978 réponses à ce sujet

[AlanC9]

The part with Kai Leng I didn't like. He has to do his ayhhh 3 times before I could kill him

Haven't Bio boss fights sucked for a long time, though? I didn't see anything unusually awful about the Kai Leng fights.

[Jorji Costava]

I don't really have much of an issue with it story-wise either. If Priority: Earth was a far better-designed endgame for ME3, I'd consider Cronos the nigh perfect point-of-no-return mission to start it off.

 

Cronos Station is probably the best of any of the post-Rannoch missions (Thessia, Sanctuary, Priority: Earth, etc.), but I do wish that the whole Cerberus plot could have been wrapped up there; it would have made sense for the final encounter with TIM to have taken place on Cronos. I also think it's a little telling that the point of no return for the Reaper War is an assault on a Cerberus space station, suggesting something about Cerberus' outsized importance in the narrative of ME3. Lastly, some of the exposition introduced in those videos could have been introduced much earlier. For instance, there was no reason for EDI's ploy to allow Shepard and company to keep the SR2 out of the hands of Cerberus well before Cronos to be kept secret from Shepard until Cronos.

 

Haven't Bio boss fights sucked for a long time, though? I didn't see anything unusually awful about the Kai Leng fights.

 

True enough; both robo-Saren and the Reaper baby were about as lame as Kai Leng both mechanically and story-wise (Casey Hudson's remark about having a final boss fight for ME3 be too "video gamey" was almost certainly a reaction to the negative reception of the Reaper larva). The only substantive difference I can think of off the top of my head is that ME3 spent at least some time building up Kai Leng as a serious threat, where as the Reaper larva is introduced and then dispensed with almost in the same moment; as a result, there's no chance for our expectations about how badass the Reaper baby is to be frustrated. That's my guess, anyways.

[ImaginaryMatter]

Haven't Bio boss fights sucked for a long time, though? I didn't see anything unusually awful about the Kai Leng fights.

 

Within the game's mechanics I think his is much worse. Like why do we have a melee guy who fights out in the open in a cover based shooter? ME2 had fairly decent, sometimes excellent boss fights, why not make it like one of those?

 

I think the biggest frustrations though come from the cutscenes afterwards. It hurts to mow him down only to have him cheat when the game yanks control away from you.

[AlanC9]

I also think it's a little telling that the point of no return for the Reaper War is an assault on a Cerberus space station, suggesting something about Cerberus' outsized importance in the narrative of ME3.

Given the size of Cerberus' role, though, this was the correct final gate. It's not conceptually very much different from having the final confrontation with Loghain at the Landsmeet be the final gate before the DAO endgame.

[AlanC9]

Within the game's mechanics I think his is much worse. Like why do we have a melee guy who fights out in the open in a cover based shooter? ME2 had fairly decent, sometimes excellent boss fights, why not make it like one of those?

I wasn't thinking of most of the ME2 mission end fights as "boss fights" because those typically used standard ME2 combat mechanics. I would have been fine with standard combat for Kai Leng, but such a fight might not have been all that dramatic given the way ME3 combat works. This has been a problem for some shooters I've played; NOLF in particular comes to mind.
 

I think the biggest frustrations though come from the cutscenes afterwards. It hurts to mow him down only to have him cheat when the game yanks control away from you.

Same thing happened in KotOR. Darth Malak has a special irresistible Force power that he can only use in cutscenes to hose the PC.

[Jorji Costava]

Given the size of Cerberus' role, though, this was the correct final gate. It's not conceptually very much different from having the final confrontation with Loghain at the Landsmeet be the final gate before the DAO endgame.

 

It's an apt comparison given what Cerberus' role was in ME3, but my question was just whether or not they should have had that role to begin with. I've expressed my view before that Cerberus could have been dispensed with in ME2 (leaving Udina as the voice of reasonable pro-humanism), but that's probably a debate for another day.

[ImaginaryMatter]

Same thing happened in KotOR. Darth Malak has a special irresistible Force power that he can only use in cutscenes to hose the PC.

 

Were people not frustrated with cutscenes in KotOR? I can only speak from personal experience.

[Jorji Costava]

Were people not frustrated with cutscenes in KotOR? I can only speak from personal experience.

 

My sense is that when we're talking about the Kai Leng cutscenes, we can't separate from that discussion the fact that Kai Leng was just a very despised character, and would have been poorly received even if we were never subject to any cutscene-induced incompetence at his hands. Perhaps people aren't so much upset about the prospect of auto-failure as they are about the prospect of auto-failure to a character who just isn't any good as an antagonist.

