214 réponses à ce sujet

[Revan Reborn]

How is it hyperbolic? The ending clearly states that everyone has "unlimited access to knowledge", that everyone can now live the lives they have wished for, all the characters are shown doing the same exact things that they do in the other endings, the Reapers have been integrated into galactic civilization, etc. 

 

Destroy, as Ieldra stated earlier in this thread, seems to support a reactionary ideology, one that is concerned with protecting organic purity from the taint of machines (a theme that is somewhat prominent in ME1). Synthesis has its ethical problems, some that I suspect were unintentional and a consequence of bad writing, but I'm quite pleased with the central themes of the ending: that categories like "organic" and "synthetic" are ultimately meaningless, for we are all living beings, and that the unknown can be known, and with that knowledge comes prosperity and mastery over one's destiny. 

Or Synthesis is the embodiment of indocrination. Silliness aside, I don't view Destroy that way. The way I see Destroy is Shepard, and all organics and synthetics, rising up and telling the Catalyst, reapers, and Leviathans, that this cycle is different and that the races of the cycle should have a right to choose their own fate. Destroy is a rejection of the reaper solution and the idea that there must be a solution for "order" to prevent "chaos." It's a rejection of the warped and one-sided ideals the Catalysts was programmed with due to the lack of foresight and arrogance of the Leviathans.

 

It's a means of breaking away from the grip of "big brother" and the phony existence the Catalyst has created, for self-determination and a new path for organics and synthetics. Destroy is the embodiment of everything it means to be human and having the right and choice to be who you want to be.

 

As the great Commander Shepard once said: "People are messy, awkward, sometimes selfish and cruel. But they're trying, and I'm going to make sure they have a chance."

 

That is Destroy in a nutshell.

[CosmicGnosis]

I once viewed Destroy in that way. But the annihilation of synthetics is difficult for me to accept in that interpretation. I actually think the endings can be reduced to very basic descriptions.

 

Destroy = The chaos of organic life.

Control = The order of synthetics.

Synthesis = The balance of order and chaos.

 

 

EDIT: I think your interpretation is what people want Destroy to mean, but it wasn't originally intended to mean that. Or at least synthetics weren't supposed to be included in it. Post-EC, maybe it is supposed to mean that, especially after the fan complaints.

[Revan Reborn]

I once viewed Destroy in that way. But the annihilation of synthetics is difficult for me to accept in that interpretation. I actually think the endings can be reduced to very basic descriptions.

 

Destroy = The chaos of organic life.

Control = The order of synthetics.

Synthesis = The balance of order and chaos.

The "annihilation of synthetics," meaning the Geth and EDI, is the hard facts of reality. Take notice. Destroy is the only option where people will actually die (not counting Refuse). In Control and Synthesis, everybody lives (except Shepard). Why do you think that is? It's simple really. Destroy isn't supposed to be appealing. It's supposed to be a tough choice with unfortunate repercussions. That is exactly why it's the right choice, because the right choice, in most cases, is always the most difficult one to make.

 

It's not a hard choice to become a Reaper-Shepard and dictate the galaxy. It's not a hard choice for Shepard to sacrifice himself and assume all organics and synthetics will be perfect and live in "harmony." Those are choices the Catalyst prefers for you and the galaxy. Whether they are to your benefit or not is an entirely different question. Regardless, nobody ever said this was going to be easy, and Shepard and friends knew the stakes were high. I'm not saying Destroy is the ideal resolution, but it's by far the best choice for the galaxy, organics and synthetics included.

[Iakus]

Or Synthesis is the embodiment of indocrination. Silliness aside, I don't view Destroy that way. The way I see Destroy is Shepard, and all organics and synthetics, rising up and telling the Catalyst, reapers, and Leviathans, that this cycle is different and that the races of the cycle should have a right to choose their own fate. Destroy is a rejection of the reaper solution and the idea that there must be a solution for "order" to prevent "chaos." It's a rejection of the warped and one-sided ideals the Catalysts was programmed with due to the lack of foresight and arrogance of the Leviathans.

