Jimquisition: Changing A Game's Ending And Destroying Art

[J.d. Scott]

Do any of you guys know Sherlock Holmes?
Of course you do.

He stems from a series of short stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Do you know that Sherlock Holmes died once, because Doyle had lost interest in the absurdly popular character and wanted to move on? Holmes fell down some freaking huge waterfalls.

Doyle wrote another book in which he retconned that stuff, several years later, since he admittedly wanted to make money. (They have documents to prove that was his intention) So Doyle changed his Art to cash in on some more Holmes stories.


The point of this little story is that art changes in demand of fans since there is art. The whole idea of independent art, of different streams is all centered around the demand of the consumers.

Granted, most of the time you don't see movements to change a given piece of art that has already been finished.

But in most artistic projects, that seek to turn a profit, the interests of the consumers come up during the production. To the point where it very well might compromise the artistic vision (whatever that might be).

TL;DR:
If we want lots of art of high quality, we need commercialized industries to produce art. For these industries to be profitable, they have to listen to their consumers. So while it might not be desireable to compromise artistic vision in favor of fan demands, it is a neccesary evil to maintain this level of quality.

I don't think one example justifies another. Just because say Dickens edited Great Expectations because his first reader said the ending was too bleak, or Han/Greedo shooting first, or a recut/reshoot of a movie that got a poor test audience doesn't make that a rule or a justification. Each artist gets to make their own choice. I'm sure there's hundreds of times where an artist has told their editor or test audience that it's going out this way, and it worked out best for the artist.

And there's situations where it backfired. Bethesda altered their admittedly terrible ending to Fallout 3, to a slightly different but still just as terrible ending to justify adding the Broken Steel DLC. A lot of Bethesda fans lost their minds, mostly because the only change to their terrible illogical ending was to wedge in DLC. A lot of people didn't buy it. I haven't bought a Bethesda product since. In this case, it didn't work as expected.

More importantly, I don't think an artist should cater to the whims of the public in order to create popular art. That's actually, against the point of really good art, which is to present new perspectives and new ideas and challenge the consumer. If artists cater to the masses too much, they'll end up creating art that only caters to the lowest common denominator, since that will appeal to the most people. Do you really want all your games to be a string of mediocre thoughtless sequels, like so many VH1 Reality Shows, Stephanie Meyer novels, SumBlink18241 records and Modern Warfare games?

 

[idodo35]

I don't watch this. The illustration alone is annoying enough.

so why did you commet at all?

OT: can you give us the number for your "mass effect" hotline? id like a better ending
also i agree that its not so bad if they change the ending for the fans however the fact that they published a prodact that they didnt believe in enogh to stand behind is a bad thing... but what ya gonna do?

 

[dragonswarrior]

I... I never thought I would find myself seriously saying this... But today. Today the moment has come.

Thank God for Jim!!

 

[Lunar Templar]

I don't watch this. The illustration alone is annoying enough.

>.> ... then your posting here because?


OT: good ep Jim, kinda (read: alot) disappointed is 'another fucking ME3 video', but you made some good points, and glad your show got better, its been part of my 'Monday routine', well, since the beginning.

 

[J.d. Scott]

Gee Jim, taking notes from Bob now in that you have to drag your liberal politics into the episode? You want to talk unwelcome protesters of whatever and you drag out the Tea Party; why not the rapist, public defecating, anarchist infested Occupy movement?

Leave the politics to MSNBC and Fox, Jim. This IS a gaming site last I checked.

Relax. Deep breath. I don't think he was commenting on the right or wrong of the tea party, just the hard line they take on their stance. I think his position is like a lot of political analysts do that the tea party undermined their viability and threatened their longevity by refusing to compromise on any point in their agenda whatsoever. Some people, even within the Tea Party itself believe they could have a much more powerful effect and prevent being marginalized by understanding the limits of what they can affect at the moment and being reasonable about it and working to get their principles included in more laws instead of just rejecting laws that don't match their principles without even considering editing, and refusing to edit laws they propose with the full knowledge that they will most likely be summarily rejected.

 

[Teoes]

Thank god... a level-headed opinion from a game pundit I can get behind.

Wouldn't we all like to get behind Jim? Hmmm? Oh yes we would. But wouldn't he rather get behind us?



Yeah, I went there.

 

[Darkmantle]

Here's the problem:

All that Jim said about "showing that endings matter" would be a great lesson... but that's not what publishers or gamers are going to take away from this. The precedent that actually WILL be established is: "Publishers will change an established game to popular specification, if the fans scream loud enough!" That's the only lesson that's going to be learned from this.

And if the publishers start caving to THAT precedent, then no writer worth a damn will ever work for the big-name publishers. They're ALREADY incredibly risk-averse, and this will just make things even worse. They may churn out a lot of garbage now, but you would not believe the garbage they'll be knocking off if they think that their work can be tossed out at the whim of internet hatedoms.

There isn't going to be a happy ending to this mess, but this campaign is the ultimate in short-term self-gratification against long-term potential.

