177 réponses à ce sujet

[dorktainian]

you should see the latest theory.... wowzers. and it makes perfect sense.

open your minds.  embrace the snake.  

Modifié par dorktainian, 01 août 2013 - 01:50 .

[Xamufam]

dorktainian wrote...

www.youtube.com/watch 

The end was always important.  Us ITers have always thought so.  So much so that Magnetite has posted this vid on youtube with the background sounds only (no speech or music - sfx only) from shep getting hit by harbie right to starjar.

Pretty damning evidence if you ask me that us ITers were right all along.   

Reaper horns.  Whispering voices.  Sound effects on the citadel that were on earth.  

The same things is in the dreams if you remove the music when you get near the kid the whispers get stronger, you even hear don't trust him, give in & harbinger, but this is not some IT discovery it's just that they cut out indoctrination these things are just remains.

In me 2 mine reports they saw a white glow after being exposed to the reaper artifact
www.youtube.com/watch
www.youtube.com/watch

[dreamgazer]

Nothing to see here.

Modifié par dreamgazer, 01 août 2013 - 05:18 .

[Tron Mega]

Cobalt2113 wrote...

Tron Mega wrote...

i never deserved refuse. nobody who played the game deserves refuse ending. unfortunatley, i agree with refuse.

which means i hate the game(and the ones that came before it) and i blame bioware for it.

after all, its not my fault i picked refuse.

What did you expect to happen?

The game tells you over and over that conventional vitory is impossible. it tells you that all your hopes are depending on the Crucible. So what did you actually expect to happen when you refused to use it?

i expected to drive the reapers back to dark space via united galaxy along with the addition of any number of already established ventures into defeating the reapers(thanix canons, that species of cyber people, the kledagon weapon, the 'light people' as seen by that crazy voulus, reverse engineering soveriegn, the derelict reaper, or the collector base......how many more ideas should i list???).

i couldnt care less what NPC #357 says! is that really all you want to rely on? "the game said you were supposed to loose, duh!" did you forget the fact that ME was an underdog story, right up untill the very end? remember when you beat the so called "suicide mission?" remember when you completed that mission and no one died??? name one thing shepard has done that wasnt deamed impossible!

more impotant then anything, i never once heard shepard say "we cant beat the reapers." and thats all the convincing i needed.

[JamesFaith]

Tron Mega wrote...

more impotant then anything, i never once heard shepard say "we cant beat the reapers." and thats all the convincing i needed.

"Liara, your work was important. We can't beat the Reapers without the Catalyst."

Commander Shepard

[CronoDragoon]

Tron Mega wrote...

i couldnt care less what NPC #357 says! is that really all you want to rely on? "the game said you were supposed to loose, duh!" did you forget the fact that ME was an underdog story, right up untill the very end? remember when you beat the so called "suicide mission?" remember when you completed that mission and no one died??? name one thing shepard has done that wasnt deamed impossible!

This is really the problem. You tell players in ME2 via NPCs and Shepard that not all of them will make it and people will die, that it's a Suicide Mission, and then have no deaths whatsoever, it does establish an expectation.

With that being said, my expectation was still that we would use the Crucible to win without having to compromise our morality, not that conventional victory was possible. The Crucible was simply too important to ME3's plot to be an optional device.

[Tron Mega]

CronoDragoon wrote...

Tron Mega wrote...

i couldnt care less what NPC #357 says! is that really all you want to rely on? "the game said you were supposed to loose, duh!" did you forget the fact that ME was an underdog story, right up untill the very end? remember when you beat the so called "suicide mission?" remember when you completed that mission and no one died??? name one thing shepard has done that wasnt deamed impossible!

This is really the problem. You tell players in ME2 via NPCs and Shepard that not all of them will make it and people will die, that it's a Suicide Mission, and then have no deaths whatsoever, it does establish an expectation.

