236 réponses à ce sujet

[LucasShark]

Mcfly616 wrote...

I'm not going to debate the topic, as I've done many times before. But I will say OP....to the part about the synth vs organics conflict and all that. The Geth were deliberately humanized in order to make the ending choice more difficult.

That's it. Otherwise, everybody would shoot the tube

That is... kind of impossible: considering the initial humanizing of the Geth via Legion took place in ME2 before this idiotic plot was even concieved of.

[grey_wind]

Leonardo the Magnificent wrote...

grey_wind wrote...

I have a feeling the forced pseudo-intellectualism at the end was also a byproduct of them not having many of the writers from ME1 and 2 who actually could give characters and issues like the ones you mentioned depth. Thus, they may have felt that having this artsy ending was the only way to compensate for the way every conflict that actually had depth previously is turned into a black-and-white caricature of itself:
Alliance vs Cerberus
Geth vs Quarians
Krogan vs Salarians

Aside from the fact that the first two were completely black and white to begin with and their transition to grey is practically a retcon.

Every conflict usually starts out at black and white anyway. The fact remains that if a good writer fleshes out the factions in a conflict and adds several layers of grey to them, he often doesn't revert it back to black vs white and ignore everything he painstakingly established before because it makes for easier writing in the last book.

[David7204]

Personally, if I was asked to guess the motivations of the Reapers before ME 3, I would have guessed that they existed to ensure life continued to struggle. To ensure life always has a goal to reach towards.

If life reached its apex, established perfect societies, learned all there is to know, built empires across the galaxy...then what else is there? What purpose is there? No more conflict, no more mystery. No more stories. Nothing to do or gain or see or create. Just existence. Stagnation, as Mordin put it. Heroes can't exist in such a world - there's no need for them, no purpose for them.

But as long as there is a cycle, the stories can continue. Forever. The proof is right in front of us, that we continually seek stories with new enemies to defeat, new partners to romance, new worlds to explore. The Reapers allow that to happen. They allow life to always have a journey ahead of it. To always have possibilities and opportunities lying in wait.


Of course, there's two big problems with all of that. One, is that it introduces kind of a "Fight-Club" theme, which I'm not sure I like. Two is that it's kind of an unhappy and uncomfortable conclusion to end things on. I think most people would agree with the Reapers to some extent...

Modifié par David7204, 10 octobre 2012 - 03:34 .

[Jaulen]

I for one never thought of the Quarian and Geth conflict as Black and white.
At first, when you're getting attacked and killing Geth in ME, yeah, they are just machine baddies to vaporize. But then after talking to Tali and learning some of the history between the Quarians and Geth, it becomes a whole lot grayer....and that was all the way back to ME.

[Mathias]

The funniest thing about all this is that Bioware and it's developers/writers are totally convinced that what was written was beautiful and artistic, completely delusional to the truth. They dismiss the masses who dislike the ending as entitled whiners who don't understand.

I like to compare Bioware nowadays as the one kid you knew in high school who thought he was popular and cool, but in reality everyone was laughing at him behind his back.

Modifié par Mdoggy1214, 10 octobre 2012 - 05:08 .

[Foxhound2121]

Yes, it is really sad.

But someone at Bioware thought the ending to Dues Ex and speculation for everyone was better than the writing they had made thus far.

[KevShep]

grey_wind wrote...

I have a feeling the forced pseudo-intellectualism at the end was also a byproduct of them not having many of the writers from ME1 and 2 who actually could give characters and issues like the ones you mentioned depth. Thus, they may have felt that having this artsy ending was the only way to compensate for the way every conflict that actually had depth previously is turned into a black-and-white caricature of itself:
Alliance vs Cerberus
Geth vs Quarians
Krogan vs Salarians

This^  Why the hell did they EVER send Drew Karpyshyn to do SWTOR instead of ME3???

[3DandBeyond]

David7204 wrote...

Personally, if I was asked to guess the motivations of the Reapers before ME 3, I would have guessed that they existed to ensure life continued to struggle. To ensure life always has a goal to reach towards.

