Mass Effect 3

[Silence Sei]

We're clouding up the 'What are you playing' thread now with all our ME3 talks, so I decided to give it its own thread.

Hows everyone enjoying the game?

[Enigmatic Immortal]

Great! Doing good personally. Beat up the peepaweepas and the chumbawoombas. Did a smooth forward to back motion, shot a voltic charge in a counterhit and landed the 720 for the emerald fusion tager buster. Bam, dead jin.

Though he froze the shit out of me in the next round and hit a couple blizzard's into arrows of ice. Damn his eyes, guys got strong pokes and easily can knock peeps into the corner, very patient game to play against him. Very close matches i would say. Though Relius and Carl matches have interestingly enough turned into quite the specatcle. Why one combo even managed a delicious victory. Not to mention the double distortion where they activate their weapons and the two beat on each other.

Though pat needs to up his game and be a bit smarter with Ragna. Rushes to much and not enough kick of jesus. Has a lot of interesting ways to get into a combo, but seems content to keep the one or two he uses.

Very good time i'm having.

[Letho]

Just landed in London, so endgame time. So far it's been a blast.

Oh, and also, the geth energy sniper whatever it's called. Fucking awesome. Shoots through the damn walls. :P

[Silence Sei]

Most of the Geth stuff is amazing, but I prefer the Black Widow myself. Still has that kick, but at least you get 3 shots before reloading rather than 1.

[SirArtemis]

I play the multiplayer on PC a good deal and for snipers I prefer the widow or black widow (which i haven't gotten this time - had the widow in beta and using black widow in single player) and a heavy pistol like the crynefax or paladin.

[Letho]

Most of the Geth stuff is amazing, but I prefer the Black Widow myself. Still has that kick, but at least you get 3 shots before reloading rather than 1.And it also doesn't have the delay that the Javelin has, but I got used to it. I still stuck around with it because it seemed to slow down time more than the rest (though I did modify it to slow it down even more) and I felt it does more damage when shooting through cover (you can do this with pretty much all of them, but the Javelin seemed more effective at it, if a bit quirky at times). Oh, and it also allows you to see enemies through cover/smoke without wasting a modification slot on the scope.

At any rate, I finished it moments ago. The end seems fitting, though I did expect a longer animation. But then again, most that needed to be said was said within the game, so I guess there was no point in dragging it out. If anybody is curious as to which ending I choose, I went with the "middle" path, if you know what I mean. ;) Found it a bit weird, but not necessarily in a bad way.


On a further note, a question. What's your favorite team to run with, not necessarily just in this game but in all of them?

Garrus is my number one pick. He's badass, cool and funny and I just like having him around, though I don't pick him all the time because his class is the same as mine. But as he said in the finale: There is no Shepard without Vakarian. I tend to agree. I'm a bit divided about the second member. I like Tali for her Drone abilities, James was also quite useful due to lots of HP, Wrex/Grunt were also cool, and I found EDI fun as well. As you might've noticed, not a big fan of the biotics. :P

[SirArtemis]

Always Garrus. Though I'm an infiltrator. I'd prefer a krogan when the option is given. Otherwise, EDI because of her knowledge, though I wish she were in a male body. I really don't like the outfits the women wear. Too sexual. Distracting.

[Enigmatic Immortal]

though I wish she were in a male body. I really don't like the outfits the women wear. Too sexual. Distracting.

There is far too much wrong with that statement Arty...Far too much...

[SirArtemis]

I prefer to run around as me, being awesome, and a turian and krogan, because there is nothing to be attracted to. Lucky for me, I'm not attracted to men or aliens, so I can focus on the game, rather than the latex wedgie the woman has and the perfectly snug fit on her boobs. I want to play, not get off.

