My full of spoilers review of Mass Effect 3

Eugene

Back in December 2010 I hopped on board the Mass Effect train. I loved Knights of the Old Republic and I loved Dragon Age: Origins, so seeing both games up for 5 bucks each was a no brainer for me. I remember doing all nighters in order to beat the games and I can say that those purchases have not gone to waste. The Mass Effect series at that time became a favorite of mine.

Before I even begin talking about Mass Effect 3 I want to go a bit into my train of thought and how I approached the games.

I choose the female Shepard for my character, because Jennifer Hale is a goddess at voice acting. After two games, I fell in love with the character. See one of my pet peeves as a gamer is seeing a female character where her whole purpose is to be "eye candy." If I want to see boobs I can go to google and just type boobs in. However, Fem-Shepard(who I will just refer to as Shepard for the rest of this post) was not that. While yes, Mass Effect 2 had Miranda who was all cleavage and ass that was done on purpose as she was genetically modified to be "perfect." None the less, I witnessed a rarity in games, a female character who was not all sex appeal. A character who I picked not just to look at an ass all day but because I liked the voice acting. So when Mass Effect 3 came out and one of the casual options was a slinky dress I raged.

What the fuck did they do to my precious Shepard? A character who on multiple occasions stood eye to eye with a reaper and won, a character whose name causes her enemies to flee! Ok, I could deal with it, I could just choose to ignore that option. Then later there is a scene where Shepard awakes and is only wearing her undergarments, lacy undergarments... I nearly flipped my table in fury.

That is just a pet peeve of mine, now let us get to the game. Overall, I loved what they did, ignoring the whole DLC debacle, Bioware went back to the RPG elements of ME1 and combined it with the easy of customization of ME2. However that is where the RPG elements stopped for me. Don't get me wrong, the game was epic and they do a really good job of giving you the feel that the universe is in its last days. Even the scanning has the chance to bring Reapers on your tale. However there are two very important parts that I feel Bioware kind of skimped out on; The beginning and the ending.

Whenever you read a book or watch a movie the whole beginning sets up how you will feel, and the ending is very important. In Mass Effect 3 the beginning is very confusing. It counts upon you buying the ME2 DLC to get the whole story. Which is another argument all together, but anyway. I had to alt-tab out and read up on The Arrival DLC to know what was happening. A poor play on their part but I can get past it. The setting and dialogue was somewhat cheesy, but I could get past it. They were trying to set up a tone for the game, an idea of do or die, and that the reapers are these cold killing machines.

Now the middle of the game which to me was Mars-Right before taking back Earth was top-notch. Combat was fluid, the story and interactions was amazing and I was amazed how everything came together into one big story, and very little felt like side missions that many RPGS suffer from (The earth is getting torn apart, find my cat whiskers). I do have some complaints with this part of the game though.

Bioware announced early on that you will be forced to make decisions that will cause your teammates to die. I was cool with that, but then it turns out that for half the decisions its non-party character vs non-party character, or potential-party character vs someone who you won't see again. Yea, the choices there are real easy to make; who do I like more? I was expecting something akin to Mass Effect one where you would have to send a party member off to die to sacrifice themselves. Sure I could see the sacrifice but I didn't really feel the loss of a character who really wasn't there beforehand and chances are won't be there afterwards.

Which brings me to the ending:

I have been with Shepard for three games, I have made important decisions and in the end none of it mattered. I got to the end, a still kicking Shepard and I was given three options which really were:
Pick what color of beam you will see during the cutscene. There is no closure at all!

What happens now that I cured the genophage? How did my choice affect the galaxy? What happened to the Garrus/Tali romance? What about Earth? Instead I got to see a color shot from mass relay to mass relay the Normandy crash and one of three cutscenes and then credits. Which then rewarded with the number one google search image with Buzz Aldrin talking to me.

No final battle, no closure, which left me in a really bad mood when I beat the game.
Overall the game wasn't bad. It was like eating a three course meal:

The Appetizer wasn't great but it didn't need to be.
The Main meal was awesome, like a perfectly cooked steak with a side of asparagus.
The Desert was a really bitter lemon sorbet where you eat it just to get it over with because you spent good money on it.

If I had to rank the games I would say this:
Mass Effect 1>Mass Effect 3>Mass Effect 2
Not bad but not the best.

Berry Punch · Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2012 11:15 pm Post subject:

>Insert rant about how much I dispise EA here<

Vlad Piranha · Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2012 11:44 pm Post subject:

There's little argument that the ending was a farce.

