If it has a basis, it's possible that Bioware planned it that way. We're not mindreaders, we can't possibly know how it all really went down. We can speculate based on what we see, but we cannot know for sure unless we get truly definitive evidence for it, for which we currently have none. I find condemning bioware on a pure lack of faith in their abilities to be as stupid as expecting the indoctrination theory to be true purely on belief that bioware cannot fuck up that bad. Posts like these are annoying, because as much as I'd like it to be revealed that bioware was actually being clever with all the subtle hints, I don't deny the possibility that they really did mess up that badly. I'd like the ones on the opposite side of the fence to acknowledge the same regarding my position.
Mass Effect 3 SPOILER THREAD: LOTS OF SPECULATION FROM EVERYONE
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If it has a basis, it's possible that Bioware planned it that way. We're not mindreaders, we can't possibly know how it all really went down. We can speculate based on what we see, but we cannot know for sure unless we get truly definitive evidence for it, for which we currently have none. I find condemning bioware on a pure lack of faith in their abilities to be as stupid as expecting the indoctrination theory to be true purely on belief that bioware cannot fuck up that bad. Posts like these are annoying, because as much as I'd like it to be revealed that bioware was actually being clever with all the subtle hints, I don't deny the possibility that they really did mess up that badly. I'd like the ones on the opposite side of the fence to acknowledge the same regarding my position.
Why? Ambiguity has often been looked on as a positive way to end a series.
Zomba13
Member
Apparently if you wait like, 10 mins in the Crucible you get this ending:
Also, the 'Mako wheels' are only on the left side, the side the Mako was before the conduit.
Something to think about huh.
Also, everyone saying the indoctrination thing isn't true, bioware have said they want people do extrapolate (aka make up) what really happens. We're just as right about indoctrination as we are about the galaxy starving.
Also, the 'Mako wheels' are only on the left side, the side the Mako was before the conduit.
Something to think about huh.
Also, everyone saying the indoctrination thing isn't true, bioware have said they want people do extrapolate (aka make up) what really happens. We're just as right about indoctrination as we are about the galaxy starving.
It's just people grasping for hope from an otherwise hopeless ending. We all want it to be true that BioWare thought ahead and made some super deep ending, but their history shows that this is less likely than anything.
Is that for reals? Shep failed pretty much?
Also, I forgot to add that Mako image to the collection.
Edit: Added.
firehawk12
Subete no aware
I like how they just title them by the color.
I can't believe they actually just used the colours as the file names. Amazing.
I've yet to see any definitive evidence for either argument, I just feel that the sheer ammount of hints for the indoctrination theory makes it unlikely to be a coincidence. If you found something that completely undermines the theory, that'll be evidence enough for me to think that bioware just messed up, so please share.
But are you seriously going to argue that using ambiguity in a good way is impossible? All ambiguity in stories is wrong and a sign of bad writing?
BannedEpisode
Member
Beating this game and then hearing that some people liked the ending must be what it feels like for those folks who hate MGS4 so much to hear that people love it.
The difference being that I loved 95% of ME3 of course.
The difference being that I loved 95% of ME3 of course.
SpectreFire
Member
That's the part that made the ending so much worse. I loved the rest of the game, I was excited building up my fleet, finding all the War Assets everywhere thinking "man, I bet Bioware's got some great ending planned with all of this shit I'm gathering ties into it, just like Mass Effect 2". And then I played the endgame, and pretty much NONE of whatever I did during that whole game ties back into it. Made peace with the Quarians and Geth? Who the fuck cares, doesn't matter in the ending. I think that's what pisses everyone off the most. All those choices we made, the decisions, for the 100 hours we've put into this franchise, all of it entirely moot when it mattered the most.
Brawndo Addict
Banned
The indoctrination idea is not a dueling interpretation. I could say the ending was just a hallucination Shepard experienced right before he was incinerated by a giant laser, as a way for his mind to let him die at peace caused by chemicals in his brain. There's nothing ambiguous about trying to reinterpret endings as "all a dream" or "it never really happened" because you can say that no matter what. Why not say the entire Mass Effect storyline is a work of fiction within the Stargazer child's universe, and he's simply telling his son the story like we might talk about Achilles.
Sure indoctrination exists as a distinct entity in the universe, but it's never been tied to elaborate visions and hallucinations, makes no logical sense in the context of what was actually occurring on the ground, and ignores the fact the reapers shot a giant ass laser directly at Shepard. Seems like a good way to kill someone, unless you're arguing they somehow knew exactly which small soldier charging the portal was Shepard and they knew he would survive the blast, and all kinds of nonsense. Saying its the secret ending is no better than the ridiculous variants I posited above.
I would never argue for such a thing. Ambiguity can be a great thing.
However, I don't have enough will to counter argue the indoctrinated. It's just a sad case.
Yes. Happened to me yesterday. I tought about my possibilities for a few minutes, and then while walking towards one option, this screen popped up and I had to start over with the decision.
I don't think it took 10 minutes. Maybe 5 or 6.
