134 réponses à ce sujet

[Dean_the_Young]

SpamBot2000 wrote...

The "design choice" of the ending device practically screams deadline desperation and "Screw this thing, let's just terminate it." I'd imagine they wouldn't have gone for such an obvious lift off a recent, popular game if not under huge pressure to come up with something right then and there.

Depends on what you mean by terminate. It wasn't exactly a secret that Shepard's story was going to end: they told us that, repeatedly, before release. Killing Shepard in most of the endings is well within that long-intended goal.

At the same time, none of the endings end the franchise and prevent a continuation. Synthesis would lose the most if you got rid of its deliberate ambiguity, but once you disregard that you have a pretty straight shot at whatever you want, since everything that happens post-Synthesis can be rationalized by, well, the post-Synthesis effects on the setting. Control is middling, but still very much doable: the Mass Effect universe could easily create games and stories under the auspice of the Shepardlyst, especially on ideas of either resistance to the Shepard or attempts to replace the Shepard with someone else taking control, and could easily be written in such a way to explain why conflict continues. Destroy is by far the easiest to continue forward: a simple time skip as the galaxy rebuilds and relays are remade. The Geth are dead, true, but that's a personal objection and not a narrative impass.

You could certainly say the ME3 ending prevents a continuation that covers all the choices simultaneously... but then, the franchise doesn't need to do that to continue forward. It doesn't need Shepard either. Past that, what kills the franchise?

[IllusiveManJr]

Jukaga wrote...

axl99 wrote...

ME1 was like level design 101 for Bioware. They sure leveled up pretty damn quick with ME2. Exponentially.

In terms of polish for sure but I think they dropped the ball when they radically changed the skill aquisition system, the skills themselves and the universal cooldown timer. ME1 was more of an RPG and the combat, while unpolished had a great tactical element that 2 and 3 just don't have.

Yes. 

[SpamBot2000]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

You could certainly say the ME3 ending prevents a continuation that covers all the choices simultaneously.

I believe that was the big idea behind the 'epic' choice, yes. The Mass Effect universe cannot assimilate all the possible end states.  The idea was to make the fans fight each other over which canon ending they would never accept, then declare any sequel impossible because of their "great respect for our community" or something to that effect.

And Casey Hudson can move onto his new IP, and Mac Walters can get paid for writing 16 words/page for comic books based on characters already created. This is what Mass Effect came down to in the end. Whatever wreck it seemed easier to extricate these two people from. 

The players deserved better. The rest of the dozens of people involved in creating the game deserved better. Mass Effect deserved better.

And they all still do.

Modifié par SpamBot2000, 26 mars 2013 - 02:39 .

[Dean_the_Young]

SpamBot2000 wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

You could certainly say the ME3 ending prevents a continuation that covers all the choices simultaneously.

I believe that was the big idea behind the 'epic' choice, yes. The Mass Effect universe cannot assimilate all the possible end states.  The idea was to make the fans fight each other over which canon ending they would never accept, then declare any sequel impossible because of their "great respect for our community" or something to that effect.

Personally, I wouldn't even go that far. Plenty of RPGs and stories with different endings have simply declared one to be continuation canon just because they wanted to go with one.

I suspect tehy intended the more optimistic version of what you said, of choosing the most popular rather than betting they'd all be unpopular, but that's because I don't think they deliberatly sabotaged the ending or expected the mass outrage effect. As it is, I'd be tickled to death if they happened to choose something close to my own post-Destroy thoughts, but that's just the narcist in me preening.

[SpamBot2000]

Edited the post above to reflect my even more depressing conclusion.

[N7Gold]

I would say that it was rushed if BioWare stuck with the original release date which was in the fall of 2011.

[Dean_the_Young]

In an uncharacteristic counter-argument to cynicism...

SpamBot2000 wrote...

And Casey Hudson can move onto his new IP, and Mac Walters can get paid for writing 16 words/page for comic books based on characters already created. This is what Mass Effect came down to in the end. Whatever wreck it seemed easier to extricate these two people from. 

The players deserved better. The rest of the dozens of people involved in creating the game deserved better. Mass Effect deserved better.

And they all still do.

I don't think they do, but not because you the people suck: rather, that what you listed was probably going to happen anyway. After ME3, no matter how popular, people were going to move around in their careers just as the process had started, comics were going to be written, and the ME franchise was going to cash in. It's not like they were going to write less spin-off material if the game did well, after all.

What you have here is a metric in which failure is indistinguishable from success. And that, my friend, is what no one deserves.

