The Mass Effect Thread

[King Ellis]

Any online tonight, lads?

[Nick Adams]

Sounds good to me.

[Dan]

I'm in, we need a #4.

[Ruki]

I will join in!

....tomorrow.

[King Ellis]

Get your arse in the game, Nick!

[Nick Adams]

GAH! XBox live hates me. Couldn't load the damn game with everybody else, then it kicks me off... I give up.

[mystikz]

I heard about the backlash to the ending and all. It just really left me saying WTF. Besides the ending I really enjoyed the bulk of the game. there was some good character development and dialogue. I obviously missed some of the ME2 squadmates but it seemed fitting. I still feel rather disappointed like others. I'll obviously spoiler actual thoughts

seriously WTF was that ending? where the hell did my squad go? you don't fight Harbinger or any reapers? I didn't even end up fighting the Illusive Man he shot himself like Saren. I didn't like the idea of him as end boss either way. the catalyst is some ghost/spectral kid that created/uses them? what the hell? uh.... really?

other than the last choice it didn't even seem like my choices mattered much. what about the Geth? after making peace with them?

for this being the end of the trilogy it seemed like a lot of plotholes. the Asari/Prothean connections you discover on Thessia. nthat Sun going Nova from Tali's recruitment mission on ME2.

the build up was so great..... and then the end. choices were supposed to matter. you make peace and the biggest army ever, and there wasn't even much of a conclusion.

oh yeah, I continued my relationshp with Tali (sorry Liara). I thought it was great, besides the face controversy. the stock photo use and it just being way too human like. I mean I'll almost pretend I didn't see it. I mean hot alien babes should look somewhat .... alien ya know?

Edited March 13, 2012 by mystikz

[tenaciousg]

I wouldn't be surprised if we find out that EA rushed the game's production to get it out early, so the last portion suffered for it.

[Nick Adams]

It's also possible that doing as many additional videos for the ending as there are endings (apparently there are five different outcomes total, ten if you account for the variable of the Collector Base and whether you destroyed it or just vaporized every living thing in the place) was so much work that the game would have been delayed until 2013, even though they announced a definite release of 2012. Admittedly, when they pushed back Arkham City, it wound up being worth the wait, so maybe, just maybe, EA did rush it. Either that, or, y'know, since they're saying, "Keep your saved games", we're gonna' have a shit-ton of DLC come September.

(PS - yes, I did just toss in a movie title.)

[Benji]

I wouldn't be surprised if we find out that EA rushed the game's production to get it out early, so the last portion suffered for it.

Which was basically the stupidest thing they could have done. I'll probably write spoilers below...

This is a series called Mass Effect, not just because of the the technology of the same name, but because the entire concept of the game was that your decisions decide things(IE: Your actions have an effect of large reach). There's a set path, but at the end, your decisions are what counts. They've clearly chickened out of just making it a trilogy and decided to carry on with the series as a cash cow. That should've been the end of it, you should've gotten either text or video to explain what happens to the universe after that, and that's it.

Honestly, I'm not even bothered that much that the final decision was just a different coloured light, and the countless plot holes in that ending... whatever... what I want to know is the results were of my decisions. Did the Geth and the Quarians manage to co-exist? Did my obsession with saving the Krogans backfire and wind up with them storming the universe? Did my decision to tell Vega to join the N7s pan out, and did he become a big damn hero, or did my lack of telling him off for being such a layabout cause some kind of big issue? Did the universe manage to rebuild the relays and get back in contact, or are they all now stuck wherever they wound up?

You make a LOT of decisions... and none of them pan out. Hopefully Bioware's DLC will give you these answers, but I've got a lot of questions about my decisions, not to mention more stuff (the random last minute addition of the info that the Asari were in contact with the Protheans at one point, for one).

EDIT: I've since discovered that one of the main writers of the first two, Drew Krapshyn, was not involved in number three, which may go some way to explaining the subpar ending. I think the best word for the ending is not bad, it's "unfulfilling".

[EddieRuckus]

Ending spoilers:

I REALLY hope I don't get called an apologist for what I'm about to write, because if I am by any of you intelligent folks then I really cannot take your word seriously. That said, anyone who didn't like the ending I totally understand why you don't, for reasons listed.

