The Leviathans were yet another way to justify Bioware's terribad ending by providing retroactive foreshadowing rather than actually listen to the negative feedback.
True. But I'd rather have that foreshadowing than not have it because imo it does help in some ways.
@Ithurael, in the other topic and here you are talking about retcon as inconsistency, breaking the internal logic. But don't you think that Mass Effect 2 is a big retcon of Mass Effect 1?
A retcon is an inconsistency by definition. About ME2 retcons, weren't there some pretty large debates about those in the day?
>>@KrrKs, it doesn't matter if you want.<<
The question was, whether judgement of the end differs based on its status as art or 'not art'.
Such a status does not shield from criticism in any way, so I don't see it as relevant.
BTW: Declaring just the end and not the rest as art is questionable, imo. If asked whether these games in total are art, I'd say yes.
>>@JonathonPR, the A.I. isn't an antagonist. He wasn't foreshadowed? What did you see in the dreams sequences? Did you listen to the prothean VI? the DLC were not done to create foreshadowing, it was done to create explicit foreshadowing.<<
1. The child from the dream sequences has nothing to do with the 'intelligence', apart from appearance. Do you really intend to say that these dreams, (which are supposed to show Shepard's mental state and symbolize the lives lost to the reapers, imo) somehow foreshadow a central being that controls the reapers?
2. The VI does state that there likely is something that controls the cycles, including -but not limited to- the reapers (as a faction). Considering the AI is part of the reaper faction, I personally found that questionable as foreshadowing of the AI. It seemed more directed at something at an even higher level.
Also: Could you please explain the qualitative difference between 'foreshadowing' and 'explicit foreshadowing'. I still don't get it.
>>So why did we spend all that time thinking that Earth was the center of the galaxy?<<
Because the 'church said so', which was the end all (literally for so called heretics) authority. While not a valid argument, potential loss of life is a game changer.
Probably more important is that the ptolemaic model (as favoured by the church) did work for most observations, until Galileo's time.
Edit: Dropped a negation which was too much, and a spelling Error.
Auto correct wants to change 'ptolemaic' to 'problematic' 
Modifié par KrrKs, 26 janvier 2016 - 04:25 .
The only good thing to come out of leviathan are the interesting new maps and locations.
The Leviathan backstory is just more of the same badness as the endings.
A retcon is an inconsistency by definition. About ME2 retcons, weren't there some pretty large debates about those in the day?
Yes. Yes there were.
The Leviathans were yet another way to justify Bioware's terribad ending by providing retroactive foreshadowing rather than actually listen to the negative feedback.
At the low, low price of $10.
Yep hence why i normally ignore that linear piece of garbage or play to the point of locating the homeworld only.
I like Leviathan (the DLC), I really do. Its design, locations, dialogue and the fact that they bothered to get new dialogue for all squad mates are fantastic and IMO well worth the $10. It is in fact one of my favorite parts of the game these days.
The only thing I do not like about it is the ending. Not because the dialogue in and of itself is bad (it's actually really well made with the shifting forms of Leviathan within Shep's mind, the badass voice and visualizations like the galaxy map popping in and out, etc.). The content of the dialogue is not bad either, the explanation for how the Leviathans built the AI and how that AI made the first reaper and ushered into the cycles is intriguing enough (although the djinni from the bottle that grants you a wish in a different way than you thought is hardly an original concept tbh). No, all of that is fine. It’s simply the meta knowledge that the writers quite apparently were aware of their mistakes with the catalyst and just were too dam stubborn to do anything about it one month earlier in the extended cut that bothers me.
I mean, why else would you make a DLC that retroactively “foreshadows” the character that is the key to the entire plotline? Apparently they did realize that this whole idea came from nowhere and thus they retroactively introduced it. It’s rather pathetic to so obviously try and fix this 5 months after the fact and after you (i.e. BW) denied that there was any problem in the first place for these 5 months. Frankly I find it funny that some people use Leviathan to defend the ending. IMO it is one of the main pieces of evidence to show that even the writers themselves were apparently not happy with how it all played out, even with the EC. They just didn't have the guts to admit it outright or rather (more likely) EA didn't have the guts to allow them to talk about it.
That was my main problem with the DLC. Technically, it’s actually one of BW’s better DLCs, I think.
