Bioware vs. their Fans

[kasperbbs]

Whatever their faults might be i still like their games the most, except for that starwars mmo, because its starwars themed and an mmo, two things i'm not interested in. I just hope that they will stop going downhill, one of their last two SP games dropped in quality drastically and another one is plagued with problems that i don't even need to mention.

 

[SpaceBat]

I liked KotOR, but I felt that KotOR 2 was better...the writing was better, more gray and less black and white.

Ummmmm

He's right, you know .
I mean, it's obsidian.

 

[Angry_squirrel]

I never bought any Mass Effect game, I planned on waiting for a price drop on this one then completing all three in one sitting. The fact that none of your choices make a difference to the ending has really put me off though. Personally, I hope Bioware add new endings that I can have a chance of achieving when I do play them.
If not, I think I wont bother with any of these games.

 

[Folji]

I am very skeptical of Steam ever since I heard that you don't actually own the games you buy from them and if they decide to ban your account you can no longer access the games you bought. I don't like that at all.

True, they can. Just like that, and bam, no more access to any of those games.

Rarely happens, though. A lot of bans on Steam are just VAC bans for purposefully cheating in games and don't result in more than not being able to play on some online servers in that game (sometimes other games as well). One of the few stories I know of where someone got their whole account banned, it was for trying to sell the account and it ended with head honcho Gabe deciding that "this is wrong" and giving them their $1800 worth account back.

They don't ban entire accounts without a reason that's written black on white in the subscriber agreement (which is pretty much all the typical stuff; selling, hacking, reverse-engineering with a sinister goal of building an army of miniature robots, etc.) and even when they do have a reason they probably wish they didn't. That's more than what can be said about services like Origin and their "people got banned for forum profanity" fiasco.

I've been on Steam for over five years, and still got my account in one piece with no warnings or anything.

 

[Kevlar Eater]

You do realise that the ending of Mass Effect 3 is perfectly in line with the theme of the games up to this point? And, you also do realise that not everything has to end well to be considered complete? Hamlet doesn't end well, but it's still considered rather good. King Lear doesn't end well, either. A Tale of Two Cities ends in a very similar way to Mass Effect 3 in many ways.

Perhaps it's time people got used to an ending in which people make actual sacrifices rather than getting their way all the time. Like the Rolling Stones say, "You can't always get what you want."

Oh dear gods, why do you (as well as the misinformed press that enjoy using the word 'entitled')assume that people wanted a happy ending where Shepard and co. fly off into the sunset and live happily ever after, a la Disney? No! We don't care if a story ends in a tragic way, as long as it:

1. Fills massive plot holes
2. Has closure of some kind
3. Makes sense.

Bioware/ME3 failed all criteria, and that is why this debacle has gone on for this long, and their PR is continuously pissing off dissatisfied customers with double speak, which would make even the most loyal Bio-tards (with a few exceptions) reconsider buying their future titles.

 

[ckriley]

I'm not sure if this has been mentioned, but the OP left out an obvious $200 million behemoth: Star Wars.

Also, the OP left out the myriad of DLC that was not well received with fans. Particularly Arrival. And let's not forget the equally panned DA expansion: Awakening.

To top it all off, the OP left out the entire Jennifer Hepler incident. All of that has contributed to what we are seeing today in terms of fan attitude toward Bioware.

 

[ckriley]

I liked KotOR, but I felt that KotOR 2 was better...the writing was better, more gray and less black and white.

Ummmmm

He's right, you know .
I mean, it's obsidian.

Everyone is absolutely entitled to their own opinion, but the reviews of KOTOR2 today are 110% revisionist history. In 2004 when that game came out, you can't IMAGINE the amount of scorn heaped on it.

I feel like the same exact thing will happen with DA2 about ten years from now. Fans will point to it as being so awesome. Watch.

