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[FlutterPuffs]

You'll never guess what you get at 100%!

Yeah, I've heard. I just can't be bothered anymore. Try finally getting something in your grasp only to be denied from it by a stupid rule.

 

[ScreenSplitter]

The burnt grass is a plot inconsistency. There's no way the Collectors can land that ship "without a trace," and Horizon proves it.

Like I said, hundreds of thousands of people are gone and nobody does anything. None of the evidence lines up to support that it is pirates. It's a flimsy excuse to retcon nearly the entire ending of the first game and put Shepard on his own again. It's stupid, nonsensical, portrays the galaxy as complete morons rather than simply flawed, and has no consistency. There's no justification for them doing nothing, we're just supposed to believe this bullshit "DOWN WITH THE MAN, MAN" mentality.

There's no way that the Reapers would manage to leave behind juuust enough evidence for their existence so that they were an actual threat to the player.

Look at the world we live in. Most the people are morons. And I hardly think it's down with the man mentality when, for a good proportion of the game you're working with the most manliest "man" (in that sense of the word) in the universe.

 

[Snacks the sober sea lion]

There's no way that the Reapers would manage to leave behind juuust enough evidence for their existence so that they were an actual threat to the player.

Look at the world we live in. Most the people are morons. And I hardly think it's down with the man mentality when, for a good proportion of the game you're working with the most manliest "man" (in that sense of the word) in the universe.

Oh, so spaceship kilometers long blowing up all over the Citadel is "just a Geth ship," even though Cerberus managed to salvage enough to create a true artificial intelligence? And nobody thought to give the Quarians a call, ask them if this was a Geth ship? We know the Quarians don't like the Council so much, so I guess that's too bad. It's not as though this is a matter of galactic security, I mean, it's not like an enormous spaceship just attacked the capital of galactic socie-OH WAIT THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED. Take this threat seriously, consider that there might be more? Nope. Handwave the hell out of that. Everything's cool.

No, that's crap. "Because they're idiots" is not an acceptable reason for suspension of disbelief.

The only thing the game seems to tell you consistently are that the Council and Alliance are complete morons. Which is not consistent with Mass Effect 1, where the attack on Eden Prime was considered a major galactic event and the start of a war, and the Council accepts a mere audio recording of Saren as irrefutable evidence that he's rogue.

 

[Brawndo Addict]

What honestly confuses me the most is why they killed Shepard in Mass Effect 2 just to bring him/her back in like 20 seconds. It might have been an interesting, though incredibly transient, surprise but they showed it off in all the pre-release media too. It seemed like the most hackneyed excuse to force you into the plot they wanted. "Oh you have to work for Cerberus now, can't go back to Alliance...All your old squad-mates are gone, guess you'll have to go recruiting again....You died so all your powers reset...".

Was there any larger point to this other than allowing them to reset the fiction to whatever they wanted? I thought I remember there being some planned intro where you actually played as Liara until you found Shepard's body or something like that.

 

[MechaX]

When addressing Kai Leng, I just have to wonder in what world would Bioware have thought him to be an acceptable third act major antagonist in a trilogy spanning well over 60+ hours at minimum for most players.

Grand Theft Cereal EU antics aside, calling him a "Z-Tier Ninja Villain" is pretty close to what we got. His only moments of him being a "bad ass" either include cutscene incompetence or him barely fending off wounded characters. In case point,

Spoiler

he should feel embarrassed that a terminally ill alien was able to keep him at bay single-handedly

. Other moments have the writers trying to make him a credible threat for Shepard by... having him summon gunships and waves of enemy reinforcements.

If that was the best they could do to introduce a credible personal antagonist for Shepard, they should have just brought back Saren.

 

[John Harker]

Yea... seems like they got it right to me. If you didn't see where ME3 was going design-wise based on playing 1 and 2, then you likely disappointed yourself. ME3 is a really good game with an ending designed to spark conversation... and it achieves that. It's a blast to play and experience. And they even changed an ending for free (this is EA, mind you) because people were so unhappy with it. Still blows my mind.

 

[Pbombas]

ME3 was the best in the series. Fact. ME1 had exploration, ME2 had character development, but the dialogue and grandiose nature of ME3 blew me away. Everything seemed to be refined, sharp, and pertinent. Were it not for the ending (and I've yet to play the new endings/DLC), ME3 would undoubtedly have been a favorite for GOTY, next to the likes of Halo 4, etc.

