It was a powerful moment. the whole time you act as the father/mother and overall leader (aka shepherd) for so many people. Yet who was there to guide and protect you? Who was there to shepherd Shepard? Who could take the weight of the galaxy off his shoulders, if for a moment? It was Anderson all along, and it was great to see their relationship.
Keith David is the only one that could have made Anderson Anderson. His voice is drips with character. He's up there with Kevin Conroy that voiced Batman and Mark Hamill that voiced the Joker. If they ever do a time travel thing with Mass Effect and need him and he isn't available, they'll have trouble finding someone capable to carry it off.
My problem is that they didn't give each ending a proper epilogue. The choices I made still felt important, but I wanted to know what happened in the immediate aftermath.
I would have been much more forgiving on the ending as well if they had just fleshed out each choice a bit more but it seemed like they tried to make it so that there was room for a 4th game and left the ending of 3 feeling hollow.
I just wanted an ending where you flat out could win, if you did enough leg work, and the final shot was of you and Garrus sipping drinks on the beach with dead reaper hulls sticking out of the water out in the distance.
@@clydemarshall8095 i think the final mission in me2 makes a lot of people feel like that. the fact that if you put in the work in the form of farming the mats to upgrade the ship and do the loyalty missions you get rewarded with a good ending( ie. everyone gets out alive) is extremly satisfying
@@craserx6267 I don’t know, I feel like the overarching theme in this game is achievement through perseverance and sacrifice. Hell, Garrus even says that Turians know what’s at stake and humans just want to save everyone, but it won’t be possible in this war. The endings definitely feel hollow with just Admiral Hackett giving a slideshow. But I think the destroy ending makes perfect sense in hindsight, more so if you’ve maxed out the war assets. ME3 wasn’t about you winning with overwhelming odds against simply because everyone joined together. It was the desperate need to survive at any costs. The Protheans were far more advanced and spanned larger than the current cycle and they still lost. That means something to me. I think the difference between the suicide mission in 2 and the final battle in 3 are simply the change in scale. In 2 it is very unlikely you’ll win but if you can play your cards right maybe things will work out. In 3 there is no chance to win. It’s a Hail Mary of plans. One final act of desperation and defiance. And I think 3 perfectly captures that. Sorry for the rant. And it totally would be cool if we saw Garrus and Shepard drinking beer on the beach.
@@RagingRavioli22 I guess you are right. All i know is that 10 years later the me3 ending is still famous for being really bad. And 10 years in gaming is a lot of time.
Yeah, the final ending in ME3 wasn't great. But what realy makes the game for me are the in-game endings (or rather payoffs) to all the great previous story threads in the series. The development of your companions and the resolutions of the genophage & Geth questions! To me, those are the real selling points of the game. Also, "citadel" is my favourite piece of DLC of any game
Exactly what you said is why I’m fine with the endings to the game. Everything else gets wrapped up with all the other characters. That pretty much is the ending
I played thru the games recently with the hd remaster but I don’t know if I did the citadel dlc. Was going to start a new character playthru and would like to make sure to do all the content this time. I wish there was more time in the day lol
I wasn't fine with the endings. My Shepard believes deeply in free will, but no matter what choice you makes on the Citadel it takes the free will from either many beings or all beings and that's BS. I didn't bust my ass off creating peace between the Geth and the Quarians just to commit genocide, or the horror show of forcing all biological life to become partially synthetic which left me with control as the only option...which is not a happy ending for Shepard by any stretch of the imagination and frankly he earned a small amount of happiness after everything he did for the galaxy. I mean is his consciousness forever locked into a reaper platform never to know love or life again...for eternity? No, I'll just stick with Audemus' Happy Ending Mod and pretend it's cannon.
ME1 was one of my favorites back in its day. I played through at least once for every character class. In 2008, I became so sick that I almost died. Lying in an ICU, I thought "If I die, I'll never find out how Mass Effect ends." Imagine my disappointment.
@@eugeneferguson5987 And the ending of Arrival has you kill over 300000 Batarians to prevent the Reapers from arriving through their personal back door by literally slamming an asteroid into a Mass Relay, what's your point?
It was a good ending, although it was a sad ending. Wish it could have ended some other way and more, I wish it is resurrected in some way for Mass Effect 4. Andromeda was rubbish. And, oh yea, I hope you are well now and that you can wait in anticipation for the next real instalment of Mass Effect....
I do think Mass Effect 3 deserves more credit than it gets and I do think they had way too much on their plate to deal with. Couple that with growing pressure from EA and the original ending getting leaked and they really had everything working against them. However, while I don't necessarily blame Bioware, bad writing is bad writing. It is my favorite of the three though. The combat, especially the multiplayer, still holds up to this day and while not as dynamic as Andromeda, I do find it way more satisfying.
@@seal2560 It was essentially that the reapers were harvesting organic life to slow the spread of dark energy, which was the byproduct of eezo. It was hinted at a few times in 2, like with Tali's recruitment mission, and even had a couple mentions in 3 as well.
@@clintbeastwood5116 But was it really the intended ending and did it really leak? Because what I've read is that they just didn't know how to end it (the writer who came up with the dark energy stuff had left) so they had to come up with something new regardless.
Yeah... no. If I can play as the greatest hero who saves the Rachni, saves all the colonists on Feros, saves the Salarian STG team on Virmire, saves the Council, continues to play as the ultimate Paragon through all the missions (saving/sparing others like Niket, Maleon, Aresh, David Archer etc), bringing my entire squad home from the Suicide Mission, denying Cerberus the base, curing the genophage, saving the Rachni (again), and bringing peace to the Geth and Quarians, or play as the ultimate Renegade, killing the Rachni, indiscriminately killing Feros colonists, abandoning the STG team, killing the Council, killing/sacrificing the aforementioned others, sacrificing squad members, giving Cerberus the base, betraying the Krogan to the genophage, killing the Rachni (again) and committing genocide against either the Geth or Quarians - and get the exact same red, blue or green endings and explanations - then no, ultimately none of those choices mattered.
Which is why I can't bring myself to finish me3. That's after pre-ordering it, playing through the entire game with 100% campaign completetion in 36 hours with 8 hours of sleep. I blitzed it. And all I get is an ending full of plot holes the ignore everything else.
The "You did good son (kid), you did good. I'm. Proud of you" scene from Anderson has to be the saddest moment in the trilogy for me. I have played these games multiple times and did 4 complete playthroughs just last year after the remastered trilogy came out and it still make me water up so hard every time!!!! May as well have Forest Gump telling Jenny's grave how proud he is of Forest Jr.!!!!
For me it was talking to garrus, romanced tali, wrex, and kaiden on earth. It basically sank in I was gonna die and this was the last time my shepard would see his best friends
If they had just ended with that, the Crucible docking and the Reapers being defeated (or not if your War Assets we too low), I could've been okay with the ending. Idk what they have planned with ME4, and after Andromeda, I'm not sure I care.
@@Deafwing There were some speculations going on about a different ending structure altogether, based on your EMS (Effective Military Strength / War Asset) rating, where certain choices were locked out if you didn't have a high enough score. A fifth, secret ending would open up if the player had a perfect playthough (a really high EMS rating)
I think it was nice that bioware chose Vancouver Canada to start the game since it's the hometown of the mass effect bioware team. It just shows how personal this game was to them. They put a lot of heart into this.
@@rayclay3249 No, they get a feed from London showing it being attacked in the chamber with the admirals at the beginning, and then the Reapers show up and start destroying Vancouver.
My biggest issues with ME3 were the ending, Kai Leng in general, and the bit with the Rachni queen. Which culminated with plus or minus a couple hundred points. Yay? I think what would have been amazing is all the forces you saved along the journey in all three games joined you in the final battle. How amazing would it be if there were Rachni and Geth and the Quarians all fought side by side because of YOUR efforts! Kai Leng meant nothing to people who never read the book. Maybe if he had been around in Mass Effect 2 and he was helping you out or was even a companion. But he just appears from nowhere and he's essentially the final boss of all three games. Kai Leng was a slap in the face.
The Rachni should have been Sovereigns ticking clock. The vanguard wakes up when the galaxy has reached the point of killing the most powerful organic species the reapers had faced. The Queens couldn’t be indoctrinated. Javik knew of them from his cycle and rachni communication means theoretically a hibernating reaper could have been responded to their deaths subconsciously. Basically, the rachni war is a repeating thing the reapers use to force some form of galactic unity/accelerate the cycles. That is why they can and do make the fake queen so easily. They need to prepare Rachni for the next cycle. If you saved the queen in Noveria. Her forces should appear looking for the new queen. If you spoke to her again through the Asari in Mass Effect 2. The rachni soldiers don’t attack you and you can recruit the fake queen as a war asset that doesn’t betray you, because the true queen is there to shut her up. The amount of soliders the true queen has also gets affect by talking to her asari ally in ME2. Since if the asari recognises Shepard. She can ask for help and Shepard gets the Krogan and Rachni soldiers to work together. If this doesn’t happen, the rachni queen goes from 100 war assets to 60
I'm pretty sure the main reason why the endings overshadowed everything else is because pre release Casey Hudson said the endings will account for player choices, they won't be just A, B or C... but that's exactly what we got. The expectations didn't came out of nowhere, Bioware hyped it time and again. At release there wasn't even an epilogue and the one added by Extended Cut left a lot to be desired. It is impressive that they managed to assemble this game in just 22 months. If EA wasn't EA and gave them one more year, it would've been heralded as one of the greatest instead of one that dissapointed everyone.
I don't know it makes sense to me if they could do shit like they did in ME2. They had so much money and power they are kind of like the shadow broker on steriods. It makes sense to me that they were able to amass so much power when they didn't care about ethics at all they can make a lot of money when they'll do anything for power.
I remember going back to 2 and talking to EDI after being unshackled and she said Cerberus is at that moment including Shepard and the Normandy crew in its entirety, made up of I think it was 136 individuals. Than 6 months later and you’re killing minimum 136 Cerberus agents every time you have a damn mission? I’m not even against the low number it’s just the absurdity of that number swell that always gets me. My headcanon is that the Cerberus ground forces were already being produced and used, but the 136 number is only indicative of key personal and researches ala every names Cerberus character you meet, I can see them not counting the ground troops especially with how modified and indoctrinated they are, it’d be very Cerberus move to not even acknowledge them in the grander scheme of who’s who. They tools for those 136 individuals to use
@@TheScientificBackpacIt’s been too long since I’ve last played ME2 (currently running through the trilogy again via LE, and am in the middle of ME1). But I could’ve sworn that EDI mentioned there being an unknown number of Cerberus cells she doesn’t have the information on. This was done intentionally in the event that if one of the cells gets burned, the rest won’t be compromised as a result. If this is the case, and Bioware really wanted to stretch the suspension of disbelief, then I suppose you could theorize that the Illusive Man (assumedly being the only one with an overview of all operations) was already going forward with rapid expansion/militarization during and following the two years it took to complete Project Lazarus. This in and of itself I guess wouldn’t be too big of a leap, given the scope of other known Cerberus research endeavors like Project Overlord. But I also seem to remember Miranda mentioning that Cerberus had sunk a huge amount of their resources into resurrecting Shepard/reconstructing the Normandy. Ultimately, I think it’s a bit far-fetched that TIM was able to create as large of a military force as he had in ME3 given the circumstances. Especially if he really didn’t start until after Shepard finished offing the Collectors, which would have only given him like half a year. That’s not to mention how he was able to keep all of those people/resources under the Alliance’s notice leading up to the Reaper attack. Ultimately probably just Bioware needing to pad out the enemy variety in ME3’s combat beyond the indoctrinated reaper foot-soldiers. Kai Leng alone points to that mindset pretty strongly.
Imagine if they had another year or even 2 to develop ME3... it would have been such a triumphant achievement. All the choices that got biffed or character replacements that felt wrong could have been righted. The ending could have been something else entirely that would have pleased a lot more people, I think.
Two years wouldn't have suddenly made the ending any better unless they had a different writing team. The length of the ending is irrelevant to the quality. It was like five minutes long, they could have done a lot more in the time they had than what we got.
@@tournesol99 they got pushed into the ending due to time constraints. The colors were placeholders by the writing team and not meant to be a part of the end, but the people at the top that wanted a game yesterday said to run with it. Not to mention the fact that every ending looks the same... More time could have allowed that to not be like that.
@@devynn7x Agree with you there. But the writing behind those choices and the way it unfolds in game could have been a heck of a lot better. Time constraints pushed them to make a short ending, but the quality of that ending falls on the writing team. More time doesn't automatically make writing better. It just lets you write more.
@@tournesol99 They only had time constraints because BioWare, and especially their Mass Effect teams, are lousy. Good developers, sure. But the leading of those teams royally suck. Them and their idiotic "BioWare magic". The impression one gets throughout the years is that they leave the developers roaming free for way too long and are then surprised when they don't have enough good results. Things that just shouldn't happen at such a company, but... The fact that their writers for the endings (it was written by Casey Hudson and Mac Walters, if I remember correctly) suck certainly didn't help. I remember reading an article where it was obvious that two people only wrote the ending - the rest of the writing team didn't get any input. That's certainly not how you write a good ending.
The primary complaint many people had with ME3 was that Bioware said that the ending would be completely determined by your choices. Instead we had to choose Red/Blue/Green explosion, which is exactly what they said wouldn't happen. So it's more a case of under delivering on promises rather than the endings being bad.
it would have been better to not have a final choice. just let the cruicible always destroy the reapers, just that whether or not you can execute it, and the outcome of it all depends on your choices in the game. like maybe you NEED the rachnii in order to do something, or without the geth then EDI needs to sacrifice herself to fire off the cruicible. things like that, rather than the player choosing red green blue which are artificial, meaningless choices.
The problem with the ending isn't that it didn't branch enough. The problem is that the structure of the ending is broken. At the end of the game, Shepard's choices are made. There should be no more choices. Instead, they shoehorn a choice into the ending by introducing a new character, main antagonist, and an incompatible central conflict in the final 15 minutes. This is not good story telling.
"You did good son, you did good. I'm proud of you." - a quote every son should here from his father. Combined with this music... man the Anderson scene hit every time!
I don't care when you play this game, you're going to cry. There will be tears. You can't help it. I have played this game since September endlessly. I think it has helped me mentally deal with my mother's illness and residence at a healthcare facility. This game tests one's morality. We'll all say that we won't do so and so. But when this game puts you to the test, you find out what you will and will not tolerate. There is one thing that I can't bring myself to do. it is kill off Kaidan on Virmire. I can't do it. It just doesn't feel right. There should have been a way to save both or just had one in the first place.
The biggest issue with ME3 that I had was that all of the advertising used the phrase "Take Back the Earth" or something like that. It created an expectation that we were going to kick the reapers out through a big military campaign, but we just ended up sneaking in to press an "I win" button.
When they were first out I played them through dozens of times. Probably the most I have played any non love service game. I have just finished a full back to back insanity play through and I am blown away how much they still stand out.
I haven’t played any of them in 10 years Just finished the remasters the other day, most of 1 and all of 2 and 3 (I couldn’t stand 1s gameplay, it’s way too dated and I actually never played it before. Fantastic story, but like KOTOR I can’t play those games again, gaming has just jumped so far ahead to where it wasn’t enjoyable to play anymore) and I couldn’t believe how much of an influence this series had on my most formative years. In that time since I’ve played them, I’ve been in management, and realized that my main approach to it (building personal connections with employees and genuinely caring about them as people to bolster morale) was exactly how I played Paragon Shepard. I owe so much to this universe and it didn’t take til literally a few days ago for me to realize it. Now that I finished it, that shit hit hard. Now I got nothing to play, nothings gonna hit the same for a while. Yeah, 3s ending is kind of crappy, but it’s still my favorite to play. The tone was nailed perfectly, the gameplay is the best of the trilogy, and there’s so many quality of life improvements that it’s one I can easily play again, and again, and again without burnout.
Ive always said this! Best game I've ever played if you take out the last 15 min. But now PC can enjoy the happy ending mod and feel even better about the ending.
idk what you guys call happy ending but the way the game was made to end imo and the best ending is when you make bio and mech live together and become one, that's like the answer to stopping the cycle, the synths would stop human nature to self destruct. And it feels stupid to kill Edi or the geth seeing how much they helped. Actually Geth > Tali and her people, they are the victims and their only fault was becoming self aware like other living creatures. Sheppard dying is what heroes usually do, most people are just dumb and wish their character lived, I assume most of them being console casual gamers.
Look up the happy ending mod. But no I wholeheartedly disagree with you synthesizing ending is a cop out. You have played 3 games where shepherd's only goal was to destroy the reapers he/she wouldn't waver.
@@deathjunky "he/she wouldn't waver" The player is Shepard, the players gets to decide, tbh I always loved the two favorite endings Femshep Renegade Destruction which makes shepard have tunnel vision to destroy the Reapers even if he/she has to sacrifice friendships along the way. And Paragon shepard control which turns him into a moral compass for the universe.
@@deathjunky I would counter that Shepard's experiences with Legion (and the Geth consciousness) and EDI would make her reconsider her goal to destroy the Reapers if it meant the destruction of all synthetic life in the galaxy. I don't think my Shepard could make that sacrifice. If synthesis ended the cycle and stopped the Reapers from destroying advanced organic life, that would be preferable to sacrificing synthetic life for the sake of organic.
Edi isn't technically synthetic she could be backed up and put in another body. Catalyst says shep will die because of all the implants, doesn't make sense its not a reaper. Its just metal devices by that logic all ships, citadel included should be obliterated their "synthetic" going by the games logic. Yet Shep only breathes at the end after the destroy end. So if Shep's alive the quarians should be too. Its just a suit. Crucible was built before quarians had the suits so it shouldn't even target it. Sighhh, its why we all dislike 3s end.
@@Dreadwing1000 You can also get the CEM (Citadel Ending Mod) in tandem with AHEM to get the true happy ending experience, as like Big Dan, I too think the Citadel DLC is the true happy ending to the trilogy
Things ive learned from playing other rpgs which have a similar premise of "your choices matter" is it's extremely difficult to incorporate all these different outcomes while also trying to tell a story a certain way, a compromise is usually sought where they can have the story play out with some of the choices you made present. I feel this is what Bioware went into, they put telling a story over choices, they wanted the story to play out a certain way regardless of the choices made, it's hard to have impactful choices without it messing up the story to a point that it might not be satisfying, or make any sense. So we ended up getting those endings, which ultimately led to players feeling like their choices mattered little.
True and when they were making mass effect 3 bioware wrote themselves into a corner and they had about a year and a half to make the game which is less time the original games had.
Come on man.. they managed to wrap up the genophage, quarian and geth conflict, the citadel conflict with the virmire survivor with incredible outcomes and varied choices.. They could have wrapped up the same way.. The main problem is that you all start the same (an alliance soldier), and gain the control and synthesis options without earning it.. You should have been able to side with cerberus to gain the control ending or side with the reapers and gain the synthesis ending..
i don't disagree but given that the ending was apparently written around late 2011, i feel that Bioware pinned themselves at a wall by writing the ending during the final months of development. They should have focused on writing the ending during the game's early phase of development because they had a near perfect blueprint in the form of ME2's Suicide Mission. while it is difficult to incorporate all these different outcomes but if they followed the blueprint of ME2's Suicide Mission, then they could have achieved a near perfect ending where Shepard destroy the Reapers but there are a variety of outcomes (based from the mission tasks and EMS points overall).