[Enigmatic Immortal]

I prefer to run around as me, being awesome, and a turian and krogan, (Deleting frivolous words.) so I can focus on the game rather than the latex wedgie the woman has and the perfectly snug fit on her boobs

I still am finding far too much wrong with this...far too much

[Letho]

I still am finding far too much wrong with this...far too muchhttp://playstationeu.i.lithium.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/37688iC8BAEF89810B5BC3/image-size/original?v=mpbl-1&px=-1

[SirArtemis]

Whatevs. Don't care lol I answered the question so I'm done.

[Mistletien]

I love biotics. I run with my Shepard (a Sentinel), Samara and Legion, usually, although I switch it up from time to time with the others.

[Joseff]

I beat the game. I was pretty excited throughout the entire game. I've played all three but wasnt able to import it because my harddrive had gotten broken, so i didnt get the maximum amount of game play out of the game. the ending was a bit underwhelming and I have been looking up things online and have seen that im not the only one disappointed. i was less disappointed before i read the things but not that i had read what other people have said I have grown a little more disappointed.
over all though the game was amazing. the characters and everything was great, development and story was really great.
I'm in the process of replaying the second game and then importing to the third one to play it again.

[orphans]

The series was epic all the way through... then the ending failed epically. All "three" of the different endings.... = _ =

[Letho]

One thing that might change the way you look at the "ending" of ME 3: Link, scroll down to Gabe's post. (http://penny-arcade.com/2012/03/14)

I have to agree with this. When I finished the game, I was also a bit underwhelmed. But then I ran into that post, and it put a sort of a different perspective to it. Because it makes sense that practically the whole of ME3 should be considered a grand finale, and if viewed as such, it's fricking awesome. I can hardly count more than one or two games I had more fun playing than this one. Well, these three. :P

[Keeper of the Oath]

I'm having a blast with this game. Finished my work for the asari, and that was probably my favorite mission in the game so far. Even with the way things unfold, it just punches you in the gut. Felt like a real battle with the intensity and everything.

I'm going to finish any N7 missions and side quests I have before I continue in the main story, maybe play some multiplayer.

Oh, and I achieved something in the game that I am very proud of:
I managed to get the geth and the quarians to cooperate, even after I had rewritten the heretics in ME2. And that even benefitted me in the end, boosting the Geth Fleet up to 400 alone. I'm definitely a happy camper in that regard.

I know people are ranting and raving about the ending, but I doubt it'll be as bad as everyone makes it out to be. In BioWare, I trust.

[Duffy]

*Cough*, Dragon Age 2...*cough*.

[orphans]

One thing that might change the way you look at the "ending" of ME 3: Link, scroll down to Gabe's post. (http://penny-arcade.com/2012/03/14)

I have to agree with this. When I finished the game, I was also a bit underwhelmed. But then I ran into that post, and it put a sort of a different perspective to it. Because it makes sense that practically the whole of ME3 should be considered a grand finale, and if viewed as such, it's fricking awesome. I can hardly count more than one or two games I had more fun playing than this one. Well, these three. :P

I disagree with Gabe because, what Gabe writes seems to be a very well written way of saying, "Well, tough luck guys you didn't like it, it was cool for me." It also seemed that Gabe didn't peruse the article he linked to either, and only gave it a quick skim with the mindset of, "You're all whiners."

This is mostly why:
Gabe's comment of, "I don’t know much about this one. I’m just not a big enough ME fan to know what’s supposed to happen when a Mass Relay explodes. What I do know is that you can let yourself get bogged down by details like how long a Star Destroyer is or how many innocent people Luke murdered when he destroyed the Death Star, or you can try and enjoy it knowing that it all doesn’t match up perfectly," is completely wonderful in how it misses the point, IF he actually knew the lore.

As said in playing the game and if you discovered the lore, when a Mass Relay is destroyed, it has the same effect of a super nova, which is what happened to the batarian area and why their homeworld is no more. >_>.... major plot hole in that Shepard destroys all mass relays... thus destroying every star system with mass relays...

