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[Reorte]

Malanek999 wrote...

Reorte wrote...

Would that be any different from wiping out the whole of human civilisation then recreating us from some remaining DNA samples? Even if you've got documentary evidence the new humans could see of what was before you wouldn't get the same civilisation.

Its an interesting philosophical question. What if their memories could be read from their remnants and reinstated. Would that make a difference? Even in the case of an extinct organic species, restoring them from a cataclysmic event involving their sacrifice would still have value.

How much is a huge matter of debate. It also treads on fairly scary ground, because it edges into rather nasty territory - do something completely and utterly horrific that kills huge numbers, not even for any good reason, and eventually it'll just become another episode in history.

How similar recreated geth could be is also a matter of debate, particularly if most of their databases remain intact. Considering the nature of the geth (which is easily the most difficult yet valid concept to get my head around in Mass Effect) it's hard to know just what that means, particularly in their more interesting pre-upgrade "Hey, make stuff more like us is good!" version.

[durasteel]

RiptideX1090 wrote...
...it's not something they can follow up in a sequel, because they have to account for all the endings.

Not really.

If there is a silver lining to the rancid ending to ME3 it is that almost no one will be upset to see it swept away by a canon world state that threads the needle between control and destroy.

Shepard defeated the Reapers, but no one really tells you how. Most of them were destroyed but some were rumored to have survived. The geth took heavy losses but are recovering. Shepard is reported dead, but some rumors persist that he survived, other rumors say he is somehow controling the surviving reapers.

Much of the galaxy has been rebuilt, and gleaming high-tech metropolises exist. The Citadel is the center of galactic trade and the seat of the Council. Most of the galaxy, however, is still struggling to recover from the Reaper war, and post-apocalyptic wild-West areas are the new 'normal.'

There are probably no more than a handful of die-hard synthesis fans who would object to a world state like that for ME4. It is what needs to be done, because a prequel is pretty much out of the question, for me. Anything set before the Reaper War is a waste of time, because anything your character builds will be destroyed, anyone you save will die anyway, and nothing you care about will matter at all. 

ME3 destroyed the galaxy, and before anything else can have relevance, the galaxy has to be put back together.

[KaiserShep]

durasteel wrote...

EDI lives in the Normandy's core, which is hardened to resist EMP attacks and general electromagnetic shenanigans. While her fembot mobile platform might be damaged or disabled, her personality and such should be safe and sound in the Normandy's innards.

It isn't, though.

See, this is space magic. If you try to understand it, it will only make your brain hurt. It's stupid and nonsensical, and it has effects because it is written that it does.

What we experienced is a writer's cop-out. I'm pretty sure that, in a complete absence of inspiration, Mac started with two choices: kill the reapers; or join the reapers. A brief struggle with the nonsensical nature of a "join the reapers" plot led to the idea of the Catalyst and an opportunity to replace it as the AI reaper god. Still, that idea is pretty dumb and most people would, as a no-brainer, just go with "kill the reapers" instead. That raised the necessity of attaching a cost to what became the "destroy" option. Incorporating the Catalyst idea from "control" suggested casting everything in a quick and dirty AI versus organic theme, so the obvious cost for destroy would be all Shepard's AI friends. It was then decided to add a third "best" option for reaching a certain threshold of galactic readiness, and so--in the absence of any better ideas--it was decided that "synthesis" should make all AI and organic life equal thereby resolving the thrown-together AI/Organic conflict theme.

The "Last Days" iOS app gives some behind-the-scenes perspective of the development, and if you were paying attention to the Old Republic development time table you can pretty clearly see what probably happened. SWTOR needed a few more months of development, so the bean-counters switched the release windows because they needed a product to release in the Spring of 2012 when they had been planning to unleash SWTOR. That basically took 6 to 9 months of development time away from Mass Effect 3, and put Casey in the awkward position of scheduling studio time for the voice actors before there was even a draft of the script.

Mac was then (as is confirmed in the Last Days app) writing the ending with the actors already in the studio waiting for their pages to read from. Everyone had planned on having a few more months to iron everything out and generate a quality product, but the rug was pulled out from under them.

Then Dr. Ray Muzyka, who was trying to fit into the EA corporate structure, steps in to handle the PR disaster that began to built the moment players reached the end of the game. He had to make a call between throwing someone under the bus and having a do-over, or sticking by his people and put his own credibility through the meat grinder with the whole "artistic integrity" thing. We know which way it went.

