Question about Cerberus from people who've beat the game or are close to end. It's about their troops and I'm only asking this questions so I can feel smart.
I'm guessing Cerberus is somehow indoctrinating or brainwashing people, that's how they're getting all these troops? I remember something about "Sanctuary" during the Grissom mission so are they using people who go there for refuge as their own person troops?
Okay, like everyone else, have to write down my thoughts on the ending
First of all, I think the Synthesis ending is the only one that makes sense. And I think it's genius, but it comes up short. It makes perfect sense for the whole point of the series to be about how these two forms of life, organic and synthetic, cannot coexist, and that the reapers are a temporary solution to the problem until another arises. Shepard's cycle finishes the Crucible and now there's a new solution in synthesis. Like I said I don't think the other endings make sense. Destroy the reapers and billions of years of galactic cycles tells you you've just doomed all organic life eventually. Control them and the problem still exists, except Shepard is now the new Catalyst. So, I would throw out the other two endings. Synthesis hits it right on the head.
With that said, others are right in that making the ending choice literally wipe the slate clean and make all your other choices meaningless is so lame. There needs to be a "ride off into the sunset" moment for these characters. You need to cut back to Earth, the surviving fleets rebuilding faster than they ever could before now that they've become hybrid life, and end on the implication that eventually they rebuild the mass relays and now the possibilities are endless. That's all it needs and I think it's all better, to be honest. Just some closure, and a sense that Shepard's other choices beyond the last one mattered.
I just want to reiterate how much I think Synthesis works so well in nailing exactly what I think the game is trying to say. The whole game from beginning to end is about unity. You're fighting to unite the races of the galaxy for literally the entire game. Ending it on the idea that the way to escape the cycle is to unify all life into a new hybrid works so well.
It just needed closure.
I agree with most of your points, although I still really like the relative stone ageing of the galaxy. I think the problem is letting people choose between the endings, which I guess is a silly thing to say in a series that let you choose the endings in the last two.
The slate has to be wiped clean though. It's the only way they can make an actual successor. The only victory that could have happened was one that was basically armageddon and I think that it's foolish to have come in thinking otherwise. It's a huge property and they can't write themselves into a corner.
Yeah, I think you're right, but there needs to be a way of preserving the weight of the player's decisions. I mean, for the game's purpose, it's fine because those decisions were hard to make at the time. They were effective for that part of the story and that's all they needed to be. But having seen the ending and knowing that none of these things mattered in the long run is extremely jarring and that's why people are pissed about it. I think it would have worked maybe if they had spent time preparing the player for the concept that everything you do in the game is simply a means to an end and nothing more. You need to cure the genophage to ensure you complete your mission? Then damn the consequences, get it done. Who cares what happens when the Krogan are given the capacity to multiply at dangerous rates and overrun the galaxy? None of that matters because all we care about is ending the cycle.
As it is though, you make those decisions and think about them with the idea that they have a lasting effect on what happens after the game is over. The narrative at every turn leads you to draw this conclusion. Once you finish the game though, you realize nothing mattered other than you got to the Catalyst and you made your decision. And the fact that the whole concept of the catalyst and the choices is so sudden doesn't help either. I think Javik would have been a great character to drive that point home before the final confrontation. One conversation where Shepard is maybe having second thoughts about a major decision, only for Javik to slap her and say "No, listen, all that matters is winning. Everything else is inconsequential in the face of the millions of civilizations who fought and died to get us to this point."
Basically I like the ending fundamentally on pretty much every level. The game just needed to prepare the player better.
I had a very similar conversation with a friend re: your choices not mattering. Your choices did matter. They got you that far. Knowing the ending is metagaming and you really don't have any way to know how the ending is from Shepard's perspective, but you're going to do everything in your fucking power to give humanity the best possible chance. Furthermore, I realized that my friend was coming from a sense of gaming (I don't want to use this word) entitlement. We take it for granted that we win at the end. We take it for granted that usually everything is pretty happy at the end when we do, but sometimes we make the final sacrifice.
But you can't ASSUME that. And neither can Shepard. You have to assume that the galaxy is fucking doomed unless you do everything you can. All of your choices got you this far. Saving the galaxy at all is the reward, considering the immense scope of what you're doing. A victory can be considered a viable population of people able to repopulate the galaxy meaningfully, and then everything after that is fucking gravy.
Anything less than that makes a mockery of the immense threat that the Reapers are. They are cold, calculated killing machines that have existed for millions of years and beat countless other sentients who tried just as hard as you did to stop them. If you are going to beat them, it's going to be at heavy cost.
I think viewing the ending through that lens makes it better.
No. No, it doesn't.
After all the ass I kicked, bringing an end to TWO century long feuds, and amassing the destructive and engineering might of every intelligent species i could find, I wanted my happy ending.
If they wanted to have endings where everything you worked for up to that point was made irrelevant but was really meta and forced you to think and assess themes and shit, I would be fine with it... as long as they gave me the means to achieve that perfect ending.
I don't care if I had to follow a strict chain of events, choose a certain answer for every option, bust my ass to complete time challenges, and play a 1000 hours in multiplayer first to do it, I would have. As it is now I get to choose how to die at the end and who I take with me and all i get to know is that decades or centuries later buzz aldrin's decendant can tell his grandchild about how stupid the last two minutes of my life was.
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited March 2012
...Ahh...that Garrus/Vega bonding scene was awesome.