@@Johnny-ux7yi Pretty much what I expected from the ending. Instead, Casey Hudson thought having a fan-boner over Deus Ex was a good idea and copy-pasta the ending was the only solution (BTW, it's the ORIGINAL Deus Ex game from 2000 he plagiarized. Look at the endings for that game and you'll know what I mean.)
The problem with the ending is that they gave us a choice. There is only one ending, destroy. Bioware thought that the players wouldn't be happy with no choices so they gave us control and synthesis. Synthesis doesn't make sense, it is just there as a feel good ending. Control is the ending of indoctrination as represented by the Illusive Man. The whole trilogy we are trying to protect organic life and only one ending does that. Also throughout the entire game we are told we can't save everyone. We have to sacrifice EDI to save all organic life and that is something she told us that she was willing to do. And one more thing, the star child is our enemy and may have lied to us. Shepard doesn't die if you have enough war assets and that could be the child lying to us or him being wrong but either way we may not have doomed all synthetic life with the destroy ending. We don't know how long we'll be able to control the reapers for in the control ending. We may just be lulling everyone into submission. And synthesis isn't an ending because nothing is explained except "Nobody dies" which goes against the entire trilogy's theme of sacrifice.
Well, the latest poster for ME4 implies Geth are involved. I think that they will canonize the destroy ending, and somehow allow EDI and the Geth to continue.
All these years later and we still talking about it, this by itself shows how much we cared about this series. To say it simple we are dissapointment not because "choices don't matter" but because we were sold two games on the pitch that "its all your choices" I'm not mad that there are not more choices, i am mad that i ordered choices with action, not action with choices.
I think it's worth mentioning the Big Unexplained Implausibles. First, there was literally no reason for the Reapers not to follow their invasion plan laid out by Vigil in ME1. The Citadel should have been taken, the Relay system taken over and the worlds isolated. Two, there was literally no plausible reason that Cerberus could build such a vast and powerful army underneath every nose of every powerful society in the known galaxy.
For me the best part of this game was the side stories. Like the Asari who killed Joker's sister, or the girl waiting for her parents in the refugee area on the Citadel being comforted by the Turian C-Sec officer.
My absolute favorite meme about the ending was the picture of Casey Hudson talking about how all the endings would be unique, and then the other picture of him was him holding the pick a number and color origami game. An absolute masterpiece of a game right up until the last 20 minutes. Have never seen a game take a nose dive quite like it since.
I agree on a lot of points, but there are some assertions being made I'm not sure I agree with in this video. Rather than go point by point, I'll just say this... I'm certain if Bioware made victory possible via conventional warfare (if you played the game perfectly), we wouldn't hear from half of the people who hate the ending; it would have had its detractors for sure, but it wouldn't have blown up like it did. And it would have made sense for Bioware to go that route and only added to Shepard's legacy as being this "uniting figure" that the Reapers never calculated or accounted for in any other cycle - the one guy who actually could unite the galaxy as a giant single collaborative force. I understand the arguments against this and what and how powerful the Reapers were suppose to be, but this just feels like a giant missed opportunity to me and for what? The devs to defend their star child endings and label it "art"? That's what really irritates me. Shepard could have literally united no one, happened to get aboard the star child ship, and we'd still have the same endings we have. It disminished everything Shepard (and the player) did. I'm still emotional about this 10+ years later lol
I felt the same. WTF was with the whining about the multiplayer? Sure they messed up in the beginning, making it mandatory, but then later they fixed it to being optional. But Dan is whining about having to do everything correctly to get the best ending? Seriously? That's kind of the fookin point of a game, right? Do everything correctly, and you get the best ending. I am sick to death of hearing people whine about multiplayer, and having to do everything a specific way to get the best ending. It's kind of the point of games. ME:OT is meant to be played different ways, and experience very different cut scenes as a result.
Was It so hard to make the Catalyst be a goddamn Death Star like It was implied to be since the start of the game and like any other space opera to begin with? Seriosly, they could have insisted in being unique in so many other aspects of this game, but no, they had to complicate the only concept that should be as simple as PRESSING A BUTTON.
Honestly, they could have gone for an ending where no matter what you do the Reapers win and the cycle continues. Even *that* level of piss-in-your-face would not have been as bad as what they did
I remember in the days leading up to the release of Mass Effect 3 (I only was introduced to the series about a year prior to its release, and had pretty much played nothing but ME and ME2 during that year, over and over), I was thinking that they better not introduce some kind of deus ex machina to solve the Reaper problem. Which is, of course, what they did with the Crucible and the Star Child. So that was extremely disappointing. Normally I'd also be wary of choices being relegated to a mathematical formula, like War Assets, but I'm okay with that here because the sheer number of choices makes anything else unwieldy. But as you said, I would have been much happier with an ending that used the combined might of all the races, or at least all those you recruited, to defeat the Reapers conventionally. Or at least some component that was like that.
@@dereka5017 Thumbs up. My experience was the same as yours. Bought ME2 about a year before ME3 came out. Played 3 times. Then I decided I wanted to change things, so I looked at the comic that allows you to do that, but then saw that ME1 wasn't much more expensive. So I downloaded that, and then went looking for a physical copy of ME3. Went to the closest Best Buy, but they were out, so an associate looked in their database, and found that only one was left in all of Jacksonville, so he called that store for me, and had them put it behind the counter at Customer Service. I drove straight there and bought it. I had the N7 patch sewn onto a high quality black hat sold by a local uniform shop. I still have that hat, though it's seen better days, lol.
the whole 'choices dont matter' isnt about the scenes in the first two acts, those are well crafted, and entirely about the fact that the third act (point of no return onward) effectively ignores not just the previous two games, but 3/4 of THIS game save for an arbitrary number, and has a stupidly abrupt ending thats just "kaboom, its over". the extended cut fixed a lot of the abruptness, but it didn't fix the third act feeling hollow and samey nomatter how you play the games. the worst part? fans actually FIXED this problem in it's entirety with mods. and guess what said mods do? add cameos to the battle of earth. im not joking. thats it. thats all it needed. the final arc acknowledging a few key moments by swapping out a few npcs, little bit of comm chatter here, little bit of background action there, tinkering with a few space-battle animations playing in the background of the final room, or dropping in a few geth to fight extra enemies that were added solely for the geth have something to shoot at. its not perfect, but thats because its being hacked together by people who arent exactly programmers or voice actors (and the fact that there's no clean way to replace Kai Lang with someone who isnt a joke), but its still a damn sight better than what bioware gave us.
I enjoyed Mass Effect 3 the most in my most recent legendary edition play through. I still hated the ending and had other issues with the story, but i chose to make the Citadel my ending and it worked for me. I still think the final act with Thessia was the weak link. Priority Earth was still absolutely awful with very weak level design. I hated the forced slow walk ending. Forced slow walk sections are probably sections of games I hate most. Thankfully I can appreciate Mass Effect 3 more for what it does right than what it does wrong. Mass Effect 2 is still my favorite.
1 had god awful combat and PLENTY of glitches... but after replaying the 360 version through again recently... I fucking hate 2. Attrocious UI, hollow and meaningless character arcs, god awful customization and weapon options, FUCKING AMMO BEING FORCED INTO THE GAME WITH NERFED LEVELING AND A RUINED INFILTRATOR CLASS, boring as FUCK linear levels with an awful final boss and forced race to the finish at a random arbitrary point that doesnt allow you to get to know legion without saving side missions for the epilogue, with major elements of the story ripped out and turned into DLC because fuck EA... major step down from 1 as an RPG turning the game into an action 3rd person shooter with paltry excuses for RPG elements.... 3 had buttery smooth and satisfying (if rather repetitive) combat with improved leveling chimera'd from the best parts of 1 and 2. Plenty of writing complaints because EA Bioware... but the game gets far too much hate.
Personally i wouldn't mind fewer romances in entire trilogy, but each one of them with more screen time. They made too much options in me2, and then only add extra in me3 (diana allers wtf..) For player who plays once or even 3-4, 10 extra romances with some plain characters (jacob for example) don't matter.
Miranda and Jack should've made the cut in ME3. It was hugely disappointing that we couldn't spend more time with these awesome characters, and their romance suffered as a result.
Well, I kind of liked having tons of options - sure some characters were bland (Kaidan and Ashley IMHO - especially Kaidan!) and annoying (Jacob, not to mention that he's a cheater! Damned, you were with Shep, no knocking up some scientists and then come crying for help...should have been able to punch him really hard! Just like we should have been able to tell everybody, repeatedly: I TOLD YOU SO! - From the annoying Turian Councillor, to the lying Asari (who kept a beacon for themselves!) and the damn Salarian, too and the Alliance leadership as well!)...but over all, the romances are one of the best things in any ME game :)
It´s not a problem in the first game, because Shepard is just getting to know the realities of commanding his own ship, and the whole game kind of puts you on the clock from a certain point. However, there should definitely have been options for having romance way earlier in ME2 and ME3. It feels especially akward with Liara in ME3 after finishing the Shadow Broker DLC. Aside from a few playful conversations, you get no indication that the romance is even happening until right before Thessia. I get that the ME tradition is that the sex happens before the final mission, but by the third game, it´s just ridiculous. There should have been an option to just lock into a romance with her right away and have her wake up next to Shepard when he has his nightmares. Even other previously romanced characters should have had that option. I mean, the world is ending, and people are wondering whether they should hook up or not?
Rewatching M3 recently, I honestly feel like this was 75% of an incredible game. There really is a lot of deep reactivity and plot rewards for things that occurred all the way back in ME1. How many other game series exist that even attempted to account for player choices two games ago? The payoff for *most* of the major conflicts they set up is really satisfying, and there are also a lot of really awesome companion moments. This game was incredibly ambitious, and I feel like if EA had not rushed the game and forced an insanely short development cycle, Bioware would have really delivered. Even with the crunch what they gave us was mostly great, endings aside. What the game really needed was 1 more year of development so they could write a more extended ending and epilogue that accounts for the player choices in a more meaningful, detailed way. Actually getting to see all the war assets you earned participate in the conflict and really take the offensive against the reapers. The main themes that the game really tried to develop were the ideas of cooperation despite species differences, heroism in difficult circumstances, and the conflict between organic and synthetic lifeforms. I think the main problem with the current endings is that they don't really provide a satisfactory culmination to the themes the series had been built on - players wanted Shepard to be a hero, but instead he kind of arbitrarily decides everyone's fate, and most of the endings involve a significant betrayal of the people who helped you get there.
Absolutely. I had 8271 assets, which is almost the maximum you can get, and I had all the stuff that goes into the Crucible design. Yet, I couldn't choose to destroy only the Reapers and save EDI and the Geth, who I helped grow and with whom I brokered peace, gaining their assistance in the final battle? I had to lump all synthetic life together, instead of deciding the Reapers were the stagnant force that destroyed life, and EDI and the Geth chose to be better, work with organics, and grow? That really pissed me off.
When a game's whole marketing revolves around the significance of the player's choices, people expect something that lives up to what was promised. And when promises aren't kept, people will naturally get upset, especially when the promise was so colossal like with Mass Effect.
ME3 had too much to do, and too much to wrap up, because ME2 went on a side quest instead of setting up a solid story like a proper sequel. But the ending was a case of 'know when to stop'. End with Anderson and Shep dying side by side as the Crucible fires. Fade to black. Ending slides and voiceover rounding things off. Would have been fine.
The storylines of Tuchanka and Rannoch were definitely the highlights of ME 3. And Tali is my 2nd favorite character of the trilogy but after that Geth virtual mission there was no way I was going to side with the Quarians. Thanks to your deep dive vids I never realized just how much I lucked into the “peace” ending with my choices in the first two games. So I’m glad I never had to let Tali die.
If you share the disgusting anger of how Bioware mistreated Ashley (it is not that there shouldn't have been fights with A/K on ME2, it is how they were just used as a passing cameo and Liara never bothered to tell them of what she did and instead of apologizing in LOTSB she claims A/K are shortsighted to not blindly trust Shepard unlike Wrex, Tali and Garrus AND in ME3 how half of her content is bugged and was turned into Barbie with guns when she had the most potential out of the two VS to shine (her grandfather and TIM knew each other) she gets the Kasumi/Zaeed treatment and after spending one entire game without her and half of the 3rd game with her on the hospital it is still BS how Bioware has never cared tp restore the dialog she has with Liara post Coup or extended lines during the memorial with her sister as well the Citadel date) know that there is a blink and you miss it conversation that only happens between her as Tali but, you have to do the mission with the Rachni (which were underused) and then do Tuchanka so that when you finish Priority Rannoch you do the Turian Patrol with her and Garrus (she expresses concern of the wellbeing of Lt Victus and wants to be kept aware of how he is on the Normandy) and then take her and Tali to the bomb mission, beyond her and Tali expressing a PTSD breakout on the ride back to the Normandy they both have a banter with Tali mentioning how it reminded her of Virmire to which Ash ask if Tali heard when she spoke of it back on the shuttle (someone is still suffering from ME1 survivors guilt) and then they both proceed to discuss the people they lost up to that point and Tali asks Ash how it feels knowing someone had to die so that she got to leave (out of concern of her lost teams in ME2 and if someone lost their live on the Suicide Mission she talks to that instead) and Ash just says that it feels heavy as she knows that there will be a time she will die to save someone else and all that perished will be looking on her to make sure she does the correct thing. Bioware decided to make her the ship drunk rather than exploring that event more.
"Barbie with guns". Lol, agreed. In ME1&2 she had a modest appearance of a regular soldier, whereas in ME3 she apparently becomes a supermodel as a side gig. Yet Kaiden remains mostly unchanged, because apparently no one cares about Kaiden. The biggest irony of her change of appearance in ME3 is the fact that she was quite a feminist in ME1, so during one optional cutscene, if you chose the bottom "renegade" lines which makes Shepard rant about humanity's beautiful women, Ashley makes quite a snarky response: "If you want to see me in skirt and high heels, I want dinner first." I guess Shepard must've taken her out on quite a dinner just before the start of ME3.
@@GTAVictor9128 What is the deal with her having heels as part of her armor? That makes zero sense. Also, her dialogue sucks. In the first game, she had some pretty intelligent insights into life and such, and read deep poetry. Suddenly, in ME3, she is either drunk or still whining and complaining. She is great in a fight, but her character isn't done well at all. Tali has such amazing growth and comes to believe in herself and separate herself from her father, and Liara also really shows growth. Also, and this is just a former soldier complaining, but she went from a high-ranking non-commissioned officer (I'm guessing Operations Chief is an E-8) to a Lieutenant Commander, which is an O-4, three ranks and about ten years of service as a commissioned officer. She is a Marine, so they could have given her a Commission for sure, but she would have been a Lieutenant. Since Shepard calls her Lieutenant half the time anyway, instead of Commander, which is what you call a Lieutenant Commander when speaking to them, then it would make sense. Also, she is a Marine, so she wouldn't go to Lieutenant Commander anyway, but to Major. I had previously thought about romancing her with Male Shepard through the whole trilogy, but I decided against it with what little you get from her as a character in ME3. Even the ME2 love interests, other than Jacob, all give you more and grow more than Ashley. I'm not saying Jacob doesn't grow, but rather that he isn't an option for you in ME3, since he is attached to another woman and having a baby.
Really glad I’m not the only one who feels like Ashley’s character got way worse in ME3. They really stripped her of all her charm and confidence, yet some people think she’s better like this cause there’s no racism; but Ashley had more than that going for her and it’s gone too.
@@justaguy8218 what is bonkers is the character dialog of her that is bugged in ME3 since the original release of the game that Bioware has been ignoring.
Having just finished me3 for the 100th time I really do love this series. I do feel tho harbinger really deserved a last stand battle or seeing as he is the star child that should be his voice. Like it is if you decide to do nothing and the cycle continues he says "so be it" just seems 2 games of knowing and fighting harbinger for nothing to end it. Just my opinion tho
I agree Harbinger needed to be more present and god forbid speak in ME 3. They built him up so much in 2 that it seems like they forgot about him I’m 3.
@Big Dan Gaming The claim "your choices don't matter" isn't about ME3 in general, but about the finale. What you did with the Genophage, Quarian-Geth War, War Assets, and who you saved or sacrificed mean absolutely nothing when it comes to the 3-color choice at the end, outside of unlocking all the options, which is all a background metric that goes unseen by the player. Garnered peace on Rannoch? Doesn't matter, Star-child dismisses it out of hand. Talked to Leviathan? Cool, Star-child doesn't care. Sabotaged the Genophage? Doesn't matter with Synthesis. Chose the Geth and helped EDI-Joker, that's all gone with Destroy. On first playthrough, the overwhelming implication from the game is that you might as well have skipped all the rest of the game, and probably even ME1 & 2, and just come straight to the Star-child, because nothing else matters.
6:48 Two things in-universe: 1) Canada is part of the United North American States, along with Mexico and the USA. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that, especially with past climate change, the Systems Alliance doesn’t want to put a facility near Washington DC. 2) The Systems Alliance has multiple facilities on earth, it just happens that Vancouver is where they put this particular facility. I know they have N training in Rio, and other facilities elsewhere on earth.
I think the main thing with "your choices don't matter" is...they do matter throughout the rest of the game, but indeed in the finale it seems like they don't matter at all. And I don't expect them to have...like...100 different endings, or anything. That'd be crazy. It's just...it provides you choices, which are unlocked by your war assets...for no reason? Like...WHY does Synthesis require high war assets? There's no connection. It's just an arbitrary threshold you have to meet that will arbitrarily award you with extra choices, even though there is no logical reason the stupid star child should offer you more options due to having more war assets. The other issue I have with it is, conceptually, it feels like Priority: Earth should mirror ME2's suicide mission on a grander scale. Like, the suicide mission was, if you completed all the loyalty missions, fully upgraded your ship, and assigned everyone to the correct tasks, you should do well in the suicide mission if not defy the odds and have everyone survive. It feels like the grand finale of ME3 should be set up a similar way; you've spent three games building up respect, connections, and influence, and you've spent all of ME3 getting commitments from Asari, Turians, Quarians, Geth, Salarians, Krogans, Hanar, Drell, Volus, Rachni, Batarians, Vorcha...scraping together whatever factions you can. It feels like it's leading up to a similar "suicide mission" where you've gathered all this might, and depending how you play your cards you might be able to win, if not stomp. But, instead, this isn't an option at all, you have to follow the snotty star child's limited options that have nothing to do with anything. The expanded ending even added that "refuse" option, and it's just "lol, you lose automatically, get fucked". Pretty shitty. Some would argue they made the Reapers too overpowered for this sort of ending to make sense and...well, that's Bioware's problem, and honestly I don't really care anyway. I really feel like that was the ending they should have gone for. It just feels like that's the natural endpoint, where everything should lead. The structure, the themes of the game...uh, basic storytelling practices, all lead to it. As far as the Synthesis ending...the one they're pushing you toward...honestly, I don't really get it. First of all, I barely even know what it means to create a synthesis between organic and synthetic life. I also don't think this would "solve racism" (er, anti-synthetic prejudice or whatever). Second, it seems like a huge violation of people's consent too just suddenly change the state of being of everyone in the galaxy. Third, it just sorta accepts the premise that synthetics are destined to wipe out organics, which seems bad when the events of the game have been moving toward a mutual respect (at least, if you resolved the Quarian-Geth conflict). Fourth, I thought a theme of the series was overcoming differences and strength in diversity, and making all beings homogenous seems to go against that. It's just...this ending doesn't fit with anything any of the games were going for. It's just weird.
