Mass Effect 3 endings [SPOILERS OBVIOUSLY]

[deano2099]

If they didn't want to waste time on it, they should have just go on to Deviant Art, which has thousands of (far better) Tali portraits all ready to go.

Which they can't use because they don't have the rights to them, and negotiating and organising that with a fan and making sure they're okay legally is a lot more messy than buying a stock image. If you just think it's a bad image then that's fair enough, but criticising it because it's stock seems silly, unless you're the one guy that happens to be a graphic designer, happened to get that event in game, and happened to have spotted that image because he was looking at it for a project the other day.

[Kandon Arc]

Though to be honest, there was no way Bioware could ever satisfy the Tali superfans. One look at the (frankly terifying) Tali's Face thread on the Bioware forum is all you need to see how dedicated they are.

Which is why I probably would have left it a mystery. It didn't really enhance the game at all to know that Tali looked almost exactly the same as a human as well.

Which they can't use because they don't have the rights to them, and negotiating and organising that with a fan and making sure they're okay legally is a lot more messy than buying a stock image. If you just think it's a bad image then that's fair enough, but criticising it because it's stock seems silly, unless you're the one guy that happens to be a graphic designer, happened to get that event in game, and happened to have spotted that image because he was looking at it for a project the other day.

I'd bet that any fan would happily sign their rights away in a heartbeat to get the work in the game but that's irrelevant. My main point is that using stock for such an important character is just lazy. Over the last 3 or 4 years we've seen a bunch of concept art coming out of Bioware about what Tali's face could look like. To decide to photoshop a stock photo just seems incredible lazy and amateur for such a well funded game and well respected developer.

[Memph]

deano - I'm with you there. It's like Shepard was half sedated at the end, it was almost uncomfortable to play. I think this is one of the reasons the indoctrination theory is so popular. But like you I think it was just rushed last minute, it's already been revealed that Martin Sheen's sessions had to be moved back to the last minute.

I think I'm pretty much sold on the indoctrination theory. There may be a few gaps, but more adds up as a whole in my mind. Ashley's suspicions of Shep being the Shep she once knew were laid down pretty heavily in the beginning I thought, despite the Cerberus involvement, although I hardly bothered with her later on tbh. Could be coincidence as with noone paying attention to crawlspace kid.

However, the game's own journal text on Reaper indoctrination describes Shep's dream sequences to the letter. After 'waking up' you suddenly have unlimited ammo and for the paragon option (ie: the 'right' thing to do) you happen to have the exact same outcome you were just a few minutes ago arguing with TIM over being very bad indeed. Shep is already physically controllable by the Reapers, then asks no questions. What's said by Starchild goes, end of. It's more than plausable that the renegade option does what the tin says and is the only way to break the delusion, thus why Shep destroys the red tube, as opposed to the other, more subserviently performed self-sacrifice options, not to mention the cutscenes for those literally showing Shep's face turning husk-like and not unlike TIM and Saren before. Sure you can die in these run-up scenes, allowing it to be percieved as real events, but then it's a game innit. Quick-time events (what Marauder Shields in all his infamy essentially was) killing the player out of context I find more plausable (possibly comforting) than guffing up and snuffing out most of, if not all of the ninety-odd previous hours of plot relevance.

[westyfield]

But do you guys really think that the Bioware writing team have the sophistication and subtlety to actually intend the indoctrination theory? I'm afraid that after Buzz Aldrin's "every life is a precious snowflake, buy our DLC" I decided that they really had very little idea of what people actually wanted.

[archonsod]

Indoctrination Theory = The Original Ending Wasn't Bad Enough, We Came Up With Something Even More Retarded.

[Kadayi]

I think I'm pretty much sold on the indoctrination theory. There may be a few gaps, but more adds up as a whole in my mind. Ashley's suspicions of Shep being the Shep she once knew were laid down pretty heavily in the beginning I thought, despite the Cerberus involvement, although I hardly bothered with her later on tbh. Could be coincidence as with noone paying attention to crawlspace kid.

