369 réponses à ce sujet

[drayfish]

Robosexual wrote...

drayfish wrote...

I think you forgot to mention that I 'hate making hard choices'.

Correct, I was showing exactly what you were saying. You pointed it out, you'd rather have one choice reduced to collateral, one reduced to granting freedom with no possible way for futher input from you, and one where the galaxy gets to choose, to volunteer, without you making the choice.

You hate the fact the end gives you hard choices, and you think it should give you those instead.

-delusions on how I act-

This isn't the playground, so I wont bite. Feel free to believe this.

Honestly, I get that you love the ending (it's hard to miss), so why don't we flip this around.  Why don't I ask you the questions, since you're the one who perceives such meaning in it:

What's so hard about it?

Sure. There's no "correct" choice, all of them are equally morally grey.

They're not reduced to, for example, collateral. You actively make the choice to commit genocide, to save everyone else.

They're not reduced to, for example, granting freedom with no further input from you and the consequences out of your hands. You actively choose to take the power for yourself, to control the galaxy as you see fit.

They're not reduced to, for example, a voluntary system where others can strive to advance if they choose. You make that choice for them, without their input.

It's grey. In a game about hard choices you're forced to make a hard choice, with no "correct" answer, which is beautiful. The game makes you ask questions you never thought you would, it challenges you, it makes you think.

Because, again: I don't think anything about it is hard.  That's my whole issue with it.  Fingerpainting is hard compared to Mass Effect 3's conclusion.  I think it makes everything pitifully easy; that's precisely why I don't like it (and the point that you extraordinarily keep talking around).

It makes genocide a doddle (who cares about Geth? We can rebuild the imporant stuff after all; they're not even worth mentioning)  It makes becoming a totalitarian dictator a noble, joyous thing to do (you don't die; you live forever; the universe thinks you're great).  It makes eugenically mutating the universe the best possible thing that anyone has ever done (everyone in the universe is evolved and better and smiling and joyous and you're just great).

Nothing about any of that is hard.  That's like calling 'eating a delicious chocolate icecream' hard.

Again you're relying on your assumption that the galaxy knew Shepard made that choice. You say it's not hard despite the fact, when challenged, your alternative was easier. You didn't want Synthesis to be forced. You didn't want to make the decision to Control the galaxy. You didn't want Destroy to be anything other than collateral. You say it's easy, yet you provide no reason why other than an assumption you created in your head and an easier alternative.

You seem to find something about that powerful, and difficult, but I don't find being placated in such cheap, childish ways to be effective drama (particularly not compared to the several fictions I cited that you ignored), particularly when issues of such moral weight are being happilly, gratuitously sugarcoated.

So what was so hard for you?

Did the universe not think you were great enough?

Thanks for your opinion, I disagree, and as for the question; see above.

Robosexual wrote...

You hate the fact the end gives you hard choices.

This has now become farcical.

You know that simply repeating something ad nauseum doesn't make it become true, right?

Just like if I were to simply repeat 'You are a witch', it wouldn't make it true.

You witch.

And your cheap reductive insults aside, I offered one possible alternate interpretation that I thought (and still think) would have given the ending more substance than the childish 'It doesn't matter what moral horror you choose, because everything turns out great anyway' that you clearly prefer.  At no point did I say it was the only possible interpretation (indeed I struggle to imagine anything that could be worse), but yes, I do think it (amongst an innumerable amount of other possibilities) is 'harder' than three choices that all turn out exactly the same, with no depicted negative consequences, and nothing but gushing praise.

But, of course, you probably love that kind of shameless, vapid pandering.  All witches do.

The reason I would prefer Synthesis to not be forced is because forcing it, and having there be no bad consequences at all for its infliction upon everyone completely robs it of meaning.  That's like saying I forced you to take a hundred thousand dollars.  It's not a sacrifice - it's not deep.  It's cheap, meaningless magic. 

But you love magic, right?

The same for turning yourself into an unstoppable totalitarian god and having the universe love you as its saviour, and cherish you forever.  It's juvenile.  And again: no downside.  Not deep.  Not difficult.  If you weren't busy flying around on broomsticks all day, you'd realise that.

And again: same thing for destroy.  The reason that I would prefer indiscriminate death rather than picking one race that can be dismissed away as 'not a real species' and ultimately ignored as 'replaceable', is because the game actively cheapens the meaning of their slaughter.  It ignores it, dismisses it as technological sacrifice, and for those who think that machines aren't alive anyway, only rewards (what in this context) is racism.  'We can rebuild what we lost' would be like saying that the Salem witch trials that killed so many of your friends were all for the best.

Again: you've not indicated why any of these endings are deep, or difficult.  You claim that they are 'grey' (unlike your robes and pointy hat) but you don't seem to be able to articulate why.  The game asks you to make a 'bad' choice, but then goes out of its way to hug you and tell you that you did nothing wrong, that nothing important was sacrificed, and that the universe loves you no matter what...