When players say your choices don't matter it is in regards to the ending and that is correct. Your choices don't matter and Casey Hudson and other Bioware staff lied about the endings.
I think I would have had less of a criticism of 'choices don't matter' if the Missing Scouts/Rachni Queen mission was simply not available in a game where Shepard killed the Rachni Queen in the first game. In such a game, Grunt should be present on Tuchanka.
For the Citadel DLC, my favorite line is if you bring Javik with you to the archives before Shepard gets locked in the vault and you choose the Renegade option and interrupts/ Shepard: Then, I'm going to take BOTH your heads and space them out the airlock! Javik: Finally.
I will never forget the Mass Effect 3 ending. It’s such a shame all their wonderful work over 3 games was undone by the ending. As I’ve gotten older I really appreciate the scope and ambition fro the game. The great thing about this series is the fact that there is so much replayability. You can pick a different class/gender, change your choices and take different squad mates to check out different dialogue. Just yesterday I played the level where you fight clone Shepherd and for the first time I saw the cut scene where EDI gets disconnected from the Normandy and she goes crosseyed. That was the best. 😊
@@XunluT Question: Do you think that would have been too Saturday morning cartoonish of an ending? Meaning… after how bad this was and how many people died would it have been too over the top to hug and laugh after it all ended? I do agree that War Assets should have dictated your success of your final mission and lot just the color of explosion fans god.
My biggest pet peeve for ME3 was how similar the game was even if you killed all/most of your squad mates in the earlier games. My son and I both played ME3. He killed almost everyone in the suicide mission. I saved everyone. I didn't like how they just replaces people but the story/scenes were basically the same. I think if you didn't save most of your squad then the game should have been a little harder. You should have had to convince the new (replacement) people of your worth in order to get them to follow you. Instead my son and I had almost the same game he just had some replacement characters. Seemed a bit sloppy to me. Other than that I loved the game. The colored ending was kinda dumb but that isn't enough to make me discount the rest of the trilogy.
I loved the silversun strip characters who were essentially commentary on the multi-player. My favorite was the sentinel who would go on and on about how detonating tech armor was the right answer for all circumstances.
My problem with the ending is that ending is that in the end its really all for nothing. All your sacrifices everything you have done and it comes down to Red Green Blue endings. In Mass Effect one the way Vigil tells of the attack of the reapers and later through Javiks dialog, you get the impression that the Reapers are strong yes. They are like a group of naked men attacking a nest of killer bees A single bee we can kill with little difficulty. 2 or 5 they will get a sting or two in, but in the end they will still DIE. The entire nest attacks you We may kill a dozen or so but in the end WE will be the losers. Same thing with the Reapers they are strong yes, but they are very much dependent on isolating the various intelligent civilizations to their individual planets. Because if the galaxy ever united against them, the Reapers would be like the group of naked men against the killer bees, the Reapers would LOSE. Well turns out that was all a red herring didn´t matter if the entire galaxy united against them, they would still kick our asses. Also whats the deal with killing the protagonist at the end of a trilogy? Its like Bioware didn´t know to do with Shepard and just said fuck it.. he dead. A far more appropriate ending (in my opinion) would have been if you had gotten enough resources you could reject the crucibles offer and then actually WIN over the Reapers. Sure it would mean a galaxy that more or less looked like Berlin immediately after WW2. Most civilizations would be in shambles as most of their infrastructure was gone and their home worlds was mostly left as a smoking ruin. It would mean at least a generation or two of mass starvation and death. But the cycle was broken forever. As for Shepard have his ending be dependent on his various personal relationships. If he was just a bastard to everyone, well he would end up dead through an "accident". If it was more neutral middle of the road he would live, but end up alone abandoned by everyone. If his score was at a maximum he would end up with the one he romanced and retired or maybe with a job either as the academy or part of the new council. Either way his military career was over. Personally i think it would have been a much better ending and Mass Effect 4 could actually be a thing, rather than what we got in Andromeda. Try an imagine playing as a new character, appointed by the council desperately trying to hold the galaxy together as mass starvation, sickness, civil unrest ravages the galaxy. Alot of Mass relays are either destroyed or barely functioning. Many a supply routes have been destroyed and the few remaining aren´t enough to supply everyone... And you are dropped in the middle of it all, trying desperately to maintain order in an ever crumbling galaxy.
Absolutely loved this video, for the ones who have a major part of their life defined by this franchise, this is one of the absolute best videos out there. With that said, I know you have enough videos on this topic and I have watched almost all of them, it would be awesome if you made a video on every decision to be made step by step so that the majority, if not all of the squadmates or good NPC(s) survive and the game leaves a warm and fuzzy feeling in our tum-tum instead of thinking about the ones lost, other than characters like mordin who had to die. This would be greatly appreciated. I should go!
I agree. Big Dan should do that! I have never succeeded at having all squad mates live and the warm fuzzy ending. But I am not a huge fan of Multiplayer either and you have to do those in the original version.
Citadel DLC + Take Back the Earth mod + Happy Ending mod = ideal Mass Effect 3 experience. I would swap out the cyberninja guy for a Cerberus resurrected indoctrinated Ashley/Kaiden though as I think it would be more effective to give Shepard a personal nemesis instead of just some random edgelord.
I would have given Cerberus less prominence. We are fighting the Reapers and yet half the time in the whole game we are constantly fighting a human "black ops" organization so powerful and resourceful that it challenges the might of the human Earth Alliance. WTF?
My only problem with legendary edition is simple bioware had a chanse to fix several mistakes like ending, cut content and etc. But bioware was like no and no plus they had option to contact modders and ask them for good content that coult been implemented as offical like EGM mod, take earth back mod and happy ending mod. Still good video mate.
My only problem with ME3 is the starchild thing. I think it is unnecessary and the game should end right when Shepard opens the Citadel, with the war assets points deciding good or bad ending.
Meta-problem: Drew Karpyshyn having left Bioware and Mac "the Hack" Walters taking over as head writer. The Genophage and Geth-Quarian arcs work because each squadmate kept their own writer, so Mordin and Tali etc are as moving as ever. But the overall story structure and especially the endgame are substandard. It's especially apparent from Cronos Station on that they were not just rushed, but papering over plot holes and their own lore-subversion, and tossing in both a deus and a diabolus ex machina- even before we get to the choice-of-Instagram-filters final ending.
I thought the Geth-Quarian arc changed writers? Like I'm sure I remember reading or hearing somewhere that the guy writing them in ME2 explicitly said he didn't want to do the generic "I want to be a real boy" motive for the Geth instead making the Geth want to become a true hivemind and look down on the individuality of organics. But then in ME3 the Geth go and do the "I want to be a real boy" motive where they suddenly want individuality because a different writer took over even going so far as to retcon 'the question' from "Do these units have a soul" to "Does this unit have a soul".
actually it is not JUST the ending that is bad. It is just the ultimate symptom and final nail in the coffin that led to the rage. Most people have trouble articulating the buildup of bad writing in mass effect 3 that culminated in the rubbish nonsensical ending. Playing through ME3 a lot of things just feel "off", but you put up with it because there are some good parts, and in the hopes that it ultimately leads somewhere good, but it unfortunately doesnt. which is why most people tend to take it out on the ending. but the problems with ME3 start from the very beginning with the poorly thought out space magic crucible plotline, and the change of cerberus to some all powerful comical 1D villain. The Tuchanka arc is honestly the only truly well executed arc of ME3. Even Rannoch which you praise to high heavens is very problematic story and flow wise. and of course, everything just totally falls apart after Thessia. The lack of thought and rushed nature of the game really show through from there. and when people say choices don't matter in ME3, they really don't, at least ultimately. Killed the rachnii queen? no biggie we'll just introduce a reaper resurrected version. and ultimately the rachnii don't play any significant effect one way or the other. Destroyed the reaper base? Cerberus still gets reaper tech and the IM becomes indoctrinated regardless. KKilled the geth heretics? Welp the geth will still side with the reapers, and we will retcon the geth to make them all "human" and sympathetic to make players suddenly want to save the genocidal villains of the first Mass effect. and ultimately no matter what your choices throughout the games, the reapers always space magic the citadel to earth (despite ME1 establishing that the protheans sealed off reaper access to the citadel, or else they could have conquered the citadel at any time in ME3) and you have the suicidal space battle over earth and always make it to the beam to fire off the crucible and its' RGB ending of the reapers NO MATTER WHAT YOU DID THROUGHOUT THE TRILOGY. The outcome is always the same. So no ultimately the player's choices didnt matter, because it just changes the flavour of shit bioware serves at the end of this wonderful franchise. PS: and dont event get me started on starchild and the nonsensical synthetics vs organics crap that Mac Walters and Casey Hudson cooked up at the 11th hour.
Hear, hear. Too many people get hang ups with the ending, but that was only the results of the bad writing. Bad writing was all over the game if you look close enough and as you say, most choices mean absolutely nothing in the end. The original endings were 99% the same ending, just in different colors. Which certainly didn't help people to calm down. The fact that you couldn't possibly get access to all the endings at first without playing multiplayer, didn't help people calm down. The starchild... Yeah, great logical AI. Who argues that synthetics and organics can never get along. When I have made the Geth and Quarians sign a peace treaty. But you can't argue with him... Yeah, that will certainly make people happy, right? Seems that many people have just forgotten how bad it was when ME3 just had released. The game isn't all that great to start with, and then to top that with things like having to play multiplayer and such... The Extended Cut made some things a bit better (made the endings just a bit more different, too). Sadly, it couldn't fix all the bad writing. If only it could.
I HAAAAATE it when people saying Bioware "HAD" to make the story accessable for new players but then fail to say why they had to do it. They didn't. and it hurts the rest of the game
I had always felt that if the original ME 3 had released on March 5th, 2013 (instead of March 6th, 2012), BioWare would’ve had enough time then to flesh out all the remaining story arcs of Santcuary, Horizon, & its final two missions - leading up to more positive weight & impact of its ME 3 ending. But EA had to monopolize all that money as soon as possible. I still blame you EA for making games we’ve enjoyed for the last decade turn into empty husks 😖
I think the Catalyst should have been Shepard, or more specifically, the signal from the Prothean beacon from the first game. It should also be revealed that Shepard was _always_ the Catalyst, and a few select individuals had known it for some time, specifically Admiral Hackett, the Asari Councilor, the Illusive Man, and Leviathan. In fact, it could be revealed that the Illusive Man is indoctrinated, but not by the Reapers-but by Leviathan. The Prothean beacon, the Cypher from Feros, finding Javik, these were all Leviathan pulling the strings from afar through indoctrinated agents. Hackett and the Asari Councilor could have knowledge of Shepard being the Catalyst through the Illusive Man communicating with them clandestinely, without them knowing who is giving them the info. Basically Leviathan was a huge missed opportunity to explain how seemingly preposterous coincidences could happen, plot holes could be paved over, and giving the ending a feeling of being a trilogy-spanning effort. We learned about the Leviathan of Dis in the first game, and it would be really cool if that was the key to winning all along, the invisible hand that helped Shepard at key moments. If there needed to be an AI interface to info dump all of this inside the Citadel, that interface should have been played by characters that were canonically dead in a given playthrough, starting with Jenkins from Eden Prime. Nihlus, Benezia, Saren, the Virmire Sacrifice, Udina, Anderson, Mordin, Thane, etc. could all take turns being the mouthpiece for the interface, rather than some sparkly ghost brat. If there were Suicide Mission losses, they could show up here as well. The scene could shift around, like a dream (being a virtual world) and could revisit memorable locations from all three games. Imagine talking to Benezia on a remote mountaintop of Noveria, looking down on Peak 15 labs. Or speaking with Nihlus and Jenkins together on a version of Eden Prime where there is no carnage or destruction, just a beautiful landscape. Mordin could appear on a transformed Tuchanka, a garden world once more. Thane could appear on Illium. Udina and Anderson could appear on Earth, as it was before the Reaper attack. The AI interface could reveal to Shepard that ever since they were touched by the Prothean Beacon on Eden Prime, they had begun the process of becoming a hybrid organic/AI being. It was this hybrid nature that allowed the Lazarus Project to happen at all, since Shepard's consciousness was stored _digitally_ within the techno-organic remains. The Illusive Man himself, an indoctrinated agent of Leviathan the whole time, would not have known this, but Miranda Lawson, who _wasn't_ indoctrinated, would have. This would give a little more retroactive cool factor to Miranda, who always played her cards close to the chest. She knew Shepard was part AI all along, but (possibly) loved him anyway. This could also be something that EDI knew, and one reason she trusted Shepard's counsel so much. *EDI was trying to become more like Shepard herself.* I also think that the ‘choice’ angle of the ending was unnecessary. If you can only do one ending well, do one ending, well. Have there be lower-stakes alternate outcomes like ‘save the geth’ that are a result of choices earlier without there being some illusion of choice that ends up just being unsatisfying no matter what you pick. This is the part of the game where the results of Shepard’s actions and Shepard’s will should be revealed, not where Shepard makes a new choice.
I strongly suggest to try out the priority earth overhaul mod. It restores cut content and adds a bunch of allies and set pieces making that final push truly feel like a culmination of all your war assets. Sweetens the awful ending but thankfully, there's a mod for that too.
ME3, and the series as a whole, was amazing. I always felt the endings actually made sense, but there was one choice missing. The ultimate Paragon choice to allow Shepard to make the argument for diversity without synthesis- a "look how we came together, biological and synthetic, despite our differences" option. It could even include a "buying time" component where the Reapers agree to retreat, but they'll continue to monitor because they still feel the galaxy will screw it up eventually. Even more, they see the merit of Shepard's argument, but they still aren't wholly convinced, so as a trade (and to end Shepard's arc), Shepard must "merge" with the Catalyst to allow the system to see from his point of view. We close out with the Catalyst piece breaking away from the Citadel as it starts to move off with the remaining Reapers. A cease fire message, audio only, from Shepard to the fleets as the Reapers pull back everywhere. Finally, as all the Reapers begin to "warp" away, we see Joker turn slightly as if listening to something, and then take the Normandy to a previously unknown location. While the rest of the galaxy celebrates, the Normandy arrives at a planet where only the Catalyst ship stands. The crew get a last goodbye holographic message from Shepard, explaining the deal made, the strength in diversity, but unity that allowed them this opportunity, and a plea to make it all worth the cost. Finally, reassurance that a "part of me will always be out there... and we'll be watching." One more ending that made trying to save everyone and settling differences worth it.
I wasn't fine with the endings. My Shepard believes deeply in free will, but no matter what choice you makes on the Citadel it takes the free will from either many beings or all beings and that's BS. I didn't bust my ass off creating peace between the Geth and the Quarians just to commit genocide, or the horror show of forcing all biological life to become partially synthetic which left me with control as the only option...which is not a happy ending for Shepard by any stretch of the imagination and frankly he earned a small amount of happiness after everything he did for the galaxy. I mean is his consciousness forever locked into a reaper platform never to know love or life again...for eternity? No, I'll just stick with Audemus' Happy Ending Mod and pretend it's cannon.
I think the main problem with the ending is the linearity in the final mission. If you could see the difference that war assets make in the mission design, there wouldn‘t be the question of player choice anymore. Ultimately, some stories can‘t have Happy ends - ending a war that has lasted billions of years takes its price. The shallow taste in the end that unifies all ends in one flavour is the fact that Shepard will probably not live to see this future. But as the final arch of a character who has given to and has been given everything by his crew and friends I find it sad, but fulfilling.
Yeah when people said the choices didn’t matter, what comes to mind for me is when the Star Child said there couldn’t be an understanding and harmony between Synthetics and Organics after in my first play through I had just created a harmony between synthetics and organics. To me, that’s what I mean when I said my choices didn’t matter. I did all of these great things and yet the Star child was like LOL That doesn’t matter.
At the very least it should have been Harbinger's true form or something that would make sense like a keeper or something other than the only child in the universe.
You made what? You mean that peace treaty between geth and quarians after three hundred years of war, a treaty that have lasted about two weeks? Really? How does that prove anything? The Reapers have seen millions of years pass, your 2 weeks treaty is absolutely irrelevant. You lose the scope of the reapers lifespan and knowledge. When they say that true peace is impossible, I believe them. It's just a matter of time. I think Javik talked about the metacon wars or something like that. An organic species that fused themselves with machines... and became a danger to the galaxy. Something like that may have been just one of the many possible dystopian futures for the Quarians and the geth. That story was just starting.
@@Alfonso88279 The problem with your logic is that, if this was even real, is that they were never given the chance to prove that the peace will last. They were told they were guilty before they had the chance to prove otherwise. So yeah, my peace that I created should’ve been enough. That is 300 years of war brought to an end after all. Something nobody even dreamed would be possible.
@@EliseoRocha Again, you are forgetting the lifespan of the reapers. They have been doing this for millions of years. If you were able to get a peace treaty after 300 years of war between two species that are not warrior/like species at all from the start, I warranty you that the reapers have seen millions of peace treaties, that have probably endure more time than yours. You fail to understand that Nazara was right. You are nothing. Humans are a foot note for the reapers, and that's just because of every other species that sacrificed first to give this cycle a chance. Shepard is an anomaly because of the protean beacon. You had nothing to show to the reapers and if you don't choose synthesis, the obvious future for the galaxy is what the reapers said would happen: Non organics will end up wiping out organics. That's a mathematical reality. The other endings talk about "hope", an abstract concept that keeps us fighting but doesn't bring victory.
@@Alfonso88279 With all due respect, that requires players to fill in what is essentially a plot hole with their own headcanon to make sense, because Shepard never has the option to address the peace forged between the Quarians and Geth, nor does the Star Brat bring up whether or not other cycles attempted something similar(headcanon, in general, isn't bad when it comes to interpretive story elements, but when it's needed to fill in a plot hole, that's a problem). Also, there is no guarantee that what the Star Brat said would happen after the destruction ending would actually happen because he himself points out how Shepard's cycle is the first one to ever manage to successfully attach the Crucible to the Citadel, meaning there are factors to this situation that he can't be certain of, even he's over a billion years old. New factors change everything. Also, it is important to address how foundationally contradictory the Star Brat's logic is along with the inability to confront him about it. His solution to stopping organics from making synthetics and getting killed by them is to have synthetics kill and harvest them(which is basically the same as killing them). It gets worse. The Star Brat uses the Mass Relays to streamline the process by having them discover the Relays, and advance their technologies faster through said Relays to the point of building synthetics, and then be killed and harvested by the Reapers. Do you see the problem here? He has inadvertently become the new cause for the very problem he was made to solve by doing this. Shepard for some arbitrary reason doesn't have the dialogue option to tell this kid that his logic is flawed, that he is only making things worse, and that he should just kill all his Reapers, and perish. Sure, you could say that there's no way the kid could be persuaded into doing it, and to that, I say you can't prove me right or wrong because the game doesn't even let you try to take that approach, so we're stuck with the ludicrous decisions that he's left us in his benign stupidity. And before you tell me he's only acting illogically because the Leviathans didn't program him properly, then that brings up another issue. Why would the Leviathans in their presumably cosmic wisdom decide after seeing organics get killed by their synthetics that it would be a good idea to make a synthetic of their own to solve the problem? This makes them look like idiots when they're supposed to be thousands of IQ points smarter than everything else. There is no excuse for that kind of incompetence. Now, concerning the dumb choices that the Star Brat gives, I will have to disagree with you on that too. Blue is bad because that goes against the whole objective Shepard & his buddies were fighting for, destroying the Reapers. Red is bad because it kills all of Shepard's synthetic friends(unless you killed them early), but it gets rid of the Reapers. Refusal is bad because the Reapers kill everyone, leaving the breaking of the cycle in the hands of the next set of civilizations. Green is the worst of them all because you are basically playing god, forcing all life in the galaxy to conform to a new biological state of being, and the game has the gall to act like that's supposed to be the good ending when it is the cruelest of the endings. All four endings are pretty bad(especially green), but between them, red is the best option because you kill the Reapers. Plus, if peace between the Quarians and Geth was possible, then it's possible that the conflict between synthetics and organics afterward can also be resolved. Sure, like you kind of said, it's possible that the peace won't last, but also like you said with the other endings, there is still hope, and more than you realize, where the red ending is concerned. I still firmly believe the ending is arbitrarily stupid no matter what you choose, but when it comes to the morality of the four choices, the red ending is the only one that can be argued as the almost good ending(though honestly, BioWare should retcon the entire Catalyst ending out of existence for literally anything else at this point).