It's sad. Often, when a movie is butchered by a studio in the editing room, the creative forces behind the film can arrange for a "Director's Cut" to restore some real artistic integrity to the work. In this case, I really do wish that it had somehow been possible to give Casey the freedom to produce a Director's Cut of ME3, with a free DLC that actually fixed the ending, perhaps using the "indoctrination theory" or perhaps with something totally different and unexpected. What makes the situation sad is that I know that, given the chance, the Mass Effect development team could have made something great.

That's the only reason I'm still hanging around here waiting for ME4 info. I'm hoping that, having been knocked down, Casey Hudson manages to produce a magnum opus and redeem himself, Mac, and the Mass Effect franchise.

'Cause if he doesn't, it's done.

No pressure.

This actually gives me a great deal of hope that the next game can be fantastic, but it also makes the "artistic integrity" cracks that go on in the forums even more annoying, given the circumstances. Perhaps I'm in the minority, but I think the DLC's, particularly Leviathan and Citadel, show well enough that the team is fully capable of creating a fantastic game beyond this trilogy, even if they were largely constrained by the more somber tone of the reaper apocalypse and shaky narrative.

[RiptideX1090]

durasteel wrote...

RiptideX1090 wrote...
...it's not something they can follow up in a sequel, because they have to account for all the endings.

Not really.

If there is a silver lining to the rancid ending to ME3 it is that almost no one will be upset to see it swept away by a canon world state that threads the needle between control and destroy.

Shepard defeated the Reapers, but no one really tells you how. Most of them were destroyed but some were rumored to have survived. The geth took heavy losses but are recovering. Shepard is reported dead, but some rumors persist that he survived, other rumors say he is somehow controling the surviving reapers.

Much of the galaxy has been rebuilt, and gleaming high-tech metropolises exist. The Citadel is the center of galactic trade and the seat of the Council. Most of the galaxy, however, is still struggling to recover from the Reaper war, and post-apocalyptic wild-West areas are the new 'normal.'

There are probably no more than a handful of die-hard synthesis fans who would object to a world state like that for ME4. It is what needs to be done, because a prequel is pretty much out of the question, for me. Anything set before the Reaper War is a waste of time, because anything your character builds will be destroyed, anyone you save will die anyway, and nothing you care about will matter at all. 

ME3 destroyed the galaxy, and before anything else can have relevance, the galaxy has to be put back together.

I don't think that works. There really isn't room for interpretation between "all the reapers collapsed and died" and "all the reapers suddenly stopped shooting at us and helped us rebuild". It'd be hard to write that unless, again, the setting of the next game is so far down the line that it's actually become blurred.

Really, they either have to account for the endings in some way, or dismiss them altogether.

I don't know, really, they can do anything. From ignoring it completely and just doing whatever they want or saying "Synthesis happens whether you want it to or not, so deal with it". We're going to be stuck playing the waiting game until we see for ourselves, unfortunately.

Bloody hell, I wish they'd give us SOMETHING, a teaser or an interview talking about the next games direction or something, if only so we'd have something new to work into the equation.

[Malanek]

Reorte wrote...

Malanek999 wrote...

Reorte wrote...

Would that be any different from wiping out the whole of human civilisation then recreating us from some remaining DNA samples? Even if you've got documentary evidence the new humans could see of what was before you wouldn't get the same civilisation.

Its an interesting philosophical question. What if their memories could be read from their remnants and reinstated. Would that make a difference? Even in the case of an extinct organic species, restoring them from a cataclysmic event involving their sacrifice would still have value.

How much is a huge matter of debate. It also treads on fairly scary ground, because it edges into rather nasty territory - do something completely and utterly horrific that kills huge numbers, not even for any good reason, and eventually it'll just become another episode in history.

It was one persons decision, not the galaxy as a whole. And to say there was not a good reason for it... well I can't see how you even begin to arrive at that.

[Derpy]

Because of these endings, we know the next game wont be a sequel. If it was, they would need to canonize the ending to destroy most likely which would make a lot of fans upset.

[RiptideX1090]

Nate_Assassin wrote...

Because of these endings, we know the next game wont be a sequel. If it was, they would need to canonize the ending to destroy most likely which would make a lot of fans upset.

Problem with that logic is that making a prequel is going to make a monumental number of fans upset as well. They did a poll on Facebook or Twitter asking the question of Sequel or Prequel, and the numbers don't lie, sequel was vastly in the majority.

[Malanek]

Nate_Assassin wrote...

Because of these endings, we know the next game wont be a sequel. If it was, they would need to canonize the ending to destroy most likely which would make a lot of fans upset.