It's childish.  But you obviously love childish, because then you can throw it into an oven and cook it for dinner.

...Because you are a witch.  Was that not clear?

Modifié par drayfish, 28 juin 2013 - 06:16 .

[Clayless]

drayfish wrote...

This has now become farcical.

You know that simply repeating something ad nauseum doesn't make it become true, right?

Of course, just like how denying the truth doesn't mean it isn't. Instead of denying the truth you would attempt to show how it isn't true, rather than complaining about someone saying it, I'm sure.

And your cheap reductive insults aside, I offered one possible alternate interpretation that I thought (and still think) would have given the ending more substance than the childish 'It doesn't matter what moral horror you choose, because everything turns out great anyway' that you clearly prefer.  At no point did I say it was the only possible interpretation (indeed I struggle to imagine anything that could be worse), but yes, I do think it (amongst an innumerable amount of other possibilities) is 'harder' than three choices that all turn out exactly the same, with no depicted negative consequences, and nothing but gushing praise.

So, to be clear, you have no alternative and you believe all three choices to be "exactly the same" yes? Based on mild similarities?

The reason I would prefer Synthesis to not be forced is because forcing it, and having there be no bad consequences at all for its infliction upon everyone completely robs it of meaning.  That's like saying I forced you to take a hundred thousand dollars.  It's not a sacrifice - it's not deep.  It's cheap, meaningless magic.

So, to be clear, you think Synthesis has no bad consequences and compare it to giving someone a large amount of money, yes?

The same for turning yourself into an unstoppable totalitarian god and having the universe love you as its saviour, and cherish you forever.  It's juvenile.  And again: no downside.  Not deep.  Not difficult.

Again this falls through as you're assuming the galaxy knows Shepard controls the Reapers, when nothing suggests they would. The galaxy telling stories of Shepard and the galaxy loving an "unstoppable totalitarian god" are two completely different things. The latter of which isn't present in Control.

And again: same thing for destroy.  The reason that I would prefer indiscriminate death rather than picking one race that can be dismissed away as 'not a real species' and ultimately ignored as 'replaceable', is because the game actively cheapens the meaning of their slaughter.  It ignores it, dismisses it as technological sacrifice, and for those who think that machines aren't alive anyway, only rewards (what in this context) is racism.

So much assumptions here it's unbelievable. You're taking Hackett's speech as refering to the Geth, and for some reason trying to say the Geth aren't a real species. Headcanon is rife in that one.

There's nothing to say here really, that's not a fault of the story, that's a fault of all your assumptions. But heck, lets just say for the sake of argument that it "only rewards racism":

What's your point? Because that's just an observation.

Again: you've not indicated why any of these endings are deep,

I've not indicated something you believe? What?

or difficult.  You claim that they are 'grey' but you don't seem to be able to articulate why.

You even quoted my post where I explain this. I'm going to assume you can read.

The game asks you to make a 'bad' choice, but then goes out of its way to hug you and tell you that you did nothing wrong, that nothing important was sacrificed, and that the universe loves you no matter what...

It's childish.

Again, relying on your assumption that the galaxy knew Shepard made those choices. You even say you think the choices are "bad", and seem shocked that good could come from it.

You know, like a morally grey choice? Not something that is arbitrarily bad or good for that matter?

You have no alternative, you even admited you think the game is asking you to make a "bad" choice rather than the reality; which is it's asking you to make a hard choice. You talk about how it's lazy, yet can't come up with an alternative apart from easier choices with almost all references to responsibility removed. You make observations on "racism" yet offer no point to those. You write a lot but say very little.

You either hate a game about hard choices giving you a hard choice or you think all media should conform to your morals. All your attempts to try and prove otherwise has been, bizarrely, accusing me of being a witch, creating easier choices. and making more observations about morals with no point.

[SpamBot2000]

It's useless to argue with Robosexual because he's solely preoccupied with Orwellian linguistic programming. It's funny when he's complaining about people "twisting the meaning of words" when that's all he ever does. He's going to pick a slogan like "U no like make choice" and repeat it ad infinitum, to literally brainwash that "truth" into being.

As for the "hard choice" of the ending, what I'm seeing is the people who love it are just indulging in some gratuitous divinity porn, people like Seival and Auld Wulf, who think they have "ascended" to a plane of higher understanding and "correctly" see human life as inconsequential in their grand galactic scheme and refer to organic life as an infirmity that needs to be "cured".

But even sane people might find the "hard" choice very easy to make. The everlasting nature of the "synthesis" and "control" endings would give any thoughtful person some serious pause. "Destroy" is an atrocity, but at least it has an end. So not really such a hard choice, just one that's a huge downer to make. Like a choice between getting killed and getting kicked in the crotch. You're gonna go around boasting you made the tough choice of a kick in the crotch?

The question is: why should the Mass Effect story end in such a choice? Does it add anything of value to the experience?