 

[Hyper-space]

snip

The story of Dragon Age 2 vastly succeeds its predecessor, DA:O was basically just average cookie-cutter power-fantasy, where everything revolves around your dick. The characters were flat and typical of Bioware, while in DA2 you got ACTUAL CHARACTERS WITH THEIR OWN IDEAS AND OPINIONS. They could independently develop without your interference, you were no longer the only catalyst in their lives, you were not the center of their universe.

Frankly, I think the stories and characters of Bioware have matured past their usual audience, they no longer go by what you'd expect in a typical video-game. Maybe they've brought the maturity of literature to video-games with new writers, dunno.

EDIT:

To top it all off, the OP left out the entire Jennifer Hepler incident.

What did Mrs. Hepler do to enrage the fans? Talk back when people called her a "fat *****" and a "obese ****" on twitter? What is it exactly that shes has done that is so wrong?

The Jennifer Hepler "incident" shows more how fucking immature as shit most gamers are than any wrong-doing on her part.

 

[Something Amyss]

The funny part is how even "bad" BioWare games can still be considered a lot better than a lot of what else there is on the gaming market

Especially amazing considering the story's supposed to be the major part and they've been come of the most hackneyed, cliché stuff on the market.

 

[Ziggy]

I will og back to Bioware's party when he stops puking on my shoes. Also, it would be nice if he remembered details like chairs and a DJ.

 

[DANEgerous]

Well as vALVE has stated "games are delayed for a while but they will suck forever" they do not care if they do not push out a game fact or how many games they put out they tend to care more about them simply being good.

 

[trooper6]

I am very skeptical of Steam ever since I heard that you don't actually own the games you buy from them and if they decide to ban your account you can no longer access the games you bought. I don't like that at all.

True, they can. Just like that, and bam, no more access to any of those games.

It is the principle. I don't like that if I buy something (not rent), it can be taken away from me for whatever reason. I could understand being blocked from buying things in the future, or blocked from continuing to play an MMO in the future...but I don't like the idea that I pay $20 for a product and then that product can be take away from me bam, just like that. I have only bought one thing from Steam, before I found out about how Steam works. Now, if there is a game on Steam I'm interested in, I'll see if I can buy it from the makers themselves rather than through Steam. For example, Trauma. I could have gotten it cheaper from Steam...but then it wouldn't really be mine. So instead I spend a bit more money and bought it from the artist. Now the game is mine forever and it can't be taken from me. Additionally, the creator gets to have more of my money than if I had gone through Steam.

That they might only do it rarely, doesn't change the fact that they are presenting themselves as selling you a product, but reserve the right to repossess that product at any time. That is not a business model I want to encourage.

Oh dear gods, why do you (as well as the misinformed press that enjoy using the word 'entitled')assume that people wanted a happy ending where Shepard and co. fly off into the sunset and live happily ever after, a la Disney? No! We don't care if a story ends in a tragic way, as long as it:

1. Fills massive plot holes
2. Has closure of some kind
3. Makes sense.

Bioware/ME3 failed all criteria, and that is why this debacle has gone on for this long, and their PR is continuously pissing off dissatisfied customers with double speak, which would make even the most loyal Bio-tards (with a few exceptions) reconsider buying their future titles.

One of the reasons why people think some of the detractors want the happy ever after ending, is because even Angry Joe, in point 7, says he wants the option of the Disney happy ever after.

As for your 3 points. You state Bioware failed all three criteria as if it were objectively true. It isn't. It is opinion.
I think the ending:
1. Has no massive plot hole (it has one minor plot hole--how some of your crew got on the Normandy--that can be convincingly explained away. Further I see why it was done and doesn't detract from the ending for me)
2. Has closure. Further I saw my ending as a positive one...bittersweet, but ultimately positive. But then I don't jump to overly negative unsupported conclusions like--"If you choose the synthesis ending you turn everyone into Husks! EDI and Joker are clearly not husks. Stop being melodramatic"
3. Makes sense. It was pretty clear to me. In no way obscure or even that difficult. I mean, it wasn't David Lynch. It was pretty straight forward. But then I have experienced a lot of 1970s scifi, so I've see these sorts of themes before.

