Mass Effect 3 ending SPOILERS!

[nauticalmandems]

As a space opera, the ending (RGB) does work in some ways, sci-fi this apocalyptic does tend to follow through on it's promise and end just as dark as they can with leaving a small ray of hope for the (distant) future.

Now putting aside all plot holes, in-universe inconsistencies, and thematic arguments for and against the endings. The real problem is that ME is not a traditional work of sci-fi; it is a video game. A sci-fi video game grounded in traditional sci-fi tropes, with some genuinely unique imaginings, but a video game nonetheless.

The point is that the final ending to an epic three part series, which requires at least 60 hours to play through all three, should reflect my decisions and actions as a gamer. This is not a linear game, choices have been given and made across all three games, some being more important than others (and some later becoming meaningless), no two people have played through all three games in the same way. It was a personal adventure, something which gamers invested heavily in, we each owned our own versions of Shepard; I played the ME 1 and 2 about a dozen times each to get all different outcomes.

But not this time, when we were told that our actions would matter more than ever, at a seemingly epic end to an epic trilogy, every player was given one of three very similar and disappointing endings. I did not play these games to sit through a poorly conceived and half arsed conclusion. I was prepared for any outcome, no matter how grim, as long as it was MY outcome, a result of MY actions. Filling up a meter and selecting what color you would like your ending is an insult to every player who has invested their time, money and energy into these games.

I could write down my ideal ending but that would ultimately be pointless. We simply deserved better.

If they wanted to make a Space Opera Ending, then they would have had the Citadel Blow up the Entire Sol System, with everything in it.

If you subscribe to the theory that the mass relays blew up then this does indeed happen. If not then Shepard's galactic armada dies a slow painful death in isolation.

 

[V TheSystem V]

I have an interesting interpretation for this ending:

When Hackett gets on the radio and says that the Crucible isn't doing anything, I believe that Shepard lost consciousness. As a result, everything from that point onwards is simply Shepard's hallucinations as he slowly bled out. That would explain why the Guardian looks like the kid from Shepard's dreams and why Joker fled the Sol system in the thick of battle, an action which doesn't reflect his character as we know it at all.

Shepard was dreaming of a galaxy free from the Reapers as he slowly died from his wounds. That's how the ending should be interpreted.

Still, crappy, crappy, ending though.

Bioware are probably listening. They'll use this in future DLC.

All jokes aside, Mass Effect 3 was amazing. Thessia being destroyed made my cry inside, and Shepard going towards the Conduit to travel to the Citadel felt tense, so I made every footstep count. I had united the Turians and Krogans (screw the Salarians, apart from Mordin), I had freed the Geth and united them with the Quarians, and I had lost good men. I was, and still am, in love with the series, but the conclusion? I respect Bioware for refusing to go for an ending where everything is all happy (like Gears of War 3, which I did like, but it all tied up a bit TOO nicely), but messing with the lore and making our choices count for nothing except the missions in which those characters could turn up...why?

I mean, the only thing about the ending which shows the unity of the various species are the ships that you see when approaching Earth!

I love this series, it's possibly the best trilogy of this generation, but the ending was a wasted opportunity. An ending showing what happened to the other races would have been nice, and I am very grateful for this amazing series of games...it's just...I dunno, the conclusion wasn't exactly a high point for the series.

 

[XX55XX]

How is this game so well reviewed? The ending just leaves such a bad taste in my mouth. I'm not adverse to sad or bittersweet endings, but the total collapse of galactic civilization? What the fuck happens to the millions of alien soldiers around battle scared earth? THEY ARE ALL GOING TO DIE OF STARVATION. NONE OF THEM ARE GOING TO SEE HOME.

Worse of all, everything I did in the series means jack shit. The whole reason I played ME was to experience and have a say in its intergalactic politics, but nothing I did in the past 3 games and 100 hours of gameplay count for anything at all. At best, it was acknowledged by some side characters in conversation, but that was it. I just don't know what to say...

The game as a whole, outside of the ending, was generally excellent.

At any rate, unlike the people on the BioWare forums, I don't feel like wasting any more time calling for a better ending. It is what it is.

 

[Cl0udz0r]

Hey, does the Council die? They were on the Citadel and it blew up in the ending, right?

 

[VivaciousDeimos]

Sniiip

It sounds like Bioware is challenging Valve for the title of "world's biggest cooperate troll"

"Fingers crossed"

God I hope they have a miracle up their sleeves, and I hope they announce whatever they're talking about soon.