Okay, like everyone else, have to write down my thoughts on the ending
First of all, I think the Synthesis ending is the only one that makes sense. And I think it's genius, but it comes up short. It makes perfect sense for the whole point of the series to be about how these two forms of life, organic and synthetic, cannot coexist, and that the reapers are a temporary solution to the problem until another arises. Shepard's cycle finishes the Crucible and now there's a new solution in synthesis. Like I said I don't think the other endings make sense. Destroy the reapers and billions of years of galactic cycles tells you you've just doomed all organic life eventually. Control them and the problem still exists, except Shepard is now the new Catalyst. So, I would throw out the other two endings. Synthesis hits it right on the head.
With that said, others are right in that making the ending choice literally wipe the slate clean and make all your other choices meaningless is so lame. There needs to be a "ride off into the sunset" moment for these characters. You need to cut back to Earth, the surviving fleets rebuilding faster than they ever could before now that they've become hybrid life, and end on the implication that eventually they rebuild the mass relays and now the possibilities are endless. That's all it needs and I think it's all better, to be honest. Just some closure, and a sense that Shepard's other choices beyond the last one mattered.
I just want to reiterate how much I think Synthesis works so well in nailing exactly what I think the game is trying to say. The whole game from beginning to end is about unity. You're fighting to unite the races of the galaxy for literally the entire game. Ending it on the idea that the way to escape the cycle is to unify all life into a new hybrid works so well.
It just needed closure.
I agree with most of your points, although I still really like the relative stone ageing of the galaxy. I think the problem is letting people choose between the endings, which I guess is a silly thing to say in a series that let you choose the endings in the last two.
The slate has to be wiped clean though. It's the only way they can make an actual successor. The only victory that could have happened was one that was basically armageddon and I think that it's foolish to have come in thinking otherwise. It's a huge property and they can't write themselves into a corner.
Yeah, I think you're right, but there needs to be a way of preserving the weight of the player's decisions. I mean, for the game's purpose, it's fine because those decisions were hard to make at the time. They were effective for that part of the story and that's all they needed to be. But having seen the ending and knowing that none of these things mattered in the long run is extremely jarring and that's why people are pissed about it. I think it would have worked maybe if they had spent time preparing the player for the concept that everything you do in the game is simply a means to an end and nothing more. You need to cure the genophage to ensure you complete your mission? Then damn the consequences, get it done. Who cares what happens when the Krogan are given the capacity to multiply at dangerous rates and overrun the galaxy? None of that matters because all we care about is ending the cycle.
As it is though, you make those decisions and think about them with the idea that they have a lasting effect on what happens after the game is over. The narrative at every turn leads you to draw this conclusion. Once you finish the game though, you realize nothing mattered other than you got to the Catalyst and you made your decision. And the fact that the whole concept of the catalyst and the choices is so sudden doesn't help either. I think Javik would have been a great character to drive that point home before the final confrontation. One conversation where Shepard is maybe having second thoughts about a major decision, only for Javik to slap her and say "No, listen, all that matters is winning. Everything else is inconsequential in the face of the millions of civilizations who fought and died to get us to this point."
Basically I like the ending fundamentally on pretty much every level. The game just needed to prepare the player better.
I had a very similar conversation with a friend re: your choices not mattering. Your choices did matter. They got you that far. Knowing the ending is metagaming and you really don't have any way to know how the ending is from Shepard's perspective, but you're going to do everything in your fucking power to give humanity the best possible chance. Furthermore, I realized that my friend was coming from a sense of gaming (I don't want to use this word) entitlement. We take it for granted that we win at the end. We take it for granted that usually everything is pretty happy at the end when we do, but sometimes we make the final sacrifice.
But you can't ASSUME that. And neither can Shepard. You have to assume that the galaxy is fucking doomed unless you do everything you can. All of your choices got you this far. Saving the galaxy at all is the reward, considering the immense scope of what you're doing. A victory can be considered a viable population of people able to repopulate the galaxy meaningfully, and then everything after that is fucking gravy.
Anything less than that makes a mockery of the immense threat that the Reapers are. They are cold, calculated killing machines that have existed for millions of years and beat countless other sentients who tried just as hard as you did to stop them. If you are going to beat them, it's going to be at heavy cost.
I think viewing the ending through that lens makes it better.
No. No, it doesn't.
After all the ass I kicked, bringing an end to TWO century long feuds, and amassing the destructive and engineering might of every intelligent species i could find, I wanted my happy ending.
If they wanted to have endings where everything you worked for up to that point was made irrelevant but was really meta and forced you to think and assess themes and shit, I would be fine with it... as long as they gave me the means to achieve that perfect ending.
I don't care if I had to follow a strict chain of events, choose a certain answer for every option, bust my ass to complete time challenges, and play a 1000 hours in multiplayer first to do it, I would have. As it is now I get to choose how to die at the end and who I take with me and all i get to know is that decades or centuries later buzz aldrin's decendant can tell his grandchild about how stupid the last two minutes of my life was.
There's no point in having that ending because then people would do it and it could be assumed canon for some people which would totally fuck with the other three endings in a "how do we continue this series" way.
And you ended a feud that was millions of years old. Life versus the Reapers. And all the choices you made helped you do that. So yay! Happy ending because the galaxy isn't a smoldering crater.
Yeah, the deaths in this game are handled super well. It fucking hurts man, but it's for the ultimate war. I like how they focus a lot more on Shepard's reaction to stuff than in previous games.
Banshee tips anyone? Anyone? I can drop their barriers fast with Overload, but once they get into that hyped up blue super sayain shit they kill me THROUGH full shields. They're kinda the one enemy in the game that I think are total bullshit. Even brutes and Atlas are fair.
Tactical cloak, black widow, armor piercing (or I guess warp) ammo. Three shots to the dome. The hardest part is stripping the barriers, which I did with disruptor ammo on an SMG.