Fantastic video Dan. Pretty much my thoughts as well. Watched the entire thing. I love the Citadel DLC in ME 3, quite possibly the best part of ME 3. Thanks for the hard work! Worth the watch.
Because synthesis is a bad ending for a multitude of reasons. It makes no logical sense that merging synthetics and organics would instill peace in the galaxy. It's like the developers forgot that there's other conflicts beyond synthetics vs. organics. Last time I checked there was no synthetic vs. organic elements to the Rachni Wars, or the Krogan Rebellions, but apparently we're supposed to believe that as long as solve the Geth Quarian conflict everything in the Universe is now paradise. Synthesis is Shepherd making a choice that forces the rewriting of all of the DNA of every being in the Galaxy. If he wasn't dead already he should be on trial for war crimes for doing that. Oh you completely rewrote everyone's DNA so that medical knowledge is completely back to square one? Up against the wall with you now. The crucible should have done nothing more than rendered all the Reapers and anything infected with Reaper code inert and awaiting the next command. After that there should have been a scene where the council races are all attempting to decide what to do with the Reapers. Paragon option is to destroy all Reaper tech to prevent it from hurting anyone else again. Renegade is keeping the Reapers around and using the technology for personal gain. You gain more technological advancement but you risk indoctrination and you've just kicked off a galactic arms race.
@thisismyyoutubecommentacco6302 Not to mention the fact that the "synthesis" option basically implies a hivemind and loss of individuality. The impression it gives off is one of being put on SSRIs and antipsychotics when you were already sane. Completely dystopian, "off" and the greater context of indoctrination, loss of conscious humanity and identity is straight up gross. This is not the good ending. I'd rather the main character be killed and all technology be wiped than remove everyone's "soul". But if you choose red, you're punished for it. You die. Your team gets stranded in the middle of nowhere. Intergalactic travel is no more. It's gloomy, depressing. It doesn't matter how many good decisions you made. There is no better ending because they didn't think people would have a problem with becoming artificial. Fake. And they do, and should.
The first time I played through ME3 I got all the way to the starchild and my first thought was. "I still have a gun. Can I shoot it? Yes. What happens if I shoot the kid? Oh, I've doomed the galaxy. Woops."
Man, the music and last words when Anderson dies always gets me. I haven't played ME3 in years and that still brought me right back to that place I first saw a decade ago.
Saying "the fans expected too much" is a cop-out. All that choice doesn't matter if the endings negate every choice your character ever made and fly in the face of that character's previously established internal logic.
As an outside observer to the uproar that erupted when the game launched, I got the impression that the biggest issue was how the endings didn't deliver the same feeling of choice as the rest of the game had up until that point. To explain what I mean by the endings lacking choice, in Dragon Age: Origins, you can get happy endings, but you can also get bittersweet endings. Both are optional for players that might prefer one over the other which creates a distinct mood for each playthrough. Whereas in ME3, it seems that all the endings were purposefully designed to be bittersweet. And when all 3 endings evoke the exact same mood, it makes them feel identical.
Hit the nail on the head here. I expected all of those earlier decisions to heavily influence the actual ending themselves, not silo themselves in their little corner.
The thing about Mass Effect is that none of the choices ever mattered in any of the games save virmire and the suicide mission. 99% of your decision making is whether you want to be mean, nice, or neutral in conversations.
Great video, and lots of great points! I really like ME3 90% of the way, but I have a few points that I really don't like in ME3. First and foremost; ME3 was a third game in a planned trilogy, but it was made to introduce new players as much as fans. That is, for me, a huge mistake that is the catalyst to most of my personal complaints with this game. ME2 expects the players to have played ME1, and that is the best game in history, in my opinion.. Second; Javik should never have been a DLC. Period! Third; The entire ending (as in the Priority: Earth mission) is rushed. The entire ME3 has taken its time to explain and round of lots of lore and history-points, but the entire last mission is just rushed, both in writing and graphics. It's a shame. Fourth; The ending with the Star Child rubs me the wrong way. I don't really care about the ending, because it doesn't seem to make a meaningful difference. The outcomes are different in a sense, but I (as a player) don't really benefit from that as the MC always seem to die. I really like all the history-arcs throughout the game, and how it plays into both ME1 and ME2, but the ending isolated doesn't seem to matter, and it feels anti-climatic to me. Fifth; The Leviathan DLC is such a shame! When I played the Leviathan DLC the first time, I was shaking when I met them under the water. It's such an amazing story playing out, and to discover them is altering the entire known history of the universe, on the same level as discover Javik with all the implications. But it becomes a huge missed opportunity. It should have had a huge effect, but it just ends half way there. Amazing setup, poor execution... Sixth; EA. Period! And now I could write for hours about the great things, as I said I liked 90% of the game. Curing the genophage, the geth/quarian war, Leviathan, the attack by Cerberus on the Citadel and the Citadel DLC are all amazing points and missions in the game. There are lots of amazing writing, amazing graphics, and the music is writen and mastered perfect many places. The sound-picture is for me amazing throughout the game. I think the expectations were just too high for this game, and Bioware could never rise to the hight that were expected. Players who are playing Mass Effect for the first time with Legendary Edition likes ME3 a lot more than "the original" players did. In my opinion the game is a lot better than all the criticisms that has been given to the game, and I think that a lot of the criticism is unfair..
Legion is one of my favorite Mass Effect characters. His death was one of the ones that hit me hard. And I hate the banshees 😂😂😂 so much. Great game of the legendary edition came to switch I'd buy it immediately
I think Mass Effect 3 is a good game but it could've been a great game if it had just a little more time. 2 is still my favorite game in the trilogy and my favorite game period.
One thing I didn't really like about ME3 is that ME2 made Cerberus and the Illusive Man full of gray. In ME2, even if you didn't agree with their methods, an argument could be made in their favor. It spoke to the main theme of paragon vs renegade not being equivalent to good vs evil as the devs intended. ME2 gave them a bit of complexity. But ME3 just made them unequivocally and undeniably evil. It retroactively made any renegade choice made in favor of Cerberus in the past an evil choice instead. I get the Illusive Man is indoctrinated, but I think it would've been more compelling if the Illusive Man and Cerberus were an asset to the Alliance at first, proving to be helpful at first. Then later on, we see the effects of indoctrination take hold and then Cerberus becomes a full blown enemy. Idk, the way Cerberus was handled in ME3 kind of seemed openly hostile to the depth that ME2 gave them.
Mass Effect 3 isn't remembered for "poorly executed endings;" it's remembered for its _bad, insulting ending_ that completely undermines the major themes of the entire series. There are obvious dialog choices to make during the talk with the Crucible entity, exactly the sort of things Shepard has been saying to resolve situations for 3 games now, that aren't even presented as options. This isn't a bad execution; it's a fundamentally bad design that no better execution could have salvaged. (Especially when, given the chance, they doubled down on the terrible ending by adding the "refuse" option as an additional slap in the face to all the fans who pointed out the problems rather than doing anything to actually make it right!)
WHAT?? I'm just learning about the multiplayer effect on galactic readiness. So Shepard can live during the end game cut scene? I've been playing these games for a decade and I'm just learning that this is even possible? What...
A lot of the problems this game are due to Mass Effect 2. I keep saying it but that game dropped the ball. Ultimately it doomed the series by focusing on the wrong things. The beginning of the game kills Shepard off just to set up a new status quo. One that was unnecessary as it took time away from the story it was supposed to tell. Mass Effect 1 ended with the Council seeing a Reaper up close. Then in Mass Effect 2 they and the rest of galaxy act like it never took place. Shepard says they'll find a way to stop the Reapers. Frustratingly the entirety of Mass Effect 2 doesn't solve this dilemma or give us the tools to do so. This forced Mass Effect 3 to shoehorn the Crucible. Something that Shepard doesn't discover or understand. We're just told about it. Cerberus has been built up way too much in Mass Effect 2 forcing Mass Effect 3 to have to do something with them. Frustratingly though this means that Cerberus winds up getting far more of a focus than the universe Mass Effect 1 built up. When it is supposed to be a finale to them. When ME3 did so it unsurprisingly was the best parts of the game. I just wish more was done with that. Instead Cerberus this Cerberus that. Thus resulting in a slapped together ending. How could the trilogy end satisfyingly with no builld up? Regardless of what the Reaper's motivation it still would feel shallow. The extended cut did nothing to fix this only further explain it's own nonsense. The combat is the only consistently good thing about ME3. The majority of the problems I have started with the beginning of Mass Effect 2. Which is why Mass Effect 1 is the best in series for me. It didn't have the frustrating disjointed narrative that veered off course then u-turn to finish everything. One last thing I hated that the dlc of ME2 and ME3 either are filler or feel cut from the game. Javik's original role in the story is so much better than him just being there in the final release.
The Catalyst/Starchild end dialog is one of the biggest main plot self destruction I've seen in a video game. An epic combination of terrible writing and lore retcon for the worse.
ME3's final ending was a forgone conclusion, and the overall story line was easily predictable from all we knew in ME1 and ME2. Some McGuffin was 100% required once you saw some large number of Reaper vessels at the end of ME2 - and frankly, the plot would have been inconsistent any other way given the size of a fleet created from tens of thousands of cycles, each creating at least one Reaper. I also liked the twist of the Citadel once again playing a central role in the plot. I wasn't able to play ME3 for a couple months after launch, so I never did so before the updated ending which would have been notably unsatisfying, for sure. My only personal complaint about the final act was ending with a zergfest and a denouement that was solely story telling (which was fantastically written) instead of some kind of boss fight against, perhaps, a last-minute guardian created out of desperation by Harbinger before the starchild appears. Then again, that fight would really just be a rehash of ME1, where Sovereign had a last-minute, desperate attempt to regain control of the Citadel
oh my god I pretty sure I said "it's good to see you too big guy" in the exact same tone of voice when I ran into grunt during that mission. I was so proud of him.
The Geth vs the Quarisns plot line was one of the worst parts of ME3. It was beyond absurd that after all that had happened in ME2 that the geth and quarians were still going at it. The ending part of that section was well written, but that section of the game was a perfect example of weak writing beyond the ending. Don't even get me started on the Rachni subplot of ME3. That was the worst. So much wasted opportunities. Gameplay wise Mass Effect 3 is outstanding. The tools they give you to tackle scenarios in any class is great, but it's obvious that Mac Walters is not a great story teller in the grand scale. I forgot how much I hated the subplot with the kid and the dream sequence. Never made one damn bit of sense and it makes less sense now. I still can't get over how convenient it is that there happens to be a Prothean weapon unearthed on Mars JUST in TIME. I made an effort to pay attention to the dark energy subplot in Mass Effect 2 and I very much believe it would have been a better direction to go than the Crucible/McGuffin. Those that say Mass Effect 3 had a great story despite the ending weren't paying attention. Wayyy too much lazy writing in ME3.
All the devs had to do was have a quest where you find out a group of Geth that went out of the veil to attack the Quarians were following direct orders from the Reapers to get the Quarians to go attack the Geth and Shepard and crew investigate and fail to get the admirals to not fall for the trap would have been a decent way to set up that quest line
I believe one of the Codex Entries mentions that the Reapers are able to make Banshees from Asari that have the the Ardat-Yakshi gene as a recessive trait, as well as the active version. Which explains why there are more Banshees than expected.
You are not wrong when you say that people are being unfair in a lot of ways when they say that choices don't matter in Mass Effect 3. It does a fairly impressive job of culminating choices from previous games throughout the game although some of them are disappointingly entirely contained within war assets points, which was probably inevitable without more dev time to be fair. All that being said though I do think though that what a lot of people mean when they say choices don't matter in Mass Effect 3 is that pretty much no choice affects the ending in any way beyond War Assets and especially before the Extended cut there wasn't any elaboration on the effect your choices had going forward and even after it what was there was fairly minimal and also fairly cookie-cutter. It all boiled down to red, green, or blue in the end with some minor variations based on War Score. Beyond that, many of those slight variations of the cutscene were almost a non-factor because it was also basically impossible to fail unless you spent the whole time doing it on purpose. Also making 50% of the possible war score only obtainable through multiplayer further reduced the impact your choices had on the outcome. Ultimately while it was unrealistic to expect every choice to create a major difference in the end some of the big ones could've had much more of a role and could've been elaborated on further. TL;DR: The game did a surprisingly good job representing choices leading up to the ending, but the cookie-cutter endings, lack of elaboration post ending, and various other minor issues really undermined the feeling of impactful choice in the end.
still say , that because the game shows anderson attacking the destroy ending, means he blows the thing up and shep didn't even leave the planet and thats always gonna be my canon
As for Asari and Ardat-Yakshi, as far I remember it was told that about 1% of Asari population (which is one of the biggest in space) has it as latent gene. And this fact was enough for Reapers to turn them into Banshies. Why actual number of Ardat-Yakshi in monastery was bigger than 2, I can`t say. Maybe Samara didn`t check updates, since her daughters was put there hundreds of years ago?
This was a great watch that really took me down memory lane. Which actually isn't that far back for me since I didn't get around to completing ME 2 and 3 until around a year ago just before the legendary edition was out. I had to play some dipshit mobile game to get my military readiness maxed out, which was stupid easy but a bit time consuming. All in all, though, I loved all 3 games and the ending of the 3rd felt perfect to me. I'm just glad I didn't play it back when all the hype was around it because might've fucked up my perception of it. I feel like they really wrote themselves into a tough spot with the whole Reaper threat that loomed large over the series for so long. They could have given us a happy ending, but all things considered it wasn't too bad considering the magnitude of what Shepard and crew were up against. I thought they stayed true to the narrative, and I was more than happy with my green-eyed hippie ending! I get it does make it look like some sorta nightmare situation, but I just assumed it worked out as the game had illustrated where everyone reached a new stage in evolution. That's just something that is going to be difficult, if not downright impossible, to truly understand beyond a surface level for the most part. So I just let it go and assume they are living their best life (except Liara, who my Shepard had to leave all alone ugh).
@@legion6211 oh well when the game asks you if you wanna listen to Aria or the other girl about killing all the civilians if you are an engineer you can just say nah bro I'm too smart for this and auto win both choices, then Aria complements you saying your better then the rest of her grunts.
Great video! I agree with you on most points. But I would like to point out that when people say your choices don't matter, they're specifically talking about the ending ninety-nine percent of the time. Bioware could have kept the same general options for the endings, but made them actually look different and made unlocking them based on your previous choices. Like, if you supported the Illusive Man previously you unlock the control ending. They could have added hints at the synthesis ending earlier and made it the "secret" ending that was harder to get. And they could have made the destroy ending's outcome vary depending on your war assets how united the galaxy was by the end. They could even add another secret outcome where with a fully united galaxy and crazy high war assets the refusal ending actually results in you beating the Reapers militarily, despite the star child saying it's impossible.
keith david’s performance at the end crushed and obliterated me emotionally. “you did good son/child” has me tearing up every time
It was a powerful moment. the whole time you act as the father/mother and overall leader (aka shepherd) for so many people. Yet who was there to guide and protect you? Who was there to shepherd Shepard? Who could take the weight of the galaxy off his shoulders, if for a moment? It was Anderson all along, and it was great to see their relationship.
Keith David voicing someone born in London i did find sorta weird as a Brit but i guess in the era they're in mixed accents would make sense
@@dedmajor born and raised are two different things though. Anderson was born in London but could have been raised in America since he was a child.
Keith David is awesome. He's been in some amazing movies.
Keith David is the only one that could have made Anderson Anderson. His voice is drips with character. He's up there with Kevin Conroy that voiced Batman and Mark Hamill that voiced the Joker. If they ever do a time travel thing with Mass Effect and need him and he isn't available, they'll have trouble finding someone capable to carry it off.
My problem is that they didn't give each ending a proper epilogue. The choices I made still felt important, but I wanted to know what happened in the immediate aftermath.
I would have been much more forgiving on the ending as well if they had just fleshed out each choice a bit more but it seemed like they tried to make it so that there was room for a 4th game and left the ending of 3 feeling hollow.
I just wanted an ending where you flat out could win, if you did enough leg work, and the final shot was of you and Garrus sipping drinks on the beach with dead reaper hulls sticking out of the water out in the distance.
@@clydemarshall8095 i think the final mission in me2 makes a lot of people feel like that. the fact that if you put in the work in the form of farming the mats to upgrade the ship and do the loyalty missions you get rewarded with a good ending( ie. everyone gets out alive) is extremly satisfying
@@craserx6267 I don’t know, I feel like the overarching theme in this game is achievement through perseverance and sacrifice. Hell, Garrus even says that Turians know what’s at stake and humans just want to save everyone, but it won’t be possible in this war. The endings definitely feel hollow with just Admiral Hackett giving a slideshow. But I think the destroy ending makes perfect sense in hindsight, more so if you’ve maxed out the war assets. ME3 wasn’t about you winning with overwhelming odds against simply because everyone joined together. It was the desperate need to survive at any costs. The Protheans were far more advanced and spanned larger than the current cycle and they still lost. That means something to me. I think the difference between the suicide mission in 2 and the final battle in 3 are simply the change in scale. In 2 it is very unlikely you’ll win but if you can play your cards right maybe things will work out. In 3 there is no chance to win. It’s a Hail Mary of plans. One final act of desperation and defiance. And I think 3 perfectly captures that.
Sorry for the rant. And it totally would be cool if we saw Garrus and Shepard drinking beer on the beach.
@@RagingRavioli22 I guess you are right. All i know is that 10 years later the me3 ending is still famous for being really bad. And 10 years in gaming is a lot of time.
Yeah, the final ending in ME3 wasn't great. But what realy makes the game for me are the in-game endings (or rather payoffs) to all the great previous story threads in the series. The development of your companions and the resolutions of the genophage & Geth questions!
