Mass Effect 3 - The Ending Continued

Dhruin

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The Mass Effect 3 ending continues to generate columns of copy - even the Better Business Bureau has weighed in. Zohaib sends in this article from Brad Tramel, who argues the current ending is appropriate:
Players have many problems with the final minutes of Mass Effect 3, but the lack of impact previous choices have on the ending is perhaps the most apparent complaint. It seems fitting that a series rife with variety and choice would, well, carry that variety and choice to the end. Sure, you cured the Genophage, but why didn’t BioWare show Wrex or Grunt charge at a Reaper full bore? Why didn’t the Rachni Queen, if you saved her, swarm a Reaper or two with its smaller creepy-crawlies close behind? And why didn’t we see Tali and Legion, having just debated the incorporeal essence of being, follow up with the meaning of life on their way to London, the final battleground?
The answer is simple. It’s because Mass Effect is about Shepard—not Wrex, Grunt, Legion, or Tali. Moreover, it’s about you, the player, as an extension of Shepard. The player has always infused Shepard with a part of him or herself, and player values are injected into Shepard by way of player choice. This is true of the game’s final moments, too. The last choice you have to make is brilliant, because rather than provide one of x number of endings, it gives you three and tells you to choose, after all that has happened—after every laborious choice you have made—what is most important.
Kotaku has news the US Better Business Bureau blog supports the idea that BioWare's advertising was misleading. I've got to tell you - whatever you think about the ending, this is a slippery slope:
The issue at stake here is, did Bio Ware falsely advertise? Technically, yes, they did. In the first bullet point, where it states “the decisions you make completely shape your experience”, there is no indecision in that statement. It is an absolute.
...and Eurogamer reports on what the Extended Cut will offer:
Gamble reiterated BioWare's previous stance that the new content would not "re-imagine" the current ending or add a new one. So why wasn't the Extended Cut part of the game already?
"The dev team stands by what was released in the core product, and we're very proud of it," Gamble concluded. "It was important though for us to listen to the community, and a lot of that feedback didn't come until the game came out. Once we were listening we decided to include the extended cut. It wasn't in the game because we didn't know there was such a huge demand for it, to be honest with you."
More information.
 
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The answer is simple. It’s because Mass Effect is about Shepard—not Wrex, Grunt, Legion, or Tali. Moreover, it’s about you, the player, as an extension of Shepard.

What a *beep*. Also, of course, completely wrong. ME is ONLY about Wrex, Grunt, Legion and Tali (and the other characters and their stories). Because that's what BioWare does: party-based RPGs - not "lone wolf" titles. That's all BioWare has ever done. Shepard isn't even a real character (in the sense of the mentioned squad members), he's basically just the avatar, the thing the player uses to take action in the game world. The opposite of what this guy claims. They only came up with a static name and all that, because it's cheaper and takes less effort throughout the whole development cycle (just like they gave all characters one outfit, beginning with Mass Effect 2, instead of fully customizable armors). Only with the static name it's possible to have voice-actors address the player character. And voicing absolutely everything is what they do.
What happens in the end, or what it addresses, is also the opposite of what is most important. But whatever, the whole thing is just a major misinterpretation.
 
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A Thousand sites can come with a millions justifications on why the ending was good and why its apropriate and whatnot, but for me, a simple customer that spent 50 on it, i am disapointed.

In the end, thats what matters, the customer's opinion. I was so disapointed with the ending that i swore never to buy a bioware game again.

If i'm wrong in the end doesnt matter because me (a paying customer) will always think he is right no matter what. Its the human nature.

It's in bioware's best interest to fix its product if too many people think its "broken" because in the end, losing customers its always bad no matter what business you are at, and no matter how many millions you make.

The true proof that bioware reached a conclusion its product its "semi-broken" its the fact they will add a FREE DLC with more depth. EA its not knows for its free DLCs ;)
 
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People are silly and need to find better things to do with their time.
 
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Honestly the indoctrination theory does make complete sense and providing it was what bioware intended i gotta admit that would be the most EPIC thinking and writing ever done they made everyone think the ending is something else even though giving you many clues through out the 3 games about whats really going on

this is the video if anybody didn't see it yet: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ythY_GkEBck

if bioware did include this in the game not in a future DLC, the fuss and discussions that is going on about the ending wouldn't have happened(at least not this big) but what they did is genius providing that they fulfill it properly to the end with this addon in summer.
 
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Will the Better Business Bureau also be going after John Romero for not making me his bitch as advertised?
 
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I agree with one thing the on the BBB blog.

