Mass Effect

mass effect 1/2 are boring as fuck as far as being a game that is fun to play

Can't speak for those games but I am finding the game part of ME3 really fun so far. The story part is good but I would've stopped playing by now if I wasn't enjoying the process of killing lots of baddies.

imagine if fallout dropped the intro cinematic and you spent the first hour going 'we live in a vault? what's a vault?' or if planescape: torment had, say, a magical library in which you could read on and on about the different planes you visited.

Fallout seems like it is meant to be ABOUT having a lack of information, though. Sorting your way through the wreckage.

I don't know Planetscape.

man the degree to which people will strain credulity to imagine that this ending is ~actually~ ~if you catch all the hints~ ~really mind-blowing~ is depressing

reminds me of message board chatter after the 2nd matrix movie came out when people were like 'no, see, the 'real world' is actually totally another matrix"

not sure what you're trying to say? i've been reading a hell of a lot about the indoctrination theories and have come to genuinely believe them, such as fact that i very much see bioware releasing epilogue dlc by next month

rumors brewing about that as well

still have to add 2cents that the ending was fucking devastating, in the worst way

i mean

i just don't buy the theories man

**spoilers**spoilers**spoilers****spoilers**spoilers**spoilers**

that a company would spend millions to put out a game with an ostensibly fake ending for the sake of ~really driving their narrative point home~ just strikes me as completely implausible, and it seems considerably more likely to me that they just wrote an ending that lots of people were unsatisfied by. i think it's a fine ending as it is! and the fact that so many are so dissatisfied by it that they're seeking evidence that it's ~not the real ending~ might say more about divergence of taste than it does about the likelihood of bioware fooling their customers. can you imagine the outrage if, after all the hubbub over DLC lately, they released the ~real ending~ as DLC?? total fucking shitstorm.

those are the least spoiler spoilers i ever saw

this game's ending is the ending to a game, hot diggity

Ha I mean better safe

i mean

i just don't buy the theories man

**spoilers**spoilers**spoilers****spoilers**spoilers**spoilers**

that a company would spend millions to put out a game with an ostensibly fake ending for the sake of ~really driving their narrative point home~ just strikes me as completely implausible, and it seems considerably more likely to me that they just wrote an ending that lots of people were unsatisfied by. i think it's a fine ending as it is! and the fact that so many are so dissatisfied by it that they're seeking evidence that it's ~not the real ending~ might say more about divergence of taste than it does about the likelihood of bioware fooling their customers. can you imagine the outrage if, after all the hubbub over DLC lately, they released the ~real ending~ as DLC?? total fucking shitstorm.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Friday, 16 March 2012 04:28 (Yesterday) Permalink

All this I agree with, but it's not an alternative ending I think possible, it's an epilogue - a follow-through, or at least some sort of "reality check" sans the fringe supernatural shit that occurred near the end. I think the largest factor of my convincing was the fact that, towards the end, the Illusive Man's "path" was lighted as blue and destroying the reapers red - driving home sense that the reapers were tricking you, the player, into thinking you were making some sort of right decision by following this color-code that has dictated how much of the series plays out.

I could never imagine Bioware apologizing and issuing forth an alternative re-written ending - it would set the possibility that gamers could do this in the future: Bitch enough and things will change. Plus, rewriting or remaking one's own "artistic vision" at the request of unhappy customers is just not something I could see Bioware do...that's just not something people will do. When the lot of BSN posters have tossed their hands up following the wake of the Final Hours "documentary" and in regards of Hudson & Co. clearly stating this is the ending they wanted to see happen and thus disowning all indoctrination theories, I think their missing the point that these theories are integral to how the ending played out in the first place. I'll scrounge up some more evidence if you're not convinced, but numerous twitter feeds from staff have hinted to an announcement in the ready that they only want to be made when they feel a proper amount of people have actually finished ME3 (as if the spoilers were unavoidable in this mass internet tirade: My game was spoiled, on accident, long before I finished it).