EDIT: As for the EC btw (since that came up earlier as well), it's a similar thing. Yes, BW said that they wanted to maintain their artistic integrity by not changing the ending (which IMO is a valid argument that I could have accepted) but then they went ahead and changed pretty much everything about it. I do give both BW and EA a lot of credit for the effort. Making the EC (and financing devs for 3 month without getting a return for it) was very cool indeed. The content however is just further admission of how much of a writing screw-up the ending was and the fact that even afterwards there is still more than enough to criticize enhances that point even more and goes to show that yes, while the EC did "fix" some very specific issues of the original cut, there are others that are more systemic to the entire setup of the ending or even the entirety of ME2 and 3.
Why can Shepard ask Leviathan about the crucible but not the catalyst? I wonder if the answer would be they don't know since they refer the thing as intelligence and not catalyst
Too bad Leviathan couldn't of been part of the main game when it was released
In the case of Steve his death scenario should have been kept as the only outcome, because his survival brings up many questions which probably have no logical answers.
I look at his survival the same as completing a loyalty mission for the squadmates in ME2
If a squadmate is loyal, he/she will survive fighting the baby reaper and if the loyalty mission isn't completed, he/she will die.
For Steve, talking with him throughout the game to help him put closure to his dead husband gives him that extra will to live.
I liked Leviathan myself and thought it was pretty interesting. I think it would have been better if they kept everything the same but had the Leviathan's outright tell you they refused to help and weren't going to be helping. (It seemed like this happened, but it was also kind of unclear and weird, and the mission also gave war assets that involved the artifacts, which it never even mentioned them allowing anyone to take, or even how they could take them without being dominated. It was all very weird.) It also REALLY needed to be in the main story, not DLC, and take place in between Thessia and Horizon.
It really would have been an unexpected plot twist to do all that work to seek out these mysterious and powerful beings only for them to tell you to bugger off.
Also, had their intelligence never appeared it would have left some room for a possible episode 7 style sequel, which I would have had alot more faith could have been really awesome than I do with Andromeda.
Leviathan is my favourite dlc of the trilogy mainly for the reasons stated above.
Personally i hate it more than i hate arrival and that's saying something.
It also REALLY needed to be in the main story, not DLC, and take place in between Thessia and Horizon.
Yes it should have been part of the main game.
If the dlc was part of the main game, Samantha could have played a role. She could track the signal like she tracked Kai Leng. If romanced, have a line of dialogue between her and femshep near the shower. She can talk to Ann about the rachni since she studied them. Her and Ann could compare notes
Reaper...erm....cough I mean Leviathan DLC is awesome.
@JonathonPR, the A.I. isn't an antagonist. He wasn't foreshadowed? What did you see in the dreams sequences? Did you listen to the prothean VI? the DLC were not done to create foreshadowing, it was done to create explicit foreshadowing. Just like Hitchcock said, if you want people to understand something, you have to say it twice.
Yes it is. It opposes the protagonist, which is the definition of antagonist. The dreams weren't foreshadowing the Catalyst. Those were dreams caused by Shepard cracking under the pressure of the events of the games. Why the Catalyst takes on the appearance of the same child is unexplained and very strange. The VI did mention something but I think that was too close to the end.
@Natureguy85, yes you can ignore what happened to Galileo Galilei or ignore the fact that it took years and other scientifics. Answering like that, you're not wrong, but, most important, you're not right. You deliberatly say what you want to say about it, not what happened and how it happened.
And for what he has said about heliocentrism, you should know that Nicolaus Copernicus defended that point of view ealier and we can go further in the Antiquity. So arguments and analysis ? That's really how we know we are right? So why did we spend all that time thinking that Earth was the center of the galaxy?
Ok there is no "who" answer, that's all I wanted to know.
So failed at trying to be deep? Then what is supposed to be deep? What does it mean "being deep"?
Again, I didn't ignore what happened. I simply went to the end, which is what you brought up. And people thinking Galileo was wrong didn't make him less right. And they did not argue against him in the same way his argument was made. As for why we thought Earth was the center, some of it was religious, which I don't really understand, but some was simple observation. The Sun does appear to circle the Earth.
By "being deep", I mean that it brings up complicated philosophical concepts just for its own sake. It tries to be thoughtful, which is why the Catalyst talks so much and Shepard barely gets to speak. The problem is that these ideas weren't shown in the narrative. In fact the story showed us the opposite.