If life reached its apex, established perfect societies, learned all there is to know, built empires across the galaxy...then what else is there? What purpose is there? No more conflict, no more mystery. No more stories. Nothing to do or gain or see or create. Just existence. Stagnation, as Mordin put it. Heroes can't exist in such a world - there's no need for them, no purpose for them.

But as long as there is a cycle, the stories can continue. Forever. The proof is right in front of us, that we continually seek stories with new enemies to defeat, new partners to romance, new worlds to explore. The Reapers allow that to happen. They allow life to always have a journey ahead of it. To always have possibilities and opportunities lying in wait.


Of course, there's two big problems with all of that. One, is that it introduces kind of a "Fight-Club" theme, which I'm not sure I like. Two is that it's kind of an unhappy and uncomfortable conclusion to end things on. I think most people would agree with the Reapers to some extent...

The thing was there were so many hints within the stories that the reapers were merely larger versions of us or bears, treating us like fish.  Ha ha funny right?  However, they lay dormant as if in hibernation for 50k years and came out to reproduce and to "feed".  They advanced people to a certain preferred state, just like you may fatten up your prey before harvesting it.  The difference seems to be that they needed more of a mental fattening up than just making sure that prey is big enough.  And you throw back anything not big enough.

What's funny is the Leviathans sort of kind of explains the reapers, but nothing explains the Leviathans and what they were doing.  Why did they create the machines that became reapers?  And when they created machines that apparently turned on them, did they really think it was a great idea to create more tech to deal with those machines?  And since that too turned on them, would it really be a good idea to enlist them to help deal with something they've proven they had no clue about in the first place?  Perhaps that's why they don't deliver on their promise and they don't actually help do anything.  They're way too incompetent.

[xxskyshadowxx]

LucasShark wrote...

Tomwew wrote...

bringing up a resolved issue (can syntehetics and organics co-exist) in the last ten minutes was a mistake, not giving you the option to disagree, and forcing you to accept the catalyst's beliefs is antithesis to everything mass effect stood for, freedom of choice.

Agreed in full: it is precisely what Bioware themselves said it would not be.

I agree with both of you completly. Points well made.

[xxskyshadowxx]

Mdoggy1214 wrote...

The funniest thing about all this is that Bioware and it's developers/writers are totally convinced that what was written was beautiful and artistic, completely delusional to the truth. They dismiss the masses who dislike the ending as entitled whiners who don't understand.

I like to compare Bioware nowadays as the one kid you knew in high school who thought he was popular and cool, but in reality everyone was laughing at him behind his back.

They say that, but I think what they are actually basing their "It's artistic gold!" opinion on is cashflow. ME3 sold better than the previous installments, and Leviathan is their best selling DLC ever. They don't truly care what people think of the story/etc. They care about how much money the game earns...so if the game had earned less, and the DLCs weren't selling so well...they might have a different opinion entirely.

[RockSW]

xAmilli0n wrote...

LucasShark wrote...

Cthulhu42 wrote...

grey_wind wrote...

I have a feeling the forced pseudo-intellectualism at the end was also a byproduct of them not having many of the writers from ME1 and 2 who actually could give characters and issues like the ones you mentioned depth. Thus, they may have felt that having this artsy ending was the only way to compensate for the way every conflict that actually had depth previously is turned into a black-and-white caricature of itself:
Alliance vs Cerberus
Geth vs Quarians
Krogan vs Salarians

I agree that none of those issues were handled very well at all. Massive bias and retcons everywhere!

I don't think this one is brought up that often: but why exactly are the Krogan so pissed with the Salarians?  They developed the weapon, but the Turians deployed it.  So yeah even that wasn't handled with much subtlty.

I figured this had to do with the Salarian's "uplifting" them to fight the Rachni, and then creating the genophage to control them afterward.  Meaning, the Krogan resent the Salarian's for using them as tools.  That's my take on it, if it was expressed well in game, I don't remember, its been months since I've played ME3 SP.

it was. galaxy needing them then discarding them when they became a problem or some such talk

[3DandBeyond]

xxskyshadowxx wrote...