With that being said, my expectation was still that we would use the Crucible to win without having to compromise our morality, not that conventional victory was possible. The Crucible was simply too important to ME3's plot to be an optional device.

ever since the moment in the game i find out the reapers moved the citadel to the sol system I KNEW the crucible was going to be some kind of shield buster against the reapers. i just knew the dumb reasoning behind the reapers moving the citadel near earth was so bioware could keep humans alive in the MEU. i thought the EMS was going to provide variable in the magnification of the crucibles shield disrupting radius. the higher the EMS the larger its radius, thusly meaning the more species that can be saved. who is important enough to keep within the crucibles range? the turians? the krogan??? can volus live in one of saturns moons? the decision of who lives is up to the player. i thought id see my war assets displayed in a glorious montage of nostalgic memories and fateful consequences of long forgotten choices. i thought id be thankful for the things ive done, the people id met, and species i united! i wouldnt change anything that comes before the citadel getting moved to the sol system. every change would be thereafter.

then ME4 starts with bioware using a much more thought out approach to ending the mass effect series.

there could be memes like "how bigs your bubble?" imagin the world we could have lived in if only ME3 was good!

Modifié par Tron Mega, 02 août 2013 - 12:04 .

[o Ventus]

CronoDragoon wrote...

This is really the problem. You tell players in ME2 via NPCs and Shepard that not all of them will make it and people will die, that it's a Suicide Mission, and then have no deaths whatsoever, it does establish an expectation.

And for a great deal of people, characters DID die on the suicide mission. It isn't like the marketing was wrong or false or misleading.

Unless your first playthrough involved a strategy guide or the wiki page (or any other source of help online), chances are you didn't meet all the criteria for a "perfect" ME2 playthrough.

Modifié par o Ventus, 02 août 2013 - 12:42 .

[mopotter]

Tron Mega wrote...

Cobalt2113 wrote...

Tron Mega wrote...

i never deserved refuse. nobody who played the game deserves refuse ending. unfortunatley, i agree with refuse.

which means i hate the game(and the ones that came before it) and i blame bioware for it.

after all, its not my fault i picked refuse.

What did you expect to happen?

The game tells you over and over that conventional vitory is impossible. it tells you that all your hopes are depending on the Crucible. So what did you actually expect to happen when you refused to use it?

i expected to drive the reapers back to dark space via united galaxy along with the addition of any number of already established ventures into defeating the reapers(thanix canons, that species of cyber people, the kledagon weapon, the 'light people' as seen by that crazy voulus, reverse engineering soveriegn, the derelict reaper, or the collector base......how many more ideas should i list???).

i couldnt care less what NPC #357 says! is that really all you want to rely on? "the game said you were supposed to loose, duh!" did you forget the fact that ME was an underdog story, right up untill the very end? remember when you beat the so called "suicide mission?" remember when you completed that mission and no one died??? name one thing shepard has done that wasnt deamed impossible!

more impotant then anything, i never once heard shepard say "we cant beat the reapers." and thats all the convincing i needed.

  Driving them back to dark space was also one of the options I was hoping for, and this would have made way for future games where a new group goes after them in their home base.    I didn't expect to destroy the reapers in every game, though I thought it would be a possibility depending on choices from past games and ME3.

Also agree, We did the impossible in both previous games and there was no reason not to expect at least one or two impossible thing in the final game.  What's impossible changes every day.

Audrey Hepburn once said "nothing is impossible, the word itself says I'm possible'!"   edit dark red does not show up well on black.

We destroyed Sovereign by reducing his shields.  Someone had mentioned finding a way to do this with the attacking reapers as one possibility.  There are so many ways they could have gone.  

Modifié par mopotter, 02 août 2013 - 05:14 .

[mopotter]

o Ventus wrote...

CronoDragoon wrote...

This is really the problem. You tell players in ME2 via NPCs and Shepard that not all of them will make it and people will die, that it's a Suicide Mission, and then have no deaths whatsoever, it does establish an expectation.

And for a great deal of people, characters DID die on the suicide mission. It isn't like the marketing was wrong or false or misleading.

Unless your first playthrough involved a strategy guide or the wiki page (or any other source of help online), chances are you didn't meet all the criteria for a "perfect" ME2 playthrough.

yes, I did have people die in ME2.  And I had people live, not by using the strategy guide I just played so many games that  I ended up with one where everyone survived.  Only once.

And for me, I did expect Shepard to die in some games, did expect the reapers to win in some game,  but I never expected the type of endings they ended up with.

