Mass Effect Series

[beatski]

[Cal]

Someone tried to write a more appropriate ending to Mass Effect 3. http://www.reddit.com/r/truegaming/comm ... ?context=3" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

SpoilerShow

First, you ditch the Crucible. Yes, Mass Effect is sci-fi, but the superweapon trope is really tired and played out. However, over the course of the series, the Reapers were built up into such unstoppable death machines that you run the risk of either not letting the Reapers live up to their reputation when you take on a fleet of them, or you have to come up with some other solution to defeat them. (Sidenote: if the bosses at Bioware really wanted to keep the Crucible, I'd have made you directly involved with the building of it. Fetching crucial materials and scientists and such, rather than the "You should just do some missions while we build this offscreen for you to use at the climax." that we got.)

Instead, you go with the 'unite the various species' plan. Earth can't stand alone, Humans with a couple allies are going to get steamrolled, so you need everyone. Focus your missions on winning allies, building your fleet, bribing, threatening, cajoling and pleading with whoever you can find to give you their military power to wipe out the Reapers. For the large part, this is what the game was about already, so I had no problem with it.

Now you're headed to the final battle with whatever fleet you've managed to assemble, here your choices come into play. How big a fleet you have and how many forces you've assembled depends on how well you do in the initial fight.

Going to London? Nope, instead there should have been one location that was focused on throughout the game. Where you started the game with your court martial and such should have been where you landed back on Earth so you could see the difference between the time you left and when you got back. London was used in the game for the final battle because it's fun to see a major city with buildings that people recognize all blown up. So instead of

"Why are we going to London?"

"I dunno, there are a bunch of Reapers there?"

you get a much better reaction of "It started here, now it ends here." Hell, your court martial could have been in London at the start of the game and it would've been a lot better.

Anyway, so now you've landed and you need to start making your way to the Citadel lift site because Cerberus and the Illusive man is on the Citadel, getting ready to deploy their 'control the Reapers' device. But guess what? Harbinger is running from the space battle to come kill you and he is PISSED. Here's where your gathered resources really come into play. You're in a base and wave after wave of Reaper ground forces are assaulting you, all while Harbinger stomps towards you, blowing up bits of your base as he does.

At this point, your power wheel is replaced with different abilities. You're Commander Shepard and it's now time for you to command all the forces you've gathered. You can call for various ground support to help kill the Reaper ground forces, and attacks that directly target Harbinger. Earned the loyalty of the Geth and kept their species alive? Call for a drop of Geth ground forces. Kept the Destiny Ascension alive in the first game? Use it for an orbital strike that damages Harbinger. Call for a charge of Krogan to kill the ground forces, or for the Normandy to come in guns blazing and put the hurt on Harbinger. This is the big boss fight. If you haven't gathered as many allies as you should have before you came to Earth, as a natural consequence, the fight is harder. And yes, you can lose if Harbinger gets to the base before you kill it. Then you get the ending from the Extended Cut where Liara's beacons are found in the future and help kill the Reapers next cycle, along with the story of the final stand of The Shepard.

If you kill Harbinger though, now the Reapers start fighting less effectively. Their leader is killed and you can talk about how there was a 'hivemind' in the Reapers with him at the center. Anyway, the fight in space is getting easier, and the fight on the ground is going well. Now we're headed to the Citadel to fight Cerberus one last time and confront the Illusive Man. Find him and now you have to decide whether to kill him or not. He's obviously indoctrinated, but is talking about how humans can control the Reapers with his device. How they can unlock amazing technology and dominate the galaxy. If you kill him because he's indoctrinated, now you have to make the choice whether to use the device or not. If you let him live, he leaves the decision up to you and commits suicide because he doesn't want to live as a thrall of the Reapers. Renegade, you use the device and humans go on to dominate the galaxy and build an empire, Prothean-style with everyone else underneath them. Paragon, you destroy the device and your fleet kills the rest of the Reapers. (Multiple outcomes based on how many species you've brought together. Whether you curb-stomp the Reapers or are left with a ragtag fleet after the battle depends on how you've done.)

Then, you see endings based on your choices. You know how Fallout has slides based on what quests you've done and your choices? Something like that. Slides showing you with various squadmates and their lives after the battle if they lived. You and your love interest. How various worlds are rebuilding. Etc. Etc. The end.

That's what I could come up with in 10 minutes. Probably has some flaws or changes I could make to it that would be better. Still, I do what I can.

I like it, although the commanding stuff should be sewn throughout the game in order to make it come more naturally, instead of just going from small team leader / spectre to commanding everything the galaxy has to offer.

[Cal]

" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Michael Gamble ‏@GambleMike (Mass Effect producer)
The next chapter of Mass Effect is upon us!! #N7Day13 pic.twitter.com/OxKudy2Wo9

[DDuc]

Michael Gamble ‏@GambleMike (Mass Effect producer)
The next chapter of Mass Effect is upon us!! #N7Day13 pic.twitter.com/OxKudy2Wo9

All the emotions, they're flooding back.

[Cal]

Bioware are considering a next-gen, upgraded port of the trilogy. Not sure how I feel about this... If they actually included all the DLC I might be tempted.

[Colback's Orange Tufts]

Bioware are considering a next-gen, upgraded port of the trilogy. Not sure how I feel about this... If they actually included all the DLC I might be tempted.