I think the current theory is that they're waiting for the global release (the 15th) before they say anything in an official capacity.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4H_A7SeawU4&feature=g-all-u&context=G2d8a2a9FAAAAAAAAAAA

This video summarises my feelings to a tee

That guy puts it just perfectly. Free DLC, damn. Wouldn't that be nice?

Jeremy's Garrus impression is made of utter win and I laugh every time I watch it.

One of the points he makes I think hasn't been brought up too often either: I don't think it's necessarily out of the question, or childish or cliche, to want a happy ending. Or at least the option for one. If you're really going to have a multitude of divergent endings, do they really all need to be grimdarkbitter? I guess I would just prefer a mix of flavors--some bitter, some bittersweet and some sweet. That way when you're around the water-cooler you can say, "Oh this happened, and it was totally awesome," or "this happened, and it was super sad, but still worth it." NOT, "So what color did you get?"

 

[Yeager942]

How is this game so well reviewed? The ending just leaves such a bad taste in my mouth. I'm not adverse to sad or bittersweet endings, but the total collapse of galactic civilization? What the fuck happens to the millions of alien soldiers around battle scared earth? THEY ARE ALL GOING TO DIE OF STARVATION. NONE OF THEM ARE GOING TO SEE HOME.

Worse of all, everything I did in the series means jack shit. The whole reason I played ME was to experience and have a say in its intergalactic politics, but nothing I did in the past 3 games and 100 hours of gameplay count for anything at all. At best, it was acknowledged by some side characters in conversation, but that was it. I just don't know what to say...

The game as a whole, outside of the ending, was generally excellent.

At any rate, unlike the people on the BioWare forums, I don't feel like wasting any more time calling for a better ending. It is what it is.

If I conjured the image of a frothing fanboy, I apologize. I only meant to underscore my frustrations with the ending. I don't mean to say it should've been critically panned, I'm just surprised that none of the reviewers talked in depth or had any qualms with the ending. I personally had a great deal of fun save for those final 20 min. I only wished there had been an ending that considered what we did as players.

 

[Blachman201_v1legacy]

Someone made a comparison between all the available endings:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPelM2hwhJA

It is pretty damning evidence that the "choice" at ending is essentially "pick your pretty explosion color".

 

[Deathninja19]

Yeah but that's my problem if technology becomes predictable (which it can't be but that's an argument for another time) surely the Reapers would realise that AI is inevitable because the Mass Relays are leading tech in to a single predictable path (which again technology doesn't follow a single path but hey sci-fi). If the Reapers want to prevent AI (which they are or at least their leader is, again stupid) why not for one cycle remove the Mass Relays/make them inoperable as an experiment or at the very least leave warnings/reasons for their past harvests.

AI is inevitable, barring specific measures taken to prevent its creation, particularly when you factor in a wide variety of philosophical frameworks (ie, an entire galaxy full of sentient species). Leaving that aside, AI is also not dependent on the technology of the mass relays; we're in the early stages of developing it right now, after all.

Leaving the mass relays around makes sure that the developing races will probably base specific aspects of their technology (drives, and more importantly to the Reapers, shields and weapons) on that tech, giving the Reapers an advantage at harvest time.

Why not leave warnings behind? Same reason. A prepared galaxy will be more effective in resisting the Reapers, assuming they believe the warnings, and given that the development of AI is inevitable... No point in letting the biologicals kill more Reapers than absolutely necessary.

Nothing is inevitable when it comes to advancement, compare the technological evolution of the Spanish Conquisitors to the Aztecs or the American pioneers to Native Americans, no two cultures develop at the same time/develop the same way. So saying that I think the logic behind saying AI is inevitable is flawed from the start.

And the Reapers not wanted the races to be prepared so they never leave a trace, I still have issue with that but fine. So why don't the Reapers just stay and occupy Citadel space, as soon as a civilisation reaches the citadel just harvest/indoctrinate them as soon as they arrive? Why flee for 50,000 years, why not stay since they have nothing better to do?

Plus how can they predict the AI won't occur within 50,000 years (and is that human years or what), maybe AI will occur quickly and by the time the Reapers get there the AI will have an overwhelming force ready for battle.

 

[flipthepool]

One of the points he makes I think hasn't been brought up too often either: I don't think it's necessarily out of the question, or childish or cliche, to want a happy ending. Or at least the option for one."

Eh, I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I can understand wanting a completely happy ending. On the other hand, I don't think fans in any way "deserve" a happy ending. They deserve an ending that fulfills the story in a logical manner, that is consistent with the themes of the games, and the character of Shepard. Which is...not what exists now.