It's a means of breaking away from the grip of "big brother" and the phony existence the Catalyst has created, for self-determination and a new path for organics and synthetics. Destroy is the embodiment of everything it means to be human and having the right and choice to be who you want to be.

As the great Commander Shepard once said: "People are messy, awkward, sometimes selfish and cruel. But they're trying, and I'm going to make sure they have a chance."

That is Destroy in a nutshell.

Sadly, with EC Bioware gave us exactly that kind of ending with Refusal. And that amounted to nothing more than "How dare you deny our Art! Rocks fall, everyone dies! Now reload and pick a color"

[CosmicGnosis]

It's not a hard choice to become a Reaper-Shepard and dictate the galaxy. It's not a hard choice for Shepard to sacrifice himself and assume all organics and synthetics will be perfect and live in "harmony."

Heh, it wasn't easy for me. I don't know if you were around a few years ago, but I became somewhat infamous as the guy who liked Synthesis but hated the racist implications and the forced implementation of it. I struggled for a long time to just accept the ending. Now I just assume that the negative implications were unintentional, especially because of the evidence from the leaked scripts and my OP in this thread. Combining all of this with the info from Karpyshyn about one of the original ending ideas, and I think it's very clear that BioWare always intended for the Reapers to have a "noble" goal that players would be confronted with, and hard choices would follow.

[Revan Reborn]

Sadly, with EC Bioware gave us exactly that kind of ending with Refusal. And that amounted to nothing more than "How dare you deny our Art! Rocks fall, everyone dies! Now reload and pick a color"

There is a difference between rejecting something and outright refusal. Destroy is a rejection of an ideology, but it is still a choice. Refusal is not even making a choice, but instead watching the world burn.

 

Heh, it wasn't easy for me. I don't know if you were around a few years ago, but I became somewhat infamous as the guy who liked Synthesis but hated the racist implications and the forced implementation of it. I struggled for a long time to just accept the ending. Now I just assume that the negative implications were unintentional, especially because of the evidence from the leaked scripts and my OP in this thread. Combining all of this with the info from Karpyshyn about one of the original ending ideas, and I think it's very clear that BioWare always intended for the Reapers to have a "noble" goal that players would be confronted with, and hard choices would follow.

That certainly ties into Drew's concept of the dark energy theory, but that was dropped after ME2. Once Mac took over as the lead writer, he made it abundantly clear this was a battle between organics and synthetics. I agree that BioWare intended reapers to actually be "good" and Synthesis was meant to be the "ideal" choice, but its implementation, execution, and consistency with the rest of the series was nonexistent. Just from a pure storytelling perspective, High EMS Destroy with Shepard living is the most practical and satisfying conclusion to ME3 with the least plot holes.

[teh DRUMPf!!]

When it says "A new... DNA," it seemed to be the AI was trying to translate and rationalize in a way Shepard would understand. You have to realize this is an intelligence that has been around for millions, if not billions of years. It is addressing Shepard in a way that gives the Catalyt's words meaning. As Sovereign stated at Virmire, the motivations for what the reapers were doing was far beyond the comprehension of man or any other organic.

... I agree with you.
 
 

Again, Mass Effect is science fiction with elements of fantasy. It's not real. Trying to rationalize something is leading you astray. You can only take what the developers and writers give you. If they say it's explicitly something, that is what is happening, no matter how unreasonable it is. You cannot headcanon your own understanding in order to disprove my argument. Your point was a failure before you even started.

 

I hold to a very simple concept: if something is not clearly explained in a story, but the player's personal interpretation can aptly make sense of it and nothing in-story contradicts their interpretation, then their interpretation is about as good as canon. If there are multiple such explanations, the most logical one wins out.

 

An interpretation is not the same as headcanon because it is tied to the story, does not change its substance. Headcanon is an add-on to the story.

