[General Battuta]

IMHO, the Mass Effect series is like a Neal Stephenson novel. A great ride that leads to a somewhat lackluster ending. But that doesn't mean that the money and time spent on it was in any way wasted; for me, the last ten minutes of ME3 do not invalidate the fun I've had playing in the universe for close to a hundred hours before.

I, personally, think that everything that could be said about the ending has been said, whining about it some more won't change it. Whining about it here will certainly have no effect whatsoever.

I feel completely the opposite! Anyone opposed to this ending needs to direct that opposition at BioWare, consistently and repeatedly, in clear, polite, concise statements. The first step of PR damage control is to hunker down and hope the opposition burns itself out. If the fanbase wants to get past that reaction they'll need to sustain their effort - and so far they're doing a firm, polite, nearly professional job of it.

BioWare cannot ignore the outrage as long as the outrage can sustain itself. They're already seeing ME3's PC price chopped by $10-$20 on Amazon due to bad reviews. They're getting negative coverage in Forbes and CNN. Money tells, and as long this outrage focuses on a specific point, BioWare will be forced - by internal or external demand - to address that point.

Remember, this is a company completely dedicated to fanservice.

I've heard all kinds of bull**** analogies to justify the idea that Bioware should stick it out. From general "artistic integrity" comments to actually having it compared to a great painter changing a famous painting because the "fans" liked green sunflowers better.

The analogies are bull****. Mass Effect 3 isn't art, it features some art - there's a fundamental difference. Pure art doesn't have to conform to mass user standards. It can be whatever it's author wants it to be. Mass Effect is a mass consumer product, a piece of pulp, an entertaining space game where you make a lot of galaxy-affecting choices in an effort to save it. It's a piece of escapism, a fictional universe-based epic story to get lost in after a hard day's work. It is not a piece of classic literature meant to have us ponder about the reality of man's existence. It's a game where you command a space ship, seduce blue alien babes and shoot at zombie like things, feeling unique and like a galaxy saving hero - something most of us can really only experience through interactive fiction like this.

So, once you spent 5 years (or so) telling that fans to keep their saves, presenting them with options and decisions that you keep promising will have a meaningful impact on the games, and then fail to deliver that, it's basically false advertising. When you spend that same time making them care about the characters, and then fail to provide any sort of closure regarding them, it's not false advertising, but it is bad storytelling. As is a plot hole ridden end that really makes no sense.

So why shouldn't we get a DLC that at least expands on the endings, fixes the plot holes, and puts things in context? I agree with the general concensus that the worst problems of the endings are the fact that they throw your choices out the window, and contain massive plot holes. People say they're fine with sad endings as long as these issues are addressed. I'm fine with them too, but in a game that's all about player choices, why force only sad endings? What is so wrong about coming home from work, immersing into a fantastic sci fi universe, winning over the blue alien babe and saving the galaxy while we're at it? I know dark and gloomy is fashionable these days, but damn it I just want a happy hero ending, and no - I don't think it's a bad thing.

[Herra Tohtori]

It was a **** ending, sure, but if someone won't petition an author for a less ****ty ending to their book that leaves them unsatisfied then I don't see how it's any more valid to demand the same of a videogame. I had no idea the ****ing thing was called 'Take back mass effect 3' until just now and it makes me want to start defending the choice of coloured explosions as opposed to seeing a ****ing retarded precedent set where gamers can just demand that the people who make the game simply recraft it when they don't like it. (Although it's been brought to my attention that this has already been done. Whatever.)

Book writers usually don't advertise one book and sell another.

Then again, book writers typically don't tell us what to expect of the book aside from a very general summary, so they typically don't face this type of issue.


However I am inclined to agree that a lot of people are overreacting and it is getting just as much of a problem as Bioware, because all those masses of raging posts full of personal insults is just detracting from the valid critique and feedback that Bioware could gather.

They are also making it easy to lump everyone who would prefer a different ending into same group, whatever their reasons may be, and call it "LOL GAMER ENTITLEMENT" or "RAGING FANBOYS NOT BEING HAPPY WITH UNHAPPY", or other things I've seen happening already.