Stephens concludes stating that the “lesson to be learned” from in this case is “companies should give careful consideration to how they word their advertisements.”

Advertising does go out of hand and show footage and game content sometimes not in the game. It's a slippery slope but maybe one the industry needs to learn. False advertising is wrong.
 
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People are silly and need to find better things to do with their time.

Ironic, this coming from someone that spends his time on internet computer games' forums, saying other people shouldn't lose time on a computer game.


eh eh, deliciously ironic.


Anyways, i work 8 hours a day, have a wife and a son. When they are all in bed i like to waste my time doing nothing and playing computer games and nagging about them ;)
 
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I agree with one thing the on the BBB blog.
Advertising does go out of hand and show footage and game content sometimes not in the game. It's a slippery slope but maybe one the industry needs to learn. False advertising is wrong.

IMO advertising in the game industry has been out of hand because untruthful pre-release hype sells copies with minimum risk. As long as they can get away with it, of course they'll keep doing it. This has been long time coming.
 
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Ironic, this coming from someone that spends his time on internet computer games' forums, saying other people shouldn't lose time on a computer game.

eh eh, deliciously ironic.

Anyways, i work 8 hours a day, have a wife and a son. When they are all in bed i like to waste my time doing nothing and playing computer games and nagging about them ;)

Many nerds seem to delight in being able to laugh down on other nerds for being nerdy. Maybe that way they can pretend not being nerds?

Embrace your nerdiness, I say! Raise your fake lightsabers and buffer swords with pride! :p
 
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Many nerds seem to delight in being able to laugh down on other nerds for being nerdy. Maybe that way they can pretend not being nerds?

Embrace your nerdiness, I say! Raise your fake lightsabers and buffer swords with pride! :p

Nah I'll challenge you to a starwars dance off instead. We can raise our fake lightsabers and dance are asses off. It's on.:biggrin:
 
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The desire to play exceptional characters, characters large than the universe, is what gives games like ME3.
The writer is right: it is you, the player who wants to play exceptional characters, who gives the licence to developpers to developp that kind of games.

It is forcefully a good game if you like that kind of play.

False advertising? Normalcy for video game industry. ME2 was advertized as being a suicide mission. Well, it was not, you had to work your way to make it a suicide mission.

Most players probably do not even believed that ME3 would provide multiple endings. People with at least one year gaming experience, that is. It was written on the walls.

Artistic choice? Nope. Commercial choice. ME universe franchise is likely to be the sole major sci fi universe developped during the 2010s. It is the sci fi universe this generation will be brought up.
Not that is good. It is dull, generic, revamped, devoid of any soul.

But it prevails as it is the only one.

Bioware certainly aims at milking that universe. ME3 ending with several different outcomes that would deeply change the universe? Well, not that possible to milk the universe after that.

Lets see what it gives for the next arc.
 
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Ironic, this coming from someone that spends his time on internet computer games' forums, saying other people shouldn't lose time on a computer game.

eh eh, deliciously ironic.

Anyways, i work 8 hours a day, have a wife and a son. When they are all in bed i like to waste my time doing nothing and playing computer games and nagging about them ;)

Nag away brother. I'm more surprised at the level of the bitching than the bitching itself if that makes any sense. You would thing Bioware/EA crapped all over some great estate in the gaming universe.

Maybe I'm just sad that Mass Effect is that great estate. I couldn't bring myself to finish the first one.
 
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I get the sense that those who were most disappointed with ME3 were the ones who were the biggest fans of ME1 and ME2, and may have imported saves from the previous games, hoping that some of their choices along the way would affect the final ending.

In my case, I really enjoyed ME2, but it was never exactly one of my favorite games. I prefer games where you have a bit more freedom of exploration and character customization (and less cutscenes, or at least skippable ones). That said, the setting was original and very interesting, the gameplay was a heck of a lot of fun and the cinematic storytelling was top notch.

I tried ME1 after playing ME2 and I appreciated that there was much more open exploration, but the gameplay was not as fun as ME2.

ME3's level design really blew me away. I was very impressed. I did not import any save game and I approached it as a new game, in the sense that I didn't particularly care whether "Squadmate X" was alive or dead from the previous games in the series. At any rate, I enjoyed the gameplay so much that I don't think I could ever go back to playing ME2 or ME1. ME3 is a far superior game IMHO, freed from the "corridor-cutscene-corridor" pace of ME2 and with a reputation system that better facilitates roleplaying instead of requiring that you always pick either the "paragon" or "renegade" dialogue options.