 

[Haunted]

That ninja was pretty cringeworthy. Also didn't like that deus ex machina they immediately introduced. Also the weird pacing disconnect between Earth being under immediate attack and danger while Shepard is lollygagging around the galaxy doing sidequests.

Which, to be fair, would've not been as bad if I were allowed to be Shepard again (I don't give a shit about earth), but they took him away from me in ME3 and made me more of a bystander - at least that's how I felt like.

Given that they further streamlined the gameplay, finally putting the game into the shooter with RPG elements (compared to RPG with shooter elements) category, I think it's the weakest of the three games.

I didn't hate the ending as much as other people did.

 

[EmCeeGramr]

My problem with the storytelling in Mass Effect 3 is that it decided to focus on Shepard the person, and the plight of Earth as the climactic conflict. Problem: Shepard is my goofy-faced avatar, and Earth is a place I've been to once in the games against my will and found an annoying planet to be on. Suddenly Earth is the place where the Reapers all want to hole up, suddenly Commander Shepard has a far more independent personality than the past two games, and will even engage in long conversations with little to no input from me.

My love of Mass Effect's storytelling is when it focuses on other characters and cultures, focuses on the unique alien setting that I love. It's why I (and many others) found the Tuchanka and Rannoch missions to be the best in the game and some of the best in the entire series. That's also why the rest of Mass Effect 3 annoys me, because it spends the rest of the game destroying that setting and focusing on a boring trite mythos regarding the robot space squids with nonsensical motivations, and how a huge bombastic war makes Shepard sad and angry.


To put it bluntly, it's like Star Trek TNG transitioning into the Star Trek TNG movies.

 

[Keavy_Rain]

Mass Effect 2 and moreso with Mass Effect 3 felt like Bioware realizing that they would need to create and cut players off from scenarios to truly achieve what was promised and that meant a lot of work for content that would only be seen by someone obsessive enough to play through the trilogy with a set of characters that encompass all possible choices.

The Illusive Man stuff in 2 felt weird if you went Paragon because it felt like I was openly defying Illusive Man and he just got upset. I would have expected him to turn on me at the midpoint in the game and it become my crew vs. Cerberus.

Plus, if I was Paragon in 1 and saved the council HE SHOULD HAVE FUCKING SEEN IT COMING!!!

The two things in ME3 that pissed me off more than anything were Jessica Chobot's character just showing up on my ship after I had completely ignored her (Part of the "Fuck you and your choice, we paid for her VO and you're gonna hear it, goddamnit" mentality) and the romance between EDI and Joker which, honestly, felt like something straight out of fanfic.

In fact, all the romance options felt like fanfic bullshit and I hated that being friendly with your crew = You want sexy time with them.

Mass Effect's trilogy is one solid game with potential that had two sequels that could not live up to what the first promised, and as long as you're OK with that it's not a bad experience.

 

[Patryn]

Mass Effect 2 and moreso with Mass Effect 3 felt like Bioware realizing that they would need to create and cut players off from scenarios to truly achieve what was promised and that meant a lot of work for content that would only be seen by someone obsessive enough to play through the trilogy with a set of characters that encompass all possible choices.

The Illusive Man stuff in 2 felt weird if you went Paragon because it felt like I was openly defying Illusive Man and he just got upset. I would have expected him to turn on me at the midpoint in the game and it become my crew vs. Cerberus.

Plus, if I was Paragon in 1 and saved the council HE SHOULD HAVE FUCKING SEEN IT COMING!!!

The two things in ME3 that pissed me off more than anything were Jessica Chobot's character just showing up on my ship after I had completely ignored her (Part of the "Fuck you and your choice, we paid for her VO and you're gonna hear it, goddamnit" mentality) and the romance between EDI and Joker which, honestly, felt like something straight out of fanfic.

In fact, all the romance options felt like fanfic bullshit and I hated that being friendly with your crew = You want sexy time with them.

Mass Effect's trilogy is one solid game with potential that had two sequels that could not live up to what the first promised, and as long as you're OK with that it's not a bad experience.

One of the few things DA2 got right was showing the Heart icon any time you were going to select a dialogue choice that would lead to a romance. Really helped prevent the awkward realization that you thought you were just talking to a squad member and suddenly realized that you'd actually been romancing them.