Also, DLC promotes purchases of original copies and thus I see DLC being likely - the merger with EA kinda posits the acquisition of a franchise as big as this as a step toward combating the likes of GameStop and other retailers that reap 100% of used-purchase profits. You can still buy a complete game used - but if you want the "full experience" do you have to buy an original copy. It's bullshit, I know, but I really think this is an opportunity EA couldn't bear to pass up - it's not often that DLC is regarded as "essential".

- it's not often that DLC is regarded as "essential".

― kelpolaris, Saturday, March 17, 2012 4:20 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i'm just saying that the very idea of DLC as essential is both problematic as to the nature of the game released

well no other half of that "nature of the game" come to think

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=zRRpGlmtws8

wait

http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=zRRpGlmtws8

okay here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRRpGlmtws8

I have been playing a bunch of the multiplayer and it's pretty enjoyable. I happen to prefer co-op multiplayer vs. computer opponents over getting shot in the face over and over again by 12-year olds so there's that.

i want to know if ur allowed to roleplay a homophobe

lol

this kid should be shot. what a fucking crybaby.

http://kotaku.com/5894278/mass-effect-3-fan-complains-to-the-feds-over-the-games-ending

it's pathetic, but i'm rather glad there are people willing to go to such lengths. it kinda channels my rage for how much i absolutely hate casey hudson/marc walters since fucking with the minds of so many loyal and devoted fans. mass effect 3 was the first game i've pre-ordered since....shit, i think it was doom 3 in 2004.

and now i make them both sound like royal geniuses, for having the ability to exhibit so much control. what i meant to say is that they're both cunts who committed reputation suicide for thinking such a shit ending was a great idea.

it's been a week since i beat the game - i'm just a little pizzed that it has no incentive for replayability. the first couple games i gave a good 2 runs a piece. too fun, being able to see all the outcomes of your actions.

but i'm rather glad there are people willing to go to such lengths.

they should expend that kind of energy for something other than a goddamn video game. it's really first-world problem bullshit.

picked up ME3 this weekend, really annoying how i have to sit through "Checking Downloadable Content...", "Checking Save...", "Checking Downloadable Content..." before i can load my game. this is even after i disabled automatically logging into EA servers

but i'm rather glad there are people willing to go to such lengths.

they should expend that kind of energy for something other than a goddamn video game. it's really first-world problem bullshit.

― Conmetheus (latebloomer), Sunday, March 18, 2012 9:25 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I know. I'd want to slap the dude as a reality check if I ever knew him and he proposed such a plan. But videogames cost a lot, they required a lot of time investments - it's hard not to find yourself attached to it more so than any other project in another medium you've been disappointed by. You don't have to spend 30hrs with each Matrix sequel. You don't have to die, repeat, die, repeat a dozen times with the latest Radiohead groaner. I think it's absolutely silly to invest so much of your life in a fantasy world that you're willing to forward into legal action in order to maintain some sense of symbiosis with how much you care for this world and how much and where you ultimately want to see it proceed, BUT the investments nonetheless have been made on a $60/person admission fee and by the large majority of anyone who considers themselves a "gamer". I like the guy in that article for reason that I like somebody willing to risk dejection in order to throw a tomato at at deceitful politician - it sorta shows there's a more than vocal number of people who are don't want to take it up the ass any longer and simply content themselves with the fact that you've provided something for them to do.

But at the same time I can't believe I've typed such lengths to defend such a whiney little loser. The whole scenario, for me, has just been like watching a movie I've paid for - say, a police thriller - and having those "auteurs" at the helm blast Earth with comets, killing the whole cast in an ultimate attempt for commentary that nothing matters in the end. Fuck the Bioware writers.

/angrynerd

i'm officially done attacking this game. it's a waste of time.

instead i'll let this dude do it for me
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6M0Cf864P7E#!

annoying narration, but the guy is up there in redlettermedia-esque terms into truly delving into what's beyond nerd-raging and why this is just juevenile stuff bioware writers decided would be "memorable"

that video, man

<I>You don't have to spend 30hrs with each Matrix sequel. You don't have to die, repeat, die, repeat a dozen times with the latest Radiohead groaner. </I>

Right, but the gameplay is not actually affected by the story.* If you are enjoying the shooting and magic enough to get through 30 hours, that's the game you paid for. If you're not getting enough out of the gameplay but are still interested in the story - dude that's what the Easy mode is there for.

