Mass Effect 3 SPOILER THREAD: LOTS OF SPECULATION FROM EVERYONE

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b.mak said:
hmm ok...

I'm curious to know the reasoning of those that picked the option 'destroy synethics option' knowing that the cycle will continue.

and also, what's the consensus on what the best option was?
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There's no cycle between synthetics and organics, bro. The Catalyst was lying to you.
 
Minion101 said:
Choose red space magic and if your war effort meter is high enough, Shepard lives.
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Lame, I didn't want to kill EDI and the Geth. :(

I thought that was so dumb. Oh, all synthetics are SO alike that the same thing will kill all of them? Wouldn't that destroy pretty much all technology in the entire galaxy too?

Man, I really wanted some kind of epilogue for this game. Find out how everything worked out.


The Synthesis ending REALLY reminded me of one of Deus Ex 2's endings.
 
Bowdz said:
I don't think the cycle will continue. Shepard literally just proved the Catalyst wrong not only by ending the Geth/Quarian war (one that was started by the stupidity of the Quarians and not by the Geth's desire for conflict) AND by forming a true friendship with EDI while bringing out human aspects in her character. Regardless of what the Catalyst says happens, the experience with my Shepard was completely the opposite. Also, who knows what would happen to both the organics and synthetics in the synthesis option. What if it rewrote their entire being? What if they forgot everything in their past? If any of those had a chance of happening, then what Shepard is doing would be no different than indoctrination or even outright murder.

Based on that logic, the destroy option allows organics to continue living unchanged and permanently eliminates the Reapers with the Geth/EDI/other AI being casualties.
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Well, with the relays all gone, not really. FTL travel might let some people get home eventually but I'm imagining a lot of races are going to be stuck in the Sol System which is going to cause a shitton of problems.

Not to mention places that are reliant on outside supplies and such.
 
Also, for once, I enjoyed Mark Meer's horrible voice acting:

Liara: "Is this how is was on Earth?"
Shepard: "Yes."

But Meer made it sound like this.

Liara: "Is this how it was on Earth?"
Shepard ".... yes?"
 
Has anybody encountered this yet?

Primagames strategy guide said:
There is a special reward available only to players who have imported a save from Mass Effect 2 with the Prejek Paddle Fish purchased by Commander Shepard.

If the Prejeck Paddle Fish survives through all of Mass Effect 3 and Mass Effect 3 New Game Plus, visit Liara’s quarters aboard the Normandy for a very special intel bonus!
Click to expand...
 
HP_Wuvcraft said:
Because it would negate the need for the Reapers, as well as give future generations the best shot at reinventing Mass Relay tech.
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Bowdz said:
I don't think the cycle will continue. Shepard literally just proved the Catalyst wrong not only by ending the Geth/Quarian war (one that was started by the stupidity of the Quarians and not by the Geth's desire for conflict) AND by forming a true friendship with EDI while bringing out human aspects in her character. Regardless of what the Catalyst says happens, the experience with my Shepard was completely the opposite. Also, who knows what would happen to both the organics and synthetics in the synthesis option. What if it rewrote their entire being? What if they forgot everything in their past? If any of those had a chance of happening, then what Shepard is doing would be no different than indoctrination or even outright murder.

Based on that logic, the destroy option allows organics to continue living unchanged and permanently eliminates the Reapers with the Geth/EDI/other AI being casualties.
Click to expand...


That makes sense. But then what's wrong with choosing control? If you can control the reapers you can just have em kill each other, and then synthetics won't have to die...or am I misunderstanding that option?
 
Dax01 said:
There's no cycle between synthetics or organics, bro. The Catalyst was lying to you.
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The catalyst also created the only weapon in the galaxy capable of destroying itself. I'm starting to think that the Reaper race would have been better off without the Catalyst.
 
