are talking about.  This is one is a reward for putting points into a skill, not for making smart choices or for going out of your way to do more quests and talking to people; simply killing enemies and putting points into charm or intimidate is enough.  It's incredibly bizarre how you call this window narrower when there's no way to fail it by making bad choices in game.  You can only fail if you just didn't put points into a skill.  That's an incredibly easy thing to avoid.
 

AlanC9 wrote... 
As for the SM, ME2 should have forced the Reaper IFF mission the moment it became available. So you could still get everyone to loyal, if you're willing to let your whole crew get juiced.

If you choose to do other missions when the Reaper IFF mission is available you can lose your crew.  You can lose everyone but Joker and Chakwas if you do more than 4 missions, so that cost already exists.

That just sounds a lot less interesting to me.

I honestly don't understand why.  Why are choices for the sake of choices better than no choices?  Are you saying that just because you have to make a choice it automatically makes it more interesting?  Why is having a superior third or fourth option a bad thing?  If the superior option is the result of making smarter choices and paying attention, what is the problem with that?

[elitehunter34]

dreman9999 wrote...
But the choices at the end of the game do flow organicly.

The existance of a choice doesn't mean it flowed organically.  If Shepard suddenly had to decide whether or not he should shoot Garrus in the head in the middle of a conversation on the Normandy, that's not flowing organically from the narrative.  That would just be making a choice for the sake of having a choice.

The end game choices don't flow organically because there is no reason why the Crucible has Synthesis or Control.  The Crucible was designed to kill the Reapers, not control them or whatever the hell synthesis does.  It's a choice for the sake of making a choice.  The Catalyst shouldn't even present Control and Destroy to Shepard because they are against its goals.  I'll say it again because it bears repeating: the choices are contrived.

[dreman9999]

elitehunter34 wrote...

dreman9999 wrote...
But the choices at the end of the game do flow organicly.

The existance of a choice doesn't mean it flowed organically.  If Shepard suddenly had to decide whether or not he should shoot Garrus in the head in the middle of a conversation on the Normandy, that's not flowing organically from the narrative.  That would just be making a choice for the sake of having a choice.

The end game choices don't flow organically because there is no reason why the Crucible has Synthesis or Control.  The Crucible was designed to kill the Reapers, not control them or whatever the hell synthesis does.  It's a choice for the sake of making a choice.  The Catalyst shouldn't even present Control and Destroy to Shepard because they are against its goals.  I'll say it again because it bears repeating: the choices are contrived.

There's your problem. You not considering you form of plot element the choices are. The concepts of destory and control were always part of the theme of ME3. From the first coversation with TIM, the depate of contraol and destory came in had. But that we find out the destorykills the geth. That is a plot twist. With a plot twist, you viewer does not expect it to come up. In addiontion to tha the twist is still in the lines of the sersis concept and themes."What lenghts will you go to stop an unstoppable force". It's about putting th eplayer into moral conflict with this twist. Control has the same consept as well, you have been debating with TIM all the while over this concept and it turns out he was right.
Synthesis is the only one of the choices that comes out of left field but it in it self flow the same concept of the meaning of indocterination.

indocterination.  
http://www.thefreedi.../indoctrination 
1. To instruct in a body of doctrine or principles.2. To imbue with a partisan or ideological point of view


Synthesis fall in that line becasue you are forcing this on everyone.

The choice are all in line with the themes of the story.

[robertthebard]

sth128 wrote...

... But the Mass Relays will only be severely damaged. Because while the Crucible energy won't distinguish the Geth from the Reapers, it will distinguish Reapers from Reaper technologies...

So did your underwear die?  It's probably a synthetic cotton too.  Hey, how about your weapons?  Nah, they died before you ever got there, didn't they?  Are there any buildings left, they're synthetic too.  Did anyone see my road, it was there before the red button got pushed.

[elitehunter34]

dreman9999 wrote...
But the choices at the end of the game do flow organicly.

