176 réponses à ce sujet

[Linkenski]

All evidence of Synthetic life negatively surpassing organics in ME3 was added post main game by Bioware. Perhaps you'd think with all Javik's conversations that it was always foreshadowed... Except when you realize that the day one DLC was actually developed after the main game and had an opportunity to incorporate feedback from negative reactions to the leaked script.

All references to the conflict between organics and synthetics before the main game was completed, like the support conversation between Karin and Adams on the crew deck, like all other moments of ME3 have a positive agenda about synthetics and how they're "real people" and the optimal outcome of Rannoch is all about the peace between synthetic and organic life, as is EDI. It's like that was the first intent, to close the subplot and theme of organics and synthetics along with other subplots like Krogan, salarian and turian grudges and the genophage and the main plot of the reapers, not a completely new main plot about synthetics and organics we never saw indication of.

Like I said, all the facts that support or foreshadow the catalysts assumption were retroactively added to the game through DLC after they had the main plot locked down, or in ME1 (which was taken in the opposite direction in ME2 and then ME3)

The fact that this bull has actually spawned serious discussion about such a logically incoherent left field nonsense plot sickens me.

[SwobyJ]

Seriously, what is up with all the goddamn Reaper apologism as of late?

 

Not really. I choose destroy and I don't give a crap, in the end, in this ending of ME3, whether the Reapers are correct or what they're seeking for the galaxy.

 

Some things I just gotta feel more Renegade about.

 

[Vazgen]

"Your survival depends on stopping them, not understanding them"
Still, understanding them does not hurt
I shoot the tube regardless.

[dorktainian]

Indeed Swoby, Shep called it at the beginning of the game.

 

to take a leaf out of terminators book.....

 

"Listen, and understand. The Reapers are out there. They can't be bargained with. They can't be reasoned with. They don't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And they absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead"

[God]

Seriously, what is up with all the goddamn Reaper apologism as of late?

 

Seriously, what's up with the complete lack of reflection and willingness to understand the Reapers purpose?

 

Understanding of them is not sympathizing with them. I still don't want to see the galaxy reaped by them. I know what they're doing now and why they're doing it, but that doesn't mean I want it to happen or that I won't fight to find a way to beat them or stop them.

 

To paraphrase H.Y.R from one thread, the 'revelation of what the Reapers purpose and goal is does not replace them as a threat, only restructures the context of how you look at them'. The Reapers are still a very real issue that still must be stopped at all costs. However, you now have understanding of what their plan is, what they're trying to do, and knowledge that if you destroy them (which I do), you will have to inherit the problem that the Catalyst has been facing for eons. 

 

Plus, despite my results at all cost nature and practical nature, I don't believe the Reapers are inherently evil. We are both two entities with two different goals. At the end of the day, our two goals are simply incompatible. It's them or us. I don't have to hate them because they aren't us however.

[Vortex13]

Seriously, what's up with the complete lack of reflection and willingness to understand the Reapers purpose?

 

Understanding of them is not sympathizing with them. I still don't want to see the galaxy reaped by them. I know what they're doing now and why they're doing it, but that doesn't mean I want it to happen or that I won't fight to find a way to beat them or stop them.

 

To paraphrase H.Y.R from one thread, the 'revelation of what the Reapers purpose and goal is does not replace them as a threat, only restructures the context of how you look at them'. The Reapers are still a very real issue that still must be stopped at all costs. However, you now have understanding of what their plan is, what they're trying to do, and knowledge that if you destroy them (which I do), you will have to inherit the problem that the Catalyst has been facing for eons. 

 

Plus, despite my results at all cost nature and practical nature, I don't believe the Reapers are inherently evil. We are both two entities with two different goals. At the end of the day, our two goals are simply incompatible. It's them or us. I don't have to hate them because they aren't us however.

 

 

I am not against understanding the Reapers, but their actions in the trilogy do run contrary to the whole: 'amoral machines programed to solve an impossible task' bit that we are given in the last ten minutes of the 3rd game. The chief examples of what I am talking about is Sovereign's and Harbinger's personalities and how they interacted with the species of the current cycle; the fact that they even interacted with the species of the cycle at all is another matter, but we'll leave it for now. 