I think the ending does all the things people say they want it to--and I say this as a person who does not at all buy the cop-out of the indoctrination theory.

I have watched Angry Joe and read the Google Doc. I've heard all the complaints. I think most of those complaints are invalid and more than a little ridiculous and disingenuous. That is my view.

Detractors can have their view. That's fine, what do I care? I mean, lots of people didn't like the ending of Battlestar Galactica though I did. Yet those BSG fans didn't try to force the creators to redo the ending (which is the worst kind of entitlement), thus depriving me from the ending I enjoyed as well as the ending the creators wanted to make. And here is where one of the problems come in. The detractors don't want "extra clarification" they want a completely different ending...one that would negate the ending we were given. They feel entitled to demand a new ending that fits what they want, as if Bioware were their bitches (to reference the Niel Gaiman commentary on fan entitlement, which you can find here: http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2011/02/catch-up-and-entitlement-issues-once.html)

This is the ending we have and one that the creators wanted to do as well as one that fans like. If you want your own ending, write fanfic. That is your right.

But I wish the detractors would stop acting like Anne Wilkes from Misery and I wish they'd stop presenting their personal preferences as objective fact and lastly I wish they'd stop making such vicious attacks on people who did like the ending.

 

[ZombieMonkey7]

I never heard a single bad thing about Mass Effect 2 and is honestly one of the best works they have put out. Yeah the upgrade system might be a bit mindless, but who cares the gameplay is a HUGE step up from ME1 and the story is really engaging.

As for Bioware caving into making another ending, that is totally called for. Yes it's their game and it's their choice if they don't want to remake it, but not doing so would be a huge mistake. The ending spits on everything that Mass Effect stands for and not to mention the RIDICULOUS amount of plot holes. For some reason people seem not to want remake the ending to change ME3 just because the fanboys are complaining. Even though the ending could ruin the entire series, has plot holes which make no sense, and doesn't support what mass effect has been known so much for, choice.

 

[trooper6]

Everyone is absolutely entitled to their own opinion, but the reviews of KOTOR2 today are 110% revisionist history. In 2004 when that game came out, you can't IMAGINE the amount of scorn heaped on it.

I feel like the same exact thing will happen with DA2 about ten years from now. Fans will point to it as being so awesome. Watch.

I can imagine the scorn because I was alive and gaming in 2004. But you know what? I liked KotOR2 back then as well. But that scorn was not universal. KotOR2, if you check metacritic, has an 85 rating. Lots of the industry gave KotOR2 praise. If over time the grumpy people gain some critical distance and realize they were being a bit ridiculous, that isn't revisionist history...that is people calming down a bit and when not caught in the throes of nerd rage realizing that the game is actually really good.

And DA2 (which got a 79 metacritic rating)? I loved it then and think it is a great work of art--as did many others. I'm pretty sure people will come around over time and come to see its great value, just as they did with KotOR2.

I certainly am sure the people will come to appreciate Mass Effect 3 in the future...at game that has a 93 metacritic rating, by the way.

 

[Crazy Elf]

Oh dear gods, why do you (as well as the misinformed press that enjoy using the word 'entitled')assume that people wanted a happy ending where Shepard and co. fly off into the sunset and live happily ever after, a la Disney? No! We don't care if a story ends in a tragic way, as long as it:

1. Fills massive plot holes
2. Has closure of some kind
3. Makes sense.

Bioware/ME3 failed all criteria...

Like trooper6 says, that's really just your perception of it. I personally see the largest plot hole as being the Normandy flying away, but that can easily be explained as we have no idea how long Shepard was unconscious for. Otherwise it makes complete sense (the purpose of the Reapers is completely logical) and any of the three options that you choose give complete closure. You don't see the long term effects of your choices, sure, but you know what your choice was. Closure with all the supporting characters is achieved moments before you undertake the last mission, when you get to either call everyone or see everyone in person and say goodbye to them. If you want to know more about them go write a fanfic.