Just finished the game. I found the ending extremely distasteful. I don't hate it. It just left a bad taste in my mouth.
 
azentium said:
The file name for that scene is End03_Shephard_Alive_Male/Female.
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Welp, there you go. I haven't been following this thread, so I don't know if this has been discussed already - but I don't think Shepard went to the Citadel in the first place. Bioware is gonna make the whole ending a "dream" of Shepard's or something.
 
Just finished, restarted the last possible place to save for all 3 endings.

Wow.

What a shitty way to end the ME universe as we know it. I'll give props in that the choice on endings was hard to make, but that's only because they were all so bad.

The thing that really gets me is that these endings are all bittersweet at best, while neither ME1 or ME2 had that feeling at all. ME1 has you saving the Citadel, and even destroying Saren with high paragon/renegade skills. In ME2, having high Paragon/Renegade lets you keep the entire squad loyal and keep them all alive throughout the suicide mission.

In ME3, having a high paragon/renegade translates into getting a high fleet score....which then does nothing more than give you an invisible amount of space points threshold to unlock the synthesis ending? There's no real telling of the consequences of your actions, nothing beyond that uncharted world jungle scene? (and a faint hitch of breath from Shepard after the destroy ending, but that apparently requires 5000 readiness points, which is impossible without playing multiplayer)

It's so out of place with the franchise's theme/endings/storytelling design, really makes me wonder what they were thinking.

And it really sucks, because otherwise, ME3 corrected a lot of ME2's flaws while keeping the improved combat and reintroducing ME1 rpg elements in a much more cohesive fashion.

Also, that last little "Commander Shepard has beaten the reapers, see more by buying DLC" is just so.....tacky.
 
Dax01 said:
There's no cycle between synthetics or organics, bro. The Catalyst was lying to you.
Click to expand...

Ugh, the Catalyst.

I loved the Reapers in Mass Effect 1. They were mysterious, ominous, and seemed nearly indestructible. Even if you manage to kill one there's still thousands or millions more of them.

Mass Effect 2 made them seem a little silly with the stupid human-skeleton looking Reaper, but it at least gave one reason for why the want to 'reap' the galaxy every 50,000 years. (baby makin')

And then Mass Effect 3 makes them seem a lot more badass again since there are a ton of them and they're destroying pretty much the whole galaxy. BUT THEN they had to go and make it seem like there is something EVEN BIGGER THAN THE REAPERS that they're trying to prevent (when you talk to the one on the Quarian homeworld).

I thought Bioware was just setting up for a Mass Effect 4 where you fight an even worse foe or something, but then the Catalyst comes along and just ruins everything. The thing even worse than the Reapers is MAN'S INHUMANITY TOWARDS OTHERS, in this case against synthetic life.

I mean come on, really? Such an old Sci-fi theme and one that was already a minor theme in all three Mass Effects. Then out of nowhere they make it the central motivation behind everything the Reapers do.

Meh, whatever. The rest of the game was pretty sweet. That giant thresher maw taking down a Reaper was so ridiculous and awesome.
 
Rodney McKay said:
Ugh, the Catalyst.

I loved the Reapers in Mass Effect 1. They were mysterious, ominous, and seemed nearly indestructible. Even if you manage to kill one there's still thousands or millions more of them.

Mass Effect 2 made them seem a little silly with the stupid human-skeleton looking Reaper, but it at least gave one reason for why the want to 'reap' the galaxy every 50,000 years. (baby makin')

And then Mass Effect 3 makes them seem a lot more badass again since there are a ton of them and they're destroying pretty much the whole galaxy. BUT THEN they had to go and make it seem like there is something EVEN BIGGER THAN THE REAPERS that they're trying to prevent (when you talk to the one on the Quarian homeworld).

I thought Bioware was just setting up for a Mass Effect 4 where you fight an even worse foe or something, but then the Catalyst comes along and just ruins everything. The thing even worse than the Reapers is MAN'S INHUMANITY TOWARDS OTHERS, in this case against synthetic life.

I mean come on, really? Such an old Sci-fi theme and one that was already a minor theme in all three Mass Effects. Then out of nowhere they make it the central motivation behind everything the Reapers do.

