Mass Effect

[TheBATMAN]

Very well put. ME3 gets a harsh ride in my book.

[Kimarhi]

The end of a series always gets trashed.  Fans just don't want to admit that something they like is coming to an end.  That said Me3 suffers from choices that it should not have.  Mainly the investment in other characters that you put into ME2 isn't rewarded in ME3.  I absolutely hated how little time most of the ME2 cast got, especially Jack. 

The ending for such a sprawling series was also underwhelming. 

ME2 was the pinnacle imo. 

[The Old One]

This, also perhaps... ME2 is a contender, but not ME3. Not while stuff like The Witcher 2 & 3, Batman Arkham City/Knight, Telltale's TWD S1/The Wolf Among Us, Spec Ops The Line, Minecraft, Dark Souls, Nier Automata, Fallout New Vegas, Shovel Knight, Hollow Knight, Doom, God of War, Red Dead Redemption, Outer Wilds and Undertale exist.

[Local Trouble]

Of the games you listed, the only ones I've played are the Arkhams.

[The Old One]

That's a pity, but, you do you.

[Local Trouble]

Mainly the investment in other characters that you put into ME2 isn't rewarded in ME3.  I absolutely hated how little time most of the ME2 cast got, especially Jack.

That's a natural consequence of ME2's design, though.  I don't think Bioware could justify investing even more of their limited development resources into characters that, depending on your choices, may have died in ME2's suicide mission.

That's why any ME4 that we get may only feature characters like Liara, Joker, Traynor and Vega: they're the only ones that definitely survived.

That's a pity, but, you do you.

I think I'll skip Minecraft.

[Kimarhi]

I'm pretty sure they could've just canonized that the player had completed the loyalty missions and all the crew members survived.  Especially since each character in ME2 has what is essentially another loyalty mission in ME3 anyways.  All you would've needed to do was add mission dialogue and ship dialogue from that point on.  They didn't need to add any new characters in ME3, and the only one that they did that was of interest was the Promethean who was a bonus DLC. 

Whats done is done, but that direction was shit. 

[Local Trouble]

I'm pretty sure they could've just canonized that the player had completed the loyalty missions and all the crew members survived.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I wanted my choices in ME2 (and ME1) to carry over to ME3.  Am I alone in this?

I thought that was a major draw of the series. 

[The Old One]

It is a major draw of the series, sorry Jack.

[JokersWarPig]

I love that the choices carry over.
Granted I only had one instance where in ME2 I royally screwed the pooch by going through the relay to early and getting a lot of crew killed.

I had to load a previous save and do a lot over again.

[Local Trouble]

I've never done a playthrough in which anyone from ME2 died and I had to play ME3 either without them or with their inferior substitutes (e.g. Wreav).  Maybe I should.

[Kimarhi]

I'm pretty sure they could've just canonized that the player had completed the loyalty missions and all the crew members survived.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I wanted my choices in ME2 (and ME1) to carry over to ME3.  Am I alone in this?

I thought that was a major draw of the series. 

There is always a canon storyline.  Like where whats his nuts died in the first one and Ashley lived.  That is the "official" storyline in which the EU media is derived from. 


Edit: the recent google hits say otherwise, but I remember reading back when ME3 was released that they followed one overall storyline to derive all the things in the EU from (as there is no way to change books and shit to fit your characters choices in the games).


My point still stands though.  The characters from ME2 all had moments/missions in ME3.  They all had what amounted to loyalty missions, they all were at Shepards party, and they all played apart in the final mission. You simply needed to add dialogue variations for the different missions and points in time on the ship.  Which they have done in EVERY ME game from the first to Andromeda.  That is certainly not beyond their scope and is very much a design choice to focus back again on primarily the original ME crew. 

The extended cut of ME3 helped it out considerably, but it still felt like a smack in the face for ME2 fans. 

[Local Trouble]

That is certainly not beyond their scope and is very much a design choice to focus back again on primarily the original ME crew.

With the exception of Liara and Ashley (or Kaiden), there were no definite surviving squadmates from ME1.  Wrex could have died in ME1 while Tali and Garrus could have both died in ME2.

It was a bold choice for Bioware to allow for so many characters to die, but that's part of what made the trilogy great.  It's just too bad they didn't release more ME3 DLC that would have given us more time with our favorite killable squadmates, but I suppose Citadel was the best they could do at the time.

[Kimarhi]

C'mon man.  Nobody killed those characters with exception of Kaiden/Ashley because it is required.  Nobody is going to complete a playthrough with dead Tali or Garrus. 


The third game definitely favors the original cast, since all but Kaiden (usually) is going to be there.

[Local Trouble]

I know what you mean, but I can't fault Bioware for their creative decision in making our choices matter.  It made the games extremely replayable, but they had to draw the line somewhere.

I'm actually surprised we got as much content as we did given ME3's review-bombing upon release.