End game thoughts now that I've had some time to think.
Okay, so, here are some things that are bothering me.
Why is EDI on the Normandy at the end? Did Joker make a special run to Earth to pick her up or something? I assumed the rest of my squad was on Earth somewhere, dead or alive. How the fuck did EDI get back to the ship?
Harbinger at the end was a total goddamn waste. "Oh noes Harbinger is coming." He lasers you for a little bit and then runs off. It would have been nice to have more of a confrontation (even though I liked the whole "ow fuck I am hurt" part of the end).
I don't like the Catalyst. It seems like there should be more options, or a contingency plan. "Listen, this peace with the Geth is historic. Let's try it out and if it sucks maybe we'll try one of your options?" I don't think his logic is circular (as many people are griping) I just don't know if I accept these options.
With the ending as sad as it is, I totally get why there is no epilogue "what's happening with your friends." I actually think most of my friends are dead. Still, I won't say that I wouldn't say no to a happy ending. I just didn't like how abrupt it was. BAM over. The post credits scene didn't change my opinion at all. I wish the post credits scene could have been more of a teaser, a look into galactic life much, much later on, instead of some kid and his grandpa. Give us some context as to what Shepard died to create.
The motivations of the Reapers were pretty easy to understand. They kill so some life may continue instead of all life dying before synthetics. I get that. It's just...Sovereign said I wouldn't understand. I think they maybe should have never given a reason.
And here are some things I liked.
I liked the scene with Anderson at the end, two old soldiers hurt and potentially dying with a scenic view of Earth as war rages around them. The third game is so god damn hectic and stressful (and they make mention of this towards the end) for these two characters especially. It was nice to see a moment of genuine peace between them (even the romance scene wasn't a fun time). I almost wish the game had ended there as Shepard slowly loses consciousness and dies while hearing triumphant Alliance comm chatter in the background.
Actually, the whole part of the game post being lasered by Harbinger and pre Catalyst is great. I had a ton of reputation so I could hit all the conversation options. It was a good scene filled with teh dramaz.
I liked being able to make the Illusive Man shoot himself. Shepard's running the lowest success rate suicide hotline up in heaven.
I liked Shepard being able to broker galactic peace through sacrifice. I like the Synthesis ending and I think it makes a ton of sense.
This game didn't have a "FINAL BOSS RAR." Which is good. Because I was afraid there was going to be something stupid like the Reaper-Man or something and he'd be like the nexus of Reaper intelligence that is conveniently man sized so Shepard can kill it by shooting it behind a low wall. The Reapers aren't a thing you should be able to defeat via a final boss.
That's it. For now.
I like your ending better then the actual ending.
ENDING SPOILERS:
IGN Claims that their videos here: http://www.ign.com/wikis/mass-effect-3/Endings have Shep surviving, but fuck if I can tell how. Is he supposed to be the old guy in the credits or something?
Supposedly you can see shepard waking up on the citadel in the ending but IGN never uploaded it.
My Ending Suggestion:
A very simple and effective solution would be a narrated epilogue with real time cutscenes. No need for million dollar CG.
Sheperd's vision fades as the platform he is on lights up. You can hear the fleet saying something like "There's a light coming from the crucible! Something is happening" The game takes into account all your actions and gives you an appropriate ending based on paragon points, renegade points and missions.
Bad end: narrated by reaper. zoom out of reaper core to reaper fleet in dark space. (reapers able to destroy crucible)
Bad Middle end: narrated by Liara via box. Buried on earth uncovered by a recently space faring race. (crucible lasts long enough to destroy citadel)
Middle End (dont save earth, but help everyone): Narrated by Liara via her box. At the end box zooms out to kids and adults listening to it in a citadel museum far into future. You can see galactic civilization of all kinds, synthetics and organics.
Best End (perfect ending): Narrated by liarra, wrex, samara, edi or geth. At the end you zoom out and its a holo recording from Liara's box on earth. With citadel in orbit. Earth is doing great.
each of the endings has machinima scenes spliced in based on your decisions with narrator explaining:
What happened with the rachni
The fate of the krogan
Buncha other stuff i can't remember but easily told through naration and simple machinama.
With perfect ending:
Shepard still in the military and with whoever he romanced.
Liara is an Asari and able to live for a thousand years. In the end, the naration can be by anyone who lives long enough to see the outcome of sheperd's decisions, and 50,000 years in the future you can see the result of sheperd's battle.
Yeah, the deaths in this game are handled super well. It fucking hurts man, but it's for the ultimate war. I like how they focus a lot more on Shepard's reaction to stuff than in previous games.
Banshee tips anyone? Anyone? I can drop their barriers fast with Overload, but once they get into that hyped up blue super sayain shit they kill me THROUGH full shields. They're kinda the one enemy in the game that I think are total bullshit. Even brutes and Atlas are fair.
Tactical cloak, black widow, armor piercing (or I guess warp) ammo. Three shots to the dome. The hardest part is stripping the barriers, which I did with disruptor ammo on an SMG.
End game thoughts now that I've had some time to think.
Okay, so, here are some things that are bothering me.
Why is EDI on the Normandy at the end? Did Joker make a special run to Earth to pick her up or something? I assumed the rest of my squad was on Earth somewhere, dead or alive. How the fuck did EDI get back to the ship?
Harbinger at the end was a total goddamn waste. "Oh noes Harbinger is coming." He lasers you for a little bit and then runs off. It would have been nice to have more of a confrontation (even though I liked the whole "ow fuck I am hurt" part of the end).