Mdoggy1214 wrote...

The funniest thing about all this is that Bioware and it's developers/writers are totally convinced that what was written was beautiful and artistic, completely delusional to the truth. They dismiss the masses who dislike the ending as entitled whiners who don't understand.

I like to compare Bioware nowadays as the one kid you knew in high school who thought he was popular and cool, but in reality everyone was laughing at him behind his back.

They say that, but I think what they are actually basing their "It's artistic gold!" opinion on is cashflow. ME3 sold better than the previous installments, and Leviathan is their best selling DLC ever. They don't truly care what people think of the story/etc. They care about how much money the game earns...so if the game had earned less, and the DLCs weren't selling so well...they might have a different opinion entirely.

Unfortunately, everything they seem to (and I believe you are quite accurate) be basing their opinions on are statistics and not the reasons behind the statistics.  They believed more people liked MP because a lot of people used MP to kind of wait and see what was going to happen with the SP.  They've now revamped a lot of the MP in Retaliation (gee where did that name come from) and added elements that it would have been nice to have in SP-thinking of Firebase Dagger and the inability to see in front of you.  The other challenge elements are their attempt to keep players (completionists) playing forever, but honestly horde mode gets old fast.  But I am definitely not interested in PvP either.  In fact, I've noticed quite a drop off in play that seems to surge a bit for challenge weekends and for new maps but then falls way off again-that and a lot of young kids.  Great.

Leviathan was their best-selling, most popular DLC ever-yep, they say that.  It however was not their best-received.  Reviews from sites that were their biggest supporters were not great and even called it pointless and meh.  It sold more than LotSB, because for the PS3 LotSB was FREE.  You don't get sales from free.  And there was the little mini-debacle pre-Leviathan release.  You have to ask why IGN would say Leviathan would change ME3's endings if they were not told that by the devs.  They did come out the next day after stating that it would change the endings and say that it wouldn't but even the statements made by the devs about Leviathan indicated it would do something to the endings, but it really didn't do anything worthwhile-as reviewers pointed out after its release.  They purposely made people think it would change something.  And apparently they led reviewers to somehow think the same thing by playing the ambiguity card again.  It was counter-intuitive to think, seeing the Leviathan trailers that it would not do anything to the endings.  Why the heck wouldn't it?  But it didn't.  That's the very definition of pointless.

But, I agree they will base everything on earnings and statistics and they won't understand or care about the underlying factors behind all that-the money is the thing.  All those little kids that were playing MP (on the xbox where you pay for MP-I play on the PS3 too and I'd expect kids there where you play for free), all those kids playing must have been paying for a lot of the micro-transactions.  And that may well be what BW wants the most.  The work put into the MP maps (some have been altered) could have made for a better SP experience.  Too bad, really.

[Xilizhra]

What's funny is the Leviathans sort of kind of explains the reapers, but nothing explains the Leviathans and what they were doing. Why did they create the machines that became reapers? And when they created machines that apparently turned on them, did they really think it was a great idea to create more tech to deal with those machines? And since that too turned on them, would it really be a good idea to enlist them to help deal with something they've proven they had no clue about in the first place? Perhaps that's why they don't deliver on their promise and they don't actually help do anything. They're way too incompetent.

Actually, it was the thrall races who built synthetics who turned on them. The Leviathans didn't build anything until the Intelligence, and they're sufficiently arrogant to believe that none of their work would go bad in the same manner... except that it did. Also, the Leviathans do help, it's just in the form of a war asset (but a very big one, among the biggest in the game).

[Podge 90]

Leonardo the Magnificent wrote...

grey_wind wrote...

I have a feeling the forced pseudo-intellectualism at the end was also a byproduct of them not having many of the writers from ME1 and 2 who actually could give characters and issues like the ones you mentioned depth. Thus, they may have felt that having this artsy ending was the only way to compensate for the way every conflict that actually had depth previously is turned into a black-and-white caricature of itself:
Alliance vs Cerberus
Geth vs Quarians
Krogan vs Salarians

Aside from the fact that the first two were completely black and white to begin with and their transition to grey is practically a retcon.