Oh, and the Star Wars "Special Edition" analogy in that penny-arcade video is inaccurate for several reasons. If Bioware were to add an ending that actually makes sense, it would be significantly different from what Lucas did to his films, for two main reasons.

1. There was never any requests from fans to add modern day editing magic to the films, Lucas decided to do that on his own. Also, Mass Effect 3 has not been out for 30+ years

2. While mostly unfortunately ill-advised, Lucas' additions and changes in the original films did not significantly change the plot or, indeed, even add anything of importance, while an ending DLC would radically transform the storyline of ME3 (most likely for the better, but I'll withstand judgement until they actually make one).



Aside from all this, I have to say one thing: Whether it was intentional or nonintentional, the current ending of ME3 couldn't have been any better suited for a continuation with "IT WAS ALL JUST A DREAM" trope. It's all there - how things don't seem to make sense, how Shepard, Anderson, TIM and Catalyst act, how the Normandy's escape is depicted, and finally, showing Shepard alive, quite obviously not showing signs of unassisted orbital descent, or exposure to powerful space magic explosions and vacuum.


Like said, if they had planned this as a "dream" sequence, with a real ending to the series being released afterwards, it would actually be nearly perfectly executed.


And I am still somewhat suspicious about whether it was actually their plan to begin with. It would make sense that any stuff about a possible ending DLC would be NDA'd to Mordor and back again, and the statements about there not being an ending DLC could simply be them lying. There have been a few things that seem to hint that we haven't heard everything on this matter yet.

However it seems if that was their plan, they massively underestimated (or overestimated) the Internet as a collective, and the controversy is possibly starting to harm them more than any possible aggregated visibility can benefit them.


I'm still waiting to see how this all plays out. Meanwhile, I can enjoy an excellent game with a mystifying rather than disappointing ending - it's all dependant on how you choose to look at it, after all.

[General Battuta]

One of the Alpha Protocol devs was all 'haha this is just angry nerds.' Then he played the game and called the ending 'a narrative and design atrocity'.

obsidian please buy bioware

[TrashMan]

I feel completely the opposite! Anyone opposed to this ending needs to direct that opposition at BioWare, consistently and repeatedly, in clear, polite, concise statements.

No they don't.
FFS' it's just a game. Make your oppinion known, post on the forums, make a you Tube review if you want, but constant repetition and forcing is beyond interest in the game. That goes into "questionably sanity" territory.

The analogies are bull****. Mass Effect 3 isn't art, it features some art - there's a fundamental difference. Pure art doesn't have to conform to mass user standards. It can be whatever it's author wants it to be. Mass Effect is a mass consumer product, a piece of pulp, an entertaining space game where you make a lot of galaxy-affecting choices in an effort to save it. It's a piece of escapism, a fictional universe-based epic story to get lost in after a hard day's work. It is not a piece of classic literature meant to have us ponder about the reality of man's existence. It's a game where you command a space ship, seduce blue alien babes and shoot at zombie like things, feeling unique and like a galaxy saving hero - something most of us can really only experience through interactive fiction like this.

It's what the delopers want it to be. If developers WANT us to ponder about the reality of man's existance, it is their right. Just because it's a entertainment product doesn't mean a bunch of consumers have the right to dictate everything.
You know what? I DON'T want to ponder the issues of technological singularity and sentient AI. I hate those. Yet ME3 has them. By your logic I should start a never-ending war till BioWare changes it.

So, once you spent 5 years (or so) telling that fans to keep their saves, presenting them with options and decisions that you keep promising will have a meaningful impact on the games, and then fail to deliver that, it's basically false advertising. When you spend that same time making them care about the characters, and then fail to provide any sort of closure regarding them, it's not false advertising, but it is bad storytelling. As is a plot hole ridden end that really makes no sense.

There is closure, but not to your satisfaction. Big difference. You'e spot on on the plot holes tough.

[newman]

It's what the delopers want it to be. If developers WANT us to ponder about the reality of man's existance, it is their right. Just because it's a entertainment product doesn't mean a bunch of consumers have the right to dictate everything.
You know what? I DON'T want to ponder the issues of technological singularity and sentient AI. I hate those. Yet ME3 has them. By your logic I should start a never-ending war till BioWare changes it.