Zomba13
Member
No idea if it's fake or not, guy had a bunch of pics. Some people say they don't get anything waiting at the choice (one said he'd waited an hour) so it might be to do with EMS, might be a fake or might be to do with steps take and not time taken. Doesn't really add anything just an interesting thing if real.
EDIT: Well I guess it is real then. Pretty interesting. I guess they want you to make a choice fast? How far back did it put you?
That's great, they're just going at it with the Easter eggs.
It may actually pull me back into the game to encounter them.
SpectreFire
Member
I think this pretty much sums up most people's feelings on the ending.
What's the point of most of the stuff you do in the game when none of it actually matters?
What's the point of most of the stuff you do in the game when none of it actually matters?
It must have sucked knowing that your choice hardly made a difference.
Zomba13
Member
But it does! Your number saved Big Ben! You are hero!
I have to say though, the 'The Crucible has been destroyed' ending is my favourite so far.
Too bad they don't have an FMV for it.
LAUGHTREY
Modesty becomes a woman
When was the last time an ambiguous ending after being promised answers ended well? Lost sure did go over well didn't it?
The "hints" for indoctrination are all coincidental or game-play elements.
-No one but Shep sees the kid
Colliding Meshes and stuff are already pretty bad, no one acknowledged that Shepard was seeing things either. The kid is obviously used to show Shepards anxiety about Earth and the pressure throughout the game. The dream sequences are him trying to save the kid, nothing else.
-Infinite Ammo GunJust a gameplay and animation constraint. You should only have to shoot 5-6 times at most anyway. Why not bring up that my Adept Shepard suddenly has adrenaline rush and can slow down time? It's just a gameplay thing.
-No helmet in spaceAgain, nothing except gameplay. It wouldn't look too good to have him in singed shit armor with his helmet on. It's just for cool effect. Besides, the wards on the citadel are "exposed" to regular space. I thought it was pretty obvious that it has a regular atmosphere like any other planet. You walk around under open sky just like the end sequence in ME1. Suddenly a giant billion year old space station is fine, but it having breathable air without a ceiling is just going too far.
-Anderson (a good guy) representing the renegade option. This is just to show the lesser of two evils. Destroying all synthetic life includes sacrificing EDI and the Geth, whereas the paragon option saves them and also stops the Reapers.
Everybody seems to ignore everything that is much more explicit in telling you what happened after that too, after giving in to the reapers they still show him what happens to his friends? Why? No reason at all. And they show him what he wants to see, instead of the error of his ways. If they were actually indoctrinating him, they'd show himi that wiping out all life was the right thing to do.
Why show TIM having indoctrination like control over you when he walks in too? If they did that, and then hinted at it with the wavy lines later on that'd be different. But they explicitly show you what indoctrination looks like. You lose control of your body and you get wavy black lines in your vision.
I also don't get how this makes the ending better, it actually makes it a lot worse. If he gets indoctrinated and all that was just a vision planted in his head, what really happened then?
It all really happened, give it up. Indoctrination theorists just see what they want to see.
Zomba13
Member
Too bad they don't have an FMV for it.
Yeah, they could've worked purple space magic into it.
Bioware's Indoctrination is strong with this one.
Upcoming DLC will show what happened in the real world and to the rest of the Normandy crews while Shepard was being indoctrinated. Explaining how Joker ended up doing what he did in the ending.
UnluckyKate
Member
ME3 is the opposite MGS4 syndrome but the same result:
both amazing game. Both with terrible endings : one being rushed and the other couldn't stop
You're angry that a character is homosexual? Lol.
Zomba13
Member
Also potentially robosexual.
LAUGHTREY
Modesty becomes a woman
That's making it worse.
I'm willing to listen, but your not going to convince anyone if your argument is "I'm clearly right but I don't feel like proving it".
Perhaps ambiguity is the wrong word for it, but there is dueling interpretations to it. I've said multiple times that there is no definitive evidence, nothing that seals it entirely, but if you take those things as a whole I think you have a pretty convincing argument for indoctrination. And that's the definition of ambiguity, because if there is definitive evidence that supports on interpretation, then it is not ambiguous. On the other hand, what you suggested has no evidence for it outside of it's possibility.
Anyway, indoctrination HAS been tied to all sorts of mind altering things. The scientists in the reaper said the walls were moving. They had their memories altered to where they experienced the same wedding night. And in the file, it says indoctrination has people seeing ghostly images. Hallucinations are a part of it.
As for the ground-reaper thing, it just seems to me that shepard managed to survive the laser blast by not taking it directly. But managed to make it to the beam of light. And the reapers seem to have been trying to indoctrinate him from the beginning of ME3, if the little kid is not real, and given their close proximity in addition to what is likely to be a great amount of concious effort on their part while they did it just by being around most other people (due to him being the only one able to activate the crucible, this was most likely their last shot at stopping him), so it makes sense that it'd be all the more potent at that moment. They sensed that Shepard was in the citadel and stopped him with the only way they could, while they made their way asap to the crucible in an effort to destroy it, which they do it you delay.
