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[Display Name Owner]

I never liked the idea of Harbinger being the Reaper nexus, probably because I never really liked Harbinger. He just had none of Sovereign's presence and all of The Riddler's childish need for taunts. Plus, the idea of Shepard just taking on a Reaper was always silly to me. At least with the Rannoch Reaper it was Shepard + a huge fleet, so even if the mechanics of the battle were downright dumb I could swallow it.

 

Harbinger never felt like any kind of foil to Shepard or vice versa. Honestly I'd completely hate for the trilogy to boil down to a fight between them. At least TIM and Shepard's relationship felt natural.

[Display Name Owner]

Sovereign and Harbinger are the same presence to me. They're Reapers.. is there a difference? And his taunts are just extended versions of what Sovereign says. How we're basically just pointless lifeforms, struggling against the impossible.

 

I agree on TIM though. I could say the same about Saren (there just wasn't enough Saren to match TIM's content). The more humanized an opponent, the better. 

 

To be fair Sovereign had the benefit of being the first Reaper we met and having all the hype of "oh my god, it's not a ship, it's a living Reaper!". But Harbinger's banter was a tad ott for me. Felt a bit like he was trying too hard, like he cared what you thought about him. His Shepard fixation felt a little tacked on as well imo. He's just Sovereign v2 who talks too much.

[Iakus]

Backlashes similar to this are seen constantly.  The backlash against COD and Assassin's Creed are practically yearly events. What amplified the ME3 backlash was Shepard's death; at the same time some players were sad about that, other players had been looking for a way to give Bioware and EA bloody noses for the Prothy DLC, and had been searching for some way to get back at them.  The two groups merged.

Other games may have backlashes, but the sheer intensity of ME3's backlash was nearly unprecedented.  And it was largely about the endings.  Both Shepard's death and other aspects of it.  How much you wanna bet the very first topic of discussion when MENext gets announced is "how will the endings be handled?"  And it won't be about the continuity aspects.

 

Javik as Day One DLC did p*ss some people off, but once the ending debate started, faded way into the background.

[AlanC9]

I think the Shepard fixation was an extension of human fixation. Harbinger is also kidnapping all the colonists and makes favorable comments on human companions specifically too. But Bioware never followed through with why exactly they want to harvest humans over others.
 
Drew K had his ideas for it (that humans -- and especially human biotics - were a good candidate in solving the dark energy problem), but that's been thrown out. Now it comes off more pointless than it should have.

I agree with how they got into the mess, but even if "humans are speshul" had been more important in the end, I still think personalizing the issue was a big mistake.

[Iakus]

I feel part of the ending backlash had to do with people's emotional involvement in the game. Some take this game way too seriously. So when they enjoyed the 99% of the game and disliked the ending, they started petitions and *demanded* better endings. You don't see that kind of thing in other games.

 

Perhaps the emotional involvement could be solved by not putting all their eggs in one basket. If all they played for the last 3 years was ME3, then yeah, people certainly feel the way they do. If I played 10 games over the last 3 years, it wouldn't have such an impact on me. As I recall, I played about 8 games over 3 years.

 

Diversity is stable, and having all your things doing one thing is unstable. Balance is key.

 

 

I would think most people who had ending issues would have moved on by then.

So the backlash was a result of the players being mentally unbalanced?  Gotcha.

 

Sure diversity is stable.  Maybe next time Bioware should provide a more diverse range of endings.

[shodiswe]

While I had issues with the endgame and how uninspired it feelt, I never feelt I required a bossfight or to fight Harbinger.

 

My issue is mostly that it feelt cheap. Before the EC it also seemed to lack closure. the EC and I guess Citadel DLC added some welcome closure and expanded lore live with.

 

I'm sure it could have been worse but that would have been a true catastrophy, there was so much good in the ME series, I kind of expected more from the finale.

[Ithurael]

Maybe you should look beyond the surface of the endings. There's a lot more to it than red green blue. It just isn't all spelled out to you. Implicit writing, ya know.