Then cite them please. I know if you only look at the aesthetic meaning of ME3's ending you get a great bit to talk about (just like almost anything). But when you look at the actual writing - the transmission - it completely falls apart. Most when defending the ending just focus on the ideas and meaning interpreted rather than the actual presentation (and this does include you Angol). And simply being a literature teacher or 'working in art' does not mean they have valid counter points, in the same way that working in Finance doesn't mean one is good with money. The career of the person means little, it is their arguments that matters and the quality and rationality of those arguments. If they can cite their points back to rational conventions (as what is already defined and represented) then I am all for this. Conversely, if they can objectively represent across multiple sources and studies that Narrative coherence is not what i cited many times over but something that allows for ME3's ending to be coherent I would be interested in review.
Thank you. Arguments from authority won't cut it. I want the actual argument.
If you've played the game, you know what the Leviathan DLC does, and the context to the Catalyst it provides. Catalyst origin, reason for creation, and a more detailed history of its operation, beginning with the destruction of the Leviathans. Basically, BioWare created a race that has "all the answers." Does it change the ending? No. But it changes the perception of the ending (for me, anyway). The Catalyst goes from being a (pseudo) mysterious being to just another AI that is functioning with murderous intent, like so many others in the Mass Effect series: the AI in the console in ME1, the AI that killed an entire station's crew (ME2 MSV Corsica plotline, forget the exact mission), or even EDI (though retconning EDI as the Rogue VI from ME1 seems like BioWare trying too hard to make everything neat and tidy). What had been an outrageous shoe-horn of a new figure into the ME3 ending is instead given a place in the world beyond just being a super "being who explains the wonders of the universe to Shepard" (quote from the leaked script). You sound like you wanted / expected / wished the Leviathan DLC to be more than just a dialogue-driven information dump; I think it adds a measure of understanding and foreshadowing to the ending, making the ending feel like an actual ending, instead of - well, the original ending that we had.
My choice during the ending is influenced by some research I've done on trans-humanism. The Catalyst and his Synthesis can go to hell.
Heh. You jest, of course. A large part of living in the Soviet Union was about professing and sharing the same collective opinion as was handed down by the political bureaus responsible for the topic in question. Because individualism was considered obsolete.
"I don't know that the article was proof" but "one more thing on the mountain of evidence"
Contradictory. Does the article constitute proof in your opinion or not? If not (as you seem to indicate here), then it is not evidence either, as I expressed previously. Well, it is evidence of outrage. Again, as I said previously, it is an interesting discussion of the ending, but not proof of anything other than the writer's professed disgust / anger / resignation about the endings.
It was a satiristic statement. Those who know me (who have read the forum) understood that right away. I should have been clearer in my post. I apologize for the misunderstanding.
I did play and I do know and made my comments based on having played it. Since you disagree, I challenged you to explain your position, which you have ducked by telling me I already know. Leviathan told me nothing new about the Catalyst other than who created it and their original motivation. All of that is interesting, but influences nothing Sure, now it seems to have taken its original mandate into a crazy direction but it doesn't alter how I view it or the Reapers. It's just as wrong as before and just as much of a problem as before.
You using outside influences to make your decision is fine, but I'm talking about what is internal to the story.
There is no contradiction. Evidence =/= proof. They are different, though related, things.
Thanks for explaining your "isms" comment.
The only thing I do not like about [Leviathan] is the ending. Not because the dialogue in and of itself is bad (it's actually really well made with the shifting forms of Leviathan within Shep's mind, the badass voice and visualizations like the galaxy map popping in and out, etc.). The content of the dialogue is not bad either, the explanation for how the Leviathans built the AI and how that AI made the first reaper and ushered into the cycles is intriguing enough (although the djinni from the bottle that grants you a wish in a different way than you thought is hardly an original concept tbh). No, all of that is fine. It’s simply the meta knowledge that the writers quite apparently were aware of their mistakes with the catalyst and just were too dam stubborn to do anything about it one month earlier in the extended cut that bothers me.
I mean, why else would you make a DLC that retroactively “foreshadows” the character that is the key to the entire plotline? Apparently they did realize that this whole idea came from nowhere and thus they retroactively introduced it. It’s rather pathetic to so obviously try and fix this 5 months after the fact and after you (i.e. BW) denied that there was any problem in the first place for these 5 months. Frankly I find it funny that some people use Leviathan to defend the ending. IMO it is one of the main pieces of evidence to show that even the writers themselves were apparently not happy with how it all played out, even with the EC. They just didn't have the guts to admit it outright or rather (more likely) EA didn't have the guts to allow them to talk about it.
