How would YOU have ended Mass Effect 3?

[gundamrx101]

Ahem

First off I'd roll with the indoctrination theory. So you'd have the 2 "endings" and the one continuation where your Shepard wakes up among the rubble. Now depending on your EMS/choices/Paragon and Renegade; Anderson could either be dead under the rubble, dying or alive with injuries. Reinforcements show up IF you cured the genophage.

As the reinforcements push for the beam, Harbinger focus' it's attacks. Here's where your choice to resolve the Quarian/Geth conflict comes into play. If you did, there will be enough ships to cover the fight above Earth so the Normandy flies in to help against Harbinger. If you have high Paragon or Renegade/EMS/upgraded your ship from ME 2 then the Normandy will survive and push Harbinger away. If one of those requirements hasn't been met the Normandy is either damaged or destroyed. If Damaged or Destroyed, Shepard never makes it to the beam, either to help hold off incoming Reaper forces or be killed by Harbinger. In that scenario an unnamed solider makes it to the beam but it ends on a cliff hanger.

Assuming the Normandy survived, Shepard makes it to the beam but the transportation fries his weapons. Upon entering the Citadel, they sees the bodies of C-Sec officers and Cerberus operatives. Scrapping some left over armor and weapons, they either discovers Bailey's body or finds him holding his position in a security office; revealing that all the civilians were able to get off the Citadel in time(once again depending on your choices and personality) if not; civilian bodies will be laying throughout the Citadel. If Bailey is alive then the race to the crucible console is a bit easier, if not get ready for a long drawn out trek.

Along the way, Harbinger; still in Shepards mind, tries to persuade them. Creating images of the squad mates dying, being harvested and convincing them to join the Reapers. Either Shepard gives in or they fight off the attempt. As Shepard nears the console, a keeper approaches them; revealing a Prothean AI stored in the keepers as part of the Protheans reprogramming. It allows Shepard to touch Harbingers mind where they learn of "dark energy". After this, the AI wipes the traces of Harbinger from Shepard but by doing that it terminates itself.

Now free from any more indoctrination attempts, Shepard pushes to the final room. The crucible terminal; where the Illusive Man is waiting. Looking normal, he attempts to convince Shepard to work with the Reapers and allow them to process Humanity and turn them into the next Reapers; giving them galactic superiority. Shepard can either agree or talk him down. Talking down leads to a shoot out. If Bailey is alive, he'll activate nearby automated turrets to help. If not, hope you brought a lot of medi-gel.

Either you agreed or talked down, Shepard and the Illusive Man will come face to face in front of the Catalyst console. A giant interface that sends out a signal. You can either talk down the Illusive Man and convince him to face his errors (he doesn't shoot himself in the face if you are high Paragon), kill him, allow him to merge humanity with the Reapers, high renegade he commits suicide or fight him. Which would be difficult as he has Reaper level biotics. Either way, when Shepard reaches the console they are greeted by an image of Harbinger masquerading as the Shepard opposite of your own. So if paragon Shepard, Harbinger will appear as Renegade Shepard and vice versa. If Illusive Man was left alive, he'll keel over in pain as this is another indoctrination attempt.

Thanks to the Reaper signal purge by the AI, Shepard can resist it and confront Harbinger. With the Normandy hitting Harbinger hard, it becomes desperate and commands Shepard to not activate the catalyst. Shepard can either comply or put the pressure on Harbinger by bringing up Dark Energy. That the reapers were once organics, afraid of their own mortality so they sought to live forever. With the discovery of Dark Energy, the Reapers feared that organics left unchecked will discover a way to end their 'perfect' existence. The Crucible sends out a signal that disrupts dark energy. Not only severely disabling the Reapers but possibly shutting down the relays by disrupting their own dark energy by sending the signal through them. If high paragon, Shepard will warn the fleet of what's about to happen, if high renegade Shepard will only warn the Normandy. You can choose to not warn anyone.

Either way, Shepard makes their choice and Harbinger phases out; damning Shepard. Now, if you kept the Illusive Man alive; he'll disable Shepard and activate the Crucible himself, dying in the process: Stating that he wanted to one up the Reapers and Shepard to prove his superiority. If not Shepard will activate the Crucible and either be severely crippled or die. The signal is sent out and the Reapers are made helpless as the ships blow them to hell. The signal is sent through the mass relays, if Shepard sent out a warning either himself or through the Normandy; the fleets head through the relays to get to their home planets before Shepard activates the signal. If not, they become stranded in the milky way. Either way, the Normandy heads to the Citadel and Shepard is greeted by their LI and most used squad member. They can either receive medical attention for their crippling injuries, die in their LI's arms or be helped by their LI and squad mate and limp out towards the Normandy. Then the credits roll.

