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[jtav]

This is a good point, as DAO's endings have certainly spawned some thoughtful discussions (is creating an OGB a good idea?  Does Loghain deserve a chance at redemption?  Is it more important for the Warden or Alistiar to live?  etc) But ME3's endings, for many reasons, caused a negative backlash that tainted any discussion that's likely to come out of it. 

 

SO, why were DAO's endings generally considered a success, and ME3's, well, not?  And what can DAI learn from it?

A few things:

 

1. The ending to DAO doesn't violate themes or narrative logic that came before.

 

2. The problem  it attempts to solve (end the Blight) is the one you've been pursuing since the beginning. ME3's ending elevates a secondary conflict. Not only that, it's one many players consider solved after Rannoch.

 

3. Exposition comes from a reliable source.

 

4. Foreshadowung. "The Grey Wardens are needed to defeat the Archdemon" and "Morrigan has a plan" are things the player has heard before. Redcliffe is an "aha, now it makes sense" sequence.

 

5. Closure and a sense of accomplishment. Even if our heroine dies, we the player see that she has accomplished something and the world is better off than before. The sacrifice was worth it. ME3 stranded the crew on an unknown planet and destroyed the relays. Will they get home? Is galactic society gone? Is the ME2 team okay? We don't know.

[EmperorSahlertz]

5. Closure and a sense of accomplishment. Even if our heroine dies, we the player see that she has accomplished something and the world is better off than before. The sacrifice was worth it. ME3 stranded the crew on an unknown planet and destroyed the relays. Will they get home? Is galactic society gone? Is the ME2 team okay? We don't know.

To be fair, all of that was fixed in the DIrector's Cut dlc.

[jtav]

To be fair, all of that was fixed in the DIrector's Cut dlc.

And by then the well had been poisoned, so to speak. The OE left a very bad taste in people's mouth.

[Felya87]

To be fair, all of that was fixed in the DIrector's Cut dlc.

 

not really...you still don't know what will happen to your crew, since is "somewhere". for all we know, they can die just after putting the ensign with Shepard's name on the wall.

and we still don't know the phate of all the people on the Citadel.

[TheJediSaint]

To be fair, all of that was fixed in the DIrector's Cut dlc.

Director's Cut fixed potholes by introducing even more.  It was a nice try, though.

[Kimarous]

How would people feel if the PC died in a heroic sacrifice, but then something (completely within in-story reason) happens that resurrects the character and allows them to live? Or only making a partial sacrifice, like the loss of limb / skill / status / what-have-you?

[jtav]

How would people feel if the PC died in a heroic sacrifice, but then something (completely within in-story reason) happens that resurrects the character and allows them to live? Or only making a partial sacrifice, like the loss of limb / skill / status / what-have-you?

The first I would find horribly cheesy, but the second I'd approve of. It allows the writers to explain why the Inquisitor isn't involved in DA4 while allowing them a postgame life.

[Milan92]

How would people feel if the PC died in a heroic sacrifice, but then something (completely within in-story reason) happens that resurrects the character and allows them to live? Or only making a partial sacrifice, like the loss of limb / skill / status / what-have-you?

 

I would be fine with the latter. I think they should definitely address the fact that the Inquisitor is sucking in all that fade power with their glowy hand.

 

I mean, what happens with it? Does it built up and will explode at some point? Does it just dissapear?

[fhs33721]

not really...you still don't know what will happen to your crew, since is "somewhere". for all we know, they can die just after putting the ensign with Shepard's name on the wall.

and we still don't know the phate of all the people on the Citadel.

They fly away from the planet in the Normandy in the ending cutscene, so It is clear that they didn't die right after putting/not putting  Shepards name on the wall.

Also at least in Synthesis and control the relay system is still intact, assuring that they can easily return to civilisation in their fully operational spaceship.

And the people on the citadel have either been evacuated or are dead, most likely the second. Deal with it. A desperate struggle against almost invincible, chtulhuesque space robots shouldn't be a fun little adventure where everyone makes it out alive.

 

How would people feel if the PC died in a heroic sacrifice, but then something (completely within in-story reason) happens that resurrects the character and allows them to live? Or only making a partial sacrifice, like the loss of limb / skill / status / what-have-you?

The former sounds like the awful plot for some cartoon for little kids or some supernatural romance novel where the hero gets revived trough the power of friendship or love. The second is ok I guess but still (at least to me) it seems that loosing a limb is kind of a low price to pay for stopping an apocalytical event. It could be cool though if it was done in a good way.

[Felya87]

How would people feel if the PC died in a heroic sacrifice, but then something (completely within in-story reason) happens that resurrects the character and allows them to live? Or only making a partial sacrifice, like the loss of limb / skill / status / what-have-you?