IT is a pipe dream concocted by fans to make up for the fact that the current endings are so dire. If the 'true' ending was in the works they'd just release that rather than waste time rejiggering a false ending. Occams razor.

Indoctrination Theory = The Original Ending Wasn't Bad Enough, We Came Up With Something Even More Retarded.

You stay classy there old man.

[NathanH]

IT would still be a rubbish ending to a choice'n'consequence game, so the fact it might make a little more sense than taking the crappy ending at face value doesn't mean we should in any way encourage it.

[Memph]

IT would still be a rubbish ending to a choice'n'consequence game.

How can you be sure when you don't know what may/may not be coming? If 'it was all a dream', then none of it actually happened, leaving the ending wide-open again.

[Nalano]

How can you be sure when you don't know what may/may not be coming? If 'it was all a dream', then none of it actually happened, leaving the ending wide-open again.

Because they're clarifying, not changing. They're adding to, not replacing. I fully expect a short ditty that explains that the destruction of the mass effect gates didn't end life as we know it, and that the various civilizations would work hard to rebuild a network in their own image rather than piggyback a system made by their attempted murderers.

[Memph]

IT is a pipe dream concocted by fans to make up for the fact that the current endings are so dire. If the 'true' ending was in the works they'd just release that rather than waste time rejiggering a false ending. Occams razor.

I certainly don't see it as unrealistic to be fair. Not when the evidence is so compelling. It's in the very text of the game itself. Why would dream sequences identical to how indoctrination is described in the game (oily, shadowy figures, voices) that progressively get more intense throughout the story even be there otherwise? My reaction to the first sequence was to wonder this. Sure a kid dies, oh noes. Maybe i'm not that cynical as to assume Bioware are and he wasn't just there to feebly yank on heart strings, that it maybe all ties together, which having backtracked through the story is found to be the case many a time, right down to the 3 choices representing the 3 game's previous indoctrinees - Saren wanted synthesis - TIM control - Shepard's destiny was to destroy. Sure this buggers the 'choice' factor, having the right way predetermined, but it also would mean none of it mattered and there's more to come. If it was always going to be free DLC and they really did want to risk the franchise and internet fanboi wrath by 'indoctrinating' the players themselves with a 4th wall breaking ending conspiracy, well that's pretty damn cool really.

[Memph]

Because they're clarifying, not changing. They're adding to, not replacing.

If they came out now and admitted there's another hour to go it'd somewhat give the game away though no?
What are folks expecting from the much fanfared plans for DLC? Shep can't get up to much if s/he's dead. And adding more filling wouldn't be worth a single toss, as of course Shep ends up dead.

[Heliocentric]

I like the indoctrination ending because it's less stupid and more fitting with mass effects overall narrative than MAGIC GLOWING SUPER ALIEN CHILDREN.

Serious, Saren was a renegade turned indoctrinated but he cared about galactic society so, with a little prompting he popped his dome.

That shep doesn't have a renegade interruption where he tells the alliance fleet to bomb the citadel to space dust (serious, you wouldn't have a pistol destroyable fuel tank that could destroy the citadel on the outside).

All of the 'choices' would be exactly what the controlling force wants, whether literally or not.

[Nalano]

If they came out now and admitted there's another hour to go it'd somewhat give the game away though no?

But they're not.

If if if but but but want want want.

[Memph]

But they're not.

And why not would be obvious

*edit: not is

[soldant]

And why would be obvious

*edit: not is

Reading their statements thus far it seems like it's just clarifying a few points from the ending. They're unlikely to go "LOL JUST KIDDING it's really dark energy" and rewrite the ending.

[Memph]

Reading their statements thus far it seems like it's just clarifying a few points from the ending. They're unlikely to go "LOL JUST KIDDING it's really dark energy" and rewrite the ending.

Again, it wouldn't be a rewrite. If IT is fact, then we've literally only seen one of the major possible endings so far: Shep being indoctrinated. The other is a blatant cliffhanger.