If the warning was sent out, there is an after credit scene where it pans to the Mass Relay and just as it hints that the Relay is starting back up, the screen goes black. The End.

Phew. That took a bit but that's how I would have done the ending.

Not bad...can end on a Hopeful though Bitter sweet ending. Like in Iron Giant when you see the piece the kid has roll out the window and into the yard. ( I stop the movie there cause that's enough to know the Giant is coming back.) You get your LI, all the fleets make it out plus you didn't put in a 'this many years later' when the Relays start back up so it could be a hundred + years could only have been a decade. Seriously why couldn't Bioware have thought this up?

Because it would have been too much work for Casey Hudson the hack. I also would like to add that if you managed the SWORD and HAMMER teams well and like in 2, picked the appropriate people then Shepard can have a squad backing him when they arrive on the citadel and the area is cleared of Reaper forces; if not prepare for a lot of causalities. Also, keeping the collector base would make the whole final charge a walk in the park, same if you collect Reaper artifacts/choose to hand over any data related to the Reapers (the Reaper IFF wink wink) but not on a grander scale. Also, if your entire team survived the suicide mission from 2, the whole final fight would have been easier. The difficulty spikes depending on how many team members died in 2 as they could all contribute to Reaper studies.

 

[InsanityRequiem]

You know what? A lot of the previous posts were awesome. But to bring it home that ME3 was Shepard's last game? Have the Crucible blow up when you shoot it, not the Mass Relays. Victory through sacrifice. You either shoot or fall into what looks to be reactor beam stuff, so you mess it up anyways. So the Crucible exploding is completely logical.

 

[Agayek]

(This is going to be my last Mass Effect 3 thread! I'm sick to the back teeth by it!)

We all know that Mass Effect 3's ending has made gaming history, for good or for bad, and we all know that Bioware are not going to change Mass Effect 3's ending. So I ask those fans who do not consider the current ME3 ending to be the best possible: How would you have ended Mass Effect 3?

Honestly? I would have kept it exactly the same, except the magic elevator would never happen. Instead, Shepard would stumble to the console and activate it, and the Prothean VI would appear. It would then explain that the Catalyst could be used as intended and destroy the Reapers, but that the Illusive Man's research that it collected on his ship indicates that it could also be used to control them. From there, it lets Shepard decide which one to pick, and the wave o' space magic goes roaring out. Whether or not it kills Shepard, I'm not sure. I'm tempted to say that the destroy ending explodes the Citadel and the control does not, same as in canon, but I'm honestly not sure.

After that, the cutscenes would probably be the same, insofar as the space magic and it's effects. Instead of that random bullshit with the Normandy though, there'd be brief displays of every living squadmate (probably in pairs or trios) fighting against the Reaper forces when the space magic comes in. In the destroy ending, all the husks et al fall over dead. In the control ending, they would just sorta stop after the space magic and stand there as the crew figures out what's going on and blows them to fuck and back.

Then we'd have a few scenes of the Normandy out in space reacting to what's going on, along with the allied fleet. Control ending would see the fleet continuing to attack the Reapers as they leave Earth, probably destroying a few.

Finally, we'd end at an aftermath style shot, where we find out if Shepard lived or died (probably depending on EMS) and the end result of what happened. Would probably have Hackett narrate the after-effect, wrapping up what happened to the fleet and what could be expected now that the Relays are all exploded.

If Shepard chose control, Reaper/eezo-based tech would become more and more dominant, and the galaxy would ultimately return to its previous status quo (or as close as could be expected when half the galactic population is dead), including the re-creation of the Relays due to information provided by Shepard. Humans would be the dominant species, with the Turians as the #2.

If Shepard chose destroy, then the galaxy would rebuild with a focus on new avenues of technology. In this case, the Geth (if alive) would end up being the dominant species in the galaxy, since they're all about finding their own solutions. There'd be a lot of unrest but eventually new breakthroughs would allow communication and transportation to reach similar levels. There'd be a lot of death from starvation and whatnot in the meantime, but ultimately the galaxy becomes an entirely different, and possibly better, place.