However, I think if the game had an ending that was satisfying on an emotional level, even if it was bittersweet, the call for a happy ending would die down. I think people would have been sad if, say, Shepard still had to sacrifice him/herself for the galaxy, but I don't think there would have been as much of an outcry. We always knew this game was going to be "darker" than ME2, and even in that one Shepard could die (if, you know, you made literally all the wrong choices, but still). But considering how bigger the threat is now, it seemed that it was pretty unlikely Shepard would make it out of this alive.

As it is, I think it would be nice to have a completely happy ending (Shepard lives, galaxy has been roughed up but is intact), but I don't think that is a necessary inclusion to the story. I would just like to have an ending that made Shepard's sacrifice seem worthwhile.

Anyways, I just realized another thing that bothered me about the endings. Basically, if you're total Paragon, then you're screwed. No matter what, you're boning someone over.
-Destroy: You destroy the Reapers but also the synthetics that are sentient (Geth, who you could have FINALLY gotten on your side, EDI). So, hooray for useless genocide.
-Control: Oh, you know those Reapers? Yeah, you get to be in control of them. Yay. Also, what do you do with them after you get them? Well...we don't get to see that. Maybe they just hover around ominously. Maybe you fly them into a sun. Who knows?!
-Synthesis: You play Magic Space God and merge synthetics and organics together. Diversity in the galaxy? LAME!

It seems like the only one who doesn't get boned by the ending is a Renegade Shep, who I feel wouldn't really care if some synthetics are destroyed, so long as the Reapers are gone. But Paragon? It seems like these choices exist SOLELY to dick you over and compromise your morality. Which is incredibly stupid because the rest of the game has actually interesting and built up moral choices throughout. Ones with real reasoning and motivation behind them. Every action has a reaction that makes sense within the context of the game. It can be possible to have your cake and eat it too, at some points, but you had to have worked your ass off in the previous games and do some fancy decision making.

But the endings as they are don't have any kind of reasoning to them. It's just, "this is what's going to happen, because we say so. Want to destroy the Reapers but not genocide the synthetics? Haha, sucks to be you. That's a side-effect because we say it is. Don't want to become the Reaper supermaster, OR destroy synthetics? Say good-bye to diversity in the galaxy! Also, have fun playing God!"

And none of it has any kind of logical reasoning behind it, each one just has some kind of horrible side-effect because...well, because the game-makers say it does. Nothing inherent in the game's universe explains why these things work the way they do. They just are designed this way, with no build up or reason.

 

[Raesvelg]

Nothing is inevitable when it comes to advancement, compare the technological evolution of the Spanish Conquisitors to the Aztecs or the American pioneers to Native Americans, no two cultures develop at the same time/develop the same way. So saying that I think the logic behind saying AI is inevitable is flawed from the start.

Broad scale though; someone on the planet did have significant technological advancement, after all. Like I said, variety of galactic cultures, someone is going to make the leap eventually. Hence, inevitable.

The underdeveloped races of the ME universe exist; the Krogan, for example, who were uplifted to fight the Rachni, but had not discovered FTL capabilities or the mass relays independently.

And the Reapers not wanted the races to be prepared so they never leave a trace, I still have issue with that but fine. So why don't the Reapers just stay and occupy Citadel space, as soon as a civilisation reaches the citadel just harvest/indoctrinate them as soon as they arrive? Why flee for 50,000 years, why not stay since they have nothing better to do?

Apparently 50,000 years is a significant amount of time even for a Reaper. Presumably that's why they go off and hibernate in dark space where they won't be found, leaving one behind to keep tabs on the galaxy.

Plus how can they predict the AI won't occur within 50,000 years (and is that human years or what), maybe AI will occur quickly and by the time the Reapers get there the AI will have an overwhelming force ready for battle.

See aforementioned reference to leaving one Reaper behind to keep tabs on the galaxy. I'd guess they take turns between cycles, so no one Reaper has actually been awake the full 37+ million years.

 

[ServebotFrank]

Yeah I thought the ending controversy was stupid and was like, "Can't be that bad."
After seeing the ending I will say I understand why people hate it and a little confused on why the Mass Relays didn't annihilate everything. Also I'm confused on how my squad arrived on the Normandy when moments prior they were in the vehicle with me. For a bit I thought they died from Harbinger's assault but apparently not. I did like the call back to Mass Effect 1 with talking the Illusive Man into killing himself but I would've preferred not to have a weird explanation for why the Reapers kill people. I thought it was just their way of reproduction not some weird version of the Anti-Spirals from Gurren Lagann. I know that's a weird comparison but it feels similar and seems stupid the Reapers don't just kill young civilizations if they're just gonna kill them later on anyway.