I don't agree that they were black and white.  I think one of the strenghts of the first two games (in combination, when you start to get the full picture of events) is that there is no wrong answer to the secondary conflicts.

Alliance vs Cerebrus seems clear cut in Mass Effect 1 (particularly for my Shep as he was on Akuze) but in Mass Effect 2 it is Cerberus that is the only party willing to do anything.  Don't get me wrong, I never sided with them, and was always quick to give TIM the finger, but you can't deny that without them, the outcome for the galaxy would have been much more bleak.  Also, Miranda and TIM make it clear that some of Cerberus' projects went rogue and away from his control.

Geth vs Quarians is much more 'grey'. Again, in ME1, Geth are the enemy, with their back story being a synthetic uprising, forcing Quarians from their homeworld and damn near exterminating the species.  But ME2 suggests (and ME3 shows) that the Geth were acting in self-defence, that they were the oppressed, and it was they who were at risk of extinction.  Add to that in ME3 of the Quarians being hell-bent on persuing a war with the Geth, right in the middle of the Reaper invasion, and it makes you question who was right.

Krogan vs Salarians is similar too.  From the outset we are made aware of the Krogan population being crippled, but Mordin makes it clear that there was genuinely no alternative.  And have to Krogan changed that much?  Some might say they are even more dangerous, because not only could they reclaim their original strength as a species, but large numbers of them are also severly bitter towards the rest of the galaxy, and post-genophage, they might actually be in the fearsome position of being able to do something about it.  I guess it depends on how much you trust Wrex, and how much control you believe he wields.

Ah, back when writing was a strength of the series.

Modifié par Podge 90, 10 octobre 2012 - 01:52 .

[Xilizhra]

Krogan vs Salarians is similar too. From the outset we are made aware of the Krogan population being crippled, but Mordin makes it clear that there was genuinely no alternative. And have to Krogan changed that much? Some might say they are even more dangerous, because not only could they reclaim their original strength as a species, but large numbers of them are also severly bitter towards the rest of the galaxy, and post-genophage, they might actually be in the fearsome position of being able to do something about it.

The narrative was severely against me sabotaging the cure when Wrex and Eve were alive, but this is one of the reasons I choose Control.

[Podge 90]

Xilizhra wrote...

Krogan vs Salarians is similar too. From the outset we are made aware of the Krogan population being crippled, but Mordin makes it clear that there was genuinely no alternative. And have to Krogan changed that much? Some might say they are even more dangerous, because not only could they reclaim their original strength as a species, but large numbers of them are also severly bitter towards the rest of the galaxy, and post-genophage, they might actually be in the fearsome position of being able to do something about it.

The narrative was severely against me sabotaging the cure when Wrex and Eve were alive, but this is one of the reasons I choose Control.

Yeah I made a slight edit when I read it back saying it depends on your trust with Wrex and how much influence you believe he has.

[Mathias]

3DandBeyond wrote...

xxskyshadowxx wrote...

Mdoggy1214 wrote...

The funniest thing about all this is that Bioware and it's developers/writers are totally convinced that what was written was beautiful and artistic, completely delusional to the truth. They dismiss the masses who dislike the ending as entitled whiners who don't understand.

I like to compare Bioware nowadays as the one kid you knew in high school who thought he was popular and cool, but in reality everyone was laughing at him behind his back.

They say that, but I think what they are actually basing their "It's artistic gold!" opinion on is cashflow. ME3 sold better than the previous installments, and Leviathan is their best selling DLC ever. They don't truly care what people think of the story/etc. They care about how much money the game earns...so if the game had earned less, and the DLCs weren't selling so well...they might have a different opinion entirely.