There's your problem. You not considering you form of plot element the choices are. The concepts of destory and control were always part of the theme of ME3. From the first coversation with TIM, the depate of contraol and destory came in had. But that we find out the destorykills the geth. That is a plot twist. With a plot twist, you viewer does not expect it to come up. In addiontion to tha the twist is still in the lines of the sersis concept and themes."What lenghts will you go to stop an unstoppable force". It's about putting th eplayer into moral conflict with this twist. Control has the same consept as well, you have been debating with TIM all the while over this concept and it turns out he was right.
Synthesis is the only one of the choices that comes out of left field but it in it self flow the same concept of the meaning of indocterination.

indocterination.  
http://www.thefreedi.../indoctrination 
1. To instruct in a body of doctrine or principles.2. To imbue with a partisan or ideological point of view


Synthesis fall in that line becasue you are forcing this on everyone.

The choice are all in line with the themes of the story.

Yeah, and the game beat you over the head with the notion that controling the Reapers is impossible.  Literally up  until 1 minute before Shepard meets the Catalyst Shepard is utterly convinced that controlling the Reapers is impossible. Controlling the Reapers shouldn't be possible and the writers suddenly changed their mind.  

And yes that is exactly my problem with the ending.  It is a FORCED moral dilemma.  There is no reason why the Crucible can't just kill the Reapers.  It is forced because the situation did not demand that the Crucible do x or y.  I don't know how many times I have to say this, but you just do not seem to understand it.  You can say that it is in line with the games themes, but that is completely subjective.  It isn't it line with the games themes.  You know what one of Bioware's writers thinks the main themes are?   http://www.gamesthir...dson/] Galactic alliances, friends, and organics vs. synthetics[/url].  I dont think the game is about what lengths you would go to stop an unstoppable force.  It has always been about strength through diversity and how Shepard always gets things done his/her way. Shepard didn't hesitate to do the impossible, which is demonstrated by the plot of ME1 and ME2.  It isn't until ME3 that Shepard has to bow before someone else and be forced to do it someone else's way without any good alternatives.
[/i]Look, the
Crucible is an enormously powerful device that operates on unknown
principles.  Therfore, the consequences of the Crucible are
completely up to the writers.  There is no reason why the
Crucible has to control the Reapers.  There is no reason why it
can give synthetics full understanding of organics, whatever the hell
that means.  There is no reason why it can control the Reapers,
yet it doesn't control the Geth and EDI.  It does all of these
things because the writer willed it to be so.The
Crucible doesn't have to kill the Geth and EDI.  It is a comple
and utter forced sacrifice.  They aren't sacrificed because the
Geth sacrificed their fleets to stop the Reapers.  EDI isn't
killed in a storm of Reaper fire as Joker takes on a Sovereign class
Reaper head on to stop it from destroying the Crucible.  Those
would have been noble sacrifices borne of their own actions and
reasonable circumstances.  The Crucible killing the Geth/EDI in
a beam of energy is not borne of reasonable circumstances.

Almost
every time the game has had a sacrifice it was done as a result of an
reasonable and unavoidable situation and/or it was done of the
character's own will, or it could be avoided by making the right
choices/putting in effort to the game (suicide mission in Mass Effect
2).  

Kaiden/Ashley's sacrifce?  It happened because
there wasn't enough time to save both.  There were too many Geth
forces. That's reasonable.

The fleet's sacrifice to save the
Destiny Ascension?  It happened because they needed to draw fire
to stop the Destiny Ascension from being destroyed.  Ships dying
in this situation isn't unreasonable to expect.

Mordin's
sacrifice?  The Shroud was being destroyed by the STG sabotage.
 Mordin had only seconds to counteract it.  An explosion
killed him, but he went in being fully prepared to die.  The
situation was reasonable so I'm not complaining.

Thane's
sacrifice?  Arguably it wasn't necessary.  Why didn't
Shepard help Thane?  Shepard and the whole squad stood there
while Thane was engaging Kai Leng in hand to hand combat.  They
could've helped Thane.  Thane's sacrifice was therefore borne of
somewhat unreasonable circumstances, but even if Shepard helped,
Thane could have been stabbed anyways, so it wasn't that unreasonable
that Thane died from his wounds.

Legion's sacrifice?  The
writers willed it, but I will accept it this time because it
isn't that unreasonable that an extremely complex
code upload might take "direct personality dissemination."
 It might have even happened as a result of Reaper sabotage,
making the code more difficult to upload, so Legion had to use more
drastic methods. Reaper technology is completely fictional, so it's
effects can be manipulated by the writers.  I'll take it because
it seems plausable enough to me that it is necessary.

