333 réponses à ce sujet

[Ctoagu]

Yea well, as I said above, my main gripe with the synthetics vs. organics plot is that it essentially shows off how limited the reaper's perspective really is, while something like dark energy would have shown how vast it is.

For me, from ME1 onwards, there was no doubt in my mind that the cycles were just a small symptom of a larger purpose the reapers had going. Unfortunately, it turned out that the cycles were the entirety of the reapers' purpose. That was really disappointing to me.

 

This pretty much sums up why I can't go back to any of the Mass Effect games and feel the same as I did before the third game came out. Everything about Sovereign sent shivers down my spine the first time I ever played Mass Effect - now, I can't even take its gloating speech seriously.

 

I've said it before, but Mass Effect 3 would've done far better had they expanded upon and revised the plot of the Arrival DLC and used that as the premise of the whole third game - instead of going to war with the unstoppable death machines, we should have been finding a way to stop them at our doorstep. Bioware could have done so much more with ME3 had they not pigeonholed themselves into sending the galaxy to war with a force that couldn't be stopped without an ad-hoc superweapon being thrown in.

[I Am Robot]

This pretty much sums up why I can't go back to any of the Mass Effect games and feel the same as I did before the third game came out. Everything about Sovereign sent shivers down my spine the first time I ever played Mass Effect - now, I can't even take its gloating speech seriously.

 

I've said it before, but Mass Effect 3 would've done far better had they expanded upon and revised the plot of the Arrival DLC and used that as the premise of the whole third game - instead of going to war with the unstoppable death machines, we should have been finding a way to stop them at our doorstep. Bioware could have done so much more with ME3 had they not pigeonholed themselves into sending the galaxy to war with a force that couldn't be stopped without an ad-hoc superweapon being thrown in.

 

I agree that the revelation of the reapers origin and nature, and that they were being used as slaves without knowing so themselves, took away a lot from the awe of the idea of a super advanced synthetic race, out to harvest all organic and synthetic life in the galaxy. 

 

But I think having the galaxy go to war with the reapers in the way that they did added a lot of drama and tension that would've otherwise been much more difficult to achieve. 

[God]

I still say the safest option for the Reapers origin and motives would have been a stock assimilation plot. 

 

Not really hugely used to the point of cliche yet, and still presentable enough to appear suitably alien.

[RoboticWater]

I still say the safest option for the Reapers origin and motives would have been a stock assimilation plot. 

 

Not really hugely used to the point of cliche yet, and still presentable enough to appear suitably alien.

Everybody loves the Borg. Everybody must love the Borg.

 

In all seriousness, I was surprised BioWare didn't go this route. Homogenization vs. diversity was a major conflict throughout the series and would've fit perfectly with the Reaper's motives. I don't know if I can classify what the writers did as "a creative risk," but following the logical path set by the series would've yielded a much better ending than we got. Heck, it's what BioWare does best.

[God]

Everybody loves the Borg. Everybody must love the Borg.

 

In all seriousness, I was surprised BioWare didn't go this route. Homogenization vs. diversity was a major conflict throughout the series and would've fit perfectly with the Reaper's motives. I don't know if I can classify what the writers did as "a creative risk," but following the logical path set by the series would've yielded a much better ending than we got. Heck, it's what BioWare does best.

 

Technically speaking, it already fits into the current endings. Sans changing dialogue a bit to mention stopping the chaos of non-Reaper life instead of the literal conflict between organics and synthetics (which is just plain underwhelming IMO), you wouldn't even have to change anything else around in the ending. 

[BioWareM0d13]

I'm not a fan of the Dark Energy ending idea. It would have given the extinction cycles a higher purpose, with the cycles somehow part of the Reapers attempt to prevent an accelerated heat death for the universe. But then I'm no fan of any twist that would have the Reapers as anything other than villains that needed to be destroyed. The only thing the Dark Energy endings would have going for them is that it would tie into the series title, Mass Effect. 

[SimonTheFrog]

This pretty much sums up why I can't go back to any of the Mass Effect games and feel the same as I did before the third game came out. Everything about Sovereign sent shivers down my spine the first time I ever played Mass Effect - now, I can't even take its gloating speech seriously.

 

I've said it before, but Mass Effect 3 would've done far better had they expanded upon and revised the plot of the Arrival DLC and used that as the premise of the whole third game - instead of going to war with the unstoppable death machines, we should have been finding a way to stop them at our doorstep. Bioware could have done so much more with ME3 had they not pigeonholed themselves into sending the galaxy to war with a force that couldn't be stopped without an ad-hoc superweapon being thrown in.

 

 

And that silly silly idea of making London the center of the galaxy. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyy???????

[Tonymac]

And that silly silly idea of making London the center of the galaxy. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyy???????

 

Your guess is as good as any.  The whole arc of the ME3 storyline is just wrong - it could have been done so much better.

[God]

I'm not a fan of the Dark Energy ending idea. It would have given the extinction cycles a higher purpose, with the cycles somehow part of the Reapers attempt to prevent an accelerated heat death for the universe. But then I'm no fan of any twist that would have the Reapers as anything other than villains that needed to be destroyed. The only thing the Dark Energy endings would have going for them is that it would tie into the series title, Mass Effect. 

 

I don't necessarily support them becoming sympathetic or misunderstood righteous beings either, but I wouldn't mind seeing them in a more ambiguous light either. I'm fine with the idea of the cycles having a 'higher purpose' so to speak. It depends on presentation whether I'd fall in line with it or not.

[Rittmeister64]

The mistake was to try and portrait the reapers and the catalyst as benevolent and explain why they do it.

A villain doesn't necessarily need to explain why he does anything.

The Starkid dialogue basically removed all fear and respect one had for the reapers "we are beyond your comprehension!" and made them look ridiculous.