Unfortunately, everything they seem to (and I believe you are quite accurate) be basing their opinions on are statistics and not the reasons behind the statistics.  They believed more people liked MP because a lot of people used MP to kind of wait and see what was going to happen with the SP.  They've now revamped a lot of the MP in Retaliation (gee where did that name come from) and added elements that it would have been nice to have in SP-thinking of Firebase Dagger and the inability to see in front of you.  The other challenge elements are their attempt to keep players (completionists) playing forever, but honestly horde mode gets old fast.  But I am definitely not interested in PvP either.  In fact, I've noticed quite a drop off in play that seems to surge a bit for challenge weekends and for new maps but then falls way off again-that and a lot of young kids.  Great.

Leviathan was their best-selling, most popular DLC ever-yep, they say that.  It however was not their best-received.  Reviews from sites that were their biggest supporters were not great and even called it pointless and meh.  It sold more than LotSB, because for the PS3 LotSB was FREE.  You don't get sales from free.  And there was the little mini-debacle pre-Leviathan release.  You have to ask why IGN would say Leviathan would change ME3's endings if they were not told that by the devs.  They did come out the next day after stating that it would change the endings and say that it wouldn't but even the statements made by the devs about Leviathan indicated it would do something to the endings, but it really didn't do anything worthwhile-as reviewers pointed out after its release.  They purposely made people think it would change something.  And apparently they led reviewers to somehow think the same thing by playing the ambiguity card again.  It was counter-intuitive to think, seeing the Leviathan trailers that it would not do anything to the endings.  Why the heck wouldn't it?  But it didn't.  That's the very definition of pointless.

But, I agree they will base everything on earnings and statistics and they won't understand or care about the underlying factors behind all that-the money is the thing.  All those little kids that were playing MP (on the xbox where you pay for MP-I play on the PS3 too and I'd expect kids there where you play for free), all those kids playing must have been paying for a lot of the micro-transactions.  And that may well be what BW wants the most.  The work put into the MP maps (some have been altered) could have made for a better SP experience.  Too bad, really.

Exactly. And a month ago I attempted to replay Mass Effect 1, and i'm looking at this game and i'm thinking what happened to the series? Like what the f happened?

Rest assured i only got about 4 hours into the game before i lost all enthusiasm to keep playing. Before ME3 released i had beaten ME1 probably close to 20 times, and i was still not sick of the game. But now knowing how the series ends, and that 90% of our choices don't amount to anything, the past 2 games are completely ruined for me. And that really REALLY sucks, because i loved the games.

But what's really funny about this is that ending the trilogy should've been easy. Yes you can argue that writing an ending is the hardest part of a story, but we're talking about a story that spans over 3 games, that's suppose to have multiple different endings. There should've been something for everybody here. The formula should've been simple. Instead of getting 3 different endings to choose from, your ending should be determined by your actions. If you want to see a different ending, then you have to start the story over again and play it differently. We should've had an ending where if you completed nearly 100% of the entire trilogy and it's side quests, and made the right decisions, then there should've been that happy ending where everyone lives.

How can anyone look at the past 7 months now and say, "Nah having a happy ending where everyone lives would've been a terrible idea." I can pretty much guarentee you that if there were endings that had multiple degrees of success and failure, and one of those was a golden perfect ending, Bioware would not have taken any heat for the ending.

[3DandBeyond]

Xilizhra wrote...

What's funny is the Leviathans sort of kind of explains the reapers, but nothing explains the Leviathans and what they were doing. Why did they create the machines that became reapers? And when they created machines that apparently turned on them, did they really think it was a great idea to create more tech to deal with those machines? And since that too turned on them, would it really be a good idea to enlist them to help deal with something they've proven they had no clue about in the first place? Perhaps that's why they don't deliver on their promise and they don't actually help do anything. They're way too incompetent.

Actually, it was the thrall races who built synthetics who turned on them. The Leviathans didn't build anything until the Intelligence, and they're sufficiently arrogant to believe that none of their work would go bad in the same manner... except that it did. Also, the Leviathans do help, it's just in the form of a war asset (but a very big one, among the biggest in the game).