I don't like the Catalyst. It seems like there should be more options, or a contingency plan. "Listen, this peace with the Geth is historic. Let's try it out and if it sucks maybe we'll try one of your options?" I don't think his logic is circular (as many people are griping) I just don't know if I accept these options.
With the ending as sad as it is, I totally get why there is no epilogue "what's happening with your friends." I actually think most of my friends are dead. Still, I won't say that I wouldn't say no to a happy ending. I just didn't like how abrupt it was. BAM over. The post credits scene didn't change my opinion at all. I wish the post credits scene could have been more of a teaser, a look into galactic life much, much later on, instead of some kid and his grandpa. Give us some context as to what Shepard died to create.
The motivations of the Reapers were pretty easy to understand. They kill so some life may continue instead of all life dying before synthetics. I get that. It's just...Sovereign said I wouldn't understand. I think they maybe should have never given a reason.
And here are some things I liked.
I liked the scene with Anderson at the end, two old soldiers hurt and potentially dying with a scenic view of Earth as war rages around them. The third game is so god damn hectic and stressful (and they make mention of this towards the end) for these two characters especially. It was nice to see a moment of genuine peace between them (even the romance scene wasn't a fun time). I almost wish the game had ended there as Shepard slowly loses consciousness and dies while hearing triumphant Alliance comm chatter in the background.
Actually, the whole part of the game post being lasered by Harbinger and pre Catalyst is great. I had a ton of reputation so I could hit all the conversation options. It was a good scene filled with teh dramaz.
I liked being able to make the Illusive Man shoot himself. Shepard's running the lowest success rate suicide hotline up in heaven.
I liked Shepard being able to broker galactic peace through sacrifice. I like the Synthesis ending and I think it makes a ton of sense.
This game didn't have a "FINAL BOSS RAR." Which is good. Because I was afraid there was going to be something stupid like the Reaper-Man or something and he'd be like the nexus of Reaper intelligence that is conveniently man sized so Shepard can kill it by shooting it behind a low wall. The Reapers aren't a thing you should be able to defeat via a final boss.
That's it. For now.
I like your ending better then the actual ending.
ENDING SPOILERS:
IGN Claims that their videos here: http://www.ign.com/wikis/mass-effect-3/Endings have Shep surviving, but fuck if I can tell how. Is he supposed to be the old guy in the credits or something?
Supposedly you can see shepard waking up on the citadel in the ending but IGN never uploaded it.
My Ending Suggestion:
A very simple and effective solution would be a narrated epilogue with real time cutscenes. No need for million dollar CG.
Sheperd's vision fades as the platform he is on lights up. You can hear the fleet saying something like "There's a light coming from the crucible! Something is happening" The game takes into account all your actions and gives you an appropriate ending based on paragon points, renegade points and missions.
Bad end: narrated by reaper. zoom out of reaper core to reaper fleet in dark space. (reapers able to destroy crucible)
Bad Middle end: narrated by Liara via box. Buried on earth uncovered by a recently space faring race. (crucible lasts long enough to destroy citadel)
Middle End (dont save earth, but help everyone): Narrated by Liara via her box. At the end box zooms out to kids and adults listening to it in a citadel museum far into future. You can see galactic civilization of all kinds, synthetics and organics.
Best End (perfect ending): Narrated by liarra, wrex, samara, edi or geth. At the end you zoom out and its a holo recording from Liara's box on earth. With citadel in orbit. Earth is doing great.
each of the endings has machinima scenes spliced in based on your decisions with narrator explaining:
What happened with the rachni
The fate of the krogan
Buncha other stuff i can't remember but easily told through naration and simple machinama.
With perfect ending:
Shepard still in the military and with whoever he romanced.
Liara is an Asari and able to live for a thousand years. In the end, the naration can be by anyone who lives long enough to see the outcome of sheperd's decisions, and 50,000 years in the future you can see the result of sheperd's battle.
A non spoilery response to something you said in spoilers. What's with all the CG? On my PC some of the CG scenes looked really pixely and shittty compared to the in engine cutscenes, which don't look "cinematic quality" but were great for in engine work. Seriously, do more of that.
And then a spoilery response.
The ending of the game HAS to invalidate your choices throughout the game, or at least mitigate them to a "Shepard saved the galaxy and a lot of the other stuff didn't matter." because they obviously plan on doing more with the property later on and that's the only thing that allows for sequels.
I can't believe I'm the only one who thought of that coming into this. I promise you, Bioware totally thought of those endings. They thought of a myriad of happy endings that you'll never know and are probably amazing. And then they realized that it's not possible to do them.
the sound of the Revenant firing is a choir of angels
Oh, and the Hurricane. I just load up any SMG squadmates with that because I love hearing it. The sound effects are so, so much better this time around. The extra effort really shows off.
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DHSChase lizards.....bark at donkeys..Registered Userregular
edited March 2012
Conrad Verner.
Greatest Character in the history of videogames, nay... the idea of narrative storytelling. I didn't even hear anything after he said:
I'd need a whole lot of ancient Asari Writings for the paper from Gavin Hossle.
The laughter was far too riotous.
DHS on
"Grip 'em up, grip 'em, grip 'em good, said the Gryphon... to the pig."
Just ugh. I just wanted the reapers dead and some postscript about what happens to everyone after, but basically what they did was combine the endings of Deus Ex and BSG. And I hated each of those. If you can't pull off an ending that is original, thoughtful, and nuanced; then don't try. Go for simple, I would have been happy with that.
Hoz on
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Fondor_YardsElite Four Member: HydraRegistered Userregular
The Geth Shotgun is so awesome. Can't wait until I max it out.