[Shaigunjoe]

o Ventus wrote...
Unless your first playthrough involved a strategy guide or the wiki page (or any other source of help online), chances are you didn't meet all the criteria for a "perfect" ME2 playthrough.

I feel like this can't be true, the npc's make it abundantly clear when they feel like every thing is ready, that unless you really rushed through the game without paying attention and gave orders to your squad during the mission that made no sense, then nobody should have had any trouble survining the first time through.

[chemiclord]

Shaigunjoe wrote...

o Ventus wrote...
Unless your first playthrough involved a strategy guide or the wiki page (or any other source of help online), chances are you didn't meet all the criteria for a "perfect" ME2 playthrough.

I feel like this can't be true, the npc's make it abundantly clear when they feel like every thing is ready, that unless you really rushed through the game without paying attention and gave orders to your squad during the mission that made no sense, then nobody should have had any trouble survining the first time through.

It isn't true.  It was absurdly easy to complete a "golden" playthrough on your first try.  You pretty much had to TRY to screw things up by intentionally ignoring loyalty missions and not paying attention at all to the dossiers you're given during the suicide mission that could have only been more obvious if they outright said, "Pick this character" and "Don't pick this character."

Modifié par chemiclord, 02 août 2013 - 08:51 .

[3DandBeyond]

wright1978 wrote...

The destination is always going to be of paramount importance. Unfortunately they botched the delivery of the endings and seemed wedded to one particular outcome rather than building an ending that was truly reflective of choice & consequence.

Yes, exactly.  In stories one does not only want a great journey but wishes to see through to how it will end and what reward (good or bad) they are met with.  But it must play out and be connected to the sense of the things that came before.  Otherwise, it becomes disjointed.  I must feel something in an ending that is tied back to the beginning.  In fact, this is a really good way to tell if a story has kept its internal promise-does the ending answer the beginning's question?  I know what I think about ME and ME3's ending.  They seem as if they are from two different stories.

The other incontrovertible truth for me is that going forward, because the past is past, whenever a game dev creates something with the promise of alternate endings, then make them actually so that they appeal to the broad range of players you have as fans.  Don't set up players with the idea of hope (or desolation) and only give them one version.  That is just as true for games with a grim/dark slant as for anything else.  When you create something that can allow for divergent mind-sets then you owe it to those that paid you money to remember that when ending the story.

I say this because ME was my preferred game and warts and all, it appealed to me for this very reason, the happy and sad of it.  It led me to believe that the devs realized people could forge forward and do the wrong thing and create bad situations, but also that people could do the opposite.  It devolved into someone's need to see only the dank and dark as possible.  My opinion, but it's how it felt to me and in the visual arts emotions are everything.  The fact that in exploring the story and the endings my emotions still ring true changes nothing for me.

And yes, this is of course an endings' thread.  As I said it was always important.  It always will be.  It's a hope I have the BW and other devs will learn from this and think again about how stories need to play out.  It's also good to have an idea where you want to go with a story when you begin, kind of like a road map.  You can deviate but don't stray too far.

[3DandBeyond]

mopotter wrote...


yes, I did have people die in ME2.  And I had people live, not by using the strategy guide I just played so many games that  I ended up with one where everyone survived.  Only once.

And for me, I did expect Shepard to die in some games, did expect the reapers to win in some game,  but I never expected the type of endings they ended up with.

Always my expectation as well and what I will always believe was the major mistake here.  You don't set up people to think that along with certain truly bad possible outcomes there are some truly good possible ones (or one) as well and then don't make the good ones possible.  I can fully see that some wouldn't want an all too easy "super silly victory" only sort of ending (but I then would wonder why they ever played ME2 because ME1 had that).  I also would have to wonder why they played ME3 because even in ME2 Shepard HAD TO LIVE to be able to use that save game.

This is what I mean about internal promises in stories.  ME1 and ME2 did at least set up a story world in which Shepard could (and always had to) come out alive and because of that at least some shred of happiness was forced upon the player.  Those that wanted more could only get that in ME2 by saving everyone and getting to the crew in time so they weren't turned into goo.  ME1 didn't even give you that choice-Shepard lived, all is happy, though Shepard's pissed at those ignoring the reaper issue. 

