Support NeoGAF

[LightofRohan]

I do think this game is the best out of the three (minus the last 15 minutes). But there's absolutely no way I could ever suggest this game to anyone because of that last 15 minutes and it makes me feel like those that are still not done with it (my friends/brother) is waiting for Christmas when in reality I know there is no Santa. Makes me really sad.

My friend messaged me, "My galactic score is really high! I'm getting ready!" I shed a tear. I definitely feel like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKTN5NHfwlQ

Is it perhaps possible that the team that made the Arrival DLC also made the ending? I find that most plausible. Because both were disappointing for somewhat similar reasons (plot wise).

This is undoubtedly my most favorite scifi series of all time and now it is completely destroyed. I wont ever play through Mass Effect 1 or 2 again, because the feeling of pointlessness is too much to bear. This is a sad day for me... 5 years for this.

 

[Minion101]

I think the subtext of the whole Space Kid scene was deciding for yourself whether your Shepherd was indoctrinated.

 

[Kabuki Quantum Lover]

i thought the ending was grand but i can understand why people will hate it. all the investment you had with the characters are kinda tossed aside which is actually kinda depressing

There's more than just the characters. There's a lot of logic issues with the ending.

 

[Prologue]

So, let me get this straight. The Paragon ending involves you destroying all Synthetic life? Including the geth?

If you believe destroying(red explosion) all synthetic life(including geth+EDI), is paragon, then sure.

 

[golem]

I did think it was odd TIM showed up for the 'paragon' colored ending and vice versa... argh

Also regarding the endings (controlling the reapers, synthesis, destroying all ai), we did call it space magic in earlier portions of the thread. They were already outlandish powers.. maybe the kid was lying to us.

Dare we give bioware credit for a somewhat clever 'ending'? I guess we'll have to wait and see.

 

[lastplayed]

Why do they have to be paragon or renegade endings? They're just endings with different colours. Millions of people die no matter what you chose.

 

[Lime]

i thought the ending was grand but i can understand why people will hate it. all the investment you had with the characters are kinda tossed aside which is actually kinda depressing

Surely you are able to notice the plotholes, sudden MacGuffins, fallacies, contradictions in whatever information and resolution presented to the player post-Anderson's death? I think it's almost inarguable to consider this ending to be nothing but severely flawed considering what is usually considered acceptable storytelling.

 

[Rebel Leader]

You guys and your dream theory :lol

Destruction is the renegade choice. It's color coded red and you destroy all synthetic life forms. Geth and EDI are toasted and you don't break the cycle. Eventually AI will rise like they geth did and all hell will break lose.

Control is the paragon choice. It's color coded blue and you become a reaper to control them. You break the cycle as you can control the reapers and are able to use them get rid of the AI if they rise. It's different from the Illusive Man choice as he wanted to use them to push human at the top and use the reapers to enslave the other races.

Space Magic is the neutral choice. You simply merge synthetic and organic life with the crucible magic power. The cycle is broken since everyone is now half synthetic half organic. Full AIs don't exist anymore so they can't revolt against their creators.

The dream theroy was NEVER ours.... or I hope it wasn't.... I would hate to think we've been infiltrated by BSN.

 

[JimFear]

Noob here.

is this true what you do in the online portion of the game have an impact on the ending you will get?

 

[LiK]

Surely you are able to notice the plotholes, MacGuffins, fallacies, contradictions in whatever information and resolution presented to the player post-Anderson's death? I think it's almost inarguable to consider this ending to be nothing but severely flawed considering what is usually considered acceptable storytelling.

well, i'm not gonna delve into it too much cuz i thought the moments were awesome. but i do have to say that not knowing what happened to everyone after trying so hard to save them is a bit of an issue.

 

[LightofRohan]

Dunno if this was posted. But it should be posted again. lol

 

[Rebel Leader]

Noob here.

is this true what you do in the online portion of the game have an impact on the ending you will get?

Shepard breaths if you go for the destroy option... but need high EMS and readiness %(I think)

 

[Keasar]

If you believe destroying(red explosion) all synthetic life(including geth+EDI), is paragon, then sure.