I believe more fans will be upset if it isn't a sequel. However, whatever they choose, all will be forgiven if the game and story is good.

Ultimately, if they want to keep the franchise alive, they will eventually need to make a sequel so to me doing so now is the only approach that makes sense.

Modifié par Malanek999, 12 décembre 2013 - 08:08 .

[RiptideX1090]

Malanek999 wrote...
all will be forgiven if the game and story is good.

Even if they did a great prequel, I sincerely doubt that's going to be the case. Because by it's very nature, a prequel is going to be forced to feed into the endings of ME3. This is the same problem that came up with doing Citadel. It was utterly phenomenal, but for a lot of people it still feels bittersweet and leaves them feeling a bit unhappy because they know it feeds into the ending.

Really, they'd be better off not making a prequel. Doing so is just going to let all these unresolved questions and stuff continue to fester, and it's going to color everything they do because it all ends up in the same place. Better to lead into new possibilities with a fresh outlook so they'll have more freedom.

[Wayning_Star]

Biggest drawback to the destruction/deprogramming of the geth/synthetics is that you're ending up doing exactly what the catalyst accuse organics of doing. Invoking that pesky endless cycle of events, ignoring the problem that exists via the catalyst and it's creator races.

Who wants to prove the catalyst "right" as well as correct, eh?

[Malanek]

Wayning_Star wrote...

Biggest drawback to the destruction/deprogramming of the geth/synthetics is that you're ending up doing exactly what the catalyst accuse organics of doing. Invoking that pesky endless cycle of events, ignoring the problem that exists via the catalyst and it's creator races.

Who wants to prove the catalyst "right" as well as correct, eh?

I don't agree with this. It's bringing the recurring cycle to an end to save yourselves. Its very different than what the Reapers were doing.

[durasteel]

RiptideX1090 wrote...
I don't think that works. There really isn't room for interpretation between "all the reapers collapsed and died" and "all the reapers suddenly stopped shooting at us and helped us rebuild". It'd be hard to write that unless, again, the setting of the next game is so far down the line that it's actually become blurred.

Really, they either have to account for the endings in some way, or dismiss them altogether.

I don't know, really, they can do anything. From ignoring it completely and just doing whatever they want or saying "Synthesis happens whether you want it to or not, so deal with it". We're going to be stuck playing the waiting game until we see for ourselves, unfortunately.

Bloody hell, I wish they'd give us SOMETHING, a teaser or an interview talking about the next games direction or something, if only so we'd have something new to work into the equation.

Half of the Post-It notes you got after the end of Dragon Age: Origin turned out to be totally bogus.

The Alliance killed a bunch of Reapers, any way you look at it. I think "room for interpretation" comes between "they all died" and "some of them just left." To the extent that they helped rebuild, that would more likely be limited to their own toys, like the relays. Since it would be years before martial law was suspended pretty much anywhere, there are few people who would be in a position to just fly out to Charon and see who exactly was wrapping it in duct tape. Even among space jockeys, few would have any reason to see the relay before it was repaired.

To the man-on-the-street just about anywhere in the galaxy, red or blue both lead to "bury your dead, clean up dead reaper parts, and start rebuilding your stuff."

[RiptideX1090]

Wayning_Star wrote...

Biggest drawback to the destruction/deprogramming of the geth/synthetics is that you're ending up doing exactly what the catalyst accuse organics of doing. Invoking that pesky endless cycle of events, ignoring the problem that exists via the catalyst and it's creator races.

Who wants to prove the catalyst "right" as well as correct, eh?

I think that's a false way of looking at it. I chose Destroy rather in spite of the Catalyst's argument, not because of it. Because I believe that we can achieve peace without him or his Reapers, without his or TIM's solution. We did it on Rannoch, EDI and Joker did it, and picking anything other than destroy might not kill the geth, Legion or EDI, but I feel it's far more of a betrayal to their characters.

Legion states approval at Shepard for destroying the collector base because it rejects the old machine's gifts in favor of finding their own way.

If you take the renegade option in Citadel when EDI presents Shepard with the ring, she states that it should represent not only her hopes, but the hopes of everyone Shepard fights for, the entire galaxy. Her 'humanity' is something she wants to fight to the death for. SynthesisEDI's rambling on immortality should thematically indicate the about face she's made in that ending: it's not even EDI anymore.