And yet, twice in endings you are clearly shown Shepard must live but ultimately are given no such thing in a very real emotionally satisfying way at the end of the whole story.  In fact, even with the Lazarus Project you are shown that Shepard must live.  And you can get some bittersweet moments later on due to this. 

The idea that ultimately Shepard's fate is of little consequence (to the devs) and to the whole story while at the same time it's once again Shepard "fixing" everything and the galaxy sitting there with fingers in their noses while this is happening is just so stupid.

In ME1 and 2, the galaxy is a bunch of idiotic children.  In 3, they begin to learn to grow.  Shepard was meant to help them do this, but at the end Shepard still makes the decisions AND pays the price for all of this.  And the galaxy has to live with this decision without having a say, without lifting a finger at the end.  Brilliant. 


On top of all that there's the whole twisted logic that no matter how many words are thrown at cannot be made logical.  In truth with Leviathan we are given a story in which the hero must mostly die in service to some ancient organic idiots that created an AI that destroyed them when he was created to keep AIs from destroying them.  If I'm expected to think this idiocy is cool story telling, I'd at least like to leave the game with a smile.

Modifié par 3DandBeyond, 02 août 2013 - 09:52 .

[ShepnTali]

Shepard's send off did seem strangely weak. The legend of Shepard is mentioned in an after game Bioware message, but why nothing in game? Even in EC, I would think Hackett would have a thing or two to say about Shepard in the destroy epilogue. I know there's a memorial plaque in EC, but I just don't understand the thinking in the original version. Especially since it was known then that Bioware is done with Shepard.

[3DandBeyond]

AlanC9 wrote...

This whole argument strikes me as a search for "meaning " that isn't there. Or rather, was never intended to be there.

Edit: I've got some sympathy for wanting the Destroy ending to symbolize something beyond the Crucible having a regrettable design flaw, etc. I just don't think there's any there there.

The whole argument is about there actually being no meaning there as in no meaning to the endings.  It's always been clear to me that Bioware was pressed for time and created abrupt no thought endings and that they then extorted players to speculate and to help them define the endings.  They have simply never decided to discuss anything about this at all and have thrown poo at the wall and hoped it would stick.  But while we may search to find some meaning (and any meaning we'd want will never exist) it was not we who wanted to have to speculate all of this.  We didn't want a "fill in the blanks" ending. 

Sure imagination is one thing but I shouldn't have to imagined away illogic passed off as logic or arbitrary scenes meant to conveny emotion when real emotion remains unsatisfied.  And I shouldn't have to imagine meaning where none exists or was never intended.  If so, then the writer of the story has done paying customers a disservice.  On the one hand the devs want us to accept an ending as having meaning that befits the story.  And yet, on the other hand you and the writers want it to be so open to interpretation as to do several things.  You want it to defy meaning and they want it to further speculation.  Neither can fully meet what stories do best, whether sad or happy in the extreme.  Neither meaningless random words flung together nor open to interpretation full on speculation can satisfy the emotions of those who were seeing things through Shepard's eyes.

The fact that some find the ending satisfactory does not make them wrong.  Nor does the fact that some don't find it so make them wrong.  What is consistently wrong about the whole thing is that so many people will never find the endings satisfactory and yet even those of us that may have wanted a happier possibility could have even perhaps accepted meaningful sacrifice as necessary and right.  As I said, if I had to live with the lack of real logic about the whole thing and the drastic turn the endings took that diverged from what the story I played was about, then at least let me leave with a smile.  I totally would rather I'd not been treated as if I was some sort of child that just didn't understand good esoteric writing so I didn't "get" it and instead was treated as if my brain was fully functional especially with the addition of Leviathan.  Since I was told I was supposed to speculate I did that. 

And I did speculate after I tried to make sense of this cool story that popped up out of nowhere in the form of a little kid at the very end of an even better story of these huge unknowable arrogant monsters that I wanted to destroy to save all the galaxy.  I looked at the kid and tried to figure out if what he said made sense, even if just to him and thought it's fine if he believes it.  But nothing could bring me to think Shepard would ever accept that, not without some sort of fight or confrontational questioning.  And we got the EC for that, right? 

