Mass Effect 3 $$(ENDINGS SPOILERS)$$
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I'd be seriously surprised if *any* of that had any significant impact on the game's development. It's the sort of basic thing they'd have budgeted time for right from the get-go. I imagine making actual game content takes much more time than that stuff and the sheer volume of content is probably what really causes a time crunch.
I have two more thoughts on this game.
First, I wonder how much of an impact the aborted first person shooter had on the development of this game. During the development phase of the other two games, they were working on one project for the franchise. For the third game, they had two projects in early 2010. Sometime in 2010, Casey Hudson reviewed the work on the fps, and ordered that the team stop developing the fps and begin work on a multiplayer component for Mass Effect 3.
Second, in the dlc LotSB, Commander Shepard could access a console on the Shadowbroker's Ship where the Commander could invest credits in an investment project. I think a variation of this concept could have worked in the third game where Shepard would review missions from the Shadowbroker and, if the Commander accepted a mission, they and a team would work together to complete this mission. (I have been watching the movie series Mission Impossible, and this is where I am getting this idea from.) Liara, as the Shadowbroker, was a wasted concept. Like one reviewer said, she became a chick with a gun.
One of the things that I have heard and read from critics in the past about other games was how flaky the physics engine performed. This was one of the reasons I raised the wobbly tank. In the first game, I have been able to have my Commander jump onto the Mako and the Grizzly. Neither vehicle ever wobbled. In this third game, a soldier jumps off the front of a tank, and this tank wobbles badly.
Another glitch disturbed me in a different way. When I watch Commander Shepard's eyes roll back into her head and I saw the white of her eyes, this freaked me out. Before I played this game, I had read about what happen to Shanda Sharer. This young girl was kidnapped and brutally murdered by four female teenagers in the early 1990's. From this website, http://simplysue1958.webs.com/shandaslasthours.htm, is a description of this girl when two of the girls checked on their victim who they had dumped in the truck of a car. They had beaten her with a tire iron, and a portion of her skull had caved in.
When they opened the trunk, they both gasped. Shanda sat up moaning, completely red from her own blood, her eyes rolled back in her head showing only the whites and she began to slowly swayside to side.
I am unable to dissociate these two events, Commander Shepard and Shanda Shearer, in my mind, and every time I saw it I was freaked out. I wished that Bioware cared enough about their product that they wouldn't have released a game that had this crap in it.
First, I wonder how much of an impact the aborted first person shooter had on the development of this game. During the development phase of the other two games, they were working on one project for the franchise. For the third game, they had two projects in early 2010. Sometime in 2010, Casey Hudson reviewed the work on the fps, and ordered that the team stop developing the fps and begin work on a multiplayer component for Mass Effect 3.
Second, in the dlc LotSB, Commander Shepard could access a console on the Shadowbroker's Ship where the Commander could invest credits in an investment project. I think a variation of this concept could have worked in the third game where Shepard would review missions from the Shadowbroker and, if the Commander accepted a mission, they and a team would work together to complete this mission. (I have been watching the movie series Mission Impossible, and this is where I am getting this idea from.) Liara, as the Shadowbroker, was a wasted concept. Like one reviewer said, she became a chick with a gun.
One of the things that I have heard and read from critics in the past about other games was how flaky the physics engine performed. This was one of the reasons I raised the wobbly tank. In the first game, I have been able to have my Commander jump onto the Mako and the Grizzly. Neither vehicle ever wobbled. In this third game, a soldier jumps off the front of a tank, and this tank wobbles badly.
Another glitch disturbed me in a different way. When I watch Commander Shepard's eyes roll back into her head and I saw the white of her eyes, this freaked me out. Before I played this game, I had read about what happen to Shanda Sharer. This young girl was kidnapped and brutally murdered by four female teenagers in the early 1990's. From this website, http://simplysue1958.webs.com/shandaslasthours.htm, is a description of this girl when two of the girls checked on their victim who they had dumped in the truck of a car. They had beaten her with a tire iron, and a portion of her skull had caved in.