 

Going off on a bit of a tangent, sometimes I think the same might be true with respect to the issue of auto-dialogue. While there is definitely a subset of role-playing purists who will be upset by auto-dialogue of any sort no matter what, I suspect that for a lot of people the issue was just as much about badly written auto-dialogue (i.e. "This isn't about strategy or tactics!", etc.). I wonder how the auto-dialogue would have been received if it had consisted largely of cleverly written Whedonesque banter, for instance.

[ImaginaryMatter]

My sense is that when we're talking about the Kai Leng cutscenes, we can't separate from that discussion the fact that Kai Leng was just a very despised character, and would have been poorly received even if we were never subject to any cutscene-induced incompetence at his hands. Perhaps people aren't so much upset about the prospect of auto-failure as they are about the prospect of auto-failure to a character who just isn't any good as an antagonist.

 

Going off on a bit of a tangent, sometimes I think the same might be true with respect to the issue of auto-dialogue. While there is definitely a subset of role-playing purists who will be upset by auto-dialogue of any sort no matter what, I suspect that for a lot of people the issue was just as much about badly written auto-dialogue (i.e. "This isn't about strategy or tactics!", etc.). I wonder how the auto-dialogue would have been received if it had consisted largely of cleverly written Whedonesque banter, for instance.

 

Maybe, there are certainly other frustrating/annoying things about him. Personally his appearance didn't grate on me too much until after that first cutscene, "Thane knocked him on his butt everybody! Open fire!" Although back then I thought his sword was just a gimmick and he had actual weapons stored somewhere.

 

I think some of the auto dialogue might stem from the deeper issue of how players see Shepard. Some players view him as a character in his or her own right, and since Shepard is so much more expressive with the ME3 dialogue they're pretty happy with it. Something about how he's not as much of a brick. Others view Shepard more as their personal avatar (and where I personally stand) where the choices are simply outlets to reflect whatever deep personality lurks in the player's mind. Because of that it wouldn't matter how eloquent the writing is if it doesn't match up with what they want Shepard to do or say (like that kid).

[SporkFu]

Were people not frustrated with cutscenes in KotOR? I can only speak from personal experience.

I was more frustrated talking to aliens. Kashyyk should have been my favorite place to visit, and yeah the fights were fun, but... by the time I picked up Jolee Bindo, I was really turning to the dark side, and I don't mean in-game. 

[keekee53]

Always destroy...

 

To choose anything else, you might as well let Saren or the Illusive Man win and not even bothered fighting through the series.  Honestly, this is why the ending sucked so badly.  With the choices given, we all could have stopped playing at ME1.

 

Let's be honest control....everyone who tried to "control" the reapers ended up indoctrinated.  

 

Synthesis...really...we are going to force the human race or any organic race to become part machine because we thought it was okay...uh...I think had Shepard lived some organics might have tried to kill him...reapers killed organic's family members now you want those same people to become part machine...I don't think so. 

 

Yeah..destroy is the only answer in my opinion.

[KaiserShep]

The forced part is not really what troubles me the most about Synthesis, since Shepard can force a lot of things on many thousands of people anyway, but rather the whole mystical, seeking perfection mumbo jumbo that it involves, and the fact that Shepard has to have enough conviction in this silly idea to die over. New framework? New DNA? What is this madness? Where's the dispensary, Cat? 'Cause I got a craving.

[JeffZero]

I think the biggest frustrations though come from the cutscenes afterwards. It hurts to mow him down only to have him cheat when the game yanks control away from you.

 

Nah, I love that cutscene, personally. Wouldn't trade it for some "satisfaction" of mowing him down which I personally don't really receive from games anyway. The "interrupt" I get afterward is much cooler for my tastes.

[ImaginaryMatter]

Nah, I love that cutscene, personally. Wouldn't trade it for some "satisfaction" of mowing him down which I personally don't really receive from games anyway. The "interrupt" I get afterward is much cooler for my tastes.

 

I'm generally not a fan of action cutscenes in video games as I find that they defeat the purpose of the medium. I further dislike cutscenes when they defeat the character not through the antagonist doing something clever, but my making everyone in the scene act like idiots. The Kai Leng scenes pretty much represent all I dislike, no, loathe about cutscenes. His greatest power isn't his sword, or his shields, or his gun ship, or his more competent lackeys; it's his ability to manipulate the game world so he could win.

 

Ultimately, I didn't get any satisfaction out of killing Kai Leng. He wasn't an adversary, he was a test on my patience as a player. I get as much satisfaction from beating him as ending a phone call with my cable provider.

[KaiserShep]

I can almost see a Kai Leng slow-mo montage of all the cutscenes where he applies his dual layer, script-weave plot armor, playing to the sound of Lionel Richie's Hello. Precious memories.

[Nogroson]

Destroy for me too.