Now I
know what you are thinking, "If he can accept Legion's why can't
he accept the Geth and EDI's."  It's because of a
combination of the Crucible's inconsistant abilities (an example is
how it controls the Reapers, but not the Geth/EDI, yet it can't
distinguish in destroy), the fact that it doesn't have to,
and because I can draw the line of what I think is reasonable
wherever I want.  The Crucible is a device designed to kill
Reapers; it shouldn't target synthetics in general.  It has been
built and refined for millions of years.  It was worked on
by Geth engineers.  It makes no sense how it wasn't
precisely calibrated to destroy only Reapers.   I would have had
absolutely no problem with it if the sacrifice was borne of a low
EMS, just like how the deaths of characters in Mass Effect 2's
suicide mission could be avoided by doing their loyalty missions,
making the right choices, and getting the ship ugrades.  The
game rewarded you for putting the effort in and being smart.  Having
more war assests represents more talented people on the Crucible, so
if you had enough, it would work exactly as it should: by killing the
Reapers, and only the Reapers.

Right now we have a device with
completely contrived consequences that can't be altered by making
smart choices and putting in effort into the game.  I will not
accept that. 

Modifié par elitehunter34, 22 juillet 2012 - 11:32 .

[elitehunter34]

dreman9999 wrote...
There's your problem. You not considering you form of plot element the choices are. The concepts of destory and control were always part of the theme of ME3. From the first coversation with TIM, the depate of contraol and destory came in had. But that we find out the destorykills the geth. That is a plot twist. With a plot twist, you viewer does not expect it to come up. In addiontion to tha the twist is still in the lines of the sersis concept and themes."What lenghts will you go to stop an unstoppable force". It's about putting th eplayer into moral conflict with this twist. Control has the same consept as well, you have been debating with TIM all the while over this concept and it turns out he was right.
Synthesis is the only one of the choices that comes out of left field but it in it self flow the same concept of the meaning of indocterination.

indocterination.  
http://www.thefreedi.../indoctrination 
1. To instruct in a body of doctrine or principles.2. To imbue with a partisan or ideological point of view


Synthesis fall in that line becasue you are forcing this on everyone.

The choice are all in line with the themes of the story.

Don't patronize me by explaining to me what a plot twist is.  I know what a goddamn plot twist is.  And your sentence where you say: "
You not considering you form of plot element the choices are."  Is literally not a coherent or properly formed sentence.  I am not trying to insult you, but you should reformat that so it is actually in line with English grammer conventions.

Anyways, the game beat you over the head with the notion that controling the Reapers is impossible.  Literally up  until 1 minute before Shepard meets the Catalyst Shepard is utterly convinced that controlling the Reapers is impossible. Controlling the Reapers shouldn't be possible and the writers suddenly changed their mind.  

And yes that is exactly my problem with the ending.  It is a FORCED moral dilemma.  There is no reason why the Crucible can't just kill the Reapers.  It is forced because the situation did not demand that the Crucible do x or y.  I don't know how many times I have to say this, but you just do not seem to understand it.  You can say that it is in line with the games themes, but that is completely subjective.  It isn't it line with the games themes.  You know what one of Bioware's writers thinks the main themes are?   http://www.gamesthir...dson/] Galactic alliances, friends, and organics vs. synthetics[/url].  I dont think the game is about what lengths you would go to stop an unstoppable force.  It has always been about strength through diversity and how Shepard always gets things done his/her way. Shepard didn't hesitate to do the impossible, which is demonstrated by the plot of ME1 and ME2.  It isn't until ME3 that Shepard has to bow before someone else and be forced to do it someone else's way without any good alternatives.

Look, theCrucible is an enormously powerful device that operates on unknownprinciples.  Therfore, the consequences of the Crucible are
completely up to the writers.  There is no reason why the
Crucible has to control the Reapers.  There is no reason why it
can give synthetics full understanding of organics, whatever the hell
that means.  There is no reason why it can control the Reapers,
yet it doesn't control the Geth and EDI.  It does all of these
things because the writer willed it to be so.The
Crucible doesn't have to kill the Geth and EDI.  It is a comple
and utter forced sacrifice.  They aren't sacrificed because the
Geth sacrificed their fleets to stop the Reapers.  EDI isn't
killed in a storm of Reaper fire as Joker takes on a Sovereign class
Reaper head on to stop it from destroying the Crucible.  Those
would have been noble sacrifices borne of their own actions and
reasonable circumstances.  The Crucible killing the Geth/EDI in
a beam of energy is not borne of reasonable circumstances.

