EPIC SPOILERS! so much spoiler, pretty much entirely comprised of spoiler.

This thread won't make any sense if you haven't finished the game anyway so no reason to continue.

This first spoiler tag is a courtesy, after that it's back to normal. But that doesn't mean no more spoilers. (it's easier to read.)


Now, I quickly became a believer in this theory to an extent. But I don't swallow the whole "it was a dream pill." I'm not sure what to think. I think the "it was a dream" reason would be a bad move, but who knows.

However it ends up playing out though, I'm entirely convinced these were not the true endings. Bioware is not stupid, and having a crew member who died while rushing the beam show up in the end cutscene is obviously too sloppy for them. Here are some tweets from bioware that cemented my belief in this.

"Are you holding something back, that could quell the large amount of frustration from the community, a tiny hint would be enough."
@masseffect: "Mike Gamble already said on his twitter, if the fans knew what was in store, the reaction would be different."

"Its not that the ending was taken in the wrong direction its that it makes NO SENSE. Ashley was on the Normandy? she [was] with me."
@masseffect: "Probably a good thing to be cautious of."

That tweet right there says it all for me. Combined with all the examples in that video, in that article, and similarities I'm noticing in the previous games, I'm betting on the coming DLC to be something truly awesome.

They were playing with indoctrination controls in the design stage but dropped the gameplay aspect of it. I think they managed to pull the ultimate troll and indoctrinate the player. If they really pulled this off, they... are... gods...

Thoughts anyone?

I'm not sure whether I buy the indoctrination ending, but regardless, the endings left a lot of stuff open. Like the way Harbinger after featuring very heavily in the last game was largely absent from this one, and also why there was such a focus on humanity, the dreams of the so-called "God-Child", all of that could have been brought together, but just wasn't.


Those tweets, particularly the bolded one most certainly suggest that there's more to come.

Still I quite enjoyed the game until you got shot with the laser running to the beam at the end. The Adept and Vanguard classes are quite a lot of fun.

Here's something that really stuck out to me. I was just playing mass effect 2 and I read an email you receive from Han Olar. He was the volus from the Noveria station in the first game who closed the door on his colleague to escape the rachni. He watched her head split like a melon. That guy. Anyway, here's what stuck out to me.
"But maybe you're not really back. Maybe I died. Maybe I didn't close that door in time. Maybe I held it open to give her a chance, and the rachni ripped my suit open, and I died of exposure there on Peak 15. Maybe I'm a martyr, and this is an ugly hallucination before a glorious afterlife.
But if I'm not, then thank you."

A happy coincidence, yes. But my point is someone had to write that letter. And the fact they put that in leads me to believe that idea was at least in someones head as far back as 2. And the way 2 was done, it was like a lead-up to 3. So I imagine they were in development at the same time.

I don't think that indoctrination video ^ got it all right, it makes some pretty big leaps, but I think the general idea is sound. My first suspicion was that the beam certainly couldn't be that easy. Even if you did reach it, why would it give you safe passage? The reapers are simply harvesting humanity, and using the citadel as what appears to be another collector ship/staging area for creating more reapers. Even though it's described as transporting humans both alive and dead, who's to say they survive the trip?

But now, I'm leaning more towards nothing happening after you get blasted being reality. For one, my first time playing through I thought the mysterious way in which you get lasered was a bit odd. My second time through I noticed Shepard flinches in exactly the same way he does when you're inside the geth terminal and you enter a data portal. I wrote this off as a gameplay mechanic/corner cut, but now I'm not so sure.

I'm totally nerding out on this whole thing I find it completely fascinating. All the fun of a conspiracy theory without any real world implications.

i know someone who attempts to play ME3 his every waking moment. when he can't play it, he looks it up on his phone. when that's not acceptable to do, he talks about it.

The amazing thing is the amount of discussion it's provoked. I've never seen an ending of a book, TV series whatever provoke this kind of widespread reaction. It's no wonder the series has developed such a huge fan base being as evocative and engaging as it is.

