287 réponses à ce sujet

[devSin]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Though is it really a parallel?  The advantage the Dark Ritual has is that it's done and you do see some in game consequences (your characters don't die) for the choice.  It affects what happens immediately after it in the same game, which makes it stronger IMO.

I do agree that the dark ritual is a fundamental component of the Origins' ending in a way that the ME-series' ultimate choices aren't, but the point is that they all lend themselves to the sort of arguments over which is the "best" decision in largely identical ways.

Arguments about the dark ritual being the right choice have more places to go, but I doubt they'd be all that different from arguments about the Collector base or the Council's fate (I don't really care to think about glow boy and his trifecta of nonsense anymore).

I will say that I believe ME2's ending is not just keeping yourself from dying before the end. It's also about what you do once you get there; unlike Origins, where the ritual is entirely ancillary to the main goal, this is what you had been striving toward the whole time (for some reason).

[Allan Schumacher]

Even if the choice for a "happy" ending exists, the choice for a "dramatic" ending is not diminished. What makes one ending "optimal" and another ending "suboptimal" is entirely subjective, even in ME2--while one person might argue that the "No One Left Behind" ending is the "optimal" ending because everyone survived, another might just as strongly argue that their ending where Shepard's love interest died is the "optimal" ending because it really underscored the sacrifices Shepard is willing to make to stop the Reapers. It really comes down to player perference.

That's purely from a narrative point of view, and with respect to ME2 it mostly comes across as not as well done as I would have liked because I find obtaining the primary preconditions for it is rather trivial. That it's still a factor of the entire game's worth of play, however, is its saving grace. That is, it's not like the game says at the end "Okay, if you want you can kill some people off for no particularly good reason."

I like that in my ME2 game, Thane died, and I think that that makes for a more interesting story. In spite of knowing this, I still consider the roleplaying "optimal" ending to be the one where everyone survives. I don't think it makes for a more interesting story, but it's clear that my Shepard would have preferred everyone to survive. If he had the clairvoyance to know which decisions would result in the death of various characters, he would have made different choices.


With respect to ME3, a game where the choices are at the end themselves (rather than a culmination of the entire game with no proactive choice at the end), the idea that had I done everything and I am presented with a choice to say "eff off" and it works compared to the other choices defeats any of the interesting aspects of the choice. At best they become "that was interesting from a narrative perspective" and less of a "I find it interesting that in spite of all the challenges, there's still a great cost that must be paid in other to win this thing."

This is compounded if there's explicit closure. Without explicit closure, the player is arguably put more into the head of Shepard in that you have to make your decision and live with it, without ever getting any extra metaknowledge to influence your decision. The focus shifts to the choice itself, rather than the consequences of the choice. I think people that liked the ending to ME3 are the ones that were able to enjoy that focus, whereas there's definitely a group of people that did prefer to have more closure and they are the ones that do not like the ending (at least the original ending).

[devSin]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

This is compounded if there's explicit closure. Without explicit closure, the player is arguably put more into the head of Shepard in that you have to make your decision and live with it, without ever getting any extra metaknowledge to influence your decision. The focus shifts to the choice itself, rather than the consequences of the choice. I think people that liked the ending to ME3 are the ones that were able to enjoy that focus, whereas there's definitely a group of people that did prefer to have more closure and they are the ones that do not like the ending (at least the original ending).

I disagree. To some extent, sure, I suppose you can say that people who were dissatisfied needed to see explicit closure.

But the original ending still told you what happened. You saw the effect it had on Earth, and you inexplicably see that one ship vomit forth to some point for some reason with some people who somehow got onboard to miraculously land in the bosom of the fertile Garden of Eden to spring forth unharmed and freshly groomed, happy and stranded and doomed.

It wasn't some great experiment where it left the future to your imagination. It just gave you the complete opposite of what you ever wanted to see and then said "fill in the pieces on your own! huzzah!"

A lot of people have said that the ending would have been more bearable even if it was just an explosion after that one part with the old guy and the nice view. And I agree with them. It's not because they can't be satisfied with their own version of the ending. It's because they were fed garbage and told to digest.

