- As the debate rages on, and as I listen to and read arguments about the ending Mass Effect 3, I've come to the conclusion I've fallen into the minority position. If it has taught me anything about a vocal minority, it's that we are vocal only in comparison to a contented majority.
- One of the first things that Adam Sessler says in this Vox Games podcast was "I didn't realize the ending was not to be liked." That made me think, but from the opposite side. Knowing that so many other were dissatisfied gave me the courage to step forward about my own disappointment. And as we've added voices of dissent, we've encouraged others to join as well. But I see now that even if we're the ones speaking up, there is still a vast majority of people who are just fine with the ending and don't have any special need to share that.
- (Of course when I saw the ending of Portal 2, I wanted to tell everyone how great that was. But I'm not here to complain that the ending doesn't live up to that mark.)
- There is no tyranny of the masses going on here. I have to come to terms with that fact that I may very well be wrong about the game. Bioware does not owe me a change. I'm the one who needs to change. And it is a change that has been a long time to come.
- To date, Bioware has produced exactly three games that I have enjoyed unreservedly: Jade Empire, Mass Effect, and Mass Effect 2. Every other game that they have produced has been flawed to such an extent that I do not like them, although several are considered classics: Baldur's Gate, Dragon Age, Knights of the Old Republic, Neverwinter Nights. As much as I may enjoy some of their stories, I did not enjoy them as games. Even though I've purchase all of them, I'm come to regret doing so in many cases. And I have no one but myself to blame.
- Going forward, I will no longer buy any games from Bioware. I won't bow to the hype as I've done several times in the past. I should have learned my lesson long ago, but I can't continue to make the same mistake over and over again.
- Now if you'll excuse me, Skyrim seems to be a lot better than I expected from a Bethesda game. Maybe that second chance will pay off.
© 2012 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.
- We're back in no spoiler territory for ME3. However, there are spoilers for Blade Runner and Wall-E, so read accordingly. Yes, I'm still writing about that game. No, I can't get it out of my head.
- One of the craziest things to come out of the Mass Effect 3 ending fiasco was the backlash from game journalists when Dr. Ray Muzyka stated that Bioware would revisit the ending in some capacity due to feedback from the fans. Several of them took to Twitter to whine about how Bioware had caved to the fans instead of sticking to their artistic intention. It was just as embarrassing as all of the people making threats and attacking Bioware. They seem to think that changing the ending would be a fatal blow to the "games as art" position.
- It is amazing to me that so many people forget that Bethesda sold a new DLC ending for Fallout 3. People hated the ending so much that they were almost required to clear it up somehow. And it should be no surprise that Bioware would consider changing the game since they committed to patch the novel Mass Effect: Deception due to numerous errors.
- I suspect that what everyone fears is that the changes will end up like those made to the theatrical release of Blade Runner. The original cut ends with Deckard and Rachael making a run for it, not sure how long she'll live, whether his fellow blade runners will come for them, unsure whether he's really human or not. Test audiences were so dissatisfied with this ending that the studio demanded a happy ending be tacked on. It is still a towering achievement in science fiction cinema, but the eventual director's cut showed that Ridley Scott's original vision was greater still. Tacking some inane happy ending onto the end of ME3 will make some people happy, but it's not what we really need.
- Instead, the paradigm people (and Bioware) need to keep in mind is that established by Wall-E. When that movie was tested, fully half of the audience believed that the humans returning to Earth were so incapable that their deaths would so follow the end of the film. Director Andrew Stanton, not wanting to leave audiences with that impression, added the end credit sequence that shows human civilization growing and flourishing after the movie ends. It is great bit of animation and it leaves no doubt about how the ending should be viewed.
- If anyone at Bioware is smart, this is template they will follow. The ending of Mass Effect 3 left so many people, including myself, with the opposite impression from the one they were intending. I can't say that I'm looking forward to their solution. But it will be interesting to see if they can pull it off.
- SPOILER WARNING!!! IF YOU HAVE NOT COMPLETED MASS EFFECT 3, TURN BACK NOW!!! (I EVEN CAPITALIZED THE HTML TAGS. THAT IS HOW SERIOUS I AM.)
- Even though I said in my last post that I was going to talk about the ending today, I was strongly reconcidering whether I want to keep beating this drum. But after talking to my brother about the game for an hour and a half (he is compelled by the Indoctrination Theory, I am unconvinced) and then falling down an internet hole of people trying to describe why they did not like the ending (with a myriad of differences, good luck parsing that, Bioware), I knew that I could not let this go yet. I have to get my thoughts out before I could put the game (and the series) behind me.
- To explain what I feel is wrong with the ending, you have to understand how I experienced it. It was about 3:30 in the morning when I began the final mission. When you land on Earth and start fighting your way through the streets of London. There are some incredible battles. Even in casual difficulty, I felt hard pressed to succeed. And when I reached the final hold out battle, it felt like we really might be overrun. So when we killed the Destroyer guarding the conduit, I was so relieved. I had been so excited by this entire sequence that I had stood up somewhere along the line and was standing four feet away from my television. It was from that position that I experienced the rest of the game.
