Mass Effect 3 SPOILER THREAD: LOTS OF SPECULATION FROM EVERYONE

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The part about the ending which gets me the most is that no matter what you do, the mass effect relays are destroyed.

They're such a key element to Mass Effect that it seems like a death to the universe. I'm fine with the other aspects of the choices the player must make. I stand by my Shepard's decision to sacrifice herself to control the Reapers and end the cycle. It's heartrending that she'll see her friends or lover again. But it's better than betraying Legion and committing genocide on the Geth, or risking the unknown with synthesis, least it results ultimately results in failure, like the Reaper "solution". The game could have cut to credits immediately after the sacrifice, and while I would be a bit bitter about not having an epilogue that reflects the choices I've made, I could imagine the effects and repercussions of my journey. Wrex rebuilding Tuchanka, Tali and the geth on Rannoc, the further adventures of Garrus, space cop, and maybe Liara with a bunch of little blue Shepard jr's. But with the extra side effect of the mass relay's destruction, a lot of that and any further stories in the Mass Effect universe is shot. To think that everyone in the fleet is effectively stuck in the Sol system, especially the Quarians who just got their homeworld back, is just depressing. Not to mention the Normandy's crew being stuck who knows where.

I guess I really wanted the Mass Effect universe to continue on, even if Shepard (and the player) can't see it.

I can't help but wonder if the destruction of the mass relays was an intentional end to the franchise. To put a period to the trilogy to say to the audience, the fans, and maybe also EA, this story is done.
 
Derrick01 said:
Pretty much. It's indefensible and downright lazy.
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A lot of the characters they replace in ME3 are lazy. It couldn't have killed them to just make completely new models and/or animations for the very few they had.

Even just giving the models some defining features would have made things 100x better.

The Quarians made sense. But the Legion Replacement looking exactly like Legion was just idiotic.
 
What's with people complaining about it being a bad thing if Bioware provided a more fulfilling ending?

First of all, this is Mass Effect, a Bioware game. It is SUPPOSED to have multiple endings. They could easily ADD new endings to the game. So, if you're perfectly satisfied with the existing endings, good for you. But if you think they were pathetic, then alternative ending options aren't a bad thing. This isn't a Final Fantasy game, where the ending is set. This is SUPPOSED to be a game with multiple endings. So, if they provide us with an ending where everyone survives, everyone dies, some die, etc. - that is only a good thing because that is what this genre of gaming is all about - having different choices and having those choices affect the consequences.
 
Technically, the ships can still go at like, 5 light years per day. So, over the course of a couple decades they could probably get home!

That is, if they weren't destroyed by all that exploding debris from the giant Mass Relay, which is most likely.
 
HP_Wuvcraft said:
A lot of the characters they replace in ME3 are lazy. It couldn't have killed them to just make completely new models and/or animations for the very few they had.

Even just giving the models some defining features would have made things 100x better.

The Quarians made sense. But the Legion Replacement looking exactly like Legion was just idiotic.
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Does it even have the N7 armor? They never do explain why he took the armor and used it either did they.
 
watership said:
Oh god the music. Other than the Clint Mansell theme there was nothing, NOTHING I liked about this soundtrack. Any good cues came from previous ME games, but otherwise utterly forgettable. Perhaps I didn't read all the details, but when Clint Mansell's name was announced I thought he was doing the whole score. He worked on two tracks. TWO. The rest of the score didn't grab me in the least. Extremely disappointed. Jack Wall, you are missed.
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I completely disagree with this statement. IMO, it was easily on par with the ME1/ME2 soundtracks with Mars, Leaving Earth, An End Once and For All, and the Prothean Beacon being the standouts. The soundtrack in its entirety (flashback tracks and all) fit the game's dark atmosphere perfectly.
 
watership said:
Oh god the music. Other than the Clint Mansell theme there was nothing, NOTHING I liked about this soundtrack. Any good cues came from previous ME games, but otherwise utterly forgettable. Perhaps I didn't read all the details, but when Clint Mansell's name was announced I thought he was doing the whole score. He worked on two tracks. TWO. The rest of the score didn't grab me in the least. Extremely disappointed. Jack Wall, you are missed.
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Man you didn't like the Mars music?

Wass wrong wit choo?
 
Terra Firma said:
What's with people complaining about it being a bad thing if Bioware provided a more fulfilling ending?
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From my own perspective, I'm not saying that good writing is bad or something, or that people wanting a better ending (to them) is stupid. My point is that:

1) BioWare is setting a very lame precedent if they pander in this way
2) People are going to complain no matter what; you can't please everyone

Empty Space said:
Does it even have the N7 armor? They never do explain why he took the armor and used it either did they.
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Yes. The replacement has the texture, all except for the N7 logo.
 