To me, those are the real selling points of the game. Also, "citadel" is my favourite piece of DLC of any game
Exactly what you said is why I’m fine with the endings to the game. Everything else gets wrapped up with all the other characters. That pretty much is the ending
I played thru the games recently with the hd remaster but I don’t know if I did the citadel dlc. Was going to start a new character playthru and would like to make sure to do all the content this time. I wish there was more time in the day lol
"I'm friedipar and this is my favorite dlc on the citadel."
You are joking right? Sarcasm is hard to tell on the internet sometimes.
I wasn't fine with the endings. My Shepard believes deeply in free will, but no matter what choice you makes on the Citadel it takes the free will from either many beings or all beings and that's BS. I didn't bust my ass off creating peace between the Geth and the Quarians just to commit genocide, or the horror show of forcing all biological life to become partially synthetic which left me with control as the only option...which is not a happy ending for Shepard by any stretch of the imagination and frankly he earned a small amount of happiness after everything he did for the galaxy. I mean is his consciousness forever locked into a reaper platform never to know love or life again...for eternity? No, I'll just stick with Audemus' Happy Ending Mod and pretend it's cannon.
ME1 was one of my favorites back in its day. I played through at least once for every character class. In 2008, I became so sick that I almost died. Lying in an ICU, I thought "If I die, I'll never find out how Mass Effect ends." Imagine my disappointment.
I would have flat lined
Didn't Mass Effect 1 come out in 2007 though?
@@griffingower1883 The ending of ME1 shows you that stopping Sovereign only slowed down the Reapers' invasion.
@@eugeneferguson5987 And the ending of Arrival has you kill over 300000 Batarians to prevent the Reapers from arriving through their personal back door by literally slamming an asteroid into a Mass Relay, what's your point?
It was a good ending, although it was a sad ending. Wish it could have ended some other way and more, I wish it is resurrected in some way for Mass Effect 4. Andromeda was rubbish. And, oh yea, I hope you are well now and that you can wait in anticipation for the next real instalment of Mass Effect....
I do think Mass Effect 3 deserves more credit than it gets and I do think they had way too much on their plate to deal with. Couple that with growing pressure from EA and the original ending getting leaked and they really had everything working against them. However, while I don't necessarily blame Bioware, bad writing is bad writing. It is my favorite of the three though. The combat, especially the multiplayer, still holds up to this day and while not as dynamic as Andromeda, I do find it way more satisfying.
If Bioware was smart they should have stayed with the leaked ending instead of giving us these same 3 color endings with small differences.
What was the leaked ending? I've never heard about it
@@seal2560 It was essentially that the reapers were harvesting organic life to slow the spread of dark energy, which was the byproduct of eezo. It was hinted at a few times in 2, like with Tali's recruitment mission, and even had a couple mentions in 3 as well.
Mass effect 3 was just the same ole same ole as mass effect 2 combat wise with even worse writing
@@clintbeastwood5116 But was it really the intended ending and did it really leak? Because what I've read is that they just didn't know how to end it (the writer who came up with the dark energy stuff had left) so they had to come up with something new regardless.
Yeah... no. If I can play as the greatest hero who saves the Rachni, saves all the colonists on Feros, saves the Salarian STG team on Virmire, saves the Council, continues to play as the ultimate Paragon through all the missions (saving/sparing others like Niket, Maleon, Aresh, David Archer etc), bringing my entire squad home from the Suicide Mission, denying Cerberus the base, curing the genophage, saving the Rachni (again), and bringing peace to the Geth and Quarians, or play as the ultimate Renegade, killing the Rachni, indiscriminately killing Feros colonists, abandoning the STG team, killing the Council, killing/sacrificing the aforementioned others, sacrificing squad members, giving Cerberus the base, betraying the Krogan to the genophage, killing the Rachni (again) and committing genocide against either the Geth or Quarians - and get the exact same red, blue or green endings and explanations - then no, ultimately none of those choices mattered.
By siding with the Geth and then chooses the destroy ending. You can genocide both the Quarians and Geth.
Which is why I can't bring myself to finish me3. That's after pre-ordering it, playing through the entire game with 100% campaign completetion in 36 hours with 8 hours of sleep. I blitzed it. And all I get is an ending full of plot holes the ignore everything else.
Ending of the citadel dlc, when shepard says silently "the best" always cracks me up
The "You did good son (kid), you did good. I'm. Proud of you" scene from Anderson has to be the saddest moment in the trilogy for me. I have played these games multiple times and did 4 complete playthroughs just last year after the remastered trilogy came out and it still make me water up so hard every time!!!! May as well have Forest Gump telling Jenny's grave how proud he is of Forest Jr.!!!!
Roll tide!!!
For me it was talking to garrus, romanced tali, wrex, and kaiden on earth. It basically sank in I was gonna die and this was the last time my shepard would see his best friends
@@raditzhoneyham That's a really good one too.
If they had just ended with that, the Crucible docking and the Reapers being defeated (or not if your War Assets we too low), I could've been okay with the ending.
Idk what they have planned with ME4, and after Andromeda, I'm not sure I care.
@@Deafwing There were some speculations going on about a different ending structure altogether, based on your EMS (Effective Military Strength / War Asset) rating, where certain choices were locked out if you didn't have a high enough score. A fifth, secret ending would open up if the player had a perfect playthough (a really high EMS rating)
I think it was nice that bioware chose Vancouver Canada to start the game since it's the hometown of the mass effect bioware team. It just shows how personal this game was to them. They put a lot of heart into this.
The beginning was at Vancouver Canada ? I've always thought that they were in london
@@rayclay3249 No, they get a feed from London showing it being attacked in the chamber with the admirals at the beginning, and then the Reapers show up and start destroying Vancouver.
@@justaguy8218 I never noticed that. Nice catch
Bioware is located in Edmonton. Not Vancouver.
@@rayclay3249
Bioware is located in Edmonton. Not Vancouver.
My biggest issues with ME3 were the ending, Kai Leng in general, and the bit with the Rachni queen. Which culminated with plus or minus a couple hundred points. Yay? I think what would have been amazing is all the forces you saved along the journey in all three games joined you in the final battle. How amazing would it be if there were Rachni and Geth and the Quarians all fought side by side because of YOUR efforts!
Kai Leng meant nothing to people who never read the book. Maybe if he had been around in Mass Effect 2 and he was helping you out or was even a companion. But he just appears from nowhere and he's essentially the final boss of all three games. Kai Leng was a slap in the face.
The fake queen was meant to be similar. It is the body of a queen with reapers adding parts to make it work
The Rachni should have been Sovereigns ticking clock. The vanguard wakes up when the galaxy has reached the point of killing the most powerful organic species the reapers had faced. The Queens couldn’t be indoctrinated. Javik knew of them from his cycle and rachni communication means theoretically a hibernating reaper could have been responded to their deaths subconsciously. Basically, the rachni war is a repeating thing the reapers use to force some form of galactic unity/accelerate the cycles. That is why they can and do make the fake queen so easily. They need to prepare Rachni for the next cycle. If you saved the queen in Noveria. Her forces should appear looking for the new queen. If you spoke to her again through the Asari in Mass Effect 2. The rachni soldiers don’t attack you and you can recruit the fake queen as a war asset that doesn’t betray you, because the true queen is there to shut her up. The amount of soliders the true queen has also gets affect by talking to her asari ally in ME2. Since if the asari recognises Shepard. She can ask for help and Shepard gets the Krogan and Rachni soldiers to work together. If this doesn’t happen, the rachni queen goes from 100 war assets to 60
That, and the Normandy sitting as a duck in front of Harbinger for Shepard to say his love goodbyes...
I always thought Leng should've just been Miranda
And Kai Leng was a bastard, too; an indoctrinated one like his master.
I'm pretty sure the main reason why the endings overshadowed everything else is because pre release Casey Hudson said the endings will account for player choices, they won't be just A, B or C... but that's exactly what we got. The expectations didn't came out of nowhere, Bioware hyped it time and again.
At release there wasn't even an epilogue and the one added by Extended Cut left a lot to be desired.
It is impressive that they managed to assemble this game in just 22 months. If EA wasn't EA and gave them one more year, it would've been heralded as one of the greatest instead of one that dissapointed everyone.
It didn't disappoint me, it's my favourite game of all time. 🤷♂🤷♂🤷♂️
What bothered me a lot was how absurdly powerful Cerberus were in this game. It really hurt the immersion for me.
Reads a lot better when you just assume Cerberus is a front organization for the Reapers.
I don't know it makes sense to me if they could do shit like they did in ME2. They had so much money and power they are kind of like the shadow broker on steriods. It makes sense to me that they were able to amass so much power when they didn't care about ethics at all they can make a lot of money when they'll do anything for power.
I remember going back to 2 and talking to EDI after being unshackled and she said Cerberus is at that moment including Shepard and the Normandy crew in its entirety, made up of I think it was 136 individuals. Than 6 months later and you’re killing minimum 136 Cerberus agents every time you have a damn mission? I’m not even against the low number it’s just the absurdity of that number swell that always gets me. My headcanon is that the Cerberus ground forces were already being produced and used, but the 136 number is only indicative of key personal and researches ala every names Cerberus character you meet, I can see them not counting the ground troops especially with how modified and indoctrinated they are, it’d be very Cerberus move to not even acknowledge them in the grander scheme of who’s who. They tools for those 136 individuals to use
@@TheScientificBackpacIt’s been too long since I’ve last played ME2 (currently running through the trilogy again via LE, and am in the middle of ME1). But I could’ve sworn that EDI mentioned there being an unknown number of Cerberus cells she doesn’t have the information on.
This was done intentionally in the event that if one of the cells gets burned, the rest won’t be compromised as a result. If this is the case, and Bioware really wanted to stretch the suspension of disbelief, then I suppose you could theorize that the Illusive Man (assumedly being the only one with an overview of all operations) was already going forward with rapid expansion/militarization during and following the two years it took to complete Project Lazarus.
This in and of itself I guess wouldn’t be too big of a leap, given the scope of other known Cerberus research endeavors like Project Overlord. But I also seem to remember Miranda mentioning that Cerberus had sunk a huge amount of their resources into resurrecting Shepard/reconstructing the Normandy.
Ultimately, I think it’s a bit far-fetched that TIM was able to create as large of a military force as he had in ME3 given the circumstances. Especially if he really didn’t start until after Shepard finished offing the Collectors, which would have only given him like half a year. That’s not to mention how he was able to keep all of those people/resources under the Alliance’s notice leading up to the Reaper attack. Ultimately probably just Bioware needing to pad out the enemy variety in ME3’s combat beyond the indoctrinated reaper foot-soldiers. Kai Leng alone points to that mindset pretty strongly.
why? its obvious why they had so much power
Imagine if they had another year or even 2 to develop ME3... it would have been such a triumphant achievement. All the choices that got biffed or character replacements that felt wrong could have been righted. The ending could have been something else entirely that would have pleased a lot more people, I think.
Two years wouldn't have suddenly made the ending any better unless they had a different writing team. The length of the ending is irrelevant to the quality. It was like five minutes long, they could have done a lot more in the time they had than what we got.
@@tournesol99 they got pushed into the ending due to time constraints. The colors were placeholders by the writing team and not meant to be a part of the end, but the people at the top that wanted a game yesterday said to run with it. Not to mention the fact that every ending looks the same... More time could have allowed that to not be like that.
@@devynn7x Agree with you there. But the writing behind those choices and the way it unfolds in game could have been a heck of a lot better. Time constraints pushed them to make a short ending, but the quality of that ending falls on the writing team. More time doesn't automatically make writing better. It just lets you write more.
@@tournesol99
They only had time constraints because BioWare, and especially their Mass Effect teams, are lousy. Good developers, sure. But the leading of those teams royally suck. Them and their idiotic "BioWare magic". The impression one gets throughout the years is that they leave the developers roaming free for way too long and are then surprised when they don't have enough good results. Things that just shouldn't happen at such a company, but...
The fact that their writers for the endings (it was written by Casey Hudson and Mac Walters, if I remember correctly) suck certainly didn't help. I remember reading an article where it was obvious that two people only wrote the ending - the rest of the writing team didn't get any input. That's certainly not how you write a good ending.
And EA wanted it to be released in 2011. One year after ME2.
Javvik never should have been separated from the main game
The primary complaint many people had with ME3 was that Bioware said that the ending would be completely determined by your choices. Instead we had to choose Red/Blue/Green explosion, which is exactly what they said wouldn't happen. So it's more a case of under delivering on promises rather than the endings being bad.
it would have been better to not have a final choice. just let the cruicible always destroy the reapers, just that whether or not you can execute it, and the outcome of it all depends on your choices in the game.
like maybe you NEED the rachnii in order to do something, or without the geth then EDI needs to sacrifice herself to fire off the cruicible. things like that, rather than the player choosing red green blue which are artificial, meaningless choices.
@@shriramvenu That's exactly what Bioware promised it would be. They did Red/Blue/Green instead.
@@shriramvenu war assets determine which major characters survive the final conflict would make gathering them feel worthwhile
The problem with the ending isn't that it didn't branch enough. The problem is that the structure of the ending is broken. At the end of the game, Shepard's choices are made. There should be no more choices. Instead, they shoehorn a choice into the ending by introducing a new character, main antagonist, and an incompatible central conflict in the final 15 minutes. This is not good story telling.
"You did good son, you did good. I'm proud of you." - a quote every son should here from his father. Combined with this music... man the Anderson scene hit every time!
hear*
I'm not proud of you.
I don't care when you play this game, you're going to cry. There will be tears. You can't help it.
I have played this game since September endlessly. I think it has helped me mentally deal with my mother's illness and residence at a healthcare facility.
This game tests one's morality. We'll all say that we won't do so and so. But when this game puts you to the test, you find out what you will and will not tolerate.
There is one thing that I can't bring myself to do. it is kill off Kaidan on Virmire. I can't do it. It just doesn't feel right. There should have been a way to save both or just had one in the first place.
@@mljohnson6072 Completely agree. Thode games were something else.
Tbh I never had any huge gripes with ME3. I don't get where the hate comes from.
The biggest issue with ME3 that I had was that all of the advertising used the phrase "Take Back the Earth" or something like that. It created an expectation that we were going to kick the reapers out through a big military campaign, but we just ended up sneaking in to press an "I win" button.
I love the whole game. The WHOLE game. I played all 3 games every year or two just because they don’t make experiences like this anymore
When they were first out I played them through dozens of times. Probably the most I have played any non love service game. I have just finished a full back to back insanity play through and I am blown away how much they still stand out.
@@bigmol1633 I’m on my 6th or 7th play through of the series I think and I still can’t get sick of them.
THANK you. I feel fucking insane, I really don't get what the problem is with the ending. I loved every second of this series.
Same. I played the trilogy on PC, PS3 and then the LE on XBox One X and now on PS5. It has a hold on me like no other game.
I haven’t played any of them in 10 years
Just finished the remasters the other day, most of 1 and all of 2 and 3 (I couldn’t stand 1s gameplay, it’s way too dated and I actually never played it before. Fantastic story, but like KOTOR I can’t play those games again, gaming has just jumped so far ahead to where it wasn’t enjoyable to play anymore) and I couldn’t believe how much of an influence this series had on my most formative years.
In that time since I’ve played them, I’ve been in management, and realized that my main approach to it (building personal connections with employees and genuinely caring about them as people to bolster morale) was exactly how I played Paragon Shepard.
I owe so much to this universe and it didn’t take til literally a few days ago for me to realize it.
Now that I finished it, that shit hit hard. Now I got nothing to play, nothings gonna hit the same for a while.
Yeah, 3s ending is kind of crappy, but it’s still my favorite to play. The tone was nailed perfectly, the gameplay is the best of the trilogy, and there’s so many quality of life improvements that it’s one I can easily play again, and again, and again without burnout.
Ive always said this! Best game I've ever played if you take out the last 15 min. But now PC can enjoy the happy ending mod and feel even better about the ending.
idk what you guys call happy ending but the way the game was made to end imo and the best ending is when you make bio and mech live together and become one, that's like the answer to stopping the cycle, the synths would stop human nature to self destruct. And it feels stupid to kill Edi or the geth seeing how much they helped. Actually Geth > Tali and her people, they are the victims and their only fault was becoming self aware like other living creatures. Sheppard dying is what heroes usually do, most people are just dumb and wish their character lived, I assume most of them being console casual gamers.
Look up the happy ending mod. But no I wholeheartedly disagree with you synthesizing ending is a cop out. You have played 3 games where shepherd's only goal was to destroy the reapers he/she wouldn't waver.
@@deathjunky "he/she wouldn't waver" The player is Shepard, the players gets to decide, tbh I always loved the two favorite endings Femshep Renegade Destruction which makes shepard have tunnel vision to destroy the Reapers even if he/she has to sacrifice friendships along the way.
And Paragon shepard control which turns him into a moral compass for the universe.
@@deathjunky I would counter that Shepard's experiences with Legion (and the Geth consciousness) and EDI would make her reconsider her goal to destroy the Reapers if it meant the destruction of all synthetic life in the galaxy. I don't think my Shepard could make that sacrifice. If synthesis ended the cycle and stopped the Reapers from destroying advanced organic life, that would be preferable to sacrificing synthetic life for the sake of organic.
Edi isn't technically synthetic she could be backed up and put in another body.
Catalyst says shep will die because of all the implants, doesn't make sense its not a reaper. Its just metal devices by that logic all ships, citadel included should be obliterated their "synthetic" going by the games logic. Yet Shep only breathes at the end after the destroy end. So if Shep's alive the quarians should be too. Its just a suit. Crucible was built before quarians had the suits so it shouldn't even target it.
Sighhh, its why we all dislike 3s end.
3 is actually my favorite until the end. Then I downloaded the happy ending mod and now it's amazing
That mod is so scuffed though. Poor guys really need a better microphone.
@@janisir4529 for legendary edition Audemus’ Ending mod is like a spiritual successor to MEHEM & better quality, if you have LE on pc
@@Dreadwing1000 You can also get the CEM (Citadel Ending Mod) in tandem with AHEM to get the true happy ending experience, as like Big Dan, I too think the Citadel DLC is the true happy ending to the trilogy
Things ive learned from playing other rpgs which have a similar premise of "your choices matter" is it's extremely difficult to incorporate all these different outcomes while also trying to tell a story a certain way, a compromise is usually sought where they can have the story play out with some of the choices you made present. I feel this is what Bioware went into, they put telling a story over choices, they wanted the story to play out a certain way regardless of the choices made, it's hard to have impactful choices without it messing up the story to a point that it might not be satisfying, or make any sense. So we ended up getting those endings, which ultimately led to players feeling like their choices mattered little.
True and when they were making mass effect 3 bioware wrote themselves into a corner and they had about a year and a half to make the game which is less time the original games had.
Come on man.. they managed to wrap up the genophage, quarian and geth conflict, the citadel conflict with the virmire survivor with incredible outcomes and varied choices.. They could have wrapped up the same way..
The main problem is that you all start the same (an alliance soldier), and gain the control and synthesis options without earning it..
You should have been able to side with cerberus to gain the control ending or side with the reapers and gain the synthesis ending..
i don't disagree but given that the ending was apparently written around late 2011, i feel that Bioware pinned themselves at a wall by writing the ending during the final months of development. They should have focused on writing the ending during the game's early phase of development because they had a near perfect blueprint in the form of ME2's Suicide Mission.
while it is difficult to incorporate all these different outcomes but if they followed the blueprint of ME2's Suicide Mission, then they could have achieved a near perfect ending where Shepard destroy the Reapers but there are a variety of outcomes (based from the mission tasks and EMS points overall).
