Mass Effect 3

[Morgoth]

I got something like 5500.

 

Yes, it was strenuous to get there, but certainly not impossible.

[Lexx]

Active war assets or normal ones? Because I had 6000+ war assets in the end, which I found really easy to get. The hard part is to get 4000+ active war assets for the final battle.

Edited March 11, 2012 by Lexx

[Morgoth]

I didn't look that closely (active vs normal?), but I got the nice end.

That is, all civilizations and Earth survived

 

 

Only thing I missed in my playthrough are:

Thane, he sent me an Email but I didn't bother to visit him on the Citadel, then it was too late and he was dead. Also Kelly, she was supposed to be there somewhere, never found her

 

[Nepenthe]

Active war assets or normal ones? Because I had 6000+ war assets in the end, which I found really easy to get. The hard part is to get 4000+ active war assets for the final battle.

AFAIK it's not just hard, but impossible without multiplayer/future DLC assets. I think you can get to about 7000 total (so a bit over 3500 effective) without MP.

 

There's a rumor about post-ending DLC, but considering the ****storm going on, it's more likely to be wishful thinking. That said, something needs to be done about the end, and this time even people who were happy with DA2 (like me) have pretty much joined the people wanting a change.

[Morgoth]

What's wrong with the ending? I thought it was nice, well, apart from

Sheaprd dying and the Normandy stranding on some strange planet

[Lexx]

Heh, as far as I can see, the majority of the "ME3's ending sucks!11" folks on the Bio forum is about the ending being ****ty, because it's too dark and not because of a lack of visible consequences.

Edited March 11, 2012 by Lexx

[Calax]

I didn't look that closely (active vs normal?), but I got the nice end.

That is, all civilizations and Earth survived

 

 

Only thing I missed in my playthrough are:

Thane, he sent me an Email but I didn't bother to visit him on the Citadel, then it was too late and he was dead. Also Kelly, she was supposed to be there somewhere, never found her

 

Try the refugee camp on the Citadel.

Heh, as far as I can see, the majority of the "ME3's ending sucks!11" folks on the Bio forum is about the ending being ****ty, because it's too dark and not because of a lack of visible consequences.

... Go look at my spoiler rant in the previous thread.

Edited March 11, 2012 by Calax

[greylord]

I didn't look that closely (active vs normal?), but I got the nice end.

That is, all civilizations and Earth survived

 

 

Only thing I missed in my playthrough are:

Thane, he sent me an Email but I didn't bother to visit him on the Citadel, then it was too late and he was dead. Also Kelly, she was supposed to be there somewhere, never found her

 

 

Good ending has more...

 

 

 

In the good ending it has 15 seconds more in which you survive. I had nigh 7000 War assets, but due to the 50% I only had 3500 Effective. Only after you do MP and get that Readiness up to 100% so all your war assets count do you get the good ending.

 

 

 

[Tale]

I'd hardly call

 

genociding the Geth

 

a "nice" end.

[Raithe]

Well i wrapped it up and crawled my way to the finish line...

 

Fairly enjoyable run, and then that ending.... yeah.

 

I mean, if you take into account the 50% war readiness due to no mp, I had around 3,600 effective war assets. Got the three possibile choices.. and that was so Deus Ex'y it made me chuckle.

 

As so many people have said, there are some very.. weird bits there.

 

 

While I can sort of follow the logic of "Star Child", what came across as some super developed AI developed to run a form of synthetic life designed to cull advanced organic life before it could screw up and create a synthetic that would wipe out all organic life in total, rather then just periodic cullings... The whole shebang just seemed very.. plot-holey. If he controls the Reapers and has been lurking in the Citadel all this time... why the hell would Sovereign have needed to access it in ME1?

 

And the other.. At what point did the Normandy pick up all the crew, then randomly decide to jump into the Mass Effect Relay system to be caught, regardless of your ending?

 

Geez. And the options pretty much sucked.

A> Destroy the Reapers - not bad, but for some random reason, whilst it wouldn't destroy all technology it would wipe out the Geth and EDI.

B> Synthetic Fusion - randomly combine in some utterly bizarre handwaving of space-magic and glowing circuits on skin..

C> Control - this actually made the most freaking sense. Knowing the Mass Relays were to be destroyed, controlling the Reapers meant you could potentially use them (as they're scattered all around the galaxy) to help bootstrap galactic travel back into working order.. and it would stop the destruction, whilst keeping EDI and the Geth alive. Both of whom seem to be evolving/learning how to deal with organic life and thus disproving "Star Child's" theory...