To be honest, as much as the choices mattered in the 2nd game and most of the third game, I really don't think choices are what should have mattered in the ending. From the very first game Shepard has always said he/she would do whatever it takes to destroy the reapers, and in the end he/she is willing to sacrifice in order to do so(though obviously if your EMS is high enough he/she breathes at the end.) I really don't mind having everything tied up in a nice little bow, because it causes for fun discussions after the game is done. We've had movies and books that have done the same thing, where you're left to wonder what happens and discuss it afterwards.

Again, I understand people who want it wrapped entirely up in a bow, they're right to be mad, I'm just explaining why I enjoyed the ending. The scene after the credits though where Stargazer(voiced by Buzz Aldrin) is talking to a kid makes me think they have at least one more game or DLC to wrap things up. Why? The kid says "tell me another story of The Shepard", to which Stargazer responds "ok, just one more story."

[Kane's Mullet Slacker]

Ending spoilers:

I REALLY hope I don't get called an apologist for what I'm about to write, because if I am by any of you intelligent folks then I really cannot take your word seriously. That said, anyone who didn't like the ending I totally understand why you don't, for reasons listed.

To be honest, as much as the choices mattered in the 2nd game and most of the third game, I really don't think choices are what should have mattered in the ending. From the very first game Shepard has always said he/she would do whatever it takes to destroy the reapers, and in the end he/she is willing to sacrifice in order to do so(though obviously if your EMS is high enough he/she breathes at the end.) I really don't mind having everything tied up in a nice little bow, because it causes for fun discussions after the game is done. We've had movies and books that have done the same thing, where you're left to wonder what happens and discuss it afterwards.

Again, I understand people who want it wrapped entirely up in a bow, they're right to be mad, I'm just explaining why I enjoyed the ending. The scene after the credits though where Stargazer(voiced by Buzz Aldrin) is talking to a kid makes me think they have at least one more game or DLC to wrap things up. Why? The kid says "tell me another story of The Shepard", to which Stargazer responds "ok, just one more story."

The three choices in the end result in basically the same outcome with the same cutscene. It's just a different colored light, the Mass Relays are destroyed. How are you going to have another game even if Shepard somehow survived when the Mass Relays are destroyed. All the aliens that joined the fight against the Reapers on Earth are fucked. They're stuck on Earth and the Mass Relay technology was so far advanced it couldn't be replicated. Also, why the Hell is the Normandy in mid-flight when they were in the battle above Earth? Also, why is your team back on Normandy? Also what the Hell happened to your squad after Harbinger was all, "I'M A' FIRIN' MAH LAZER!!"? It would have been nice to have an epilogue to the story. Instead 100 of hours of gameplay amount to nothing.

Edited March 13, 2012 by Don Ready Slacker

[mystikz]

I wouldn't be surprised if we find out that EA rushed the game's production to get it out early, so the last portion suffered for it.

Which was basically the stupidest thing they could have done. I'll probably write spoilers below...

This is a series called Mass Effect, not just because of the the technology of the same name, but because the entire concept of the game was that your decisions decide things(IE: Your actions have an effect of large reach). There's a set path, but at the end, your decisions are what counts. They've clearly chickened out of just making it a trilogy and decided to carry on with the series as a cash cow. That should've been the end of it, you should've gotten either text or video to explain what happens to the universe after that, and that's it.

Honestly, I'm not even bothered that much that the final decision was just a different coloured light, and the countless plot holes in that ending... whatever... what I want to know is the results were of my decisions. Did the Geth and the Quarians manage to co-exist? Did my obsession with saving the Krogans backfire and wind up with them storming the universe? Did my decision to tell Vega to join the N7s pan out, and did he become a big damn hero, or did my lack of telling him off for being such a layabout cause some kind of big issue? Did the universe manage to rebuild the relays and get back in contact, or are they all now stuck wherever they wound up?

You make a LOT of decisions... and none of them pan out. Hopefully Bioware's DLC will give you these answers, but I've got a lot of questions about my decisions, not to mention more stuff (the random last minute addition of the info that the Asari were in contact with the Protheans at one point, for one).

EDIT: I've since discovered that one of the main writers of the first two, Drew Krapshyn, was not involved in number three, which may go some way to explaining the subpar ending. I think the best word for the ending is not bad, it's "unfulfilling".

basically Drew Karpyshyn lead wrote KOTOR, ME1, and the JK story in SWTOR, co-wrote ME2, and worked on NWN/JE/BG2. from what I've read he had different ideas for an ending. I'm with others in thinking if he had finished the ME story it would have been A LOT better.

