Mass Effect

[deoxys]

I'm on the Mass Effect subreddit where they have been very good about not spoiling things, but everyone keeps saying the ending left them feeling "empty", "like a husk", "shattered", "numb", "terrible". And people who haven't beaten it are saying things like "I hope you guys are collectively trolling us and it's actually good", and the response was "You poor, poor soul."

I'm a bit scared o_O

[Blastoise]

Originally Posted by deoxys

I'm on the Mass Effect subreddit where they have been very good about not spoiling things, but everyone keeps saying the ending left them feeling "empty", "like a husk", "shattered", "numb", "terrible". And people who haven't beaten it are saying things like "I hope you guys are collectively trolling us and it's actually good", and the response was "You poor, poor soul."

I'm a bit scared o_O

To be fair I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of those are people who were expecting to have a perfect ending where Shepard and his waifu move to a lovely cottage by the sea, have 2.5 kids and live happily ever after. I'm more disappointed for other reasons, and chances are you'll probably have some common ground with me when you finish.

[Loki]

I was trying to avoid the topic since some/most/half haven't even gotten to play the game yet.

Let's just say, it certainly wasn't what we all expected.

[deoxys]

Spoiler: show

If the reapers succeed or it's a mutual destruction type thing and the current races have saved the future races that will rebirth from the reapers cleansing or something, I think I might be able to live with that. Being that this is the final game in the trilogy, I don't expect a 'happy' ending, and never did. I have heard there are a whopping 16 endings or so, but whatever it is, I'm trying to prepare myself for it, so long as it's not some bullshit like 'it was all a dream', or 'all three games were just the protheans looking into the future to see what happens if they dont succeed' or something. Or 'Shepard is Illusive Man come back in time'.

Like I said. I don't expect a happy ending. I knew from the ending of the first game there was no way they could take on a whole army of reapers considering it took the entire alliance fleet in citadel space to destroy just one (sovereign).

[deoxys]

Alright; I'm done for the night. Obviously I've avoided your spoilers up to this point, and will go back and read them once I beat the game and then react.

Here's where I'm at at this point in time; Major plot spoilers, be warned.

Spoiler: show

I saved the Rachni queen in ME1, so she was back, and with the help of Grunt, I saved her. I gotta hand it to them, they got me good when he ran in headstrong to battle the rachni to the melody of a sad piano. I thought for sure he was dead, especially when he dove off the cliff and it faded to black. Nope, out comes Grunt, crawling and covered in blood. What a damn trooper.

I decided to cure the Krogan of the genophage out of desperation for their support. Originally, my canon Shepard was neutral on it and saw pros and cons on both sides of the issue. I ignored the Salarian councilor and let Mordin go through with the cure. Watching him go up the tower and die singing "Scientist Salarian" was pretty emotional... I'll admit, being that he was one of my favorite characters, it tore me up.

I went back to the Citadel to take care of Cerberus. When Ashley pulled her gun on me to defend the council, I had enough paragon to have her stand down. Then Udina had to be a fuckass as per usual and try to unlock the elevator, so with the renegade option I finally got to do what I've wanted to since ME1, and put a bullet through his chest. Council saved again, Ashley is alive (I know she could have died, as that's what happened in my friend's game, although that could have been fun). After Nightwing escaped (Seriously Bioware...?), I went and watched Thane die in the hospital, which actually made me shed some completely and totally unmanly tears. Sad as hell.

And that's where I stopped for the night.

Theories:

Spoiler: show

Judging by how the Cerberus soldier at the beginning looked like he had the face of a husk, I'm starting to think Illusive Man really was indoctrinated. Fighting in the name of Humanity is the perfect guide to do it, and now that the Reapers are out, instead of fighting them or stepping down to help like even the fucking Blue Suns, Eclipse, and Blood Pack are doing, they are essentially fighting with them. It's too convenient that they suddenly start acting like fucks (moreso than usual). I'm beginning to question whether or not Shepard was tampered with internally when he was rebuilt. In fact, if Illusive Man was possibly indoctrinated, then Shepard could be as well, although you think they would have "activated" that by now.

I don't know; it's too early to tell.

PS. I found out one spoiler by complete accident, but thankfully it's the one spoiler I'd actually WANT to know about. I know Miranda can be killed, I don't know how, and I don't know when, but I know it can be stopped, and I really want to be able to stop it, so hopefully I do everything right in doing so (I'm not going to try and find out how, because that would ruin the experience), although I don't want my changing romances from Ashley to her affect anything (and thankfully I was able to tell her that I still liked her when I met her on the Citadel, and then proceed to tell Ashley in the hospital that she needs to get over me, like the asshole I am).

