Current Events > Was it possible to make Mass Effect satisfying ? -Spoliers-

(+) Yeah! (+)

I was watching the conversation with the Reaper from Mass Effect 1. And I was thinking nothing in the world could have loved up to how cool those things were presented to be.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_NAoNd4YyY

All that and they were just old AI that kill organic to stop wars between AI and Organics .


---

Dark energy

---

Easily, 3 different color explosions for each choice was fucking laughable.

---

Mass Effect went wrong in 2 ways, IMO. Cerberus. It was a mistake to have a human organization be such a core focus in the sequels. I never cared about Martin Sheen. I didn't buy the shepard revival. I didn't buy their unlimited resources. I didn't buy that Martin Sheen would underestimate the reapers so hard and let himself get possessed.

Second, mass effect 3. All of it. The game should not have opened with the reapers invading Earth. In 1, the Sovereign himself seemed like a planet-breaking cosmic monster. 3 tells us that isn't true, because admiral Keith David is able to hold Earth under sustained reaper assault for weeks, if not more. That simply isn't believable based on what we've seen and heard on the reapers prior to that. It ruins the pacing of the entire fucking game. I cannot, cannot believe that bioware expected fans to accept a sustained reaper assault on Earth. They should have taken it in a day, if not hours.

Nope. You were never going to make a large branching story where all the choices across three games had meaningful differences.

There is a reason why very few things have satisfying endings in general. Let alone getting programming a multiple branching game.

---

Thighon posted...

Mass Effect went wrong in 2 ways, IMO. Cerberus. It was a mistake to have a human organization be such a core focus in the sequels. I never cared about Martin Sheen. I didn't buy the shepard revival. I didn't buy their unlimited resources. I didn't buy that Martin Sheen would underestimate the reapers so hard and let himself get possessed.

I think the chief thing ME2 did wrong was that it didn't come before ME1, if that makes sense. It just seems more logical to me to start with a smaller scale threat like the Collectors, then move to a single Reaper to show its potential, then throw the rest of the Reapers at you to finish the trilogy off. As it is, the Collectors just seem like a sideshow.

---

Thighon posted...

Second, mass effect 3. All of it. The game should not have opened with the reapers invading Earth. In 1, the Sovereign himself seemed like a planet-breaking cosmic monster. 3 tells us that isn't true, because admiral Keith David is able to hold Earth under sustained reaper assault for weeks, if not more. That simply isn't believable based on what we've seen and heard on the reapers prior to that. It ruins the pacing of the entire fucking game. I cannot, cannot believe that bioware expected fans to accept a sustained reaper assault on Earth. They should have taken it in a day, if not hours.

So this isn't true. In Mass Effect 1 its stated by Virgil on Ilos that it took the Reapers decades to wipe out the Protheans planet by planet. By the time the Reapers went back through the Mu Relay and Virgil woke up the scientists decades later there wasn't enough of them left to repopulate the galaxy.

There are issues with the pacing of Mass Effect 3, but that isn't one of them.

---

Thighon posted...

Second, mass effect 3. All of it. The game should not have opened with the reapers invading Earth. In 1, the Sovereign himself seemed like a planet-breaking cosmic monster. 3 tells us that isn't true, because admiral Keith David is able to hold Earth under sustained reaper assault for weeks, if not more. That simply isn't believable based on what we've seen and heard on the reapers prior to that. It ruins the pacing of the entire fucking game. I cannot, cannot believe that bioware expected fans to accept a sustained reaper assault on Earth. They should have taken it in a day, if not hours.

This is one of my many gripes with 3. The whole point of Arrival was to delay the reapers and then at the start of 3 all that time is just hand waved away. They could have done a lot with that narratively without having to explain or avoid explaining why everyone wasnt just instantly exploded.

Jiggy101011 posted...

So this isn't true. In Mass Effect 1 its stated by Virgil on Ilos that it took the Reapers decades to wipe out the Protheans planet by planet. By the time the Reapers went back through the Mu Relay and Virgil woke up the scientists decades later there wasn't enough of them left to repopulate the galaxy.

There are issues with the pacing of Mass Effect 3, but that isn't one of them.

The protheans were galactic cockroaches and had technology that fucking annihilated 99% of the tech that came after them, so I still don't buy it even a little

UnholyMudcrab posted...