When they opened the trunk, they both gasped. Shanda sat up moaning, completely red from her own blood, her eyes rolled back in her head showing only the whites and she began to slowly swayside to side.
I am unable to dissociate these two events, Commander Shepard and Shanda Shearer, in my mind, and every time I saw it I was freaked out. I wished that Bioware cared enough about their product that they wouldn't have released a game that had this crap in it.
I doubt Team Assault had much, if any, impact on ME3's development. TA was, after all, being developed by BioWare Montreal, whereas BioWare Edmonton - the flagship, original studio - was developing the single-player content. If TA had been cancelled without being reworked into MP, the Montreal team probably would've moved onto something else entirely.
The biggest insult I got out of the LotSB carry over was the promise my Shepard made about always coming back. A very important moment in my opinion since Shepard pretty much proposes to her. And that carry over was bugged... After doing some research, I found out that if it wasn't bugged, it only changed one line of dialogue, and it was just about the tour of the Normandy. Not about the conversation the two shared about Shepard's feelings about fighting the Reapers, and NOT ABOUT SHEPARD'S PROMISE SHE MADE TO HER! She even asks Shepard after that very sentence if she's still interested in her. . . .
Most of all though, I felt it robbed my Shepard of a well earned happy ending.
Amen to that. Someone over at Bioware's social forums had a pretty interesting quote that their Dad said. "Shouldn't you be able to beat the game?" and I was like "Yeah. We should!".
Most of all though, I felt it robbed my Shepard of a well earned happy ending.
Amen to that. Someone over at Bioware's social forums had a pretty interesting quote that their Dad said. "Shouldn't you be able to beat the game?" and I was like "Yeah. We should!".
This. Another great way to describe how the endings were a giant slap in the face to the Mass Effect fans, gamers and small children.
More cut dialogue from London, this time it looks like Geth Primes and quarians were supposed to fight along side Shepard. And the rushed ending argument just keeps on getting stronger...
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwIbvWC7qh0[/yt]
Oh and it looks like Tali my have been a romance option for femShep, or at least they recorded dialogue for people that edited their ME2 saves. Darnit!
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmExTZIQit0[/yt]
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwIbvWC7qh0[/yt]
Oh and it looks like Tali my have been a romance option for femShep, or at least they recorded dialogue for people that edited their ME2 saves. Darnit!
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmExTZIQit0[/yt]
I think the geth dialogue was great, and it's a shame that it wasn't in the final product. I would judge from the dialogue that it presupposes that the Commander orchestrated a peace between the quarians and the geth. I liked that the geth promised that they would help humans with the rebuilding of their civilization.
As for the argument that this material was dropped because of a rush to complete the ending, are we sure that this was the case? Or can it be argued that this material belonged to an earlier version of the ending and was abandoned when the lead writer and project director elected to make a new ending?
As for the argument that this material was dropped because of a rush to complete the ending, are we sure that this was the case? Or can it be argued that this material belonged to an earlier version of the ending and was abandoned when the lead writer and project director elected to make a new ending?
No, the ending being changed at the last minute is a bit of a myth. The whole starchild thing was in the game as early as the beta leak.
Regardless, stuff like this would have come into play during the London mission itself, which has zero impact on the story after that point. So again, no it's not from some radically different version. Indeed, Jack's dialogue is perfectly in line with the level as is.
What's been rushed here is the level itself. The cut dialogue indicates that the original idea here was that many of your decisions would affect how the fight to the FOB would play out.
As for the Geth dialogue, I don't think the Geth being there would necessarily be contingent on a Geth-Quarrian peace. I've been mucking about with Gibbed's audio extractor myself and the way these files are arranged you tend to get all variations of a conversation in the order they'd be triggered.
For example, a section that involved a conversation between Liara, Shepard and the VS would go something like:-
[Liara's line]
[femShep's paragon response] / [maleShep's paragon response]
[Liara's reaction to paragon response]
[femShep's renegade response] / [maleShep's renegade response]
[Liara's reaction to renegade response]
[Ashley's line] / [Kaiden's line]
[Liara's response to Kaiden] / [Liara's response to Ashley]
Basically what you hear there are all variations of a conversation broken apart and arranged in chronological order, so it's a comprehensive conversation rather than a cohesive one.