I just came over to ask why any other guns exist. It's the power of the claymore with pinpoint accuracy up to about half the map. And for infiltrators: you charge before cloaking, not after. When you fire, you don't break cloak. But if you cloak/charge, you immediate drop cloak when you start charging.
What I don't get is why I can dominate with that shotgun and kill half the enemy troops off at any range. But the Graal? Fuck if I can hit ANYTHING with that, or hurt them without headshots. I want to love that huge spike throwing monster.. but it just seems like the same mechanics as the Geth Shotgun, without any of the stopping power/accuracy/ammo capacity.
I didn't like finding out the reapers' origins and motives. I would be content never knowing, because we all know the most important thing about them...They're evil, they're the bane of all organic life.
Finding out that they're actually the servants, the simple enforcers of a solution created by the very first AI millions or billions of years ago to allow organic life to continue existing is disappointing and especially irritating if you made a point to give the geth and EDI every opportunity to live and achieve peace with people.
so in the end we're forced to decide between 3 monumentally huge changes to life for all beings based on the report by the oldest AI that, "Oh, yea it totally happens every time. Trust me, Organics create synthetics, then try to kill them, then get wiped out by their own creations. its happened like a million times. so we kill off everyone as soon as they start accidentally creating artificial intelligence because it's the only (and stupid) way for organic life to continue existing but hey, you made it to the finish line this time so now I'm going to let you either control my reapers, magically destroy all synthetic life, or make everything in the galaxy a techno/organic hybrid."
Yup, that's the motivation for the reapers folks. Each reaper is an AI controlled storage unit of the liquified remains of every civilization that was able to create AI and then used to kill off all intelligent species to allow the stupider species to advance enough to create AI before killing them all again, repeat until shepard.
DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited March 2012
So who would have guessed. Joker...
is a robo-sexual.
So strange...I mean with his brittle brittle bones and all.
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BerkshireEarth Federal ForcesMassachusettsRegistered Userregular
I'm about 10 hours into this game, and my only gripe is that my ME1 Canon Shep's face didn't translate so I had to make a new one. I will write a thorough review upon completion, but between the excellent mission design and all the callbacks to past games, I love this game.
ME2 squadmate missions in ME3 spoilers:
Grunt being a bro and owning those ravagers for me to get away and seemingly dying, only to appear covered in blood and hungry was awesome. That appearance is thus far beaten out only by Jack's, though. I didn't care for her at all in ME2, and that Grissom Academy mission just made me so goddamn happy. I was smiling like an idiot as soon as I found out what Jack was doing on that station, which added to an already pretty awesome mission.
So excited to see what everybody else is up to!
"And don't you ever stand for that sort of thing. Someone ever tries to kill you, you try to kill 'em right back."
GT: FootlongKaPow
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Triple BBastard of the NorthMARegistered Userregular
edited March 2012
Kelly Chambers spoilers:
So, after the Cerberus attack on the Citadel, I was in the refugee camp, and I overheard a very saddening conversation between NPCs.
Synopsis:
"So what ever happened to that nice redhead that used to help everyone out around here?"
"You mean Kelly Chambers? She's dead. During the attack, Cerberus troops approached her and said 'Are you Kelly Chambers?'. When she said 'Yes.', they put a bullet between her eyes."
This is starting to feel like Game of Thrones. "You know that character you like? Dead."
I didn't like finding out the reapers' origins and motives. I would be content never knowing, because we all know the most important thing about them...They're evil, they're the bane of all organic life.
Finding out that they're actually the servants, the simple enforcers of a solution created by the very first AI millions or billions of years ago to allow organic life to continue existing is disappointing and especially irritating if you made a point to give the geth and EDI every opportunity to live and achieve peace with people.
so in the end we're forced to decide between 3 monumentally huge changes to life for all beings based on the report by the oldest AI that, "Oh, yea it totally happens every time. Trust me, Organics create synthetics, then try to kill them, then get wiped out by their own creations. its happened like a million times. so we kill off everyone as soon as they start accidentally creating artificial intelligence because it's the only (and stupid) way for organic life to continue existing but hey, you made it to the finish line this time so now I'm going to let you either control my reapers, magically destroy all synthetic life, or make everything in the galaxy a techno/organic hybrid."
Yup, that's the motivation for the reapers folks. Each reaper is an AI controlled storage unit of the liquified remains of every civilization that was able to create AI and then used to kill off all intelligent species to allow the stupider species to advance enough to create AI before killing them all again, repeat until shepard.
Pretty much what was going through my mind as I was listening to characters at the end talk is that this game would be a perfect example to be used in a lecture on logical fallacies in sci-fi writing.
95% of the writing in this game was oriented around the characters and I eagerly devoured every second of it. Then they just throw them out into a void, and for what? A bullshit pseudo-scientific cosmic conclusion after Frodo actually jumps into the volcano.
So, after the Cerberus attack on the Citadel, I was in the refugee camp, and I overheard a very saddening conversation between NPCs.
Synopsis:
"So what ever happened to that nice redhead that used to help everyone out around here?"
"You mean Kelly Chambers? She's dead. During the attack, Cerberus troops approached her and said 'Are you Kelly Chambers?'. When she said 'Yes.', they put a bullet between her eyes."
This is starting to feel like Game of Thrones. "You know that character you like? Dead."
she survives if you tell her to change her identity
So, after the Cerberus attack on the Citadel, I was in the refugee camp, and I overheard a very saddening conversation between NPCs.
Synopsis:
"So what ever happened to that nice redhead that used to help everyone out around here?"