I think the chief thing ME2 did wrong was that it didn't come before ME1, if that makes sense. It just seems more logical to me to start with a smaller scale threat like the Collectors, then move to a single Reaper to show its potential, then throw the rest of the Reapers at you to finish the trilogy off. As it is, the Collectors just seem like a sideshow.

that's a pretty neat view I hadn't thought of, and I think I agree. I didn't mind the collectors since it was obvious they were just a reaper hivemind, but if 2's events happened first i think it'd be much more palatable

Thighon posted...

The protheans were galactic cockroaches and had technology that fucking annihilated 99% of the tech that came after them, so I still don't buy it even a little

Again, the Protheans got destroyed because the Reapers were successful in using the conduit and teleporting straight through the Citadel. By the time they knew what was happening their entire government body was destroyed. Still took decades to systematically wipe them out of the galaxy.

---

Jiggy101011 posted...

So this isn't true. In Mass Effect 1 its stated by Virgil on Ilos that it took the Reapers decades to wipe out the Protheans planet by planet. By the time the Reapers went back through the Mu Relay and Virgil woke up the scientists decades later there wasn't enough of them left to repopulate the galaxy.

There are issues with the pacing of Mass Effect 3, but that isn't one of them.

Yeah this. The reapers are strong but their true strength are indoctrination and converting organisms into husks.

I can't remember if it was said in the games, comics, novels or on the bioware forum so if it's canon I cannot say, but while the reapers are formidable in battle they still try to avoid partaking in it themselves as much as possible as the loss of a reaper would be the loss of the race that reaper was made from. The usual attack plan was ruined by Shepard so even from the get go they are spread thin and use reckless tactics.

---

Seitar posted...

Yeah this. The reapers are strong but their true strength are indoctrination and converting organisms into husks.

I can't remember if it was said in the games, comics, novels or on the bioware forum so if it's canon I cannot say, but while the reapers are formidable in battle they still try to avoid partaking in it themselves as much as possible as the loss of a reaper would be the loss of the race that reaper was made from. The usual attack plan was ruined by Shepard so even from the get go they are spread thin and use reckless tactics.

The main problem with the Mass Effect franchise are the Reapers themselves. Bioware made the be all end all of enemies from the get go that Casey Hudson imo basically wrote himself into a corner. I personally believe the trilogy should have ended with the cycle continuing but Shepard and Co are able to put something in place so the next group 50,000 years later are able to successfully defeat the Reapers. Like building off how the Protheans were able to figure out the signal for the conduit which allowed Shepards era to stop the Reapers from just teleporting through.

---

I was pretty satisfied with the journey, even if it had some glaring plotholes. But the Reapers as they are presented in ME1 were not a tenable big bad. It's actually sort of funny going back to the first game and listening to Sovereign talk in circles about how incomprehensible the Reapers are to humans, and then the third game explains their purpose fairly easily >_>

---

There was this rabbit hole talking about the original plot of ME3 where it would be focused on dark matter causing stars to explode like in ME2 where youre on that planet where the sun damages you. But the idea was that the Reapers were harvesting the most developed races to combine their intellect until they could solve the problem. And in the end you would either defeat the reapers and be doomed to the apocalypse or you would persuade the reapers to stand down.

eston posted...

I was pretty satisfied with the journey, even if it had some glaring plotholes. But the Reapers as they are presented in ME1 were not a tenable big bad. It's actually sort of funny going back to the first game and listening to Sovereign talk in circles about how incomprehensible the Reapers are to humans, and then the third game explains their purpose fairly easily >_>

Annoyingly it's explained in DLC too.

---

Seaman_Prime posted...

There was this rabbit hole talking about the original plot of ME3 where it would be focused on dark matter causing stars to explode like in ME2 where youre on that planet where the sun damages you. But the idea was that the Reapers were harvesting the most developed races to combine their intellect until they could solve the problem. And in the end you would either defeat the reapers and be doomed to the apocalypse or you would persuade the reapers to stand down.

The Reapers being some ridiculously ancient rogue AI harvesting intellect and scientific knowledge to stop entropy would probably have been more compelling than what we got, even if it's obviously dumb.
But then, ME3 should tell us we can't trust that it wouldn't have been completely stupid.

But yeah, I too found Cerberus to be rather jarring. It seems to straight-up have more resources than most galactic governments, and it has reams of exclusive research knowledge and Reaper artifacts and...how? How does an avowedly human-supremacist terrorist organization have all these resources? Terrorist organizations are terrorist organizations because they don't have a ton of support and/or resources!
They then turn around and install a Reaper skeleton(please forget that there was probably a massive explosion that should have destroyed it or at least mangled it) in their secret headquarters, in spite of knowing more about indoctrination than literally anyone else. It's insanely stupid!
Wait, why are the Collectors making a Human Reaper anyway? If all you need to do is abduct a few thousand randos to make one, why...you know what? I feel like I'm putting more thought into this than Bioware did, at this point.