[Nomen Mendax]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

That's purely from a narrative point of view, and with respect to ME2 it mostly comes across as not as well done as I would have liked because I find obtaining the primary preconditions for it is rather trivial. That it's still a factor of the entire game's worth of play, however, is its saving grace. That is, it's not like the game says at the end "Okay, if you want you can kill some people off for no particularly good reason."

I like that in my ME2 game, Thane died, and I think that that makes for a more interesting story. In spite of knowing this, I still consider the roleplaying "optimal" ending to be the one where everyone survives. I don't think it makes for a more interesting story, but it's clear that my Shepard would have preferred everyone to survive. If he had the clairvoyance to know which decisions would result in the death of various characters, he would have made different choices.


With respect to ME3, a game where the choices are at the end themselves (rather than a culmination of the entire game with no proactive choice at the end), the idea that had I done everything and I am presented with a choice to say "eff off" and it works compared to the other choices defeats any of the interesting aspects of the choice. At best they become "that was interesting from a narrative perspective" and less of a "I find it interesting that in spite of all the challenges, there's still a great cost that must be paid in other to win this thing."

This is compounded if there's explicit closure. Without explicit closure, the player is arguably put more into the head of Shepard in that you have to make your decision and live with it, without ever getting any extra metaknowledge to influence your decision. The focus shifts to the choice itself, rather than the consequences of the choice. I think people that liked the ending to ME3 are the ones that were able to enjoy that focus, whereas there's definitely a group of people that did prefer to have more closure and they are the ones that do not like the ending (at least the original ending).

Without getting into an ME3 ending argument I think there are a lot of valid reasons that people didn't like them other than wanting more closure (and I think that's a valid reason in itself). 

I do agree with you about ME2 though, in that it was pretty easy to get the perfect ending just by completing everything in the game (and it was pretty obviously a good idea to updgrade the Normandy as much as possible). In essence having all your crew survive was a reward for doing your best to get your money's worth out of purchasing the game, which doesn't really seem to have much narrative significance.

One thing that really annoyed me about the ME2 ending is that about the only way that one of your crew members could not die was in in-game combat which seemed very silly. 

And as far as endings go I would be happy with endings where your choices make a difference, and that are clearly derived from your character's actions.

Modifié par Nomen Mendax, 07 octobre 2012 - 07:12 .

[CronoDragoon]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

This is compounded if there's explicit closure. Without explicit closure, the player is arguably put more into the head of Shepard in that you have to make your decision and live with it, without ever getting any extra metaknowledge to influence your decision. The focus shifts to the choice itself, rather than the consequences of the choice. I think people that liked the ending to ME3 are the ones that were able to enjoy that focus, whereas there's definitely a group of people that did prefer to have more closure and they are the ones that do not like the ending (at least the original ending).

I don't think you can so easily separate the two (choice and consequence). More often than not what makes a choice "hard" is precisely the consequences. That is certainly the case for the red ending of ME3. I say this because I think most choices that do not focus on consequences focus on morality in some way instead, but most often the choice will involve competing moralities instead of a conflict within a specific moral system. This leads to an easy choice because the player already presumably has a set moral code.

There are some exceptions. I think the decision of whether or not to kill Anders was, for me, unrelated to the consequences and difficult to choose. It was about whether or not I felt killing him then and there was justice (I ultimately decided it was). But even then, some may have decided to kill him because Sebastian threatens war on Kirkwall if you don't.

Related to this topic, I want to bring up the case of Isabela, which I think could provide a nice example of how a player could make a hard choice but still be satisfied.

You can either give her the book or not. Making this choice is difficult at the time, especially if you romance her. However, if you have interacted with her in such a way, she comes back with the book. Now, here we essentially have a happy ending to the arc, but did that diminish the choice earlier when I made it? I don't think so. It was still tough, and I didn't know if she was coming back or not. Only in retrospect does the decision seem clear. But then, that can be the case with a lot of choices in the real world, as well. 

It sounds like you want to preclude the possibility of a player reloading or possibly restarting in order to get a more satisfying outcome for them. But why? Such a player isn't going to find value in tough choices with borderline sucky outcomes no matter what. And for players who want nothing but tough choices, they should be fine playing through the game living with whatever decisions they made.

Modifié par CronoDragoon, 07 octobre 2012 - 07:41 .