Yea maybe one day they. Can make a game where the game creates itself as you make choices but I think that's pretty tough to do
@@Johnny-ux7yi Pretty much what I expected from the ending. Instead, Casey Hudson thought having a fan-boner over Deus Ex was a good idea and copy-pasta the ending was the only solution (BTW, it's the ORIGINAL Deus Ex game from 2000 he plagiarized. Look at the endings for that game and you'll know what I mean.)
The problem with the ending is that they gave us a choice. There is only one ending, destroy. Bioware thought that the players wouldn't be happy with no choices so they gave us control and synthesis. Synthesis doesn't make sense, it is just there as a feel good ending. Control is the ending of indoctrination as represented by the Illusive Man. The whole trilogy we are trying to protect organic life and only one ending does that. Also throughout the entire game we are told we can't save everyone. We have to sacrifice EDI to save all organic life and that is something she told us that she was willing to do. And one more thing, the star child is our enemy and may have lied to us. Shepard doesn't die if you have enough war assets and that could be the child lying to us or him being wrong but either way we may not have doomed all synthetic life with the destroy ending. We don't know how long we'll be able to control the reapers for in the control ending. We may just be lulling everyone into submission. And synthesis isn't an ending because nothing is explained except "Nobody dies" which goes against the entire trilogy's theme of sacrifice.
Well, the latest poster for ME4 implies Geth are involved. I think that they will canonize the destroy ending, and somehow allow EDI and the Geth to continue.
All these years later and we still talking about it, this by itself shows how much we cared about this series. To say it simple we are dissapointment not because "choices don't matter" but because we were sold two games on the pitch that "its all your choices"
I'm not mad that there are not more choices, i am mad that i ordered choices with action, not action with choices.
I think it's worth mentioning the Big Unexplained Implausibles. First, there was literally no reason for the Reapers not to follow their invasion plan laid out by Vigil in ME1. The Citadel should have been taken, the Relay system taken over and the worlds isolated. Two, there was literally no plausible reason that Cerberus could build such a vast and powerful army underneath every nose of every powerful society in the known galaxy.
For me the best part of this game was the side stories. Like the Asari who killed Joker's sister, or the girl waiting for her parents in the refugee area on the Citadel being comforted by the Turian C-Sec officer.
My absolute favorite meme about the ending was the picture of Casey Hudson talking about how all the endings would be unique, and then the other picture of him was him holding the pick a number and color origami game.
An absolute masterpiece of a game right up until the last 20 minutes. Have never seen a game take a nose dive quite like it since.
I agree on a lot of points, but there are some assertions being made I'm not sure I agree with in this video. Rather than go point by point, I'll just say this... I'm certain if Bioware made victory possible via conventional warfare (if you played the game perfectly), we wouldn't hear from half of the people who hate the ending; it would have had its detractors for sure, but it wouldn't have blown up like it did. And it would have made sense for Bioware to go that route and only added to Shepard's legacy as being this "uniting figure" that the Reapers never calculated or accounted for in any other cycle - the one guy who actually could unite the galaxy as a giant single collaborative force. I understand the arguments against this and what and how powerful the Reapers were suppose to be, but this just feels like a giant missed opportunity to me and for what? The devs to defend their star child endings and label it "art"? That's what really irritates me. Shepard could have literally united no one, happened to get aboard the star child ship, and we'd still have the same endings we have. It disminished everything Shepard (and the player) did. I'm still emotional about this 10+ years later lol
I felt the same. WTF was with the whining about the multiplayer? Sure they messed up in the beginning, making it mandatory, but then later they fixed it to being optional. But Dan is whining about having to do everything correctly to get the best ending? Seriously? That's kind of the fookin point of a game, right? Do everything correctly, and you get the best ending. I am sick to death of hearing people whine about multiplayer, and having to do everything a specific way to get the best ending. It's kind of the point of games. ME:OT is meant to be played different ways, and experience very different cut scenes as a result.
Was It so hard to make the Catalyst be a goddamn Death Star like It was implied to be since the start of the game and like any other space opera to begin with? Seriosly, they could have insisted in being unique in so many other aspects of this game, but no, they had to complicate the only concept that should be as simple as PRESSING A BUTTON.
Honestly, they could have gone for an ending where no matter what you do the Reapers win and the cycle continues. Even *that* level of piss-in-your-face would not have been as bad as what they did
I remember in the days leading up to the release of Mass Effect 3 (I only was introduced to the series about a year prior to its release, and had pretty much played nothing but ME and ME2 during that year, over and over), I was thinking that they better not introduce some kind of deus ex machina to solve the Reaper problem. Which is, of course, what they did with the Crucible and the Star Child. So that was extremely disappointing.
Normally I'd also be wary of choices being relegated to a mathematical formula, like War Assets, but I'm okay with that here because the sheer number of choices makes anything else unwieldy.
But as you said, I would have been much happier with an ending that used the combined might of all the races, or at least all those you recruited, to defeat the Reapers conventionally. Or at least some component that was like that.
@@dereka5017 Thumbs up.
My experience was the same as yours. Bought ME2 about a year before ME3 came out. Played 3 times. Then I decided I wanted to change things, so I looked at the comic that allows you to do that, but then saw that ME1 wasn't much more expensive.
So I downloaded that, and then went looking for a physical copy of ME3. Went to the closest Best Buy, but they were out, so an associate looked in their database, and found that only one was left in all of Jacksonville, so he called that store for me, and had them put it behind the counter at Customer Service. I drove straight there and bought it.
I had the N7 patch sewn onto a high quality black hat sold by a local uniform shop. I still have that hat, though it's seen better days, lol.
the whole 'choices dont matter' isnt about the scenes in the first two acts, those are well crafted, and entirely about the fact that the third act (point of no return onward) effectively ignores not just the previous two games, but 3/4 of THIS game save for an arbitrary number, and has a stupidly abrupt ending thats just "kaboom, its over". the extended cut fixed a lot of the abruptness, but it didn't fix the third act feeling hollow and samey nomatter how you play the games.
the worst part? fans actually FIXED this problem in it's entirety with mods. and guess what said mods do? add cameos to the battle of earth. im not joking. thats it. thats all it needed.
the final arc acknowledging a few key moments by swapping out a few npcs, little bit of comm chatter here, little bit of background action there, tinkering with a few space-battle animations playing in the background of the final room, or dropping in a few geth to fight extra enemies that were added solely for the geth have something to shoot at.
its not perfect, but thats because its being hacked together by people who arent exactly programmers or voice actors (and the fact that there's no clean way to replace Kai Lang with someone who isnt a joke), but its still a damn sight better than what bioware gave us.
Kie leing, cerberus ANSWER TO ANAKIN SKYWAKLKER!!???
I enjoyed Mass Effect 3 the most in my most recent legendary edition play through. I still hated the ending and had other issues with the story, but i chose to make the Citadel my ending and it worked for me. I still think the final act with Thessia was the weak link. Priority Earth was still absolutely awful with very weak level design. I hated the forced slow walk ending. Forced slow walk sections are probably sections of games I hate most. Thankfully I can appreciate Mass Effect 3 more for what it does right than what it does wrong. Mass Effect 2 is still my favorite.
Yeah, forced slow walks are annoying.
I’m also part of a very small minority that liked all three games, including the endings in ME3
1 had god awful combat and PLENTY of glitches... but after replaying the 360 version through again recently... I fucking hate 2. Attrocious UI, hollow and meaningless character arcs, god awful customization and weapon options, FUCKING AMMO BEING FORCED INTO THE GAME WITH NERFED LEVELING AND A RUINED INFILTRATOR CLASS, boring as FUCK linear levels with an awful final boss and forced race to the finish at a random arbitrary point that doesnt allow you to get to know legion without saving side missions for the epilogue, with major elements of the story ripped out and turned into DLC because fuck EA... major step down from 1 as an RPG turning the game into an action 3rd person shooter with paltry excuses for RPG elements....
3 had buttery smooth and satisfying (if rather repetitive) combat with improved leveling chimera'd from the best parts of 1 and 2. Plenty of writing complaints because EA Bioware... but the game gets far too much hate.
Hot take time: Priority Earth doesn't really look much worse than actual London.
@@janisir4529 Ah, a fellow Brit
@@gaven5479 I'm just a one time tourist
Personally i wouldn't mind fewer romances in entire trilogy, but each one of them with more screen time. They made too much options in me2, and then only add extra in me3 (diana allers wtf..) For player who plays once or even 3-4, 10 extra romances with some plain characters (jacob for example) don't matter.
Miranda and Jack should've made the cut in ME3. It was hugely disappointing that we couldn't spend more time with these awesome characters, and their romance suffered as a result.
completely agree. I love jack and always romance her. but she has so little screen time!
Well, I kind of liked having tons of options - sure some characters were bland (Kaidan and Ashley IMHO - especially Kaidan!) and annoying (Jacob, not to mention that he's a cheater! Damned, you were with Shep, no knocking up some scientists and then come crying for help...should have been able to punch him really hard! Just like we should have been able to tell everybody, repeatedly: I TOLD YOU SO! - From the annoying Turian Councillor, to the lying Asari (who kept a beacon for themselves!) and the damn Salarian, too and the Alliance leadership as well!)...but over all, the romances are one of the best things in any ME game :)
I feel like Dragon Age does romance so much better than ME. They could've just copy paste the DA romance formula and improve it a little. lol
It´s not a problem in the first game, because Shepard is just getting to know the realities of commanding his own ship, and the whole game kind of puts you on the clock from a certain point. However, there should definitely have been options for having romance way earlier in ME2 and ME3. It feels especially akward with Liara in ME3 after finishing the Shadow Broker DLC. Aside from a few playful conversations, you get no indication that the romance is even happening until right before Thessia. I get that the ME tradition is that the sex happens before the final mission, but by the third game, it´s just ridiculous.
There should have been an option to just lock into a romance with her right away and have her wake up next to Shepard when he has his nightmares. Even other previously romanced characters should have had that option. I mean, the world is ending, and people are wondering whether they should hook up or not?
Rewatching M3 recently, I honestly feel like this was 75% of an incredible game. There really is a lot of deep reactivity and plot rewards for things that occurred all the way back in ME1. How many other game series exist that even attempted to account for player choices two games ago? The payoff for *most* of the major conflicts they set up is really satisfying, and there are also a lot of really awesome companion moments. This game was incredibly ambitious, and I feel like if EA had not rushed the game and forced an insanely short development cycle, Bioware would have really delivered. Even with the crunch what they gave us was mostly great, endings aside. What the game really needed was 1 more year of development so they could write a more extended ending and epilogue that accounts for the player choices in a more meaningful, detailed way. Actually getting to see all the war assets you earned participate in the conflict and really take the offensive against the reapers. The main themes that the game really tried to develop were the ideas of cooperation despite species differences, heroism in difficult circumstances, and the conflict between organic and synthetic lifeforms. I think the main problem with the current endings is that they don't really provide a satisfactory culmination to the themes the series had been built on - players wanted Shepard to be a hero, but instead he kind of arbitrarily decides everyone's fate, and most of the endings involve a significant betrayal of the people who helped you get there.
Absolutely. I had 8271 assets, which is almost the maximum you can get, and I had all the stuff that goes into the Crucible design. Yet, I couldn't choose to destroy only the Reapers and save EDI and the Geth, who I helped grow and with whom I brokered peace, gaining their assistance in the final battle? I had to lump all synthetic life together, instead of deciding the Reapers were the stagnant force that destroyed life, and EDI and the Geth chose to be better, work with organics, and grow? That really pissed me off.
When a game's whole marketing revolves around the significance of the player's choices, people expect something that lives up to what was promised. And when promises aren't kept, people will naturally get upset, especially when the promise was so colossal like with Mass Effect.
ME3 had too much to do, and too much to wrap up, because ME2 went on a side quest instead of setting up a solid story like a proper sequel.
But the ending was a case of 'know when to stop'. End with Anderson and Shep dying side by side as the Crucible fires. Fade to black. Ending slides and voiceover rounding things off. Would have been fine.
The storylines of Tuchanka and Rannoch were definitely the highlights of ME 3. And Tali is my 2nd favorite character of the trilogy but after that Geth virtual mission there was no way I was going to side with the Quarians. Thanks to your deep dive vids I never realized just how much I lucked into the “peace” ending with my choices in the first two games. So I’m glad I never had to let Tali die.
The geth tried wholesale slaughter instead of trying to fight for peace.
Citadel DLC was the epic ending we all wanted for sure. I loved it. It was pure, see-through fan service and I'm here for it.
The love for the "Steve!" dialogue bug always makes me happy. Good vid!
If you share the disgusting anger of how Bioware mistreated Ashley (it is not that there shouldn't have been fights with A/K on ME2, it is how they were just used as a passing cameo and Liara never bothered to tell them of what she did and instead of apologizing in LOTSB she claims A/K are shortsighted to not blindly trust Shepard unlike Wrex, Tali and Garrus AND in ME3 how half of her content is bugged and was turned into Barbie with guns when she had the most potential out of the two VS to shine (her grandfather and TIM knew each other) she gets the Kasumi/Zaeed treatment and after spending one entire game without her and half of the 3rd game with her on the hospital it is still BS how Bioware has never cared tp restore the dialog she has with Liara post Coup or extended lines during the memorial with her sister as well the Citadel date) know that there is a blink and you miss it conversation that only happens between her as Tali but, you have to do the mission with the Rachni (which were underused) and then do Tuchanka so that when you finish Priority Rannoch you do the Turian Patrol with her and Garrus (she expresses concern of the wellbeing of Lt Victus and wants to be kept aware of how he is on the Normandy) and then take her and Tali to the bomb mission, beyond her and Tali expressing a PTSD breakout on the ride back to the Normandy they both have a banter with Tali mentioning how it reminded her of Virmire to which Ash ask if Tali heard when she spoke of it back on the shuttle (someone is still suffering from ME1 survivors guilt) and then they both proceed to discuss the people they lost up to that point and Tali asks Ash how it feels knowing someone had to die so that she got to leave (out of concern of her lost teams in ME2 and if someone lost their live on the Suicide Mission she talks to that instead) and Ash just says that it feels heavy as she knows that there will be a time she will die to save someone else and all that perished will be looking on her to make sure she does the correct thing.
Bioware decided to make her the ship drunk rather than exploring that event more.
"Barbie with guns".
Lol, agreed. In ME1&2 she had a modest appearance of a regular soldier, whereas in ME3 she apparently becomes a supermodel as a side gig. Yet Kaiden remains mostly unchanged, because apparently no one cares about Kaiden.
The biggest irony of her change of appearance in ME3 is the fact that she was quite a feminist in ME1, so during one optional cutscene, if you chose the bottom "renegade" lines which makes Shepard rant about humanity's beautiful women, Ashley makes quite a snarky response: "If you want to see me in skirt and high heels, I want dinner first."
I guess Shepard must've taken her out on quite a dinner just before the start of ME3.
@@GTAVictor9128 big time.
@@GTAVictor9128 What is the deal with her having heels as part of her armor? That makes zero sense. Also, her dialogue sucks. In the first game, she had some pretty intelligent insights into life and such, and read deep poetry. Suddenly, in ME3, she is either drunk or still whining and complaining. She is great in a fight, but her character isn't done well at all. Tali has such amazing growth and comes to believe in herself and separate herself from her father, and Liara also really shows growth.
Also, and this is just a former soldier complaining, but she went from a high-ranking non-commissioned officer (I'm guessing Operations Chief is an E-8) to a Lieutenant Commander, which is an O-4, three ranks and about ten years of service as a commissioned officer. She is a Marine, so they could have given her a Commission for sure, but she would have been a Lieutenant. Since Shepard calls her Lieutenant half the time anyway, instead of Commander, which is what you call a Lieutenant Commander when speaking to them, then it would make sense. Also, she is a Marine, so she wouldn't go to Lieutenant Commander anyway, but to Major.
I had previously thought about romancing her with Male Shepard through the whole trilogy, but I decided against it with what little you get from her as a character in ME3. Even the ME2 love interests, other than Jacob, all give you more and grow more than Ashley. I'm not saying Jacob doesn't grow, but rather that he isn't an option for you in ME3, since he is attached to another woman and having a baby.
Really glad I’m not the only one who feels like Ashley’s character got way worse in ME3. They really stripped her of all her charm and confidence, yet some people think she’s better like this cause there’s no racism; but Ashley had more than that going for her and it’s gone too.
@@justaguy8218 what is bonkers is the character dialog of her that is bugged in ME3 since the original release of the game that Bioware has been ignoring.
This game was so good that, to be honest, the ending not even matter. This is still the best game of all time.
Having just finished me3 for the 100th time I really do love this series. I do feel tho harbinger really deserved a last stand battle or seeing as he is the star child that should be his voice. Like it is if you decide to do nothing and the cycle continues he says "so be it" just seems 2 games of knowing and fighting harbinger for nothing to end it. Just my opinion tho
I agree Harbinger needed to be more present and god forbid speak in ME 3. They built him up so much in 2 that it seems like they forgot about him I’m 3.
All they had to do was make Harbinger possess the Illusive Man on the Citadel. But no.
I was absolutely furious with the ending after I complete mass effect 3 for the first time
Absolutely and positiviely livid
It felt so hollow, and unfulfilling
@Big Dan Gaming The claim "your choices don't matter" isn't about ME3 in general, but about the finale. What you did with the Genophage, Quarian-Geth War, War Assets, and who you saved or sacrificed mean absolutely nothing when it comes to the 3-color choice at the end, outside of unlocking all the options, which is all a background metric that goes unseen by the player. Garnered peace on Rannoch? Doesn't matter, Star-child dismisses it out of hand. Talked to Leviathan? Cool, Star-child doesn't care. Sabotaged the Genophage? Doesn't matter with Synthesis. Chose the Geth and helped EDI-Joker, that's all gone with Destroy.
On first playthrough, the overwhelming implication from the game is that you might as well have skipped all the rest of the game, and probably even ME1 & 2, and just come straight to the Star-child, because nothing else matters.
This alone should get you free drinks. You hit the nail on the head here.
6:48 Two things in-universe:
1) Canada is part of the United North American States, along with Mexico and the USA. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that, especially with past climate change, the Systems Alliance doesn’t want to put a facility near Washington DC.
2) The Systems Alliance has multiple facilities on earth, it just happens that Vancouver is where they put this particular facility. I know they have N training in Rio, and other facilities elsewhere on earth.
I think the main thing with "your choices don't matter" is...they do matter throughout the rest of the game, but indeed in the finale it seems like they don't matter at all.
And I don't expect them to have...like...100 different endings, or anything. That'd be crazy. It's just...it provides you choices, which are unlocked by your war assets...for no reason? Like...WHY does Synthesis require high war assets? There's no connection. It's just an arbitrary threshold you have to meet that will arbitrarily award you with extra choices, even though there is no logical reason the stupid star child should offer you more options due to having more war assets.