It's one thing to say it's a small detail to be overlooked, like all the innocent people kills on the Death Star, and another to say that the destruction of all mass relays somehow (magically) doesn't extinguish all life as we know it anyways because of the lore that was already imbedded into the story >_>

Also, Joker's escape at the end made NO sense. All the time playing the game, I never got the feeling that Joker was some wuss. It was extremely out of character. Sure, he has brittle bones (crash on the planet, anyone? No bones broken, he's cool...), but that doesn't mean he wouldn't lay his life on the line. And didn't he rejoin "Sword" squadron to fight the Reapers after dropping Shepard off...? Why the hell is he running away all of a sudden?

And it's not that I was expecting ponies and flowers and butterflies as the ending, because that would have made no sense either. I'm fine with a dead Shepard, I'm fine with a "game over" type ending, and I'm fine with a grim ending with everyone struggling until they all perished eventually. But, I'm NOT fine with horribly constructed endings that seem to ignore everything the characters have done and from PROFESSIONAL writers who make this their living and have previously poured so much effort into the construction of the previous two games and all the events of the third game leading up to the ending.

Finally... Penny Arcade's whole stance of grouping every unhappy person into the general category of wanting the above stated "Happy ending (http://penny-arcade.com/comic/2012/03/16)" was not impressive and extremely insulting.


I agree much more with the article that Gabe links (http://www.gamefront.com/mass-effect-3-ending-hatred-5-reasons-the-fans-are-right/) to, especially the Lore Errors and Plot Holes section, Key Philosophical Theme section, and Player Choice is Completely Discarded section. I don't agree 100% with everything said in the article, but much more than Gabe's reasoning.

Just a quick clip from the start article that Gabe linked to (and apparently missed):
Many fans have been raging about the ending choices, the final cutscene and the implications of the Mass Effect universe after the end of Shepard. Some see it as the raging of entitled, whiny gamers who didn’t get enough sunshine and puppies in their ending, and expected Shep to retire with Tali on Rannoch and creepy little masked babies. But the people who would argue that gamers are entitled and that BioWare’s creative integrity is preserved by the ending, however bleak, are — quite simply — wrong. It’s not about a happy ending; it’s about an ending that makes sense.

EDIT: If no one can tell, this is me raging.

But, game play wise, it was fun. Grand finale wise... I wish I never finished the game now.

[Silence Sei]

The only reason that Mass Relay blew up is because -a freaking asteroid crashed into it- An asteroid, mind you, that had enough explosives in it to level an entire galaxy. Yes, the Mass Relays would cause a giant explosion, but nowhere near enough to destroy an entire system, but that combined with what I'm assuming is enough explosives to kill our own solar system would be more than enough. Most people overlook the fact that before the crew in the Arrival DLC became indoctrined, their goals was to have Shepard look at the Reaper artifact -then destroy it-.

Joker wasn't running, he was probably trying to get the alien crew home after the battle. Tali and Garrus were both in my party during the final battle, but both were aboard the Normandy during my Synthesis ending. Sure, the Reapers were still on Earth, but has anyone ever stopped to think that after Shepards 'Death', everyone might have thought Earth a lost cause, and thus tried to go to the next best place to fight the Reapers, Pavalen or Tunchaka? I never thought Joker was running away, I always thought he was retreating to move the Normandy crew to another location. I assumed Garrus would be next-in-command after Shepard, and there was no way he'd high-tail it somewhere without a plan as to what to do next.


Also, my team was always Tali with either EDI, Garrus, or Javik, since Javik was the closest I got to a Krogan (I always had Grunt in my party in 2, barring the suicide mission where I needed him to hold the lines)

[Enigmatic Immortal]

with horribly constructed endings that seem to ignore everything the characters have done and from PROFESSIONAL writers who make this their living and have previously poured so much effort into the construction of the previous two games and all the events of the third game leading up to the ending.