After all the hell I've gone trough to defeat the reapers ..... well I do not see any other possible solution than wipe them out, even if the Catalyst tries everything to change my mind .......... beside I've got so emotionally attached to Shepard that I do not like to see him die, even if it is for saving the galaxy .. and high EMS destroy is the only option where he lives at the end

[JeffZero]

Eh, well, I hear ya, and I'm sorry you (and from what I've seen, many fellow BioWare fans) feel that way about the character and the setup in the final encounter. Blame it on my love for old-school Squaresoft, Uncharted, Metal Gear, et al. I'm totally down for some great action cutscenes. I'll agree that the party doesn't look the brightest in that situation, but I'm willing to forgive it for the satisfaction of plunging Shepard's omni-blade through.

[CaIIisto]

Casey Hudson's remark about having a final boss fight for ME3 be too "video gamey" 

 

 

A videogamey ending to a videogame? Thank God Casey and the gang were on point to protect us from such heretical ideas....

[RiptideX1090]

Destroy.

 

I hate killing the geth, but I hate not putting the Reapers down more. The geth dying was just a pitiful attempt to make the ending decision harder and somehow more thought provoking than it ever should of been, and I'm not doing it. No, I don't want to be Space GOD EMPEROR and no I am not showing the mint flavored rainbow love cannon so everyone can be best friends with their toaster.

 

...Despite my undying love of toast...

[RiouHotaru]

It's funny that people complained about Kai Leng soundly trouncing the party in a cutscene despite the ability for a party to mow through him with the proper set-up, but Saren from ME1 on Virmire gets the exact same treatement.  No matter how well you thrash his ass, he shrugs off every injury, blows Shepard off his/her feet, and almost strangles you.  And Saren's status as the main antagonist is no excuse for Cutscene Power To The Max.  Also, aside from Tela Vasir in LotSB, Kai Leng is the closest to a "boss" character that the ME Trilogy has ever had (Because Reaper Larva doesn't count IMO).

 

Back to the idea of the final decision:

 

At first I've been a diehard Destroy fan.  Yes, it kills the Geth, but the Geth had to understand the risks involved if the idea was the give the Reapers a final defeat.  However, more and more I find myself swaying between Destroy and Synthesis.  Synthesis because it gives everyone the happy ending they deserve.  And Destroy because it gives Shepard the happy ending they deserve.

[ImaginaryMatter]

It's funny that people complained about Kai Leng soundly trouncing the party in a cutscene despite the ability for a party to mow through him with the proper set-up, but Saren from ME1 on Virmire gets the exact same treatement.  No matter how well you thrash his ass, he shrugs off every injury, blows Shepard off his/her feet, and almost strangles you.  And Saren's status as the main antagonist is no excuse for Cutscene Power To The Max.  Also, aside from Tela Vasir in LotSB, Kai Leng is the closest to a "boss" character that the ME Trilogy has ever had (Because Reaper Larva doesn't count IMO).

 

It's an issue of magnitudes. Saren's is bad but not so bad as to be memorable in the grand lexicon of video game cutscene tropes (compared to most games it's actually kinda average). Most people are also more forgiving towards Saren as he actually has a character, a character that they like. Kai Leng however has cutscenes that are just the worst thing to have to sit through. He also has almost no character to speak of and what little wisps of characterization that able to waft through are ridiculous.

[JeffZero]

I like Kai Leng. It's probably my most controversial Mass Effect statement, but I like him. I don't love him, but he's functional to me. He's an antagonistic face to identify a desire to crush Cerberus through, because The Illusive Man himself is significantly more complex. Leng was hired because he does things no matter how despicable, and I feel like he gets me in the zone to take him down going forward after the Cerberus assault on the Citadel every single file.

 

Destroy.

 

I hate killing the geth, but I hate not putting the Reapers down more. The geth dying was just a pitiful attempt to make the ending decision harder and somehow more thought provoking than it ever should of been, and I'm not doing it. No, I don't want to be Space GOD EMPEROR and no I am not showing the mint flavored rainbow love cannon so everyone can be best friends with their toaster.

 

...Despite my undying love of toast...

 

I'll of course ignore your negative statements on my chosen endings since that's a two-year-old road I personally avoid traveling down at this point, and I respect and enjoy that we're all entitled to our opinions and interpretations. But I do want to briefly comment on "taking down the Reapers" -- I know it isn't cut and dry explained (because, frustratingly, so little is re: the endings) but I have always, always gotten the impression that in Synthesis and especially Control very little to zero vestiges of the original Reaper "brain" programming remain. That is to say, for all intents and purposes, their sentience as illogical, cycle-looping little vindictive bastards is gone in every route sans Refuse. (In which case it's gone eventually, most likely.)

