71 réponses à ce sujet

[KaiserShep]

Not sure how I feel about this.

 

On the one hand, it makes perfect sense and would have made a great ending to the game.

 

On the other hand, it would leave Mass Effect 2 with a cliffhanger ending akin to Halo 2's ending. (Essentially nothing is resolved, and the plot picks up again in the next game. Rather disappointing.)

 

Personally, I thought the ME1 and ME2 endings handled trilogy installments pretty well, with a firm resolution to the main plot of the game, while opening up the possibilities for future installments.

 

Technically, Mass Effect 2's main campaign does have a cliffhanger ending, because the Collectors are only a phase of the overarching plot, but the final scene before the credits easily leaves the entire thing unresolved and left for ME3 to finish.

[RedCaesar97]

Technically, Mass Effect 2's main campaign does have a cliffhanger ending, because the Collectors are only a phase of the overarching plot, but the final scene before the credits easily leaves the entire thing unresolved and left for ME3 to finish.

 

The plot of ME2 was to stop the Collectors. Shepard did that. The view of the Reapers travelling to the galaxy was not so much a cliffhanger, but a tease for the next game's plot. Those are two separate things. Note that Mass Effect 1's ending also teased the Reapers arrival but did not actually show anything (unlike ME2).

 

What themikefest proposed -- or what I think was proposing -- was integrating the Arrival DLC into the (end of the) main plot, but have Shepard fail at delaying the Reapers so the Reapers arrive at the very end of ME2. So essentially the main plot of the game -- stop the Collectorse, or stop/delay the Reapers -- would be left unresolved.

 

 

And this is sort of an issue with planned trilogies. Ideally, you want an overarching plot across the three games, but have each game with its self-contained plot so that you feel like you accomplished something within the game. You want to play a game within a trilogy without feeling like you bought only half (or one-third) of a game. I thought Mass Effect 1-3 did this pretty well by having the Reapers as the overarching plot, but each game was broken down into roughly "Stop Saren", "Stop the Collectors", and then "Stop the Reapers".

 

An example of a series that did it wrong would be Halo. Basically, Halo 1-3 takes place during a war between humanity and a group of alien species called The Covenant; so the war is the overarching plot.

 - In Halo 1, the Master Chief (you) land on an alien ring world called Halo. The plot of the game has you discovering Halo's purpose, then destroying it to prevent an alien parasite called The Flood from escaping.

 - In Halo 2, The Covenant arrives on Earth, so you fight them off, then travel to another Halo, witness a civil war start between Covenant races, then travel back to Earth... and then the game ends. Nothing was accomplished other than advancing the overarching plot; the main game plot, which kept changing, was never resolved. You did not actually "finish the fight" until Halo 3.

[txgoldrush]

And Plan D is the catalyst just opens the bloody relay, and turns off the rest of the relay network.

The narrative never assigns him this power.

 

His ONLY power the narrative assigns is enthrallment.

[txgoldrush]

A greatly expanded Arrival should have been the plot of me2.

In fact me2 should have ended with shep failing to stop their return, leading us nicely into me3.

But the delay allowed Liara to find the Crucible.

[GarrusIsABadass]

The collectors use the humans for stuff

[Reorte]

But the delay allowed Liara to find the Crucible.

An arbitrary delay to find an arbitrary solution.

[Kynare]

My guess is it was supposed to portray the Reapers' twisted fascination with the races they harvest. I don't see why they couldn't have just converted all of their gathered information and stored in a database, but for some reason, they felt the need to make an organic likeness of the race they harvested.

 

Same motivations for why they were so focused on Shepard, I imagine. Maybe they were intrigued with humans because of Shepard. This is what the original concept for the "Reaper baby" was:

 

 

From what I can see. no movement capability, no attack or defense mechanisms, no clear intended purpose. Just a portrayal of humanity. Which I like way better than the end-product. I think they switched it simply because they wanted a cool boss fight.

 

As for why they went this direction in the first place... no idea.

[von uber]

But the delay allowed Liara to find the Crucible.

 

Is that the same plans which were in an archive for 30 years and conveniently never discovered?

 

Oh, right.

[Dantriges]

The Power of the Narrative decreed that the plans shall only be found, when the time is right, according to the book of Mars 1:12.

[themikefest]

But the delay allowed Liara to find the Crucible.

Was the crucible already built for her to find it? I thought it was plans for some device that was in the Mars archives.