"You mean Kelly Chambers? She's dead. During the attack, Cerberus troops approached her and said 'Are you Kelly Chambers?'. When she said 'Yes.', they put a bullet between her eyes."
This is starting to feel like Game of Thrones. "You know that character you like? Dead."
she survives if you tell her to change her identity
I didn't like finding out the reapers' origins and motives. I would be content never knowing, because we all know the most important thing about them...They're evil, they're the bane of all organic life.
Finding out that they're actually the servants, the simple enforcers of a solution created by the very first AI millions or billions of years ago to allow organic life to continue existing is disappointing and especially irritating if you made a point to give the geth and EDI every opportunity to live and achieve peace with people.
so in the end we're forced to decide between 3 monumentally huge changes to life for all beings based on the report by the oldest AI that, "Oh, yea it totally happens every time. Trust me, Organics create synthetics, then try to kill them, then get wiped out by their own creations. its happened like a million times. so we kill off everyone as soon as they start accidentally creating artificial intelligence because it's the only (and stupid) way for organic life to continue existing but hey, you made it to the finish line this time so now I'm going to let you either control my reapers, magically destroy all synthetic life, or make everything in the galaxy a techno/organic hybrid."
Yup, that's the motivation for the reapers folks. Each reaper is an AI controlled storage unit of the liquified remains of every civilization that was able to create AI and then used to kill off all intelligent species to allow the stupider species to advance enough to create AI before killing them all again, repeat until shepard.
Pretty much what was going through my mind as I was listening to characters at the end talk is that this game would be a perfect example to be used in a lecture on logical fallacies in sci-fi writing.
95% of the writing in this game was oriented around the characters and I eagerly devoured every second of it. Then they just throw them out into a void, and for what? A bullshit pseudo-scientific cosmic conclusion after Frodo actually jumps into the volcano.
Oh man they should have left a lot of stuff to mystery. Cosmic things that we didnt really care about for one. I was more invested in the individuals I helped. As for the reapers, it was already mentioned in ME2 that they were hive minds of organic races. A secret dialogue with legion. That's fine. It goes along with the idea of immortal ultimate being. each organic mind being more complex then a single geth program. I would have accepted that a long time ago some people uploaded themselves into machines to escape death. And then eventually they just all went crazy and decided they knew better. Leave it at that.
Also would have been cool if Catalyst was just an ancient VI. It just did what the original reaper race told it to do: save everyone. And it's conclusion was to immortalize all races into indestructible squid bodies. And harvest them every 50,000 years before things got out of hand. No Sythetic vs Organic bs that didnt really have any teeth. It's tragic, and stupidly simple thing that caused the deaths of trillions, but at least it doesnt sound like more then it is.
I'm so goddamn annoyed. ALL that character build up, all this customized story, all this talk about how choices matter and I get this horse shit generic one of three ending. So basically I play through the whole game, I have a million choices, get emotionally invested, then get this bullshit ending that barely features ANY of the characters I'm now crazy about. Good god am I pissed and disappointed, here I am thinking I'll get some good length quality movie style ending and I get the ending of Deus Ex thrown in at the end of Mass Effect. Know why that ending didn't bother me in Deus Ex? Because I didn't give a flying fuck what happened to any of the characters aside from myself at the end. Man am I disappointed.
"I will f**kin' beat you into the ground in front of your whole life that I don't get to have." -Nick Diaz
I'm so goddamn annoyed. ALL that character build up, all this customized story, all this talk about how choices matter and I get this horse shit generic one of three ending. So basically I play through the whole game, I have a million choices, get emotionally invested, then get this bullshit ending that barely features ANY of the characters I'm now crazy about. Good god am I pissed and disappointed, here I am thinking I'll get some good length quality movie style ending and I get the ending of Deus Ex thrown in at the end of Mass Effect. Know why that ending didn't bother me in Deus Ex? Because I didn't give a flying fuck what happened to any of the characters aside from myself at the end. Man am I disappointed.
I'm so goddamn annoyed. ALL that character build up, all this customized story, all this talk about how choices matter and I get this horse shit generic one of three ending. So basically I play through the whole game, I have a million choices, get emotionally invested, then get this bullshit ending that barely features ANY of the characters I'm now crazy about. Good god am I pissed and disappointed, here I am thinking I'll get some good length quality movie style ending and I get the ending of Deus Ex thrown in at the end of Mass Effect. Know why that ending didn't bother me in Deus Ex? Because I didn't give a flying fuck what happened to any of the characters aside from myself at the end. Man am I disappointed.
you should play xenoblade. Very satisfying ending
I'm just so insanely disappointed. I can't believe they thought this was a good idea. The characters are so great and there's such an opportunity for a really satisfying awesome ending to conclude the 3 game trilogy we've played through and we get this bullshit. The ending in ME2 kinda worked because it left things off to be continued, this doesn't do the story justice in the least, it's fucking weak. I'm just so bummed out about it, love the game, love the series, played through all of them and all the downloadable stuff, for a story that I started in 2007 I expected a hell of a lot better ending when that story finally concluded in 2012.
"I will f**kin' beat you into the ground in front of your whole life that I don't get to have." -Nick Diaz
so, I am assuming based on the results of the 'meet the diplomats' mission that my wrex is dead and something has gone terribly wrong with my shepard's import.
which bums me out! I had used the genesis comic thing to re-create my shepard since I didn't wanna play through ME1 again; can anyone c/d for me that those settings come through successfully? I mucked around with my save some using the editor, and that might have been what caused it, but I don't really wanna run through ME2 again if I'm just going to have this same issue.