Almost
every time the game has had a sacrifice it was done as a result of an
reasonable and unavoidable situation and/or it was done of the
character's own will, or it could be avoided by making the right
choices/putting in effort to the game (suicide mission in Mass Effect
2).  

Kaiden/Ashley's sacrifce?  It happened because
there wasn't enough time to save both.  There were too many Geth
forces. That's reasonable.

The fleet's sacrifice to save the
Destiny Ascension?  It happened because they needed to draw fire
to stop the Destiny Ascension from being destroyed.  Ships dying
in this situation isn't unreasonable to expect.

Mordin's
sacrifice?  The Shroud was being destroyed by the STG sabotage.
 Mordin had only seconds to counteract it.  An explosion
killed him, but he went in being fully prepared to die.  The
situation was reasonable so I'm not complaining.

Thane's
sacrifice?  Arguably it wasn't necessary.  Why didn't
Shepard help Thane?  Shepard and the whole squad stood there
while Thane was engaging Kai Leng in hand to hand combat.  They
could've helped Thane.  Thane's sacrifice was therefore borne of
somewhat unreasonable circumstances, but even if Shepard helped,
Thane could have been stabbed anyways, so it wasn't that unreasonable
that Thane died from his wounds.

Legion's sacrifice?  The
writers willed it, but I will accept it this time because it
isn't that unreasonable that an extremely complex
code upload might take "direct personality dissemination."
 It might have even happened as a result of Reaper sabotage,
making the code more difficult to upload, so Legion had to use more
drastic methods. Reaper technology is completely fictional, so it's
effects can be manipulated by the writers.  I'll take it because
it seems plausable enough to me that it is necessary.

Now I
know what you are thinking, "If he can accept Legion's why can't
he accept the Geth and EDI's."  It's because of a
combination of the Crucible's inconsistant abilities (an example is
how it controls the Reapers, but not the Geth/EDI, yet it can't
distinguish in destroy), the fact that it doesn't have to,
and because I can draw the line of what I think is reasonable
wherever I want.  The Crucible is a device designed to kill
Reapers; it shouldn't target synthetics in general.  It has been
built and refined for millions of years.  It was worked on
by Geth engineers.  It makes no sense how it wasn't
precisely calibrated to destroy only Reapers.   I would have had
absolutely no problem with it if the sacrifice was borne of a low
EMS, just like how the deaths of characters in Mass Effect 2's
suicide mission could be avoided by doing their loyalty missions,
making the right choices, and getting the ship ugrades.  The
game rewarded you for putting the effort in and being smart.  Having
more war assests represents more talented people on the Crucible, so
if you had enough, it would work exactly as it should: by killing the
Reapers, and only the Reapers.

Right now we have a device with
completely contrived consequences that can't be altered by making
smart choices and putting in effort into the game.  I will not
accept that.  

EDIT:  Formatting problems that would take too long to fix.  Oh well, it's still easily readable.

Modifié par elitehunter34, 22 juillet 2012 - 11:43 .

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

The ending from the laser blast onward was a charlie foxtrot. It was like watching "Plan Nine From Outer Space" in parts. I wish they'd changed the name of "Child" to "Smeghead" except it was not worthy of that name. Yes it was. It was a smeghead. I wish that Shepard would have been able to get Conrad Verner to run to the beam, and instead had gotten back onto the Normandy rather than have to endure that craptastic ending. Just as long as Conrad knew that the only way to be a true hero was to destroy the reapers. Doing anything else would make him a smeghead like the other smeghead.

[dreman9999]

elitehunter34 wrote...

dreman9999 wrote...
There's your problem. You not considering you form of plot element the choices are. The concepts of destory and control were always part of the theme of ME3. From the first coversation with TIM, the depate of contraol and destory came in had. But that we find out the destorykills the geth. That is a plot twist. With a plot twist, you viewer does not expect it to come up. In addiontion to tha the twist is still in the lines of the sersis concept and themes."What lenghts will you go to stop an unstoppable force". It's about putting th eplayer into moral conflict with this twist. Control has the same consept as well, you have been debating with TIM all the while over this concept and it turns out he was right.
Synthesis is the only one of the choices that comes out of left field but it in it self flow the same concept of the meaning of indocterination.

indocterination.  
http://www.thefreedi.../indoctrination 
1. To instruct in a body of doctrine or principles.2. To imbue with a partisan or ideological point of view


Synthesis fall in that line becasue you are forcing this on everyone.