Going back to the Gurren Lagann comparison, the Anti-Spirals at least only kept humans alive so they could kill them later in a curbstomp battle for shits and giggles.

 

[VivaciousDeimos]

One of the points he makes I think hasn't been brought up too often either: I don't think it's necessarily out of the question, or childish or cliche, to want a happy ending. Or at least the option for one."

Eh, I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I can understand wanting a completely happy ending. On the other hand, I don't think fans in any way "deserve" a happy ending. They deserve an ending that fulfills the story in a logical manner, that is consistent with the themes of the games, and the character of Shepard. Which is...not what exists now.

As it is, I think it would be nice to have a completely happy ending (Shepard lives, galaxy has been roughed up but is intact), but I don't think that is a necessary inclusion to the story. I would just like to have an ending that made Shepard's sacrifice seem worthwhile.

And I think that's a completely fair viewpoint. And I definitely agree that I wouldn't feel quite so bothered if Shepard's sacrifice, like you said, felt worthwhile.

On the other hand, as dark as this game got, one of the running themes throughout, at least to me, was the idea of hope. Hope versus despair. Can we really do this? And--if you'll forgive me for descending into somewhat flowery prose--if Javik is the Avatar of Vengeance, then Shepard is most certainly the Avatar of Hope; Hackett pretty much outright states it in game. And so to have this running theme of hope and determination only for it to be so cruelly quelled is...problematic.

And maybe that's the point, maybe the developers wanted to get across that sometimes sacrifice is the only option, and I think I would be more okay with it if it had been better executed. And if there had been more personal closure.

Because let's be honest, and here I'll quote someone who can put it better than I, "People frequently tend to confuse BioWare's main strength when it comes to writing games. They think it's plot; it isn't. BioWare's actual strength is giving you people as opposed to characters; ones you honest-to-gods end up liking. Yeah, they're only pixels, but they're pixels you care about and it's actually kind of a bummer you can't ring up Alistair and invite him round for some Xbox IRL."

So yes, I don't give a flying fuck about the future of the galaxy. I don't care. I care about my crew, I care about the alliances I worked to forge, I care about some sort of personal resolution and to be robbed of any of that is just...heartbreaking. And not in a good, cathartic way. In a bad, destroys-replayability-way.

 

[Cobbs]

I hope they add a DLC that causes shepard to wake up after his odd, AI child infested hallucinations caused by blood loss and lack of oxygen, all whilst every bioware employee's face turns into the first naturally occurring troll face of all time.

 

[Bmagada]

Hey look, an article at Forbes.com. You know the professional magazine that covers business trends. A nice article about how Bioware can fix their "situation"

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2012/03/12/how-bioware-could-find-redemption-using-mass-effect-3/

It's actually pretty good and is saying the same thing that many disappointed fans are saying. So I'm guessing this sounds like an entitled fan too right?

 

[___________________]

I wanted to get all 3 Mass Effect games. But if the choices one makes throughout all these years while playing the first 2 games will only lead to 3 fixed endings you can choose from...then there is no purpose for spending money. The Mass Effect universe was about choices that would shape the end of the last game. That was expected. They rejected the idea. They gave us fixed endings. Mass Effect 3 makes no sense in its current state.

 

[Emiscary]

Honest to god, can the Bioware apologists PLEASE just pipe down? You have nothing to gain by "winning" this argument. Voice the opinion that the mediocre and inconclusive ending is perfectly okay with you loud enough and we can all look forward to a future of mediocre and inconclusive games. At *some* point gamers have to be able to call out developers for their failures. Even (hell, ESPECIALLY) the best of them. So no, I'm not going to cut Bioware/EA some slack for making the games good up until the climax. Not when you built an entire series of games predicated on said climax being... what was it? "Fulfilling, conclusive, satisfying, diverse, personal..." to use just a few of the words from the advertising campaign. And every single "oh it's not THAT bad" and "OMG IT'S SAD GET OVER IT" just lends credence to the idea that we are all in fact the whiny children they say we are and that it's perfectly okay to repeatedly mislead and disappoint us.