Meh, whatever. The rest of the game was pretty sweet. That giant thresher maw taking down a Reaper was so ridiculous and awesome.
Click to expand...

The Catalyst... AKA the Macguffin's Macguffin.
 
Organics will eventually create the Reapers, ergo the Reapers must prevent Organics from creating the Reapers. For their own sake, or some shit. By this logic, they should just TAKE OUT SYNTHETICS EVERY CYCLE instead of organics.

I think they cribbed heavily from the Spiral/Anti-Spiral arc of
Gurren Lagann

Edit: I was just kind of semi-drunkenly making a joke about the whole "Take out synthetics every cycle" thing, but the more I think about it....the more I think this entirely invalidates the entire premise of the game. Instead of coming back and being all "We've deleted your AI's and VI's. No more of that shit or we'll have to destroy you, okay?" every fifty thousand years, they wipe out both synthetics and advanced organics? What? Why?
 
Rodney McKay said:
Ugh, the Catalyst.

I loved the Reapers in Mass Effect 1. They were mysterious, ominous, and seemed nearly indestructible. Even if you manage to kill one there's still thousands or millions more of them.

Mass Effect 2 made them seem a little silly with the stupid human-skeleton looking Reaper, but it at least gave one reason for why the want to 'reap' the galaxy every 50,000 years. (baby makin')

And then Mass Effect 3 makes them seem a lot more badass again since there are a ton of them and they're destroying pretty much the whole galaxy. BUT THEN they had to go and make it seem like there is something EVEN BIGGER THAN THE REAPERS that they're trying to prevent (when you talk to the one on the Quarian homeworld).

I thought Bioware was just setting up for a Mass Effect 4 where you fight an even worse foe or something, but then the Catalyst comes along and just ruins everything. The thing even worse than the Reapers is MAN'S INHUMANITY TOWARDS OTHERS, in this case against synthetic life.

I mean come on, really? Such an old Sci-fi theme and one that was already a minor theme in all three Mass Effects. Then out of nowhere they make it the central motivation behind everything the Reapers do.

Meh, whatever. The rest of the game was pretty sweet. That giant thresher maw taking down a Reaper was so ridiculous and awesome.
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The Reaper's motivations were changed when Walters became the head writer.

Drew K. wanted to make them the regulators of the galaxy, making sure they didn't destroy it for future life.

Walters apparently wanted something else, and rather than stick with the plan, he changed it all to his vision.
 
I think what saddens me the most is that I was 100% on board for everything the game was throwing at me in ME3, until the ending.

WHAT THE FUCK

What an awful fucking ending. Holy shit. No explanation, no narrative. Yes, great. Nice job Bioware.
 
HP_Wuvcraft said:
Also, for once, I enjoyed Mark Meer's horrible voice acting:

Liara: "Is this how is was on Earth?"
Shepard: "Yes."

But Meer made it sound like this.

Liara: "Is this how it was on Earth?"
Shepard ".... yes?"
Click to expand...

My favorite was when Cortez's ship got hit on the final mission.

"STEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVE!!!!!!!!!"

then two seconds later in a completely normal voice "are you sure?"
 
Mr2day said:
My favorite was when Cortez's ship got hit on the final mission.

"STEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVE!!!!!!!!!"

then two seconds later in a completely normal voice "are you sure?"
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I laughed so hard at that part.
 
I think we can all agree this is our collective response to Bioware concerning the endings:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTQzCH47dIU&feature=related

Rodney Mackay said:
I loved the Reapers in Mass Effect 1. They were mysterious, ominous, and seemed nearly indestructible. Even if you manage to kill one there's still thousands or millions more of them.

Mass Effect 2 made them seem a little silly with the stupid human-skeleton looking Reaper, but it at least gave one reason for why the want to 'reap' the galaxy every 50,000 years. (baby makin')
Click to expand...