 

[Haunted]

My problem with the storytelling in Mass Effect 3 is that it decided to focus on Shepard the person, and the plight of Earth as the climactic conflict. Problem: Shepard is my goofy-faced avatar, and Earth is a place I've been to once in the games against my will and found an annoying planet to be on. Suddenly Earth is the place where the Reapers all want to hole up, suddenly Commander Shepard has a far more independent personality than the past two games, and will even engage in long conversations with little to no input from me.

My love of Mass Effect's storytelling is when it focuses on other characters and cultures, focuses on the unique alien setting that I love. It's why I (and many others) found the Tuchanka and Rannoch missions to be the best in the game and some of the best in the entire series. That's also why the rest of Mass Effect 3 annoys me, because it spends the rest of the game destroying that setting and focusing on a boring trite mythos regarding the robot space squids with nonsensical motivations, and how a huge bombastic war makes Shepard sad and angry.

To put it bluntly, it's like Star Trek TNG transitioning into the Star Trek TNG movies.

woah woah woah let's not say something in the heat of the moment that we're going to regret later.

 

[Sulik2]

Because parts of ME3 were straight up brilliant and were destroyed by that ending. Mordin and Thane man. Mordin and Thane! I cried, twice, in the same game. To go from that writing to the ending. Ugh.

 

[Snacks the sober sea lion]

Joker and EDI was completely insane. Why did she need a body, why does it look like that? Does that not lessen the impact of the romance? Why is there suddenly chemistry between these two anyway? Why does this creepy Scottish engineer keep making comments about EDI's body? Why does the body have a 1950's housewife haircut? How does an AI have a gender? Everything about it is bizarre.

woah woah woah let's not say something in the heat of the moment that we're going to regret later.

 

[Haunted]

God, between Titty McSexbot, that reporter woman, Prinze Jr's Bolt Vanderhuge and that ninja, was there even a good character created for ME3?

ME2 had so many good ones.

 

[Snacks the sober sea lion]

God, between Titty McSexbot, that reporter woman, Prinze Jr's Bolt Vanderhuge and that ninja, was there even a good character created for ME3?

ME2 had so many good ones.

Eve? Maybe?

Javik. That's it. But you have to pay $10 for him, so does he still count?

 

[Grief.exe]

Not even counting the ending, Mass Effect 3 winds up being completely worse than Mass Effect 2 in almost every single way.

ME3 was dumbed down in terms of story, content, character development, combat, etc.

ME2 wasn't dumbed down?

The only character progression was picking an ammo. Every class basically ended up the same at the end of the game.

No inventory to speak of, no way to tell what guns were better than another.

The only thing ME2 improved on was the gunplay, and instead of improving the other systems they cut them out entirely. It can be argued that the level up system is so dumbed down it might as well have been cut anyways.

 

[Haunted]

Eve? Maybe?

Javik. That's it. But you have to pay $10 for him, so does he still count?

Oh yeah, forgot about Javik. He was really good. Great character.

Too bad he's the only one.

 

[Grief.exe]

The two things in ME3 that pissed me off more than anything were Jessica Chobot's character just showing up on my ship after I had completely ignored her (Part of the "Fuck you and your choice, we paid for her VO and you're gonna hear it, goddamnit" mentality) and the romance between EDI and Joker which, honestly, felt like something straight out of fanfic.

In fact, all the romance options felt like fanfic bullshit and I hated that being friendly with your crew = You want sexy time with them.

Mass Effect's trilogy is one solid game with potential that had two sequels that could not live up to what the first promised, and as long as you're OK with that it's not a bad experience.

I agree.

I haven't played ME3 yet but I watched a lot of gameplay Lets Plays on Youtube and all of the endings, since ME and Bioware used to be one of my favorite series/developers.

I can't believe some people can take this seriously. Its just so out of place, forced, and almost amateurish writing. It blows my mind that people can even take this stuff seriously sometimes. Might be because people haven't read actual books by professional authors where there is actual character development.

 

[Anticitizen One]

ME 1 had so much love and care put into it. Even that first time when you press start on the menu screen was so fucking awsome.