The Leviathans help nothing.  I have over 9000 EMS.  Exactly what happens that is different by getting the Leviathans (who said they'd fight and are never seen again) as an asset?  What changes?  Nothing and that's what the paid for review sites even say-pointless.  IGN, G4TV, and many more used that word.  IGN even says the combat portions within it fail.  And BW needlessly led people to believe it would do something major to the endings-the exact quote after they told IGN it did not change the endings, was that it would have an impact.  What a load of horse pucks.  They knew what people would think that meant.

The thrall races are well enthralled.  If someone controls you and you make something, more than likely you are making something they want you to make or you think they want to make.  If nothing else the Leviathans were very likely providing those they enthralled with the tools (advancement of their intelligence and knowledge of tech) to create such things.  They were securing them to have them pay tribute to them.  Just like indoctrinating people makes them do what you want them to do and seeding the galaxy with tech determines the path for advancement.

[Xilizhra]

I thought it had an impact on the endings. Minor, but it did help clarify the Catalyst conversation a fair bit. As for the thrall races, I don't think the Leviathans managed the minutiae of their day-to-day lives much; they seemed to be relatively hands-off rulers, probably because it takes active effort to enthrall someone.

[3DandBeyond]

Mdoggy1214 wrote...

Exactly. And a month ago I attempted to replay Mass Effect 1, and i'm looking at this game and i'm thinking what happened to the series? Like what the f happened?

Rest assured i only got about 4 hours into the game before i lost all enthusiasm to keep playing. Before ME3 released i had beaten ME1 probably close to 20 times, and i was still not sick of the game. But now knowing how the series ends, and that 90% of our choices don't amount to anything, the past 2 games are completely ruined for me. And that really REALLY sucks, because i loved the games.

But what's really funny about this is that ending the trilogy should've been easy. Yes you can argue that writing an ending is the hardest part of a story, but we're talking about a story that spans over 3 games, that's suppose to have multiple different endings. There should've been something for everybody here. The formula should've been simple. Instead of getting 3 different endings to choose from, your ending should be determined by your actions. If you want to see a different ending, then you have to start the story over again and play it differently. We should've had an ending where if you completed nearly 100% of the entire trilogy and it's side quests, and made the right decisions, then there should've been that happy ending where everyone lives.

How can anyone look at the past 7 months now and say, "Nah having a happy ending where everyone lives would've been a terrible idea." I can pretty much guarentee you that if there were endings that had multiple degrees of success and failure, and one of those was a golden perfect ending, Bioware would not have taken any heat for the ending.

This is totally correct.  They darn well knew that by not providing at least one clear cut win as in we earned a victory based upon our actions and we lived to tell about it, ending they knew they would alienate a huge section of their fans.  There is no way they didn't know that.


The game led to a natural ending and they chose to have Shepard sit down and chat with the new foe who is supposedly helping Shepard choose something that helps him and not Shepard.  So, he's the antagonist who isn't one because he's only been trying to help, but is an antagonist because he's going about it the wrong way.  Exactly who wrote this again? 

I've even been able to find a way where they could have sort of kept these "choices" and sort of kept the kid but only if the choices were not choices at all, but natural outcomes of the Shepard you played.  The kid would be replaced by different avatars based upon the type of Shepard you played and each non-choice could have good, bad, and really bad results.

There wouldn't be 3 choices when you get to the citadel, there would be one thing that would happen when you activate the crucible.  And the AI avatar could be there to tell you what will happen and even explain why or in some cases he might be there to try and stop you.  Say it was Harbinger and he was there as an avatar and was trying to tell you that using the crucible would be a mistake.  The only option you have is to refuse at that point.  Harbinger could be there to try and tell you that you will be killing others if you use the crucible (and based upon what you've done, he could be right).  This might occur if you played the type of Shepard who only ever wanted to destroy the reapers-who agreed when Hackett said that was the goal and so on.  A bad version might be like it is now and just destroy everything.  But if you did things right and in time (prevented the reapers in this case from attacking the crucible so it's intact), the reapers only would be destroyed and a reunion could take place.