[ElitePinecone]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

With respect to ME3, a game where the choices are at the end themselves (rather than a culmination of the entire game with no proactive choice at the end), the idea that had I done everything and I am presented with a choice to say "eff off" and it works compared to the other choices defeats any of the interesting aspects of the choice. At best they become "that was interesting from a narrative perspective" and less of a "I find it interesting that in spite of all the challenges, there's still a great cost that must be paid in other to win this thing."

This is compounded if there's explicit closure. Without explicit closure, the player is arguably put more into the head of Shepard in that you have to make your decision and live with it, without ever getting any extra metaknowledge to influence your decision. The focus shifts to the choice itself, rather than the consequences of the choice. I think people that liked the ending to ME3 are the ones that were able to enjoy that focus, whereas there's definitely a group of people that did prefer to have more closure and they are the ones that do not like the ending (at least the original ending).

Not to get too side-tracked, but among the innumerably splintered groups of people who have an issue with the ending, I think it's difficult to say that people who wanted closure were the most vocal. Jessica Merizan collected actual data after the maelstrom started, but anecdotally there were many people upset with the mechanics of the ending, or the tone, or the narrative, or the abruptness - not necessarily the ambiguity. 

Focusing criticism on the lack of consequences shown (and not knowing what happens to characters, say) would seem to require not having a problem with a lot of the major narrative elements, or the lack of interactivity in the entirety of Priority: Earth, or the weird logic that the entire Reaper storyline depends on after those last ten minutes. For me, a lack of closure is far down on the list of issues - but it seems to have been the focus of what the developers were trying to do in the Extended Cut.

Regarding "optimal" paths, I agree that in ME2's case it essentially rewarded completionism, but what about a system of mutually-exclusive choices that would change the experience no matter the degree of completion? Forcing players to choose between two (three, four?) options then giving *none* of them an advantage does huge things to the interactivity and reactivity of the storytelling. DAO had no objectively 'bad' endings, we always killed the Archdemon, but the flavour and tone of the ending is influenced by mutually-exclusive choices that the player must make. Either we sacrifice ourselves, or Alistair, or Loghain, or allow Morrigan to capture the soul of an old god in a baby - none of those are especially "optimal" - just different. 

[Zu Long]

I'm gonna throw my name into this hat as well.

Edit: To be clear, I'm agreeing with the OP.

Modifié par Zu Long, 07 octobre 2012 - 07:40 .

[Monica21]

ElitePinecone wrote...
DAO had no objectively 'bad' endings, we always killed the Archdemon, but the flavour and tone of the ending is influenced by mutually-exclusive choices that the player must make. Either we sacrifice ourselves, or Alistair, or Loghain, or allow Morrigan to capture the soul of an old god in a baby - none of those are especially "optimal" - just different.

I haven't played ME so I can't comment on that, but I figured the point of the DAO ending was sacrifice in some form. You're told from the beginning of the game, maybe even before your first conversation with Alistair, that the Wardens do whatever it takes to defeat the Blight. With so few Wardens, doesn't it make sense to have one "whatever it takes" choice be the ritual? It's a sacrifice, just not the kind that ends in a dead Warden. I agree with the poster above (sorry, too tired to look) who said that both the player and the character do get closure even it's not necessarily happy.

DA2 is very different. There isn't closure and to me, there isn't really even an acceptance that, as a player, I can be happy with the ending. Ten years in Kirkwall leads my character to an ending that's almost exactly the same no matter what choices I've made. DAO sowed the seeds of the mage/templar conflict and DA2 brought that conflict into the open. I suppose the point of my character's ten years was to get to the point of that open conflict, but the way it happened and my character's choices not making a difference didn't make sense to me as a player. I'm not too concerned with a "happy" ending. I just want an ending that makes sense. Not to mention that it's hard to have closure at the end of a game that's basically a cliffhanger.

[esper]

CronoDragoon wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

This is compounded if there's explicit closure. Without explicit closure, the player is arguably put more into the head of Shepard in that you have to make your decision and live with it, without ever getting any extra metaknowledge to influence your decision. The focus shifts to the choice itself, rather than the consequences of the choice. I think people that liked the ending to ME3 are the ones that were able to enjoy that focus, whereas there's definitely a group of people that did prefer to have more closure and they are the ones that do not like the ending (at least the original ending).