However If Bioware don't address the ending in some way, be it through add-on DLC or whatever, they'll have lost a lot of fans. Of course the other avenue is paid "True-Ending" DLC, which is nothing but a rather dirty money grabbing tactic, although given the fan-base, I think a surprizingly large amount of people will be willing to cough up.

I was pretty disappointed. I went for the synthesis ending, which was moderately appropriate, considering the other options (aside from the fact that they're all basically the same with different colored explosions). What bugged me the most was that very little that you did up until that point really seemed to matter. Yeah, I brought more "war assets" to the party than I could have... but there wasn't any reason to realistically think that the options offered to me by the starchild (who came out of left field and was completely incongruous with the entire storyline) had anything to do with that.

The martyring of Shepard was not what I wanted to see -- but I would have accepted it had it really fit with the rest of the story. But it didn't. Not even close. That's the big point for me. Mass Effect, overall, had a *great* story. But it ended on a completely sour note, as the ending was just tacked on (from what I've read, it *was* tacked on -- the original ending was leaked, and afterwards they built this one instead).

Having said that, and admitting that I'm disappointed in it, I'm going to be *really* upset if they release the "real" ending as DLC -- especially paid DLC. I'm not a fan of the whole DLC model anyway (ie, blatant cash grab), and the whole ruckus over the day-1 Prothean teammate DLC was appropriate (I bought the DLC, and enjoyed it... but it had lore that should have been in the main game).

For a series that was a 10 out of 10 for almost all of the storyline, I'd give the ending about a 3. Which is just bogglingly stupid, considering how well the story had been crafted up until that point.

With all that's been said by bioware, the fact that 70k+ has been raised for charity in an effort to get the ending changed, the rumors that the coming DLC "Truth" will be free, and that the whole ending felt strange, I'm banking on them releasing an ending related DLC.

Even if these were the endings they'd be stupid to leave it at this. It just doesn't make any sense. The endings are so sloppy, leave so much unsaid, and are so full of holes there's no way they didn't purposefully make it this way. Putting in specific characters is not hard they do it all the time. They have the movements mapped and just import the appearance. And having Ashley standing there with joker, on a planet that looks eerily similar to one from mass effect 2, after she died in the beam rush has to be intentional. Or edi there after "all synthetic life is destroyed."

Plus IDK if anyone's played the arrival DLC, spoiler alert.... but you blow up a mass relay in that. This DLC that leads you into the events of 3 is all about a system on the edge of the galaxy getting obliterated because you blow up a mass relay to delay the reaper arrival. It literally wipes the system out. Being that this happens in every populated system in the galaxy in all 3 endings, it makes no sense. You save the galaxy to destroy it? I doubt they'd make such a blatant mistake. Even if the ending was tacked on in a hurry, there's no reason to destroy the mass relays.

i've heard a theory that after shepard is knocked out, the rest of the battle is just symbolism for him internally fighting the indoctrination. that would explain it.

A Logical Breakdown of Why the Mass Effect 3 Ending Makes no Sense.

Worth a read, amazing the level of detail some go to.

Indeed. I'm thoroughly convinced all is not as it seems. Looking forward to see where they take it, honestly hope they don't make an entirely new game though. A nice free DLC would get everyone back on their dicks. Or at least a free one for everyone with an online pass. Charging in any case would be a bad move. I hope they can see that.

While the level of outrage is ridiculous, I think it's great that upwards of 70k has been given to charity in "protest" of the endings. It will be completely amazing when whatever they're releasing comes out and everyone feels slightly stupid but at least it was for a good cause.

http://blog.bioware.com/2012/03/21/4108/



Make of it what you will...

Saw this, thought it was neat.

http://www.dorkly.com/article/35726/8-movies-with-mass-effect-morality

And also saw this..

http://www.pcgamer.com/2012/03/23/mass-effect-3-ending-what-do-game-writers-think/