In either ending, we'd also get the following breakdown:

If the genophage was cured, there'd be mention that the Krogans have either a) started an aggressive expansion to conquer more worlds or b) effectively become the police of the galaxy depending on if Wrex of Wreave is in charge. If the genophage was not cured, then Hackett would mention they're going extinct, and are rioting since the cure apparently didn't work. Depending on how the Quarian/Geth missions played out, either a) the Geth are mentioned as isolating themselves further and refusing to deal with any organic, b) the Quarians settle Rannoch, but their immune systems never normalize or something and many of them die, or c) the Geth and Quarians work together for a better future, etc etc. Then there'd probably be a brief rundown of where every surviving squadmate ended up, ala Dragon Age: Origins. Garrus became Primarch eventually, Tali got fed up with the admiralty board and told them to go suck on an induction port, Javik went and offed himself, etc.

 

[OblivionSoul]

I would've put in an option for a good ending. Shepard lives, Reapers die, Shepard retires to cabin by a lake with love interest and Garrus as next door neighbour. Cue fishing/beer drinking with Garrus for life. I'm not outraged (just disappointed) by the endings we got, I just like to pretend this was one of the options. And that's fine with me.

 

[Smiley Face]

I'm not much of a writer, I work with the little ideas. So here's some things that should have been done.

1. The Reapers should have had a believable motive. So believable that siding with them, or (after persuasion) reaching a compromise with them, should be a viable, and to some, attractive, option.

2. Shepard should have the option to reject the choices Starchild gives you (assuming they show up). One or more of these options should involve finding a way to weaken the Reapers so that the fleet you've spent the WHOLE GAME compiling can take them out (Assuming Starchild is basically Reaper Command & Control, the logical choice would be to DESTROY HIM or cut off his comms, making the Reapers uncoordinated, or if he had Direct Control of some, taking some out of commission or making them turn on the others.)
- Subnote: The Reapers should not be undefeatable by military means. Seriously, you spend the game defeating them and building up a huge army - it is never demonstrated at any point in the game that conventional warfare by a united galaxy will NOT work. Yes, the facts suggest it, people speculate on it - but as a player, I never see anything over the course of the game that suggests it's not possible. If that's supposed to be the case, BioWare failed at making it clear, and should have.

3. The aftermath should make it clear what happens to your crew, your allies, the various alien races and worlds, and how things change as a result of the drastic changes that you've wrought.

4. It should make sense.

 

[Slayer_2]

I'd make everyone die no matter what you did, because life isn't fair. Double meaning intended.

 

[Sean Steele]

Give me the option to when the Reapers all jump to earth and all are in that system to blow up Earth's Mass Effect Relay thus absolutely and completely beating the Reapers without arbitrarily destroying the rest of the Mass Effect Universe. (Most likely lets face it so EA can restart at zero and make a sequel with a unanimous starting point.)

 

[gyrobot_v1legacy]

I will keep the nature of the destroy/control/Synth endings since in Mass Effect if the Galaxy loses against the Reapers. It is a Critical Mission Failure, that is what Bioware states, Reapers win and it is a game over. As long Shepard must defeat the reapers so what I propose is this: Allow a Charm/Intimidate to allow Shepard to cow the starchild into their way of thought. The Starchild is quite amazed at Shepard's sheer willpower and finds a way to allow them to escape alive and well even in the Control/Synth Ending. Depending on the EMS, Shepard will be either treated as hero or as an extremist. But here is the tone of each ending

Destroy: The galaxy is finally free from the era of Mass Relay Technology and decided to take upon a new path. The Krogan under Wreav would be stuck fighting amongst themselves without any starships and eventually kill themselves off while Wrex keeps them in line long enough to build spacecraft and eventually pummel the Yahg when they started building spaceships and the Yahg contributes themselves to the Krogan due to the "might makes right" rule. The Quarians will take unspecified amounts of deaths with the loss of the Geth depending on the EMS. Shepard is hailed as the Destroyer of Reapers and bringing the galaxy to a new cycle. But if the Earth is destroyed, humanity is condemned to become space nomads, forced to wander the galaxy for several centuries to come until they found a new planet to settle on with prebuilt infrastructure. Anderson if alive will tell you the news of the victory and Shepard can respond accordingly