Killing the repears was pretty paragonial, what if Shepard goes nuts and start seeing somekind of reason with the Catalysts action (since he was being an idiot and listening to it to begin with) while controlling them and then invade once more?

 

[Riposte]

Got to love YouTube comments. From a video showing your encounter with Sovereign in ME1:

"You cannot even grasp the nature of our existence."

"Try me."

"We were built millions of years ago to stop organics from building AIs, which we sort of assumed would destroy the galaxy. However, there is a master Reaper AI in the Citadel (which I can't contact to open the relay apparently) that can shoot out a laser either destroying all synthetics or making all organics into cyborgs. We decided that instead of using that to stop AIs, we'd just wage genocide."

"...Wow, you were right."

 

[Lime]

well, i'm not gonna delve into it too much cuz i thought the moments were awesome. but i do have to say that not knowing what happened to everyone after trying so hard to save them is a bit of an issue.

I can agree with that. The biggest issue of the ending in an emotional sense is the fact that you as a player do not get any resolution. It basically just ends with no explanation or reasoning to why Shepard had to choose between the Colours of Space Magic, while the characters and everything in the universe are presumably left behind in their respective solar systems with nothing revealed about their future. Like mentioned earlier in the thread, a fucking slide show of what happened would have been preferable than this lack of exposition.

 

[lastplayed]

I wish Javik made it up to the Citadel with Shepard. I would have made him choose.

 

[Uriah]

After I beat the game I went to look up the other endings on youtube. One of the first results was this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_uw-gTqCsc&feature=related

 

[Riposte]

I wish Javik made it up to the Citadel with Shepard. I would have made him choose.

It is pretty obvious what he would choose lol.

 

[LiK]

I can agree with that. The biggest issue of the ending in an emotional sense is the fact that you as a player do not get any resolution. It basically just ends with no explanation or reasoning to why Shepard had to choose between the Colours of Space Magic, while the characters and everything in the universe are presumably left behind in their respective solar systems with nothing revealed on their future.

kinda curious if this will be addressed in future DLC or comics etc.

 

[Rahxephon91]

Pretty bad ending. I have somewhat negative views on the game in general and that ending sure didn't help. ME is a real real uneven series.

 

[Rebel Leader]

It is pretty obvious what he would choose lol.

You have diffacul-

*bam*

Reapers destroyed

----

He may have chosen synthesis though

 

[Bruce Lee Kicks]

Also, new Multiplayer DLC (characters):

http://www.cinemablend.com/games/Mass-Effect-3-Multiplayer-DLC-Characters-Revealed-40370.html

Yeah...I'm naming the Geth Infiltrator "Legion".

 

[LiK]

You have diffacul-

*bam*

Reapers destroyed

----

He may have chosen synthesis though

highly doubt it, he hates synthtics with a passion no matter how much i try to convince him otherwise.

 

[Alchemy]

Dunno if this was posted. But it should be posted again. lol

So good. I want to send this to all my friends by I fear violent retaliation for spoilers.

 

[hateradio]

Dunno if this was posted. But it should be posted again.
http://uppix.net/0/0/1/92346318f4bca02f1e23c21b7442a.jpg

It was.

Also, if you do turn it, you can sorta grasp which could be which if there were a wheel. It's odd that there's actually a third option, since this game removed the neutral response.

The whole world is a dialogue wheel.

 

[dragonelite]

I wish Javik made it up to the Citadel with Shepard. I would have made him choose.

Wasn't something like that in the leaked script. But then he became dlc. We should all make a fanfic group .

 

[lastplayed]

It was.

Also, if you do turn it, you can sorta grasp which could be which if there were a wheel. It's odd that there's actually a third option, since this game removed the neutral response.

But the coloured choices are usually on the other side of the wheel, so the image would be flipped...

 

[hateradio]

Wasn't something like that in the leaked script. But then he became dlc. We should all make a fanfic group .

Nothing's sadder than fanfics. Don't do this GAF!

But the coloured choices are usually on the other side of the wheel, so the image would be flipped...

It would be, but indoctrination changed it.

 

[Lime]

I think you're putting way too much thought into how Bioware wanted it to be. At most, it's probably just accidental.