That was my main problem with the DLC. Technically, it’s actually one of BW’s better DLCs, I think.
EDIT: As for the EC btw (since that came up earlier as well), it's a similar thing. Yes, BW said that they wanted to maintain their artistic integrity by not changing the ending (which IMO is a valid argument that I could have accepted) but then they went ahead and changed pretty much everything about it. I do give both BW and EA a lot of credit for the effort. Making the EC (and financing devs for 3 month without getting a return for it) was very cool indeed. The content however is just further admission of how much of a writing screw-up the ending was and the fact that even afterwards there is still more than enough to criticize enhances that point even more and goes to show that yes, while the EC did "fix" some very specific issues of the original cut, there are others that are more systemic to the entire setup of the ending or even the entirety of ME2 and 3.
You're so right. I like your phrase "retroactive foreshadowing." Not only is it still optional and therefore not really a fix to the story, but it's trying to insert something earlier to make something later make sense, rather than the other way around, which is the usual approach.
Personally i hate it more than i hate arrival and that's saying something.
Really? Why? I don't think it added all that much to the story, but I really liked the investigation format.
I wanted to stay out of debating this dead horse but I just wanted to say that foreshadowing is not required for every major event that occurs in a story. If your goal is to build up suspension then sure, since foreshadowing is key to the suspense, but if you want to have some big massive reveal like the Catalyst originally was then no, you don't constantly foreshadow that stuff otherwise it will remove the surprise factor, the most you should do is plant some clues which people can go back and revisit later without giving away the event they were pointing to.
The mark of a good writer is to know which events to foreshadow and which to keep low-key until they're revealed, constant use of foreshadowing is a sign of bad writing since it usually devolves into comical levels where even the most minor and irrelevant events get foreshadowed. So many aspiring writers fall into this damn trap.
Isn't that what foreshadowing is, at least at its most subtle? The Catalyst was not a good reveal. You can't just manufacture a new antagonist out of nowhere at the end of the story.
I wanted to stay out of debating this dead horse but I just wanted to say that foreshadowing is not required for every major event that occurs in a story. If your goal is to build up suspension then sure, since foreshadowing is key to the suspense, but if you want to have some big massive reveal like the Catalyst originally was then no, you don't constantly foreshadow that stuff otherwise it will remove the surprise factor, the most you should do is plant some clues which people can go back and revisit later without giving away the event they were pointing to.
The mark of a good writer is to know which events to foreshadow and which to keep low-key until they're revealed, constant use of foreshadowing is a sign of bad writing since it usually devolves into comical levels where even the most minor and irrelevant events get foreshadowed. So many aspiring writers fall into this damn trap.
I recognise your feeling on this to a certain extent, but one thing that occurred to me about the end of ME2 and the development of the ME3 story, was the hopelessness of the quest to actually beat the reapers due to their numbers, and overall superiority. To me the most obvious way to develop the story faced with such odds was an accord between the human Alliance and Cerberus with the object of undermining the IM using Shep as the catalyst. This of course means a split between Humans and the rest of the Council races, but they are heading that way eventually anyway.I think the the IM actually had the right of it in terms of finding a way to influence reaper action rather than direct confrontation This must have been an option considered at one point by the developers but discarded for a reason that escapes me. I agree introducing some sort of ethereal construct (the format revealed a semi benign insight to Shep's psyche anyway) asking for instructions falls directly into the wtf category
Really? Why? I don't think it added all that much to the story, but I really liked the investigation format.
Linear piece of drivel.
Plus it was a blatant attempt to shore up their utter trainwreck of an ending post mess.
Feels like more of an attempt to push their genetic rape ending too, with look here's a dangerous apex species lurking to take over if you destroy the reapers.
Linear piece of drivel.
Plus it was a blatant attempt to shore up their utter trainwreck of an ending post mess.
Feels like more of an attempt to push their genetic rape ending too, with look here's a dangerous apex species lurking to take over if you destroy the reapers.
Yeah, I agree on what it did for the story, but I really liked the presentation.
Hey guys...I've been away for a while.What's going on?
Hey guys...I've been away for a while.What's going on?
Popeyes' Tuesday special. Two piece meal with biscuit and side for $4.50
Yes it is. It opposes the protagonist, which is the definition of antagonist. The dreams weren't foreshadowing the Catalyst. Those were dreams caused by Shepard cracking under the pressure of the events of the games. Why the Catalyst takes on the appearance of the same child is unexplained and very strange. The VI did mention something but I think that was too close to the end.