I don't think you can so easily separate the two (choice and consequence). More often than not what makes a choice "hard" is precisely the consequences. That is certainly the case for the red ending of ME3. I say this because I think most choices that do not focus on consequences focus on morality in some way instead, but most often the choice will involve competing moralities instead of a conflict within a specific moral system. This leads to an easy choice because the player already presumably has a set moral code.

There are some exceptions. I think the decision of whether or not to kill Anders was, for me, unrelated to the consequences and difficult to choose. It was about whether or not I felt killing him then and there was justice (I ultimately decided it was). But even then, some may have decided to kill him because Sebastian threatens war on Kirkwall if you don't.

The problem with choice and consequence for me are that the big final choice often end up completeley negating all other choices doing. The Anders choice as you make as an example is a personal choice for the player and Hawke and all comes down to morals/personal emotions and sense of betrayal.

The dark choice still feels like a get out of prison for free card. An ultimately how you handled the dwarves, elves and mages have nothing to do with the ending or even further narrative. All the big choice was confined to only affect their little hub and didn't matter much in the larger narrative. And I so fear that bioware will go back to this form of story telling.

The Me3 ending, I guess, did take former choices into account but it did it in a way where you could clearly see that it was a game and every choice was munch down to how much points (war assests) did you manage to culminate. To top it all the big final choice came out of nowhere. I would have like the ending of me3 much more if it had ended with Shephard and Anderson staring out in space and then the effect of firing the crucible would differ depending on which war assets had helped building it.

I liked da2's ending, but that is only because for my canon Hawke it personally was a very good end to kill Meridith and kick off the mage/templar conflict. What I would have liked to see in da2 was that if you had been mostly pro-mage Meridith would assume that you were on the mages side still and claims that it was all your fault for harboring an apostate (Consequenctly in the end dialog between Cassandra and Varric Cassandra could still be blaming Hawke, claiming that she helped plotted the explosion. That would have been a good example to show the difference between real Hawke and legend Hawke), on the other side if you had been pro-templar Orsino would think that you are his enemy and you would have to side with Meridith because he couldn't trust you (of course that would demand a tweeking off the narrative so it would make sense for Orsino to turn down help) and then Cassandra could I don't know claim that Hawke was an opportunist who turned Meridith (even if we know it is the opporsite way around) to claim the vicount throne. Only if the player had tried to stay neutral would I have like the final choice here and that in the sense off. You have to take a stand now, champion.  

[AlexJK]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

I think people that liked the ending to ME3 are the ones that were able to enjoy that focus, whereas there's definitely a group of people that did prefer to have more closure and they are the ones that do not like the ending (at least the original ending).

This may come across as a somewhat churlish comment (and it's not like the topic hasn't been explored), but I don't think the problem with the original ME3 ending was a lack of closure. There are (many) other problems to which I'd look first.

Lack of closure in an ending isn't a problem, in most circumstances. Leaving the fate of a main character, supporting characters, or even the entire world hanging isn't generally a problem, *as long as the key motivation is resolved*. DAO couldn't have ended without explaining how the Blight was stopped, because that was the player's motivation throughout; without concluding that storyline the game has not been completed and shouldn't be over. Once that's been drawn to a close, other plot holes are perhaps fair game.

The ME3 ending provided closure in this respect; whatever ending you chose ended the Reaper threat. The problem came from the fact that it seemed to be an unrelated ending tacked onto a series which had spent three games building up to an ending which never materialised...

[Ridwan]

Why do so many of you consider dark and depressing stuff as entertainment, do you guys play black metal at parties too and frown when people tell you to change the music?

[GodWood]

I'd prefer bittersweet as completely happy feels cheap and artificial.
 
Ideally there should be multiple ending scenarios determined by the choices of the PC over the course of the game with each scenario having both debatable positives and negatives.

M25105 wrote...
do you guys play black metal at parties too and frown when people tell you to change the music?

Yes.

[Ridwan]

GodWood wrote...

I'd prefer bittersweet as completely happy feels cheap and artificial.
 