Oh, and then have the balls to smile in our faces afterwards, tell us with all due respect that our *opinions* are incorrect (see the "divisive" line for details) and ask us for more money. WITH A POP UP WINDOW. For those of you who didn't know: that's the real ending. The true, final, ultimate conclusion of the Mass Effect triology is a blue pop up window saying "Congratulations! You Are Become Legend! Buy The Upcoming Take Back Omega DLC Pack!" , I paraphrase but you get the idea.

 

[Azazass]

Some sort of spoilers if you haven't played or you haven't finished Dragon Age: Origins

I think Bioware is going Dragon Age: Origins with Mass Effect 3, near the end of Dragon Age: Origins you could do a ritual with someone to just before you defeated the main antagonist and after that you became the hero. But if you didn't performed the ritual, you die after defeating the main antagonist or you send that guy to kill the antagonist for you and survive that encounter.

What I'm trying to say is... We better wait for a "Closure" DLC or in the case of DA:O an expasion pack (a term that has been lost), I read somewhere that Bioware is defending their ending... But are we really seeing the "ending" of Mass Effect 3?

If not... Then we'll get a spin-off with one of the main characters, most likely with that annoying and useless James Vega or with Garrus Vakarian which would make a decent spin-off.

 

[Navvan]

My major problem with the ending wasn't its quality, how it left little closure, or how it had a nonsense logic star child thing at the end. Those are serious problems but they aren't the thing that made me "hate" the ending.

My problem was that the ending pigeonholed me into three options my vision of Shepard simply would not do. Based on the actions my Shepard has done in the past they would not accept the following as "solutions".

Spoiler: Bad Solutions

1) Forcibly converting the entire universe to some arbitrary vision of "perfection". (This is like making everyone the same race to stop racism)

2) Murdering an entire civilization that you are friendly with (Destroy Synthetics (Geth/EDI))

3) Controlling the Reapers which has TRAP written all over it and was stated several times to be far to risky just moments before by my character.

 

[Commander CC]

Although I think ME3 as a whole was really amazing and emotional, I think it's final sequence, from assaulting Earth onwards, fell short on a few levels and didn't use things that were set up for it to use.

Although I am disappointed with the ending, I have to say that I'm even more disappointed with the entire endgame itself. ME2's suicide mission ending was a great finale to a game where the point was to assemble a team to achieve something, and you got to decide which assets to deploy and all the things you did, like loyalty missions, impacted on how many made it out alive.

That said, once you kind of figured out how the suicide mission worked and the calculus of who was best used for what task, it kind of became a bit more transparent, even though I still think it was a good culmination of what had been happening through the game.

As such, I was expecting ME3's final mission to reclaim earth to be along the same lines as the suicide mission, except instead of deciding which individual specialist squad-mate goes where, you would use the war assets you had gathered throughout the game to tackle certain challenges in a multi-tiered ending towards some kind of final goal. When I heard there were 16 endings, I doubly figured this would be the scenario as it allowed for that kind of variance.

So that left kind of a sour taste in my mouth.

I was glad to see the "dialogue boss fight" make a return, but was a bit disappointed how the Illusive Man's story basically mirrored Saren's story almost exactly. It kind of felt like Saren should have been an ally to start with and had this character point occur here, or have the illusive man carry out this role over all three games. I suppose this hadn't been considered so far in advance so I'll give it a pass.

As for the ending, I admit I've only finished it once and haven't seen all the different things play out, but I had been expecting Harbinger to be the final boss, or to at least make some kind of appearance, since he spent most of the last game and its DLC making clear he, as official Reaper spokesman or whatever, had a personal beef with Shepard, and setting up that Reapers can form petty personal grudges and be malicious towards an individual. So on the Citadel, I kept expecting him to show up. I first thought it would turn out he had personally hijacked the Illusive Man, and then it didn't happen. Then when I saw Illusive Man had been mind controlling Shep and Anderson, I thought that the thing with the little boy was just Harbinger toying with Shepard, assuming that through the mind control he had seen Shepard's torment about the child's death. I further figured it was some kind of trick as Shepard appeared to be breathing in space, and also there didn't seem to be any reason why the Crucible, built by non-Reapers, would have any other function besides a "Kill Reapers" button, so maybe the choices were some kind of test to see what Shepard would do when put in a corner.

Then the game ended. I was pretty bummed that ol' Harbinger had only been pathetically name dropped once or twice and hadn't made a villainous appearance.

I'm pretty sad the "pick your ending" thing was the actual end. It must be really hard to end games with choice elements or something because Deus Ex:HR had this too.