[fraggle]

I don't actually have that big a problem with the plans being never discovered before. I kinda headcanon they had to be hidden really well so that the Reapers wouldn't find them and could get rid of them. Seeing that Liara has an idea what she's looking for specifically maybe could make it somewhat plausible. Dunno.

However I do have a problem with when and how it's introduced. If you're looking for something that can deal with the Reapers, you should start looking for something when you know they'll come to get you. Which was a lot earlier than the start of ME3. That was just too convenient, even with Liara being on Mars for a longer period of time.

But then maybe they listened to the Council to much? Reapers a threat? Nah.

[Linkenski]

Some people in here have definitely made me think twice about the events of ME2, and I think there's some truth to it when people say ME2 has narrative moments that are just as terrible as ME3's ending. I think the biggest idiocy to ME2 was that the Collector's plan was not an alternative to Sovereign in bringing back Reapers into the milky way, but instead Reapers for some arbitrary reason could just slowly get out of dark space all along, which made Sovereign's plan seem kind of meaningless.

 

So yeah, both ME2 and ME3 make ME1 seem a bit more pointless, which is a really dumb and fatal mistake of Bioware to have made.

 

I certainly hope we get a gaming trilogy at some point with the same ambition and creativity as Mass Effect... but I definitely hope Bioware aren't the makers, because they apparently don't know how to do direct sequels very well. But I do find save-imports and how choices were implemented to be largely unmatched. It's not like Witcher 3 cares much for your Witcher 2 choices or that there's even much continuity to speak of.

 

I still think Mass Effect is the only gaming franchise I can think of that has a clear overarching premise for all 3 parts that keeps that in mind with all 3 stories. (well, the only choice-based and save-importing trilogy)

 

Casey is still a person I look up to after all the mistakes he might've made, because I think he was a well-intended and a guy genuinely driven by ambition under Bioware.

[Monica21]

I don't actually have that big a problem with the plans being never discovered before. I kinda headcanon they had to be hidden really well so that the Reapers wouldn't find them and could get rid of them. Seeing that Liara has an idea what she's looking for specifically maybe could make it somewhat plausible. Dunno.

 

I don't really have a problem with it either, at least in the context of ME3. I mean, they just found a bigger Stonehenge last week and it's been studied by archaeologists for a hundred years. The only problem I have is that in ME1 you're told that what we found on Mars is "just a small data cache" and then in ME3 it's suddenly the Mars Archives complete with huge complex and Liara talking about the various ways in which we were studied by the Protheans.

[Tim van Beek]

But then maybe they listened to the Council to much? Reapers a threat? Nah.

Surprised to see you running out of ideas at this point  .

In the citadel DLC the archive entry that describes Sovereign's attack on the citadel unlocks the information that Sovereign is a reaper, after recognizing Shepard's (and, if applicable, Kaiden's or Ashley's) spectre status:

 

https://www.youtube....h?v=N4QkfPjJL4Y

 

Starts at 1:45.

 

Simple solution: The council kept all information about the reapers top secret, in order to avoid a panic and a total collapse of all civlization etc. They did not trust humanity in general and Shepard in particular. They probably had top secret research and development programs going, that, from Shepard's viewpoint, did not have any visible effect...

[fraggle]

Simple solution: The council kept all information about the reapers top secret, in order to avoid a panic and a total collapse of all civlization etc. They did not trust humanity in general and Shepard in particular. They probably had top secret research and development programs going, that, from Shepard's viewpoint, did not have any visible effect...

 

Yeah, I always took it as keeping it secret to avoid panic, which is somewhat understandable and as in the real world, things are swept under the rug, but all the evidence piling up and no one is seemingly doing anything... eh.

The asari also kept the artifact on Thessia a secret until THEIR homeworld was under attack and oh so suddenly needed Shepard's help. Saying it might help with the search for the Catalyst. Which we told them about in the first meeting, that we need it to build the device that could get rid of the Reapers. It's just stupid to keep it hidden when they know the Reapers are already here. This has nothing to do with "uh, but they're not attacking our homeworld right now", it should be looked upon from a bigger angle. Even if initially it was only Earth that was attacked, the Reapers will come to get everyone.

Trusting humanity at that point should be considered when there's a galactic threat arriving, they were right about Sovereign/the Reapers all along.

But better to wait and see.

And even if they had top secret research going on (which is likely, I agree), apparently they didn't find anything of value, or else they might've actually been able to give us something over the course of the game.