Ending spoilers:

I REALLY hope I don't get called an apologist for what I'm about to write, because if I am by any of you intelligent folks then I really cannot take your word seriously. That said, anyone who didn't like the ending I totally understand why you don't, for reasons listed.

To be honest, as much as the choices mattered in the 2nd game and most of the third game, I really don't think choices are what should have mattered in the ending. From the very first game Shepard has always said he/she would do whatever it takes to destroy the reapers, and in the end he/she is willing to sacrifice in order to do so(though obviously if your EMS is high enough he/she breathes at the end.) I really don't mind having everything tied up in a nice little bow, because it causes for fun discussions after the game is done. We've had movies and books that have done the same thing, where you're left to wonder what happens and discuss it afterwards.

Again, I understand people who want it wrapped entirely up in a bow, they're right to be mad, I'm just explaining why I enjoyed the ending. The scene after the credits though where Stargazer(voiced by Buzz Aldrin) is talking to a kid makes me think they have at least one more game or DLC to wrap things up. Why? The kid says "tell me another story of The Shepard", to which Stargazer responds "ok, just one more story."

a kotaku post about the ending. obviously don't go if you haven't gotten to the ending. http://kotaku.com/5892676/why-mass-effect-3s-ending-was-so-terrible/

the point is Sheppard goes to so much effort to assemble the largest army ever and you don't even get to see them do much of anything. the fleets check in and you see them flying towards Earth that's about it. you don't get any update on how they are or what's going on.

the Citadel is magically taken to Earth and then what? your lead to believe COUNTLESS LIVES ARE JUST SLAUGHTERED? what happened to EVERYONE on the citadel? you are given no information other than seeing some dead bodies which were supposed to be cerberus troops and some civilians I take it?

the Stargazer thing seemed like a poorly tacked on epilogue that didn't tell you anything.

a conclusion of a trilogy, should actually wrap things up. instead it just left plotholes, inconsistencies and confusion. again don't get me wrong I loved everything until the ending.

the endings are all very similar. the one you've been fighting for all game to beat the Reapers is somehow then presented as Renegade, and to do it you kill all synthetic life including Edi and the Geth you've allied with. that makes NO SENSE. the other 2 were even less satisfying.

I wanted to fight Harbinger. see all the species rallying together. what about the Elcor? Volus? Hanar? Drell? all the war assets? your previous squadmates get nothing but a holo call and pep talk. it's just very unsatisfying for what should have been an epic ending to an amazing series.

I don't know what to do though. I really want to replay the game as I loved everything up till the end. I'd probably just stop there though.

Edited March 13, 2012 by mystikz

[EddieRuckus]

I see the points you all make, but my post was really just saying I didn't mind the ending for the reasons I listed. It really didn't bother me as much as others, if that makes me a bad person or whatever so be it

[tenaciousg]

I don't hate the last five minutes or so as much as a lot of other people, but I fully believe that if they were cut out, I'd see ME3 as a perfect game.

[King Ellis]

More online tonight!

[Nick Adams]

I read a possible ending where Microsoft decided to tell BioWare, "Hey, could you work with those Halo guys for one of the endings? We totally want to see an ending where the Reapers get blasted to the Halo universe where the Flood has succeeded, and the Reapers can NEVER take them down, because they just keep coming without dropping dead."

Ah well. I think the real problem that people have with the ending is:

Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 were sort of morality plays with your choices allowing you to make an end result that doesn't screw over everybody. Mass Effect 3 doesn't seem to present any one "good" option, because either:

1. The Reapers are left alive to possibly return at some point, but this time with Shephard in control. In other words, whereas you could have ended the cycle, you chose to put the ONE PERSON that actually had a chance to end the cycle forever in charge of the Reapers. Congratulations, you're an idiot.
   
2. The sentient races of the galaxy get what I call the "Resistance is Futile" ending where everybody becomes a cyborg. Considering you were just fighting against machine domination, it feels like kind of a cop-out. More to the point, the Reapers still win, because synthetics are now a part of EVERY galactic race.
   