We get some dizzy recent converts to the Cult of Art rhapsodizing about the riches of intellectual provocation embedded in the ME3 ending, but it sure fails miserably for many of us. The other night I was lazing on the sofa, watching whatever was on the TV. (I don't program my own viewing, being a filthy luddite you see.) The Wedding Crashers was on, so I watched that. And I gotta say, this Hollywood "rom-com" was far more thought-provoking than "I am the Catalyst! Now pick a card!" You have to consider the course and finite nature of human life, whether there is a definite wisdom in how to conduct it or if it is all relative to the perspective of the moment and so on. By contrast, ME3 comes down to a simple Sophie's Choice of picking the least horrible out of options that are so far removed from the story you were engaged in as to wreck all suspension of disbelief and only get you thinking about the developers and publishers of software in the capitalist economy.

Now the worst thing here is that the awful ending supplants the entire rich story that had been sustained for most of 3 games over the years. And it was not the kind of story that should end with defeat. Mass Effect was an epic, not a novel. It dealt with myth. And myths have a usefulness that goes beyond homilies of defeatism that the ending dealt in. As for themes, you know how them moral philosophers have been going on about "expanding the circle of empathy"? Well, that is a powerful theme in Mass Effect right there, how you gradually come to understand and accept life beyond humanity. And it's completely undermined by the Org. vs. Synth. Final Solution ending. Synthesis is not an outcome of the process, it is a magic button that invalidates the work of the trilogy.

Modifié par SpamBot2000, 28 juin 2013 - 07:42 .

[Clayless]

SpamBot2000 wrote...

It's useless to argue with Robosexual because he's solely preoccupied with Orwellian linguistic programming. It's funny when he's complaining about people "twisting the meaning of words" when that's all he ever does.

Where did I say this?

[NeonFlux117]

SpamBot2000 wrote...

It's useless to argue with Robosexual because he's solely preoccupied with Orwellian linguistic programming. It's funny when he's complaining about people "twisting the meaning of words" when that's all he ever does. He's going to pick a slogan like "U no like make choice" and repeat it ad infinitum, to literally brainwash that "truth" into being.

As for the "hard choice" of the ending, what I'm seeing is the people who love it are just indulging in some gratuitous divinity porn, people like Seival and Auld Wulf, who think they have "ascended" to a plane of higher understanding and "correctly" see human life as inconsequential in their grand galactic scheme and refer to organic life as an infirmity that needs to be "cured".

But even sane people might find the "hard" choice very easy to make. The everlasting nature of the "synthesis" and "control" endings would give any thoughtful person some serious pause. "Destroy" is an atrocity, but at least it has an end. So not really such a hard choice, just one that's a huge downer to make. Like a choice between getting killed and getting kicked in the crotch. You're gonna go around boasting you made the tough choice of a kick in the crotch?

The question is: why should the Mass Effect story end in such a choice? Does it add anything of value to the experience?

We get some dizzy recent converts to the Cult of Art rhapsodizing about the riches of intellectual provocation embedded in the ME3 ending, but it sure fails miserably for many of us. The other night I was lazing on the sofa, watching whatever was on the TV. (I don't program my own viewing, being a filthy luddite you see.) The Wedding Crashers was on, so I watched that. And I gotta say, this Hollywood "rom-com" was far more thought-provoking than "I am the Catalyst! Now pick a card!" You have to consider the course and finite nature of human life, whether there is a definite wisdom in how to conduct it or if it is all relative to the perspective of the moment and so on. By contrast, ME3 comes down to a simple Sophie's Choice of picking the least horrible out of options that are so far removed from the story you were engaged in as to wreck all suspension of disbelief and only get you thinking about the developers and publishers of software in the capitalist economy.

Now the worst thing here is that the awful ending supplants the entire rich story that had been sustained for most of 3 games over the years. And it was not the kind of story that should end with defeat. Mass Effect was an epic, not a novel. It dealt with myth. And myths have a usefulness that goes beyond homilies of defeatism that the ending dealt in. As for themes, you know how them moral philosophers have been going on about "expanding the circle of empathy"? Well, that is a powerful theme in Mass Effect right there, how you gradually come to understand and accept life beyond humanity. And it's completely undermined by the Org. vs. Synth. Final Solution ending. Synthesis is not an outcome of the process, it is a magic button that invalidates the work of the trilogy.

Pretty much this. And very atriculate and well put I might add. Also, Sophies Choice is such a sad movie. Sad panda. 

Modifié par NeonFlux117, 28 juin 2013 - 07:52 .

[SpamBot2000]

Robosexual wrote...

SpamBot2000 wrote...

It's useless to argue with Robosexual because he's solely preoccupied with Orwellian linguistic programming. It's funny when he's complaining about people "twisting the meaning of words" when that's all he ever does.

Where did I say this?

You're ALWAYS saying it, dude. If you are a dude and not an algorithm. 