[jtav]

It's an issue of magnitudes. Saren's is bad but not so bad as to be memorable in the grand lexicon of video game cutscene tropes (compared to most games it's actually kinda average). Most people are also more forgiving towards Saren as he actually has a character, a character that they like. Kai Leng however has cutscenes that are just the worst thing to have to sit through. He also has almost no character to speak of and what little wisps of characterization that able to waft through are ridiculous.

Pretty much. It's not losing, it's losing to a character with no menace, charisma, or anything to justify his role as  the one who can almost beat Shep. Eva is better.

[RiptideX1090]

I like Kai Leng. It's probably my most controversial Mass Effect statement, but I like him. I don't love him, but he's functional to me. He's an antagonistic face to identify a desire to crush Cerberus through, because The Illusive Man himself is significantly more complex. Leng was hired because he does things no matter how despicable, and I feel like he gets me in the zone to take him down going forward after the Cerberus assault on the Citadel every single file.

 

 

I'll of course ignore your negative statements on my chosen endings since that's a two-year-old road I personally avoid traveling down at this point, and I respect and enjoy that we're all entitled to our opinions and interpretations. But I do want to briefly comment on "taking down the Reapers" -- I know it isn't cut and dry explained (because, frustratingly, so little is re: the endings) but I have always, always gotten the impression that in Synthesis and especially Control very little to zero vestiges of the original Reaper "brain" programming remain. That is to say, for all intents and purposes, their sentience as illogical, cycle-looping little vindictive bastards is gone in every route sans Refuse. (In which case it's gone eventually, most likely.)

 

I have a friend who wrote a thing somewhere about how Kai Leng had insane potential to be a good foil for Shepard, but it was never realized. I'm not sure where it is, or I'd be linking it...

 

Right, right, sorry. Two years of speculating has left me a bit sour about it. To be honest, I hate every ending, even Destroy, because it's so bloody contrived...

 

Anyway, the fact of the matter is we don't know what happens to the Reapers in Control and Synthesis because, well, we never understood them to begin with. Because we can't. Sovereign says they're a bunch of unfeeling synthetics that want to wipe us out because we're magnitudes beneath them, EDI tells us they're giant cyborg lobsters that are just using us to reproduce, and the Catalyst tells us they're just puppets that do what he tells them to, implying they don't even have actual free will, and that they might not even be truly sentient.

 

So... if they are sentient, does that mean Shepard in Control is letting them maintain that sentience and has simply just convinced them to work for him? Or have their minds been erased entirely and Shepard is completely in control? Do they have minds TO erase? And Synthesis... I mean... I guess husks are alive now? Do they have memories of what they were before, or...? I mean, if you pick Synthesis for example, is Harbinger still a trash talking monster that wants to "turn our worlds into his laboratories", or has his personality been changed, or what? What if he decides he prefers killing organics? Can he choose? Does he have free will? Did he ever?

 

You can theorize, but it's never explained. We just get implied glimpses, except with so much contradictory information and speculative narration we really don't have much of anything concrete to go on.

 

All I know for sure is I don't want to have a cybertronic conversation with my toaster every time I want breakfast. Or... to have circuitry in my bread, for that matter.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Why would that be a bad thing? Most games only have one ending.

 

There's a level where I think about that forced decision at the end, and that part of it is about being forced to make peace with the reapers. Become one with them (synthesis) or become part of (and endorse) them (control). The "wipe them out" was given a moral threshold that would be unacceptably high to some players.

 

Regardless, whichever choice, the end came through the triggering of a superweapon and pressing a button. Not defeating a bad guy, or out-witting/out-reasoning an adversary.... a software interface said "thats the way it is and you can have one of these three". It may as well have been radio buttons on a modal pop-up dialog box. Or maybe clippy from Office 2000 "it looks like you're trying to save the galaxy - would you like some help?".

 

I didn't earn my ending - "clippy" let me have one of the three that were available. And that's why it tasted of ashes. All that pointless waste.

 

Thinking about it more, the superweapon had already been triggered. The crucible only let you talk to it. Reminds me of a game I had on My Acorn Electron many years ago, based on the film Dark Star. You had to try and talk a malfunctioning AI Thermostellar Bomb out of detonating.

 

Let there be light.

 

Ah, Dark Star.... I loved the beachball with the claws. lol. John Carpenter's college project - his first movie.

 

Well having one ending wouldn't necessarily have been a bad thing. Even one where you were forced to make peace with the reapers with synthesis wouldn't have been bad. We would have had to be prepared conventionally, and the reapers would have had to see that continuing the fight would have profound effects on the viability of life in the galaxy. Something their programming was set to preserve. So we reach a stalemate and they offer synthesis to end the war which would otherwise obliterate both sides. The war was about survival. We would have survived which would have been something no other cycle ever accomplished.

 

Still it would have been better than pick a color and all the endings are the same except for the color of the explosions on your screen: you die, the relays explode, and the Normandy crashes.