[SpamBot2000]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

In an uncharacteristic counter-argument to cynicism...

SpamBot2000 wrote...

And Casey Hudson can move onto his new IP, and Mac Walters can get paid for writing 16 words/page for comic books based on characters already created. This is what Mass Effect came down to in the end. Whatever wreck it seemed easier to extricate these two people from. 

The players deserved better. The rest of the dozens of people involved in creating the game deserved better. Mass Effect deserved better.

And they all still do.

I don't think they do, but not because you the people suck: rather, that what you listed was probably going to happen anyway. After ME3, no matter how popular, people were going to move around in their careers just as the process had started, comics were going to be written, and the ME franchise was going to cash in. It's not like they were going to write less spin-off material if the game did well, after all.

What you have here is a metric in which failure is indistinguishable from success. And that, my friend, is what no one deserves.

No doubt there was going to be assorted cash-in merch in any case, but the relevant detail here is the need for a perception of the impossibility of continuing the story of Mass Effect, with or without Shepard. Because that is the root of the whole issue. 

Now obviously they could have refused popular calls for a sequel, but what about Big Daddy EA, calling up about the annual Mass Effect release? I do wonder if it was for such reasons that Hudson saw fit to burn down the franchise. Which I guess I can even sympathize with to some small degree, but certainly not up to defacing the work that millions of paying people were looking forward to, then promoting it with knowing misrepresentations.

Modifié par SpamBot2000, 26 mars 2013 - 03:08 .

[o Ventus]

Meatbaggins wrote...

People like to forget that ME3 began development before ME2 was even came out. I'm sure they had to cut corners and scrap ideas, just like any developer making a game of this magnitude. Even DA:O had a ton of planned content that they couldn't fit in due to time/budget reasons.

Only immediately before ME2 went gold. That gives them, what, just a few extra weeks?

[Dean_the_Young]

SpamBot2000 wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

In an uncharacteristic counter-argument to cynicism...

SpamBot2000 wrote...

And Casey Hudson can move onto his new IP, and Mac Walters can get paid for writing 16 words/page for comic books based on characters already created. This is what Mass Effect came down to in the end. Whatever wreck it seemed easier to extricate these two people from. 

The players deserved better. The rest of the dozens of people involved in creating the game deserved better. Mass Effect deserved better.

And they all still do.

I don't think they do, but not because you the people suck: rather, that what you listed was probably going to happen anyway. After ME3, no matter how popular, people were going to move around in their careers just as the process had started, comics were going to be written, and the ME franchise was going to cash in. It's not like they were going to write less spin-off material if the game did well, after all.

What you have here is a metric in which failure is indistinguishable from success. And that, my friend, is what no one deserves.

No doubt there was going to be assorted cash-in merch in any case, but the relevant detail here is the need for a perception of the impossibility of continuing the story of Mass Effect, with or without Shepard. Because that is the root of the whole issue. 

How so? They could cash in, writers could move on, regardless of whether it has a continuation or not. This is proven by the fact that this was occuring during the post-ME2 heyday.

Now obviously they could have refused popular calls for a sequel, but what about Big Daddy EA, calling up about the annual Mass Effect release? I do wonder if it was for such reasons that Hudson saw fit to burn down the franchise. Which I guess I can even sympathize with to some small degree, but certainly not up to defacing the work that millions of paying people were looking forward to, then promoting it with knowing misrepresentations.

Mass Effect wasn't getting an annual release in the first place, so the Big Daddy EA is woefully misaimed... especially since Big Daddy EA can still tell them to write another Mass Effect game, and they still can. That can make a prequel, a sequel, or a spin-off during the time of the games. There's not a lack of content to be developed.

As it is, you're just arguing with arguments that can apply the same no matter how the game was received. That's little more than a conspiracy that Bioware tried to fail, only with no clear benefit for anyone. EA doesn't make more money if it's hated, Bioware doesn't improve its reputation, finances, or freedom if it's flagship produces a flop, and the writers associated take a hit to their careers if they're associated with the opposite of good writing.

[CronoDragoon]

Whether or not it was "rushed" is an indirect way to frame the real question:

Was BioWare given enough time to reasonably finish ME3?

Going along with this: is it EA's fault that BW drove themselves into a corner with ME1 and 2, setting up a part 3 that had far too many plotlines to realistically tie up, too many variations to complete within a standard development cycle? ME3 ended up having a similar dev cycle to ME2; was EA expected to just give ME3 another year or two because BW claims they needed it?