 

I have a workable interpretation of Synthesis and the ending in general. A lot of it is original. Some of it is not; I relinquished some of my original interpretations in favor "better" (simpler, more logical, more lore-compatible) ones that other people have offered. "Lots of speculation for everyone!!" Well for me that was a constructive process. It does not excuse weak writing, mind you, but over time, all the speculation from others and myself came together and formed better understanding of a purposely-vague ending. That is the benefit of an open-mind, however. Not many actually have that.

[Larry-3]

In Control, Shepard executes sudo command. I wish the Collectors were still around so I could make their eyes turn blue and say "direct intervention is necessary!" Anyway, the hologram kid stated that Shepard would lose his corporeal form. Next thing you know there are blue lines going around you, then you dissappear and wake up in the Matrix.

In Synthesis, you jump into a beam the looks like a glow stick. You are dispersed in the beam and simultaneously do everyone in the galaxy. Sex level 9000. Everyone gets night vision and supercomputer brains... except for EDI and the Geth... they become partially organic and have feelings.

In Destroy, you blow up all the A.I.'s, which probably mean video games will stop working. And the Geth, EDI, and the Reapers die. Everything starts go go back to how it was before the war, and people start making synthetics again.

[Revan Reborn]

... I agree with you.
 
 

 

I hold to a very simple concept: if something is not clearly explained in a story, but the player's personal interpretation can aptly make sense of it and nothing in-story contradicts their interpretation, then their interpretation is about as good as canon. If there are multiple such explanations, the most logical one wins out.

 

An interpretation is not the same as headcanon because it is tied to the story, does not change its substance. Headcanon is an add-on to the story.

 

I have a workable interpretation of Synthesis and the ending in general. A lot of it is original. Some of it is not; I relinquished some of my original interpretations in favor "better" (simpler, more logical, more lore-compatible) ones that other people have offered. "Lots of speculation for everyone!!" Well for me that was a constructive process. It does not excuse weak writing, mind you, but over time, all the speculation from others and myself came together and formed better understanding of a purposely-vague ending. That is the benefit of an open-mind, however. Not many actually have that.

Yep. The ending of ME3 is actually somewhat brilliant if you think about it. The execution was poor, but because of the vagueness and ambiguity, it left itself open to a wide variety of interpretations. Thus, we have the community, three years later, still trying to piece together what it all exactly meant. There's been all sorts of theories and rationales to try and justify why the game ended the way it did. To put it simply, BioWare screwed up and tried to do damage control with the EC. But, the effects of that screw up has led to a wealth of discussions BioWare likely never anticipated. It is truly the epitome of the perfect disaster.

[StealthGamer92]

There is a difference between rejecting something and outright refusal. Destroy is a rejection of an ideology, but it is still a choice. Refusal is not even making a choice, but instead watching the world burn.

 

That certainly ties into Drew's concept of the dark energy theory, but that was dropped after ME2. Once Mac took over as the lead writer, he made it abundantly clear this was a battle between organics and synthetics. I agree that BioWare intended reapers to actually be "good" and Synthesis was meant to be the "ideal" choice, but its implementation, execution, and consistency with the rest of the series was nonexistent. Just from a pure storytelling perspective, High EMS Destroy with Shepard living is the most practical and satisfying conclusion to ME3 with the least plot holes.

Lol, I just watched the endings again and high EMS destroy is also Utopian(can't think of the right word but close enough). "We beat 'em, we rebuilt, it's like nothing happened, also Shep's alive but we left him to possibly die because we assumed he was dead(implied by memorial scene)" it's a too good to be true scenario. That and the Stargazer scene(in since release unlike the rebuild explanation) why I look at it as a story book ending.

[Revan Reborn]

Lol, I just watched the endings again and high EMS destroy is also Utopian(can't think of the right word but close enough). "We beat 'em, we rebuilt, it's like nothing happened, also Shep's alive but we left him to possibly die because we assumed he was dead(implied by memorial scene)" it's a too good to be true scenario. That and the Stargazer scene(in since release unlike the rebuild explanation) why I look at it as a story book ending.