3. The Reapers and everything they built, as well as every synthetic individual (namely, the Geth and EDI). This ending leads to the Citadel and all of its occupants going ka-boom, the mass relays being gone, and the whole of the galaxy no longer being a truly connected community. Even if Shephard survives this one, he's responsible for betraying a large group of allies, eliminating the one individual that Jeff Moreau actually tried to romance, and trapping an entire fleet of diverse races within the Sol system, and with little possibility of getting beyond the local star cluster within a human, salarian, or turian life time (though the krogan and asari could probably live long enough to make it last). Oh, and he probably also blew up the devices that were keeping him alive. Because, y'know, cybernetic implants. Meaning he's also doomed a bunch of people on pace makers, or that had implants that were keeping them alive or helping with their quality of life, if that's the case.
   

Basically, no matter how things play out, the galaxy is screwed. It's totally a nihilistic end result. It seems like a no-win scenario, and none of the choices you make matter.

However, the reason for this ending is:

Since this is a disc-based game instead of a computer install, you can't have an endless number of results. The original Deus Ex was a PC-only title specifically because there were 64 ways that the game could end, although admittedly it was technically because there were sixteen variables with four different possibilities each (or maybe it was four variables with sixteen possibilities - I haven't played it in years). In Mass Effect, it would have been possible to do the same thing, when you think about it. Here are the variables, as far as I could figure:

Mass Effect 1

• Your back story
  
• Whether Wrex lives or dies on Virmire.
  
• Letting the Rachni queen live or die
  
• Who survives Virmire: Ashley or Kaidan
  
• Who you romance: The human counterpart, or Liara
  
• Whether you saved the Council in the Battle of the Citadel
  
• Who you chose to be the Councillor: Anderson or Udina
  
• Whether you completed certain missions or not, although that was mostly for the Mass Effect 2 game play, as far as I can see, since it would be unfair to PS3 players for choices you can't make except in the Genesis pre-story to have far-reaching consequences
  
  Mass Effect 2
  
• The loyalty missions, and how you complete them.
  
• Who survives the attack on the Collector Base
  
• More romance options, and whether you pursue (Male or female): Jack/Miranda/Tali or Jacob/Garrus/Thane
  
• Whether you destroy the Collector Base or just kill the inhabitants
  
  Mass Effect 3
  Haven't finished the game, but I imagine it's a LOT of variables
  
  Entire Series
  
• Paragon or Renegade
  
• Swaying allies to Paragon or Renegade view points

Here's the problem with having too many endings. It wouldn't have worked for a console game, because that is just too much data to have without having the game installed on the console. They would have needed to make a third disc just so that every choice, every single thing you've done up to that point, to get an accounting. It would be months of extra programming just for a conclusion that is truly immersive, that truly lets every decision you've done determine the end result. The problem here is that BioWare made the Crucible the MacGuffin of the game, and then realized that they'd made a mistake by doing that, but couldn't go anywhere from there, except to get to the finish. Of course, destroying the reapers means that future societies will develop on their own in a space-faring age, instead of taking technology from their predecessors, so perhaps that's the ending that people really should take, in spite of it being apparently the Renegade choice.

As for my impressions of how the ending could could have been better:

Honestly, I wish that BioWare had gone with the leaked ending that sounded similar to how Terminator: Salvation was originally planned, before most people on the project decided that John Connor needed a more pivotal role. But I digress. Taking what little information we have from the original plan for Mass Effect 3, or at least what could have been the original plan, this is how I figure BioWare may have been thinking, before the guy that wrote Mass Effect and co-wrote Mass Effect 2 chose to leave the Mass Effect 3 writing team to work on The Old Republic (fuck that game, it could have waited so ME3 got a better story).

Basically, it went that The Reapers were originally vessels of the galaxy's first space-faring society. That society, instead of making mass relays, actually just built ships large enough that they were their own mass relays. This society used these ships to traverse the numerous star systems, going almost instantly from point to point. But this had an unfortunate side effect - the constant use of dark energy to generate mass effect fields caused instabilities in the systems where these ships were used. After utilizing so many of them, the home star of this society deteriorated until finally, the dark energy compressed it to the point where it was forty times more massive than it should have been, leading to a supernova that destroyed the home of this species. This society, seeing the havoc that their vessels had wrought, took the ships they had left, and placed them strategically throughout the Milky Way. They deconstructed the propulsion systems, and made them the mass relays. Meanwhile, the remnants of these huge vessels, still capable of summoning dark energy when needed, were turned in to the Citadel, and the Citadel in turn was built to originally resemble one of the cities in the home world.