Regardless, stuff like this would have come into play during the London mission itself, which has zero impact on the story after that point. So again, no it's not from some radically different version. Indeed, Jack's dialogue is perfectly in line with the level as is.
What's been rushed here is the level itself. The cut dialogue indicates that the original idea here was that many of your decisions would affect how the fight to the FOB would play out.
As for the Geth dialogue, I don't think the Geth being there would necessarily be contingent on a Geth-Quarrian peace. I've been mucking about with Gibbed's audio extractor myself and the way these files are arranged you tend to get all variations of a conversation in the order they'd be triggered.
For example, a section that involved a conversation between Liara, Shepard and the VS would go something like:-
[Liara's line]
[femShep's paragon response] / [maleShep's paragon response]
[Liara's reaction to paragon response]
[femShep's renegade response] / [maleShep's renegade response]
[Liara's reaction to renegade response]
[Ashley's line] / [Kaiden's line]
[Liara's response to Kaiden] / [Liara's response to Ashley]
Basically what you hear there are all variations of a conversation broken apart and arranged in chronological order, so it's a comprehensive conversation rather than a cohesive one.
Hey I found a video that deals with the problems in Mass Effect 3
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M-jtGoYX_Q&feature=g-vrec[/yt]
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M-jtGoYX_Q&feature=g-vrec[/yt]
^Like there isn't already a million of those. 
Seriously though, it's good to see this approached from a design POV rather than a writing or a "GRR! EA AR SUCH EVILZ!!!" one. There are some very good points and a lot of it lines up with my own feelings.
I know I couldn't have been the only one to notice right from the off that the London mission just wasn't up to the same standard of design as the others. You get dropped in the middle of a fire-fight with no sense of the battlefield's geography, no clue where to go and having to deal with damn hades cannon (something you'd never even heard of until 20 seconds ago) firing blasts every few seconds that hit you with blinding light and a serious case of shaky-cam. Both of which only add to the confusion.
After you take it out you then have to dig in and fight infinite waves of enemies until your extraction shuttle arrives. Problem is agin the battlefield geography so so poorly designed and implemented that it's hard to get a sense of where the enemy is coming from and thus where to position yourself. A rather vital factor for shooters with cover mechanics.
Then to top it off you have to deal with several banshees, which as you discovered earlier in the game render cover next to useless as they can biotic-charge right up to your face, forcing you to dodge from cover and right into the kill zone of the ranged enemies. Now there's another Cain just over there on the floor that can make life easier, but you're not liable to spot that on your first try, as you're more likely to be focused on the enemy than looking for conveniently (or inconveniently) placed heavy weapons.
Actually, this is a flaw with the rest of the game too. On my first playthough I don't think I found *any* of the heavy weapon drops until *after* the fighting was over. You're apparently supposed to just stumble on them randomly.
The FOB section is handled fairly well, there's some neat touches like listening to radio chatter about casualty & scouting reports, some datapads left lying around and an mini-drama with a medic trying to coach a doomed civilian over the radio. You even get a nice little character moment with each of your party members and even a (somewhat implausibly arranged) chat over the comms with any surviving former squad-mates...the flow of which is utterly destroyed by some random and pointless turret segment. Seriously, what was the thinking behind this? You get a much better sense of "moving though the trenches" as it were if you saw other soldiers doing the fighting as you walked past.
After more exposition, Shepard gets to make *only* decision thus far in the level and the penultimate decision of the entire series: who do you want on your squad...? I mean that's all we get to decide? No say in how to deploy the various disparate forces you've pulled together throughout the *entire* game? No questions about what your other team mates or assets should be doing? By this point, Shepard is arguable the most important person in the whole Alliance. In practice only third in line of authority after Admirals Hackett and Anderson and her role is to pick a two person team to follow her where the fighting is heaviest?