 

[megalowho]

You guys and your dream theory :lol

Destruction is the renegade choice. It's color coded red and you destroy all synthetic life forms. Geth and EDI are toasted and you don't break the cycle. Eventually AI will rise like they geth did and all hell will break lose.

Control is the paragon choice. It's color coded blue and you become a reaper to control them. You break the cycle as you can control the reapers and are able to use them get rid of the AI if they rise. It's different from the Illusive Man choice as he wanted to use them to push human at the top and use the reapers to enslave the other races.

Space Magic is the neutral choice. You simply merge synthetic and organic life with the crucible magic power. The cycle is broken since everyone is now half synthetic half organic. Full AIs don't exist anymore so they can't revolt against their creators.

The one detail that strikes me as funny in all that was having Anderson represent Destruction/Renegade and The Illusive Man represent Control/Paragon. Throughout the series they'd come to symbolize pretty much the opposite. But it's probably not worth reading too far into.

 

[tass0]

This is actually frustrating.

BioWare shat on Mass Effect, but worst of all, they shat on the fans.

We've been waiting 5 years from this, and what we got was the same 3 endings, all of which make no sense, and was most likely thought of in 10 minutes or less.


It's such a damn shame to ruin such a great franchise with a horrible ending like this, and even though 95% of the game is great, the last 5% will not let me recommend this game to anybody.

BioWare should openly come out and say "We admit we fucked up the ending, it's complete bull and it only came to this because we ran out of time. We're sorry.".


Ultimately, I think Mass Effect will be remembered as a franchise that had so much wasted potential.

 

[hateradio]

I think you're putting way too much thought into how Bioware wanted it to be. At most, it's probably just accidental.

Obviously they didn't know what they were doing.

 

[Uriah]

Nothing's sadder than fanfics. Don't do this GAF!

Can we really sink any lower? Dat ending.

 

[lastplayed]

I think you're putting way too much thought into how Bioware wanted it to be. At most, it's probably just accidental.

Even if it's true... if it was a dream or Shepard was tricked or whatever, it would have been far better to end the second game like that. Not the entire series, especially not knowing if we'll ever have a proper resolution or not.

 

[Lime]

As posted earlier in the thread, this is an example of how much some simple editing basically made the ending of ME3 that much better:

http://youtu.be/PZDDC7vhdug

 

[Zomba13]

This is actually frustrating.

BioWare shat on Mass Effect, but worst of all, they shat on the fans.

We've been waiting 5 years from this, and what we got was the same 3 endings, all of which make no sense, and was most likely thought of in 10 minutes or less.


It's such a damn shame to ruin such a great franchise with a horrible ending like this, and even though 95% of the game is great, the last 5% will not let me recommend this game to anybody.

BioWare should openly come out and say "We admit we fucked up the ending, it's complete bull and it only came to this because we ran out of time. We're sorry.".


Ultimately, I think Mass Effect will be remembered as a franchise that had so much wasted potential.

Maybe the whole thing is a commentary on how we only think we have choice in video games and in the end all that matters is what the devs want you to see. No matter what you choose you get 3 VERY similar endings showing that your choices don't really matter.

 

[Digoman]

Nothing's sadder than fanfics. Don't do this GAF!

Too late for me. Someone posted this alternate ending a while back here, and I actually found it interesting. Between having to tell people I don't see any sense in the "dream" theory, and reading an fanfic ending, I'm feeling dirty.

 

[lastplayed]

Another thing that bothers me, I remember Anderson saying "we followed you up" when Shepard woke up, but then Anderson got ahead of Shepard? Where did he come from? Who else was he with and where did they go?

 

[Keasar]

Too late for me. Someone posted this alternate ending a while back here, and I actually found it interesting. Between having to tell people I don't see any sense in the "dream" theory, and reading an fanfic ending, I'm feeling dirty.

Read that alternate ending earlier, I totally back it up rather then going with the faulty logic Bioware thought was nice.

 

[Pollux]

What really pisses me off about this whole thing is that even if Bioware releases DLC with a better "ending" and Shepard was hallucinating because of Harbinger attempting to finally indoctrinate him....THAT NEW DLC SHOULD AHVE BEEN IN THE FUCKING GAME. They would admit to having shipped only 95% of the game.

