Why Mass Effect 3's Ending is Perfect
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- Опубликовано: 6 ноя 2018
- I break down my thoughts on the much maligned ending of the Shepard Trilogy.
• Video
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Happy N7 Day everyone!
You sir, have balls of adamantium steel my friend, and I respect that.
This is in line with my "soft indoctrination" theory: The ending does happen for real, but the Reapers are trying to convince Shephard to choose anything other than destroy.
This trilogy, especially the 'destroy' ending, is perfectly summed up by Javik: "Stand in the ashes of a trillion dead souls and ask the ghost if honour matters."
People didn't hate the ending because it gave you no choice, people hated it because they gave you two fake choices and wasted time making those alternate endings instead of giving us one true epic finale that was as memorable as the ME1 & 2. The "ending-matron" is never fun or interesting, it's two wrong answers and the one you're obviously supposed to pick, AND you can pick whatever end you wanted no matter what choices you made. Your ending should be determined by your actions, not by what color you like more. You're not wrong, but you did kinda miss the point of why people didn't like the ending of ME3. (IMO)
No matter what ending you choose, we can all agree that music and the end of this grand adventure had us crying our hearts out, and that is what makes Mass Effect a powerful story and fantastic epic.
People's discontent came from absolutely no influence of player's choices on the ending. Those 3 endings were the same for everyone no matter what actions they took. The assets you gather through the game were not even depicted during the final push, save the couple of seconds when particular fleet arrived. Also the starchild meme Bioware served us was not funny at all and completely unnecessary. As for control ending - its outcome may actually differ from player to player depending on Shepard's personality. If he was altruistic, taking control of the Reapers could have elevated peoples of the galaxy to unseen level. If he was cruel psychopath he could have actually finished Reapers' job and turn his attention towards other galaxies to strip them out of organic life too.
Thing is - even the Destroy ending meant the end of civilization as we knew it. Sure, the organics survived as they were, but the Mass Relay network is destroyed, making long-range interstellar travel impossible, and with the Reapers gone, no one possesses the technology to rebuild them.
I agree that the Destroy ending is the only choice and the story that comes with it is fine by me. What I don't like about the ending is that it is essentially Red Wave, Green Wave or Blue Wave. Sure, the cutscenes have different narrations and other effects on the textures, but after 3 games and countless decisions that supposedly have shaped the fate of the galaxy, boiling it down to this just felt massively cheap. The extended cut helped a bit, but the issue still remains IMO. Instead of endings that play out differently we just got a 7 minute cutscene in either red, blue or green and that is what truly bugs me about it.
You know, I went in with a fairly neutral opinion and yet somehow this video has convinced me that the ending is actually worse than I thought.
"The ruthless calculations of war" as Garrus would say
"Why Mass Effect 3's Ending is Perfect"
man saren wouldve made a badass ally if he couldve been saved
The reason Mass Effect is so popular as a series, is that the characters are equally as important as the world. The ending as it was when the ME3 shipped, gave very little information on what happened to the characters, besides crashing on the planet in the normandy. The fact that people HAD to ask questions like, what happened? where are they? are they OK? what's next for them? is exactly why one of the most common complaints towards the ending is that it's unsatisfactory, because very little information is given to answer those questions about the characters.
The one point I agree with you on is that Destroy is the least offensive of all endings. The reason I find ME 3's ending to be a complete farcical sham was because of how the central conflict of the series is thrown out of the window. The entire underlying theme of Mass Effect out of the gate was to work past our differences for the greater good, as cliche as that sounds. In ME 1 you assemble a rag tag team who through the diversity of your skill sets work together to bring a halt to Sovereign's plan. ME 2 is the same principal on steroids, as you get together another team of the good, the bad and the ugly to stop the Collectors. ME 3 all up until the final 15 minutes shared the same central conflict. You had to assemble everybody to build the Crucible and fight the Reapers but on a Galactic Scale. Old wounds had to be mended and enemies made allies for the best possible chance at victory and at that point the series was locked into an emotional contract to provide the natural conclusion to the tale it was telling, be that your annihilation because you told everyone to go fuck themselves and started picking sides or something more cathartic because you had put the time and energy into bringing every race together for a last hurrah, where you win or die trying.
Control actually goes one of two ways depending if your paragon or renegade. Renegade makes you more like big brother always watching and gives a dark undertone. Paragon gives a more paternal feeling and sounds more hopeful
Saren was synthesis. Failed.
I'm gonna take this a step further: all the endings are good. They all represent what Mass Effect is about. Yes, synthesis was sort of a vague cop-out, so are 90% of paragon choices and just about every "happy ending" in art and literary history. I think your critiques about the other two endings, along with most other critiques from people who hate the endings, assume a shit ton. I don't think the control ending implied the Reapers control organics, or that synthesis meant a loss of individuality or something of the sort. I think they implied the possibility of things like that happening, but it's not like "Oh this is what happens and you actually made the wrong choice".
I always liked ME3 the most. It was always about the journey not the destination. I was used to the hard choices and it seemed right that Shepherd gave his life
When the writers admit they weren't that smart when writing the ending...there's a problem there...