Now I'm not saying Shep should have spent the next segment back at base while everyone else goes out to get slaughtered, but there should have been a lot more agency than this! She should have been given direct command over a battalion, of not a full brigade of ground forces with which to tackle the final combat mission. Assigning squadmates to command smaller units, directing assets to engage enemy forces to punch a hole though the reaper lines and allow the bulk of hammer a shot at the beam...but no, we get more street to street fighting, topped off by yet another "hold off endless waves of enemies" fight while we wait to be able to fire the magical thanix missiles (something else we only even hear about shortly before they're introduced) only two of which apparently have enough power to take down a destroyer-class reaper. Quite impressive considering the last two times we took down one of these it took either a Godzilla sized, acid spewing spaceworm or multiple precision orbital barrages from the largest fleet in the galaxy...if that's not a complete arse-pull, I don't know what is!
Finally, with our goal in sight we're left with the final brilliant strategy of "leg it across no man's land directly at the heavily armed and entrenched enemy position, never mind the two kilometre tall reaper that just landed opposite the kill zone." Field Marshal Haig would have been so proud! I can just see Shepard's final journal entry now. it simply says "bugger."
So yeah, sorry for the wall of text, that went on a bit longer than I'd intended! But still, as I've said before, the problems with this game extend much deeper than a shoddy ending, there are some serious design flaws throughout the game.
Seriously though, it's good to see this approached from a design POV rather than a writing or a "GRR! EA AR SUCH EVILZ!!!" one. There are some very good points and a lot of it lines up with my own feelings.
I know I couldn't have been the only one to notice right from the off that the London mission just wasn't up to the same standard of design as the others. You get dropped in the middle of a fire-fight with no sense of the battlefield's geography, no clue where to go and having to deal with damn hades cannon (something you'd never even heard of until 20 seconds ago) firing blasts every few seconds that hit you with blinding light and a serious case of shaky-cam. Both of which only add to the confusion.
After you take it out you then have to dig in and fight infinite waves of enemies until your extraction shuttle arrives. Problem is agin the battlefield geography so so poorly designed and implemented that it's hard to get a sense of where the enemy is coming from and thus where to position yourself. A rather vital factor for shooters with cover mechanics.
Then to top it off you have to deal with several banshees, which as you discovered earlier in the game render cover next to useless as they can biotic-charge right up to your face, forcing you to dodge from cover and right into the kill zone of the ranged enemies. Now there's another Cain just over there on the floor that can make life easier, but you're not liable to spot that on your first try, as you're more likely to be focused on the enemy than looking for conveniently (or inconveniently) placed heavy weapons.
Actually, this is a flaw with the rest of the game too. On my first playthough I don't think I found *any* of the heavy weapon drops until *after* the fighting was over. You're apparently supposed to just stumble on them randomly.
The FOB section is handled fairly well, there's some neat touches like listening to radio chatter about casualty & scouting reports, some datapads left lying around and an mini-drama with a medic trying to coach a doomed civilian over the radio. You even get a nice little character moment with each of your party members and even a (somewhat implausibly arranged) chat over the comms with any surviving former squad-mates...the flow of which is utterly destroyed by some random and pointless turret segment. Seriously, what was the thinking behind this? You get a much better sense of "moving though the trenches" as it were if you saw other soldiers doing the fighting as you walked past.
After more exposition, Shepard gets to make *only* decision thus far in the level and the penultimate decision of the entire series: who do you want on your squad...? I mean that's all we get to decide? No say in how to deploy the various disparate forces you've pulled together throughout the *entire* game? No questions about what your other team mates or assets should be doing? By this point, Shepard is arguable the most important person in the whole Alliance. In practice only third in line of authority after Admirals Hackett and Anderson and her role is to pick a two person team to follow her where the fighting is heaviest?