"WELCOME TO ALLIANCE MILITARY DATABASE" *80s sci fi music starts pumping through your speakers*

 

[Lime]

It was a fucking shitty rush-job with no heart and thought. It was a simplistic, primitive example of how to create a game with no aspirations for anything other than fulfilling the quarterly report of your parent company. In the course of a playthrough, it manages to include all of the following *basic* deficiencies:

• Broken quest log. Even freely available browser games do a better job.
• Recycled N7 missions, i.e. horde-modes multiplayer maps masquerading as singleplayer missions.
• Asspulls out of nowhere. The Crucible is somehow the solution to the Reaper problem? Really? That's the best you could do as a writer?
• Lazy writing: Cerberus are apparently no longer a paramilitary organisation, but have millions of personnel and are able to cover the entire galaxy wherever Space Jesus goes
• Even more lazy writing: In-your-face exposition, like having a newly introduced character referencing what happened in the earlier games. For example, James asks during the trip back to Eden Prime: "So, Shepard, this is the place where [lists all the things that happened in ME1] took place?" Shepard: "Yes, that is correct, James." I know Bioware wanted to be more inclusive towards people unfamiliar with the universe, but this is just lazy writing and it is entirely possible to convey that information in a believable and intelligent manner
• Fetch side-quests that *only* involved fucking planet scanning.
• Animations were even worse and unpolished. Many, many instances of buggy weapons or items or even switching up weapons between gameplay and cutscenes.
• Removing features that were in the previous two games
• Random turret sequences. A lot of times. One particular main campaign mission involves defending two points from enemy waves, followed by another turret sequence from the air. Yes, 3 turret sequences in one mission
• Holstering was removed, which goes to show that not once does the game *not* focus on shooting while you're in a mission. Your gun is always constantly pointing towards something, which speaks volumes about Bioware's design philosophy
• Fanservice én masse.
• Plot pacing was completely terrible. It's either rush to save Earth, unite the warring races versus getting a trinket from some planet for a random citizen
• Kai Leng was not properly established, so he just comes across as an extreme nuisance with a lot of plot armour
• The earlier established villain didn't even say a word in the entire game and has like a 2 minute cameo in the end. Apparently Harbinger's importance in ME2 was entirely worthless.
• A lot of internal logical inconsistencies
• Dialogue moments that used to be interactive with at least some sort of camera work is relegated to pushing a button and a wave-file playing. It screams that Bioware rushed the game by not having the usual dialogue presentation that they had in earlier games.
• The way to start sidequests revolves around walking by some strangers
• Linear, corridor-based level design
• Emphasis on shootbang, meaning a lot of shooting, intense action, explosions, etc. The game design never stops to let the atmosphere and setting breathe, but is instead focused on yelling at the player as much as possible, as if he/she suffers from ADHD
• Lame, shitty attempts at affecting the player's emotions. The introduction sequence at Earth with Vent Kid dying is probably the worst example of shitty writing that I've come across in the history gaming. I felt so offended that someone thought such a ridiculous attempt at creating empathy would be successful.
• The ending of ME2 was rendered completely irrelevant. Apparently blowing up a colony of Batarians wasn't such a big deal.
• Shitty, shitty writing. Examples like "We fight or we die!" are plenty.
• Meaningless war assets. They amount to being nothing more than a number-filled spreadsheet. A complete travesty.
• And this is not to talk about the monumental clusterfuck of an ending. I mean, you have to actually commit a tremendous amount of effort to do such a terrible fucking job.

All of the above seems pretty self-evident to me if you expect to be engaged and respected as a human being capable of rational and critical thought when experiencing different fictional media. Yet the following was somehow the judgement by "game critics":

Seriously, they must all be blind and/or incompetent to gloss over the many deficiencies of Mass Effect 3. But then again, it might all make sense: A game created by incompetent developers will be well-received by incompetent critics.

 

[KefkaPalazzo]

Because it was awesome?

 

[Patryn]

Oh, geez. I forgot about the broken quest log! And that was even something that worked just fine in ME1 and ME2, and suddenly it's all but useless.

Seriously, WTF happened?

 

[Eight Diagram Bat Fighter]

I just finished ME3 for the first time a few days ago, I didn't mind the ending and felt ok with it. Was it because of what

Spoiler

happened to Shepard regardless of the choice you make

?