As for the ending, perhaps it could have used a couple of extra cutscenes to show more details about what happened to some of the NPCs and the rest of the galaxy, but I found it to be a logical conclusion to the story. Certainly nothing worth complaining about to the Better Business Bureau :p
 
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I think the endings work if you don't look to deep at them and are just playing the game casually ... meaning little investment.

I would suspect playing all the games and investing more into the game on a deeper level would create the sense that the endings were not all that great. having played all three games back to back (started late) I can easily see why the endings would disappoint some.

However its all really dependent on the player to a large degree ... although clearly plenty of people were upset. For me it had more to do with a disruption of some themes that were in the game.

Oddly enough I thought many of your choices did get some recognition in the game. I saw any number of things pop-up through out all the games.

My biggest beef is that I am not a tragic ending guy. Oh I understand many people love those - one of my best friends really digs them. However I don't. Life is depressing enough. I want my gaming hero to have a bit more of an uplifting ending ... or at least some resolution.

Given a choice I would have preferred the endings to have the option of tragic, neutral and semi-positive. I never really understood why people like depressing and sad endings in a game even though I know many do.

Regardless I enjoyed all the games for what they were. Since I played them back to back it was easy to compare all three over the 5-6 weeks it took me to play them all. All had some good and bad points IMO.

Overall really enjoyed them and was sad when it was all over. However I won't be playing them again as the endings somewhat removed any desire to replay. Still I have no regrets playing - it was a great 5-6 weeks that I fully enjoyed a great deal.
 
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Agree, Wolfgrimdark. If I wanted a tragic end, I'd just not reload after I'd lost a shootout.

To quote DA:O's lead designer, Brent Knowles, on the ME3 endings: "End on a positive note. This is really important for video games... life in general is full of shitty stuff happening all the time. When I invest a hundred hours into a game I need to walk away feeling like a hero"
 
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I get the sense that those who were most disappointed with ME3 were the ones who were the biggest fans of ME1 and ME2, and may have imported saves from the previous games, hoping that some of their choices along the way would affect the final ending.

.....

As for the ending, perhaps it could have used a couple of extra cutscenes to show more details about what happened to some of the NPCs and the rest of the galaxy, but I found it to be a logical conclusion to the story. Certainly nothing worth complaining about to the Better Business Bureau :p


I think it should be more than just a few more extra cut-scenes. I haven't played ME3 because I was severely disappointed by what I heard of endings. To me, ME series was about people. My Fem Shep, and my squadmates. To be denied of proper ending where you aren't sure of Shepard's fate (just because he/she twitches in rubble at the end, doesn't mean he/she is truly alive and if he/she's alive, what happened after that for child+grandpa to have that type of conversation at the end?) and wtf happened to all my squadmates? Sure, it shows 3 of them landing it some weirdo planet, but what after that? What about others? I need answers, Bioware. I felt the same rage when I bought Witch Hunt DLC for DA:O which promised some answers and gave none (in fact, it gave more questions to be answered).
 
ME3 may be getting a somewhat unfair rap here, relatively speaking, but it's high time the BBB did weigh in upon the industry. I hated the ending, but as video games go it is far from the most disappointing package. It is even excellent in some areas, like level design, some humorous moments, and multiplayer (when it works). But the industry has been out of control for a long time and that is not some unique thing to cherish. Bullshots, misleading packaging, deceptive copy, "choice and consequences", increasingly restrictive multiplayer arrangements, broken systems and AI, day one patches, which still don't help… even completely broken console games are out there, and none of it is forgiveable.

It goes without saying that policing just plain bad video games would be very difficult, infinitely moreso for PC games which have a legitimate bevy of hardware compatibility issues to deal with. But ad copy is one clearcut place to start. We all know just how many "Directors of Marketing" we've been spoonfed by over the years. The lies are endless and shameless. The press is largely ineffectual and deferential. Even Metacritic doesn't really help that much; what other industry spawned a need for averaged review scores from hundreds of writers??

Just because we've learned to deal with it all our lives, why should our children have to? I know there will always be stupid people out there, there will always be legal advertising tricks, and this is no panacaea. But it would be a start. Bioware is far from the worst offender. But I think it's fair — lie to us, point blank, and pay the consequences just like every other adman.
 
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The press is largely ineffectual and deferential. Even Metacritic doesn't really help that much; what other industry spawned a need for averaged review scores from hundreds of writers??


You could copy and paste that into a post about the movie industry and with only a few minor tweaks into posts about TV studios and the music industry. Not saying you're any less right, but just that you're really describing the marketing standard operating procedures for the entire entertainment sector - more or less.
 
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