* I haven't played the game yet, but I'm assuming that the twist isn't that you have to play through the entire game again at half speed.

does this game have the most noticable metacritic disparity ever? (91/3.7)

I haven't beat this yet, but I can't wait to see the ending. Especially since it pissed so many annoying gamers off.

i haven't actually played any of these games but i think what's pissing people off isn't a disappointing ending to the story but that a lot of big but specific promises were unfulfilled re: how much the different things players did over the course of three games would affect or even be involved in the ending. which is a sore spot because BRANCHING PLOTLINES! MORAL CHOICE! is something games have been promising fitfully at least since the beginning of the CD-ROM era; and hardly anybody gets it right, because doing only a little branching looks like a gimmick and doing a lot of branching is hard to implement. but i know from the advertising/coverage for this series that part of its brand is its ambition when it comes to player choice, character customization-by-playing, emotional connection, the impression of a unique experience, etc. -- it's hyped often enough that it's practically a technical boast, like when a game like CRYSIS makes a big deal about its graphics. plus it has this thing where your character from the first game can be carried all the way to the third, i guess, which is cool because it feels both high-tech and like a throwback to the portable-character feature in old ultima games ("journey onward"). anyway the strength of the plot, not just as a plot but as a magic recombining toy, is a big part of what the game is selling.

i watched that video: holy wow that guy's a redlettermedia fan, and also seems to think this deception is a capital crime -- plus some of the complaints are like THE PROTAGONIST WOULD NEVER DO THAT, which may of course be true but which only really add up to "this video game wasn't written as satisfactorily as we'd hoped", which is what these complaints probably all look like from the outside -- but it looks from the video like there really is a borderline-insulting lack of correspondence between the array of stuff people could do throughout three games and the stuff that happened to them at the end, after the designers spent all this time telling people there was going to be a big technical achievement in exactly this department. also apparently -- and this is either programming of a radiantly insulting sloppiness, or hilarious -- sometimes the game blithely announces your much-developed love interest is fucking another guy.

suing them is still pretty absurd i guess. they should have sued peter molyneaux over his long criminal career.

Different people live and die and entire species may be eradicated based in your decisions. So what if the ending isn't divergent enough, it's more about the value of all the hours I've put into it leading up to it.

Of course I haven't beat it yet. So maybe I'll be pissed off and make my own angry video.

Had such an epic game of multiplayer last night. Beat the reapers on Silver, full extraction. Whee.

Note that the metacritic disparity is due to a combo of people hating the ending and people hating THE GAY or somesuch

i'm enjoying some of the SRSLY EPIC missions in ME3

*spoiler* like in the genophage cure mission, the part where the mother thresher maw takes down the reaper was so bad ass *spoiler*

is there anywhere that concisely and clearly summarizes the ME3 ending controversy?

Recommend the video posted above by kelpolaris.

Its still a good game for those who've played the first two installments as gameplay is fine and it ties up a lot of loose ends. But you can quit after the foot race to the London conduit at the end, the finale does ruin a bunch of themes of the trilogy.

huh tried watching some of that but i need something with more context, i've never played any of these games.

https://twitter.com/#!/DamonLindelof/status/182263625082355712

Also (avert your eyes, spoiler averse!):

http://i1001.photobucket.com/albums/af134/gnosblax/yodawgme.jpg

It is pretty hard to not be spoiled by that huge image, I'm just saying.

http://i1001.photobucket.com/albums/af134/gnosblax/yodawgme.jpg

It is pretty hard to not be spoiled by that huge image, I'm just saying.

not really a spoiler if you at least played just half of ME1

http://pastebin.com/i2cNVDp4

not really a spoiler if you at least played just half of ME1

when you say spoilers below I don't check to see what it is if I am worried about spoilers, generally speaking.

Digging multiplayer.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/03/19/whats-right-with-mass-effect-3s-ending/#more-99917

I die a lot on multiplayer and jerk faces don't revive me.

I think if you play on silver then people are more likely to understand that they will die if you die. On bronze people have zero incentive to save you because they just might finish the level with or without you.