[deano2099]

As someone who's defended the ending and Bioware, I do think if the indoctrination thing turns out to be true then I'll turn into a raging internet bastard. And I can't be the only one. The smoking gun to the indoctrination theory is Shep waking up again in one of the endings. The hardest one to get. Most players won't see that, so won't have any reason to take things other than at face value.

It'll basically come down to:
We shipped the game without the real ending
If you've sold the game on now you can't get the real ending
If you bought second hand then you need the online pass to get the real ending
If your console isn't connected to the internet you can't have the real ending

It makes my skin crawl to say it but if they do that I think those people talking about suing Bioware for making an incomplete, faulty product may start to have a point. And for that reason it won't happen. All the other conjectured 'evidence' in the game...honestly I think it's just there from a plan to do something with indoctrination in the endgame (maybe at the TIM encounter) that was dropped.

[desvergeh]

It'll basically come down to:
We shipped the game without the real ending
If you've sold the game on now you can't get the real ending
If you bought second hand then you need the online pass to get the real ending
If your console isn't connected to the internet you can't have the real ending

This and the fact that EA are so determined to undermine 2nd hand sales actually adds a lot of weight to IT in my opinion.

Still not convinced, as I think if they were adding the "real" ending as DLC they would have done so by now.


Forget Occam's Razor, in my opinion - whichever theory involves the most incompetence is always the correct one ;)

[westyfield]

I fully expect a short ditty that explains that the destruction of the mass effect gates didn't end life as we know it, and that the various civilizations would work hard to rebuild a network in their own image rather than piggyback a system made by their attempted murderers.

You just know it'll be Joker or Liara or someone reading while a slideshow plays. "Oh and galactic civilisation wasn't destroyed after all, and everyone was fine. Also the food on this rainforest planet turned out to have a new kind of amino acid that everyone can eat, so Garrus and Tali didn't have to starve. And the wreckage of the Citadel and the Crucible didn't fall to Earth, causing a mass extinction of all life planetside, it was disintegrated by the Keepers when they saw it was going to crash. You are all unique and lovely and don't let anyone take that away from you.
The actual end.
P.S. Would you like some DLC?"

What are folks expecting from the much fanfared plans for DLC? Shep can't get up to much if s/he's dead. And adding more filling wouldn't be worth a single toss, as of course Shep ends up dead.

It wouldn't be worth anything from a narrative standpoint, no, but as a chance to play a few more hours of a fun game, why not?

Forget Occam's Razor, in my opinion - whichever theory involves the most incompetence is always the correct one ;)

As I said earlier, I just don't credit Bioware with the talent needed to intentionally screw with their audience via the indoctrination theory. They'd have given the game away in a short reveal to make sure that nobody missed it.

[Kadayi]

I certainly don't see it as unrealistic to be fair. Not when the evidence is so compelling. It's in the very text of the game itself. Why would dream sequences identical to how indoctrination is described in the game (oily, shadowy figures, voices) that progressively get more intense throughout the story even be there otherwise? My reaction to the first sequence was to wonder this. Sure a kid dies, oh noes. Maybe i'm not that cynical as to assume Bioware are and he wasn't just there to feebly yank on heart strings, that it maybe all ties together, which having backtracked through the story is found to be the case many a time, right down to the 3 choices representing the 3 game's previous indoctrinees - Saren wanted synthesis - TIM control - Shepard's destiny was to destroy. Sure this buggers the 'choice' factor, having the right way predetermined, but it also would mean none of it mattered and there's more to come. If it was always going to be free DLC and they really did want to risk the franchise and internet fanboi wrath by 'indoctrinating' the players themselves with a 4th wall breaking ending conspiracy, well that's pretty damn cool really.

I'm fairly sure I covered this earlier in the thread tbh. Essentially pulling a switcheroo would only work if the game carried on afterwards (not 3 or 4 months down the line when the emotional high is redundant), and if everyone realized it. Plain truth of the matter is IT works principally in hindsight. If it we're truly a case that 'it was all a dream' then why release the game now Vs when the real ending DLC was available? Let alone waste time rejiggering the false ending and delaying the real ending more? There's no motivation there, esp given they can't charge for either.