ViewtifulJC said:
You manage to reclaim Rannoch and broker peace between the geth and the quarians, but now they're either dead(either from Reaper battle or giant fucking explosions from the Mass Relays/Reapers) or unable to return to Rannoch. So what was the fucking point?

What was the fucking point
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so all the quarians and turians would starve to death and resort to cannabalism when they run out of dextro-protein foods.

If you loved your quarian waifu, you'd have had her commit suicide on her homeworld.
 
The Alpha Relay being destroyed resulted in pretty much all of the Batarian race being wiped out.

How many billions of people died from every mass relay getting destroyed?
 
Was watching someones playthrough and Javik at the end says he's going to go live like a king on the Hanar homeworld, but in my game he said he was going to go kill himself :(. Why did he do this to me?
 
odd_morsel said:
The Alpha Relay being destroyed resulted in pretty much all of the Batarian race being wiped out.

How many billions of people died from every mass relay getting destroyed?
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Pretty much every civilization that had access to it, i.e. all the ones that matter and would've been killed by the Reapers anyways.

Heh.
 
odd_morsel said:
The Alpha Relay being destroyed resulted in pretty much all of the Batarian race being wiped out.

How many billions of people died from every mass relay getting destroyed?
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the alpha relay only destroyed a batarian colony, the batarian homeworld was somewhere else and was the first target of the reapers.
 
Beat it again, because on second thought the reapers need to die. Controlling them has too many holes in it. As does the idea that AI dominance is inevitable. That's bullshit, I made peace with the Geth. Fuck you space casper.

Seems my military readiness was slightly too low. On the planet, Normandy's door opens, and then it goes the credits. Though I can see the frame of the door close just after the screen goes nearly black. As I approached the blue laser to the citadel, both Ash and Liara were dead on the ground.

I'm guessing the canon ending is:
-Kill the reapers
-Team survives and is stuck in some planet
-Shepard is probably dead, but he could pull another space jesus like in the beginning in #2 easily.

So Bioware could continue with a 4th one, though I'm not sure what it would be about.
 
Pandaman said:
so all the quarians and turians would starve to death and resort to cannabalism when they run out of dextro-protein foods.

If you loved your quarian waifu, you'd have had her commit suicide on her homeworld.
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odd_morsel said:
The Alpha Relay being destroyed resulted in pretty much all of the Batarian race being wiped out.

How many billions of people died from every mass relay getting destroyed?
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No matter what you do, you kill BILLIONS OF PEOPLE. Hell, you probably just destroyed Earth!

Did no one think of this!?
 
Dresden said:
Legion explains in ME2 that it was one of those Geth who were hunting for Shepard's body in the two-year lull between his death and resurrection.
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Yes but when pressed as to why he waited so long to repair himself when he could of used any other material sooner he stands there for a few seconds move his eyebrow things a bunch and responds No Data Available. He clearly had a reason, but just didn't want to say it at the time.
 
Rokam said:
Was watching someones playthrough and Javik at the end says he's going to go live like a king on the Hanar homeworld, but in my game he said he was going to go kill himself :(. Why did he do this to me?
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He told me he was going to bury his dead friends then off himself too. Jokes on him though. He's either already dead, stuck on Earth forever or stuck with whoever was on the Normandy on whatever world it happened to crash.
 
HP_Wuvcraft said:
You really think that badgering a company long and hard enough until they decide to pander and change something that already exists is a good thing for games, let alone any art medium?

You consider that a good thing?

I didn't like the end of Harry Potter. I'm going to write J.K. Rowlings a letter telling her to rewrite the last chapter.
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I agree. We're disappointed but the damage has been done. It's one thing for a work in progress to have fan input but it's another to change an already finished form of media (yes, I believe games are a form of art) because of its fans, despite how much outcry (and in this case, A LOT!) there may be.

Maybe we can hope that there is some kind of epilogue or a sequel that will delve a bit further into the Reapers, but actually changing any content would be unwise.
 
Rokam said:
Was watching someones playthrough and Javik at the end says he's going to go live like a king on the Hanar homeworld, but in my game he said he was going to go kill himself :(. Why did he do this to me?
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What, really? Live like a king? That doesnt sound like Javik at all. He said he would go ti his system to "be with his people" and kill himself to me too.
 
Is there a website that lists all the different choices/scenarios? For instance, I watched a Youtube video where you kill Kai Leng while saying "this is for Miranda", when in my playthrough he said "this is for Thane" (Miranda survived).

Just curious because I know in ME2 you could get everyone killed.
 