If they people you save aren't even those same people anymore, what's the point? Starbrat claims going with Destroy, we're going to end up with synthetics in due course again, and expresses the nihlistic view that we'll be betrayed by them. Me and my Shepard chose to spit on that because we have faith that it won't be like the last time, not after we showed we could coexist.

[Wayning_Star]

Malanek999 wrote...

Wayning_Star wrote...

Biggest drawback to the destruction/deprogramming of the geth/synthetics is that you're ending up doing exactly what the catalyst accuse organics of doing. Invoking that pesky endless cycle of events, ignoring the problem that exists via the catalyst and it's creator races.

Who wants to prove the catalyst "right" as well as correct, eh?

I don't agree with this. It's bringing the recurring cycle to an end to save yourselves. Its very different than what the Reapers were doing.

yeah, that's what the Leviathan thought when designing the catalyst because of their 'survival' instincts regarding recalcitrant thralls doing the same thing.. then attempting their destruction, only to bring about strife between synthetics and organics. 

""Destroy"" is just that... isn't it?!?

[durasteel]

RiptideX1090 wrote...

Malanek999 wrote...
all will be forgiven if the game and story is good.

Even if they did a great prequel, I sincerely doubt that's going to be the case. Because by it's very nature, a prequel is going to be forced to feed into the endings of ME3. This is the same problem that came up with doing Citadel. It was utterly phenomenal, but for a lot of people it still feels bittersweet and leaves them feeling a bit unhappy because they know it feeds into the ending.

Really, they'd be better off not making a prequel. Doing so is just going to let all these unresolved questions and stuff continue to fester, and it's going to color everything they do because it all ends up in the same place. Better to lead into new possibilities with a fresh outlook so they'll have more freedom.

Agree 100%.

[RiptideX1090]

durasteel wrote...


Half of the Post-It notes you got after the end of Dragon Age: Origin turned out to be totally bogus.

The Alliance killed a bunch of Reapers, any way you look at it. I think "room for interpretation" comes between "they all died" and "some of them just left." To the extent that they helped rebuild, that would more likely be limited to their own toys, like the relays. Since it would be years before martial law was suspended pretty much anywhere, there are few people who would be in a position to just fly out to Charon and see who exactly was wrapping it in duct tape. Even among space jockeys, few would have any reason to see the relay before it was repaired.

To the man-on-the-street just about anywhere in the galaxy, red or blue both lead to "bury your dead, clean up dead reaper parts, and start rebuilding your stuff."

Except, you know, the victory fleet in Destroy is shown flying to Charon after the battle.

Again, it's really not worth debating what they 'have to do', because in the end, they can do anything they want. It just comes down to how much whatever they do pisses people off at this point, the less people, the better they did, obviously. And at this point, I don't even know which option would be the one that would cause the least amount of fallout, which is the hole they've dug for themselves.

[KaiserShep]

Nate_Assassin wrote...

Because of these endings, we know the next game wont be a sequel. If it was, they would need to canonize the ending to destroy most likely which would make a lot of fans upset.

I'm pretty certain that a prequel would upset a great deal more fans than a sequel. I believe that going backward in time would be venomous to the IP. The big problem, as I see it, is that Mass Effect is as much about world-building as it is about the reaper plot, so aside from the main story, we have all those other conflicts in the background that frame the setting. Going backward in time basically puts everything we've seen from the trilogy back to square one. So when we meet krogan, they automatically come with issues regarding the genophage, their distrust of turians and salarians, as well as the distrust of everyone else of their kind. The rachni don't exist, because the egg on the derelict rachni ship may not have been discovered yet. The quarians are perpetually stuck as nomads, and the geth are out there, possibly with heretics planning with Sovereign. We may never hear of them, but we know they're out there. The batarians and humans are down each others' throats. It doesn't matter how good the story is, because these things will do nothing but taint it, and you can't make the story too small scale that things things can be avoided, or else you squander the potential of exploring the MEU in an entirely new game.

[RiptideX1090]

KaiserShep wrote...

Nate_Assassin wrote...

Because of these endings, we know the next game wont be a sequel. If it was, they would need to canonize the ending to destroy most likely which would make a lot of fans upset.