High EMS Destroy is extremely positive, which is why I believe it's actually the best ending canonically speaking. Synthesis is just contradictory for a variety of considerations. Also, the scene with the memorial and the companion stepping back with a smile suggests the Normandy crew believes Shepard is still out there. To me, High EMS Destroy is the most conclusive, practical, and satisfying in its ending. It hits the same high points Synthesis does, but without the pit falls.

[StealthGamer92]

High EMS Destroy is extremely positive, which is why I believe it's actually the best ending canonically speaking. Synthesis is just contradictory for a variety of considerations. Also, the scene with the memorial and the companion stepping back with a smile suggests the Normandy crew believes Shepard is still out there. To me, High EMS Destroy is the most conclusive, practical, and satisfying in its ending. It hits the same high points Synthesis does, but without the pit falls.

Well after the last few years not seeing them, even with my storybook ending pov, they all look dumb as all hell. They all look to good to be true, making it hard for me to even justify Synthesis or high EMS Destroy(my 2 most chosen) anymore.

[Revan Reborn]

Well after the last few years not seeing them, even with my storybook ending pov, they all look dumb as all hell. They all look to good to be true, making it hard for me to even justify Synthesis or high EMS Destroy(my 2 favorite) anymore.

Sure. Every choice is ultimately ridiculous. That's what makes this fun, however. Certainly, the storytelling explanation at the end about "The Shepard" justifies that technically any ending is viable. I just believe some of the choices are more consistent with the game's philosophy than others, based on themes and quotes major characters have said in all three games. I'd be curious to see which choice Drew would have picked as the best. I have a feeling it would have been destroy, as ME1 and ME2 leaned heavily towards Destroy being the best solution.

[CosmicGnosis]

The endings can really mean whatever the hell you want them to mean. Thus, I interpret Synthesis in the way that I want it to be interpreted. It's the only thing that's kept me sane during the whole fiasco. This particular ending has enough themes that I truly care about, and the negatives seems to be more mistakes than deliberate moral bankruptcy.

[Revan Reborn]

The endings can really mean whatever the hell you want them to mean. Thus, I interpret Synthesis in the way that I want it to be interpreted. It's the only thing that's kept me sane during the whole fiasco. This particular ending has enough themes that I truly care about, and the negatives seems to be more mistakes than deliberate moral bankruptcy.

That's a fair assessment. Besides the outright, poor execution, I just don't like the idea of agreeing with the Catalyst in the end. As what someone posted earlier, ME3's ending commits one of the most heinous story tropes: Utopia justifies the means, suggesting that it doesn't matter how "bad" the reapers and the Catalyst were, they were ultimately doing something "noble" for the "benefit" of all.

 

I believe that kind of storytelling can work in a very limited amount of mediums, but ME was not one of them. Trying to turn what was the main antagonist and "evil" of the series into a sympathetic "anti-hero" was just unconvincing and really sloppy. Perhaps it would have worked with the dark energy theory, but it did not with the organic-synthetic confict theory.

[Revan Reborn]

I assume you mean organics & synthetics vs Reapers?

I mean organics versus synthetics. Reapers are the solution to fix the organic-synthetic problem.

[Revan Reborn]

Citadel DLC reinforces this with the claw game. The red ball has the highest score. The purple ball (refuse) is second. The blue and green balls give the lowest score. There's even a loading screen right after Harbinger's beam which states

Now that's really interesting to know. I didn't play all of the casino/arcade games in Citadel yet, but that certainly is more evidence. It's even more credible than the Synthesis needing the highest EMS theory because that was the case when the game was first released, when BioWare clearly intended for Synthesis to originally be the best choice.

 

Citadel was their final DLC and journey in ME3, so it's not surprising they would change their views (which is seen in High EMS Destroy EC as well) and choose something more appropriate as the ending. I'll have to test out the claw game. If I remember, that's the one Zaeed was playing. It seems it ranks the choices based on rejecting the Catalyst's theory.

 

Destroy

Refusal

Control

Synthesis

 

Thanks for sharing.

[fraggle]

The original ending has you believe the synthesis ending is the best, but Citadel comes along and says destroy is best.