The Reapers were then built, and given true AIs to guide them. The Reapers also had every single weapon, every single device, every single tool given to them that the society had - except for a self-contained mass relay. Then, realizing that their technology could lead to the end of the galaxy if they continued to exist, the leaders of the society decided to give the reapers some sort of organic being. And so, billions were taken, forcibly if necessary, to give the Reapers each a collective mind - to make them gods, even in dreams. The ships were given ranks, based upon their former castes, and they were given only one directive before the final member of this disastrous society sacrificed himself - stop future societies from doing as we have done. With this in mind, the lowest-ranked Reaper was left in a place where none of the relays would send a ship, where even a regular dark matter propulsion field could find it, to wait and observe. After the time of fifty thousand orbital cycles of the former home world had passed, this one observer discovered that that second society, based upon what would later be mistaken as Reaper technology, was trying to build its own mass relay. The Citadel triggered the Reapers to return, and with their technology, they eliminated a society so close to the verge of annihilating the galaxy, star by star. Each time, they would try to save the remnants of the strongest members of those societies by incorporating them in to a new master Reaper, which would be left as the observer.

After this happened fifty thousand orbital cycles later, a pattern began to emerge. And so, every fifty millennia, the Reapers came to cull the galaxy, if only to save it for the future, and to save the future from itself. However, the cycle prior to the current society was not culled fast enough - the Protheans managed to create a mass relay, even though it was only from point to point, and only in one direction. The Reapers had truly miscalculated their return, and either because the Protheans had managed to resist more fervently than their predecessors, or because the Reapers wished for the Protheans to be forgotten completely, with only their bodies, genetically altered to be enslaved, remaining. With the current cycle, the situation was even more dire - races such as the Rachni had somehow figured out mass effect fields and mass relay jumps without ever utilizing technology developed from previous cycles. Sovereign, the reaper most recently made from the civilization preceding the Protheans, made sure that the rachni, a peaceful race, went to war with the rest of the galaxy, ensuring their extinction. However, when Sovereign (or Nazara - probably the name of the race used to make it) saw that there were even more things happening that predicted disaster - the salarians uplifting the Krogan, resulting in the Krogan Rebellions - it tried to leap in to action before an army could rise that would be powerful enough to stop the culling. However, the Citadel did not activate when Nazara sent its message, leading to it trying to find allies. Sovereign only got a respite from the Krogan threat because the turians and salarians managed to reduce Krogan birth rates, maybe even with unseen Collector help.

When Nazara came upon the Geth, a hundred years after they rebelled against the Quarians, the Geth were experimenting in dark matter physics in ways that were truly frightening to the Reaper and its kin. If the Geth succeeded in going in the direction in which they were headed, the Reapers would have failed in their purpose - to prevent the forces that caused the Reapers to exist from ever being rediscovered. Although Sovereign tried to indoctrinate the Geth, the fact that one unit was only part of a larger process, combined with the Geth's nature towards independence, meant that only Geth processes that were willing to believe that Sovereign was a synthetic god followed. By then, the star of Haestrom was irrevocably damaged, and dark energy continued to influence it. Sovereign waited, while the Geth heretics willingly built their ships, modeled after its own form. And after indoctrinating and influencing enough wayward sentients, it found one that had plenty of influence - Saren. Saren learned of a Prothean beacon, and after that, Sovereign learned what had gone wrong with its message. It tried to fix this, but fell - the last genetics of the Nazara people, lost because, as the newest Reaper, it could not predict the actions of an organic people.

Now, the Reapers are desperate, fearful that humanity, unseen and unknown when Sovereign started its campaign, could end the cycle, and with the cycle's end, could also come the galaxy's end.

It'd be a lot better of a motivation than, "Since races would inevitably develop sentient machines that would turn on them and annihilate them, we cull those species before that can happen. Probably would have helped the Quarians, instead of their own folly leading to their downfall, at any rate." But hey, that's just me.

[Kane's Mullet Slacker]

I found this and think any of these options would have been a better ending to the game.

[Lint]

Holy shit...Priority: Geth Dreadnaught spoilers..

I actually teared up a bit during Legions death scene...one of my favorite characters from ME2..

[Benji]

From now on, I'm pretending Nick's explanation for The Reapers is the real one.