The games were populated with stock characters and cliched situations, which could have been disastrous, but was done in a self-aware, Star Wars sort of way. There's nothing inherently wrong with that, as it made acclimating oneself to the game's story climate that much easier. History will show that people respond more to familiar themes in fiction than completely original material. My problem was that after making the the first and second games out to be a familiar RPG environment with character archetypes ranging from the seemingly heartless hired gun to the mystical 'magic' wielding warrior of an old warrior order, the guys who wrote the games suddenly changed directions at a critical moment, the third act of the final game. Instead of sticking to their guns and finishing the series in a way that brought closure, the writers rewarded the player with a bizarre existentialist philosophy as its ending that can only be cynically viewed as an failed attempt at trying to be clever. You simply can't take this kind of product and re-purpose it to try to be the next Isaac Asimov (who is overrated in every conceivable way).

I stand by my statements that the games really are masterpieces of the art form (the production values are sky high) but there's no excusing the flawed continuity and logic gaps in the games since storyline was the driving force behind them. The last thing a respected game series needs is a Lost series finale as it's final installment. If anyone wants to get involved in a discussion about how the ending made no logical sense when stripped of all its artsy-fartsy pretenses, I'd be more than happy to tear it down for you.

I don't think anyone at BioWare has any right to criticize George Lucas or the Star Wars prequels at this point, it would be unprincipled. Love it or hate it, Revenge of the Sith accomplished what it set out to do, which is more than Mass Effect 3 can claim.

Eugene · Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2012 9:24 am Post subject:

The writing explained:

http://i.imgur.com/7pkrW.jpg

massive · Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2012 1:41 pm Post subject:

Vlad Piranha wrote:

Isaac Asimov (who is overrated in every conceivable way).

Arthur C Clark >> Isaac Assimov on his worst day
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Vlad Piranha wrote:

I'm offended that a zombie holocaust isn't on the list. It would be terrifying, sure, but it would be pretty sweet if you think about it.

Erwin Rommel

I just finished it the game, so sorry if I'm late for the party here. I apologize for the quote-spam, but it's probably the best way for me to respond.

sleeples wrote:

Back in December 2010 I hopped on board the Mass Effect train. I loved Knights of the Old Republic and I loved Dragon Age: Origins, so seeing both games up for 5 bucks each was a no brainer for me. I remember doing all nighters in order to beat the games and I can say that those purchases have not gone to waste. The Mass Effect series at that time became a favorite of mine.

Basically the same here. I got ME1 and ME2 as part of a giant pack that I bought on Steam. I was like "Hey, I heard that these are really good Bioware games. I like Bioware games."

Quote:

I choose the female Shepard for my character, because Jennifer Hale is a goddess at voice acting. After two games, I fell in love with the character.

*Fistbump* Femsheppers unite! I love the voice acting too.

Quote:

See one of my pet peeves as a gamer is seeing a female character where her whole purpose is to be "eye candy."
*snip*
I nearly flipped my table in fury.

A lot of people would probably argue that you're overreacting to a video game. However, I'm not one of them since my reaction was along the same lines. I wouldn't say I went into a fury. I did cringe quite a bit, though.

Quote:

Whenever you read a book or watch a movie the whole beginning sets up how you will feel, and the ending is very important. In Mass Effect 3 the beginning is very confusing. It counts upon you buying the ME2 DLC to get the whole story. Which is another argument all together, but anyway. I had to alt-tab out and read up on The Arrival DLC to know what was happening. A poor play on their part but I can get past it. The setting and dialogue was somewhat cheesy, but I could get past it. They were trying to set up a tone for the game, an idea of do or die, and that the reapers are these cold killing machines

I'm a little ashamed to admit it, but I didn't even know that the beginning was expecting that DLC. I had thought that the creators just started it in media res, and did it poorly. That explains why I had so much trouble following at the beginning! Too bad I don't want to go back and get that DLC now...

Quote:

Now the middle of the game which to me was Mars-Right before taking back Earth was top-notch. Combat was fluid, the story and interactions was amazing and I was amazed how everything came together into one big story, and very little felt like side missions that many RPGS suffer from (The earth is getting torn apart, find my cat whiskers). I do have some complaints with this part of the game though.

There are a ton of whisker-finding quests available, they're just all optional. Of course, you'll want to do as many as possible since they boost your war assets and those give you the best ending. I really feel like that aspect of it detracted from the experience for me.

Quote:

Which brings me to the ending:
*snip*

I think the game designers were watching a little too much Battlestar Galactica. I thought there were just too many thematic parallels to be just accidental. And that show ended like shit too. (I thought the BSG ending was worse, myself)

It did go bizarrely existential at the end there. I've found that I have a higher tolerance for that than many do, so I was mostly okay with it. What really bugs me is the lack of closure at the end. I honestly would have been more satisfied if the reapers won and the cycles continued into the future. (Cue some alien looking at a hologram of Shepard in a distant future cycle) That has a certain beauty to it.