 

 

Sovereign detests organic life, he considers it beneath the Reapers' existence and seems quite content sneering at the ants, and getting up in their faces instead of carrying out the extermination process in an professional fashion. Likewise, Harbinger is quite the mad scientist and sadistic torturer when it comes to carrying out the harvest. Taunting captured colonists for no other reason then for the lolz, to liquifying prisoners, slowly and in full view of the other captives. In keeping with the ant exterminator metaphor, he would be the one to pull the legs off the insects just to watch them squirm, or kick over an anthill and fry the ants that come out with a magnifying glass; hardly becoming behavior of a person hired to just clear out an ant problem.

 

 

The Reapers' depiction is too contradictory in the last moments of the series vs. how they are shown previously. On one hand we are told how they are all independent and free from all weakness, the next we are told that they are simple machines programed to carry out the harvests and controlled completely by the Catalyst. On one hand the Reapers are sadistic monsters that apparently feed off of suffering and fear, and then on the other hand they are just mindless tools; the whole: "When fire burns, is it at war?" bit.

[teh DRUMPf!!]

Seriously, what's up with the complete lack of reflection and willingness to understand the Reapers purpose?

 

Understanding of them is not sympathizing with them. I still don't want to see the galaxy reaped by them. I know what they're doing now and why they're doing it, but that doesn't mean I want it to happen or that I won't fight to find a way to beat them or stop them.

 

To paraphrase H.Y.R from one thread, the 'revelation of what the Reapers purpose and goal is does not replace them as a threat, only restructures the context of how you look at them'. The Reapers are still a very real issue that still must be stopped at all costs. However, you now have understanding of what their plan is, what they're trying to do, and knowledge that if you destroy them (which I do), you will have to inherit the problem that the Catalyst has been facing for eons. 

 

Plus, despite my results at all cost nature and practical nature, I don't believe the Reapers are inherently evil. We are both two entities with two different goals. At the end of the day, our two goals are simply incompatible. It's them or us. I don't have to hate them because they aren't us however.

 

Heh, I "liked" this before I even saw the reference to me. Double like! 

[SwobyJ]

I am not against understanding the Reapers, but their actions in the trilogy do run contrary to the whole: 'amoral machines programed to solve an impossible task' bit that we are given in the last ten minutes of the 3rd game. The chief examples of what I am talking about is Sovereign's and Harbinger's personalities and how they interacted with the species of the current cycle; the fact that they even interacted with the species of the cycle at all is another matter, but we'll leave it for now. 

 

 

Sovereign detests organic life, he considers it beneath the Reapers' existence and seems quite content sneering at the ants, and getting up in their faces instead of carrying out the extermination process in an professional fashion. Likewise, Harbinger is quite the mad scientist and sadistic torturer when it comes to carrying out the harvest. Taunting captured colonists for no other reason then for the lolz, to liquifying prisoners, slowly and in full view of the other captives. In keeping with the ant exterminator metaphor, he would be the one to pull the legs off the insects just to watch them squirm, or kick over an anthill and fry the ants that come out with a magnifying glass; hardly becoming behavior of a person hired to just clear out an ant problem.

 

 

The Reapers' depiction is too contradictory in the last moments of the series vs. how they are shown previously. On one hand we are told how they are all independent and free from all weakness, the next we are told that they are simple machines programed to carry out the harvests and controlled completely by the Catalyst. On one hand the Reapers are sadistic monsters that apparently feed off of suffering and fear, and then on the other hand they are just mindless tools; the whole: "When fire burns, is it at war?" bit.

 

The Reapers, as in many 'individual' Reapers, are evil, by most of our standards.

 

It is the 'revelation' that they're effectively tools (albeit tools with a networking that lets them be part of the decision making of the tool user), that may change things. That's what the main storyline (aka the 'CAT' line of missions on the developer storyboard) is about.

 

Sovereign is an utter dick and a clear enemy.

Harbinger is sadistic and full of himself, though now players may be intruigued about just wtf is up with the Reapers and how they see things.

But the Reaper Destroyer on Rannoch, again at least by our standards, seems to be more like a drone himself, in the scheme of things.

So then we see the Catalyst, who seems to confirm that yes, the Reapers, while individual intelligences made up in a gestalt manner, also network with the Catalyst in a sort of unaware consensus. That they are controlled.

