648 réponses à ce sujet

[ScriptBabe]

Thank you all. This has been a very interesting conversation, and you've given me an idea for another blog post on my website. Always a struggle to try and keep the place active. I'm going to nip over there and write it up while it's fresh in my mind, and try to finish this chapter in the novel. Catch you all later.

[sveners]

I've asked myself the same question. If we, the fans, had been a bit more "reasonable", expressing our disappointment, our sadness, but not anger and hate. Perhaps BW had provided something different.

One thing that has always bugged me was their reason for the ending, wanting it memorable. Honestly, after 5 years and 100's of hours, any ending would be memorable. Why polarize the fans? Why create something you know, or should know, will leave many fans bitterly disappointed?

[ScriptBabe]

Blog post has been accomplished. If any of you are interested you can find it here. http://melindasnodgr...t-and-all-alone

And thank you again. For the Tolkien conversations as well as the Mass Effect discussion.

[knightnblu]

AlanC9 wrote...

Archonsg wrote...

I thought about this alot and yes, had they made a paragon / renegade choice variant of control, I might have considered it, *if* they had allowed for a choice to instead of being the new space Hitler, you take control of all Reapers, wipe the Citadel of the Catalyst and its faulty programing and then fly every single Reaper into the sun.

*That* would have turned what would have been Shepard kowtowing to the Reaper overlord, accepting its ultimatum and commit an act of suicide because he was told to do so, into an act of defiance and ultimate sacrifice.

And a stupid waste of resources. If you can make the Reapers fly into the sun, actually making them do so is pointless.

Edit: not that I have a problem with stupid choices being in for RP purposes. I alway supported adding a Refuse option, for instance.

And what of justice?

[jkflipflopDAO]

It still just befuddles me how they could let a work of art like this go out on such a horrendous note. Don't you love this series that you've been working on for years? Don't you have a shred of pride in your work? How can you just sit back and ignore the glaring failure and not do something to correct it?

[RocketManSR2]

jkflipflopDAO wrote...

It still just befuddles me how they could let a work of art like this go out on such a horrendous note. Don't you love this series that you've been working on for years? Don't you have a shred of pride in your work? How can you just sit back and ignore the glaring failure and not do something to correct it?

I'm not disagreeing with you, quite the opposite in fact. However, as other posters have pointed out, if they did do that it would kill what company morale they had. Shareholders would take note and could start selling off shares and EA could lose faith in them and close down the company. BioWare has to soldier on. Their reputation as a developer has taken a hit and they know that better than anyone. I really hope they come storming back, but I have my doubts as long as EA is in charge.

[Guanxii]

I respect the men imensely but it's Casey/heads of BioWare's fault imo... they should have fought harder for a 3 year development cycle/budget. period. Even after the extension it was clear where the project was heading.

If Mass Effect 3 had came out this month a year later it would have been the OoT of this generation.

Modifié par Guanxii, 25 mars 2013 - 10:40 .

[CosmicGnosis]

ScriptBabe wrote...

Blog post has been accomplished. If any of you are interested you can find it here. http://melindasnodgr...t-and-all-alone

And thank you again. For the Tolkien conversations as well as the Mass Effect discussion.

... Melinda Snodgrass? Writer of TNG's "The Measure of a Man"?

[ScriptBabe]

Yes, that's me.  

Modifié par ScriptBabe, 25 mars 2013 - 03:27 .

[ScriptBabe]

BTW, CosmicGnosis, I love the Sagan quote. I need to add it to the revolving quotes on my website.

[Steelcan]

This whole ending debacle isn't all that complicated. BioWare tried to make an edgy, "artistic", ending and it sucked. It was flat out awful in almost every way. The EC was a poor attempt at damage control, but it seemed to have missed the mark. It didnt target what was wrong in the endings, the narrative incoherence, the nonsensical logic, the space magic aspects. It fixed a few plot holes.

Long story short. BioWare tried to be cool with this "awesome" ending, and it just fell on its face into a cactus.

[Iakus]

Steelcan wrote...

This whole ending debacle isn't all that complicated. BioWare tried to make an edgy, "artistic", ending and it sucked. It was flat out awful in almost every way. The EC was a poor attempt at damage control, but it seemed to have missed the mark. It didnt target what was wrong in the endings, the narrative incoherence, the nonsensical logic, the space magic aspects. It fixed a few plot holes.

Long story short. BioWare tried to be cool with this "awesome" ending, and it just fell on its face into a cactus.

...and then tried to fix things with the ending propoganda that is EC and stepped on a garden rake...

[CaIIisto]

iakus wrote...

Steelcan wrote...