 

[Patryn]

I just finished ME3 for the first time a few days ago, I didn't mind the ending and felt ok with it. Was it because of what

Spoiler

happened to Shepard regardless of the choice you make

?

No, it was because of the giant ass Deus Ex Machine and the fact that the three endings were exactly the same barring the color. Keep in mind, this was after Bioware talked about how everybody's ending would be different and it wouldn't just be "A, B, or C".

To many, it was the equivalent of Bioware flipping them the bird and laughing at them for thinking that their choices would actually matter.

 

[subversus]

It was a fucking shitty rush-job with no heart and thought. It was a simplistic, primitive example of how to create a game with no aspirations for anything other than fulfilling the quarterly report of your parent company. In the course of a playthrough, it manages to include all of the following *basic* deficiencies:

• 
  

• 
  
  
  

 

[Grief.exe]

It was a fucking shitty rush-job with no heart and thought. It was a simplistic, primitive example of how to create a game with no aspirations for anything other than fulfilling the quarterly report of your parent company. In the course of a playthrough, it manages to include all of the following *basic* deficiencies:

• Broken quest log. Even freely available browser games do a better job.
• Recycled N7 missions, i.e. horde-modes multiplayer maps masquerading as singleplayer missions.
• Asspulls out of nowhere. The Crucible is somehow the solution to the Reaper problem? Really? That's the best you could do as a writer?
• Lazy writing: Cerberus are apparently no longer a paramilitary organisation, but have millions of personell and are able to cover the entire galaxy wherever Space Jesus goes
• Even more lazy writing: In-your-face exposition, like having a newly introduced character referencing what happened in the earlier games. For example, James asks during the trip back to Eden Prime: "So, Shepard, this is the place where [lists all the things that happened in ME1] took place?" Shepard: "Yes, that is correct, James." I know Bioware wanted to be more inclusive towards people unfamiliar with the universe, but this is just lazy writing and it is entirely possible to convey that information in a believable and intelligent manner
• Fetch side-quests that *only* involved fucking planet scanning.
• Animations were even worse and unpolished. Many, many instances of buggy weapons or items or even switching up weapons between gameplay and cutscenes.
• Removing features that were in the previous two games
• Random turret sequences. A lot of times. One particular main campaign mission involves defending two points from enemy waves, followed by another turrent sequence from the air. Yes, 3 turret sequences in one mission
• Holstering was removed, which goes to show that not once does the game *not* focus on shooting while you're in a mission. Your gun is always constantly pointing towards someting, which speaks volumes about Bioware's design philosophy
• Fanservice én masse.
• Plot pacing was completely terrible. It's either rush to save Earth, unite the warring races versus getting a trinket from some planet for a random citizen
• Kai Leng was not properly established, so he just comes across as an extreme nuisance with a lot of plot armor
• The earlier established villain didn't even say a word in the entire game and has like a 2 minute cameo in the end. Apparently Harbinger's importance in ME2 was entirely worthless.
• A lot of internal logical inconsistencies
• Dialogue moments that used to be interactive with at least some sort of camera work is relegated to pushing a button and a wave-file playing. It screams that Bioware rushed the game by not having the usual dialogue presentation that they had in earlier games.
• The way to start sidequests revolves around walking by some strangers
• Linear, corridor-based level design
• Emphasis on shootbang, meaning a lot of shooting, intense action, explosions, etc The game design never stops to let the atmosphere and setting breathe, but is instead focused on yelling at the player as much as possible, as if he/she suffers from ADHD
• Lame, shitty attempts at affecting the player's emotions. The introduction sequence at Earth with Vent Kid dying is probably the worst example of shitty writing that I've come across in the history gaming. I felt so offended that someone thought such a ridiculous attempt at creating empathy would be successful.
• The ending of ME2 was rendered completely irrelevant. Apparently blowing up a colony of Batarians wasn't such a big deal.
• Shitty, shitty writing. Examples like "We fight or we die!" are plenty.
• Meaningless war assets. They amount to being nothing more than a number-filled spreadsheet. A complete travesty.
• And this is not to talk about the monumental clusterfuck of an ending. I mean, you have to actually commit a tremendous amount of effort to do such a terrible fucking job.