Control: With the Reapers under control, Humanity quickly take over the Citadel as the interim capital of Humanity and the Galaxy. If EMS was low, the Crucible has damaged the Citadel as well as making the earth completely inhabitable and the galaxy is under the gun of a desperate human government which never truly recovers. Depending on how much of a pro human stance you took throughout Mass Effect, Humanity is at best a benevolent dictator and at worst a brutal tyrant which would rival the Prothean Empire in the future cycles to come. A VI of TIM will tell you how you had made him proud and how he was the one to push humanity down this path the moment they found themselves in the FCW. Shepard is herald as an enslaver of millions of species

Synthesis: Uniting Machine and Organic together, a new cycle begins. Either one where both sides struggle with the ascension or one with acceptance. The new cycle makes Mass Relays a thing of the past as the galaxy quickly rebuilds and unites. Shepard is herald as the great unifier of synths and organics.

Regardless of what happens, Shepard decides they have done enough and it was time to let the galaxy take it's own path. The crucible activates and Joker performs a blind jump that takes them to said tropical planet and if Shepard choose to keep their body. It will be Shepard and their love interest looking at the lush pristine planet's horizon.

 

[Moth_Monk]

I think it is only appropriate that I now suggest how I would have ended Mass Effect 3:

The ending is the same up until Shepard activates the Crucible however it does not work! Suddenly a bunch of Keepers appear and tell Shepard that they are actually the Man behind the Man..uh...I mean Reapers. They explain that the cycle is just for the evulz, they then tell Shepard that he has three choices: Use the Citadel (which turns out to be a Forgotten Superweapon) to destroy the every other Relay except the Sol Relay in order to destroy the Reapers - the fleets would do the rest to the Reapers in the Solar System (and of course every alien world) OR to have the Keepers summon all the Reapers to the Solar System and destroy the Sol Relay - killing EVERYTHING in the Solar System! OR the final choice would be to turn Shepard into some kind of Keeper-god and use the Reapers to conquer the galaxy!!!

Of course NONE of the choices you had made would affect anything nor would EMS.

Spoiler

 

[Groxnax]

Hmmm, a fourth option?

Shepard says "No," gives the Jerk Child both middle fingers and kicks it square in the family jewels.

Which, somehow, all the Reapers feel it and drop thier shields.

Then the EMS will decide on how long the effects will last.

(You can see how much I hate that kid.)

 

[Rai^3]

I like Yahtzee's idea where the Reapers win no matter what, personally.

 

[Shinkicker444]

Shepard and Harbinger in an epic fist fight with everything on fire, and ships and reapers in the background in a big explody battle raging everywhere.

Depending on how the fist fight goes, the battle in the background mirrors it. All the war assets you get count to Shepard's health and armor! Likewise for Harbinger with how many systems the Reapers have harvested I guess. Depending how much health Shepard has at the end reflects who survives.

.
But srsly, I'd have had the during whatever final ground assault, the war assets you gather pop up to affect things. Like you get Krogan making a charge here or there, to take out a load of husks or something (if they're not there you have to do it), the Geth smashing a reaper to pieces (or the someone else goes all noble sacrifice), Anderson doing something or the Turian general doing something, whatever, and depending how you got through it in the end depends on what clip you get and if Shepard had to sacrifice him/herself or not. People live, people die, doesn't have to be happy but it reflects what your choices were. Kind of like the ending of FreeSpace 2, where you have to outrun the supernova, you can do it but you might have to sacrifice covering the remains of the evacuees of that system otherwise you're caught in the blast wave. But in this case you're waiting for the crucible to fire, and if you don't make it everyone dies. I'd type more detail but, I'm way way to tired and I doubt anyone really cares.

 

[The Great JT]

Keep everything, but if you took anything but the red ending, it's game over. If you took the red ending, you have a big boss fight with Harbinger where you have to fire a Cain at his laser-face until he blows up, but he takes, like, 30 hits, he can fire three-way beams and one hit kills you (like a super-hard version of the Reaper fight on Rannoch). Next, you find your squadmates (who are both still alive, the beam merely grazed them since it was focused on Shepard), then you make your way to the beam, where you have to fight a whole bunch of Cerberus guys. Then you have to fight the Illusive Man, kill him, activate the Crucible and that kills the Reapers. Oh and you can't change squadmembers between the charge to the beam and the end, if you picked, say, Kaidan and Liara, you're stuck with them.