- I honestly thought that I might be the only one to survive the final rush to the conduit. So when the reaper's beam shoots across the screen, I thought that I was done for. But then there is the incredibly effective final stagger to the conduit, fighting off the husks and marauder, then walk through the corridors and bridge to the circular chamber where you find Anderson and the Illusive Man. It was at this point that the game started to fall apart for me. The conversation goes on for far too long for a talk with someone who is only a proxy for the enemy. I ended up shooting my way out of the situation, though Anderson ended up dead. Maybe I could have forgiven the clunky writing of the conversation if it were not what happened next.
- When you meet the Catalyst atop the Citadel and are presented your three choices, I'm sure the designers intended this to be a challenge for you. They want you to weigh the options and decide which is the lesser evil. When I made my decision, it came down to the fact that the center option looked closer. That is it. I looked at the destruction and control options off to the sides (and in my mind, I had confused which option was which), they seemed harder to navigate to reach them. So I just pushed forward. I cared so little for what was presented to me that literally decided the fate of the galaxy based on the fact that it was easier just to hold the stick up the whole time. When the Catalyst finished listing the options, I deflated like a balloon. There was nothing left in me to care about how the game ended.
- I know that the Retake petition is asking for a more heroic ending to the end. That was not what I was looking for from ME3. What I want is an ending that is consistent with the themes of the game to that point. The Catalyst's explanation that organic life has to be saved by being destroyed is idiotic. My Shepard had just spent the entire game disproving the point that organic and synthetic life had to be at odds. She was nurturing EDI's growth as a lifeform and encouraging her and Joker to act on their feelings. And she had successfully brought the Geth and the Quarians together, saving both species in the end. That I did not have the chance to prove that the Reapers were in the wrong flew in the face of everything that Shepard had worked for over the course of the three games.
- At some point as I was playing, I started to imagine what a fourth Mass Effect game might look like. I must admit that I drew heavily from Firefly. I could see a ragtag crew of traders and smugglers traveling the Traverse in a post-war galaxy. Of course, you would stumble across some nefarious plot that you must end. The world Bioware built seemed so full of possibility that I could see room for a number of sci-fi plots to flourish here. Then they decided to blow up the relays.
- It seems clear to me that the developers thought they were building a work of art with the ending. And credit must be given to how skillful and beautiful the final movie is. But they thought that this ending was so good that they could burn down the house after they left. I'm not even going to get into the fact that Bioware established that a destroyed reply explodes like supernova, effectively wiping out the star system. In The Final Hours of Mass Effect 3, Casey Hudson says that he's not interested in making a post-ME3 game, instead preferring a prequel or side story. And he was adamant about it that he turned the ending into a choice of three ways to nuke the galaxy. So in a way, the game is a failure because it is destructive to its own themes, as well as destructive to the possibility space of their universe. And people wonder why some of us might have difficulty accepting the current ending.
- If you are really interested, here are a few links to better writers than I who are also picking the ending apart:
- The announcement that Bioware is reconcidering the ending of Mass Effect 3 comes at an amazing time. Just the prior night I stayed up until four in the morning to finish my game. But even if Bioware is going to address people concerns, I still need to explain my feelings. I will avoid any major spoilers. However, if you want to go into the game completely clean, feel free to bookmark this post and come back when you're done. I've done that with several posts that I'm finally reading today.
- I spoke with my brother that night. He beat the game a week ago and really wanted to about it. He called it a punch in the gut. Until I finished, I wasn't sure what he could mean by that. Surely Bioware would write the ending in such a way as to fascilitate the upcoming DLC, I told him. No, he told me, the ending is as final as final can be. Huh, I said. I was saved from the rest of the conversation by the baby, but I was left unsettled. It's one thing for the internet at large to tell you a game sucks, but it's a whole other thing when it's your brother.
- The funny thing is that, by this point, I was really enjoying ME3. I know that I complained about the combat before. But after several nights, I was finally used to the controls and even enjoying the combat again. Sure, I was still playing on Casual, but I was having fun. And I was having fun doing missions and talking to old friends. The game, oh the game was fantastic. It was the story that let me down.
- Everything about Mass Effect 3 was great, right up until the last fifteen minutes. The ending undoes everything you've just spent the game achieving. After spending the entire game trying to bring the universe together, you are given a final choice that contradicts everything the series has stood for. It even contradicts plot lines that you are following in this very game!
- I honestly think that video games are a completely valid art form. But they are not passive like every other art. Gaming is a collaborative experience between the designer and the audience. Authorial intent is very murky when you are hang your narrative on the player's actions. That players would rise up so vociferously to a story decision should be no surprise at this point. No matter what Paul Barnett says, games are not one directional media; designers have to honor the interactive nature of games and the stories that play out.
- Between this and the Dragon Age games, I have lost all confidence in Bioware as a game designer. From here on, I won't be buy their games until I am reasonable assured that they will be worthwhile.
- Addendum: Before I finished this post, I downloaded and read Geoff Keighley's The Final Hours of Mass Effect 3. Watching the included videos, I started to feel bad about how much I'm seething about this game. Casey Hudson is just a dude, trying to make a game people will like. That he got so close should be commended.
- I'll have one more super spoiler post to discuss the ending but then I'm going to move on.
© 2012 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.
- This may get me to buy my first Final Fantasy game in years.
© 2012 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.