All of the above seems pretty self-evident to me if you expect to be engaged and respected as a human being capable of rational and critical thought when experiencing different fictional media. Yet this the following was somehow the impression by "game critics":

http://www.abload.de/img/me3_metacriticd9pun.png

Seriously, they must all be blind and/or incompetent to gloss over the many deficiencies of Mass Effect 3. But then again, it might all make sense: A game created by incompetent developers will be well-received by incompetent critics.

I think my favorite gif of all time comes into play here. Always gives me a chuckle

Holstering was removed, which goes to show that not once does the game *not* focus on shooting while you're in a mission. Your gun is always constantly pointing towards someting, which speaks volumes about Bioware's design philosophy

Very interesting point by the way.

 

[staticneuron]

Yes, I'll give you that one. The final moments leading to the end were kinda rushed. Also, looking into a gameplay perspective, it was a nice change of pacing. I just think that every talk about ME3 turns into a: OMG that's the worst game everrrr, when that's clearly not the case. In fact, I have a feeling it will place really well in Gaf's GoTY poll.

Ps:. I stand my opinion that the end is really, really good, and most people didn't comprehend it or just plain hated it because it wasn't what they wanted.

Lol, the end obviously wasn't "good", they wouldn't have fixed it if it was simply an artistic thing. They didn't explain anything and each ending looked almost the same except with such small differences you end up wondering why you wasted your time playing through the entire series.

All they needed to do was explain a bit more than they did and the ending, whether you liked it or not, would have felt less rushed.

It was a fucking shitty rush-job with no heart and thought. It was a simplistic, primitive example of how to create a game with no aspirations for anything other than fulfilling the quarterly report of your parent company. In the course of a playthrough, it manages to include all of the following *basic* deficiencies:

• 
  
  Well done sir! Well done.

 

[Patryn]

Lol, the end obviously wasn't "good", they wouldn't have fixed it if it was simply an artistic thing. They didn't explain anything and each ending looked almost the same except with such small differences you end up wondering why you wasted your time playing through the entire series.

All they needed to do was explain a bit more than they did and the ending, whether you liked it or not, would have felt less rushed.

The re-do also silently acknowledged that Bioware didn't really understand the universe they had created, when they stepped back from

Spoiler

the relays being destroyed after fans pointed out that based on The Arrival, that should mean that you just nuked the entire known universe and everyone should be dead.

 

[staticneuron]

The re-do also silently acknowledged that Bioware didn't really understand the universe they had created, when they stepped back from

Spoiler

the relays being destroyed after fans pointed out that based on The Arrival, that should mean that you just nuked the entire known universe and everyone should be dead.

Lol Exactly! If you played the last DLC for ME2, something they address if you carry over your save, then the ending makes even less sense.

 

[EmCeeGramr]

The re-do also silently acknowledged that Bioware didn't really understand the universe they had created, when they stepped back from

Spoiler

the relays being destroyed after fans pointed out that based on The Arrival, that should mean that you just nuked the entire known universe and everyone should be dead.

That whole aspect was so strange.

BioWare creates DLC that they bill as the "bridge" between Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 that establishes an important bit of lore by creating a rule about the technology used. They mostly gloss over the events of the DLC in Mass Effect 3, meaning nothing was really "bridged." Then the ending of Mass Effect 3 contains something extremely pertinent to the lore established months before in the DLC. Then BioWare, in response to people pointing out the ramifications of this, tries to "clarify" with the Extended Cut; notably, while most of the Extended Cut does simply extend the ending scenes to make more sense and give more context, they do rewrite at least that one aspect, showing that they probably didn't even know what the other team behind the DLC had established.

 

[Lime]

Apparently the Garnett Lee guy goes on to say in that particular discussion that he didn't think the Extended Cut was necessary, as he didn't want things spelled out for him. Which basically means that he failed to spell out the logical inconsistencies in the original ending, as Bioware's revisions to the Mass Relays being destroyed confirmed. Not only that, but Bioware's level of storytelling is blatantly spelling out the plot and its characters, so his complaint about the revision seems misguided.

I cannot for the life of me figure out why these people comment on topics they haven't researched or properly thought about when they open their mouths. It wouldn't even surprise me if some of them hadn't even played the games they sometimes discuss.

 

[Patryn]

That whole aspect was so strange.