The choice are all in line with the themes of the story.

Don't patronize me by explaining to me what a plot twist is.  I know what a goddamn plot twist is.  And your sentence where you say: "
You not considering you form of plot element the choices are."  Is literally not a coherent or properly formed sentence.  I am not trying to insult you, but you should reformat that so it is actually in line with English grammer conventions.

Anyways, the game beat you over the head with the notion that controling the Reapers is impossible.  Literally up  until 1 minute before Shepard meets the Catalyst Shepard is utterly convinced that controlling the Reapers is impossible. Controlling the Reapers shouldn't be possible and the writers suddenly changed their mind.  

And yes that is exactly my problem with the ending.  It is a FORCED moral dilemma.  There is no reason why the Crucible can't just kill the Reapers.  It is forced because the situation did not demand that the Crucible do x or y.  I don't know how many times I have to say this, but you just do not seem to understand it.  You can say that it is in line with the games themes, but that is completely subjective.  It isn't it line with the games themes.  You know what one of Bioware's writers thinks the main themes are?   http://www.gamesthir...dson/] Galactic alliances, friends, and organics vs. synthetics[/url].  I dont think the game is about what lengths you would go to stop an unstoppable force.  It has always been about strength through diversity and how Shepard always gets things done his/her way. Shepard didn't hesitate to do the impossible, which is demonstrated by the plot of ME1 and ME2.  It isn't until ME3 that Shepard has to bow before someone else and be forced to do it someone else's way without any good alternatives.

Look, theCrucible is an enormously powerful device that operates on unknownprinciples.  Therfore, the consequences of the Crucible are
completely up to the writers.  There is no reason why the
Crucible has to control the Reapers.  There is no reason why it
can give synthetics full understanding of organics, whatever the hell
that means.  There is no reason why it can control the Reapers,
yet it doesn't control the Geth and EDI.  It does all of these
things because the writer willed it to be so.The
Crucible doesn't have to kill the Geth and EDI.  It is a comple
and utter forced sacrifice.  They aren't sacrificed because the
Geth sacrificed their fleets to stop the Reapers.  EDI isn't
killed in a storm of Reaper fire as Joker takes on a Sovereign class
Reaper head on to stop it from destroying the Crucible.  Those
would have been noble sacrifices borne of their own actions and
reasonable circumstances.  The Crucible killing the Geth/EDI in
a beam of energy is not borne of reasonable circumstances.

Almost
every time the game has had a sacrifice it was done as a result of an
reasonable and unavoidable situation and/or it was done of the
character's own will, or it could be avoided by making the right
choices/putting in effort to the game (suicide mission in Mass Effect
2).  

Kaiden/Ashley's sacrifce?  It happened because
there wasn't enough time to save both.  There were too many Geth
forces. That's reasonable.

The fleet's sacrifice to save the
Destiny Ascension?  It happened because they needed to draw fire
to stop the Destiny Ascension from being destroyed.  Ships dying
in this situation isn't unreasonable to expect.

Mordin's
sacrifice?  The Shroud was being destroyed by the STG sabotage.
 Mordin had only seconds to counteract it.  An explosion
killed him, but he went in being fully prepared to die.  The
situation was reasonable so I'm not complaining.

Thane's
sacrifice?  Arguably it wasn't necessary.  Why didn't
Shepard help Thane?  Shepard and the whole squad stood there
while Thane was engaging Kai Leng in hand to hand combat.  They
could've helped Thane.  Thane's sacrifice was therefore borne of
somewhat unreasonable circumstances, but even if Shepard helped,
Thane could have been stabbed anyways, so it wasn't that unreasonable
that Thane died from his wounds.

Legion's sacrifice?  The
writers willed it, but I will accept it this time because it
isn't that unreasonable that an extremely complex
code upload might take "direct personality dissemination."
 It might have even happened as a result of Reaper sabotage,
making the code more difficult to upload, so Legion had to use more
drastic methods. Reaper technology is completely fictional, so it's
effects can be manipulated by the writers.  I'll take it because
it seems plausable enough to me that it is necessary.