In control, your Shepard might be the kind that agreed with TIM and shot Anderson (in destroy type Shepard, TIM might shoot Anderson and you'd shoot TIM).  When Shepard gets to the citadel, only control or refuse are available.  The avatar might be TIM trying to convince you that control makes sense and can be used to rule the galaxy and put humans in control.  You might have the choice here to use it as he wants or to decide to use it for something better.  Shepard can live and control the reapers externally, telling people that once the reapers fix things they will be destroyed, unless people decide they want to learn from them or some stupid thing like that.  Bad control might lead to Shepard being forced to join with the kid to perfect the control of the reapers so that the whole galaxy can be taken control of better and more efficiently so that people will never create bad synthetics.

And so on.  Good synthesis might have a Mordin avatar or Saren, and it might lead to synthesizing the reapers only so that the intelligence of the people within them make them more "rational" and organics can decide to use tech/organic hybridization to facilitate understanding between synthetics and organics.  Bad synthesis could assimilate all synthetics and organics into one race of new beings.

Anyway, this was one thought I had that changed the choices into just what happened and removed the kid as being the reason for making a choice.

[3DandBeyond]

Xilizhra wrote...

I thought it had an impact on the endings. Minor, but it did help clarify the Catalyst conversation a fair bit. As for the thrall races, I don't think the Leviathans managed the minutiae of their day-to-day lives much; they seemed to be relatively hands-off rulers, probably because it takes active effort to enthrall someone.

The problem is impact was used to make people think it really mattered.  It only matters if you never played the endings before playing Leviathan.  Leviathan to matter had to have been introduced a long ways back and not as a retcon of the kid and his purpose.  So Leviathan clarifies what the catalyst means?  Wow.  That means that he didn't mean what he originally meant and then he didn't really mean what he meant in his extended version, so his dialogue changes by what 5 words and now it's becoming clear.  There is nothing that relevant that could make him make sense because he exists to solve a problem created by exactly the opposite of what Shepard tried to achieve in ME3.

That problem was created and persisted because people that were not allowed to develop on their own (they were enthralled and therefore were not autonomous and did not self-determine), continually created bad things and were not good at it.  Take a look at the enthralled miners and then tell me again that the Leviathans were not overseeing their day to day stuff.  And then take a look at the Protheans and the bad synthetics they created-people tend to create synthetics (in this game) that are mirror images of themselves.  The geth were a lot like the quarians.  The Protheans created synthetics that were rather like them.  The people enthralled by the Leviathans created Leviathan-like synthetics.  And they had the ability to enthrall (indoctrinate) and were just as destructive, but better (more efficient) at it.  That's the main problem-the synthetics that people have created are better at doing the things the organics they are modeled after, do.  Look at the geth.  They were more efficient at killing and yet they pulled back and had remorse.  They were better versions of the quarians-most of the quarians in charge still wanted the geth dead, but the geth didn't want the quarians dead.

Leviathans must still bear the responsibility for the machines that became reapers.  They are their likenesses as synthetics.  They were created by people they controlled.  That means their control or enthrallment was flawed since they should have just stopped those people from making such synthetics, but they didn't.  They decided to create more flawed tech to handle flawed tech.

And Shepard and the geth are exactly the opposite example of what they did.  The quarians actually did it right.  They weren't supposed to but they did allow the geth to achieve sentience and the geth took what was the best in those that created them.  Races that use totalitarian regimes will more often create synthetics in their image that will rebel and kill.  Races that don't are more likely to create synthetics in their image that adhere to the sanctity of the individual and that appreciate life.  That's what I think it shows in the game, but that's what gets punished at the end.  And one line of dialogue alteration for the kid will not fix that.

[sdinc009]

Xilizhra wrote...

What's funny is the Leviathans sort of kind of explains the reapers, but nothing explains the Leviathans and what they were doing. Why did they create the machines that became reapers? And when they created machines that apparently turned on them, did they really think it was a great idea to create more tech to deal with those machines? And since that too turned on them, would it really be a good idea to enlist them to help deal with something they've proven they had no clue about in the first place? Perhaps that's why they don't deliver on their promise and they don't actually help do anything. They're way too incompetent.