I was even more frustrated after reading this article about how the ending was made.

Also, this video has an interesting theory about the end. Some of the links are really tenuous, but there are some good points in there. It would be really sad if this guy is right and EA turns into a DLC. The saddest part is that I would probably buy it...

***

One of the things you didn't mention is the multiplayer and the "Galaxy at War" aspect of the game. It is absolutely absurd for the outcome of a single-player game to be dependent on the multiplayer game. I grudgingly played the multiplayer game to boost my percentage to 100%. It wasn't terrible, but I'm glad that I don't have to do that anymore. This feels like a really sneaky type of DRM to me, since you need a pass to play online.

But I really need to ask ... what happens if I want to play this game a few years from now and no one is online? I love for my games to be backwards-compatible. I have played through the Baldur's Gate series so many times, it's probably not healthy. When I look at a game like Mass Effect 3, I see all of the wonderful things that made me love previous Bioware titles. I also see the slow, incessant corruption brought on by DLC, rushed production times, and a general tendency to dumb things down.

TL;DR <3 Bioware, Fuck EA.
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Vlad Piranha · Posted: Sat Mar 17, 2012 11:52 pm Post subject:

I give BioWare alot of credit for trying something really bold. Even if it was a failed experiment, it was an experiment nonetheless and I fully expect the Mass Effect series to push the envelope for other developers for years to come. The people who are boycotting BioWare products now or canceling their Old Republic subscriptions are overreacting and missing the larger point. Even if that made any kind of difference, it would only encourage game studios to be more conventional in the future and not try to be truly original. I resent the living hell out of the Call of Duty series for being exactly that type of generic game series.

I find it surprising that people were disappointed or even offended by the lack of a final boss battle in ME3. That was refreshing and the one part of the ending I really liked. The last thing I could have ever wanted was a gun battle with the Illusive Man where, halfway through the fight, he enters a second form and you have to fight that one too. Thank God they never did that approach. Castlevania beat that device to death before games even left the 8-bit era.

In closing, I'm upset mostly because a great thing slipped away. BioWare got so close to really leaving their mark on this generation of games, but I'm convinced that ME will now be expanded, sequeled and prequeled into oblivion.

Erwin Rommel · Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2012 1:15 am Post subject:

Vlad Piranha wrote:

I'm convinced that ME will now be expanded, sequeled and prequeled into oblivion.

Yep, Oblivion sure sucked for TES series. Razz

(Sorry, couldn't resist)

I also really like that there wasn't a final boss. The Kai Leng fight was annoying enough for me.
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Eugene · Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2012 10:14 am Post subject:

I still enjoy Bioware. Hell KoTOR is one of the five games I have ever given a perfect 10/10 too. I give them respect for trying new things, I'm just a bit mad at the closure. However in retrospect it isn't Dragon Age 2. Truth is Bioware made only one bad game and it was sort of doomed to fail with being not a full game but more of a build up to the third game, this of course being DA2.

Also the plot of Gurren Laggan and ME3 is somewhat similar. Realized this a bit ago.

(Which is the synthetics the beings of order trying to take out organics who are the beings of chaos

vs

Anti-spirals the beings of order taking out and controlling spirals the beings of chaos)

Stealth · Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2012 12:31 pm Post subject:

I love Bioware. They make some amazing games and hopefully one day I'll work for them on something.
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Motherfucking Triangles! Being all three sided n' shit, who do they think they are?!

Vlad Piranha · Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 9:24 am Post subject:

I looked up the phrase "Female Commander Shepard underwear" in Google this morning to see if the cinematics were as bad as you say (Yeah, they are) and in the list of Google images, this dude popped up. It took me a second to figure out why and I started laughing my ass off.

Apparently, the guy we all know as the default male Commander Shepard is a real Dutch underwear model named Mark Vanderloo.

atatme · Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 3:24 pm Post subject:

Vlad Piranha wrote:

I looked up the phrase "Female Commander Shepard underwear" in Google this morning to see if the cinematics were as bad as you say (Yeah, they are) and in the list of Google images, this dude popped up. It took me a second to figure out why and I started laughing my ass off.

*Image removed*

Apparently, the guy we all know as the default male Commander Shepard is a real Dutch underwear model named Mark Vanderloo.

That is so hilarious I can't even breathe. I wonder if he knows how worshiped his face is?

Erwin Rommel · Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 3:51 pm Post subject:

I heard about the underwear model thing a while ago. I saw a post somewhere (I have since lost it) that listed several similar things in modern games. Game designers use faces from many places.
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