 

I didn't say mentally unbalanced. I said because some people pretty much only played one game for the last couple years, that's all they talk about. If that's all they talk about, they are more likely to become too attached to the game, and start doing those things I mentioned. Just ask any psychiatrist, they'll tell you the same thing. Well balanced life=good. Not enough balance=bad. Playing one game for 3 years=bad. Playing 8 games for 3 years=good.

 

A casual person would just brush off the ending and move on. A fan would take it to the next level with petitions, cupcakes, lash out at people who made the game, lawsuits, etc.

 

I played many games after ME3...and yeah...ME3 narrative execution was still below average. Note, I am not talking about the themes they are trying to explore - that was interesting. Nor am I talking about Shepard's death or the lack of a happy ending - no...I prefer I high body count and love sacrifice. No, I am talking about the execution of the finale - and how botched it was.

 

And what is with this implicit writing trend popping up? Anglo-rush mentions it once and the white knights seem to rally around it.

 

For the sake of discussion I think we need to actually cite what Implicit Writing is vs is not.

 

Implicit Writing:

"implied though not directly expressed; inherent in the nature of something"

 

Explicit Writing

"precisely and clearly expressed or readily observable; leaving nothing to implication"

 

SOURCE

 

Now...let us look at some examples of explicit and implicit

 

"You're stupid and I hate you." (Explicitly mean.)

"I don't know if she's the cleverest person I've ever met, and I'm not sure how much I like her." (Implicitly mean.)

 

Main point: persons intelligence and likability

 

"File these documents alphabetically, answer the phone, and sweep the floor." (Explicitly describing your duties)
"Generally manage the office and keep things organized." (Implicit description of duties)

 

Main points: Duties in the office

 

What implicit writing seems to do is that it draws from things we already know (inherent from the nature of something) and allows us to infer something from the statement.

 

It seems to work like a logical inference. Seen below:

1. All men are mortal
2. Socrates is a man
3. Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

1. All meat comes from animals.
2. Beef is a type of meat.
3. Therefore, beef comes from an animal.

 

Source

 

 

So...what in the ending (or in IT) is drawn from what we already know? I mean...looking at the lore, we know that there is nothing inherent in indoctrination that can create vast dreamscapes to trick victims. There may be some new ability that has never been shown, described, or known about. But if that were true...it would come off as a bit...contrived /artificial

 

Looking at the ending - literally - we get such great issues seen here. Looking at the ending with IT we see that IT is not and cannot be happening the way IT says it is happening because the universe does not support it. Hell, even looking at the game design we find that the developers - the people who made the game - have the "indoctrinated" ending as the Best Ending. Now...essentially you could just do what this chap does but that is called headcanon. And headcanon =/= developer intent nor does it equate to what is represented in the core product.

 

Point in fact...IT has already been confirmed as a fan theory.

 

So...knowing what we now know about implicit writing....what implicit writing was there in the ending? It can't be in reference to starjar not opening the arms in ME1...that is not implicit. And it can't be IT because - as we have seen and as I have shown - indoctrination doesn't work that way.

 

EDIT. I thing God was able to summize my views on the ending and why it fails in a more succinct post

[angol fear]

what implicit writing was there in the ending? It can't be in reference to starjar not opening the arms in ME1...that is not implicit. And it can't be IT because - as we have seen and as I have shown - indoctrination doesn't work that way.

 

The nature of the catalyst (an A.I.) was implicit in the original ending, what happened after the choice was implicit too, the logic of the catalyst that is implicitly based on the structure of the game etc...

[Ithurael]

The nature of the catalyst (an A.I.) was implicit in the original ending, what happened after the choice was implicit too, the logic of the catalyst that is implicitly based on the structure of the game etc...