BioWare creates DLC that they bill as the "bridge" between Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 that establishes an important bit of lore by creating a rule about the technology used. They mostly gloss over the events of the DLC in Mass Effect 3, meaning nothing was really "bridged." Then the ending of Mass Effect 3 contains something extremely pertinent to the lore established months before in the DLC. Then BioWare, in response to people pointing out the ramifications of this, tries to "clarify" with the Extended Cut; notably, while most of the Extended Cut does simply extend the ending scenes to make more sense and give more context, they do rewrite at least that one aspect, showing that they probably didn't even know what the other team behind the DLC had established.

You forgot that the ME3 Codex very clearly includes that very rule, which they proceeded to violate in the original ending.

 

[Fruitster]

The weird thing about ME3 was just how unpolished it felt. Odd animations, weird bugs, even many of the characters looked off to me. I really must play ME2 again to refresh my memory but I would swear that ME2's character models were for the most part better than ME3's. Certainly human's anyway. The aliens nearly always look great in all three of the games. Maybe it was the lighting in ME3, but something looked off.

The original endings weren't what I hoped for, not by a long shot, but things like the lack of hub worlds and the dreadful fetch side quests bothered me far more. Small things too like not being able to holster your weapons, old cameo characters like Shiala and Gianna Parasini not making an appearance - things like this bugged me far more than the ending ever did. It just all added up to the feeling that not enough time was spent on making ME3 the game it should have been. Too many cut corners. In the end, ME3 (and ME2) were not the games I'd hoped for after experiencing the first Mass Effect a few years back.

 

[slightconfuse]

Mass Effect 3 was a wild ride up till the end.

the dream sequecnes were terrible, that stupid kid was terrible and the sense of urgancy was terribe. the orignal ending was half assed.

 

[Snacks the sober sea lion]

I don't know what they did to the graphics in 3. Here's one of my Shepards in 2:

Here he is in 3:

What happened to his skin? Why is his hair now just a solid block? It's so confusing.

As for the original ending, I'm sure someone could come up with a fantastic fanfic (oxymoron) as to what would actually happen with the original ending. Wrex is tragically killed and the krogan desolate Earth fighting among themselves, the quarians starve because they probably left quite a bit of their food and medical supplies on Rannoch. Shepard truly saved them all.

 

[Lime]

oh man, those 256x256 textures.

 

[Spirit of Jazz]

My love of Mass Effect's storytelling is when it focuses on other characters and cultures, focuses on the unique alien setting that I love. It's why I (and many others) found the Tuchanka and Rannoch missions to be the best in the game and some of the best in the entire series.

Was I alone in thinking that the Rannoch section was terrible? From what I recall I managed to get Tali and one of the admirals to agree that what they were doing was stupid, but because one general was fucking insane everything went to shit. A whole race had to die and Tali kills herself totally disregarding what we went through together or the fact she was siding with me because of one crazy who could have been easily stopped.

It was such a sharp contrast to Tuchanka which was excellently written. I actually felt awful for intending to prevent the cure, when I was rolling with Wrex and the female I picked a dialogue option to come clean however I was cut short by a quake before I could and reconsidered my choice when I was given the same option to go through with it or not moments after. Then having to gun down Mordin was legitimately a hard thing to do, but I knew I had no other choice. The section was so well written that it made the rest of the writing in the game look utterly stupid in comparison.

 

[Patryn]

Was I alone in thinking that the Rannoch section was terrible? From what I recall I managed to get Tali and one of the admirals to agree that what they were doing was stupid, but because one general was fucking insane everything went to shit. A whole race had to die and Tali kills herself totally disregarding what we went through together or the fact she was siding with me because of one crazy who could have been easily stopped.

It was such a sharp contrast to Tuchanka which was excellently written. I actually felt awful for intending to prevent the cure, when I was rolling with Wrex and the female I picked a dialogue option to come clean however I was cut short by a quake before I could and reconsidered my choice when I was given the same option to go through with it or not moments after. Then having to gun down Mordin was legitimately a hard thing to do, but I knew I had no other choice. The section was so well written that it made the rest of the writing in the game look utterly stupid in comparison.

It's possible, based on your actions in the previous games, to have Rannoch come out very, very differently.

 

[Lime]

To provide some positives about ME3, at least Bioware removed the jarring Mission Results screen that was prevalent in ME2. So there's that, I guess.