[o Ventus]

CronoDragoon wrote...

Whether or not it was "rushed" is an indirect way to frame the real question:

Was BioWare given enough time to reasonably finish ME3?

Going along with this: is it EA's fault that BW drove themselves into a corner with ME1 and 2, setting up a part 3 that had far too many plotlines to realistically tie up, too many variations to complete within a standard development cycle? ME3 ended up having a similar dev cycle to ME2; was EA expected to just give ME3 another year or two because BW claims they needed it?

Considering EA is the third largest game company in the world and pulls in 4 and a half billion dollars a year, I think they could be reasonably expected to give Bioware a little more time. They aren't exactly hurting for cash so badly that they need their product out the door right this instant.

[SpamBot2000]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Mass Effect wasn't getting an annual release in the first place, so the Big Daddy EA is woefully misaimed... especially since Big Daddy EA can still tell them to write another Mass Effect game, and they still can. That can make a prequel, a sequel, or a spin-off during the time of the games. There's not a lack of content to be developed.

As it is, you're just arguing with arguments that can apply the same no matter how the game was received. That's little more than a conspiracy that Bioware tried to fail, only with no clear benefit for anyone. EA doesn't make more money if it's hated, Bioware doesn't improve its reputation, finances, or freedom if it's flagship produces a flop, and the writers associated take a hit to their careers if they're associated with the opposite of good writing.

With prequels and the like, it comes down either to lack of interest on the part of the public, or at the very least, the timeline for the ME setting being already established, requiring no new macro-level scenarios.

And it was certainly not the whole of BW, let alone EA, who was responsible for the ending. Individuals can, and frequently do, prioritize their personal goals over institutional ones. We are talking about no more than two individuals. 

As for the hit to their careers, I guess there was an element of hubris involved, that most people would just lap up whatever the mighty devs were serving.

[Edolix]

Considering that at PAX they said they were in "crunch time" for most of the project, especially towards the end, I'd say it was rushed. Not their fault though.

[CronoDragoon]

o Ventus wrote...

Considering EA is the third largest game company in the world and pulls in 4 and a half billion dollars a year, I think they could be reasonably expected to give Bioware a little more time. They aren't exactly hurting for cash so badly that they need their product out the door right this instant.

Okay, but they already delayed ME3 to give BW more time. ME3 is not an unfinished product. It just feels rushed.

Regardless, your stance on EA's stability is dubious. Their CEO just resigned because of poor financial performance, and their stock has dipped considerably. I'm sure you've seen the chart; those are alarming numbers and may indeed push publishers to release a game on schedule as opposed to a further six months delay in order to look better for stockholders.

[SpamBot2000]

o Ventus wrote...

CronoDragoon wrote...

Whether or not it was "rushed" is an indirect way to frame the real question:

Was BioWare given enough time to reasonably finish ME3?

Going along with this: is it EA's fault that BW drove themselves into a corner with ME1 and 2, setting up a part 3 that had far too many plotlines to realistically tie up, too many variations to complete within a standard development cycle? ME3 ended up having a similar dev cycle to ME2; was EA expected to just give ME3 another year or two because BW claims they needed it?

Considering EA is the third largest game company in the world and pulls in 4 and a half billion dollars a year, I think they could be reasonably expected to give Bioware a little more time. They aren't exactly hurting for cash so badly that they need their product out the door right this instant.

Ah, but once again there's a personal interest at play. Specifically that of John Riccitiello, who single-handedly poached BW for EA at the cost of $800 million+ (including Pandemic Studios, though they got swiftly closed down). And now BW were costing EA anywhere between $200 mil to half a billion for TOR. BW were beginning to look like a money sink. Mr. Riccitiello surely wanted to show some numbers with a + in front of them for his purchase in the 2011 accounting, to keep the board and the shareholders happy with his performance.

Incidentally, Riccitiello's venture capital fund, Elevation Partners, were the ones who sold BW to EA, right before Mr. R. returned to EA as CEO, at a huge profit. So maybe people were starting to look at the BW acquisition as Riccitiello's cash-in at EA's expense.

Modifié par SpamBot2000, 26 mars 2013 - 03:36 .

[Dean_the_Young]

SpamBot2000 wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Mass Effect wasn't getting an annual release in the first place, so the Big Daddy EA is woefully misaimed... especially since Big Daddy EA can still tell them to write another Mass Effect game, and they still can. That can make a prequel, a sequel, or a spin-off during the time of the games. There's not a lack of content to be developed.