Actually, it was the thrall races who built synthetics who turned on them. The Leviathans didn't build anything until the Intelligence, and they're sufficiently arrogant to believe that none of their work would go bad in the same manner... except that it did. Also, the Leviathans do help, it's just in the form of a war asset (but a very big one, among the biggest in the game).

But that's the dumbest part of the DLC's explanation. The Leviathans observe a problem which is that their thrall races build sythetics which eventually rebel against them and their solution to this problem is to do the exact same thing!? And then, SURPRISE, the Intelligence does just that. Why didn't they just tell the thrall races to stop building AI's? Stick to VI's, much more reliable.

[Podge 90]

3DandBeyond wrote...

Good synthesis might have a Mordin avatar or Saren, and it might lead to synthesizing the reapers only so that the intelligence of the people within them make them more "rational" and organics can decide to use tech/organic hybridization to facilitate understanding between synthetics and organics.  Bad synthesis could assimilate all synthetics and organics into one race of new beings.

I don't think there is any alternative approach that would make Synthesis sound 'not ridiculous' 

[3DandBeyond]

Podge 90 wrote...

3DandBeyond wrote...

Good synthesis might have a Mordin avatar or Saren, and it might lead to synthesizing the reapers only so that the intelligence of the people within them make them more "rational" and organics can decide to use tech/organic hybridization to facilitate understanding between synthetics and organics.  Bad synthesis could assimilate all synthetics and organics into one race of new beings.

I don't think there is any alternative approach that would make Synthesis sound 'not ridiculous' 

Well I agree.  It's always the worst thing to try and explain.  My take on it would be that it wouldn't use Shepard's essence for this at all, but if it went really wrong, Shepard could die.  I can't fully get rid of what they mean by it so a "good" version would only affect the reapers and would allow others to augment themselves with understanding.  A bad version would be that full assimilation but it need not occur immediately or by using the magic space beam of tech implantation.  It is the most ridiculous of all the ridiculousness of this craptastic ending.

I would rather he was gone completely but since they (and others) think Leviathan explains his existence so well it was clear someone's kid was used for the role.  I'd also rather the choices never existed.  It's the biggest pile of horse pucks I've ever seen for an ending.  Just how you want to end a game that's about a war for the salvation of the galaxy and by that I mean Earth and by that I mean London.


The funny thing with Leviathan is it makes the kid contradict himself and the reason for the reapers even more than he did before.  He says that Leviathans didn't understand their destruction was a part of the very solution they required.  Ok, uh I thought he was merely ascending all life to be preserved.  I guess not.

And what he also really does is attack the reason for his own existence.  The problem was the Leviathans.  So, the Leviathan DLC was used to retcon the kid's existence which was about the need ot retcon the Leviathans.  They are the problem.  So, that's just great. 

Modifié par 3DandBeyond, 10 octobre 2012 - 03:02 .

[Klijpope]

BearlyHere wrote...
We wanted a video game. That's why we spent our money, to get a video game with a video game ending. If we had wanted a vid, we could have waited for the ME movie. All this ill will could have been avoided, and it makes no sense. And the irony is they're casting off the fanbase that likes RPGs in favor of the easy shooter players, but we're the ones more likely to buy their overpriced trinkets. I wonder how many ME hoodies and sneakers are sitting in their warehouse unpurchased? There was no reason for this, other than a perfect storm of bad descisions. Maybe someone at EA will understand, but I'm willing to bet that they're not gamers either.

Please do not speak for me. I wanted a video game that tried to break the mold - I certainly did not want a "video game ending". "Video game endings" suck (yes, my opinion). I'm not saying their actual ending was successfully rendered, but I applaud the fact they did not give us, or want to give us, a typical video game ending.

As it stands, even as an ending that poorly reflects the previous narratives, and even if you allow for every single criticism, both fair and insane, the ME3 ending still ranks as one of the better endings to a video game. Most video game endings are just so bad we just disregard them, or the story that it leqads up to so meh that the ending is irrelevant.

I'm glad they did not go for: boss battle then happy ending - that is just childish. If this medium is to be taken seriously then it has to get beyond that. And so have the fans.