There is more than the writer's shown in the credits. There is FAR more writer's scripting then get credit, cause they don't want credit, they want money. It's quite possible several people who penned the first and second game, were either busy or didn't want to bother with a third. When you start to write professional for gaming and entertainment, the laws we hold ourselves to of continuity and lore go out the window. They want to make money, they have to write out something that makes the people who sell the game nod and hand over the cash.

If writing that Shepard was about to give up all hope, put a gun to his head and kill himself, but stopped because the MY LITTLE PONIES showed him that friendship is magic, and he rides the spunky rainbow colored one into space and shot a magnum into the exhaust pipe and blew up the Mass Relay via the death star manner, with Kermit the Frog screaming "Nice Shot Kid!" can get the stooges who run the show think "THAT'S BRILLIANT." Then you are god damn right they are going to take and shove continuity down the hole and kick it.

It's kinda like Althanas Continuity...some people will respect it, and some will just write their own shit to enjoy the end result. Many will like it, looking past the slip up, and many will not, thinking it's disrespectful to all the work done so far. But to the person who wrote it, all they need to think to themselves is, "Job well done, I'm happy with what I wrote." and in their case. "And fuck it if people don't like it, I made my rent for the damn month."


Not saying it's right, but...yeah.

[Letho]

@orphans
Now, I may be alone in this, but I had a different view of the mass relays and their destruction. While I understand what would usually happen when they are destroyed, I always thought that by choosing the synthesis ending (and thus causing the green explosion), the mass relays were used to spread the synthesized DNA with their destruction. If the green stuff has the ability to change the Reapers and synthesize them, then I thought it isn't inconceivable that it changed the mass relays as well to use the "explosion" for spreading the new DNA. That's why the explosion of the relay was green as well, and that's why you see the usually white/bluish power of the relays change into green before it blows up.

As for Joker leaving, I also didn't find it that hard to reason. You see a big boom and a shockwave heading your way, it's only natural that you try to outrun it.

I don't know. Maybe I'm just not looking into it deep enough, or maybe I'm looking at it from a different angle. Or maybe I just love Bioware so much. Probably the last one. I did finish Dragon Age 2. TWICE. :(

[Silence Sei]

@orphans
Now, I may be alone in this, but I had a different view of the mass relays and their destruction. While I understand what would usually happen when they are destroyed, I always thought that by choosing the synthesis ending (and thus causing the green explosion), the mass relays were used to spread the synthesized DNA with their destruction. If the green stuff has the ability to change the Reapers and synthesize them, then I thought it isn't inconceivable that it changed the mass relays as well to use the "explosion" for spreading the new DNA. That's why the explosion of the relay was green as well, and that's why you see the usually white/bluish power of the relays change into green before it blows up.

As for Joker leaving, I also didn't find it that hard to reason. You see a big boom and a shockwave heading your way, it's only natural that you try to outrun it.

I don't know. Maybe I'm just not looking into it deep enough, or maybe I'm looking at it from a different angle. Or maybe I just love Bioware so much. Probably the last one. I did finish Dragon Age 2. TWICE. :(

Orphans problem with the ending is

It's the exact same thing that happens to the Relays no matter what ending you choose

[Letho]

Orphans problem with the ending is

It's the exact same thing that happens to the Relays no matter what ending you chooseWell, in all honesty, I didn't know that. I didn't want to look too much into other endings so as not to spoil the replays. But technically, it still fits because even if it is established that the destruction of a mass relay would cause a supernova-like explosion, I assume it's meant that would happen if you destroy it with conventional means like firing at it from a dreadnought or blowing it up with explosives. If all three ending are the same, then all three say the mass relays are destroyed after being hit by the "signal" that Shepard causes on the Citadel, be it red, blue or green or whatever the other colors are. So one could say that the signal controls the destruction of the mass relays. Well, yeah, it sounds a bit far-fetched, even I'll admit it, but it's a possibility, yes?