(Alternatively, does anybody have an otherwise unedited wrex/rachni/liara femshep kicking around that they wanna extract and email to me?)
ed: ohshit, nevermind, apparently somebody figured out how to convert PC saves to 360 saves, so I'ma go check that out
Eat it You Nasty Pig. on
it was the smallest on the list but
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
I really like the N7 Valiant. Strong enough to one-shot headshot non-shielded enemies, two-shot shielded ones, it reloads 3 shots in half the time it takes the Mantis to load one, and comes with a lot of ammo for a sniper rifle (I have 55 shots with the ammo capacity mod).
}
"Orkses never lose a battle. If we win we win, if we die we die fightin so it don't count. If we runs for it we don't die neither, cos we can come back for annuver go, see!".
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wiltingI had fun once and it was awfulRegistered Userregular
Indra is the best Sniper Rifle. And when I say 'Sniper Rifle', I mean second assault rifle.
It was okay. I actually kind of liked the explanation for the reapers. Made more sense than just "we're evil robots." My main problem was, as others have said, the choices given. Everyone seems to be going synthesize because really it was the only logical option. I can kill some of my pals and set up the future for failure, control the reapers but the issue they exist for will still happen, or bring about galactic peace to a galaxy plagued by conflict. Wonder why that was the center choice~
Saddest part of the game: I shot Mordin. I really bought into saving the galaxy at any cost. Plus the krogan are really fucking dumb on the whole. I actually felt like a bad person after killing him. Then I saw the measly 150 points I got for murdering one of the best characters and reloaded a save and let him go. 150 points isn't nearly enough to have that on my space conscience.
Best part of the game: Drunk Tali. The straw line was actually funny.
FightTest on
MOBA DOTA.
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NocrenLt Futz, Back in ActionNorth CarolinaRegistered Userregular
Just finished all of Tuchunka.
SOOOOO Awesome.
Also, A SIX THOUSAND DOLLAR (credit) TOOTHBRUSH?!?!
Of course an automatic fish feeder is also 24000 credits so I guess it's supply and demand.
Romance spoilers (just some advice.questions really on how they work)
So once you start a start a romance with one of your crew members are the other ones closed off? I may have done the deed with Traynor, and I'm getting different dialogs from Liara now, who was my ME1 romance option. Unfortunately I imported a save from ME2 that didn't have LotSB completed so I didn't rekindle that romance in ME2, but did say that I wanted to her the first time I got the chance to in ME3.
Any advice?
Bnet: CavilatRest#1874
Steam: CavilatRest
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BeezelThere was no agreement little morsel..Registered Userregular
Doesn't help when I have to stop a senile dog from knocking my TV and Xbox over because 'hey, some stuff got moved and there's space here that wasn't here before! LET'S MAKE A TUNNEL! '
Just waiting on 'From Ashes' now, then I can finally start playing.
Posts
After all the ass I kicked, bringing an end to TWO century long feuds, and amassing the destructive and engineering might of every intelligent species i could find, I wanted my happy ending.
If they wanted to have endings where everything you worked for up to that point was made irrelevant but was really meta and forced you to think and assess themes and shit, I would be fine with it... as long as they gave me the means to achieve that perfect ending.
I don't care if I had to follow a strict chain of events, choose a certain answer for every option, bust my ass to complete time challenges, and play a 1000 hours in multiplayer first to do it, I would have. As it is now I get to choose how to die at the end and who I take with me and all i get to know is that decades or centuries later buzz aldrin's decendant can tell his grandchild about how stupid the last two minutes of my life was.
MASS EFFECT 1 INVENTORY MADNESS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
v
v
v
v
MASS EFFECT 3
^
^
^
^
MASS EFFECT 2 COMPLETE LACK OF INVENTORY FUNSIES
Perfect middle ground? Maybe not perfect, but really good.
And you ended a feud that was millions of years old. Life versus the Reapers. And all the choices you made helped you do that. So yay! Happy ending because the galaxy isn't a smoldering crater.
My Ending Suggestion:
Sheperd's vision fades as the platform he is on lights up. You can hear the fleet saying something like "There's a light coming from the crucible! Something is happening" The game takes into account all your actions and gives you an appropriate ending based on paragon points, renegade points and missions.
Bad end: narrated by reaper. zoom out of reaper core to reaper fleet in dark space. (reapers able to destroy crucible)
Bad Middle end: narrated by Liara via box. Buried on earth uncovered by a recently space faring race. (crucible lasts long enough to destroy citadel)
Middle End (dont save earth, but help everyone): Narrated by Liara via her box. At the end box zooms out to kids and adults listening to it in a citadel museum far into future. You can see galactic civilization of all kinds, synthetics and organics.
Best End (perfect ending): Narrated by liarra, wrex, samara, edi or geth. At the end you zoom out and its a holo recording from Liara's box on earth. With citadel in orbit. Earth is doing great.
each of the endings has machinima scenes spliced in based on your decisions with narrator explaining:
What happened with the rachni
The fate of the krogan
Buncha other stuff i can't remember but easily told through naration and simple machinama.
With perfect ending:
Shepard still in the military and with whoever he romanced.
Liara is an Asari and able to live for a thousand years. In the end, the naration can be by anyone who lives long enough to see the outcome of sheperd's decisions, and 50,000 years in the future you can see the result of sheperd's battle.
artistjeffc.tumblr.com http://www.etsy.com/shop/artistjeffc
A non spoilery response to something you said in spoilers. What's with all the CG? On my PC some of the CG scenes looked really pixely and shittty compared to the in engine cutscenes, which don't look "cinematic quality" but were great for in engine work. Seriously, do more of that.
And then a spoilery response.
