Mass Effect 3

[Lonely]

lolol even more reason to kill this fuck in ME2.

[Kyo]

Kyo we're all very angry with you!

Fuck the haters I have thoroughly enjoyed the game.

[vrumpt]

bringing this over from the official bioware forums. More ending talk, building upon my last post.

Spoiler: show

Is it just me, or does the entire ending sequence not feel like it fits in with the overall theme of the ME universe? It just feels.... off. I cant really describe it.

It seems otherworldly and kind of unfocused.

And when you talk to TIM, you get those weird black things at the edges of the screen.

I am of the opinion that once reaching the Citadel, severely wounded, and losing blood, Shepard hallucinated most of the ending sequence.

It would explain why the kid was there.

The weird blackness when TIM tried to control you and you tried to fight it could be Shepard fighting against blood loss and trying not to pass out (hence the darkening around the edges of the screen)

It explains how even the crew who were wounded with you near the portal in London ended up on the Normandy, and even why the Normandy was leaving Earth in the first place, its because Shepard isnt thinking clearly, and these are just the images dreamed up by a deteriorating brain.

Also, there is a likelyhood that having spent so much time around Reapers, Shepard is slightly indoctrinated. The Synthesis ending really doesnt make much sense, other than the fact that the little kid seems to think it is the best option. We never get an explanation on how jumping into a beam of energy that kills us will do anything like what it is said it will do.

The Reapers used Shepard's slight indoctrination and confused state as part of a last ditch effort to get Shepard to take himself out of the picture, since they knew that if they didnt do so, Shepard was about to win.

tl;dr blood loss leads to reaper victory

Hallucination makes the most sense, in my humble opinion.

Maybe Bioware will release a DLC where it turns out the horrible endings were all just a hallucination that you experienced after you got knocked unconscious by Harbinger while heading towards the portal thingy, and then you can go on to have endings that actually make sense.

Edit: fixed my weird formatting
Edit 2: Adding a list summarizing the theories that people have come up with in the thread, compiled by Turtlicious:


recap:

Thought on the ending:

Parts 1-12 by kyleh619

1. The endgame scenario is Indoctrination/Manipulation from the Reapers (Harbinger) trying to force you into choosing to let the Reapers live. Shepard is not awake during the final sceens!

2. Choosing to control the Reapers allows them to live. Reapers win. They will still exist.

3. Choosing to combine organic and synthetic life: Reapers win. They will still exist.

4. Choosing to destroy all synthetic life: Reapers loose. Shepard lives. Reapers die.

5. Choosing to destroy all synthetic life option is more Renegade in appearence. Controlling the Reapers is more Paragon in appearence. The Illusive Man's choice should not be Paragon colors, just as Anderson's choice should not be Renegade.

6. Shepard awakes at the end of destroying Reapers. But Shepard is not awaking from the aftermath. He is awaking from either after he is hit by Harbingers lazer attack on Earth or after the scene with Anderson and the Illusive Man.

7. Stating that all sythetic life will be destroyed will give you pause; destroying the Geth can force you to a different conclusion. This choice exists for the illusion of choice; the other choices are ment to sound better.

8. Shepard does not awake in the other 2 "endings" because you are fully indoctrinated by the choices you made to allow the Reapers to win. "Assuming Control!"

9. Never trust any child construct, be it a ghost or artificial intelligence, or heck even human. They are just creepy.

10. Shepard awakes at the end because he has broken hold of the Reaper's control.

11. Shepard has spent alot of time around Reapers. Soveriegn, various Reaper artifacts, the Human Reaper, 2 Reaper destroyers, the Artifact from "The Arrival." Its foolish to assume there is not some level of
indoctrination.

12. Bioware not only get more $$$ for DLC for the final battle, but big props for INDOCTRINATING A LOT OF ITS OWN PLAYERS! I do not know of another gaming company that has tried to fool all of its consumers, but they look to be the first and reap all of the attention.