 

This may seem all over the place, and sure, it kinda is, but I think the small optional sequences with EDI says it all, when she presents herself in a much more 'evil' Reaper voice, or when she changes her code nearly instantly. That's the Reapers, at least when taken to a much higher level.

 

We can choose to see them purely, solely, only as giant killing machines, and if we name them anything, we can call them Reapers. That's okay, and true 'enough'. That's the main storyline, after all.

Or we can go further, to various extents, to understand that there's more to the Reapers, even if the information that helps to do so is either more tertiary (and thus not really part of Shepard's thought process even as he's making decisions) or outright 'hidden in the data' of optional lines (spoken or textual) or codex entries etc.

 

It is easy to see all Reapers as killers because that's what they do. But to the Reapers, that's not what they ARE. And then we find out that the actions and identities of the Reapers are all created and validated and continued by an AI that rules over all of them (whether they are actually aware of it or not, but it seems they're not, and instead use Harbinger as de facto leader - but this could be incorrect).

 

The Reapers we meet (I might not include Sovereign in this, but I have my own theories about him that I won't get into here) are jerks or drones due to both the species they came from, and the way that they were created. From a humanistic and moralistic perspective, they are faulty intelligences. But that's even what the Catalyst admits, at least indirectly. Thus Synthesis. Reapers don't quite... even with all their intelligence... understand organics. There is an imcompatability. That scale is just something that they're not able to experience in a grounded and especially sympathetic or empathetic manner. It can be even considered their 'organic' side coming through (not that they can think as organics outright, but that they act and think in divisive and superior-minded and arrogant ways towards organics).

 

I think we may be intended to question 'what is a tool' and 'what is a sadistic killing machine' and 'what is life' and other related questions, all at the same time.

 

Thus the Genophage arc.

Thus the Rannoch arc.

And there would have been more arcs to ME3/the trilogy; rachni certainly would have had more content if Bioware found themselves able to add it in, for example).

 

Both of these arcs carried similar aspects. The Geth and Krogan are tools. The Geth and Krogan are sadistic killing machines. The Geth and Krogan are living beings. And so on.

 

And then we have various side content and DLCs that add layers to things. Even just the experience of Overlord DLC, where Shepard can start to see the overlay of how synthetics view the physical world, is an addition to our conception of how the Reapers may see things, and thus organic life. The struggle to free Omega may be viewed as justice, or simply acquiring a tool that will join the war (are the Terminus peoples innocents to ensure a future for, or are they scum that are disposable assets to toss into the fray?).

 

While the 'independent and free of all weakness' line may or may not have been intended as truthful when first written, the future games make a point (whether you agree with it or not) that no one and nothing is truly independent or free of all weakness. ME3, even as set in a galaxy at war, was ultimately meant to be a game of unity, and the admittance (though perhaps not full acceptance or welcoming) of the fact that we're never actually alone, and we always life and take action with others. So ME3 is there to say that Sovereign is wrong. Just as he was wrong in ME1 itself - he was not invincible, and the Alliance+Citadel Fleet+Normandy+Shepard+Squad defeated him. Blew him up.

 

You can be as Renegade+Destroy as you want, and it does imply a galaxy of more secured power and domination for entities and characters close to Shepard, but no matter what, the message of Unity (just as with Loyalty with ME2) comes through. At the end of ME3, the Reapers themselves are almost obsolete, and the Catalyst is what matters.

 

There's a lot of flaws I can find here, but I can say that personally, I didn't much mind the many faces of the 'Reapers' (something we have to really remember was a title given by the Prothians, and the Reapers barely have names - Sovereign claimed the name 'Nazara' so they have names, but these are much more mutable concepts, and it is likely that that this was part of the bigger idea of the Reapers being multilayered in general, albeit with a 'giant destroying robot' focus in the main plot aside from the Catalyst chain of events).

[Linkenski]

Seriously, what is up with all the goddamn Reaper apologism as of late?

• Denial
• Anger
• Bargaining
• Depression
• Acceptance

You're witnessing a community-wide course through the 5 stages of grief. It took us 3 years to reach the end of this emotionally hurtful process.

 

People have finally accepted what is there and are trying to make the best of it they can.

 

See this Bioware? You've made people suffer traumas humans normally only go through when people close to them die or similar. I don't know if you should be proud or ashamed of this accomplishment.