Now I'm not saying Shep should have spent the next segment back at base while everyone else goes out to get slaughtered, but there should have been a lot more agency than this! She should have been given direct command over a battalion, of not a full brigade of ground forces with which to tackle the final combat mission. Assigning squadmates to command smaller units, directing assets to engage enemy forces to punch a hole though the reaper lines and allow the bulk of hammer a shot at the beam...but no, we get more street to street fighting, topped off by yet another "hold off endless waves of enemies" fight while we wait to be able to fire the magical thanix missiles (something else we only even hear about shortly before they're introduced) only two of which apparently have enough power to take down a destroyer-class reaper. Quite impressive considering the last two times we took down one of these it took either a Godzilla sized, acid spewing spaceworm or multiple precision orbital barrages from the largest fleet in the galaxy...if that's not a complete arse-pull, I don't know what is!
Finally, with our goal in sight we're left with the final brilliant strategy of "leg it across no man's land directly at the heavily armed and entrenched enemy position, never mind the two kilometre tall reaper that just landed opposite the kill zone." Field Marshal Haig would have been so proud! I can just see Shepard's final journal entry now. it simply says "bugger."
So yeah, sorry for the wall of text, that went on a bit longer than I'd intended! But still, as I've said before, the problems with this game extend much deeper than a shoddy ending, there are some serious design flaws throughout the game.
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I agree with this. Taking the war assets you've collected and using them in something like ME2's suicide mission decisions would have worked really well. Say you're presented with needing to send a team to take out some Reaper target in a stealthy manner so as to not attract attention. Do you send:
a) A salarian STG unit
b) An Alliance or asari commando unit
c) A bunch of krogan
Obviously, there's the ideal option (salarians) that accomplishes the mission without causalities. Then the so-so option (Alliance/asari) that accomplishes the mission, but takes some losses. And the worst option, sending the krogan, which may or may not accomplish the mission and are completely lost.
I like they actually has his words speaking about the climax/endings at the start of the video.
I think that from the moment the fleet arrives at the Earth system that the delegating of tasks should have started. Would you, as a Paragon Shepard, order diversionary strikes on the Reaper fleet in an effort to (a.) move the Reapers from Earth's orbit and (b.) minimize causalities on Earth from missed shots? Or, would you, as a Renegade Shepard, order a Digeris-type assault with your cruisers and fighters on the Reaper fleet in Earth's orbit?
Lance Henriksen and Tricia Helfer are among the cast who've been brought back for Extended Cut voice work.
Um, it seems Henriksen doesn't even know why he was brought back for the extended cut. "Problem with the ending if the player loses the game". No Lance, that's not the problem. Try playing and completing the game first.
My personal pet theory (more of a wish, come to think of it) is that the ending of ME3 is actually a bug and all three of the ending choices are decoys; they are meant to LOOK like real endings so nobody realizes the "true" ending his hidden. They cannot simply SAY this, of course, because then everyone knows what they're supposed to be looking for instead of discovering it themselves as they were originally meant to.
My guess is that much like the Barla Von bug (where the door to the apartment doesn't open and you have to leave the Commons and come back again in order to rescue him) the elusive fourth option doesn't trigger correctly or the clues that would lead the player to it never show up when they're supposed to. Bioware would be loathe to admit this, of course (they've refused to publicly acknowledge ANY of the recurring bugs in ME3, and there's an embarrassingly large number of them) so the DLC extension probably includes a fair number of bug quietly inserted into the package.
Which would explain why they're taking so long to release it. It's not just new voice acting and scenes, there's probably some ass-covering going on in the software.
My guess is that much like the Barla Von bug (where the door to the apartment doesn't open and you have to leave the Commons and come back again in order to rescue him) the elusive fourth option doesn't trigger correctly or the clues that would lead the player to it never show up when they're supposed to. Bioware would be loathe to admit this, of course (they've refused to publicly acknowledge ANY of the recurring bugs in ME3, and there's an embarrassingly large number of them) so the DLC extension probably includes a fair number of bug quietly inserted into the package.
Which would explain why they're taking so long to release it. It's not just new voice acting and scenes, there's probably some ass-covering going on in the software.
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