13. Look at these screenshots. I believe the 1m1 is a clue, because of how often it shows up, and how human it is, when the ship is supposedly older then the ancients.
http://oi41.tinypic.com/2nvgso4.jpg
http://i1269.photobucket.com/albums/...3/dreamM1M.jpg

14. Definitions:

Catalyst =
1. Chemistry A substance, usually used in small amounts relative to the reactants, that modifies and
increases the rate of a reaction without being consumed in the process.
2. One that precipitates a process or event, especially without being involved in or changed by the consequences


Crucible=
1. A vessel made of a refractory substance such as graphite or porcelain, used for melting and calcining materials
at high temperatures.
2. A severe test, as of patience or belief; a trial. See Synonyms at trial.
3. A place, time, or situation characterized by the confluence of powerful intellectual, social, economic, or political
forces:

15. Shepard is not wearing his armor when he wakes up in the Citadel, implying that this is a dream.


Kitten Tactics:

-The endgame scenario is Indoctrination/Manipulation from the Reapers (Harbinger) trying to force you into choosing to let the Reapers live.
Shepard is not awake during the final scenes.

-Choosing Control - You can not control them, they control you. Shepard says as much to the Illusive Man moments earlier.

-Choosing Synthesis - Allows everyone in the galaxy to be manipulated by Reaper code, like they have done to the Geth multiple times now.

-Choosing Destroy - Breaks the hold the reapers have on Shepard's mind.

-Choosing to destroy all synthetic life option is more Renegade in appearence. Controlling the Reapers is more Paragon in appearence. The Illusive Man's choice should not be Paragon colors, just as Anderson's choice should not be Renegade. The reapers are saying that Destroy is the worst, Control is worse, and Synthesis is the best. They want you to fail.

-Stating that all sythetic life will be destroyed will give you pause; destroying the Geth can force you to a different conclusion. This choice exists for the illusion of choice; the other choices are ment to sound better.

-Shepard wakes up after Destroy, because the Reaper's hold is diminished. Shepard does not awake in the other 2 "endings" because you are fully indoctrinated by the choices you made to allow the Reapers to win. "Assuming Control!"

-The child does not actually exist. He is an attempt to indoctrinate Shepard. Nobody but Shepard ever sees or interacts with the child.

-When Anderson calls for Shepard at the beginning of the game, when Shepard is talking to the child, Shepard turns back and the child is gone. Shepard has been "snapped out of it".

-When Shepard turns towards Anderson after being "snapped out of it", a growl is heard. In the third novel, when Greyson resisted the reapers they would make a growling noise once they realized they didn't have him under complete control.

-During Shepard's final dream with the child, chatter can be heard over the radio about nobody making it to the beam. Shepard is still in London.

-When Shepard catches the child in the final dream, they are both engulfed in flame. Going with the child (the
reapers) means Shepard's destruction.

-Shepard has spent alot of time around Reapers. Soveriegn, various Reaper artifacts, the Human Reaper, 2 Reaper destroyers, the Artifact from "The Arrival." Its foolish to assume there is not some level of indoctrination.

-When Shepard wakes up at the end of Destroy, he/she is waking up in London, after being hit with the laser.

And it all makes perfect sense.

[6souls]

Or maybe they just applied Michael O'Donoghue's "How to Write Good" to create their ending. Hell, the Coen's do it for some of their films.

Lesson 2 - The Ending:

All too often, the budding author finds that his tale has run its course and yet he sees no way to satisfactorily end it, or, in literary parlance, "wrap it up." Observe how easily I resolve this problem:

Suddenly, everyone was run over by a truck. -the end-

If the story happens to be set in England, use the same ending, slightly modified:

Suddenly, everyone was run over by a lorry. -the end-

If set in France:

Soudainement, tout le monde etait écrasé par un camion. -finis-

You'll be surprised at how many different settings and situations this ending applies to. For instance, if you were writing a story about ants, it would end "Suddenly, everyone was run over by a centipede." In fact, this is the only ending you ever need use.*

*Warning - if you are writing a story about trucks, do not have the trucks run over by a truck. Have the trucks run over by a mammoth truck.

http://workableweb.com/_pages/tips_h...write_good.htm

[Souj]

referring to ME2 character;