[God]

 

• Denial
• Anger
• Bargaining
• Depression
• Acceptance

You're witnessing a community-wide course through the 5 stages of grief. It took us 3 years to reach the end of this emotionally hurtful process.

 

People have finally accepted what is there and are trying to make the best of it they can.

 

See this Bioware? You've made people suffer traumas humans normally only go through when people close to them die or similar. I don't know if you should be proud or ashamed of this accomplishment.

 

 

It's not the 5 stages of grief so much as it is reflection.

 

We have people still stuck in denial (the IT'ers) and everyone else (Anger).

 

I just decided to look at it critically and rationally, and came to the conclusion that it's better than many have given it credit for. 

 

I'd actually applaud BW for being able to induce those feelings in some people in the first place.

[teh DRUMPf!!]

 **vomit noises** ... Just a general complaint, here...

 

What good is the ignore-list if I have to see the listed's brain-killing opinions one post later when someone quotes it?

 

Bah. Okay, we're good. Just had to vent there.

[GalacticWolf5]

We have people still stuck in denial (the IT'ers) and everyone else (Anger).

Wait, what? Are you saying everyone is angry about the endings? xD

I've always liked the endings and I'm not the only one.

[God]

Wait, what? Are you saying everyone is angry about the endings? xD

I've always liked the endings and I'm not the only one.

 

No. I know people who liked the endings from the beginning, or at least the conceptual idea behind it.

 

The first ending was, for all intents and purposes, unlikable. Sans the overall concept behind the ending, everything about it was just so poorly done.

 

The EC, after a period of reflection, is much improved on the clarity of the concept and what they were trying to go for. It was still executed, written, and framed poorly, but it's much easier and better to work with.

 

At this point, I don't think it's worth BW's time to dwell on the continued hate anymore. The people aren't going to be satisfied unless they have their ending with everyone cheering over the dead Reaper corpses and Shepard galloping into the sunset with the LI with a stock 'and they all lived happily ever after' added at the end. More realistically, they're the people who categorically hate the Catalyst and the Reapers and are upset that they aren't portrayed as anything other than totally unsympathetic monsters to be destroyed. Pretty childish. BioWare tried to do something different, but forgot that much of their audience still wants their 8 year old black and white 'I win' fantasy.

[GalacticWolf5]

At this point, I don't think it's worth BW's time to dwell on the continued hate anymore. The people aren't going to be satisfied unless they have their ending with everyone cheering over the dead Reaper corpses and Shepard galloping into the sunset with the LI with a stock 'and they all lived happily ever after' added at the end. More realistically, they're the people who categorically hate the Catalyst and the Reapers and are upset that they aren't portrayed as anything other than totally unsympathetic monsters to be destroyed. Pretty childish. BioWare tried to do something different, but forgot that much of their audience still wants their 8 year old black and white 'I win' fantasy.

Agreed on that.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Wrong. What they tried to do can work in a movie. The difference is that this is a video game. Video games are not movies the last time I looked. They took over my character and none of my choices mattered after a certain point because everything was railroaded. In a story based on choices, you don't get to suddenly say "pick your favorite color" and say there's your choices. The beam run onward was essentially a cut scene. Get out of my movie. Yeah, we got to make some conversation choices and choose how The Illusive Man died. Then we got to pick our favorite color: blue, green, or red. It was not a satisfying ending to the story. It was 2011 pseudophilosophical post-modernistic bullsh*t tacked onto a 1990s sci-fi action adventure that was filled with one-liners.

[GalacticWolf5]

Wrong. What they tried to do can work in a movie. The difference is that this is a video game. Video games are not movies the last time I looked. They took over my character and none of my choices mattered after a certain point because everything was railroaded. In a story based on choices, you don't get to suddenly say "pick your favorite color" and say there's your choices. The beam run onward was essentially a cut scene. Get out of my movie. Yeah, we got to make some conversation choices and choose how The Illusive Man died. Then we got to pick our favorite color: blue, green, or red. It was not a satisfying ending to the story. It was 2011 pseudophilosophical post-modernistic bullsh*t tacked onto a 1990s sci-fi action adventure that was filled with one-liners.

 

The endings are far more different than the just the color of the beam. If you really think this, you must be a real idiot.

 

Oh please tell me how your choices didnt matter?