This whole ending debacle isn't all that complicated. BioWare tried to make an edgy, "artistic", ending and it sucked. It was flat out awful in almost every way. The EC was a poor attempt at damage control, but it seemed to have missed the mark. It didnt target what was wrong in the endings, the narrative incoherence, the nonsensical logic, the space magic aspects. It fixed a few plot holes.

Long story short. BioWare tried to be cool with this "awesome" ending, and it just fell on its face into a cactus.

...and then tried to fix things with the ending propoganda that is EC and stepped on a garden rake...

BW every time they talk about the EC/ending;

Rake

[Maverick827]

Steelcan wrote...

This whole ending debacle isn't all that complicated. BioWare tried to make an edgy, "artistic", ending and it sucked. It was flat out awful in almost every way. The EC was a poor attempt at damage control, but it seemed to have missed the mark. It didnt target what was wrong in the endings, the narrative incoherence, the nonsensical logic, the space magic aspects. It fixed a few plot holes.

Long story short. BioWare tried to be cool with this "awesome" ending, and it just fell on its face into a cactus.

Nah

[ScriptBabe]

The ending is horribly flawed by every objective writing standard. And yes, there are rules for good writing. You break them at your peril.

[RedBeardJim]

ScriptBabe wrote...

The ending is horribly flawed by every objective writing standard. And yes, there are rules for good writing. You break them at your peril.

Old favorite:

[ScriptBabe]

Yes, RedBeardJim. A new element -- like a new antagonist that had never even been hinted at before the final ten minutes.

[MattFini]

angol fear wrote...

It's a fake. It's a fan note. Just look at it : it's not some note made by a writer but it's a "fan" who made this. When you create something, your notes don't look like this. 

Spoken as someone with no knowledge of what they speak.

Yes, notes often do look exactly like that.

And that scribbling is real. 

[MattFini]

- Songlian - wrote...

I think the fanbase overreacted. Yeah, the ending had plot holes and it's kinda messy, but everyone on BSN acted like BioWare set their mother on fire. I think that reaction was absurd, and what's even more baffling is that people still hold onto it after a year or so.

I don't.

That original ending was so broken, confusing and incoherent that people were right to be enraged.

From the non-personalized flashbacks when Shepard makes his choice (amazingly immersion-breaking) to the completely baffing Normandy crash scene (with your squadmates being back on the ship) to the lazy and largely identical ending cut scenes. 

It was so terrible, even before you start looking at the StarChild's info dump, that it's actually mind-blowing. 

The EC certainly corrected large parts of this. And thank GOD the fans raged, otherwise we would've been stuck with their original excuse for an ending. 

I'm just amazed that ANYONE out there could've played the vanilla endings and thought, "yep, that was fine."

[Dude_in_the_Room]

So you're saying that we're suppose to be nice in order to get a good ending?

The money we paid for the game wasn't enough?  Or the money we spent on previous games wasn't enough? 

Modifié par Dude_in_the_Room, 25 mars 2013 - 06:09 .

[kobayashi-maru]

Scriptbabe very well written point of view on your blog - your most recent post I'm there with you 100% including the yelling at TV

You reminded me of old story about Battlestar Galactica, the problem there was the reverse of ME, RD Moore had too much time to rethink things and ended up making a finale which is very polorizing. I liked the original story outline for the final 10 episodes which got changed during the writers strike. You would know more than me - I have ideas but writing them is difficult - but I view writing like baking bread some times they can be over or under worked making less tasty bread

And I was not being negative towards the retakers in the OP, I understand how Bioware made mistakes during the debacle but still think a more pro Bioware gives us ending we know you can write stance could have helped. They maybe rushed EC because of it and if given the time and support may have made a more successful attempt. When you push too hard people get defensive so the 'Artistic Integrity' argument got thrown and the Bioware don't change anything only expand upon the bad ideas to try and show the original ending wasn't bad. Maybe the positive approach would have got a deletion of the Normandy crash and Harbinger as the AI at end. But maybe nothing would have changed its just speculation based on my own personal slant.

[ScriptBabe]

Thank you, Kobayashi, very kind of you. Galactica is an interesting case. I worked with Ron on Trek:TNG. He's really talented, and apparently that ending with the old hoary chestnut of "She's Eve!" and people being angels and stuff was in an old script from back when Glen Larsson ran the show, and somehow it was required that they make that the end. Maybe they couldn't get the rights otherwise. Again, a story where we probably won't know the truth until years from now.

I do understand the old "flies with honey" approach, and if BioWare had still been an independent company they might have had more leeway in which to operate. But it's sort of SOP for big corporations to circle the wagons, and refuse to admit a mistake. The sad fact is that a lot of very creative fans offered them a perfect out. They could have embraced Indoctrination, said, "Oh you clever people, you figured it out", and redone the ending as a DLC, and the game would have been hailed as sheer genius.