Empty Space said:
Does it even have the N7 armor? They never do explain why he took the armor and used it either did they.
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It's subtly explained trough Legion's dialog in ME2. "There was a hole." "Yes but why my armor?" ".... There was a hole."

Legion admires Shepard like a child admires their cool uncle. What I loved about Legion in ME2 and what made him my favorite character is that despite his hyper intelligence and his starkly neutral position on everything was that there were occasionally small injections of emotion into his dialog that were subtle but all produced great moments of character interaction. He really is like a child genius type personality. Incredibly intelligent but also needs a nurturing leader. It's a wonderful dynamic and IMO the best part of ME2 (that he was shoved toward the end of the game sucks hard, especially since he has dialog written for almost every mission).

I won't say they threw that away in ME3 but it does feel like he lost a bit of flavor and was mischaracterized by the writing staff. The Geth seemed much less driven by logic and infinite understanding, and more by emotion and self-preservation in ME3. Bioware took the "synthetic life" thing a bit too far for my liking.

Re: Javik, on my game he also said he'd go live as a king amongst the Hanar.
 
Just finished my Paragon Shep run. Wow what a shitty ending - why did I even bother with those 200+ hours in ME1 and ME2? None of it mattered, such a disappointment.
 
I don't understand what you or the Illusive Man (indoctrinated though he was) were going to do with controlled reapers anyway. They're pretty much just giant living starship war machines that want to murder everybody, what's the damn point? TIM said some crap about making some kind of amazing technological/evolutionary leap, but it was just complete babble to me.
 
HP_Wuvcraft said:
From my own perspective, I'm not saying that good writing is bad or something, or that people wanting a better ending (to them) is stupid. My point is that:

1) BioWare is setting a very lame precedent if they pander in this way
2) People are going to complain no matter what; you can't please everyone
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How is it bad if they release alternate endings? They can leave the piss poor ones that already exist but they can give additional endings. How is it a bad thing to pander to your fans?

And when you put "to them" in parentheses: I have to say that it IS supposed to be subjective. If you play your character a certain way, you should get an ending that is more or less tailored to your character. If you're a renegade and you get the same ending as a paragon, then that is problematic and needs to be fixed. They can easily add additional endings and attach more conditions to the crappy one that already exists - e.g. you're not full paragon or full renegade and you have a low EMS.

This is a game that is all about choices. If it was a different type of game, I can see your point that companies should not be pandering by trying to make everybody happy. But Mass Effect and games like it - where you get to effectively decide how your character is - are supposed to have different endings or something that ties everything together.

I know that an alternative ending is not coming because Bioware already got the $$$ that it wanted and more - but isn't it bad to sucker people into a franchise and then crap all over them?

What I can hope for is an extended DLC that goes on after the ending but clarifies things or sets up scenarios for further games in the universe because with all the mass effect relays destroyed, the entire Mass Effect universe might as well have died, not just the Reapers or Shepard. I just hope it isn't another Deus ex machina.
 
If Bioware created a DLC mission that enlightened the player to a drastic new development in the story, then adds a new option onto the ending that's more satisfying, claimed it was in their plans all along and then prices it at $7, would you buy it?

I would
 
JCV said:
If you choose the ending that destroys all synthetic life, why does EDI survive at the end?
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Can you link this to me? I've seen 2 or so variations on the destroy synthetic life and EDI never comes out of the Normandy. Last one I saw had Joker, Traynor and Garrus step out.
 
Jintor said:
I don't understand what you or the Illusive Man (indoctrinated though he was) were going to do with controlled reapers anyway. They're pretty much just giant living starship war machines that want to murder everybody, what's the damn point? TIM said some crap about making some kind of amazing technological/evolutionary leap, but it was just complete babble to me.
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You could make them tell you how to make Mass Relays for starters.
 
Lone_Prodigy said:
Is there a website that lists all the different choices/scenarios? For instance, I watched a Youtube video where you kill Kai Leng while saying "this is for Miranda", when in my playthrough he said "this is for Thane" (Miranda survived).

Just curious because I know in ME2 you could get everyone killed.
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My play thru, thane died in ME2, Miranda survived Sanctuary, and Shepard killed kei ling, and spouted off "this time you don't have a damn gun ship.". I smiled with Glee on that delivery.

Edi only walked out on the "combined DNA" ending. The other 2 were Joker, the comms lady (cause I smanged that) and Garrus
 
Fimbulvetr said:
Wut.

Maybe the ending was relatively less crappy, but the last horrid 10 minutes of ME3 don’t remotely make the badness in a lot of DA2’s writing seem appealing.