[Silence Sei]

Indeed. Well thought, my friend.

[orphans]

Jensen actually touches on what I believe ultimately happened....

Bioware was bought out by EA, and EA.... has always been on a less than friendly list for me. They've continuously made game series that were good into... well... crap. All in the sake of meeting deadlines.


As for the Joker running away thing:

The sequence shows that he is in FTL speeds and traveling away from the energy beam. Issue that I have is... he would have been around and above Earth at the time engaged in combat with the Reapers.

IF we considered that the alliance of fleets thought it was hopeless, and would try and regroup, it wouldn't make sense BECAUSE, Admiral Hackett was able to contact Shepard (how did he even know you made it?) while he/she was aboard the Citadel/Crucible combination and tell him/her that it's not firing and must be something on his/her end.

IF we take all of that and say, "Fine, it might be reasonable," my take on the whole thing of my squad members making it out alive (and unscratched) was completely = WTF?

My squad was primarily Garrus and the Javik (that silly prothean dude~), and during the final cut scenes they're alive and well and step outside of the ship to join Joker, depending on what you chose as one of the three options....

So... the writers are telling me that Joker was able to make an emergency pick up in the MIDDLE of HOSTILE combat with no clear landing zones (not to mention, Harbinger class Reapers STILL around and firing), pick up my squad mates but leaves Shepard, has time to pull out, and make some sort of escape? Oh, and then magically my squad mates (who where in the laser blast), are unscathed and have recovered in what would have been assumed a few hours, or maybe a day. >_> Daayyyym... medical technology is great and has advanced... but I don't think that advanced.

But... know what? Whatever they decide to do at this point, I'll probably just read about it later and decide.

EDIT: I loved Bioware, but with EA having bought them out.... ugh....

[Letho]

You know what? I have to give it to you on the Joker thing. You have to fill the gaps with a whole lot of unlikely stuff to make it work. :P

Also, ME avatar time! :D

[Duffy]

*shoots self.

Play SSX Letho :p.

[Silence Sei]

You and me both, Letho. Now if someone could find an 'Illusive Man looking out at the Planet' image that actually fits to decent avatar size for people to know thats exactly what it is...I'll give you a cookie, also.

Joker made an emergency pick up on Earth, as well as one on the Collector Ship, and (I never finished the first, ME, sadly), I'm assuming on Sovreign as well. Making emergency pick up does not seem unlikely. Furthermore, Maybe the squad mates got blown away further than Shepard didduring Harbingers blast, which would explain why Joker could grab them, and not Shepard, as well as explain how he didn't get blasted by Reapers (remember, the Normandy is a ship that -can outrun the most advanced aliens in the universe, being able to outrun their lasers is not that far fetched).

Admiral Hackett had, from the beginning of the game, been around the Earth area (at least, thats what I was gathering), and the Captain always goes down with the ship. Under the regrouping theory, Hackett would have probably been buying time, making one last radio to Shepard in the hopes that he -was- indeed still alive. Or even maybe Shepards life signs showed up in the citadel once the Illusive Man was taken out of the picture, as I assumed he was jamming comms.

You may have me on Squad Mates healing, but remember that this is a universe where Grunt took on basically half of the Reapered-Rachni forces alone, fell off a damn cliff and survived, a world where Thane gets stabbed through the stomach with a blade, and manages to survive a few hours long enough to tell all of his loved ones goodbye. This is a world where unless it is an absolute kill shot, you will recover. If you wish to argue that point, look at the fact that Ash/Kaidan should have, and would have been too brain damaged to be fit for active duty with the way Dr. Eva tossed them and then slammed them into the side of a steel ship several times head first and still manage to come back within a week/two weeks time tops. As long as your squad mates weren't killed, between Chakwas, Liara, Tali and Javik, the team would have enough inenuity to come up with something to cure pretty much anything.

Remember, a third rate apprentic under Mordin cured the f'ing Genophage.