[Concept]

"I don't need luck, I have ammo."

Possibly my new favourite line.

[deoxys]

Wow, you're that far already? Been playing since midnight?

[Loki]

The new Blasto movie is the best.

[Concept]

Originally Posted by deoxys

Wow, you're that far already? Been playing since midnight?

It arrived a couple hours before I had to leave on friday so I played a bit then, and I arrived home at about seven yesterday evening and played a couple hours then. Playtime of maybe ten hours or so, played quite a lot today and am probably going to stop soon.

EDIT the first: Ok, so having played a decent bit today I feel the need to weigh in my opinions.

All the people complaining about the lack of dialogue control are, for the most part, pretty stupid. The only difference between the previous games and this one that I've seen so far is that you don't pick all the irrelevant middle lines. S'all we've lost. Boohoo, we can't choose the lines that make absolutely no difference to anything anymore! Waaah, we we can't choose an option to completely contradict ourselves mid-sentence anymore! Maybe I'm the only one who always found it retarded how you could be comforting someone, hear them say all of two words and then switch to telling them to go die in a hole, and that's all that's gone.

Rant over, combat is pretty good - someone already mentioned it's annoying that one button does everything because it means you do something by accident, and yeah it's annoying when it happens but it's happened to me all of three or four times thus far. Very much enjoying my Infiltrator. Also the DLC character is pretty cool, and well integrated (sticks out like a sore thumb as obviously not originally there much, much less than Kasumi and Zaeed did). Quite liking having a large crew to talk to without having a ridiculously oversized squad too.

Plotwise, the game is awesome so far. I haven't bothered with the side missions that just involve "go here and pick this up", but there've been a lot of optional missions that fit perfectly into the story, and the main missions have been pretty cool too. Occasionally I do want to headdesk at how stubborn some characters are - I mean we're clearly so far beyond the Godzilla Threshold that if the answer to "might this help with our immediate problem" is yes then the potential future ramifications are freaking irrelevant (I'm looking at you, Dalatrass).

[deoxys]

Originally Posted by Concept

Boohoo, we can't choose the lines that make absolutely no difference to anything anymore! Waaah, we we can't choose an option to completely contradict ourselves mid-sentence anymore! Maybe I'm the only one who always found it retarded how you could be comforting someone, hear them say all of two words and then switch to telling them to go die in a hole, and that's all that's gone.

Alright cool guy, I suppose I'll just keep my mouth shut on any criticisms I have in the future.

I'm used to it at this point, but even the irrelevant dialogue choices was great, at least for me. I felt more immersed, and while I can see while some would be very bored with it, I just wished they'd added an extra option to the narrative options to allow for full immersion, like in the first two. Then you could pick the medium dialogue option, which is what this one is right now.

Rant over, combat is pretty good - someone already mentioned it's annoying that one button does everything because it means you do something by accident, and yeah it's annoying when it happens but it's happened to me all of three or four times thus far.

Well, I'm glad you're getting along with it just swell.



Anyway, I just finished the DLC mission (I did it rather late), and it's got me developing a new theory (I like to speculate on plot points a lot during a long story).

Spoiler: show

A new theory as in, it almost feels like the same thing is going to happen to Shepard at the end of the game in which the final scene shows him in the pod and being awakened to fight the reapers again, or something. If that happens... I have no idea how I'd feel, so I guess we'll wait and see.


OR


PLOT TWIST! Cerberus is working for the reapers and sabotaged the crucible plans on mars to backfire

[deoxys]

Okay, what is Galactic Readiness and how do I get it to move past 50%? Because I'm a beast right now and that number will NOT SWAY and I don't know what I'm supposed to do (if anything?) to get it to do so.

[Loki]

Play multiplayer.

[deoxys]

Do I NEED to to help the ending or something? Because if so, that's pretty stupid. Although I want to anyway. But still. If that's really the case... dumb.

[Concept]

Originally Posted by deoxys

Alright cool guy, I suppose I'll just keep my mouth shut on any criticisms I have in the future.

I'm used to it at this point, but even the irrelevant dialogue choices was great, at least for me. I felt more immersed, and while I can see while some would be very bored with it, I just wished they'd added an extra option to the narrative options to allow for full immersion, like in the first two. Then you could pick the medium dialogue option, which is what this one is right now.