 

I would not like the "resurrection" thing. seen it too many times in anime/manga. I wasn't very happy with it even in ME2. I'd leave the resurrection to religions and Dragon Ball.

 

I'm more than fine with the "surviving with big loss". expecially the losing a limb or skill. It would be truly bittersweet, expecially for a character that was strong thanks to his/her fighting skill. for some character may feel worse than death. But mostly depend on wich character I'm playng.

[Killdren88]

I'd still rather have the option to live in the end and not be seen as selfish for doing so. And not be punished for wanting to live. You can have your bittersweet and doom and gloom endings as well considering the variety we are getting. So arguing for or against a specific ending seems to be unneeded. Unless of course Bioware turns around and says there will only be one ending then I can see a much larger and heated debate with multiple groups for different endings.

[CronoDragoon]

This is a good point, as DAO's endings have certainly spawned some thoughtful discussions (is creating an OGB a good idea?  Does Loghain deserve a chance at redemption?  Is it more important for the Warden or Alistiar to live?  etc) But ME3's endings, for many reasons, caused a negative backlash that tainted any discussion that's likely to come out of it. 

 

SO, why were DAO's endings generally considered a success, and ME3's, well, not?  And what can DAI learn from it?

 

I'll start by disclaiming that I'm only speaking of players that did not like ME3's endings, and that by "player" I don't mean the playerbase at large. I am also not advocating that BioWare should or not not do a sort of ending choice for Inquisition, merely analyzing why ME3's caused an outcry.

 

Spoiler

In simplest terms, I believe ME3's ending was a failure for one very simple reason: it failed to evoke the emotion that BioWare wanted it to evoke. That is not to handwave all other objections to the ending, but if you look, you can find every other complaint in a host of BioWare games. The primary cause for players to actually complain about things like plotholes (which don't really matter unless you want them to) and lack of "player choice" (there is tons of player choice in ME3, especially the ending choice) is emotional dissatisfaction, and that is a huge problem because if the player feels unsatisfied, the past two years have shown that they will pick apart everything they possibly can to justify their dissatisfaction.

 

Let's introduce a hypothetical. Let's say the EC ships with the game (in all it's the-relays-are-only-disabled glory) and that the Destroy wave doesn't kill all synthetics, but only the Reapers. Do the majority care about plotholes? Do they care whether the Catalyst's logic is correct (answer: of course not, it's the villain)? Perhaps some do, but at about the same level as people cared about the Reaper baby in ME2. Sure it's stupid, but man wasn't that Suicide Mission awesome? Internet complaints are inevitable. An outcry deals in something else.

 

So what's this emotional dissatisfaction, and why did Dragon Age Origins, a game with ostensibly a tough ending choice, not suffer a similar fate?

 

There are two key components of a tough choice.  The first is that the decision has weight and produces meaningful consequences (both good and bad) in the world. Otherwise we might call choosing cake over ice cream a tough choice. The second is that the consequences (both beneficial and harmful) are well-balanced between the choices. In the latter respect, ME3 is actually a resounding success, as is Dragon Age Origins. In each, there's a thought process that goes, "Well, in Ending A this happens as a result, and that's good. But then Ending A has this drawback which sucks and is absent from Ending B. But Ending B has...." and so on and so forth.

 

But ME3 takes condition #1 way too far in that ME3 introduces negative consequences so severe that many players feel no positive consequence can counterbalance it on an emotional level. Meanwhile, Dragon Age Origins does a good job balancing the consequences both between the choices and also within a choice. Players make sacrifices* but in each ending there is a sense that the sacrifice was well-worth what you accomplish. It's worth noting here that "balance" doesn't actually mean the negative and positive consequences are equal. This isn't even true in ME3 (the positives outweigh the negatives) and yet players still felt they hadn't achieved a true victory. It turned a bittersweet ending into a bitter or bleak ending. For the players furious with ME3's ending, it seems the positive consequences of a choice must outweigh the negative, and must do so by a SUBSTANTIAL amount. For Dragon Age Origins, the most you end up sacrificing is one life, and in all cases this is voluntary. Imagine if EDI had (through some contrived means) been able and willing to sacrifice herself to stop the Catalyst, with no other sacrifice made. That's about the level of what Origins was asking you to give.

 

And that's why Origins was a success: it balanced the choices by 1) giving them enough weight to feel important while 2) not overdoing the negative consequences and 3) introducing balanced benefits and drawbacks for each.* ME3 passes condition 1 and 3 but fails 2.

 

* Except the Dark Ritual, but that will be addressed in Inquisition.

[Iakus]

And by then the well had been poisoned, so to speak. The OE left a very bad taste in people's mouth.