I can get behind the catalyst being an AI - that is fine. But it being implicit to the original game? Do you mean the whole organics vs synthetics theme? And it isn't implied that the catalyst is an AI...it pretty much tells you that it is a synthetic intelligence. I would not really call this implicit as nothing is really inferred here, I would more call this consistent. The catalyst reflects the org/synth conflict that was established in the first game. If you mean it is implicit in that the catalyst being an AI is inferring the org/synth conflict and thus represents it...hmm still not sure. Looking at some of my examples, they still don't seem to correlate.

 

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To the second part, I am not sure what you mean by what happens after the choice in the original ending...do you mean the relays blowing up? Because that is NOT implicit (as shown by my examples)

 

We know (via Arrival) that a relay blowing up destroys the system it is in. An implicit statement is derived from the NATURE of something and expressed, essentially, as an inference. Let's look at my first example:

"I don't know if she's the cleverest person I've ever met, and I'm not sure how much I like her." (Implicitly mean.)

 

Now...while we don't know the background of this statement we see - via the text - that the individual being mentioned is not smart. Secondly, the next portion draws attention to the likability of the person.

 

What we can infer this statement is saying is: She is dumb and I don't like her.

 

Drawing back to the Vanilla ending of ME3 - aka Relays go boom - we know that the relays - when destroyed - will kill all life in the system they are in. This is a fundamental fact of the lore and is shown in the lore. To disregard that is called headcanon.

 

So, when the relays go boom and we see slideshows (via the EC) it comes off as artificial - not implicit.

 

If you could, cite exactly where this implicit statement is and we can cross examine it with what we already know about implicit structure. Because I am not at all sold about this implicit writing in the ending - as nothing I have seen in the ending matches the structure of implicit writing (as cited in my post).

========================

 

As for the logic of the catalyst...believe it or not I really had no issue with it. The reapers are bad guys - they should have circular logic or something incorrect about them. And I do note that the structure of the catalysts argument does match the events of the lore ala the Themes of the game (cycles being a predominant one). But not so much the structure of the game - not sure what you mean by this... Is it implicit writing? Technically I could say so yeah. Does that make is good writing? The idea of the catalyst = yes. The execution of the catalyst=No...no it does not as we still have lore inconsistencies shown here. Thanks, at least, for pointing that out to me though. I haven't played ME3 for a while now.

 

I am sure even you know that there is a difference between what a story explores and how it explores it. Themes are not the same as execution. The themes of the Mass Effect universe were rather well presented in the ending. The execution of the ending is where I hold issue. If you execution breaks suspension of disbelief...you fail. You can bend SOD...but do NOT break it. Once you do, no matter how grandiose the themes or brilliant the scope...it won't matter.

[Iakus]

 

As for the logic of the catalyst...believe it or not I really had no issue with it. The reapers are bad guys - they should have circular logic or something incorrect about them. And I do note that the structure of the catalysts argument does match the events of the lore ala the Themes of the game (cycles being a predominant one). But not so much the structure of the game - not sure what you mean by this... Is it implicit writing? Technically I could say so yeah. Does that make is good writing? The idea of the catalyst = yes. The execution of the catalyst=No...no it does not as we still have lore inconsistencies shown here. Thanks, at least, for pointing that out to me though. I haven't played ME3 for a while now.

 

While I agree that the Reapers are "bad guys" and their logic is circular, part of the problem with the endings is the implicit assumption that the Reapers are still right.  That their logic is in fact sound, and the only flaw is their execution.  You are not allowed to disagree with them (or I guess you can, but then the rocks fall and everyone dies).

[Vazgen]

While I agree that the Reapers are "bad guys" and their logic is circular, part of the problem with the endings is the implicit assumption that the Reapers are still right.  That their logic is in fact sound, and the only flaw is their execution.  You are not allowed to disagree with them (or I guess you can, but then the rocks fall and everyone dies).

"But the peace won't last"

"We'll take our chances"

[Iakus]

You disagree with the Reapers by shooting the tube and destroying them.

ANd all other AI.  Organics and synthetics can't co-oexist, so do unto them before they do unto you.