As it is, you're just arguing with arguments that can apply the same no matter how the game was received. That's little more than a conspiracy that Bioware tried to fail, only with no clear benefit for anyone. EA doesn't make more money if it's hated, Bioware doesn't improve its reputation, finances, or freedom if it's flagship produces a flop, and the writers associated take a hit to their careers if they're associated with the opposite of good writing.

With prequels and the like, it comes down either to lack of interest on the part of the public, or at the very least, the timeline for the ME setting being already established, requiring no new macro-level scenarios.

Who needs a macro-level scenario? The day can be saved quite easily with scenarios Shepard would never have been privy to... or alive to see. You can have post-ME1 machinations as people fight over Reaper technology, conflicts elsewhere in the galaxy during the war, and so on.

Heck, ME2 wasn't a macro-level scenario: the entire collector conflict barely reached the galactic news cycle, and was little more than a niche interest for most everyone around.

And it was certainly not the whole of BW, let alone EA, who was responsible for the ending. Individuals can, and frequently do, prioritize their personal goals over institutional ones. We are talking about no more than two individuals.

Then the Big Daddy EA card is even further out of play, and makes even less sense.

You're still not establishing how or why those two individuals stood to benefit more from sabotaging a career highlight rather than do it to the best of their abilities.

As for the hit to their careers, I guess there was an element of hubris involved, that most people would just lap up whatever the mighty devs were serving.

Why do you guess that? You seem to be assuming malevolence where incompetence will do, with little more support than that someone profited somehow in some way that you can't describe as being better than if they had done well.

[o Ventus]

CronoDragoon wrote...

Regardless, your stance on EA's stability is dubious. Their CEO just resigned because of poor financial performance, and their stock has dipped considerably.

Fiscal year 2012.

Despite Riccitiello's arguable performance as a CEO, you had to give him credit for being willing to try new things. Over his 6-year tenure, EA has put out, what, 5 or 6 new IPs? Most of which has been moderately successful.

The problem is that people don't want new, they want what is proven to work. There's a reason FIFA and Madden have been EA's highest grossing franchises for years now.

[CronoDragoon]

[quote]o Ventus wrote...
Fiscal year 2012.[/quote]

I might be missing your point here, but EA's poor performance dates back to 2009.[/quote]

[quote]Despite Riccitiello's arguable performance as a CEO, you had to give him credit for being willing to try new things. Over his 6-year tenure, EA has put out, what, 5 or 6 new IPs? Most of which has been moderately successful.

The problem is that people don't want new, they want what is proven to work. There's a reason FIFA and Madden have been EA's highest grossing franchises for years now.
[/quote]

Hey, I still buy EA games if I think I'll enjoy them. Thinking of picking up Dead Space 2 soon, actually, since it was on my "wait until sub-$20" list.

[o Ventus]

CronoDragoon wrote...

o Ventus wrote...
Fiscal year 2012.

I might be missing your point here, but EA's poor performance dates back to 2009.

In 2012, EA pulled in 4.4 billion dollars. That's not exactly "poor", considering that they don't have any sort of title on the level of Call of Duty or World of Warcraft (unlike Activision). Again, they're the third largest game company in the world (behind Nintendo and Activision).

[Dean_the_Young]

o Ventus wrote...

CronoDragoon wrote...

o Ventus wrote...
Fiscal year 2012.

I might be missing your point here, but EA's poor performance dates back to 2009.

In 2012, EA pulled in 4.4 billion dollars. That's not exactly "poor", considering that they don't have any sort of title on the level of Call of Duty or World of Warcraft (unlike Activision). Again, they're the third largest game company in the world (behind Nintendo and Activision).

This is unsound on its own. 4.4 billion dollars would be extremely poor if costs or expected income were much higher.

[CronoDragoon]

o Ventus wrote...

In 2012, EA pulled in 4.4 billion dollars. That's not exactly "poor", considering that they don't have any sort of title on the level of Call of Duty or World of Warcraft (unlike Activision). Again, they're the third largest game company in the world (behind Nintendo and Activision).

If only revenue were the only consideration in the success of a company. Here's an article that appropriately paints a pretty bleak picture of the 2012 fiscal year for EA; revenue was up, but overall income was waaaay down.

www.blisteredthumbs.net/2012/05/ea-fiscal-year-results/

[SpamBot2000]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

SpamBot2000 wrote...

And it was certainly not the whole of BW, let alone EA, who was responsible for the ending. Individuals can, and frequently do, prioritize their personal goals over institutional ones. We are talking about no more than two individuals.