I would say it's more than that, though.  The Extended Cut altered a few things, however the consequences of each of the final decisions remained strongly distasteful to a lot of people even then. 

[Iakus]

How would people feel if the PC died in a heroic sacrifice, but then something (completely within in-story reason) happens that resurrects the character and allows them to live? Or only making a partial sacrifice, like the loss of limb / skill / status / what-have-you?

That would have to be a really good in-game reason to ressurect a dead character, as such a thing is canonically impossible in Thedas, once the soul leaves teh body.

 

Loss of something else would be interesting.  Hawke going into exile if you choose ot back the mages might have made for an intersting ending, if Hawke didn't vanish regardless.

[Milan92]

The vanishing part is all that's left for me to gain full closure with the warden and hawke's story.

 

I hope we'll get some knowledge on that in DA:I.

[Iakus]

I'll start by disclaiming that I'm only speaking of players that did not like ME3's endings, and that by "player" I don't mean the playerbase at large. I am also not advocating that BioWare should or not not do a sort of ending choice for Inquisition, merely analyzing why ME3's caused an outcry.

 

Spoiler

In simplest terms, I believe ME3's ending was a failure for one very simple reason: it failed to evoke the emotion that BioWare wanted it to evoke. That is not to handwave all other objections to the ending, but if you look, you can find every other complaint in a host of BioWare games. The primary cause for players to actually complain about things like plotholes (which don't really matter unless you want them to) and lack of "player choice" (there is tons of player choice in ME3, especially the ending choice) is emotional dissatisfaction, and that is a huge problem because if the player feels unsatisfied, the past two years have shown that they will pick apart everything they possibly can to justify their dissatisfaction.

 

Let's introduce a hypothetical. Let's say the EC ships with the game (in all it's the-relays-are-only-disabled glory) and that the Destroy wave doesn't kill all synthetics, but only the Reapers. Do the majority care about plotholes? Do they care whether the Catalyst's logic is correct (answer: of course not, it's the villain)? Perhaps some do, but at about the same level as people cared about the Reaper baby in ME2. Sure it's stupid, but man wasn't that Suicide Mission awesome? Internet complaints are inevitable. An outcry deals in something else.

 

So what's this emotional dissatisfaction, and why did Dragon Age Origins, a game with ostensibly a tough ending choice, not suffer a similar fate?

 

There are two key components of a tough choice.  The first is that the decision has weight and produces meaningful consequences (both good and bad) in the world. Otherwise we might call choosing cake over ice cream a tough choice. The second is that the consequences (both beneficial and harmful) are well-balanced between the choices. In the latter respect, ME3 is actually a resounding success, as is Dragon Age Origins. In each, there's a thought process that goes, "Well, in Ending A this happens as a result, and that's good. But then Ending A has this drawback which sucks and is absent from Ending B. But Ending B has...." and so on and so forth.

 

But ME3 takes condition #1 way too far in that ME3 introduces negative consequences so severe that many players feel no positive consequence can counterbalance it on an emotional level. Meanwhile, Dragon Age Origins does a good job balancing the consequences both between the choices and also within a choice. Players make sacrifices* but in each ending there is a sense that the sacrifice was well-worth what you accomplish. It's worth noting here that "balance" doesn't actually mean the negative and positive consequences are equal. This isn't even true in ME3 (the positives outweigh the negatives) and yet players still felt they hadn't achieved a true victory. It turned a bittersweet ending into a bitter or bleak ending. For the players furious with ME3's ending, it seems the positive consequences of a choice must outweigh the negative, and must do so by a SUBSTANTIAL amount. For Dragon Age Origins, the most you end up sacrificing is one life, and in all cases this is voluntary. Imagine if EDI had (through some contrived means) been able and willing to sacrifice herself to stop the Catalyst, with no other sacrifice made. That's about the level of what Origins was asking you to give.

 

And that's why Origins was a success: it balanced the choices by 1) giving them enough weight to feel important while 2) not overdoing the negative consequences and 3) introducing balanced benefits and drawbacks for each.* ME3 passes condition 1 and 3 but fails 2.

 

* Except the Dark Ritual, but that will be addressed in Inquisition.

 

That post probably hits on the most important aspect of a "bittersweet" ending:  in the end, the sacrifice needs to feel worth it; emotionally as well as by raw numbers.   As you said, DAO requires the death of one person (and all possible candidates are, presumably, willing) or going through with the Dark Ritual, with Morrigan is certainly willing to do, as it's her idea to begin with.  Heck she's willing to sleep with Alistair to do it!  A man whose guts she hates.

 

And ME3 required a price not just for Shepard (that said price was virtually universal for all Shepards was already a very strong weakness) but required a fundamental change to the entire setting.  Something I think a lot of people believed Shepard had no right to make, even if the game itself necessitated that.  With DAO, yes, the Warden effects changes but ending the Blight didn't wreak massive upheavals across Thedas.