"People are TWISTING THE WORDS of the great Casey Milhous Hudson to FRAUDULENTLY make it SEEM LIKE he promised VARIED ENDINGS" and so on. 

[Clayless]

SpamBot2000 wrote...

Robosexual wrote...

Where did I say this?

You're ALWAYS saying it, dude. If you are a dude and not an algorithm. 

"People are TWISTING THE WORDS of the great Casey Milhous Hudson to FRAUDULENTLY make it SEEM LIKE he promised VARIED ENDINGS" and so on. 

You have a quote, so post the source.

[drayfish]

Robosexual wrote...

drayfish wrote...

This has now become farcical.

You know that simply repeating something ad nauseum doesn't make it become true, right?

Of course, just like how denying the truth doesn't mean it isn't. Instead of denying the truth you would attempt to show how it isn't true, rather than complaining about someone saying it, I'm sure.

And your cheap reductive insults aside, I offered one possible alternate interpretation that I thought (and still think) would have given the ending more substance than the childish 'It doesn't matter what moral horror you choose, because everything turns out great anyway' that you clearly prefer.  At no point did I say it was the only possible interpretation (indeed I struggle to imagine anything that could be worse), but yes, I do think it (amongst an innumerable amount of other possibilities) is 'harder' than three choices that all turn out exactly the same, with no depicted negative consequences, and nothing but gushing praise.

So, to be clear, you have no alternative and you believe all three choices to be "exactly the same" yes? Based on mild similarities?

The reason I would prefer Synthesis to not be forced is because forcing it, and having there be no bad consequences at all for its infliction upon everyone completely robs it of meaning.  That's like saying I forced you to take a hundred thousand dollars.  It's not a sacrifice - it's not deep.  It's cheap, meaningless magic.

So, to be clear, you think Synthesis has no bad consequences and compare it to giving someone a large amount of money, yes?

The same for turning yourself into an unstoppable totalitarian god and having the universe love you as its saviour, and cherish you forever.  It's juvenile.  And again: no downside.  Not deep.  Not difficult.

Again this falls through as you're assuming the galaxy knows Shepard controls the Reapers, when nothing suggests they would. The galaxy telling stories of Shepard and the galaxy loving an "unstoppable totalitarian god" are two completely different things. The latter of which isn't present in Control.

And again: same thing for destroy.  The reason that I would prefer indiscriminate death rather than picking one race that can be dismissed away as 'not a real species' and ultimately ignored as 'replaceable', is because the game actively cheapens the meaning of their slaughter.  It ignores it, dismisses it as technological sacrifice, and for those who think that machines aren't alive anyway, only rewards (what in this context) is racism.

So much assumptions here it's unbelievable. You're taking Hackett's speech as refering to the Geth, and for some reason trying to say the Geth aren't a real species. Headcanon is rife in that one.

There's nothing to say here really, that's not a fault of the story, that's a fault of all your assumptions. But heck, lets just say for the sake of argument that it "only rewards racism":

What's your point? Because that's just an observation.

Again: you've not indicated why any of these endings are deep,

I've not indicated something you believe? What?

or difficult.  You claim that they are 'grey' but you don't seem to be able to articulate why.

You even quoted my post where I explain this. I'm going to assume you can read.

The game asks you to make a 'bad' choice, but then goes out of its way to hug you and tell you that you did nothing wrong, that nothing important was sacrificed, and that the universe loves you no matter what...

It's childish.

Again, relying on your assumption that the galaxy knew Shepard made those choices. You even say you think the choices are "bad", and seem shocked that good could come from it.

You know, like a morally grey choice? Not something that is arbitrarily bad or good for that matter?

You have no alternative, you even admited you think the game is asking you to make a "bad" choice rather than the reality; which is it's asking you to make a hard choice. You talk about how it's lazy, yet can't come up with an alternative apart from easier choices with almost all references to responsibility removed. You make observations on "racism" yet offer no point to those. You write a lot but say very little.

You either hate a game about hard choices giving you a hard choice or you think all media should conform to your morals. All your attempts to try and prove otherwise has been, bizarrely, accusing me of being a witch, creating easier choices. and making more observations about morals with no point.

Sabrina, you are not even making sense any more.

I've said - repeatedly - there are no hard choices.  Forcing someone to do something, but then telling them that the choice they made doesn't matter, that the negative consequences weren't a big deal, and that they are a hero for doing it anyway, is not difficult.  It is in no way hard. 

Despite repeatedly stamping your foot (and bleating on about 'hard choices'), you've still not described how these endings are in any way difficult, or how they can be considered morally 'grey', despite removing all moral responsibility, and all negative drawbacks, from the choice.

What's so difficult about upgrading everyone with Synthesis?  They all get evolved for the better.  Everyone's happy.  universal peace.  Sounds pretty sweet to me.  Indeed, it shows that there was no drawback at all to eugenically altering people against their will.  After all, if you could be genetically upgraded you wouldn't have to fear people spilling a bucket of water on you and melting away to nothing (oh, what a world...)