Spoiler: show

.is there a chance for all of these characters to survive their missions or are some doomed to die? mordin repairs the tower but gets killed in the explosion, tali kills herself if you help the geth, legion sacrifices himself if you help the geth. Drell dude dies after stopping the assassin. I assume if you don't help the geth and krogan, mordin and tali will live, but can they stay alive even if you do? I was wondering because each character seems to have some brave sacrificial moments in the game that looks like they could die. Grunt came back miraculously after dropping from the cliff, and kasumi only had a decoy blow up. I had used those 2 alot in ME2 so I didn't know if that had something to do with it.
seems like it's just better for the characters and story if you just had everyone killed off in the suicide mission if they come back only to die these lame deaths.

[Insanecyclone]

[Jakson]

Couple things:

What determines N7 rank? I know that it is levels, but leader boards say there are many people 121+, and even if it is 20 per race per class, that's still only 480 and there are 500+ on the top of the list.

I've got the second tier Arc Pistol and Carnifex pistols and find Arc better for Vanguard, but everybody raves about Carnifex. Am I missing something, or is it primarily just for sniping purposes?

all mp, btw. Haven't started SP.

[Tyrath]

referring to ME2 character;

Spoiler: show

.is there a chance for all of these characters to survive their missions or are some doomed to die? mordin repairs the tower but gets killed in the explosion, tali kills herself if you help the geth, legion sacrifices himself if you help the geth. Drell dude dies after stopping the assassin. I assume if you don't help the geth and krogan, mordin and tali will live, but can they stay alive even if you do? I was wondering because each character seems to have some brave sacrificial moments in the game that looks like they could die. Grunt came back miraculously after dropping from the cliff, and kasumi only had a decoy blow up. I had used those 2 alot in ME2 so I didn't know if that had something to do with it.
seems like it's just better for the characters and story if you just had everyone killed off in the suicide mission if they come back only to die these lame deaths.

Spoiler: show

Mordin, Thane and Legion have to die. And lame deaths? They died pretty good deaths. Mordin died curing the genephage that he created. Legion died saving his race. Alternately Shepard could kill both of them if he made different choices. Thane was dying of old age anyways so he ended up dying helping Shepard. It wasn't bad at all.

[Isawa]

Couple things:

What determines N7 rank? I know that it is levels, but leader boards say there are many people 121+, and even if it is 20 per race per class, that's still only 480 and there are 500+ on the top of the list.

I've got the second tier Arc Pistol and Carnifex pistols and find Arc better for Vanguard, but everybody raves about Carnifex. Am I missing something, or is it primarily just for sniping purposes?

all mp, btw. Haven't started SP.

You get +10 to N7 every time you promote a character. However, this will reset that class (and characters) to 1. Good if you want to respec though, also raises galactic readiness.

[Anton]

The only thing that could possibly be worse is

Spoiler: show

that it was all a dream.

Seriously, you actually want a dream sequence ending? Does it get more cliché?

That's one of a few things I think would be an even bigger disappointment than the current endings. It's basically "PHONING IN ENDING: Now. There's your closure lol"

[Rulke]

Is there a spot on the Normandy or someplace to talk to Grunt after the Rachni mission? Everyone says he's getting patched up and how bad ass he is and It'd be cool to shoot the shit with him briefly.

[Rulke]

The only thing that could possibly be worse is

Spoiler: show

that it was all a dream.

Seriously, you actually want a dream sequence ending? Does it get more cliché?

That's one of a few things I think would be an even bigger disappointment than the current endings. It's basically "PHONING IN ENDING: Now. There's your closure lol"

Spoiler: show

While I have yet to beat the game and I highly doubt BW is that invested in this series, I think that if there was a spot (universal to all playthroughs) where Shepard could technically become partially indoctrinated and then have his teammates break him from it etc and then continue on for a different set (dual?) of endings, it could be pretty sweet. LotSB and even Arrival put a good deal of additional story there so if BW wanted to they could further the story of Shepard in that way.

Again, I don't buy into this idea but I think that it could be done and if so would be like one of the top video game 'omgwtf' moments

[Tyrath]

Is there a spot on the Normandy or someplace to talk to Grunt after the Rachni mission? Everyone says he's getting patched up and how bad ass he is and It'd be cool to shoot the shit with him briefly.