Bottom line -- companies need to think as much about story as they do about game play and graphics, and I don't think a lot of companies have had this realization yet.

[CosmicGnosis]

ScriptBabe wrote...

BTW, CosmicGnosis, I love the Sagan quote. I need to add it to the revolving quotes on my website.

Well goodness, I didn't expect this interesting revelation. Makes me wonder who all these other BSN people are.

Yeah, Sagan is a personal hero of mine. Very quotable. I've actually thought about changing the sig to one of his longer quotes, but the current one is so simple and profound.

ScriptBabe wrote...

The sad fact is that a lot of very creative fans offered them a perfect out. They could have embraced Indoctrination, said, "Oh you clever people, you figured it out", and redone the ending as a DLC, and the game would have been hailed as sheer genius.

You see, I like the potential paradigm shift that occurs at the very end. I like the fact that the Illusive Man's fundamental philosophy can be interpreted as something positive. When you strip away all of Cerberus' immoral experiments and all the racism, you are left with a philosophy which encourages the exploration of new frontiers. We should embrace new technology. We should investigate that which we do not understand. We should dispel Lovecraft's fears. We should venture into the unknown. We should illuminate the dark places.

The problem is that these ideas were not presented effectively. The writers did not justify the Control and Synthesis options. Destroy is the only viable choice for many people, and that's a real shame. It doesn't help that each choice seems to validate certain unpleasant perspectives.

Modifié par CosmicGnosis, 25 mars 2013 - 08:58 .

[chemiclord]

ScriptBabe wrote...

I do understand the old "flies with honey" approach, and if BioWare had still been an independent company they might have had more leeway in which to operate. But it's sort of SOP for big corporations to circle the wagons, and refuse to admit a mistake. The sad fact is that a lot of very creative fans offered them a perfect out. They could have embraced Indoctrination, said, "Oh you clever people, you figured it out", and redone the ending as a DLC, and the game would have been hailed as sheer genius.

And this is where you lost me... because Indoctrination Theory is not particularly clever.  It's at its core, an attempt by fans to make Destroy palpatable with no consequences (and not much else), by turning the entire moral decision into what amounts to an "it was all a dream" ending.

Not to mention it would break the very rules of writing that you champion by offering NO resolution phase to the story, and offering it at the worst possible place, right at the very ending of the entire trilogy.  You'd be asking DLC alone to completely wrap up all the loose threads remaining, while at the same time opening a Pandora's Box of an idea that I can promise you consumers do NOT want companies getting in their heads; that companies can release an incomplete product, then charge consumers more money later to fix it.

Don't kid yourself, had Bioware went "Oh you clever people" it would have simply incited just as violent and inflammatory of rage from a different group of people.

Modifié par chemiclord, 25 mars 2013 - 08:53 .

[Fawx9]

chemiclord wrote...

ScriptBabe wrote...

I do understand the old "flies with honey" approach, and if BioWare had still been an independent company they might have had more leeway in which to operate. But it's sort of SOP for big corporations to circle the wagons, and refuse to admit a mistake. The sad fact is that a lot of very creative fans offered them a perfect out. They could have embraced Indoctrination, said, "Oh you clever people, you figured it out", and redone the ending as a DLC, and the game would have been hailed as sheer genius.

And this is where you lost me... because Indoctrination Theory is not particularly clever.  It's at its core, an attempt by fans to make Destroy palpatable with no consequences (and not much else), by turning the entire moral decision into what amounts to an "it was all a dream" ending.

Not to mention it would break the very rules of writing that you champion by offering NO resolution phase to the story, and offering it at the worst possible place, right at the very ending of the entire trilogy.  You'd be asking DLC alone to completely wrap up all the loose threads remaining, while at the same time opening a Pandora's box that I can promise you consumers do NOT want companies getting in their heads; that companies can release an incomplete product, then charge consumers more money later to fix it.

Don't kid yourself, had Bioware went "Oh you clever people" it would have simply incited just as violent and inflammatory of rage from a different group of people.

I'd argue IT isn't about making Destory palatable, but making the original ending so. As others have said, there was nothing broken with ME univerese outside of the Reapers, so why did the orignal 3 options basically leave the impression that they destoryed the galaxy in order to wipe the slate clean of everything and not just the space cuttlefish? IT at its core is simply a way to undo that level of destruction to the known ME galaxy. By giving the writers another shot to clean it up without blowing it up. 

Modifié par Fawx9, 25 mars 2013 - 08:58 .