Now I
know what you are thinking, "If he can accept Legion's why can't
he accept the Geth and EDI's."  It's because of a
combination of the Crucible's inconsistant abilities (an example is
how it controls the Reapers, but not the Geth/EDI, yet it can't
distinguish in destroy), the fact that it doesn't have to,
and because I can draw the line of what I think is reasonable
wherever I want.  The Crucible is a device designed to kill
Reapers; it shouldn't target synthetics in general.  It has been
built and refined for millions of years.  It was worked on
by Geth engineers.  It makes no sense how it wasn't
precisely calibrated to destroy only Reapers.   I would have had
absolutely no problem with it if the sacrifice was borne of a low
EMS, just like how the deaths of characters in Mass Effect 2's
suicide mission could be avoided by doing their loyalty missions,
making the right choices, and getting the ship ugrades.  The
game rewarded you for putting the effort in and being smart.  Having
more war assests represents more talented people on the Crucible, so
if you had enough, it would work exactly as it should: by killing the
Reapers, and only the Reapers.

Right now we have a device with
completely contrived consequences that can't be altered by making
smart choices and putting in effort into the game.  I will not
accept that.  

EDIT:  Formatting problems that would take too long to fix.  Oh well, it's still easily readable.

When in the game does it ever say it's impossible to control the reapers?
Also, what happen with destory also  results an an unavodible situation as well. Really, your missing the point. What it did was not up to the player because someone else designed it, how well it did it is up to the player. The final choices still fallow the concepts of the main theme.
Added, the geth are not part of the crucibles system. Why would control control them if control just over rides the previose programing of the catalyst?

Modifié par dreman9999, 23 juillet 2012 - 12:18 .

[elitehunter34]

dreman9999 wrote...
When in the game does it ever say it's impossible to control the reapers?
Also, what happen with destory also  results an an unavodible situation as well. Really, your missing the point. What it did was not up to the player because someone else designed it, how well it did it is up to the player. The final choices still fallow the concepts of the main theme.

Hackett said it, Shepard said it several times.  The TIM/Anderson scene is just one example.  They don't directly say "It's impossible" but you know what I mean.  I never said what the Crucible did was up to the player.  Whatever, you think the choices follow the concept of the main theme, that's not even my problem with the ending, and this argument has been going in circles long enough.  You clearly think the ending is fine.  You're free to believe that.  I don't think there's anything else I could say to change your mind.

Modifié par elitehunter34, 23 juillet 2012 - 12:23 .

[AlanC9]

elitehunter34 wrote...

No, you are completely wrong.  Doing side quests will not guarantee you will pass the dialogue check.  Getting peace between the Geth and the Quarians arguably quite difficult.

First of all, both Legion and Tali must be alive.  If neither one of them are alive you will fail no matter what.  Doing that requires a lot effort and making smart decisions in all of Mass Effect 2 (getting loyalty of enough members and making the right choices on the suicide mission)

Ah. Missed that completely, because all my ME2 saves have both of them alive. We may have a different definition of "a lot of effort."

You must also have 4 bars of reputation.  Having that requires you to have interacted in many conversations and making many choices.

Yep. The sidequests often get you rep points; that's what I was talking about. Other rep points you get by just walking around talking to people. If that sort of thing is an effort for someone, he's playing the wrong game.

You must also broker peace between tali and legion in mass effect 2 during their argument.  This could also only be done with the nearly highest paragon or renegade score.  Again, this required you to stay either mostly paragon or mostly renegade across all of mass effect 2 because of how the reputation system worked in that game.  That's something that takes effort to do.

You sure it requires that much score? I never did fail that check in ME2, and I don't pay attention to the P/R score when playing (which is why Miranda dies a lot in my ME2 games).

As for Tali being an admiral, that one might be tricky. I could swear my primary Shep had an exiled Tali and pulled Rannoch off anyway, but since I don't have the gigs to reinstall ME2 at the moment I can't check the saves.

You must also choose to save admiral Korris.  He needs to be alive to back you and Tali up when you talk Gerrel down.

 

I counted that as doing a sidequest. Doing the mission and then not saving him is.... kinda dumb.

