RPG on Rails: Mass Effect 3 and the Illusion of Choice

[iambeanie]

I finished the game and i was very happy with almost everything. Before playing i made sure not to read ANYTHING on the internet about the game, i love this series and i wanted it to be completely unspoiled. So i played it through and loved every moment of it! After finishing it i read articles like this and many others over the interwebs and it makes you realise how poor of a game it actually was...

Choices have little to no effect, 6300+ EMS for what exactly? I came into the game expecting to be fighting for my life and that my extra hours of time spent collecting allies would have an actual impact on the final battle so that ...you know...it feels like it has a point... Few if any real choices are presented beyond the "shoot mordin to get salarian and krogran help or do the right thing and forfeit salarian help but still gain krogran". Paragon is a useless addition for the most part, a previous poster mentioned the 'bro-shake' which comes up quite a bit. I don't regret buying or playing it, the multiplayer will keep me going for some time YAY COOP WAVE DEFENCE!!, but its the only one in the series that i definitely won't be played more than once for the story.

Side note: This is worth watching over and over
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHIAibDr3yM[/youtube]

[yogi]

Good post.

Most gaming experiences of this style need a narrative to push them forward. You come up with the story first and then build the game around that. Some of the outrage about this issue suggests ME did it well - almost too well.

The recent Batman Arkham games are very much like this, but so well done, that no one really notices. You are really just following where you are told to go - it's the feeling of being able to be free that works.

It also helped that the Arkham games have an enclosed geographic space - an island and a walled part of a city - so you instintively understand that only so much, within so many variables, can happen. And a very established familar story that you can't deviate too much from. Very smart.

[Anachronous]

That chart is pretty much scene for scene how I had expected the ending to be, as I would expect anyone invested in the story would have also imagined. However, with the ending we got, I felt like the game was cut at the last minute and pushed out the door, similar to what Obsidian did with KOTOR2, when they cut the proper ending and rushed it out with some cut-down ending, which rendered all you did prior mostly pointless. Both were very disappointing.

[exe3]

Most gaming experiences of this style need a narrative to push them forward. You come up with the story first and then build the game around that. Some of the outrage about this issue suggests ME did it well - almost too well.

It's not even that though as Mass Effect 1 was full of its own flaws. It's just that Mass Effect 1 was the closest to what the series is suppose to be and of what fans want. A true scifi adventure RPG experience that uses shooting as the combat mechanic rather than the traditional forms of RPG combat. ME2 and 3 were essentially just shooters with varying degrees of RPG in the gameplay and story, NOT what the fans want despite what Bioware may think. Wow this reminds me of the old heat ammo system in ME1, I wanna replay just for that, that was brilliant design right there and really befitting of an RPG. It's decided! Going straight back into ME1 after I finish ME3, will be playing female Renegade this time. Can't wait. ^_^

/edit

I THOUGHT something was missing, hacking is gone, wtf? The RPG of this RPG series has taken more hits than i've realized.

[ShadowReaver]

I have been avoiding all the spoilers and finished ME3 today, I was hoping the insane amounts of hate for the end were due to it being controversial in the same manner a lot of people disliked clover field. This was not the case. It was just whole-sale **** ****.

Hidden: show

They had all the pieces laid out for an amazing crescendo... then used none of it. Your squad mates become irrelevant despite being central to why people love the game (They literally just disappear). Finished with that god awful child binary ending that wouldn't have been revolutionary even 10 years ago and the worst cut-to-black, well, ever. Even if it hadn't been cut it would have revealed nothing.

I think the thing that moved me from disappointed to pissed off was the end dialogue that pretty much read: "Shepherd saved the world, buy more of our **** you plebs ".

[thefinn]

I'm Ash Williams, and this is my favorite post on the citadel.

Well done Tim for showing some journalism about Mass Effect 3 when nowhere else has. Also hadn't seem that flowchart before and it does raise some good points about choices that SHOULD have been in the game.

You did well buddy!

Gotta agree, I HATE reviews that are all one-sided and they show up especially flawed in the light of such a massive let down.

In my personal opinion, I've watched the gaming industry for many years, and you can always tell a ripoff when it lands on your hard drive. This wasn't just an "oops" it was a total rip. The first hints were the writing staff all changing around. The second - the false advertising that the ME1 and ME2 decisions were going to matter and that the endings would be "vastly different".

I don't feel let down, I feel ripped off.

[Marcus Dunn]

I enjoyed ME3, but to me there were a few things that stood out as annoying along the way. I did enjoy it however, but like many, I found the ending somewhat appalling, namely due to the galaxy sized holes gaping in it.

I found there to be an almost excessive amount of emotional reminiscing - which isn't really a problem, but it became distracting and made the whole game feel like a big 'farewell to the best series in life' type thing which to me felt a little over the top.

And most of the action sequences felt like they were just an excuse for them to use the assets they'd put together for the co-op - or vice versa. Loss of points for cop-out there.

Mass Effect 2 was actually my favourite of the three. I found the introductions to the team member missions, then moreso their loyalty missions to be the highlight of the series. I can vividly remember most of them, while I am already struggling to remember anything of real note in ME3. Garrus being the sniper for keeping all those mercs at bay for example - that moved me in a 'this wins!' way.

[exe3]

I found there to be an almost excessive amount of emotional reminiscing - which isn't really a problem, but it became distracting and made the whole game feel like a big 'farewell to the best series in life' type thing which to me felt a little over the top.

Are you talking about the amount of sap in the game? Excessive emotional sap annoys me in anything and in ME3 it's layered on really heavily especially at the beginning with that dumb, obvious kid and the excessive overuse of the piano music. When it's obvious they're trying to get an emotional response for you that's all the more less likely you'll give one.

Also I just found out that it's impossible to get enough EMS for the 'best' endings without playing coop. This game is just one massive middle finger to the community after another.

[Kaldek]

I finished the game and i was very happy with almost everything. Before playing i made sure not to read ANYTHING on the internet about the game, i love this series and i wanted it to be completely unspoiled. So i played it through and loved every moment of it! After finishing it i read articles like this and many others over the interwebs and it makes you realise how poor of a game it actually was...

I had the same reaction. At first I thought "not bad", then I went and watched the complaints videos have just been getting angrier by the day.