Council is useless. Can't wait to hang up on them in ME1 again with my next Shepard

[v0rt3x22]

ME2's ending was exactly how I would've wanted ME3's ending to be. 

 

The success based on many choices you made throughout the game.

[aoibhealfae]

In ME2, you spend too much time planet scanning just so everyone could survive the first cutscene, choose people correctly or watch them die, do everything correctly or watch them die, when TIM offered another option after you destroy the baby-reaper, but choose your poison carefully or in the next game, certain people would think you still blindly follow TIM and you can watch them die too.... and if you let some of them die, it merely raise the chance of you being dead or spend ME3 being miserable and lonely....

 

And the real ending to ME2 was The Arrival which you can do immediately after Horizon which was right in the middle of the game...  -__- ME2 is not perfect but they sure know how to be emotionally manipulative.

[Tim van Beek]

The asari also kept the artifact on Thessia a secret until THEIR homeworld was under attack and oh so suddenly needed Shepard's help. Saying it might help with the search for the Catalyst. Which we told them about in the first meeting, that we need it to build the device that could get rid of the Reapers. It's just stupid to keep it hidden when they know the Reapers are already here...

Sure, and we know why they do it (because it is convenient for the plot).

 

It is irrational, but people often are irrational. In the real world, we would have groups of Asari who try diplomacy, believing that Shepard must have done something very insulting during the first contact with the reapers. We would have religious groups accepting the Reapers as harbingers of armageddon, and that all should pray for ascension by their hands. We would have violent branches of said groups starting to blow up supply ships to punish the sacrilege of the heathens etc. etc.

 

Not sharing compromising information soon enough seems to be quite plausible in this regard. Of course I would expect that Shepard should have more options to react to this situation. like becoming really angry at the Asari councillor.

[Dantriges]

Not sharing compromising information soon enough seems to be quite plausible in this regard. Of course I would expect that Shepard should have more options to react to this situation. like becoming really angry at the Asari councillor.

 

The asari probably didn´t get the memo that keeping prothean technology is a capital crime in ME 3 retroactively applied to the last 2000 years, after it was no problem in ME 1 debating why humanity shares the beacon in front of and with the turian spectre.

[fraggle]

Sure, and we know why they do it (because it is convenient for the plot).

 

Not sharing compromising information soon enough seems to be quite plausible in this regard. Of course I would expect that Shepard should have more options to react to this situation. like becoming really angry at the Asari councillor.

 

Exactly, and that's why the Council comes across as stupid.

 

I'd have loved to become really angry. Instead Shepard acts like they owe the asari Councilor something after the fall of Thessia.

Anyway. I guess we can agree that they've of course been written that way to constantly stonewall us. Otherwise it would've been too easy, eh

[larsdt]

In terms of gameplay design ME2 is much better. You spend the game preparing for the ultimate boss fight. You do pretty much the same in ME3 but instead of a boss fight you have a philosophical chat with a kid you've seen burn in your dreams. Bummer.

 

Story wise i gave up a long time ago.    

[Staff Cdr Alenko]

In terms of stupid ideas, plot holes or inconsistencies ME2 isn't foolproof, to say the least. That's for sure. I mean, the whole idea that the Collectors could actually threaten Earth at some point is shaky at best when you think about it (as someone has pointed out long ago), the Reaper baby slash Terminator at the end is goofy, Cerberus is retconned very heavily and the whole business with Shepard getting brought back to life after spending two years dead is certainly questionable.

 

The thing is though, people tend to overlook all that because the rest is so emotionally captivating. That's what suspension of disbelief is. Some people have issues with ME2, but I think it's safe to say that the vast majority of players liked it and many loved it for the sheer thrillride that it is.

 

ME3 has much, much more story problems which are far, far more severe, it was rushed, it was hyped beyond bounds, but it's only fair to admit that it probably wouldn't have been as enormous of a train wreck as it was, if at the end it didn't leave you with the biggest WTF and no payoff at all. I admit that, and I used to hate this game so much I've actually had to use brain bleach to expunge it from my system. And many people had the same reaction. I am talking about the pre-EC ending, sure, but then again, it's hard for me to treat EC seriously due to the sheer amount of corporate grass speak that EA/BioWare spouted when the response to their ending was unfavourable.

 

TL;DR version: emotionally unfulfilling > logically inconsistent when it comes to storytelling.