It also seems that you must complete rannoch: geth fighter squadrons.

Another sidequest.

If I ever manage to fail at getting a compromise at Rannoch, I might have a different opinion of the mission.

I honestly don't know how you see the Wrex choice as better.  You literally put enough points into charm or intimidate, and you can save him.  There is no side quest, I don't know what you are talking about.

Do the family armor quest and you don't need the skill. But you're right, it's bad design. I shouldn't have defended it

If you choose to do other missions when the Reaper IFF mission is available you can lose your crew.  You can lose everyone but Joker and Chakwas if you do more than 4 missions, so that cost already exists.

Sure, but I can avoid paying that cost by doing everybody's loyalty missions before the IFF. Then I do Legion's mission and a couple N7s and I'm home free.

I honestly don't understand why (it's less interesting to you).  Why are choices for the sake of choices better than no choices?  Are you saying that just because you have to make a choice it automatically makes it more interesting?  Why is having a superior third or fourth option a bad thing?  If the superior option is the result of making smarter choices and paying attention, what is the problem with that?

Because then I'm penalized for making smarter choices and paying attention by getting a less interesting endgame.The same way I'm penalized in ME2 for having everyone loyal.

And yes, less choices = less interesting, all other things being equal.

And just to head off a potential misunderstanding, the "I'm" above refers to AlanC9, not Shepard. Our interests in this matter are not the same.

Modifié par AlanC9, 23 juillet 2012 - 12:33 .

[Kyle Kabanya]

Stopping or delaying the reapers was the original quest put forth in ME1 and ME2. The crucible should have only been set to destroy the reapers, not make every one, and not control them. All endings suck, that is why I don't play ME3.

I haven't touched any of those games since the release of ME3, because I am so disgusted in how it ended. Bioware started a great series, then dropped the ball with ME2 and ME3. If you think either of those two games were good, then you are in denial about how bad they were.

[AlanC9]

Controlling the Reapers is an effective way of stopping them, isn't it?

[elitehunter34]

AlanC9 wrote...
Because then I'm penalized for making smarter choices and paying attention by getting a less interesting endgame.The same way I'm penalized in ME2 for having everyone loyal.

And yes, less choices = less interesting, all other things being equal.

And just to head off a potential misunderstanding, the "I'm" above refers to AlanC9, not Shepard. Our interests in this matter are not the same.

Just to be clear, I do agree that it isn't necessarily extremely difficult to get peace, but it does require you to pay attention and be thorough.  Arguably saving Koris over his crew can be a difficult decision for some because you are letting many die for just one person.  I personally think that it's great that it is a possibility.  
Brokering peace was arguably one of the most satisfying moments for many in the entire series; I know it was for me.  Forcing you to make a choice between the two races would just scream "false dichotomy" to me.  And right now that's what the endings scream to me.

Having everyone loyal doesn't guarantee survival.  Mordin seems to always die unless he's in your squad or is sent back on the ship.  What's wrong with everyone surviving?  If Bioware simply randomly killed off people, people would just load their saves until they get what they want because random deaths are just way way too frustrating in interactive fiction like Mass Effect.  Either make it avoidable through in game actions, or make it completely unavoidable no matter what, and I don't know what they could have to satisfy you.  Is the ending of Mass Effect 1 not interesting because theres no choice on how to defeat Sovereign?  He is simply defeated no matter what choice you pick.  Is that bad?

Again, I just don't see how less choice automatically makes it less interesting.  If the reason for a choice is contrived, why should I want that choice?  Granted, you may not agree that the ending choices are contrived, but I hope you see what I'm getting at; if there's no good reason for a choice to exist, why have one at all?

Modifié par elitehunter34, 23 juillet 2012 - 01:00 .

[Blue Gloves]

Kyle Kabanya wrote...
 Bioware started a great series, then dropped the ball with ME2 and ME3. If you think either of those two games were good, then you are in denial about how bad they were.

Just out of curiosity (and PLEASE, PLEASE understand that I'm not trying to start a console flame war here, I'm just honestly curious) are you a PC player or an XBOXer?  I really love ME2, but the hubs doesn't like it as much as ME1- he's the PC wizard and I'm the XBox chairborne warrior.  We are still, after almost 3 years, debating the issue that PC gamers liked 1 better and consolers prefer 2.