And what's so bad about having Shepard become the leader of the Reapers?  The Reapers start treating people nice and rebuilding society.  Shepard gets to watch over his/her freinds for the rest of their lives, make sure no wars break out in future, and has the wisdom of an ascended god.  Where's the drawback?  You don't like calamari?  I mean, if you could twinkle your nose and create world peace and live forever, wouldn't you?

And who cares about destroy?  The Geth were tech.  We'll just build new ones, right?  No one else cares, so why should we?

So where are these 'hard choices' I'm apparently afraid to make?  That you can see so clearly?

All I see is asinine wish-fulfillment dressed up in phoney psudo-philosophical dreck.  I'm not 'afraid' to give everyone superpowers and have them thank me.  I'm not 'cowering' from becoming the galactic police force and living forever.  What insults me is exactly how idiotically easy and simple these endings all are.

So where's your darkness, Hermione?  Where's the part where the choces get 'hard'?

(And before you wander down this weird tangent again: it doesn't matter if the universe knows whether Shepard did this stuff or not.  You keep citing that like it's some slam dunk for your argument - it's really not.  Ultimately it's irrelevant: the game's narrative tells you that everything is awesome no matter what you choose.)

Modifié par drayfish, 28 juin 2013 - 08:06 .

[drayfish]

SpamBot2000 wrote...

Robosexual wrote...

SpamBot2000 wrote...

It's useless to argue with Robosexual because he's solely preoccupied with Orwellian linguistic programming. It's funny when he's complaining about people "twisting the meaning of words" when that's all he ever does.

Where did I say this?

You're ALWAYS saying it, dude. If you are a dude and not an algorithm. 

"People are TWISTING THE WORDS of the great Casey Milhous Hudson to FRAUDULENTLY make it SEEM LIKE he promised VARIED ENDINGS" and so on. 

I don't mean to start rumours, but he's a witch.

[Clayless]

drayfish wrote...

I've said - repeatedly - there are no hard choices.

Here's a quote for you to remember:

"You know that simply repeating something ad nauseum doesn't make it become true, right?"

Forcing someone to do something, but then telling them that the choice they made doesn't matter, that the negative consequences weren't a big deal, and that they are a hero for doing it anyway, is not difficult.  It is in no way hard.

Good thing the game doesn't tell you that then.

By the looks of it you seem to think the game not showing you negative consequences means it's telling you there are none, which simply isn't true in the slightest. There's nothing else to say there, there's no argument to be had, it's not subjective.

you've still not described how these endings are in any way difficult, or how they can be considered morally 'grey', despite removing all moral responsibility, and all negative drawbacks, from the choice.

See above about when I pointed out you even quoted the post.

What's so difficult about upgrading everyone with Synthesis?  They all get evolved for the better.  Everyone's happy.  universal peace.  Sounds pretty sweet to me.  Indeed, it shows that there was no drawback at all to eugenically altering people against their will.

So, to be clear, you don't think there's any negative drawbacks to Synthesis, yes?

And what's so bad about having Shepard become the leader of the Reapers?  The Reapers start treating people nice

Headcanon.

and rebuilding society.  Shepard gets to watch over his/her freinds for the rest of their lives, make sure no wars break out in future, and has the wisdom of an ascended god.  Where's the drawback?

What's the drawback? To be clear before I answer that, you don't think there's a drawback to a galactic police state, yes?

And who cares about destroy?  The Geth were tech.  We'll just build new ones, right?  No one else cares, so why should we?

You're repeating what you said earlier, and because of that I'll have to repeat mine:

What's your point? Because that's an observation.

So where are these 'hard choices' I'm apparently afraid to make?  That you can see so clearly?

All I see is asinine wish-fulfillment dressed up in phoney psudo-philosophical dreck.  I'm not 'afraid' to give everyone superpowers and have them thank me.  I'm not 'cowering' from becoming the galactic police force and living forever.  What insults me is exactly how idiotically easy and simple these endings all are.

(And before you wander down this weird tangent again: it doesn't matter if the universe knows whether Shepard did this stuff or not.  You keep citing that like it's some slam dunk for your argument - it's really not.  Ultimately it's irrelevant: the game's narrative tells you that everything is awesome no matter what you choose.)

You've yet to answer my questions. Please stop making observations and please start answering my questions, this is how these things work, we answer questions in turn.

Start with answering the one about the "racism" thing and the Geth. What point are you making there, and please don't go on about the "message" is portrays, that'd be an observation again.

[drayfish]

Robosexual wrote...

drayfish wrote...

I've said - repeatedly - there are no hard choices.

Here's a quote for you to remember:

"You know that simply repeating something ad nauseum doesn't make it become true, right?"

Forcing someone to do something, but then telling them that the choice they made doesn't matter, that the negative consequences weren't a big deal, and that they are a hero for doing it anyway, is not difficult.  It is in no way hard.