Agreed. I still think the Reapers would have been most effective remaining a mystery. Throughout the entire game, I was never compelled to want an explanation about the Reapers because they only served as the backdrop for the meat of the game. The conflict of the galaxy and the interplay between species and crew made ME3 compelling to me and knowing the backstory of the Reapers would not change that.
 
LordCanti said:
Organics will eventually create the Reapers, ergo the Reapers must prevent Organics from creating the Reapers. For their own sake, or some shit. By this logic, they should just TAKE OUT SYNTHETICS EVERY CYCLE instead of organics.

I think they cribbed heavily from the Spiral/Anti-Spiral arc of
Gurren Lagann

Edit: I was just kind of semi-drunkenly making a joke about the whole "Take out synthetics every cycle" thing, but the more I think about it....the more I think this entirely invalidates the entire premise of the game. Instead of coming back and being all "We've deleted your AI's and VI's. No more of that shit or we'll have to destroy you, okay?" every fifty thousand years, they wipe out both synthetics and advanced organics? What? Why?
Click to expand...

If they just wiped out synthetics they would need to come back sooner than every 50k years. Wiping out advanced civs delays the creation of new synthetics more.
 
what happened to the information Liara was storing on Commander Shepard and the Reapers? i really wanna know what the situation is like present day in the ME universe..
 
NBtoaster said:
If they just wiped out synthetics they would need to come back sooner than every 50k years. Wiping out advanced civs delays the creation of new synthetics more.
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Just have the Reapers show up and tell dudes, "HEY advanced civilization! QUIT MAKING ROBOTS for fucks sake! I swear to the goddess we will reap every last one of you fuckers if you do."

Would be as effective I believe.
 
NBtoaster said:
If they just wiped out synthetics they would need to come back sooner than every 50k years. Wiping out advanced civs delays the creation of new synthetics more.
Click to expand...

But then why not wipe out all synthetic life past "x" value of intelligence and just come back every 10 years? Every other year?

It's such an arbitrary number, that is only kinda explained by the Prothean VI on Thessia with 'random evolution' equating to spacefaring civilizations being ready approximately every 50,000 years to the theoretical creating synthetic killer robots timeframe that requires reaper intervention.

edit: Bioware would have been better off explaining that the reapers were the original 'synthetic consensus platform' like Legion/EDI describes from a civilization waaaaaaaay back, and were just preventing organic life from reaching a point capable of destroying the synthetic reapers. It would have related a lot easier to the story as a whole.

Agreed. I still think the Reapers would have been most effective remaining a mystery. Throughout the entire game, I was never compelled to want an explanation about the Reapers because they only served as the backdrop for the meat of the game. The conflict of the galaxy and the interplay between species and crew made ME3 compelling to me and knowing the backstory of the Reapers would not change that.
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I was just thinking this. I honestly think that the decision to get in depth with the 'reaper/catalyst motivation' and trying to find a new reason after abandoning the dark energy concept is what lead to the endings we have now.

what happened to the information Liara was storing on Commander Shepard and the Reapers
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One of the theories floating around is that that box is what was used to pass down Shepard's Legacy throughout the jungle colony world the Normandy landed on.
 
what do you guys think? the people over at the bioware forums are discussing the possibility of Shepard hallucinating

http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/355/index/9727423/1

"I just did the mission where you go into the Geth Consensus and then went to talk to Joker afterwards.

Joker: So you went into the Geth Consensus? Like virtual reality?
Shepard: Yeah, it was strange, but I made it out ok.
Joker: But did you really?
Shepard: What do you mean?
Joker: Think about it commander, if the Geth see everything as virtual reality, maybe even this is virtual reality, and you just THINK you made it out.

I know Joker is just screwing with Shepard, but its... intriguing"


"I also think the indoctrination might start at the Cerberus base. It's a Renegade interrupt option to defend yourself against Kai Leng, and also a Renegade option when saying "well destroy the reapers".
 
Well started up my NG+, I can't possibly be more disappointed by the ending right? Oh well at least the feeling of tearing a new asshole into various enemies with the upgraded Widow brings me pleasure.
 