Then the Big Daddy EA card is even further out of play, and makes even less sense.

You're still not establishing how or why those two individuals stood to benefit more from sabotaging a career highlight rather than do it to the best of their abilities.

As for the hit to their careers, I guess there was an element of hubris involved, that most people would just lap up whatever the mighty devs were serving.

Why do you guess that? You seem to be assuming malevolence where incompetence will do, with little more support than that someone profited somehow in some way that you can't describe as being better than if they had done well.

Ugh, I hate messing with multi-quoting, so I think I'll just cut this here part right here...

The 'Big Daddy EA' card plays just fine when you look at it from the level of actual individuals caught in the grip of this terrifying beast. The key point here is that they apparently thought the audience was the one part they could leave out of the equation. Just assume that those gamers will be content with their speculashions. And indeed, it works up to a point, with even enraged players quick to snap up the parody DLC, for whatever reasons. 

You just have to recognize one thing here. Casey Hudson and Mac Walters didn't want to be put into a position of having to deliver Mass Effect 4. This obviously meant more to them than the satisfaction of work well done. Or maybe they didn't even find such satisfaction possible at the point they locked the writers out of writing the game. "This thing is gonna end up badly anyway, so let's just at least punch us a way out of the EA cycle!" Crucially at no point did they ever think that the quality of the endings was going to affect their earnings.

I'm not sure if that constitutes "malevolence" in any strict sense. More like a blatant disregard for the sensibilities of us suckers who were buying their product. I'd like to think that this is a credible motivation for these villains of this story. It's not moustache-twirling delight in evil. It's just two mercenaries, doing what mercenaries do.

[Dean_the_Young]

SpamBot2000 wrote...
Ugh, I hate messing with multi-quoting, so I think I'll just cut this here part right here...

The 'Big Daddy EA' card plays just fine when you look at it from the level of actual individuals caught in the grip of this terrifying beast. The key point here is that they apparently thought the audience was the one part they could leave out of the equation. Just assume that those gamers will be content with their speculashions. And indeed, it works up to a point, with even enraged players quick to snap up the parody DLC, for whatever reasons.

That's not how you were playing the card before, where you portrayed the situation as if Bioware trembled that EA would make unreasonable demands.

You just have to recognize one thing here. Casey Hudson and Mac Walters didn't want to be put into a position of having to deliver Mass Effect 4. This obviously meant more to them than the satisfaction of work well done. Or maybe they didn't even find such satisfaction possible at the point they locked the writers out of writing the game. "This thing is gonna end up badly anyway, so let's just at least punch us a way out of the EA cycle!" Crucially at no point did they ever think that the quality of the endings was going to affect their earnings.

This is, in a word, stupid. They don't have to stick around for ME4 if they don't want to, and one already left for SWTOR before ME3 was even put the pieces together. which rather undermines the 'sink the ship from under them' theory.

This is a theory so un-credible that you bear a lot of obligation to produce evidence to support it. Right now you're claiming that they could only escape a sinking ship, when in fact one left the ship before it sank and the other is still lined up to work with the ship anyway. Neither is escaping the EA cycle, which hasn't even existed as you described it.

I'm not sure if that constitutes "malevolence" in any strict sense. More like a blatant disregard for the sensibilities of us suckers who were buying their product. I'd like to think that this is a credible motivation for these villains of this story. It's not moustache-twirling delight in evil. It's just two mercenaries, doing what mercenaries do.

Bad business? No, that's not really what mercenaries are known for doing.

There are no villains in this tale because this isn't a work of romantic fiction. They made a product you didn't like: they don't need a motivation in order to produce something you didn't like, nor have you provided any evidence that such an outcome was their intent. All you've encountered a difference of taste, not some conspiracy.

[SpamBot2000]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

There are no villains in this tale because this isn't a work of romantic fiction. They made a product you didn't like: they don't need a motivation in order to produce something you didn't like, nor have you provided any evidence that such an outcome was their intent. All you've encountered a difference of taste, not some conspiracy.

I stand by my wild speculations. If this was just a case of weird taste and incompetence at BW, why on Earth would they shut the freaking writing team out of the room when coming up with the ending, then sneak it in the game as if ashamed? Are those the actions of people trying to provide the finest possible experience to the player?

If it seems so "stupid" to you, maybe it's because in a very real sense it is. Sadly, you misattribute the stupidity to the messanger.

Modifié par SpamBot2000, 26 mars 2013 - 06:32 .