 

I don't really believe that there's a wrong or a right ending. To me, all choices in the ending are legitimate (maybe even Refuse in its own weird, twisted way ), even if I don't personally agree with/like them. I could for example never go for anything else but Destroy.

It's up to the individual player what is the best choice for his Shepard, how his character is shaped during the Trilogy to gather enough reasons and motivations to justify your choice.

I like how open it is. No-one is wrong and no-one is right, what counts is only your own reason for picking a certain choice.

[Iakus]

There is a difference between rejecting something and outright refusal. Destroy is a rejection of an ideology, but it is still a choice. Refusal is not even making a choice, but instead watching the world burn.

 

"I fight for freedom.  Mine and everyone's. I fight for the right to choose our own fate"  

 

Sounds like Refuse is all about making a choice.  Specifically, a choice to reject the Reapers' insane ideology and find our own way in the galaxy.  A chocie to declare that organics and synthetics can coexist without space magic, that we don't need to control or destroy each other.  That we don't need green space magic to understand, or at least get along.

 

A pity the table gets flipped immediately afterwards.

[timebean]

Synthesis implies we need a DNA rewrite to get along.  The entire series suggests otherwise, which is why I pick destroy.  I hated killing the Geth and Edi, but I also hated losing Mordin, Legion, and Ash. Mordin and Legion both sacrificed themselves while fighting for peace between different groups...because they believed in redemption and forgiveness and cooperation. My Shep does as well. Thus, he sacrifices the synthetics to give the galaxy another chance...because he has hope for organics AND synthetics of the future. 

[Revan Reborn]

Citadel isn't really meant to fix anything, or choose a better ending. As it's not required in order to finish the game, you can complete the campaign without it. As I finished the main campaign when the game launched in March 2012 without touching any DLC.

 

It's like saying the original ending said X about the Catalyst, but Leviathan DLC changes it to Y. The original ending has you believe the synthesis ending is the best, but Citadel comes along and says destroy is best.

 

Any DLC is merely meant as an optional add-on to the story. Not really as a patch to fix or update content as some might claim the ending feels incomplete without all the DLC.

 

The core product is essentially everything minus the DLC. Which going by that states synthesis is the Reaper's ideal solution.

That might make sense if the Extended Cut did not make High EMS Destroy as the most optimal ending. You should watch it.

 

"I fight for freedom.  Mine and everyone's. I fight for the right to choose our own fate"  

 

Sounds like Refuse is all about making a choice.  Specifically, a choice to reject the Reapers' insane ideology and find our own way in the galaxy.  A chocie to declare that organics and synthetics can coexist without space magic, that we don't need to control or destroy each other.  That we don't need green space magic to understand, or at least get along.

 

A pity the table gets flipped immediately afterwards.

Not at all. Destroy should really be called Rejection. Refuse is simply failing to make any choice when Shepard has the ability to either go along with the Catalyst's plan or reject it. Refuse, by far, is the most selfish decision a player can make.

 

Synthesis implies we need a DNA rewrite to get along.  The entire series suggests otherwise, which is why I pick destroy.  I hated killing the Geth and Edi, but I also hated losing Mordin, Legion, and Ash. Mordin and Legion both sacrificed themselves while fighting for peace between different groups...because they believed in redemption and forgiveness and cooperation. My Shep does as well. Thus, he sacrifices the synthetics to give the galaxy another chance...because he has hope for organics AND synthetics of the future. 

Exactly. Very well stated.

[Iakus]

 

Not at all. Destroy should really be called Rejection. Refuse is simply failing to make any choice when Shepard has the ability to either go along with the Catalyst's plan or reject it. Refuse, by far, is the most selfish decision a player can make.

 

Destroy is basically agreeing with the Catalyst that organics and synthetics cannot coexist peacefully.  And therefore organics should do unto others before they do unto us.

 

Control has a similar theme, but simply puts synthetics in charge of organics rather than an outright genocide..

 

Synthesis is, as timebeam said, saying we need our DNA rewritten in order to get along.  We have to become something else because we're not worthy of existing as we are.

 

Refuse is trying to stand on your own, and getting slapped down for our impertinence.