I can't believe I'm the only one who thought of that coming into this. I promise you, Bioware totally thought of those endings. They thought of a myriad of happy endings that you'll never know and are probably amazing. And then they realized that it's not possible to do them.
the sound of the Revenant firing is a choir of angels
Oh, and the Hurricane. I just load up any SMG squadmates with that because I love hearing it. The sound effects are so, so much better this time around. The extra effort really shows off.
Greatest Character in the history of videogames, nay... the idea of narrative storytelling. I didn't even hear anything after he said:
The laughter was far too riotous.
3DS Code: 5043-2172-1361
Xbone Tag: Salal al Din
almost done though, just in time for my copy of ME3 to arrive tommorrow
had to lower the difficulty from insanity down to casual to finish in time which just doesn't feel right
I just came over to ask why any other guns exist. It's the power of the claymore with pinpoint accuracy up to about half the map. And for infiltrators: you charge before cloaking, not after. When you fire, you don't break cloak. But if you cloak/charge, you immediate drop cloak when you start charging.
What I don't get is why I can dominate with that shotgun and kill half the enemy troops off at any range. But the Graal? Fuck if I can hit ANYTHING with that, or hurt them without headshots. I want to love that huge spike throwing monster.. but it just seems like the same mechanics as the Geth Shotgun, without any of the stopping power/accuracy/ammo capacity.
Finding out that they're actually the servants, the simple enforcers of a solution created by the very first AI millions or billions of years ago to allow organic life to continue existing is disappointing and especially irritating if you made a point to give the geth and EDI every opportunity to live and achieve peace with people.
so in the end we're forced to decide between 3 monumentally huge changes to life for all beings based on the report by the oldest AI that, "Oh, yea it totally happens every time. Trust me, Organics create synthetics, then try to kill them, then get wiped out by their own creations. its happened like a million times. so we kill off everyone as soon as they start accidentally creating artificial intelligence because it's the only (and stupid) way for organic life to continue existing but hey, you made it to the finish line this time so now I'm going to let you either control my reapers, magically destroy all synthetic life, or make everything in the galaxy a techno/organic hybrid."
Yup, that's the motivation for the reapers folks. Each reaper is an AI controlled storage unit of the liquified remains of every civilization that was able to create AI and then used to kill off all intelligent species to allow the stupider species to advance enough to create AI before killing them all again, repeat until shepard.
So strange...I mean with his brittle brittle bones and all.
ME2 squadmate missions in ME3 spoilers:
So excited to see what everybody else is up to!
GT: FootlongKaPow
Synopsis:
"So what ever happened to that nice redhead that used to help everyone out around here?"
"You mean Kelly Chambers? She's dead. During the attack, Cerberus troops approached her and said 'Are you Kelly Chambers?'. When she said 'Yes.', they put a bullet between her eyes."
Good job I didn't have anything else planned for today
95% of the writing in this game was oriented around the characters and I eagerly devoured every second of it. Then they just throw them out into a void, and for what? A bullshit pseudo-scientific cosmic conclusion after Frodo actually jumps into the volcano.
artistjeffc.tumblr.com http://www.etsy.com/shop/artistjeffc
Wha....but I....I mean....
SON OF BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEECH >_<
Also would have been cool if Catalyst was just an ancient VI. It just did what the original reaper race told it to do: save everyone. And it's conclusion was to immortalize all races into indestructible squid bodies. And harvest them every 50,000 years before things got out of hand. No Sythetic vs Organic bs that didnt really have any teeth. It's tragic, and stupidly simple thing that caused the deaths of trillions, but at least it doesnt sound like more then it is.
artistjeffc.tumblr.com http://www.etsy.com/shop/artistjeffc
I love south american ground karate
artistjeffc.tumblr.com http://www.etsy.com/shop/artistjeffc
Squadmate spoilers.
Installing ME2...
I love south american ground karate
which bums me out! I had used the genesis comic thing to re-create my shepard since I didn't wanna play through ME1 again; can anyone c/d for me that those settings come through successfully? I mucked around with my save some using the editor, and that might have been what caused it, but I don't really wanna run through ME2 again if I'm just going to have this same issue.
(Alternatively, does anybody have an otherwise unedited wrex/rachni/liara femshep kicking around that they wanna extract and email to me?)
ed: ohshit, nevermind, apparently somebody figured out how to convert PC saves to 360 saves, so I'ma go check that out
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
dinosaurs, ahahaha
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
I just spent a half hour searching for a planet only to end up looking it up on the web to find out I can't even go there yet
"Orkses never lose a battle. If we win we win, if we die we die fightin so it don't count. If we runs for it we don't die neither, cos we can come back for annuver go, see!".
Saddest part of the game: I shot Mordin. I really bought into saving the galaxy at any cost. Plus the krogan are really fucking dumb on the whole. I actually felt like a bad person after killing him. Then I saw the measly 150 points I got for murdering one of the best characters and reloaded a save and let him go. 150 points isn't nearly enough to have that on my space conscience.
Best part of the game: Drunk Tali. The straw line was actually funny.
SOOOOO Awesome.
Also, A SIX THOUSAND DOLLAR (credit) TOOTHBRUSH?!?!
Of course an automatic fish feeder is also 24000 credits so I guess it's supply and demand.
Fuck you Adam Smith.
Any advice?
Steam: CavilatRest
Crew Spoiler
Can I
"...only mights and maybes."
Steam: CavilatRest
Doesn't help when I have to stop a senile dog from knocking my TV and Xbox over because 'hey, some stuff got moved and there's space here that wasn't here before! LET'S MAKE A TUNNEL!
Just waiting on 'From Ashes' now, then I can finally start playing.