The twist I was expecting going up that lift was that the Crucible actually would be the final step of the harvesting process. That every single race had been able to build it and sealed their doom through it somehow. It made sense with how oddly the Reapers acted with everything around it.
 
With new generations and new civilisations, any warnings the reapers would have given would be treated as fairy tales after a few thousand years.

Coming back in much shorter intervals would damage the effectiveness of the reapers. Life would be able to learn from their mistakes and defeats (and advance their technology) and eventually overcome them.
 
Rapstah said:
The twist I was expecting going up that lift was that the Crucible actually would be the final step of the harvesting process. That every single race had been able to build it and sealed their doom through it somehow. It made sense with how oddly the Reapers acted with everything around it.
Click to expand...

The Crucible shouldnt have done anything, simply be a thing to rally all species behind, with your war assests deciding if you succeed in destroying the Reapers and at what cost.
 
mercenar1e said:
what do you guys think? the people over at the bioware forums are discussing the possibility of Shepard hallucinating

http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/355/index/9727423/1

"I just did the mission where you go into the Geth Consensus and then went to talk to Joker afterwards.

Joker: So you went into the Geth Consensus? Like virtual reality?
Shepard: Yeah, it was strange, but I made it out ok.
Joker: But did you really?
Shepard: What do you mean?
Joker: Think about it commander, if the Geth see everything as virtual reality, maybe even this is virtual reality, and you just THINK you made it out.

I know Joker is just screwing with Shepard, but its... intriguing"


"I also think the indoctrination might start at the Cerberus base. It's a Renegade interrupt option to defend yourself against Kai Leng, and also a Renegade option when saying "well destroy the reapers".
Click to expand...

I see some people are still at the "bargaining" stage.
 
I keep seeing those dream posts saying he's wearing different armor. No he's not his armor got melted by the gigantic fuckin eye laser. There's still hints of your armor there.
 
HarryHengst said:
The Crucible shouldnt have done anything, simply be a thing to rally all species behind, with your war assests deciding if you succeed in destroying the Reapers and at what cost.
Click to expand...

I can get behind this. Instead of relying on the Prothean's to fix everything (again).

Instead of a crucibal make it a, I don't know, GIANT SPACE LASER that destroys reapers in one shot. With all those resources it seems like it would be doable.

Maybe instead of having Cerberus go 'coocoo for Chocopuffs', have them develop the plans for the thing since they're the only ones who believe the reapers existed.
 
Minion101 said:
Would we have still hated the dark energy motivations if the game to ended with same-y FMVs for all the choices?
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It would be a lazy/rushed ending (like taking a stock picture and using for Tali), and sure, people always complain, but I don't see the general hated these endings got... they're lazy/rushed *and* beyond terrible.

BigJiantRobut said:
I see some people are still at the "bargaining" stage.
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Between trying to "extract" a good ending with what we got, and begging/hoping for a DLC that change it, I think the bargaining stage is going to last awhile.
 
Wow, reading the BSN threads about the ending being a hallucination is just kind of sad. It's like babby's first literary critique, only it's a bunch of people grasping at straws trying to find meaning in an ending that is clearly just "not a very good ending", not "just kidding guys it was secretly genius".

Squall is dead all over again.
 
People are giving it way more thought than BioWare did. Actually, I think that's what BioWare hoped for - as we deconstruct their crappy placeholder ending made with minimal funds and effort, they're working on DLC with proper ending, to milk some more money from us.
 
Lord Fruity said:
People are giving it way more thought than BioWare did. Actually, I think that's what BioWare hoped for - as we deconstruct their crappy placeholder ending made with minimal funds and effort, they're working on DLC with proper ending, to milk some more money from us.
Click to expand...

They're waiting for the best fan created idea before they start working on DLC. It's easier that way.
 
As much as I support ending-criticism, I also wish that people who didn't like the ending would stop bringing up the "writer-reader contract" as if that were a real thing. It's some bs written by some random novelist. It's not a real thing, guys.
 
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