 

[gyrobot_v1legacy]

I like Yahtzee's idea where the Reapers win no matter what, personally.

Reapers win and it is a Critical Mission Failure. Didn't Arrival and Crucible's destruction tell you what happens?

 

[Jaeke]

Shepard, Liara, and Garrus are standing on the ridge overlooking their last hope for salvation.

The beam hummed, a glorious tune, it's light bathing the 100 yards left that led to the galaxy's redemption.

Liara:"This is it? Isn't it?" She turns and says to Shepard.

Shepard turns to Anderson and the few ravaged members left of the Hammer Ground Force. Their forces had been decimated, the gray sky covered in the ashes of their fallen comrades. Then as the seemingly tranquil scene plays out, it is cut short by the horror that has awaited Shepard throughout all this time of war. The one nightmare that was left. The Harbinger of the galaxy's doom.

It stood mountainous, glaring at its ant-like opponents.

Anderson:"We got to move!"

Shepard:"Come on!"

Shepard, his squad, and Anderson and the last few soldiers rushed with all their might left inside them. Their uncertainty and doubt was crushed by the heroic charge of Shepard as he stormed through the black to the conduit. The charge gave no noticed to the death around them. They continued on, as soldiers of earth, the last vanguard for the Galaxy's hope.

Harbinger released his deadly cannon, tearing apart half of the chargers almost 100 feet from the conduit. Shepard hit the ground after flying several feet through the air. He had a dreamlike hallucination (the current ending) for the battle of his mind against Harbingers attempt to indoctrinate him. After conquering his mortal foe, and battling through the illusions and trials, he gained conciousness, his first sight being Liara's tear stained face. As Harbinger struggled and frustratingly fought against the swarm of turian fighters and Quarian bombardments along with hordes of Krogan tanks that had finally arrived to reinforce that Shepard had struggled to gather over the previous weeks, he turned to Shepard and as a last attempt, began charging his beam. Shepard turned to his comrades, his best friend Garrus, his true love Aria, he silently gave his goodbye through wet eyes, and bloody tears. Just as Shepard turned to meet his doom, the colossal Harbinger suddenly turned to see the flying colors of SR2 stream by in a hazy blue and white, followed by an equally colossal explosion meet his "eyes". He stumbled back, shaking the ground with his mammoth legs. Shepard stood up, his comrades behind him and gave his last order!

Shepard:"Blast that fucker to hell!"

Joker:"Aye, Aye!"

Harbinger let out his low roars and desperate rumbles as the force of the galaxy literally weighed down on him. In a frenzied state of desperation and anxiety, he lurched towards the Normandy and fired a cannon, hitting it directly and causing it to crash into the ground in a ball of fire.

Shepard:"No!"

Harbinger turned to see his foes once again, his huge cybernetic hull of metal and wires now frayed and cracking. He set his final strike on Shepard and his comrades. Shepard turned to the broken Mako at his side and stormed for the M-920 Cain laying in the burning wreck. He dove to pick it up and turned to see his mortal foe.

Shepard and Harbinger locked sight. Each staring into his own demise. The pulsing charge of the Cain hummed in Shepard's hands, and as Shepard thought back to the years of his life, literally flashing before his eyes, the charge lifted, and released the 25 gram slug that erupted from the barrel; just at the same time Harbinger released his death-ray, directly aimed at Shepard and both of their weapons met each other.

Shepard's body was devasted, as was Harbingers. Shepard's corpse launched back in the air, tumbling to the ground, smoking and blazed. Harbinger let out a defeaning scream and reached out in all angles, blindingly reaching at anything he could as the huge slug tore its way through the ashen air, and meeting his front end. As Harbinger looked to the sky, the Crucible pulsed and vibrated; it shook violently and finally released in an explosion of fire and blood-colored lightning. The last sight that Harbinger saw was the termination of his Reaper comrades and the rushing tide of devastating red showering him.

He fell to the ground, defeated and broken.

 

[freakymojo]

would like a happy ending to be possible. but its not like i couldnt live without one, more closure, heavier impact from your choices, and incase your shepard doesnt make it a "Sad but also full of hope" large scale funeral, with all characters with some importance.
and maybe a statue of shepard.


Also: shepard punches harbinger, and he goes boom.