[Switish]

To be honest I wouldn't be surprised if there are things in the universe that ARE beyond our comprehension. Our senses restrict us in many ways, so I wouldn't rule out the probability of big kettle-fish attempting to destroy us all.

[God]

Your choices didn't matter.

 

And they shouldn't have. 

 

They had no bearing on the ending. Your choices don't change the way the Reapers work. They don't change the way the Crucible works. They don't change the way the Catalyst thinks.

 

They're not a part of the ending, and they shouldn't have to be. 

 

The choices you made are contained and concluded at separate points. At best, they give you resources to use to make the Crucible as efficient as possible or to help you and your allies build a force strong enough to protect the Crucible long enough to deploy it successfully.

 

If that wasn't satisfying for you, too bad. It had no obligation to be satisfying to you in the ways you wanted it to be.

[themikefest]

The endings are far more different than the just the color of the beam. If you really think this, you must be a real idiot.

 

Oh please tell me how your choices didnt matter?

Is there a reason for calling her an idiot?

[Linkenski]

While I understand that everyone is disappointed over choices from the past not mattering in the endgame, I think it was always a "lesser priority". There were many instances in ME3 where there were multiple variables but only one outcome was automatically chosen, both in the overabundance in autodialogue and big ones like the Collector Base.

... but first of all you have to get the high-level critical path of the story right, and that's where the ending fails above all else and if only one thing could be fixed it HAS to be the high-level story, not the choices we made in the rest of the trilogy. Everything is a factor in why the ending sucks, choices is a big one, but first and foremost it's the pre-determined critical path that's the problem.

[God]

Is there a reason for calling her an idiot?

 

Not really. He is going over the line there.

[GalacticWolf5]

Is there a reason for calling her an idiot?

 

I admit that was kind of rude, sorry for that. But seriously, how can people even think the endings are not different?

 

Control: Shep takes control of the Reapers and uses them the way he wants to.

 

Synthesis. All life in the galaxy is changed.

 

Destroy: All Synthetics are destroyed.

 

I really don't see how people can say the endings are all the same.

 

 

And your choices do matter.

 

Did you save the Quarians? Great, they're still there and rebuilding on Rannoch.

 

Did you save the Geth? Great, they're still there and doing whatever they want to do.

 

Did you make peace between both? Great, they both live on Rannoch.

 

What about the Genophage?

 

Cured it. The Krogans are repopulating, rebuilding Tuchanka and colonizing worlds

 

Didn't cure it. Well sorry Krogans.

 

Did you save the Rachni?

 

Yes. Then they are still alive.

 

No. Well they're dead.

 

I can keep going but you get the point.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Ending: Pick a color - You die, the relays explode, and the Normandy crashes. Unless you did enough things right and got a gasp of air, then you're Schroedinger's Shepard as it was described by Bioware people at the time.

[God]

Ending: Pick a color - You die, the relays explode, and the Normandy crashes. Unless you did enough things right and got a gasp of air, then you're Schroedinger's Shepard.

 

That's entirely up to you on whether he lives or dies. I don't need it spelled out in black and white; I know the intent of the scene was to depict Shepard's survival.

 

Otherwise, no, the relays don't explode in every ending, and while the Normandy crashes, it can leave or be repaired. 

 

The endings have some common elements while having drastically different outcomes.

[Linkenski]

I am in the camp that showing Shepard simply taking a breath and then leaving it open to interpretation was perfect. I am super sad Shepard isn't seen in some completely closed off ending where he kisses his LI and has a proper goodbye but I think after the Catalyst stuff or just after being shot by Harbinger it was a good call to make his survival in Destroy ambiguous. Had they made it clear that he both survived the destruction of the tube, the citadel, going through Earth's atmosphere and landing in London's rubble it would've made a lot of people shudder at how impossible that was. Most likely he would be dead but to those of us who can accept a bit of nonsense in physics he lives... if anything the sole implications of our LI not putting up the badge and the breath at the end is what shows that Shepard is alive in our interpretation.

 

Would I have liked 16 different completely unique endings instead where my choices had made it possible to give me a perfect ending to what I wanted? sure, but I respect and always did respect the fact that Bioware wanted to make us go through a critical path that had some artistic or creative intent for everybody to experience... I just wish it hadn't been nonsense. If the ending had been good but still just a single path and then some choice-reflections in the epilogue and maybe an extra legit happy ending.