They could have just let you beat the reapers

ElatedVenusaur posted...

They then turn around and install a Reaper skeleton(please forget that there was a massive explosion that should have destroyed it or at least mangled it) in their secret headquarters, in spite of knowing more about indoctrination than literally anyone else. It's insanely stupid!

part of that is explained by the Illusive Man already being partly indoctrinated long before, so he might have been persuaded to put it there to infect the rest.

---

ROBANN_88 posted...

part of that is explained by the Illusive Man already being partly indoctrinated long before, so he might have been persuaded to put it there to infect the rest.

Ah yes, of course, he was actually indoctrinated all along! That's totally not something they pulled out of their asses to justify his arc at the 11th hour.
How about this: Shepherd died at the beginning of the first game and the entire series was just their neurons firing randomly in the timespan between which they lost consciousness and when they actually died.

ElatedVenusaur posted...

Ah yes, of course, he was actually indoctrinated all along! That's totally not something they pulled out of their asses to justify his arc at the 11th hour.

Well from the first time you see him you see he has glowing blue eyes like Husks and in the origin comic for TIM you see how he got them. So I would say that one isn't pulled out of their ass.

---

Also I know this is random , but I hated Vega. What the fuck is the block head doing on my ship.

---

Tbh I think they probably shouldn't have been fully explained so they'd feel more sinister and scary.

But gameplay wise it would have always been pretty hard to portray them as threatening. I think they should have done more with indoctrination in the third game though.

Dragon Age and the Darkspawn threat was overall handled in a much more satisfying manner.

---

SevenTenths posted...

Nope. You were never going to make a large branching story where all the choices across three games had meaningful differences.

There is a reason why very few things have satisfying endings in general. Let alone getting programming a multiple branching game.

This is why I am curious about those excited for the next Mass Effect game. Are they the same people who slammed the ending of ME3 for making their choices irrelevant? Are they suddenly OK with Bioware making one of the choices cannon?

I never got the hate for the end of the trilogy, mainly because I was aware there was no way they could account for every possibility a player made. As for the stuff like the Rachni Queen not mattering, I get that too. I would have been more upset to find out there was a mission I couldn't do because of a choice I made 2 games ago.

---

Bioware games are in a tough position where they claim the choices matter but also don't want to punish players. It's hard to say that choices matter if there's no real consequence for them. You can blindly trust everyone in the ME trilogy (unless you romance Jacob) and never be punished for it. ME1 was the closest that came to actually punishing players but scaled that back a bit. ME2 had the suicide mission too but was more dependent on doing side missions and making the right tactical moves which was cool. Wish we had more of that.

But it's tough because a lot people also don't really want to be punished for their actions either. Look at all the people who still complain about getting the bad ending in Dishonored for killing everyone. So really we just get to play as Space Jesus who does everything right.

---

ElatedVenusaur posted...

Ah yes, of course, he was actually indoctrinated all along! That's totally not something they pulled out of their asses to justify his arc at the 11th hour.
How about this: Shepherd died at the beginning of the first game and the entire series was just their neurons firing randomly in the timespan between which they lost consciousness and when they actually died.

There is a full visual novel deailing how his body was infused with Reaper tech during the First Contact War.
Also the same part where Saren got in contact with it

---

ROBANN_88 posted...

There is a full visual novel deailing how his body was infused with Reaper tech during the First Contact War.
Also the same part where Saren got in contact with it

The more it's explained, the more contrived it sounds. Did they at least get to pick which color indoctrination they got?
I want to know their choices mattered.

I think there were enough hints in ME2 that The Illusive Man was already indoctrinated or arrogant enough to think he would avoid it. The guy wanted to keep the Collector Base even though he would have explicitly known about the risk.

---

Darmik posted...

I think there were enough hints in ME2 that The Illusive Man was already indoctrinated or arrogant enough to think he would avoid it. The guy wanted to keep the Collector Base even though he would have explicitly known about the risk.

Right, that's really stupid

King of human supremacists: I will forcibly bond with an alien to become more than human!

It just doesnt make sense

So, factions of bad guys are:
-Reapers
-Humans (Cerberus[Reapers])
-Geth (Reapers)

Ok