Ideally there should be multiple ending scenarios determined by the choices of the PC over the course of the game with each scenario having both debatable positives and negatives.

M25105 wrote...
do you guys play black metal at parties too and frown when people tell you to change the music?

Yes.

We're playing a video game dude, I kinda like feeling happy after I finish it you know. Kinda kills the replay value if you feel like crap after finishing a game.

[GodWood]

M25105 wrote...
We're playing a video game dude, I kinda like feeling happy after I finish it you know. Kinda kills the replay value if you feel like crap after finishing a game.

This is not a universal preference.

Many widely loved films, books and videogames have tragic/bittersweet/not-happy endings.

[Ridwan]

GodWood wrote...

M25105 wrote...
We're playing a video game dude, I kinda like feeling happy after I finish it you know. Kinda kills the replay value if you feel like crap after finishing a game.

This is not a universal preference.

Many widely loved films, books and videogames have tragic/bittersweet/not-happy endings.

Many video games?

[GodWood]

M25105 wrote...
Many video games?

Red Dead Redemption, Halo Reach, Silent Hill 2.

Not that it matters what medium the story is told with.

[Ridwan]

That's not even five, hardly qualifies as many.

And Silent Hill from the looks of it, couldn't even break the 2 million marks.

[Bfler]

Silent Hill is a survival horror game. You don't play such a game and expect that there is an happy end.

[DreGregoire]

Personally, I don't need a happy ending, and I wasn't going to bother responding until I read through a majority of the posts and decided to give my view on some of the topics.

DAO only has a positive impact for those who survived all the death and mayhem that went on before the final blow, the warden's life ends or continues at that point. So, aside from the blight ending much earlier than those in the past, I see that as a positive but I don't view it as a happy ending. Even the marriage of the female noble warden to Alistair may initially seem a positive thing but I don't think a couple that involves themselves in politics against the "creed" of their order will result in a happy outcome in the long run.

In regards to the ME2 squadmate quests, I did them or not based on what type of Shepard I was playing, but the majority of the time they were all completed because I felt above all else the majority of my Shepards felt it was significant to have everybody prepared for the mission ahead. It's the same way that I played ME3 making sure everybody was prepared for the final battle. I had no idea what that final battle would entail and I don't even learn what the crucible is for until the very end. The fact that the future is determined by my PC's decision at that point does not belittle or negate the effect of the preparedness of those who fought along side me to that point. The impact of my choice has little baring on those who are still fighting against the Reapers and their minions as I make my decision and "we" watch it happen. Once it has happened the choice Shepard made impacts the future of the entire galaxy but still the impact of the previous decisions (readiness) continues to impact the future in the form of who survives or not. Hence the end narratives by the various individuals. The end narratives were a very nice piece of work.

To me the only comparisons that can be made between DA and ME is that the game fundamentals are similiar and that the PC impacts the future. In DA by killing the Archdemon to end the blight, that's only one choice because the survival of the one who takes the killing blow does not impact the future of the many, that we know at that point anyways. In ME the PC must decide the direction of the galaxy, this is so far beyond the realm of the DA ending that I don't consider them to be remotely comparable.

I had no issues with the original ME endings, but I did enjoy the extended endings. I had no problem with the idea that my narrow view of the ME Universe led me to be surprised about what was going on behind the scenes with the Reapers and the Catalyst, if anything I was impressed and in awe of the whole idea/concept behind it all. I was going to go into details but realized that it might be to spoilerish for ME3. So did your decisions through out ME effect the decision you make in that moment? No, why would they? The only thing they actually effect is your ability to get to that point and the impact your choice has on the future based on your "readiness" (for the purpose of the game mechanics.)

Edit: In regard to DA and obtaining those who you have treaties for: They help to determine how well others survive while your PC is off taking out the Archdemon and the survival of the whole after is impacted by the "completion or readiness" of your army. It's just simple preparedness for what is to come. You don't have to play a PC that prepares completely but that doesn't negate the importance of preparing those you fight with and how your choice to prepare or not prepare impacts the survivability of those involved and left behind.

Modifié par DreGregoire, 07 octobre 2012 - 09:55 .

[GodWood]

M25105 wrote...
That's not even five, hardly qualifies as many.

I was never given a number of games I had to state.