Having just replayed the whole trilogy I'm not sure what they can do. Other than if they fix all the bugs and stuff. Yeah some of the lesser character models are wooden and repeated textures but not a big gripe.
Also as a trilogy 2 and 3 are quite different in tone, gameplay etc than 1 (for the better imo)

[Cal]

I wouldn't be expecting an overhaul or anything, probably just something that runs at 1080p and 60fps (so PC equivalent) and maybe throwing in higher density models and resolution textures if they still have those knocking around, probably reworking the main cast from the first game to bring them up to scratch with 2 and 3. As you say, a few more armour models/textures for the first wouldn't go amiss, but aren't critical. The environments in all the games are largely modular so could perhaps be worked on a bit without costing too much, but that's probably beyond the scope of this kind of thing.

I've been wanting to have another playthrough, back-to-back this time, at some point, but I'd been planning to do so on PC when I have time and if they ever package up or discount the DLC. So if this happens this could be a better option...

As for the difference between games, this pretty much sums up my ideal Mass Effect game:

[tweet][/tweet]

Although I'd also have a loot system somewhere between 1 and 3. I like feeling of progress from getting a better weapon/armour in 1, but also the variety of actually distinct equipment in 3.

[Colback's Orange Tufts]

The loot system in 1 was just over-complicated micro-management very confusing laid out. Wouldn't want any of that!

[DDuc]

I'm also desperate for them to release the full trilogy with all DLC on PC. For all my sins, I still haven't experienced Lair of The Shadow Broker, Citadel DLC etc, and I'd much rather wait it out than go through and download each piece of DLC individually.





Maybe they could fix the endings as well...

[Colback's Orange Tufts]

I'm also desperate for them to release the full trilogy with all DLC on PC. For all my sins, I still haven't experienced Lair of The Shadow Broker, Citadel DLC etc, and I'd much rather wait it out than go through and download each piece of DLC individually.





Maybe they could fix the endings as well...

Lair of The Shadow Broker and Citadel are really good.

Having only just this week seen the extended cut I'm quite happy with the ending, the only thing I think they could do is

SpoilerShow

remove choice from the very very end. Use your decisions over the trilogy to enforce a choice natural for your Shepard. So an anti-synthetic renegade would choose destroy, a Cerberus emphasiser control and a pure paragon synthesis etc etc. imo the endings aren't bad, but it makes no sense for either of my Shepards to be able to choose al options

[Cal]

That sounds like a more elegant solution to the pick a colour problem.

[Colback's Orange Tufts]

That sounds like a more elegant solution to the pick a colour problem.

I would think it wouldn't be too difficult to implement either. Although I'm guessing there would be uproar so maybe not worth the effort.

They could also answer how the beams of light that go from relay to relay (when you see the whole galaxy in profile) seem to be travelling faster than the speed of light. And light has no mass so there's no, you know, mass effect!

[DDuc]

Would be an interesting way of going about things. Like the idea of an ultimate consequence of your actions. Would be hard to still get a satisfying ending from that though, especially when a lot of people have very in depth perceptions of how 'their' Shepard would behave in certain situations.

Although, the idea that maybe when you're getting ready to approach one of the possible ending options, you slowly lose control of Shepard as he approaches an option that best suits him could really add a great dramatic twist to the ending.

Regarding the idea of consequences though...

SpoilerShow

I'd much rather something along the lines of Wrex coming out of nowhere riding shotgun in a Space Hummer being driven by a Salarian, eventually unleashing a swarm of his cute but deadly Krogan babies who proceed to kick both 'Starchild's' and the
Reapers' arses back to the stone age.

[Cal]

I just want

SpoilerShow

the original indoctrination ending

[DDuc]

I just want

SpoilerShow

the original indoctrination ending

What if...

SpoilerShow

We're the Reapers, indoctrinating and manipulating Shepard to do our bidding and make the choices we want him to make...

[Cal]

That's some NBA 2K14 level meta.

It explains the cycle perfectly though (if you overwrite saves).

[DDuc]

That's some NBA 2K14 level meta.

It explains the cycle perfectly though (if you overwrite saves).

SpoilerShow

It's simple, you're a Reaper who's simply 'assumed control'. Shepard's status within human society makes him a prime candidate to achieve a cause.
You guided him to the beacon at Eden Prime, you helped him defeat insubordinate members of the order such as Saren and the Humanoid Reaper and it is you who takes him through his journey all the way to his meeting with the Starchild.

[Colback's Orange Tufts]

I just want

SpoilerShow

the original indoctrination ending

What do you mean by this? The fan theory thing?

[Cal]

I just want

SpoilerShow

the original indoctrination ending

What do you mean by this? The fan theory thing?

SpoilerShow

The original ending was similar to the fan theory. They couldn't get a mechanic where you struggled against indoctrination to control Shepard to feel right/fun in time for Martin Sheen's already once delayed voice recording session, so it was scrapped. The Illusive Man was going to transform a bit and be a boss battle, but it was scrapped (although that might be for the best?).

Karpyshyn, the writer of ME1, ME2 and a load of other stuff, but not ME3, wanted to do something to do with the 'dark energy' mentioned in ME2, perhaps that the Reapers were preventing that from destroying the universe.

[Colback's Orange Tufts]

What do you mean by this? The fan theory thing?

SpoilerShow

The original ending was similar to the fan theory. They couldn't get a mechanic where you struggled against indoctrination to control Shepard to feel right/fun in time for Martin Sheen's already once delayed voice recording session, so it was scrapped. The Illusive Man was going to transform a bit and be a boss battle, but it was scrapped (although that might be for the best?).

Karpyshyn, the writer of ME1, ME2 and a load of other stuff, but not ME3, wanted to do something to do with the 'dark energy' mentioned in ME2, perhaps that the Reapers were preventing that from destroying the universe.

That sounds interesting, any links for Karpyshyn saying that?
Also wasn't the final version of the very end written exclusively by one guy with no-one to bounce off?