Good thing the game doesn't tell you that then.

By the looks of it you seem to think the game not showing you negative consequences means it's telling you there are none, which simply isn't true in the slightest. There's nothing else to say there, there's no argument to be had, it's not subjective.

you've still not described how these endings are in any way difficult, or how they can be considered morally 'grey', despite removing all moral responsibility, and all negative drawbacks, from the choice.

See above about when I pointed out you even quoted the post.

What's so difficult about upgrading everyone with Synthesis?  They all get evolved for the better.  Everyone's happy.  universal peace.  Sounds pretty sweet to me.  Indeed, it shows that there was no drawback at all to eugenically altering people against their will.

So, to be clear, you don't think there's any negative drawbacks to Synthesis, yes?

And what's so bad about having Shepard become the leader of the Reapers?  The Reapers start treating people nice

Headcanon.

and rebuilding society.  Shepard gets to watch over his/her freinds for the rest of their lives, make sure no wars break out in future, and has the wisdom of an ascended god.  Where's the drawback?

What's the drawback? To be clear before I answer that, you don't think there's a drawback to a galactic police state, yes?

And who cares about destroy?  The Geth were tech.  We'll just build new ones, right?  No one else cares, so why should we?

You're repeating what you said earlier, and because of that I'll have to repeat mine:

What's your point? Because that's an observation.

So where are these 'hard choices' I'm apparently afraid to make?  That you can see so clearly?

All I see is asinine wish-fulfillment dressed up in phoney psudo-philosophical dreck.  I'm not 'afraid' to give everyone superpowers and have them thank me.  I'm not 'cowering' from becoming the galactic police force and living forever.  What insults me is exactly how idiotically easy and simple these endings all are.

(And before you wander down this weird tangent again: it doesn't matter if the universe knows whether Shepard did this stuff or not.  You keep citing that like it's some slam dunk for your argument - it's really not.  Ultimately it's irrelevant: the game's narrative tells you that everything is awesome no matter what you choose.)

You've yet to answer my questions. Please stop making observations and please start answering my questions, this is how these things work, we answer questions in turn.

Start with answering the one about the "racism" thing and the Geth. What point are you making there, and please don't go on about the "message" is portrays, that'd be an observation again.

You are making my argument for me. (Also, at no point have you answered any of my very simple questions.)

You claim that the game has 'hard choices', but then agree that there is no downside to the choices at the ending.  That's my point.  They are - therefore - not difficult choices to make.  They inspire only a Disney happy ending that sugarcoats moral horror as an irrelevancy.

You may as well be skipping through Munchkin Land.




I'm sorry.  That was insensitive.  I know your friend the Witch of the East died there.  My sympathies.

Modifié par drayfish, 28 juin 2013 - 09:04 .

[Mcfly616]

Blah blah blah....."opinions". Nothing anybody says here is cold hard fact. It's all subjective. Maybe y'all should just take a deep breath and chill.

[MattFini]

The extended cut did the best it could with a hopelessly bad situation.

It rectified all the little things that really obliterated my immersion upon the initial playthrough. Little things like seeing proper flashbacks of people that actually mattered to my Shepard, seeing Joker's hesitation to "flee" and, of course, offering SOME closure.

I'll never like ME3's ending. But I can live with it now and, considering they would've needed to scrap the whole post-beam scene and start over in order to fix it, I have learned to live with what's there.

BW tried. And they did manage to make a bad situation better.

[Clayless]

drayfish wrote...

You are making my argument for me. (Also, at no point have you answered any of my very simple questions.)

Oh, choosing to ignore my answers and pretending I didn't answer them doesn't mean I haven't answered them. There's a reason why I've told you to see my previous post twice now.

You claim that the game has 'hard choices', but then agree that there is no downside to the choices at the ending.  That's my point.

No your point is there's no downsides because it doesn't concentrate on the negatives.

That's completely different from saying there's no downsides. Something I haven't said, or even implied.

And you still refuse to answer my questions.

They are - therefore - not difficult choices to make.  They inspire only a Disney happy ending that sugarcoats moral horror as an irrelevancy.

Notice how you change what you say? You say there's no downsides, then you immediately say there is but that it doesn't show you them.

And you fail to make a point.

You contradict yourself, you say they're not difficult therefore they don't exist, then you say they do exist, but you refuse to make a point. You make contradictory observations, sure, but you wont elaborate as you know that, frankly, you'll be laughed out of the thread when you attempt to say that fiction shouldn't give you morally grey choices, or that fiction should comply to your morals.

You don't elaborate, you really write the definition of pointless nonsense. Pointless being the key word, so if you would could you please answer my questions? Start with the racism one about the Geth, what point are you making there? And please, no observations again.

[SpamBot2000]

MattFini wrote...

I'll never like ME3's ending. But I can live with it now and, considering they would've needed to scrap the whole post-beam scene and start over in order to fix it, I have learned to live with what's there.