I'm pretty certain that a prequel would upset a great deal more fans than a sequel. I believe that going backward in time would be venomous to the IP. The big problem, as I see it, is that Mass Effect is as much about world-building as it is about the reaper plot, so aside from the main story, we have all those other conflicts in the background that frame the setting. Going backward in time basically puts everything we've seen from the trilogy back to square one. So when we meet krogan, they automatically come with issues regarding the genophage, their distrust of turians and salarians, as well as the distrust of everyone else of their kind. The rachni don't exist, because the egg on the derelict rachni ship may not have been discovered yet. The quarians are perpetually stuck as nomads, and the geth are out there, possibly with heretics planning with Sovereign. We may never hear of them, but we know they're out there. The batarians and humans are down each others' throats. It doesn't matter how good the story is, because these things will do nothing but taint it, and you can't make the story too small scale that things things can be avoided, or else you squander the potential of exploring the MEU in an entirely new game.

Everything that was said here, I agree with.

[Wayning_Star]

everyone gets a little piece of the "action"..lol

I just wonder when the next installment, if any, will come out..been looking for hints online.. none..

[RiptideX1090]

Wayning_Star wrote...

everyone gets a little piece of the "action"..lol

I just wonder when the next installment, if any, will come out..been looking for hints online.. none..

Normally they have a two year development cycle for these games, I think ME1 was about three years. I know they delayed starting the next ME's dev cycle because of all the controversy and what have you, so... I'd say we'll start hearing about it next year, and I'd put a release date for late 2014 to mid 2015. Going by my best guess. Really, it depends.

[Wayning_Star]

crap, I could save at least two universes' in three year, by then everyone will be on ONES and computers will be obsoleted... heheh

[Derpy]

Malanek999 wrote...

Nate_Assassin wrote...

Because of these endings, we know the next game wont be a sequel. If it was, they would need to canonize the ending to destroy most likely which would make a lot of fans upset.

I believe more fans will be upset if it isn't a sequel. However, whatever they choose, all will be forgiven if the game and story is good.

Ultimately, if they want to keep the franchise alive, they will eventually need to make a sequel so to me doing so now is the only approach that makes sense.

I would hope they made a sequel maybe like a few years after the events of ME3. I don't want a prequel or a AU as I would have to adjust to different characters.

[Wayning_Star]

for the next game I kind of have to defer to the stargazer scene. Seems as it occurs off in the far distant future, if taken literally... so a 'sequel' isn't probable, a prequel would be more likely if Shepard has anything to do with it...(time warps,etc.) and then we have that dark matter thingy aswa dark space and energy issues. All in all it's mostly a new improved version of ME.. only different.

[durasteel]

RiptideX1090 wrote...
Normally they have a two year development cycle for these games, I think ME1 was about three years. I know they delayed starting the next ME's dev cycle because of all the controversy and what have you, so... I'd say we'll start hearing about it next year, and I'd put a release date for late 2014 to mid 2015. Going by my best guess. Really, it depends.

BioWare got hammered. First came the clearly thrown-together opening and ending sequences of Mass Effect 3, then came the less-than-hoped-for performance of SWTOR. Drs. Muzyka and Zeschuk both said "screw it, I'm out." Most of the Mass Effect team moved on to other projects, like Patrick Weekes who switched to the Dragon Age team. Kasey and Mac, though, remain with the Edmondton studio and with the Mass Effect franchise, and they are apparently in charge of the team at the new Montreal studio that is developing the new game (this is the same team that did the ME3 multiplayer.)

So, I have to wonder... Did Casey and Mac go to the EA bean counters and say "we can fix this, we want you to green-light development of a new Mass Effect game!" Or, did the EA bean counters tell them "we think there's still a few bucks to be made here, so start working on a new Mass Effect game." I believe that it was the former, and that this game is driven by a desire to make something good, because if it was just driven by the bean-counters, we would already have a release date announced. It would be a Battlefield type game set to release in this early window of opportunity for the new consoles, because that would be the way to make the most short-term money.

Both Mass Effect 4 and Dragon Age Inquisition seem to have been given plenty of development time, though. It is as if someone at EA has realised what the value of the BioWare brand is, and its market, and doesn't want to repeat the mistakes of ME3 and DA2.

While cautious, I am (a little bit) optimistic.

[RiptideX1090]

durasteel wrote...

While cautious, I am (a little bit) optimistic.

Indeed. My general attitude is to always expect the worst, but also hope for the best. Same applies here. I expect that it's EA milking more money from the franchise, I expect past mistakes to be ignored due to pride and hubris, I expect DA3 getting more time is a fluke, but I hope that the next game is coming from somewhere inside the devs, I hope they approach it with a bit more humility and with that same passion for making games and cool characters and stories we love them for, and I hope DA3 is the setting of a new trend with things getting back on track.

Only time will tell if it is my expectations or my hopes that will be answered. Until then, it's business as usual.