Shadow of the Collossus and Metal Gear Solid 3. That's five.

And Silent Hill from the looks of it, couldn't even break the 2 million marks.

And yet it's a game that was positively received by fans and critics a like that is still to this day considered one of the greatest games of all time.

[Ridwan]

GodWood wrote...

M25105 wrote...
That's not even five, hardly qualifies as many.

I was never given a number of games I had to state.

Shadow of the Collossus and Metal Gear Solid 3. That's five.

And Silent Hill from the looks of it, couldn't even break the 2 million marks.

And yet it's a game that was positively received by fans and critics a like that is still to this day considered one of the greatest games of all time.

With low sales numbers.

Shadow of the Collosus couldn't break the 2 million mark either.

Modifié par M25105, 07 octobre 2012 - 09:44 .

[AlienWolf728]

 I'm so sick of lurkers claiming that grimdark endings are "so edgy and cool". I don't want to be shoe-horned into a "OH MY GOD EVERYONE I KNOW IS DEAD" ending anymore than you want a rainbow and sunshine ending. *sigh* I need to take a break from BSN.

Modifié par AlienWolf728, 07 octobre 2012 - 09:45 .

[Dave of Canada]

Off the top of my head, bittersweet and "bad" endings included:

Shadow of the Colossus, GTA4, Silent Hill series, Saint's Row 1, Fallout series, Planescape: Torment, InFamous series, most Final Fantasy games (especially Tactics), Fatal Frame series, Mega Man Zero series, Max Payne 1 & 2, Metal Gear series, Half Life series, The Darkness games, BioShock 2, Red Dead Redemption, Thief series, some of the Metroid games, NieR, L.A. Noire, Batman: Arkham City, Warcraft RTS series, The Walking Dead game (though it's unfinished, it's not going anywhere good).

AlienWolf728 wrote...

 I'm so sick of lurkers claiming that grimdark endings are "so edgy and cool". I don't want to be shoe-horned into a "OH MY GOD EVERYONE I KNOW IS DEAD" ending anymore than you want a rainbow and sunshine ending. *sigh* I need to take a break from BSN.

Bittersweet =/= "edgy and cool" grimdark. Winning with cost is still winning.

Modifié par Dave of Canada, 07 octobre 2012 - 09:48 .

[Ridwan]

AlienWolf728 wrote...

 I'm so sick of lurkers claiming that grimdark endings are "so edgy and cool". I don't want to be shoe-horned into a "OH MY GOD EVERYONE I KNOW IS DEAD" ending anymore than you want a rainbow and sunshine ending. *sigh* I need to take a break from BSN.

Didn't ya know bro, it's artistic to feel like crap! Saved the world bro and now you want get a happy feeling? Hell no bro! Here takes this crappy ending where we arrest your character or you become an alcholic or something. That's realism right there for you you bro.

[Ridwan]

Dave of Canada wrote...

Off the top of my head, bittersweet and "bad" endings included:

Shadow of the Colossus, GTA4, Silent Hill series, Saint's Row 1, Fallout series, Planescape: Torment, InFamous series, most Final Fantasy games (especially Tactics), Fatal Frame series, Mega Man Zero series, Max Payne 1 & 2, Metal Gear series, Half Life series, The Darkness games, BioShock 2, Red Dead Redemption, Thief series, some of the Metroid games, NieR, L.A. Noire, Batman: Arkham City, Warcraft RTS series, The Walking Dead game (though it's unfinished, it's not going anywhere good).

AlienWolf728 wrote...

 I'm so sick of lurkers claiming that grimdark endings are "so edgy and cool". I don't want to be shoe-horned into a "OH MY GOD EVERYONE I KNOW IS DEAD" ending anymore than you want a rainbow and sunshine ending. *sigh* I need to take a break from BSN.

Bittersweet =/= "edgy and cool" grimdark. Winning with cost is still winning.

Fallout 2 had a happy ending, so did Warcraft 2 and 3. Half-Life had an ambigious ending, neither happy or dark, just open for a sequal making the player wondering what happened. And Metal Gear Solid had a happy ending to my recollection.

Can't speak for the rest, since I haven't played or if I played it, I never finished them cause I found them too boring.