 

They would have needed to scrap the Ghost Kid, sure. But start over what? In fact, the ending would be massively improved even if the credits simply rolled after the "Best seats in the house" scene. It's simply not true that fixing the ending would have taken some Herculenean effort. It would have been very simple because the Catalyst part bears hardly any relation to the whole of Mass Effect 1-3. 

They insisted on keeping the three-way Apocalypse though, because that was what mattered to them. "An End, Once And For All", dig? Player satisfaction is nothing to these guys. 

Modifié par SpamBot2000, 28 juin 2013 - 12:39 .

[drayfish]

Robosexual wrote...

drayfish wrote...

You are making my argument for me. (Also, at no point have you answered any of my very simple questions.)

Oh, choosing to ignore my answers and pretending I didn't answer them doesn't mean I haven't answered them. There's a reason why I've told you to see my previous post twice now.

You claim that the game has 'hard choices', but then agree that there is no downside to the choices at the ending.  That's my point.

No your point is there's no downsides because it doesn't concentrate on the negatives.

That's completely different from saying there's no downsides. Something I haven't said, or even implied.

And you still refuse to answer my questions.

They are - therefore - not difficult choices to make.  They inspire only a Disney happy ending that sugarcoats moral horror as an irrelevancy.

Notice how you change what you say? You say there's no downsides, then you immediately say there is but that it doesn't show you them.

And you fail to make a point.

You contradict yourself, you say they're not difficult therefore they don't exist, then you say they do exist, but you refuse to make a point. You make contradictory observations, sure, but you wont elaborate as you know that, frankly, you'll be laughed out of the thread when you attempt to say that fiction shouldn't give you morally grey choices, or that fiction should comply to your morals.

You don't elaborate, you really write the definition of pointless nonsense. Pointless being the key word, so if you would could you please answer my questions? Start with the racism one about the Geth, what point are you making there? And please, no observations again.

Sigh.

I'm not going to follow you into some nonsense ginger bread house about racism and the Geth.  As you well know, it has nothing to do with the disagreement we are having here, and you are (rather sadly) trying to use it as an escape hatch.  It is utterly irrelevant.

Instead, please point to where you supposedly answered my original question about the 'hard choices' you have been bleating about for two days now.

Or better still, just sum them up now: What about the ending choices is hard for you?

Why can't you answer this extremely simple question?  Particularly as I've now asked it several times.

Modifié par drayfish, 28 juin 2013 - 01:18 .

[drayfish]

Fandango9641 wrote...

drayfish wrote...

It is a sign of just how artless and hamfisted the writers of Mass Effect 3 were that they paint such moral compromises with such arbitrarily glowing, celebratory results. Every one of the endings as we have them forces the player to commit an immoral action - forcing us to comply with a war crime 'win-state', then shows little to no negative consequences for this choice, with voiceovers, allies, and generations of future life, all praising the action without reservation.

A paragraph that perfectly encapsulates the issue I have with ME3's ending - it's great to have you back drayfish.

Thanks Fandango9641.

Lovely to see you too!

[ZombieJohn84]

I didn't get to play the EC because it caused my copy of ME3 to lock up about three times in a row, so I stopped right there.

But after watching the YT videos, I was left with a big "meh."

They actually did change their ending, despite swearing up and down that they weren't going to do it.  But they messed up by not going all in and re-doing certain things to go along with their new ending.

In the original ending, the point was that everything had been reset and our surviving crew was left to begin a whole new cycle/civilization.  So the "crash scene" was appropriate.

The new ending's point was that everything was okay now and we're gonna press on.  Therefore, the "crash scene" became completely unneccessary.  It no longer served a purpose to the story.  IMO, that's poor writing.  The Normandy crashes and less than a minute and a half later, they take back off.  Why?  In the old ending, it had a purpose, now it doesn't.  Why didn't they take the time and effort to just excise it from the game?

I dunno, but they didn't and now it feels wonky story-wise.

This is just one example of the flaws that came about from the way they decided to do things.  Instead of admiting that no one was satisfied with the ending and coming up with something new, they shoehorned in a lot of new ideas on top of old ones.  No matter what they say or how they spin it, they DID change their ending.  They changed the entire essence of its meaning and purpose.  We went from an Adam and Eve ending to a more conventional one.  The problem was they did it in a half-assed way in order to hide the very fact that they'd done exactly what they said they wouldn't do.

On a sidenote, I can't remember, does Destroy still kill EDI?  If so, why not?  I haven't played the game since the EC rendered my copy useless.

Modifié par ZombieJohn84, 28 juin 2013 - 01:15 .

[Kel Riever]

Supposedly, Destroy kills EDI because she is 'filled with Reaper Code.' Of course, as anyone with common sense would know, code is probably one of the worst reasons you could use to say you have to kill all synthetics. They wanted to just kill a bunch of stuff with Destroy and came up with an idiot reason.

[Clayless]

drayfish wrote...

Sigh.