Nope. Only at the end of the game with everyone else from ME2.

[Appie]

I actually didn't see Ashley at the end of the game where I could speak with my entire unit one on one. I saw all the others, but not her, did I just miss her? If it matters I romanced her.

[Tyrath]

She was there, you missed her.

[Anton]

Technically

Spoiler: show

There's something like 16 possible endings, but they're all variations of the 'three' endings, which are themselves variations of the same end (and not three totally different endings)

For example, if you choose to destroy all synthetic life but you're pimped - the reapers die. If you choose to destroy synthetic life and you are not pimped at all, you accidentally kill everyone - reapers, humans on earth, joker on the ship never exits, and so on.

Also, all this talk about how bad the end was, but very little on how awesome the music was for it. That was a man-tear moment

[Appie]

She was there, you missed her.

Ah ok, thanks.

[vrumpt]

The only thing that could possibly be worse is

Spoiler: show

that it was all a dream.

Seriously, you actually want a dream sequence ending? Does it get more cliché?

That's one of a few things I think would be an even bigger disappointment than the current endings. It's basically "PHONING IN ENDING: Now. There's your closure lol"

Spoiler: show

Not just any dream; an internal struggle to fight indoctrination. Across all 3 games, Shepard has come close to many Reaper artifacts and actual Reapers. Its foolish to think he would be immune to these effects. The culmination is at the end when Shepard is running for the beam. Cerberus already proved that adrenaline increases the rate of indoctrination. Harbinger is the leader of the Reapers, and it isn't unreasonable to think that he would have increased indoctrination effects when compared to other Reapers.

After Shepard gets hit, he is struggling, dreaming, fighting the indoctrination. The keys in all of this are 2 things: The highest renegade ending where Shepard wakes up in concrete, and the little boy that only Shepard sees. When Shepard gets up into the Citidal, Anderson somehow magically gets in there too, and when you are walking down the single path, somehow Anderson is already at the console completely unscathed. Beyond this, somehow the Illusive man manages to get inside the same part of the citidal as well, even though last you talked to him he told you himself that the Citidal is in lockdown above Earth, with the only way in through the beam in London.

The big one is the end though, where the little boy appears again; the same one that has only appeared in Shepard's dreams. This is the indoctrination manipulating Shepard, forcing him to give up and spare the Reapers. The Illusive man's proposition would not have been a paragon choice, the same way Anderson's would not have been Renegade. Shepard is being manipulated into thinking these are the good/bad choices. If Shepard chooses control or synthesis ending, then the Reapers win. The only way the Reapers lose is if they are destroyed, and its why that option is perceived as a renegade choice to Shepard. Choosing the former 2 submits his will in favor of the Reapers, while choosing the Renegade option is a victory over the indoctrination effects, which is why choosing that ending is the only one where you see Shepard snapping out of the struggle at the end and waking up.

There are other reasons this theory is popular, mainly because of other dream like qualities that occur in addition to the major plot holes that exist if you try to take the ending literally.

[Anton]

Even MORE 'alternate endings'

Spoiler: show

So I've been messing with the afc audio files that contain dialogue and I came across this strange thing: basically during the final push to the conduit joker was supposed to intervene and save the situation. Yes, I'm not joking . He literally says this:"I'm late to the party but the girls are coming home with me" and "That was for Cortez!". If you want to check it out just find and afc to ogg converter and convert the following file located in the cookedPC folder : end001_final_run_trouble.

Also found from data mining:

Cut from a discarded script. You can find it at BioGame_NonShip_INT.xml Starts at line 57710.

"Designer Cutscene:
Shepard comes to.
A handful of survivors from hammer, including Anderson and the henchmen, have gotten bogged down just a few dozen meters from the conduit and have dug in, but are dying quickly.
Suddenly, the Normandy streaks overhead, evading fire from the Reaper and blowing a hole in the Reaper enemies' lines.
Anderson shouts for Shepard to make a run for it, and orders the rest of Hammer to cover him."