So we'll probably have to spend another $9.99 on the new DLC which means we'll have had to pay $80 for the complete fucking game, which is complete bull shit. If they release a new ending or an expansion for when Shepard wakes up on the ground in London it better fucking be free or I'm done with Bioware for the foreseeable future (until they get their shit together which is highly unlikely)

 

[Metroidvania]

Another thing that bothers me, I remember Anderson saying "we followed you up" when Shepard woke up, but then Anderson got ahead of Shepard? Where did he come from? Who else was he with and where did they go?

The whole thing is a giant clusterfuck.

Anderson says he got beamed up somewhere else hence his not waiting for Shepard to get up, yet mentions the exact same chasm that Shepard sees, with only one apparent route up to where the Illusive man is. But supposedly, Anderson still came in from a different angle.

I think he does say "I followed you up" tho.

 

[hao chi]

You're gonna need to be more specific than that. What colour was your explosion?

This made me laugh more than it should have.

Then I cried.

 

[Pandaman]

i dont see whats so far fetched about the indoctrination theory when, if you believe it all actually happened, Shepard was being indoctrinated 10 minutes later.

 

[Lime]

What really pisses me off about this whole thing is that even if Bioware releases DLC with a better "ending" and Shepard was hallucinating because of Harbinger attempting to finally indoctrinate him....THAT NEW DLC SHOULD AHVE BEEN IN THE FUCKING GAME. They would admit to having shipped only 95% of the game.

So we'll probably have to spend another $9.99 on the new DLC which means we'll have had to pay $80 for the complete fucking game, which is complete bull shit. If they release a new ending or an expansion for when Shepard wakes up on the ground in London it better fucking be free or I'm done with Bioware for the foreseeable future (until they get their shit together which is highly unlikely)

I'm not defending that kind of solution to the ending, but what's your opinion on Fallout 3 and Broken Steel? Isn't that what Bioware essentially would do if they released it as DLC?

 

[hateradio]

Another thing that bothers me, I remember Anderson saying "we followed you up" when Shepard woke up, but then Anderson got ahead of Shepard? Where did he come from? Who else was he with and where did they go?

Since Shepard was knocked out, it could have given Anderson enough time to go to the console room.

Can we really sink any lower? Dat ending.

You don't want to work for BioWare one day, do you?

As posted earlier in the thread, this is an example of how much some simple editing basically made the ending of ME3 that much better:

http://youtu.be/PZDDC7vhdug

But I wanted to pick my color. :/

Flipped because . . . OCD.

 

[DTKT]

What really pisses me off about this whole thing is that even if Bioware releases DLC with a better "ending" and Shepard was hallucinating because of Harbinger attempting to finally indoctrinate him....THAT NEW DLC SHOULD AHVE BEEN IN THE FUCKING GAME. They would admit to having shipped only 95% of the game.

So we'll probably have to spend another $9.99 on the new DLC which means we'll have had to pay $80 for the complete fucking game, which is complete bull shit. If they release a new ending or an expansion for when Shepard wakes up on the ground in London it better fucking be free or I'm done with Bioware for the foreseeable future (until they get their shit together which is highly unlikely)

That will never happen. I doubt they have the resources to actually create another ending. Keep in mind that DLC is pre-planned.

 

[Escape Goat]

Why was Joker trying to outrun the shockwave? Why was he trying to warp away from Earth?

 

[LiK]

so i read up on the endings. looks like the best ending is Control. i will do that for my replay.

 

[Pollux]

I'm not defending that kind of solution to the ending, but what's your opinion on Fallout 3 and Broken Steel? Isn't that what Bioware essentially would do if they released it as DLC?

Never bought Broken Steel since I never have cared enough about the Fallout series. If it were Skyrim, then yea I would buy it and continue to buy Elder Scrolls games since I don't play them for the story anyway. Yes, I'm a hypocrite.

 

[Psychoward]

Why was Joker trying to outrun the shockwave? Why was he trying to warp away from Earth?

NO ONE KNOWS

THE ENDINGS ARE RETARDED