The ending works. I think a lot of this outrage is grieving over a character that players have spent around 100 hours building and developing. That's understandable, but it doesn't change the fact that the ending makes dramatic sense.

 

[Swny Nerdgasm]

I still consider them my favorite game studio and with the exception of Jade Empire and their Star Wars games have yet to find something they made that I haven't enjoyed

 

[lapan]

You do realise that the ending of Mass Effect 3 is perfectly in line with the theme of the games up to this point? And, you also do realise that not everything has to end well to be considered complete? Hamlet doesn't end well, but it's still considered rather good. King Lear doesn't end well, either. A Tale of Two Cities ends in a very similar way to Mass Effect 3 in many ways.

Perhaps it's time people got used to an ending in which people make actual sacrifices rather than getting their way all the time. Like the Rolling Stones say, "You can't always get what you want."

Oh dear gods, why do you (as well as the misinformed press that enjoy using the word 'entitled')assume that people wanted a happy ending where Shepard and co. fly off into the sunset and live happily ever after, a la Disney? No! We don't care if a story ends in a tragic way, as long as it:

1. Fills massive plot holes
2. Has closure of some kind
3. Makes sense.

Bioware/ME3 failed all criteria, and that is why this debacle has gone on for this long, and their PR is continuously pissing off dissatisfied customers with double speak, which would make even the most loyal Bio-tards (with a few exceptions) reconsider buying their future titles.

4. Make the choices you made before the ending actually influence it, like it was promised in multiple interviews before. Most of the choices you make in ME3 are rendered irrelevant with the current ending, especially true for the Geth/Quarian conflict.

 

[SillyBear]

I lost a lot of faith in Bioware after how they handled the ending of Mass Effect 3. I thought it showed not only poor design choices, but complete disregard for the fan base. However it's obvious that the ending was the best Bioware could do. They hadn't quite finished and couldn't have pushed the release back any further due to EA's financial year projections.

So they scrambled and came up with what they could.

I'd still buy a Bioware game - but probably not as blindly as I used to.

 

[Thammuz]

Honestly, what i dislike is the blatant abuse of their PR department. The games can suck all they want for Bioware's standards, they will still be better than most games that come out these days. Sure, they're no Baldur's Gate 2, but we can take it. Hell, even the ME3 fiasco would've been tolerable if they just expanded the endings decently. If they gave closure, and showed you how you made a difference, i would've been fine with the A/B/C endings shenanigans. Sure, it would've been disappointing, but not torches and pitchforks material.

I seriously don't understand american companies. Seems like all they can do is walk on eggshells.

Newsflash: it did more good to your case to have that one guy from ME3's writing staff throw Hudson and Walters under the bus than any of your PR riddlied non-statements. People want decisiveness, people want definite answers, by stonewalling us you're giving us good reasons to doubt your good faith, you're giving us reasons to think you're deliberately damaging your products.

There would be far less people thinking this whole thing was just a plan by EA to deliberately ship out a product that needed fixing only to charge us for the fix if they simply came out and explained themselves. I'm not even saying they should apologise, just explain what in the fuck went throught their heads.

When you start deliberately obfuscating your processes in order to save your own ass, you're doing it wrong.

I don't want to ruin anyone's lives, but this is an industry of entertainment and, much like i will pass up a movie whose director/protagonist/whatever i don't like, i want to know whose brilliant idea this was (especially if, as it turns out, it was a select few's), so i can avoid them in the future, much like I avoid David Cronenberg when he gets out his soapbox and starts writing movies instead of just directing them.

 

[Joel West]

Valve has the common sense and human decency to actually work on their games until they're done and done right. Unlike pretty much everyone else that big, save maybe bethesda and cd projekt (irrational is good too, who seem to be content with shitting out whatever buggy mess is on hand at deadline, taking everyone's money and wiping their hands of it. In short, valve actually cares about their reputation and community.