The other issue I have with it is, conceptually, it feels like Priority: Earth should mirror ME2's suicide mission on a grander scale. Like, the suicide mission was, if you completed all the loyalty missions, fully upgraded your ship, and assigned everyone to the correct tasks, you should do well in the suicide mission if not defy the odds and have everyone survive. It feels like the grand finale of ME3 should be set up a similar way; you've spent three games building up respect, connections, and influence, and you've spent all of ME3 getting commitments from Asari, Turians, Quarians, Geth, Salarians, Krogans, Hanar, Drell, Volus, Rachni, Batarians, Vorcha...scraping together whatever factions you can. It feels like it's leading up to a similar "suicide mission" where you've gathered all this might, and depending how you play your cards you might be able to win, if not stomp. But, instead, this isn't an option at all, you have to follow the snotty star child's limited options that have nothing to do with anything. The expanded ending even added that "refuse" option, and it's just "lol, you lose automatically, get fucked". Pretty shitty.
Some would argue they made the Reapers too overpowered for this sort of ending to make sense and...well, that's Bioware's problem, and honestly I don't really care anyway. I really feel like that was the ending they should have gone for. It just feels like that's the natural endpoint, where everything should lead. The structure, the themes of the game...uh, basic storytelling practices, all lead to it.
As far as the Synthesis ending...the one they're pushing you toward...honestly, I don't really get it. First of all, I barely even know what it means to create a synthesis between organic and synthetic life. I also don't think this would "solve racism" (er, anti-synthetic prejudice or whatever). Second, it seems like a huge violation of people's consent too just suddenly change the state of being of everyone in the galaxy. Third, it just sorta accepts the premise that synthetics are destined to wipe out organics, which seems bad when the events of the game have been moving toward a mutual respect (at least, if you resolved the Quarian-Geth conflict). Fourth, I thought a theme of the series was overcoming differences and strength in diversity, and making all beings homogenous seems to go against that. It's just...this ending doesn't fit with anything any of the games were going for. It's just weird.
When players say your choices don't matter it is in regards to the ending and that is correct. Your choices don't matter and Casey Hudson and other Bioware staff lied about the endings.
I think I would have had less of a criticism of 'choices don't matter' if the Missing Scouts/Rachni Queen mission was simply not available in a game where Shepard killed the Rachni Queen in the first game. In such a game, Grunt should be present on Tuchanka.
For the Citadel DLC, my favorite line is if you bring Javik with you to the archives before Shepard gets locked in the vault and you choose the Renegade option and interrupts/
Shepard: Then, I'm going to take BOTH your heads and space them out the airlock!
Javik: Finally.
I will never forget the Mass Effect 3 ending. It’s such a shame all their wonderful work over 3 games was undone by the ending. As I’ve gotten older I really appreciate the scope and ambition fro the game. The great thing about this series is the fact that there is so much replayability. You can pick a different class/gender, change your choices and take different squad mates to check out different dialogue.
Just yesterday I played the level where you fight clone Shepherd and for the first time I saw the cut scene where EDI gets disconnected from the Normandy and she goes crosseyed. That was the best. 😊
@@XunluT Question: Do you think that would have been too Saturday morning cartoonish of an ending? Meaning… after how bad this was and how many people died would it have been too over the top to hug and laugh after it all ended?
I do agree that War Assets should have dictated your success of your final mission and lot just the color of explosion fans god.
My biggest pet peeve for ME3 was how similar the game was even if you killed all/most of your squad mates in the earlier games. My son and I both played ME3. He killed almost everyone in the suicide mission. I saved everyone. I didn't like how they just replaces people but the story/scenes were basically the same. I think if you didn't save most of your squad then the game should have been a little harder. You should have had to convince the new (replacement) people of your worth in order to get them to follow you. Instead my son and I had almost the same game he just had some replacement characters. Seemed a bit sloppy to me. Other than that I loved the game. The colored ending was kinda dumb but that isn't enough to make me discount the rest of the trilogy.
I loved the silversun strip characters who were essentially commentary on the multi-player. My favorite was the sentinel who would go on and on about how detonating tech armor was the right answer for all circumstances.
I'm also a huge fan of the n7 fury making fun of loot boxes
My problem with the ending is that ending is that in the end its really all for nothing.
All your sacrifices everything you have done and it comes down to Red Green Blue endings.
In Mass Effect one the way Vigil tells of the attack of the reapers and later through Javiks dialog, you get the impression that the Reapers are strong yes.
They are like a group of naked men attacking a nest of killer bees
A single bee we can kill with little difficulty.
2 or 5 they will get a sting or two in, but in the end they will still DIE.
The entire nest attacks you We may kill a dozen or so but in the end WE will be the losers.
Same thing with the Reapers they are strong yes, but they are very much dependent on isolating the various intelligent civilizations to their individual planets.
Because if the galaxy ever united against them, the Reapers would be like the group of naked men against the killer bees, the Reapers would LOSE.
Well turns out that was all a red herring didn´t matter if the entire galaxy united against them, they would still kick our asses.
Also whats the deal with killing the protagonist at the end of a trilogy?
Its like Bioware didn´t know to do with Shepard and just said fuck it.. he dead.
A far more appropriate ending (in my opinion) would have been if you had gotten enough resources you could reject the crucibles offer and then actually WIN over the Reapers.
Sure it would mean a galaxy that more or less looked like Berlin immediately after WW2.
Most civilizations would be in shambles as most of their infrastructure was gone and their home worlds was mostly left as a smoking ruin.
It would mean at least a generation or two of mass starvation and death.
But the cycle was broken forever.
As for Shepard have his ending be dependent on his various personal relationships.
If he was just a bastard to everyone, well he would end up dead through an "accident".
If it was more neutral middle of the road he would live, but end up alone abandoned by everyone.
If his score was at a maximum he would end up with the one he romanced and retired or maybe with a job either as the academy or part of the new council.
Either way his military career was over.
Personally i think it would have been a much better ending and Mass Effect 4 could actually be a thing, rather than what we got in Andromeda.
Try an imagine playing as a new character, appointed by the council desperately trying to hold the galaxy together as mass starvation, sickness, civil unrest ravages the galaxy.
Alot of Mass relays are either destroyed or barely functioning.
Many a supply routes have been destroyed and the few remaining aren´t enough to supply everyone...
And you are dropped in the middle of it all, trying desperately to maintain order in an ever crumbling galaxy.
Absolutely loved this video, for the ones who have a major part of their life defined by this franchise, this is one of the absolute best videos out there.
With that said, I know you have enough videos on this topic and I have watched almost all of them, it would be awesome if you made a video on every decision to be made step by step so that the majority, if not all of the squadmates or good NPC(s) survive and the game leaves a warm and fuzzy feeling in our tum-tum instead of thinking about the ones lost, other than characters like mordin who had to die. This would be greatly appreciated.
I should go!
I agree. Big Dan should do that! I have never succeeded at having all squad mates live and the warm fuzzy ending. But I am not a huge fan of Multiplayer either and you have to do those in the original version.
Citadel DLC + Take Back the Earth mod + Happy Ending mod = ideal Mass Effect 3 experience.
I would swap out the cyberninja guy for a Cerberus resurrected indoctrinated Ashley/Kaiden though as I think it would be more effective to give Shepard a personal nemesis instead of just some random edgelord.
I would have given Cerberus less prominence. We are fighting the Reapers and yet half the time in the whole game we are constantly fighting a human "black ops" organization so powerful and resourceful that it challenges the might of the human Earth Alliance. WTF?
@@sergeontheloose agreed, I felt the game should’ve focused more on the reapers as well.
My only problem with legendary edition is simple bioware had a chanse to fix several mistakes like ending, cut content and etc. But bioware was like no and no plus they had option to contact modders and ask them for good content that coult been implemented as offical like EGM mod, take earth back mod and happy ending mod. Still good video mate.
My only problem with ME3 is the starchild thing. I think it is unnecessary and the game should end right when Shepard opens the Citadel, with the war assets points deciding good or bad ending.
Meta-problem: Drew Karpyshyn having left Bioware and Mac "the Hack" Walters taking over as head writer. The Genophage and Geth-Quarian arcs work because each squadmate kept their own writer, so Mordin and Tali etc are as moving as ever. But the overall story structure and especially the endgame are substandard. It's especially apparent from Cronos Station on that they were not just rushed, but papering over plot holes and their own lore-subversion, and tossing in both a deus and a diabolus ex machina- even before we get to the choice-of-Instagram-filters final ending.
I thought the Geth-Quarian arc changed writers?
Like I'm sure I remember reading or hearing somewhere that the guy writing them in ME2 explicitly said he didn't want to do the generic "I want to be a real boy" motive for the Geth instead making the Geth want to become a true hivemind and look down on the individuality of organics. But then in ME3 the Geth go and do the "I want to be a real boy" motive where they suddenly want individuality because a different writer took over even going so far as to retcon 'the question' from "Do these units have a soul" to "Does this unit have a soul".
actually it is not JUST the ending that is bad. It is just the ultimate symptom and final nail in the coffin that led to the rage. Most people have trouble articulating the buildup of bad writing in mass effect 3 that culminated in the rubbish nonsensical ending.
Playing through ME3 a lot of things just feel "off", but you put up with it because there are some good parts, and in the hopes that it ultimately leads somewhere good, but it unfortunately doesnt. which is why most people tend to take it out on the ending. but the problems with ME3 start from the very beginning with the poorly thought out space magic crucible plotline, and the change of cerberus to some all powerful comical 1D villain.
The Tuchanka arc is honestly the only truly well executed arc of ME3. Even Rannoch which you praise to high heavens is very problematic story and flow wise. and of course, everything just totally falls apart after Thessia. The lack of thought and rushed nature of the game really show through from there.
and when people say choices don't matter in ME3, they really don't, at least ultimately. Killed the rachnii queen? no biggie we'll just introduce a reaper resurrected version. and ultimately the rachnii don't play any significant effect one way or the other.
Destroyed the reaper base? Cerberus still gets reaper tech and the IM becomes indoctrinated regardless.
KKilled the geth heretics? Welp the geth will still side with the reapers, and we will retcon the geth to make them all "human" and sympathetic to make players suddenly want to save the genocidal villains of the first Mass effect.
and ultimately no matter what your choices throughout the games, the reapers always space magic the citadel to earth (despite ME1 establishing that the protheans sealed off reaper access to the citadel, or else they could have conquered the citadel at any time in ME3) and you have the suicidal space battle over earth and always make it to the beam to fire off the crucible and its' RGB ending of the reapers NO MATTER WHAT YOU DID THROUGHOUT THE TRILOGY.
The outcome is always the same. So no ultimately the player's choices didnt matter, because it just changes the flavour of shit bioware serves at the end of this wonderful franchise.
PS: and dont event get me started on starchild and the nonsensical synthetics vs organics crap that Mac Walters and Casey Hudson cooked up at the 11th hour.
Hear, hear. Too many people get hang ups with the ending, but that was only the results of the bad writing. Bad writing was all over the game if you look close enough and as you say, most choices mean absolutely nothing in the end. The original endings were 99% the same ending, just in different colors. Which certainly didn't help people to calm down. The fact that you couldn't possibly get access to all the endings at first without playing multiplayer, didn't help people calm down. The starchild... Yeah, great logical AI. Who argues that synthetics and organics can never get along. When I have made the Geth and Quarians sign a peace treaty. But you can't argue with him... Yeah, that will certainly make people happy, right?
Seems that many people have just forgotten how bad it was when ME3 just had released. The game isn't all that great to start with, and then to top that with things like having to play multiplayer and such... The Extended Cut made some things a bit better (made the endings just a bit more different, too). Sadly, it couldn't fix all the bad writing. If only it could.
I HAAAAATE it when people saying Bioware "HAD" to make the story accessable for new players but then fail to say why they had to do it. They didn't. and it hurts the rest of the game
I had always felt that if the original ME 3 had released on March 5th, 2013 (instead of March 6th, 2012), BioWare would’ve had enough time then to flesh out all the remaining story arcs of Santcuary, Horizon, & its final two missions - leading up to more positive weight & impact of its ME 3 ending.
But EA had to monopolize all that money as soon as possible. I still blame you EA for making games we’ve enjoyed for the last decade turn into empty husks 😖
I think the Catalyst should have been Shepard, or more specifically, the signal from the Prothean beacon from the first game. It should also be revealed that Shepard was _always_ the Catalyst, and a few select individuals had known it for some time, specifically Admiral Hackett, the Asari Councilor, the Illusive Man, and Leviathan. In fact, it could be revealed that the Illusive Man is indoctrinated, but not by the Reapers-but by Leviathan. The Prothean beacon, the Cypher from Feros, finding Javik, these were all Leviathan pulling the strings from afar through indoctrinated agents. Hackett and the Asari Councilor could have knowledge of Shepard being the Catalyst through the Illusive Man communicating with them clandestinely, without them knowing who is giving them the info. Basically Leviathan was a huge missed opportunity to explain how seemingly preposterous coincidences could happen, plot holes could be paved over, and giving the ending a feeling of being a trilogy-spanning effort. We learned about the Leviathan of Dis in the first game, and it would be really cool if that was the key to winning all along, the invisible hand that helped Shepard at key moments.
If there needed to be an AI interface to info dump all of this inside the Citadel, that interface should have been played by characters that were canonically dead in a given playthrough, starting with Jenkins from Eden Prime. Nihlus, Benezia, Saren, the Virmire Sacrifice, Udina, Anderson, Mordin, Thane, etc. could all take turns being the mouthpiece for the interface, rather than some sparkly ghost brat. If there were Suicide Mission losses, they could show up here as well. The scene could shift around, like a dream (being a virtual world) and could revisit memorable locations from all three games. Imagine talking to Benezia on a remote mountaintop of Noveria, looking down on Peak 15 labs. Or speaking with Nihlus and Jenkins together on a version of Eden Prime where there is no carnage or destruction, just a beautiful landscape. Mordin could appear on a transformed Tuchanka, a garden world once more. Thane could appear on Illium. Udina and Anderson could appear on Earth, as it was before the Reaper attack. The AI interface could reveal to Shepard that ever since they were touched by the Prothean Beacon on Eden Prime, they had begun the process of becoming a hybrid organic/AI being. It was this hybrid nature that allowed the Lazarus Project to happen at all, since Shepard's consciousness was stored _digitally_ within the techno-organic remains. The Illusive Man himself, an indoctrinated agent of Leviathan the whole time, would not have known this, but Miranda Lawson, who _wasn't_ indoctrinated, would have. This would give a little more retroactive cool factor to Miranda, who always played her cards close to the chest. She knew Shepard was part AI all along, but (possibly) loved him anyway. This could also be something that EDI knew, and one reason she trusted Shepard's counsel so much. *EDI was trying to become more like Shepard herself.*
I also think that the ‘choice’ angle of the ending was unnecessary. If you can only do one ending well, do one ending, well. Have there be lower-stakes alternate outcomes like ‘save the geth’ that are a result of choices earlier without there being some illusion of choice that ends up just being unsatisfying no matter what you pick. This is the part of the game where the results of Shepard’s actions and Shepard’s will should be revealed, not where Shepard makes a new choice.
The fact EA expected this game a year after 2 even with 2 having DLC is insane and I fully blame them for what happened with Mass effect 3.
absolutely in love with how you never miss a chance to mention the bug with Shepard screaming STEVE!!!!
46:15 The three Husketeers and Marauder Shields. Truly a legendary final boss death squad. 49:44 LMAO 🤣
I strongly suggest to try out the priority earth overhaul mod. It restores cut content and adds a bunch of allies and set pieces making that final push truly feel like a culmination of all your war assets. Sweetens the awful ending but thankfully, there's a mod for that too.
ME3, and the series as a whole, was amazing. I always felt the endings actually made sense, but there was one choice missing. The ultimate Paragon choice to allow Shepard to make the argument for diversity without synthesis- a "look how we came together, biological and synthetic, despite our differences" option.
It could even include a "buying time" component where the Reapers agree to retreat, but they'll continue to monitor because they still feel the galaxy will screw it up eventually. Even more, they see the merit of Shepard's argument, but they still aren't wholly convinced, so as a trade (and to end Shepard's arc), Shepard must "merge" with the Catalyst to allow the system to see from his point of view.
We close out with the Catalyst piece breaking away from the Citadel as it starts to move off with the remaining Reapers. A cease fire message, audio only, from Shepard to the fleets as the Reapers pull back everywhere. Finally, as all the Reapers begin to "warp" away, we see Joker turn slightly as if listening to something, and then take the Normandy to a previously unknown location. While the rest of the galaxy celebrates, the Normandy arrives at a planet where only the Catalyst ship stands. The crew get a last goodbye holographic message from Shepard, explaining the deal made, the strength in diversity, but unity that allowed them this opportunity, and a plea to make it all worth the cost. Finally, reassurance that a "part of me will always be out there... and we'll be watching."
One more ending that made trying to save everyone and settling differences worth it.
I wasn't fine with the endings. My Shepard believes deeply in free will, but no matter what choice you makes on the Citadel it takes the free will from either many beings or all beings and that's BS. I didn't bust my ass off creating peace between the Geth and the Quarians just to commit genocide, or the horror show of forcing all biological life to become partially synthetic which left me with control as the only option...which is not a happy ending for Shepard by any stretch of the imagination and frankly he earned a small amount of happiness after everything he did for the galaxy. I mean is his consciousness forever locked into a reaper platform never to know love or life again...for eternity? No, I'll just stick with Audemus' Happy Ending Mod and pretend it's cannon.
After adding the audemus happy ending mod, this game really feels like a great game. Highly recommend it.
I think the main problem with the ending is the linearity in the final mission. If you could see the difference that war assets make in the mission design, there wouldn‘t be the question of player choice anymore. Ultimately, some stories can‘t have Happy ends - ending a war that has lasted billions of years takes its price. The shallow taste in the end that unifies all ends in one flavour is the fact that Shepard will probably not live to see this future. But as the final arch of a character who has given to and has been given everything by his crew and friends I find it sad, but fulfilling.
19:41 If your shepherd is a sole survivor shep, then this his two biggest fears duking it out with each other and that’s thematic AF! Lol
Yeah when people said the choices didn’t matter, what comes to mind for me is when the Star Child said there couldn’t be an understanding and harmony between Synthetics and Organics after in my first play through I had just created a harmony between synthetics and organics. To me, that’s what I mean when I said my choices didn’t matter. I did all of these great things and yet the Star child was like LOL That doesn’t matter.
At the very least it should have been Harbinger's true form or something that would make sense like a keeper or something other than the only child in the universe.
You made what? You mean that peace treaty between geth and quarians after three hundred years of war, a treaty that have lasted about two weeks? Really? How does that prove anything? The Reapers have seen millions of years pass, your 2 weeks treaty is absolutely irrelevant.
You lose the scope of the reapers lifespan and knowledge. When they say that true peace is impossible, I believe them. It's just a matter of time.
I think Javik talked about the metacon wars or something like that. An organic species that fused themselves with machines... and became a danger to the galaxy. Something like that may have been just one of the many possible dystopian futures for the Quarians and the geth. That story was just starting.
@@Alfonso88279 The problem with your logic is that, if this was even real, is that they were never given the chance to prove that the peace will last. They were told they were guilty before they had the chance to prove otherwise. So yeah, my peace that I created should’ve been enough. That is 300 years of war brought to an end after all. Something nobody even dreamed would be possible.
@@EliseoRocha Again, you are forgetting the lifespan of the reapers. They have been doing this for millions of years. If you were able to get a peace treaty after 300 years of war between two species that are not warrior/like species at all from the start, I warranty you that the reapers have seen millions of peace treaties, that have probably endure more time than yours.