I'm not going to follow you into some nonsense ginger bread house about racism and the Geth.  As you well know, it has nothing to do with the disagreement we are having here, and you are (rather sadly) trying to use it as an escape hatch.  It is utterly irrelevant.

No it's completely relevant, you're refusing to answer the question because you don't want to make a point. You like making observations, like the Geth "racism" one, but you refuse to make points.

Instead, please point to where you supposedly answered my original question about the 'hard choices' you have been bleating about for two days now.

Or better still, just sum them up now: What about the ending choices is hard for you?

Why can't you answer this extremely simple question?  Particularly as I've now asked it several times.

This is on this page, and I pointed you towards it twice, and mentioned that ignoring it doesn't mean it doesn't exist, but frankly I will post it again:

Sure. There's no "correct" choice, all of them are equally morally grey.

They're not reduced to, for example, collateral. You actively make the choice to commit genocide, to save everyone else.

They're not reduced to, for example, granting freedom with no further input from you and the consequences out of your hands. You actively choose to take the power for yourself, to control the galaxy as you see fit.

They're not reduced to, for example, a voluntary system where others can strive to advance if they choose. You make that choice for them, without their input.

It's grey. In a game about hard choices you're forced to make a hard choice, with no "correct" answer, which is beautiful. The game makes you ask questions you never thought you would, it challenges you, it makes you think.

Your extremely simple question was answered straight away.

Now that's out of the way, answer my question, this is how these things work. Normal debates have each side answering questions, making points, if you want me to elaborate or answer another one of your questions answer mine first. Start with the Geth one, make a point, and please don't make another, or the same, observation this time.

Modifié par Robosexual, 28 juin 2013 - 02:25 .

[drayfish]

Robosexual wrote...

drayfish wrote...

Sigh.

I'm not going to follow you into some nonsense ginger bread house about racism and the Geth.  As you well know, it has nothing to do with the disagreement we are having here, and you are (rather sadly) trying to use it as an escape hatch.  It is utterly irrelevant.

No it's completely relevant, you're refusing to answer the question because you don't want to make a point. You like making observations, like the Geth "racism" one, but you refuse to make points.

Instead, please point to where you supposedly answered my original question about the 'hard choices' you have been bleating about for two days now.

Or better still, just sum them up now: What about the ending choices is hard for you?

Why can't you answer this extremely simple question?  Particularly as I've now asked it several times.

This is on this page, and I pointed you towards it twice, and mentioned that ignoring it doesn't mean it doesn't exist, but frankly I will post it again:

Sure. There's no "correct" choice, all of them are equally morally grey.

They're not reduced to, for example, collateral. You actively make the choice to commit genocide, to save everyone else.

They're not reduced to, for example, granting freedom with no further input from you and the consequences out of your hands. You actively choose to take the power for yourself, to control the galaxy as you see fit.

They're not reduced to, for example, a voluntary system where others can strive to advance if they choose. You make that choice for them, without their input.

It's grey. In a game about hard choices you're forced to make a hard choice, with no "correct" answer, which is beautiful. The game makes you ask questions you never thought you would, it challenges you, it makes you think.

Your extremely simple question was answered straight away.

Now that's out of the way, answer my question, this is how these things work. Normal debates have each side answering questions, making points, if you want me to elaborate or answer another one of your questions answer mine first. Start with the Geth one, make a point, and please don't make another, or the same, observation this time.

Wow.  You literally are incapable of answering the question...

'Morally grey'; 'Hard choices'; these are fun words to say, but if they are not being applied to anything substantial - if you cannot even point to the 'difficult decisions' you are talking about - they are utterly meaningless.  They become drivel to spout when you have nothing concrete to say.

Again: the decisions at the end of the game are in no possible way difficult. 

You are asked whether you want to give everyone in the universe superpowers, create universal peace, and have everyone love you for it.  If you find that 'difficult' you must find chosing which pointy hat to wear in the morning a complete nightmare.

And if becoming a supreme being, living forever, and still achieving world peace is a tough sell for you, you would be impossible to buy a halloween gift for.

I've said this so many times it has gone long past ridiculous, but you legitimately seem incapable of understanding the words: These choices are not hard.  That's what's wrong with them.  They simplify complex issues into asinine fantasies.

Clearly they stroke your ego and make you feel deep and thoughful as you get your every wish granted for you - but that doesn't mean they are philosophical - that means you enjoy being patronised. 

And leading armies full of flying monkeys.

So no, you still haven't answered the question.  And clearly you are incapable (or unwilling) to even try.

Modifié par drayfish, 28 juin 2013 - 02:45 .

[Clayless]

drayfish wrote...

-don't like your answer therefore you never answered it-

That's nice, but I answered your question, trying to dismiss it because you don't like the answer doesn't change anything, and your opinion on the matter doesn't change anything either.

Now can you answer mine? What point are you making by saying it's "racist"? Because that's not a point, it's an observation.