I don't think the Catalyst is supposed to be, in any way, related to the Earth kid. BioWare frequently reuses character models. Most likely they just went with the AI/alien/other-appearing-as-a-child trope, reused the child shaped model they already had, then put the shimmering effect on to disguise it (when the Dragonborn sees the same kid's face in every city in Skyrim he isn't being affected by dragon magic, Bethesda was being economical -- there's a huge precedent for this sort of thing).
Another way to think about it is how weird it would be if the Catalyst is supposed to be the child. Shepard doesn't react to it in anyway. He's completely oblivious or emotionally inert to the Catalyst taking the form of something that's been tormenting him for months. There's also the other weird implication that the Catalyst can somehow read minds; and if it did decide to take the kid's form why it use a wispy hologram and voice distortion. Any way you slice it doesn't make any in-story sense for the Catalyst to take the kids form.
Any way you slice it doesn't make any in-story sense for the Catalyst to take the kids form.
What about the Catalyst taking on this form to build up trust? Maybe it wants Shepard to believe it so badly that it takes on this "innocent" shape. This could be especially relevant if Synthesis is available, as it wants to talk Shepard into choosing this option.
I agree though that it's weird Shepard doesn't react at all to it. They really should've done something there. Maybe the blast made him/her forget about that damn kid 
What about the Catalyst taking on this form to build up trust? Maybe it wants Shepard to believe it so badly that it takes on this "innocent" shape. This could be especially relevant if Synthesis is available, as it wants to talk Shepard into choosing this option.
That might work if it took the form of your LI or maybe Ashley/Kaidan who died on Virmire. If not them, someone else who died that may have been close to Shepard. The kid is only seen for a few moments at the beginning of the game. I had no attachment to him.
I agree though that it's weird Shepard doesn't react at all to it. They really should've done something there. Maybe the blast made him/her forget about that damn kid
Shepard: Why are taking the form of a child?
catalyst: You don't need to know why, and there's not enough time to explain
I don't think the Catalyst is supposed to be, in any way, related to the Earth kid. BioWare frequently reuses character models. Most likely they just went with the AI/alien/other-appearing-as-a-child trope, reused the child shaped model they already had, then put the shimmering effect on to disguise it (when the Dragonborn sees the same kid's face in every city in Skyrim he isn't being affected by dragon magic, Bethesda was being economical -- there's a huge precedent for this sort of thing).
Another way to think about it is how weird it would be if the Catalyst is supposed to be the child. Shepard doesn't react to it in anyway. He's completely oblivious or emotionally inert to the Catalyst taking the form of something that's been tormenting him for months. There's also the other weird implication that the Catalyst can somehow read minds; and if it did decide to take the kid's form why it use a wispy hologram and voice distortion. Any way you slice it doesn't make any in-story sense for the Catalyst to take the kids form.
You could be right but that would be the epitome of laziness. We notice and poke fun at the reuse of character models for generic NPCs but it's really not a big deal because they don't really matter. Here, however, the entire ending scene is centered on the Catalyst and he looks like a person we've seen several times. It wasn't obviously different people using a shared model, it has been the same person in the intro and all the dreams. Due to this repetition, we're waiting for some sort of payoff relating to this kid. You can't just reuse that model in an obvious way.
As to your second paragraph, that's exactly the problem with that aspect of the scene. If we, the audience notice immediately, why doesn't Shepard?
What about the Catalyst taking on this form to build up trust? Maybe it wants Shepard to believe it so badly that it takes on this "innocent" shape. This could be especially relevant if Synthesis is available, as it wants to talk Shepard into choosing this option.
I agree though that it's weird Shepard doesn't react at all to it. They really should've done something there. Maybe the blast made him/her forget about that damn kid
Then Shepard must react to it. However it's as if he doesn't notice.
That might work if it took the form of your LI or maybe Ashley/Kaidan who died on Virmire. If not them, someone else who died that may have been close to Shepard. The kid is only seen for a few moments at the beginning of the game. I had no attachment to him.n
And again, Shepard would have to react to it. Imagine if it looked like Anderson or Miranda or whoever but Shepard had the same conversation!
And again, Shepard would have to react to it. Imagine if it looked like Anderson or Miranda or whoever but Shepard had the same conversation!
Just have it the same as when Shepard is talking with Leviathan. Shepard did call Ann by name when Leviathan stood in front of him/her
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