Except I never said anyone should start any sort of a "war". If anything, the notion that the fans are acting like a bunch of spoiled children that have been deprived of a toy has been way, way exaggerated. I found most fan reactions to actually be concise, stating exact reasons why they thought the endings felt out of place with the player character and the franchise in general, to actual constructive suggestions on how this could be fixed. Of course, there are always self entitled whiners, but in general I've found most fans keeping things polite and constructive.

The fact that there's so many of them who just felt the endings were bad doesn't automatically mean they're all screaming for Bioware's blood. If anything, Bioware should feel proud that their product evoked a response of this magnitude. But when a vast majority of their fans are unhappy with a certain feature of the product.. it's not a non-interactive, linear work of art. It's not a painting, it's not a symphony. It's an interactive medium, and changing or at least enhancing the ending isn't something I would consider necessarily bad, if they choose to do it and if they choose to do it right.

I agree that they don't have to do it. But actually doing it would make a vast majority of ME fans happy - and this can easily translate into profit. With things as they are, ME3 has little replay value for me, and I'm not even sure I'll want to buy any further DLC's that don't address the ending - because I really feel that additional events that happen prior to the end but don't change it would be irrelevant. I jus wouldn't be motivated to play, knowing it doesn't matter at all in the grand scheme of things. I'm not sure I'd be interested in additional RPG series from them either, because I don't want to be invested into a universe and a plot for 5 years and then be let down at the end. Whether or not you think I'm right is irrelevant; a lot of fans will think this way, and since it all boils down to profit in the end, I wouldn't be surprised if they took steps to satisfy said fans.

[General Battuta]

Hey people I don't think you're obeying the correct trashman post ****ty thread avoidance response protocol

[The E]

BioWare cannot ignore the outrage as long as the outrage can sustain itself. They're already seeing ME3's PC price chopped by $10-$20 on Amazon due to bad reviews. They're getting negative coverage in Forbes and CNN. Money tells, and as long this outrage focuses on a specific point, BioWare will be forced - by internal or external demand - to address that point.

And meanwhile, those of us who aren't that invested into the whole thing get increasingly bored by the endless repetition of the same talking points over and over again.
And I have to ask, what's the end goal here? Getting new endings and stories via DLC? Changing the way Bioware (or the game industry as a whole) does business? For all the talk about "voting with your wallet", going by the released sales figures, ME3 was a huge success. Not Modern Borefare or Twattlefield big, but pretty big nonetheless.

See, while I want more Mass Effect, I am not that hung up on the various ways in which the prerelease marketing was wrong and misleading, or how it was handled post-release. I bought a fun game, or series of games, and I would do it again in a heartbeat, despite all the negative feelings surrounding it on the intarwebs.

[General Battuta]

And meanwhile, those of us who aren't that invested into the whole thing get increasingly bored by the endless repetition of the same talking points over and over again.

Endless repetition of the same talking points over and over again is unfortunately how campaigns work - whether political or otherwise.

And I have to ask, what's the end goal here? Getting new endings and stories via DLC?

yup

I want to be able to enjoy Mass Effect again.

[TrashMan]

Except I never said anyone should start any sort of a "war". If anything, the notion that the fans are acting like a bunch of spoiled children that have been deprived of a toy has been way, way exaggerated. I found most fan reactions to actually be concise, stating exact reasons why they thought the endings felt out of place with the player character and the franchise in general, to actual constructive suggestions on how this could be fixed. Of course, there are always self entitled whiners, but in general I've found most fans keeping things polite and constructive.

Thing is, those things are very subjective as proven right here.

But when a vast majority of their fans are unhappy with a certain feature of the product.. it's not a non-interactive, linear work of art. It's not a painting, it's not a symphony. It's an interactive medium, and changing or at least enhancing the ending isn't something I would consider necessarily bad, if they choose to do it and if they choose to do it right.

There is a limit to any interactivity. In the end it is telling of a story. It must have an end. An end the writers make.
It being a game changes little to nothing.