 

[thetrin]

Pachter also said AC3 should get GOTY on Bonus Round, so I'm not entirely sure they get it in a lot of ways.

 

[EmCeeGramr]

Was I alone in thinking that the Rannoch section was terrible? From what I recall I managed to get Tali and one of the admirals to agree that what they were doing was stupid, but because one general was fucking insane everything went to shit. A whole race had to die and Tali kills herself totally disregarding what we went through together or the fact she was siding with me because of one crazy who could have been easily stopped.

That particular outcome was stupid, I agree.


I also didn't like how no matter which outcome you picked,

Spoiler

Legion

had to sacrifice themselves out of nowhere for no explainable reason. It was a bold move to kill off a character no matter what choice, but the rationale was weak at best.

 

[slightconfuse]

i thought the ending to Rannoch was well. Having to choose between one or the other was intense to say the least

 

[EmCeeGramr]

i thought the ending to Rannoch was well. Having to choose between one or the other was intense to say the least

You didn't have to, based on your actions in ME2 and ME3.

 

[djtiesto]

I don't really have the nostalgia for Bioware as a company nor an elevated opinion of them so ME3 to me wasn't this big clusterfuck of game design... it was just a game with decent cover-based shooting gameplay, a few obvious flaws, some serious glitches, and a nonsensical endgame. It just didn't have the ambition or the soul of the first game but I liked it better than #2.

 

[Snacks the sober sea lion]

Was I alone in thinking that the Rannoch section was terrible? From what I recall I managed to get Tali and one of the admirals to agree that what they were doing was stupid, but because one general was fucking insane everything went to shit. A whole race had to die and Tali kills herself totally disregarding what we went through together or the fact she was siding with me because of one crazy who could have been easily stopped.

It was such a sharp contrast to Tuchanka which was excellently written. I actually felt awful for intending to prevent the cure, when I was rolling with Wrex and the female I picked a dialogue option to come clean however I was cut short by a quake before I could and reconsidered my choice when I was given the same option to go through with it or not moments after. Then having to gun down Mordin was legitimately a hard thing to do, but I knew I had no other choice. The section was so well written that it made the rest of the writing in the game look utterly stupid in comparison.

What did you do with your game? You let the quarians die and prevented the genophage? There's no reason at all not to cure the genophage if you have Wrex, and it's not even difficult to get the peaceful ending for Rannoch. Just a matter of meeting Mass Effect's arbitrary "good/ bad guy" quota (high reputation).

 

[Fudgepuppy]

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, because I fail to see how in any way ME2 is linear, short of the fact that the corridors are always leading in one direction.

Well not much exploration, pretty streamlined, most missions where combat-sections etc.

I don't think ME2 or ME3 were very linear games, as they were very well-paced and engaging, but most people do think only ME1 of the series was the true RPG-experience with a lot of freedom and non-linearity.

 

[Deified Data]

Holstering was removed, which goes to show that not once does the game *not* focus on shooting while you're in a mission. Your gun is always constantly pointing towards something, which speaks volumes about Bioware's design philosophy

Of everything on your list, this one somehow stands out as the worst to me. Such a shitty design decision. "Holster your weapon? Why on Earth would they want to do that? You still have things to shoot!"

 

[Spirit of Jazz]

What did you do with your game? You let the quarians die and prevented the genophage? There's no reason at all not to cure the genophage if you have Wrex, and it's not even difficult to get the peaceful ending for Rannoch. Just a matter of meeting Mass Effect's arbitrary "good/ bad guy" quota (high reputation).

I let the Quarians die because unlike the Geth they decided to leave their entire armada under the sole command of a psychopath (though they also seemed to be the clear bad guys in the situation) and it was the one mission in the entire franchise that I failed to meet the good/bad quota. I prevented the cure to the genophage because I didn't want to risk the Krogan destroying the entire galaxy when it was an issue that had already been dealt with. Though to be honest I really didn't appreciate the point later in the game where superspy Wrex somehow got his hands on incriminating evidence and attempted to kill me in a cutscene.

 

[Bisnic]

Of everything on your list, this one somehow stands out as the worst to me. Such a shitty design decision. "Holster your weapon? Why on Earth would they want to do that? You still have things to shoot!"

I thought they said that they ran out of available memory because of new moves like heavy melee and rolling, so they had to take out holstering... or some shit excuse like that.