HarryHengst
Member
The funny thing is: so do you. The ending is so goddamn shitty that your arguments are all based on what you want to see as well. :lol
Cut audio dialogues from Joker swooping in to pick up your crew have already been found on the disc. Why it wasnt in the ending, who knows.
I'm glad she's Lesbian, making it less likely that my Male Shep will accidentally hit on her. Wish I can say the same thing about the other girls.
LAUGHTREY
Modesty becomes a woman
You see the kid before the reapers arrive, if they could implant the hallucination as a solid form kid, why at the end was he a half-done hologram?
Your line of reasoning could work for the whole series being a vision since Eden Prime. We don't know for sure, and if you keep assigning coincidences as evidence you'll never run out in this game.
lol I still like the one guy who wrote
You people are in denial, nothing anyone says will convince you. Anything will be dismissed or mis-read to make in go your way.
Your line of reasoning could work for the whole series being a vision since Eden Prime. We don't know for sure, and if you keep assigning coincidences as evidence you'll never run out in this game.
lol I still like the one guy who wrote
You people are in denial, nothing anyone says will convince you. Anything will be dismissed or mis-read to make in go your way.
Naw, i'm angry because recently, IRL, i took a sweet girl on a date who was at the time "confused". She said i was amazing, but she was more into women.
I'm just raging because i feel double trolled! haha. Plus i'm not at all interested in any other characters. lolol
dragonelite
Member
indoctrination bioware could pull out that experiece with the confused girl just so you can do their bidding.
Seriously, they should have had some sort of side mission where you take her on a 'date' to a movie, buy her dinner, get her a gift... then in the cabin have her be like 'welll you seeeeeee......'
I'm starting to think the longer we spend in this thread, the more indoctrinated we get. I keep hearing this humming sound now.
I begin to see ghostly visions.
LAUGHTREY
Modesty becomes a woman
There is nothing about "what I want to see." I saw Shep toss himself into a magic beam and organic life and synthetic life combined. There were no metaphors, no hints at something else happening. Nothing was even remotely hinted at indoctrination. If it was, it would be more overt and easier to read, not having to use infinite ammo guns and no-helmets to back it up.
All of this is moot anyway, indoctrinated or not, we never get to see any repercussions for our decisions through out the series. Absolutely nothing was resolved and final.
Zomba13
Member
Urgh... that'd take effort and work. No one will care if you don't explain things.
Just finished and this post says everything I wanted to, so thanks for that.
Honestly they should just have made an ending where you can either save earth and kill the reapers if you have enough readiness or just kill the reapers and lose earth.
Then there's a party/sad moment on the Normandy/on the battlefield and Shepard is on the Normandy, all badass looking. CREDITS.
Don't understand they made things so awkward, I don't think anyone would have complained with an ending like that.
Then there's a party/sad moment on the Normandy/on the battlefield and Shepard is on the Normandy, all badass looking. CREDITS.
Don't understand they made things so awkward, I don't think anyone would have complained with an ending like that.
Zomba13
Member
Welcome to the club.
SerArthurDayne
Member
So I got the ending where you jump into the beam. It sucked.
It sounds like the other endings kind of suck too. I'll check out the destroy option later.
I only did that one because it made me face the beam, so I thought I would make my decision once I got there. LOL NOPE!
And I thought that was supposed to save the relays, but they got blown up there too?
I can't believe they totally fucked the universe, regardless of your choice. There has to be some kind of retcon coming. DLC can obviously take place pre-endgame because it dumps you back after you beat the game.
Edit: It wasn't even the reaper (or whatever) kid that bothered me. I wish it hadn't been a kid. I would have preferred a King Reaper, or even an LOL, the Citadel is a Reaper. That isn't my issue. Their motivation is standard sci-fi fare, so I can dig it. It is just the net result of whatever decision you make being bad.
And then there is nothing after that. A couple of scenes with no resolution. Maybe the other versions are better in that aspect, but from skimming it doesn't sound that way.
It sounds like the other endings kind of suck too. I'll check out the destroy option later.
I only did that one because it made me face the beam, so I thought I would make my decision once I got there. LOL NOPE!
And I thought that was supposed to save the relays, but they got blown up there too?
I can't believe they totally fucked the universe, regardless of your choice. There has to be some kind of retcon coming. DLC can obviously take place pre-endgame because it dumps you back after you beat the game.
Edit: It wasn't even the reaper (or whatever) kid that bothered me. I wish it hadn't been a kid. I would have preferred a King Reaper, or even an LOL, the Citadel is a Reaper. That isn't my issue. Their motivation is standard sci-fi fare, so I can dig it. It is just the net result of whatever decision you make being bad.
And then there is nothing after that. A couple of scenes with no resolution. Maybe the other versions are better in that aspect, but from skimming it doesn't sound that way.
Judging by all the 'omg tali killed herself' or 'mordin is dead' complaints, I'd say that's not quite the case. The events at the end doesn't completely invalidate everything that happens before in the game.
Try seeing this from the other side: no good men to romance.
Zomba13
Member
Its the same but red.
Prequels. Believe.
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