 

Ah well. And then of course there's the fact that if you mysteriously had a certain amount of War Assets, Shepard is just alive enough to twitch - although, somewhere in the ruins of the Citadel, and not with the Normandy.. I'm trying to figure out where that 600 or so points of War Assets would come from since I scanned every system to a fare-thee-well. Curious what choices you make that boost it up.

 

 

 

While a part of me kind of enjoys Buzz Aldrin's cameo there at the end as a nice nod to space travel, good gawd, he sounded wooded and actually kind of creepy. "My sweet" - Exactly how would you react to your grandad calling you that in exactly that tone of voice?

 

But yes, throw in that whole "future DLC!" moment after the end credits, I do kind of wonder what they have planning, and just how much of a potential rewrite , ala FO3, could happen.

 

Also, how long before they let things like "New Game+" add to the War Readiness values?

[Majek]

I didn't look that closely (active vs normal?), but I got the nice end.

That is, all civilizations and Earth survived

Only thing I missed in my playthrough are:

Thane, he sent me an Email but I didn't bother to visit him on the Citadel, then it was too late and he was dead. Also Kelly, she was supposed to be there somewhere, never found her

How could you miss

Thane? I mean you have plenty of business where he's at. At least 2 War assets and someone else.

o.O

 

 

Raithe i've been told that NG+ already does add to your War Readiness. xD

Edited March 11, 2012 by Majek

[Gorgon]

Not just the consequences, they went through all the trouble of placing an

'architect'

type character at the very end of the game, you kinda expect to be able to engage in a philosophical discussion at least rivaling

DX

. This was pretty banale. A quick once over of what has been done much better several times already.

[Bos_hybrid]

So the hot thing on the bio forums, is

 

 

Shep is being indoctrinated during the ending (never made it to the citadel), which would mean choosing anything other than destroy reapers would be giving in to indoctrination.

 

 

Talk about giving bio too much credit, I also doubt they would like to deal with the ****storm that ending DLC would create.

[Tale]

I don't think saying what essentially amounts to "there is no ending at all, because it isn't real" is giving Bioware any credit. I think they just consider the endings that do exist would be better off if they did not exist.

[Pop]

The ending is very clearly supposed to be final. I would be very, very surprised if they sprung on revisionist DLC (both because I would think Bioware is satisfied with what they put out, and because doing so would set a new-low precedent for DLC content). I can accept the hokum that was the Final Choice (it's not like I wasn't expecting metaphysical fluff, given Bioware's cliche-heavy MO), but I was expecting something along the lines of Throne of Bhaal or the Fallouts or even Dragon Age: Origins, in which you get denouements for your party / the major factions of your game. At the very least, I wanted some big battle scenes of my ME2 party members fighting against the Reapers on Earth.

 

The incoherence of the final cutscenes suggests to me that the ending was rushed, but it baffles me that EA would elect not to give Bioware the development time to wrap up a flagship title from a flagship studio. Maybe I've been overestimating the amount of pull Ray & Greg have with corporate.

Edited March 12, 2012 by Pop

[Pop]

Also fwiw the scuttlebutt is that the story architect of ME (Drew... Karpyshyn, I think?) had a more coherent ending drafted but somewhere along ME3's development cycle he got shuffled to SW:TOR, leading the team to do last-minute rewrites (he resigned from the company last month, which may or may not be telling) resulting in ME3's ending, which honestly feels like it came from another game entirely. I'd believe it, if just for the fact that the ominous dark matter / star death mystery from the Tali portion of ME2 (which I think Karpyshyn was responsible for) seemed like heavy foreshadowing but is entirely ignored in ME3. Apparently the original ending had something to do with that.

 

Also rumor is that the first big DLC will be involve taking back Omega from Cerberus with Aria. Seems like a really safe bet.

 

ALSO also,

, but of course you all knew that Edited March 12, 2012 by Pop

[Tale]

Pop, I think you make a good point in the idea that ending DLC would open up some doors better off closed with regards to what is acceptable as DLC. But I also think that if they were rushed, as I agree it would seem, then Bioware probably isn't all too satisfied with the endings either. I wouldn't put my money on an ending revision being released as DLC, but I couldn't discount it completely given that.