But no, that was more like a Q and A session at E3. 

Shepard:  Big fan here.  What was your motivation in making Sovereign sound so mean? 

Kid:  Always love to hear from a fan.  Sov, he was my boy I mean, but I knew he'd have to go.  I mean, the reapers are so not important.  If not for me, they'd be sitting idle talking about the latest issue of People.  So, I had to make you hate them right.  But in the end, it's not about them.  It's about saving you from yourselves by well killing you. 

Shepard:  That's cool.  So, I just jump in here and die, right? 

Kid:  True that.



On top of that the whole thing boils down to Shepard being ok with suiciding to solve a problem that Shepard may not see as relevant (a lot of us didn't) and a problem that the Leviathans were trying to solve.  Big fat idiots in space, hiding in an ocean created this problem.  So let's turn the galaxy's eyes green to solve it.  Great.

[KaiserShep]

o Ventus wrote...

And for a great deal of people, characters DID die on the suicide mission. It isn't like the marketing was wrong or false or misleading.

Unless your first playthrough involved a strategy guide or the wiki page (or any other source of help online), chances are you didn't meet all the criteria for a "perfect" ME2 playthrough.

It's really easy to get everyone to survive. All I did was take my time in my first playthrough and guides weren't necessary. But really, that doesn't matter, because the point is that their deaths can all be avoided. 

[3DandBeyond]

ShepnTali wrote...

Shepard's send off did seem strangely weak. The legend of Shepard is mentioned in an after game Bioware message, but why nothing in game? Even in EC, I would think Hackett would have a thing or two to say about Shepard in the destroy epilogue. I know there's a memorial plaque in EC, but I just don't understand the thinking in the original version. Especially since it was known then that Bioware is done with Shepard.

Yes, and this is in sharp contrast with pre-release statements and after release statements by the devs.  Prior to anything about an EC the devs said they knew fans would be upset because this was the end of Shepard's story arc-they felt this was why people were angry with the original endings.  I think that was either something they tried to delude themselves with or just a talking point to try to absolve themselves of blame for something that has very few defenders. 

That one line says they totally misread the situation.  No no no.  Most of us knew this would be the end even if we may have hoped for more.  That was never what people were upset about.  It was at its base about an incredibly weak send off to Shepard and those we loved AND the lack of logic behind it all.  It was possible to have weak logic and a crap story with at least a decent goodbye to characters we cared about.  But anything else was just off.

[AlanC9]

chemiclord wrote...

It isn't true.  It was absurdly easy to complete a "golden" playthrough on your first try.  You pretty much had to TRY to screw things up by intentionally ignoring loyalty missions and not paying attention at all to the dossiers you're given during the suicide mission that could have only been more obvious if they outright said, "Pick this character" and "Don't pick this character."

It's not quite that simple. I actually managed to lose Miranda my first time out. I didn't go along with Bio's Paragon/Renegade dialogue scheme, so I couldn't make the checks to preserve Miranda's and Zaeed's loyalty (paragon path on his LM). And I botched Thane's mission by tracking the wrong guy wearing red ; OK, that part was just plain incompetence. With Garrus in my final mission team, I turned out to be 0.1 points under what I needed for the Hold The Line score. Miranda was the squishiest non-loyal squadmate, and died.

Modifié par AlanC9, 02 août 2013 - 10:52 .

[3DandBeyond]

KaiserShep wrote...

o Ventus wrote...

And for a great deal of people, characters DID die on the suicide mission. It isn't like the marketing was wrong or false or misleading.

Unless your first playthrough involved a strategy guide or the wiki page (or any other source of help online), chances are you didn't meet all the criteria for a "perfect" ME2 playthrough.

It's really easy to get everyone to survive. All I did was take my time in my first playthrough and guides weren't necessary. But really, that doesn't matter, because the point is that their deaths can all be avoided. 

This is exactly so.  On my first playthrough, Kelly Chambers died and so did Garrus.  But I listened to Dr. Chakwas who was mad at me and said I took too long to get there.  I realized that was why Kelly died.  And I also realized I used Jack who was not loyal to create the bubble and that led to Garrus' death.  Next time, I got to the base quickly and Kelly lived and I had Samara do the bubble and no one died.  Later on I figured out how to get Jack's loyalty back and all that but the point was, no one had to die, it could be avoided.  And yet, sure you could even have everyone die if that seems right to you.  Even Shepard and Joker could be there with all those caskets.