The outcomes to this where as follows.
1: "Shepard and Anderson approach the conduit's beam. Shepard gets in, but Anderson is grabbed by a husk. Shepard turns to help, but before he can do anything, the beam activates, whisking Shepard away to the Citadel. On the other side, Shepard tears the metal from his leg and casts it aside, and then injects himself with Medigel."

2:"Shepard comes to. Anderson is dragging him forward. A jagged, bloody piece of metal is sticking out of his thigh. The conduit anchor retracts, stranding the henchmen. Shepard tries to walk, but his leg buckles. Anderson hands Shepard his pistol, and lifts Shepard's arm around his neck, supporting his leg. The two begin to shuffle towards the conduit beam."

3: "Designer Cutscene: Shepard limps to the conduit, and takes one final look around for other survivors. Seeing none, he enters the beam and is transported to the citadel."

4: "Shepard regains consciousness. He's bloody, and obviously badly injured. The Reaper is overhead, blasting away at retreating elements of Hammer. Shepard looks around: he's surrounded by burning vehicles and corpses, alone. He reaches for a syrette of medigel, but finds them broken or empty. Determined, he struggles to his feet, and starts limping towards the conduit."

Did we... miss something?

EDIT: Audio cut

Spoiler: show

from after killing TIM and saving Anderson.


This won't change the game, but... it should have been in there.

Again, whoever did the music nailed it.

[hexagram23]

Even MORE 'alternate endings'

Spoiler: show

So I've been messing with the afc audio files that contain dialogue and I came across this strange thing: basically during the final push to the conduit joker was supposed to intervene and save the situation. Yes, I'm not joking . He literally says this:"I'm late to the party but the girls are coming home with me" and "That was for Cortez!". If you want to check it out just find and afc to ogg converter and convert the following file located in the cookedPC folder : end001_final_run_trouble.

Also found from data mining:

Cut from a discarded script. You can find it at BioGame_NonShip_INT.xml Starts at line 57710.

"Designer Cutscene:
Shepard comes to.
A handful of survivors from hammer, including Anderson and the henchmen, have gotten bogged down just a few dozen meters from the conduit and have dug in, but are dying quickly.
Suddenly, the Normandy streaks overhead, evading fire from the Reaper and blowing a hole in the Reaper enemies' lines.
Anderson shouts for Shepard to make a run for it, and orders the rest of Hammer to cover him."

The outcomes to this where as follows.
1: "Shepard and Anderson approach the conduit's beam. Shepard gets in, but Anderson is grabbed by a husk. Shepard turns to help, but before he can do anything, the beam activates, whisking Shepard away to the Citadel. On the other side, Shepard tears the metal from his leg and casts it aside, and then injects himself with Medigel."

2:"Shepard comes to. Anderson is dragging him forward. A jagged, bloody piece of metal is sticking out of his thigh. The conduit anchor retracts, stranding the henchmen. Shepard tries to walk, but his leg buckles. Anderson hands Shepard his pistol, and lifts Shepard's arm around his neck, supporting his leg. The two begin to shuffle towards the conduit beam."

3: "Designer Cutscene: Shepard limps to the conduit, and takes one final look around for other survivors. Seeing none, he enters the beam and is transported to the citadel."

4: "Shepard regains consciousness. He's bloody, and obviously badly injured. The Reaper is overhead, blasting away at retreating elements of Hammer. Shepard looks around: he's surrounded by burning vehicles and corpses, alone. He reaches for a syrette of medigel, but finds them broken or empty. Determined, he struggles to his feet, and starts limping towards the conduit."

Did we... miss something?

EDIT: Audio cut

Spoiler: show

from after killing TIM and saving Anderson.


This won't change the game, but... it should have been in there.

Again, whoever did the music nailed it.

Spoiler: show

I got that dialogue, or at least I remember 90% of it, from my play through.

Except I don't remember the kids part. Then again Anderson died in my play through, so maybe if you save him the dialogue is different.

Also how does that other stuff, the scenes with Joker, etc. figure into the end? Kinda odd only one of those has Anderson with you when you go up.