Sorry, that came out harsher than I meant. It's just literally every other thread on Biowares forums is complaining about it, and it... doesn't really make much difference at all. Really don't understand why people liked the ability to suddenly switch from "it'll be okay" to "screw you, bitch!" within the space of a couple of words.

[deoxys]

I fucked up.

Spoiler: show

So I have been successful up until now in both saves in keeping the peace between the Geth and the quarians. I made one crucial mistake though; I didn't rescue the Admiral before attacking Reaper base. I thought they were going to agree but the Geth killed the quarians and Tali killed herself. I immediately turned off my console because I absolutely do not want that to happen. So I did what I was trying to not do and I looked it up. I've met all requirements yo save them both...except save the admiral. So I'm going to have to reload a prior save tomorrow and redo the reaper base all over... and those three Geth prime almost gave me an aneurism because of how pissed I was getting. Then I discovered the Geth Spitfire. I fucking wasted all that time...

So tomorrow I try again. But if saving the admiral still doesn't do the trick... and the guide I read was wrong... I'm going to go on a rage spree.

Peace is the only answer for my story. I can't take it any other way.

[Concept]

So I just fell through the floor. First bug I've come across. Also:

"I'm Garrus Vakarian and this is my favourite spot on the Citadel!"

This game has some excellent line and moments, some just hilarious and some that are great callbacks to earlier in the series.

[Loki]

Originally Posted by deoxys

Do I NEED to to help the ending or something? Because if so, that's pretty stupid. Although I want to anyway. But still. If that's really the case... dumb.

No, it's totally optional.

[Concept]

Originally Posted by Raptor Jesus

No, it's totally optional.

Apparently, while it's possible to get the best possible ending without multiplayer, I hear it's nearly impossible. When they say "it can be done", from the amount of moaning on the bioware forums it seems like in order to do so you have to play through all the options in all three games basically perfectly.

Might be an exaggeration, s'just what I hear.

[deoxys]

> bioware forums

why do you do this to yourself? you poor, poor man.

[Concept]

I like to soak in the RAEG. It fuels my own.

I've run into most of my old ME2 squadmates now - makes me wonder where Miranda and Jack (who died in mine) would've appeared. Also gotta say (unrelatedly), this game really isn't pulling the emotional punches.

[deoxys]

I fixed it...

Spoiler: show

Legion's sacrifice for peace made me bawl hardest yet. I shed many manly tears. The way he acknowledged himself as "I" instead of "We" at the end and then his peace with Tali and "Keela sahlai" tore me up. This game is doing a very good job of tying up loose ends and being really emotional.

[Doppleganger]

Originally Posted by deoxys

> bioware forums

why do you do this to yourself? you poor, poor man.

The forums were cool before Bioware deleted all the posts from 2000 or so for absolutely no reason.

Also, just dropping in to say I think the DA and Mass Effect 3 anime are going to follow in the footsteps of DMC and similarly other ill intentioned projects. I'm surprised Bioware is even trying to make them.

[deoxys]

Seen on reddit/circlejerk:

"I thought the ending to Mass Effect 3 was quite good, and really tied the entire genre together." - Joseph Kony

Died laughing.

In other news, I've been storming through this game. I've wrapped up basically every side mission, and all that's left before launching the final mission is to get my effectiveness up through multiplayer (which I've done a bit of already, and I'm sitting at a steady 65% readiness rating. Need to get that as close to 100 as I can.

[Concept]

Ok so that was... interesting.

It's going to take some time for me to sort my thoughts about the ending into something coherent. I don't, unlike a vocal part of the fanbase, immediately hate it though. Spoilered comments will come tomorrow - also on the other parts of the game, such as those places where I shed MANLY TEARS.

[Blastoise]

Originally Posted by deoxys

Seen on reddit/circlejerk:

"I thought the ending to Mass Effect 3 was quite good, and really tied the entire genre together." - Joseph Kony

Died laughing.

In other news, I've been storming through this game. I've wrapped up basically every side mission, and all that's left before launching the final mission is to get my effectiveness up through multiplayer (which I've done a bit of already, and I'm sitting at a steady 65% readiness rating. Need to get that as close to 100 as I can.

Unless your EMS at 50% is, like, 1000 or something, you don't have to grind that hardcore. I did it at like 67% which was kinda overkill anyways.