I agree that they don't have to do it. But actually doing it would make a vast majority of ME fans happy - and this can easily translate into profit.

This could backfire spectaculary. Making another ending and charging for it would probably be the worst thing Bio could do right now.

[newman]

yup

I want to be able to enjoy Mass Effect again.

Same here. I want to.. want to replay all the games again. I don't atm.

[achtung]

New ending DLC/expansion isn't all that crazy a thought. Other devs have done it.

[newman]

This could backfire spectaculary. Making another ending and charging for it would probably be the worst thing Bio could do right now.

You misunderstand. They definitely shouldn't make people pay for a proper ending, that would be complete bull****. But by making an end that doesn't make the majority feel that all of their actions so far have been pointless, you can get people invested in buying other DLC you come up with. I'm sure not buying some DLC about, say, Aria retaking Omega or some **** like that, if I know that a few days after that it all goes to hell anyway.

[TrashMan]

Hey people I don't think you're obeying the correct trashman post ****ty thread avoidance response protocol

 

How low have the mighty fallen.....

I want to be able to enjoy Mass Effect again.

I don't. For you to enjoy it I mean. Given our different tastes, there's a 99% chance that an ending you'd like would be something I wouldn't. So I'd rather you suffer.

[TrashMan]

This could backfire spectaculary. Making another ending and charging for it would probably be the worst thing Bio could do right now.

You misunderstand. They definitely shouldn't make people pay for a proper ending, that would be complete bull****. But by making an end that doesn't make the majority feel that all of their actions so far have been pointless, you can get people invested in buying other DLC you come up with. I'm sure not buying some DLC about, say, Aria retaking Omega or some **** like that, if I know that a few days after that it all goes to hell anyway.

Ultimatively, it could backfire weather they charge for a new ending or not.

[General Battuta]

This could backfire spectaculary. Making another ending and charging for it would probably be the worst thing Bio could do right now.

You misunderstand. They definitely shouldn't make people pay for a proper ending, that would be complete bull****. But by making an end that doesn't make the majority feel that all of their actions so far have been pointless, you can get people invested in buying other DLC you come up with. I'm sure not buying some DLC about, say, Aria retaking Omega or some **** like that, if I know that a few days after that it all goes to hell anyway.

This is one of the amazing things about ME3. Everything you do to help anyone turns out to screw them over.

You can, for example, find Kelly Chambers on the Citadel. If you warn her, Cerberus won't kill her as a traitor. If you console her instead of berating her, she won't shoot herself out of guilt for informing on you.

If you take both of these good-hearted actions, she'll die screaming in a Reaper processing center, reliving her worst nightmares from the Collector abduction. It's more merciful to talk her into shooting herself.

As for Aria, yeah, it'd be pretty great to help her retake Omega, then shut down the relays and strand her there while society collapses.

[newman]

There is a limit to any interactivity. In the end it is telling of a story. It must have an end. An end the writers make.
It being a game changes little to nothing.

There is a limit to interactivity, yes, but it being a game changes a lot. In a movie, opera, book, or whatever, you follow a predetermined story from the side, to it's conclusion. In a game, you are the character. You look at the galaxy through Shepard's eyes, you change it through the choices you make, and you feel emotionally attached to the characters you interacted with over the years.
Following a story from the side, and participating in it actively through the protagonist's eyes make all the difference here.

[The E]

I was going to lock this thread, but then I remembered that I didn't care.

[General Battuta]

Hey guys can we un-****tify this thread please, I think you all know Step 1

[Herra Tohtori]

Yes.

Let's discuss for a moment about the game before Marauder Shields' demise, and what was so good about it.


My favourite part of the game was the Tuchanka episode. Mordin is a character I always sort of identified with quite strongly, and I think his writing and dialogue and acting was one of the best in the whole game.


Would have liked to perform experiments on sea-shells.


Then, right after that I return to Citadel to speak with the Salarian ambassador and Thane gets killed by a horrible person, but I found that a very good closure for the character as well. Good stuff altogether.

[newman]

I found both Mordin's and Thane's storylines wrapped up perfectly. Especially Mordin's - that was handled beautifully. The Gilbert and Sullivan song at the tower was just the right touch.