The difference is that ME3 has actual enjoyable parts before the abominable ending, so it seems even more worse by comparison.
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Okay, calling DA2 a masterpiece isn't going to make me any friends, hehe. I meant what you already inferred, that because the overall bad writing in the entire game, I the end of DA2 I didn't really cared for the ending as much. But it's also true tha DA2, while railroading you into the scenario they wanted (full scale war with the mages) no matter what, it at least did it without wiping out all the world and NPCs you could have cared for during the process.

HP_Wuvcraft said:
From my own perspective, I'm not saying that good writing is bad or something, or that people wanting a better ending (to them) is stupid. My point is that:

1) BioWare is setting a very lame precedent if they pander in this way
2) People are going to complain no matter what; you can't please everyone
Click to expand...

Bethesda allegedly did something similar in Fallout 3. Not on the same scale and their games strongest point isn't storytelling like Biowares, but they did basically sold a DLC that made the ending of the game "better". Not saying it would work here, but the precedent already exists.

Also, as others have already pointed out, since we are talking about interactive mediums, is a lot harder to make "provocative" endings without causing rage, as people are way more invested. It is not that I want a happy ending, I want one that makes sense. Even if Bioware are genius and have a future plan where it all fits, at this point, in the end of the trilogy, I'm feeling disappointed, to put it mildly. And iI think we can say that even if people always complain, there's more complaining than usual.
 
odd_morsel said:
If Bioware created a DLC mission that enlightened the player to a drastic new development in the story, then adds a new option onto the ending that's more satisfying, claimed it was in their plans all along and then prices it at $7, would you buy it?

I would
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Hey, I bought and loved End of Evagenlion. Lets go, optional endings!
 
odd_morsel said:
If Bioware created a DLC mission that enlightened the player to a drastic new development in the story, then adds a new option onto the ending that's more satisfying, claimed it was in their plans all along and then prices it at $7, would you buy it?

I would
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$7? Probably not.
 
Pandaman said:
they already know how. there were plans to build more mass relays that were shot down for lck of need/funding. hell, they use mass effect fields in toothbrushes.
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Could I get a source for this. I've never seen them indicate they were capable of making a relay. If people know how to make them that kind of takes away my complaint about the ending irrevocably changing the universe.
 
exYle said:
Can you link this to me? I've seen 2 or so variations on the destroy synthetic life and EDI never comes out of the Normandy. Last one I saw had Joker, Traynor and Garrus step out.
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Well I'm pretty sure EDI came out of the ship in my synthetic ending, but I might be wrong. I'd have to replay the ending to be sure...
 
Rokam said:
Was watching someones playthrough and Javik at the end says he's going to go live like a king on the Hanar homeworld, but in my game he said he was going to go kill himself :(. Why did he do this to me?
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Maybe you picked the renegade option and told him not to look at the memory rectangle.
 
Digoman said:
Bethesda allegedly did something similar in Fallout 3. Not on the same scale and their games strongest point isn't storytelling like Biowares, but they did basically sold a DLC that made the ending of the game "better". Not saying it would work here, but the precedent already exists.
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I think this gets into the issue of "When does post-game DLC deserve to be in the main game?". But it's an interesting issue. One that doesn't have a real clear answer yet. I would have liked Witch Hunt to be a part of DA2.

Broken Steel also was not a direct response to people not liking the Fallout 3 ending.
 
Empty Space said:
Could I get a source for this. I've never seen them indicate they were capable of making a relay. If people know how to make them that kind of takes away my complaint about the ending irrevocably changing the universe.
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it was mentioned in mass effect one that there were plans to build relays that folded to public pressure.

wrex, EDI and liara will all be toasting shepard in a few hundred years.
 
JCV said:
Well I'm pretty sure EDI came out of the ship in my synthetic ending, but I might be wrong. I'd have to replay the ending to be sure...
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Oh nevermind, I thought the BLUE ending was the one that killed every synthetic. Sorry about that...

Well, sounds like I took control of the reapers without really knowing it.
 
Now that I've had some more time to think about the ending I'm pretty sure it's up there with MGS4 as the worst ending in a video game ever. Except you could stop after any previous MGS game and be satisfied with it. ME3 ending makes ME1 and ME2 trash.

Someone's going to edit that Back to the Future gif of the Doc explaining to Marty that Spiderman 3 made Spiderman and Spiderman 2 shitty in the alternate timeline with the Mass Effect franchise.
 
Pandaman said:
it was mentioned in mass effect one that there were plans to build relays that folded to public pressure.

wrex, EDI and liara will all be toasting shepard in a few hundred years.
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I think there was talks about researching how to make them in the first game, but nobody in that universe except the Reapers know how they work. In arrival they talk about how nobody knows anything about them they didn't even know for sure if the collision would destroy it.
 
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