 

And this is the really tricky part as well:  Different people are going to be willing to pay different prices.  Or even the same person playing different inquisitors.  On character may be self-sacrificing, but the other not.  Some are willing to impose thier views upon others.  Some will prefer to let people deal with their own screw-ups.  It's a balancing act.

[EmperorSahlertz]

not really...you still don't know what will happen to your crew, since is "somewhere". for all we know, they can die just after putting the ensign with Shepard's name on the wall.

and we still don't know the phate of all the people on the Citadel.

You see the Normandy take off from the planet afterwards, and you see Galactic civilization rebuild (if you had high enough preparedness).

 

And I think you can figure out for yourself what happened to the people on the citadel. Especially after Shepard lands in the remains of them.

[Il Divo]

Anyone else really, really, really hoping this game doesn't pigeon-hole us into an ending or various endings that all end in what has been the most over-used cliche in this generation of gaming?  I am of course talking about the

 

Hero sacrifices himself to save the world cliche. 

 

This trope has been so overdone I am beyond sick of it at this point.  What I loved about Dragon Age: Origins was that it gave you options.  Wanted to have your cake and eat it too? Perform the dark ritual with Morrigan.   Would you rather be a boring ponce (I'm kidding it's your choice) and heroically lay down your life by forgoing hot sex and get a bittersweet ending?  You could do that as well!  All the bases were covered.   This was something a certain team forgot with a certain other game that shall not be mentioned. 

 

Here's hoping there's options at the end of Dragon Age Inquisition.  I want my happy ending!  I  also think Sean Connery in The Rock said it best. 

 

"Losers try their best.  Winners go home and f*** the prom queen."

 

Look, I'm all for people getting what they want, but let's not be idiotic about this. "Hero lives happily ever after with his waifu" is about as cliche`  as hero sacrifices himself to save the world. So many stories have done each ad infinitum. 

 

You don't need anything other than your personal enjoyment to justify wanting a happy ending, but appealing to "dark endings are cliche`" is pretty laughable. 

[Il Divo]

You say that like its a bad thing. I realize that Dragon Age is dark fantasy. Things will get dire, things will get depressioning. But there should always be a way to stumble into the light. Adding too much darkness for the sake of darkness leaves a bitter taste in your mouth.

 

Stumbling into the light is fine, provided it doesn't involve something face-palm level absurd as a plot device. In this case, that would mean Morrigan's OGB turning out to be a perfectly innocent child with nothing else attached. 

 

The problem I see with DA:I is that, in terms of how the choice is framed, the dark ritual should have some severe consequences, but they're unlikely to develop into anything significant, just based on development constraints. 

[Chron0id]

Look, I'm all for people getting what they want, but let's not be idiotic about this. "Hero lives happily ever after with his waifu" is about as cliche`  as hero sacrifices himself to save the world. So many stories have done each ad infinitum. 

 

You don't need anything other than your personal enjoyment to justify wanting a happy ending, but appealing to "dark endings are cliche`" is pretty laughable. 

I'm all for people expressing their opinions, but I'm not sure I appreciate you insinuating I'm an idiot. 

[Il Divo]

I'm all for people expressing their opinions, but I'm not sure I appreciate you insinuating I'm an idiot. 

 

I"m all for opinions, except when they resort to sensationalism to make their point. 

 

"I want a happy ending" is great. "I want a happy ending because dark endings are cliche`!" as I said, is a pretty bad starting point. 

[Chron0id]

I"m all for opinions, except when they resort to sensationalism to make their point. 

 

"I want a happy ending" is great. "I want a happy ending because dark endings are cliche`!" as I said, is a pretty bad starting point. 

That's nice.   But that would be your opinion as well. 

 

In conclusion: don't be an opinion dictator. 

[Pierce Miller]

I tend to hate the heroic sacrifice ending as it makes it all seem worthless, why fight for a better world when you don't even get to live in it? Those kinds of endings tend to be (for me at least) very unsatisfying.

[Nefla]

Look, I'm all for people getting what they want, but let's not be idiotic about this. "Hero lives happily ever after with his waifu" is about as cliche`  as hero sacrifices himself to save the world. So many stories have done each ad infinitum. 

 

You don't need anything other than your personal enjoyment to justify wanting a happy ending, but appealing to "dark endings are cliche`" is pretty laughable. 

Both types of endings are common, there's nothing new under the sun as they say. The important thing is that no matter the type of ending it has to fit the game and be well done. ME3's was not fitting and not well done.

[jtav]

I have to admit I'm somewhat taken aback by the subset of fans who place a priority on a personal happy ending with the LI.