So, I just finished playing Mass Effect 3 after doing the impossible: avoiding all spoilers, reviews, advertisements, etc, for the last few months. I wanted an untainted experience since I was going to get to the game a few months after release. And I did it. AMAZING, I know. I had a great time with this game, but all of my effort could not save me from the awful, awful twist of fate that the Reapers had in store for me... the ending of the game.

What can I say that hasn't been said a million times already by every MA fan out there since? I won't go into the details, because I think that everything has been said quite well, and that is not the point of this post. Let me just say that the ending was so mind-boggingly horrible and incompetent that I was in shock for about 12 hours after beating the game. I was in denial, disbelief. Not only did the ending not make sense, not only was it just plain terrible, but it goes against the core themes of the entire series itself. I used my powers of "The Internets" to the maximum in order to piece together this tragedy. How could Bioware do this? It didn't make any sense. How could such a wonderfully company, who did such an amazing job creating this incredible story and franchise, drop the ball so badly? It was during this time of research that I noticed something.

I noticed that the gaming press and the gaming industry came to the rescue of Bioware. People went out of their way to try and let Bioware save face and brush off this monumental failure. They avoided the facts and spun things as best they could. Steve Jobs level reality distortion fields were deployed. But why? Were the fans wrong? Is this sort of thing OK? Did EA drown people in hush money? Had the co-founders of Bioware sent out an SOS to everyone on their contact list? I could go on for a long time here, but I will get to my point. In a sense, Mass Effect 3 and Bioware had become too big to fail. The industry was so proud of Bioware, so proud that this flagship franchise existed. Mass Effect gave the industry, and all of us, something to be very proud of. We could point to this and say to the world, "Hey look! This is respectable! Movies can't do this! Your Grandma can't do this! We told you that games could be important and meaningful!"

So, when this incredible accomplishment in gaming history fell flat on its face SO INCREDIBLY HARD in front of everyone, what could the industry do but put on a fake smile and make an awkward laugh and tell everyone that it's alright, your all just over-reacting. I can understand their motivation for this cover-up. After all, we all want Bioware to exist. We want them to keep making great games. We want them to have mountains of cash in their bank account. We don't want this to be the end. But god damn does this hurt. It's fucking embarrassing. It's god damn unbelievable. Mass Effect was to be a shinning example for the future of story telling. So when this amazing story imploded during the last 10 minutes, the most important 10 minutes of the entire series, it's kind of a big deal. I'm sorry Mike and Jerry, I love you, but I disagree with you.

I can forgive Bioware. I'd just like to know how on Earth, how in the Milky Way, they could have fucked up so badly when the stakes were so high and the product was so good. I'd like to believe that EA and their money hungry practices played a huge part, and I honestly do believe this, but it doesn't explain everything. I hope that Bioware can love their fans enough to swallow their pride and give us the ending this story deserves. If not for the fans, then for themselves.

Now, to keep some sanity and protect my beloved Bioware, I will now blame all of this on EA. Perhaps Bioware just got into bed with the wrong person. Was joining with EA worth the price? Or maybe things just got too big to fail. I guess only time will tell.