[Iakus]

3DandBeyond wrote...
This is exactly so.  On my first playthrough, Kelly Chambers died and so did Garrus.  But I listened to Dr. Chakwas who was mad at me and said I took too long to get there.  I realized that was why Kelly died.  And I also realized I used Jack who was not loyal to create the bubble and that led to Garrus' death.  Next time, I got to the base quickly and Kelly lived and I had Samara do the bubble and no one died.  Later on I figured out how to get Jack's loyalty back and all that but the point was, no one had to die, it could be avoided.  And yet, sure you could even have everyone die if that seems right to you.  Even Shepard and Joker could be there with all those caskets.

Yup, in ME3 you can have all the tragedy, drama, and angst you could possibly want.

But something bright and happy?  THe game actively sabotages your "choice" in that regard

[KaiserShep]

After being forced to Horizon and the collector ship, I avoided the IFF mission as long as I could while I did everything else. It's made clear that you have the option to get it early or wait until your other tasks are done when talking to Miranda and Jacob.

[AlanC9]

3DandBeyond wrote...

AlanC9 wrote...
This whole argument strikes me as a search for "meaning " that isn't there. Or rather, was never intended to be there.

The whole argument is about there actually being no meaning there as in no meaning to the endings.  It's always been clear to me that Bioware was pressed for time and created abrupt no thought endings and that they then extorted players to speculate and to help them define the endings.

Oh, I get it. When you said

I'm still left with endings that seem to be someone's commentary on the human condition.

.. this isn't actually a hypothesis about what Bio was trying to do; seeming that way is just an illusion, right? Got it.

And I did speculate after I tried to make sense of this cool story that popped up out of nowhere in the form of a little kid at the very end of an even better story of these huge unknowable arrogant monsters that I wanted to destroy to save all the galaxy.  I looked at the kid and tried to figure out if what he said made sense, even if just to him and thought it's fine if he believes it.  But nothing could bring me to think Shepard would ever accept that, not without some sort of fight or confrontational questioning.  And we got the EC for that, right?  

Looks like you and I probably parted company around Virmire. It never even occurred to me that ME was going to end up being a story about "huge unknowable arrogant monsters." I always figured that Sovereign was laying down a smokescreen of b.s. to cover up either his own ignorance of his purpose or to cover up a secret but understandable purpose which would be revealed eventually.

I see your point about confrontation. It worked OK for me because most of my Shepards didn't see any point in arguing with crazy AIs, but as a matter of RP it should have been in. I suspect that Bio didn't want to have Shepard's next-to-last action in the trilogy be a futile argument. A mistake, but an understandable one.

On top of that the whole thing boils down to Shepard being ok with suiciding to solve a problem that Shepard may not see as relevant (a lot of us didn't) and a problem that the Leviathans were trying to solve.  Big fat idiots in space, hiding in an ocean created this problem.  So let's turn the galaxy's eyes green to solve it.  Great.

That's a fair argument against Synthesis, but no Shepard ever has to pick that.

Modifié par AlanC9, 02 août 2013 - 11:31 .

[CronoDragoon]

AlanC9 wrote...

It's not quite that simple. I actually managed to lose Miranda my first time out. I didn't go along with Bio's Paragon/Renegade dialogue scheme, so I couldn't make the checks to preserve Miranda's and Zaeed's loyalty (paragon path on his LM). And I botched Thane's mission by tracking the wrong guy wearing red ; OK, that part was just plain incompetence. With Garrus in my final mission team, I turned out to be 0.1 points under what I needed for the Hold The Line score. Miranda was the squishiest non-loyal squadmate, and died.

Someone who won't reload Thane's mission to do it right, or always pick P/R to pass checks, isn't someone overly concerned with the absolute best perfect ending anyway; they are more concerned with taking the game's concept of consequences for actions seriously. If someone is actively trying for the perfect playthrough, then they can get it very easily.

Modifié par CronoDragoon, 03 août 2013 - 03:49 .