See the problem here is that you are assuming what will happen, and basing your value judgement off that. Art from adversity, that's what the game industry needs now I think. Not this, complacent, "oh well, they can do whatever they want" attitude.

 

[Something Amyss]

You mean we have an opinion from a regular video contributor to the Escapist who hasn't decided to massacre strawmen?

Thank GOD for Jim!

 

[Something Amyss]

All that Jim said about "showing that endings matter" would be a great lesson... but that's not what publishers or gamers are going to take away from this. The precedent that actually WILL be established is: "Publishers will change an established game to popular specification, if the fans scream loud enough!" That's the only lesson that's going to be learned from this.

What specification is being demanded in the case of Mass Effect?

I don't even think this would be remotely an issue if the critics would stop railing against the fake argument that Mass Effect fans want the ending to exacting specifications. Or want a happy ending. Both are demonstrably false looking at the actual movement behind this.

 

[Arif_Sohaib]

I just looked at the Indoctranation Theory thing today and now I think that the ending is like that intentionally because Bioware already prepared another ending and this may have been an attempt to top the twist in Knights of the Old Republic.

 

[Fappy]

Thank god... a level-headed opinion from a game pundit I can get behind.

Wouldn't we all like to get behind Jim? Hmmm? Oh yes we would. But wouldn't he rather get behind us?



Yeah, I went there.

I would argue with him... so long as he spoke dirty to me for the appropriate amount of time beforehand. We all know how good he is at that.

 

[DugMachine]

How suprising. Someone who doesn't agree with changing the ending "OH YOU JUST DON'T GET IT" and then Jim here agrees with y'all and "OH MY GOODNESS THANK YOU, SOMEBODY FINALLY GETS IT <3." This whole ending thing is just silly. You beat a game, you either like it or you don't, then you play another. Sheesh

 

[Podunk]

Hell, I'll say it. Thank god for Jim. Finally someone who feels the need to comment on this whole debacle actually looks at the ending and not just the controversy. It doesn't need to be happy, it doesn't need to meet every fan's wildest dreams. It just needs to SUCK LESS. If it were an issue of entitlement and simple fan rage it would not be as huge a... thing... as it is.

 

[FedericoV]

Dear Jim: you got it. Thanks God for you.

I would like to add that if Bioware release an ending DLC this year (free or not), it means that it has been planned at the very least before the release of the game.

A question to the well informed: do you think that the amount of shitty endings we see in most videogames has something to do with the fact that only a tiny fragments of players actually finish games?

 

[zinho73]

Regardless of your opinion on the matter, I think you've done the most responsible thing as a guy that forms opinion by giving this whole issue another look.

Most journalists are really not doing it and are stuck with pre-historic arguments about the situation. This debate were fairly dynamic and it evolved, but very few people were able to understand that.

Congratulations for the work well done.

 

[Pandabearparade]

I would love to see a Jim V Movie Bob debate, or shouting match as it could get into, about stuff.

Bob shouts down from an ivory tower, he doesn't actually address rebuttals.

 

[CapitalistPig]

Jim laid it down today. Anyone who calls him all reactionary should forever be directed back to this episode where he very eloquently said it like it is. Thank god for Jim

 

[zinho73]

Here's the problem:

All that Jim said about "showing that endings matter" would be a great lesson... but that's not what publishers or gamers are going to take away from this. The precedent that actually WILL be established is: "Publishers will change an established game to popular specification, if the fans scream loud enough!" That's the only lesson that's going to be learned from this.

And if the publishers start caving to THAT precedent, then no writer worth a damn will ever work for the big-name publishers. They're ALREADY incredibly risk-averse, and this will just make things even worse. They may churn out a lot of garbage now, but you would not believe the garbage they'll be knocking off if they think that their work can be tossed out at the whim of internet hatedoms.

There isn't going to be a happy ending to this mess, but this campaign is the ultimate in short-term self-gratification against long-term potential.

The only ones making it worse is the gaming press making all this look like that it is something unprecedented an terrible.

You might not like it when art changes or is added to, but it is not dangerous and it is not going to change the industry (only maybe for the better, because some companies might think twice before releasing shit).

Google: Sherlock Holmes, pre-screening movies, Fallout 3, Mass Effect Deception, also google Casey Hudson's statements and focus on the ones about the endings and about the players co-authoring the whole thing. If you have time, reflect about the meaning of the words interactive media.

Somethings change for the better, others don't, but saying that art is immutable is crazy. It wasn't like that 500 years ago and it certainly is not like that today, when art is mass produced to become a commodity.

 

[chiefohara]

Thank you Jim

It was very annoying that nearly all professional reviewers and video game commenters were simply dismissing the fans criticism out of hand because of the 'fanboy' assumptions, so for you to admit to sharing a similar viewpoint until you looked into it and then putting forward a solid and reasoned opinion on it has made me respect you all the more.

Kudos to you Jim, im glad your still here, and i hope you'll be here for a very long time.