Can you replay ME1 and when Sovereign talks to you not think "shut the frak up already, you tool!" ?

Besides all his talk is made absurd - "we are all a nation of sovereigns." - yeah controlled by a flawed AI, which means you aren't sovereign AT ALL.

[von uber]

And that silly silly idea of making London the center of the galaxy. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyy???????

The Reapers were concerned about the amount of traffic on the A4 and wanted to help out.

[Ithurael]

 

Besides all his talk is made absurd - "we are all a nation of sovereigns." - yeah controlled by a flawed AI, which means you aren't sovereign AT ALL.

 

This is what happens when writers are pressed for time and don't peer review their ending with the team.

 

It is a blatant retcon that really does make it very hard for me to replay the game series - at all.

[themikefest]

I read however long ago, forget when and where, that less than 25% of the Mass Effect team that worked on ME1, worked on Mass Effect 3.

[God]

Totally proves my point. Thank you.

 

Not really. That's the nature of most video games and their developments.

 

Aside from more independent teams, most dev. teams that make games shift and change after every entry, as they are moved around within the company (or by the publishing company to other studios). You will rarely find a development team that has more than a few key people who were involved with entire series in a constant or static way.

 

Look at Bungie for example; many people say that the Halo games under 343i have a fundamental change from the Bungie team that made the original trilogy, unaware that for the most part, sans a few key members, each team for each game was almost entirely different. As well, many of the members of 343i who get called out for being different from the original Bungie are actually largely former Bungie employees themselves with credible experience making the original Halo trilogy. The same goes for many of the other companies that 343i works with, such as Certain Affinity, which is staffed almost entirely by Bungie veterans who all worked on Halo 2 and Halo 3.

[Iakus]

I read however long ago, forget when and where, that less than 25% of the Mass Effect team that worked on ME1, worked on Mass Effect 3.

Well...

 

ME1 writers

 

Drew Karpyshyn (lead writer)

Lukas Kristjanson

Chris L'Etoile

Mike Laidlaw

Mac Walters

Patrick Weekes

 

ME3 Writers:

 

John Dombrow

Sylvia Feketekuty

Chris Hepler

Ann Lemay

Neil Pollner

Cathleen Rootsaert

Jay Turner

Mac Walters (lead writer)

Jay Watamaniuk

Patrick Weekes

[Ashevajak]

The Reapers were concerned about the amount of traffic on the A4 and wanted to help out.

 

To be fair, I'm totally fine with ascending to a higher state of existence, so long as those AI then put their minds to fixing the M25.

[Rasande]

I'm not a fan of the Dark Energy ending idea. It would have given the extinction cycles a higher purpose, with the cycles somehow part of the Reapers attempt to prevent an accelerated heat death for the universe. But then I'm no fan of any twist that would have the Reapers as anything other than villains that needed to be destroyed. The only thing the Dark Energy endings would have going for them is that it would tie into the series title, Mass Effect. 

 

 

I don't necessarily support them becoming sympathetic or misunderstood righteous beings either, but I wouldn't mind seeing them in a more ambiguous light either. I'm fine with the idea of the cycles having a 'higher purpose' so to speak. It depends on presentation whether I'd fall in line with it or not.

 

 

The mistake was to try and portrait the reapers and the catalyst as benevolent and explain why they do it.

A villain doesn't necessarily need to explain why he does anything.

The Starkid dialogue basically removed all fear and respect one had for the reapers "we are beyond your comprehension!" and made them look ridiculous.

Can you replay ME1 and when Sovereign talks to you not think "shut the frak up already, you tool!" ?

Besides all his talk is made absurd - "we are all a nation of sovereigns." - yeah controlled by a flawed AI, which means you aren't sovereign AT ALL.

 

Personally i don't think the Dark Energy angle makes them righteous. I mean they are sill machines who's only concern is to fufill the purpouse they were built for who operate in a very utilitarian manner without any concerns for morality. The whole "synthetics vs orgaics" theme is still very much intact and still is a very large part of the plot.

It also leaves room for Shepard to be, well Shepard and go "hell no, we'll find our own sollution." Or go some kind of pure renegade, no cost is to high route and leave the reapers to do their thing.

A villian without a reasonable goal or purpouse is just a bad villan. I mean they still wanto wipe out entire civilazations like they have done for millions of years, even if it is for "the greater good" they can still easily be viewed as the bad guys. Just not some flawed space boogiemen with messed up circle logic. WIth the dark energy plot they're still flawed in the way anything that is programmed is(or atleast can be flawed) but atleast their logic would be sound rather than stupid.

 

I also think it would tie into ME4 nicely. Shepards story is done, she stopped the reapers, now it's time for some new hero to step up and help solve the dark energy problem.

[SilJeff]

just looking at ME2 can tell you that the nature of ME1 was disappearing.

 

ME3's being different didn't just come out of thin air

[Jaron Oberyn]

In case it hasn't been stated already: "Lots of speculation from everyone"

 

[dreamgazer]

Guys, the Reapers obey a cycle of extinction every 50k years and chill out in darkspace until the next round.  

 

Does that really sound like independence to you? 

[dreamgazer]

And that silly silly idea of making London the center of the galaxy. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyy???????

 

"Human, you've changed nothing. Your species has the attention of those infinitely your greater".

[Iakus]

Guys, the Reapers obey a cycle of extinction every 50k years and chill out in darkspace until the next round.  

 

Does that really sound like independence to you? 

But, but, they are each a nation, independent, free of all weakness!!!

 

Oh, right.  "I control the Reapers.  They are my solution"

[dreamgazer]

But, but, they are each a nation, independent, free of all weakness!!!

 

Oh, right.  "I control the Reapers.  They are my solution"

 

Yup. It's "independent" with quotation marks.