[Humanoid]

I don't expect DLC to modify the ending either, since it would be an admission of fault (I was suitably amused at WoW Cataclysm's raid boss designer interviewed recently claiming the almost-globally acknowledged worst boss of the game as an example of good design) - but it does leave them with a handy out in the event they want to Dallas the plotline in a later sequel. To an extent they've painted themselves into a corner here because with each subsequent entry into the ME series thus far, they've made the game universe more of a personal story about Sheptard and less about the viability of the gameworld beyond the character. The culmination of this approach is seen with the "Take back the Earth" marketing focus of the current game - contrast to the initial setup where it would have made nary a difference to the plot or the setting if the Earth had been declared destroyed from the outset. If the focus groups dictate that further success would be dependent on continuing the formula, I doubt anyone the Bioware would resist overmuch,

 

Something similar happened to that other once-massive EA space opera franchise - Wing Commander. Call the original arc completed, try for a fresh start with a new player character and new alien threat, set it up for a brand new trilogy. Didn't go down so well and the new trilogy was aborted at the first hurdle.

Edited March 12, 2012 by Humanoid

[Pop]

Pop, I think you make a good point in the idea that ending DLC would open up some doors better off closed with regards to what is acceptable as DLC. But I also think that if they were rushed, as I agree it would seem, then Bioware probably isn't all too satisfied with the endings either. I wouldn't put my money on an ending revision being released as DLC, but I couldn't discount it completely given that.

 

One hopes, but they stuck with the "everything in DA2 is deliberate" line for months and months despite it being in all respects a more obvious rush job than that one 15 minute section of ME3. The rest of the game feels pretty well cared for.

Edited March 12, 2012 by Pop

[Orogun01]

Apparently there is a market for their games, people who can overlook a evident gap in quality and dish out blind praise.

The reverse is also true, funny how a company can have two very polarized groups as their audience.

[Calax]

I do love how Kotaku is trying to play on the Devs side of things (laughing at fans who are bitching about the ending, and happily posting a rant from a former ME (now with riot games) dev about how customers should just buy their product and LIKE IT!)

[Maria Caliban]

I got something like 5500.

 

Yes, it was strenuous to get there, but certainly not impossible.

Actually, it is impossible to get an EMS of 5500 without MP.

[Deraldin]

I got something like 5500.

 

Yes, it was strenuous to get there, but certainly not impossible.

Actually, it is impossible to get an EMS of 5500 without MP.

 

EDIT: aw crap, read impossible as possible.

Edited March 12, 2012 by Deraldin

[Tale]

Nobody so far has reported anything even at 4000 EMS with only the default 50% modifier. 1500 more seems unlikely.

[Azure79]

I had close to 7000 military strength, with the 50% modifier I got around 3500 EMS, which was good enough to unlock 3 choices at the end. I think I got most of the side quests, if not all. I was pretty thorough since I tend to be a completionist when it comes to side quests.

 

I played some multiplayer after the SP, and it is pretty fun, but then I again I really like the core gameplay. I'm pretty bad at shooters in general, but ME offers enough variety to make me effective without being the best shot. However 2 games in a row seem to be my limit as it grows a bit tedious after that.

 

After about 2 hours, my modifier was around 85%, so I got to see the secret ending.

 

As for the ending, I think its ok despite the various plotholes. I am mostly displeased because there wasn't enough information to give a clearer picture on what is going on and why I should accept it. I don't think Bioware will change the endings in any DLC.

 

I actually find the state of the galaxy pretty interesting at the end.

The various regions of space are split, but each many areas have a mix of species, which could cause all sorts of problems. The less developed species have a change to develop like the Yagh. According to how you played the Krogan could become a powerful force, if they don't totally destroy each other again with Wrex on Earth and all. The Salarians seem to be the least affected as in my game the STG were the only ones that joined up. The Asari and Turians were pretty devastated but have the potential to quickly rise to power once again. I think it will be exciting to explore this new MEverse, trying to link up the galaxy again. Run into familiar species and new ones, who now all have different priorities.

 

 

As for ME3 DLC, I was pretty satisfied with the quality of most ME2 DLC. They weren't all copy-paste jobs like DAO DLC and each offered new locations and items and some different gameplay elements. At this point though, I don't have any real urge to purchase any pre-endgame ME3 DLC because what's the point?

 

DLC that would interest me is something that expands upon the end-game sequence. I was hoping for the endgame to be drawn out and brutal. I was expecting Shephard to help Anderson lay out the entire battle plan, and you could assign the allies you picked up, ME2 and ME3 party members to specific roles according to their aptitude much like ME2.