You fail to understand that Nazara was right. You are nothing. Humans are a foot note for the reapers, and that's just because of every other species that sacrificed first to give this cycle a chance. Shepard is an anomaly because of the protean beacon.
You had nothing to show to the reapers and if you don't choose synthesis, the obvious future for the galaxy is what the reapers said would happen: Non organics will end up wiping out organics. That's a mathematical reality. The other endings talk about "hope", an abstract concept that keeps us fighting but doesn't bring victory.
@@Alfonso88279 With all due respect, that requires players to fill in what is essentially a plot hole with their own headcanon to make sense, because Shepard never has the option to address the peace forged between the Quarians and Geth, nor does the Star Brat bring up whether or not other cycles attempted something similar(headcanon, in general, isn't bad when it comes to interpretive story elements, but when it's needed to fill in a plot hole, that's a problem).
Also, there is no guarantee that what the Star Brat said would happen after the destruction ending would actually happen because he himself points out how Shepard's cycle is the first one to ever manage to successfully attach the Crucible to the Citadel, meaning there are factors to this situation that he can't be certain of, even he's over a billion years old. New factors change everything.
Also, it is important to address how foundationally contradictory the Star Brat's logic is along with the inability to confront him about it. His solution to stopping organics from making synthetics and getting killed by them is to have synthetics kill and harvest them(which is basically the same as killing them). It gets worse. The Star Brat uses the Mass Relays to streamline the process by having them discover the Relays, and advance their technologies faster through said Relays to the point of building synthetics, and then be killed and harvested by the Reapers. Do you see the problem here? He has inadvertently become the new cause for the very problem he was made to solve by doing this. Shepard for some arbitrary reason doesn't have the dialogue option to tell this kid that his logic is flawed, that he is only making things worse, and that he should just kill all his Reapers, and perish. Sure, you could say that there's no way the kid could be persuaded into doing it, and to that, I say you can't prove me right or wrong because the game doesn't even let you try to take that approach, so we're stuck with the ludicrous decisions that he's left us in his benign stupidity.
And before you tell me he's only acting illogically because the Leviathans didn't program him properly, then that brings up another issue. Why would the Leviathans in their presumably cosmic wisdom decide after seeing organics get killed by their synthetics that it would be a good idea to make a synthetic of their own to solve the problem? This makes them look like idiots when they're supposed to be thousands of IQ points smarter than everything else. There is no excuse for that kind of incompetence.
Now, concerning the dumb choices that the Star Brat gives, I will have to disagree with you on that too. Blue is bad because that goes against the whole objective Shepard & his buddies were fighting for, destroying the Reapers. Red is bad because it kills all of Shepard's synthetic friends(unless you killed them early), but it gets rid of the Reapers. Refusal is bad because the Reapers kill everyone, leaving the breaking of the cycle in the hands of the next set of civilizations. Green is the worst of them all because you are basically playing god, forcing all life in the galaxy to conform to a new biological state of being, and the game has the gall to act like that's supposed to be the good ending when it is the cruelest of the endings. All four endings are pretty bad(especially green), but between them, red is the best option because you kill the Reapers. Plus, if peace between the Quarians and Geth was possible, then it's possible that the conflict between synthetics and organics afterward can also be resolved. Sure, like you kind of said, it's possible that the peace won't last, but also like you said with the other endings, there is still hope, and more than you realize, where the red ending is concerned.
I still firmly believe the ending is arbitrarily stupid no matter what you choose, but when it comes to the morality of the four choices, the red ending is the only one that can be argued as the almost good ending(though honestly, BioWare should retcon the entire Catalyst ending out of existence for literally anything else at this point).
Fantastic video Dan. Pretty much my thoughts as well. Watched the entire thing. I love the Citadel DLC in ME 3, quite possibly the best part of ME 3. Thanks for the hard work! Worth the watch.
The real problem is that the "good" ending is suppose to be synthesis, but it backfired because the public didn't saw like that
Because synthesis is a bad ending for a multitude of reasons. It makes no logical sense that merging synthetics and organics would instill peace in the galaxy. It's like the developers forgot that there's other conflicts beyond synthetics vs. organics. Last time I checked there was no synthetic vs. organic elements to the Rachni Wars, or the Krogan Rebellions, but apparently we're supposed to believe that as long as solve the Geth Quarian conflict everything in the Universe is now paradise. Synthesis is Shepherd making a choice that forces the rewriting of all of the DNA of every being in the Galaxy. If he wasn't dead already he should be on trial for war crimes for doing that. Oh you completely rewrote everyone's DNA so that medical knowledge is completely back to square one? Up against the wall with you now.
The crucible should have done nothing more than rendered all the Reapers and anything infected with Reaper code inert and awaiting the next command. After that there should have been a scene where the council races are all attempting to decide what to do with the Reapers. Paragon option is to destroy all Reaper tech to prevent it from hurting anyone else again. Renegade is keeping the Reapers around and using the technology for personal gain. You gain more technological advancement but you risk indoctrination and you've just kicked off a galactic arms race.
@thisismyyoutubecommentacco6302 Not to mention the fact that the "synthesis" option basically implies a hivemind and loss of individuality. The impression it gives off is one of being put on SSRIs and antipsychotics when you were already sane. Completely dystopian, "off" and the greater context of indoctrination, loss of conscious humanity and identity is straight up gross.
This is not the good ending. I'd rather the main character be killed and all technology be wiped than remove everyone's "soul".
But if you choose red, you're punished for it. You die. Your team gets stranded in the middle of nowhere. Intergalactic travel is no more. It's gloomy, depressing. It doesn't matter how many good decisions you made. There is no better ending because they didn't think people would have a problem with becoming artificial. Fake. And they do, and should.
The first time I played through ME3 I got all the way to the starchild and my first thought was. "I still have a gun. Can I shoot it? Yes. What happens if I shoot the kid? Oh, I've doomed the galaxy. Woops."
Man, the music and last words when Anderson dies always gets me. I haven't played ME3 in years and that still brought me right back to that place I first saw a decade ago.
Saying "the fans expected too much" is a cop-out. All that choice doesn't matter if the endings negate every choice your character ever made and fly in the face of that character's previously established internal logic.
When liara says “I am yours” during that final push , it sends me 😩😭
Cringe lol
As an outside observer to the uproar that erupted when the game launched, I got the impression that the biggest issue was how the endings didn't deliver the same feeling of choice as the rest of the game had up until that point.
To explain what I mean by the endings lacking choice, in Dragon Age: Origins, you can get happy endings, but you can also get bittersweet endings. Both are optional for players that might prefer one over the other which creates a distinct mood for each playthrough. Whereas in ME3, it seems that all the endings were purposefully designed to be bittersweet. And when all 3 endings evoke the exact same mood, it makes them feel identical.
Hit the nail on the head here. I expected all of those earlier decisions to heavily influence the actual ending themselves, not silo themselves in their little corner.
The thing about Mass Effect is that none of the choices ever mattered in any of the games save virmire and the suicide mission. 99% of your decision making is whether you want to be mean, nice, or neutral in conversations.
Great video, and lots of great points!
I really like ME3 90% of the way, but I have a few points that I really don't like in ME3.
First and foremost; ME3 was a third game in a planned trilogy, but it was made to introduce new players as much as fans. That is, for me, a huge mistake that is the catalyst to most of my personal complaints with this game. ME2 expects the players to have played ME1, and that is the best game in history, in my opinion..
Second; Javik should never have been a DLC. Period!
Third; The entire ending (as in the Priority: Earth mission) is rushed. The entire ME3 has taken its time to explain and round of lots of lore and history-points, but the entire last mission is just rushed, both in writing and graphics. It's a shame.
Fourth; The ending with the Star Child rubs me the wrong way. I don't really care about the ending, because it doesn't seem to make a meaningful difference. The outcomes are different in a sense, but I (as a player) don't really benefit from that as the MC always seem to die. I really like all the history-arcs throughout the game, and how it plays into both ME1 and ME2, but the ending isolated doesn't seem to matter, and it feels anti-climatic to me.
Fifth; The Leviathan DLC is such a shame! When I played the Leviathan DLC the first time, I was shaking when I met them under the water. It's such an amazing story playing out, and to discover them is altering the entire known history of the universe, on the same level as discover Javik with all the implications. But it becomes a huge missed opportunity. It should have had a huge effect, but it just ends half way there. Amazing setup, poor execution...
Sixth; EA. Period!
And now I could write for hours about the great things, as I said I liked 90% of the game. Curing the genophage, the geth/quarian war, Leviathan, the attack by Cerberus on the Citadel and the Citadel DLC are all amazing points and missions in the game. There are lots of amazing writing, amazing graphics, and the music is writen and mastered perfect many places. The sound-picture is for me amazing throughout the game.
I think the expectations were just too high for this game, and Bioware could never rise to the hight that were expected. Players who are playing Mass Effect for the first time with Legendary Edition likes ME3 a lot more than "the original" players did. In my opinion the game is a lot better than all the criticisms that has been given to the game, and I think that a lot of the criticism is unfair..
I didn’t mind the multiplayer thing. I actually really enjoyed it. It was so fun to play as different races.
Legion is one of my favorite Mass Effect characters. His death was one of the ones that hit me hard. And I hate the banshees 😂😂😂 so much. Great game of the legendary edition came to switch I'd buy it immediately
I think Mass Effect 3 is a good game but it could've been a great game if it had just a little more time. 2 is still my favorite game in the trilogy and my favorite game period.
One thing I didn't really like about ME3 is that ME2 made Cerberus and the Illusive Man full of gray. In ME2, even if you didn't agree with their methods, an argument could be made in their favor. It spoke to the main theme of paragon vs renegade not being equivalent to good vs evil as the devs intended. ME2 gave them a bit of complexity.
But ME3 just made them unequivocally and undeniably evil. It retroactively made any renegade choice made in favor of Cerberus in the past an evil choice instead. I get the Illusive Man is indoctrinated, but I think it would've been more compelling if the Illusive Man and Cerberus were an asset to the Alliance at first, proving to be helpful at first. Then later on, we see the effects of indoctrination take hold and then Cerberus becomes a full blown enemy.
Idk, the way Cerberus was handled in ME3 kind of seemed openly hostile to the depth that ME2 gave them.
Mass Effect 3 isn't remembered for "poorly executed endings;" it's remembered for its _bad, insulting ending_ that completely undermines the major themes of the entire series. There are obvious dialog choices to make during the talk with the Crucible entity, exactly the sort of things Shepard has been saying to resolve situations for 3 games now, that aren't even presented as options. This isn't a bad execution; it's a fundamentally bad design that no better execution could have salvaged. (Especially when, given the chance, they doubled down on the terrible ending by adding the "refuse" option as an additional slap in the face to all the fans who pointed out the problems rather than doing anything to actually make it right!)
WHAT?? I'm just learning about the multiplayer effect on galactic readiness. So Shepard can live during the end game cut scene? I've been playing these games for a decade and I'm just learning that this is even possible? What...
Pretty sure Shepard living was added after the game came out
@@Mr_Snifflez Nope. It was available at launch, but you were FORCED to do Multiplayer as Dan said.
A lot of the problems this game are due to Mass Effect 2. I keep saying it but that game dropped the ball. Ultimately it doomed the series by focusing on the wrong things. The beginning of the game kills Shepard off just to set up a new status quo. One that was unnecessary as it took time away from the story it was supposed to tell. Mass Effect 1 ended with the Council seeing a Reaper up close. Then in Mass Effect 2 they and the rest of galaxy act like it never took place. Shepard says they'll find a way to stop the Reapers. Frustratingly the entirety of Mass Effect 2 doesn't solve this dilemma or give us the tools to do so. This forced Mass Effect 3 to shoehorn the Crucible. Something that Shepard doesn't discover or understand. We're just told about it. Cerberus has been built up way too much in Mass Effect 2 forcing Mass Effect 3 to have to do something with them. Frustratingly though this means that Cerberus winds up getting far more of a focus than the universe Mass Effect 1 built up. When it is supposed to be a finale to them. When ME3 did so it unsurprisingly was the best parts of the game. I just wish more was done with that. Instead Cerberus this Cerberus that. Thus resulting in a slapped together ending. How could the trilogy end satisfyingly with no builld up? Regardless of what the Reaper's motivation it still would feel shallow. The extended cut did nothing to fix this only further explain it's own nonsense. The combat is the only consistently good thing about ME3. The majority of the problems I have started with the beginning of Mass Effect 2. Which is why Mass Effect 1 is the best in series for me. It didn't have the frustrating disjointed narrative that veered off course then u-turn to finish everything. One last thing I hated that the dlc of ME2 and ME3 either are filler or feel cut from the game. Javik's original role in the story is so much better than him just being there in the final release.
The Catalyst/Starchild end dialog is one of the biggest main plot self destruction I've seen in a video game. An epic combination of terrible writing and lore retcon for the worse.
But can't deny that up until that point the game was perfect. Wish there would be a 4th option.
Thank you for helping keep the community alive. I have always loved the third. It’s my personal favorite as well.
ME3's final ending was a forgone conclusion, and the overall story line was easily predictable from all we knew in ME1 and ME2. Some McGuffin was 100% required once you saw some large number of Reaper vessels at the end of ME2 - and frankly, the plot would have been inconsistent any other way given the size of a fleet created from tens of thousands of cycles, each creating at least one Reaper. I also liked the twist of the Citadel once again playing a central role in the plot.
I wasn't able to play ME3 for a couple months after launch, so I never did so before the updated ending which would have been notably unsatisfying, for sure. My only personal complaint about the final act was ending with a zergfest and a denouement that was solely story telling (which was fantastically written) instead of some kind of boss fight against, perhaps, a last-minute guardian created out of desperation by Harbinger before the starchild appears.
Then again, that fight would really just be a rehash of ME1, where Sovereign had a last-minute, desperate attempt to regain control of the Citadel
oh my god I pretty sure I said "it's good to see you too big guy" in the exact same tone of voice when I ran into grunt during that mission. I was so proud of him.
The Geth vs the Quarisns plot line was one of the worst parts of ME3. It was beyond absurd that after all that had happened in ME2 that the geth and quarians were still going at it. The ending part of that section was well written, but that section of the game was a perfect example of weak writing beyond the ending. Don't even get me started on the Rachni subplot of ME3. That was the worst. So much wasted opportunities.
Gameplay wise Mass Effect 3 is outstanding. The tools they give you to tackle scenarios in any class is great, but it's obvious that Mac Walters is not a great story teller in the grand scale. I forgot how much I hated the subplot with the kid and the dream sequence. Never made one damn bit of sense and it makes less sense now.
I still can't get over how convenient it is that there happens to be a Prothean weapon unearthed on Mars JUST in TIME. I made an effort to pay attention to the dark energy subplot in Mass Effect 2 and I very much believe it would have been a better direction to go than the Crucible/McGuffin.
Those that say Mass Effect 3 had a great story despite the ending weren't paying attention. Wayyy too much lazy writing in ME3.
All the devs had to do was have a quest where you find out a group of Geth that went out of the veil to attack the Quarians were following direct orders from the Reapers to get the Quarians to go attack the Geth and Shepard and crew investigate and fail to get the admirals to not fall for the trap would have been a decent way to set up that quest line
I believe one of the Codex Entries mentions that the Reapers are able to make Banshees from Asari that have the the Ardat-Yakshi gene as a recessive trait, as well as the active version. Which explains why there are more Banshees than expected.
You are not wrong when you say that people are being unfair in a lot of ways when they say that choices don't matter in Mass Effect 3. It does a fairly impressive job of culminating choices from previous games throughout the game although some of them are disappointingly entirely contained within war assets points, which was probably inevitable without more dev time to be fair. All that being said though I do think though that what a lot of people mean when they say choices don't matter in Mass Effect 3 is that pretty much no choice affects the ending in any way beyond War Assets and especially before the Extended cut there wasn't any elaboration on the effect your choices had going forward and even after it what was there was fairly minimal and also fairly cookie-cutter. It all boiled down to red, green, or blue in the end with some minor variations based on War Score. Beyond that, many of those slight variations of the cutscene were almost a non-factor because it was also basically impossible to fail unless you spent the whole time doing it on purpose. Also making 50% of the possible war score only obtainable through multiplayer further reduced the impact your choices had on the outcome. Ultimately while it was unrealistic to expect every choice to create a major difference in the end some of the big ones could've had much more of a role and could've been elaborated on further.
TL;DR: The game did a surprisingly good job representing choices leading up to the ending, but the cookie-cutter endings, lack of elaboration post ending, and various other minor issues really undermined the feeling of impactful choice in the end.
still say , that because the game shows anderson attacking the destroy ending, means he blows the thing up and shep didn't even leave the planet
and thats always gonna be my canon
This was a great video Dan thank you! Keep up the good work!
As for Asari and Ardat-Yakshi, as far I remember it was told that about 1% of Asari population (which is one of the biggest in space) has it as latent gene. And this fact was enough for Reapers to turn them into Banshies.
Why actual number of Ardat-Yakshi in monastery was bigger than 2, I can`t say. Maybe Samara didn`t check updates, since her daughters was put there hundreds of years ago?
So, what happened to that War Assets video you said you had planned when you released your video about the differences between the endings?
This was a great watch that really took me down memory lane. Which actually isn't that far back for me since I didn't get around to completing ME 2 and 3 until around a year ago just before the legendary edition was out. I had to play some dipshit mobile game to get my military readiness maxed out, which was stupid easy but a bit time consuming. All in all, though, I loved all 3 games and the ending of the 3rd felt perfect to me. I'm just glad I didn't play it back when all the hype was around it because might've fucked up my perception of it. I feel like they really wrote themselves into a tough spot with the whole Reaper threat that loomed large over the series for so long. They could have given us a happy ending, but all things considered it wasn't too bad considering the magnitude of what Shepard and crew were up against. I thought they stayed true to the narrative, and I was more than happy with my green-eyed hippie ending! I get it does make it look like some sorta nightmare situation, but I just assumed it worked out as the game had illustrated where everyone reached a new stage in evolution. That's just something that is going to be difficult, if not downright impossible, to truly understand beyond a surface level for the most part. So I just let it go and assume they are living their best life (except Liara, who my Shepard had to leave all alone ugh).
Omega is great and I love that it's like one of the only places in the game that acknowledges if you picked Engineer as a class. Omega video when?
what do you get if you pick engineer?
@@legion6211 oh well when the game asks you if you wanna listen to Aria or the other girl about killing all the civilians if you are an engineer you can just say nah bro I'm too smart for this and auto win both choices, then Aria complements you saying your better then the rest of her grunts.
Great video! I agree with you on most points. But I would like to point out that when people say your choices don't matter, they're specifically talking about the ending ninety-nine percent of the time. Bioware could have kept the same general options for the endings, but made them actually look different and made unlocking them based on your previous choices.
Like, if you supported the Illusive Man previously you unlock the control ending. They could have added hints at the synthesis ending earlier and made it the "secret" ending that was harder to get. And they could have made the destroy ending's outcome vary depending on your war assets how united the galaxy was by the end. They could even add another secret outcome where with a fully united galaxy and crazy high war assets the refusal ending actually results in you beating the Reapers militarily, despite the star child saying it's impossible.