Mass Effect 3

[Evil Twin]

The best thing LotSB and Citadel had going for them was that they provided "hang out" locations after you finished their stories that you could revisit any time you wished. Slogging through the Omega DLC again the other day I was thinking, why the hell couldn't they let you revisit a reopened Afterlife afterwards? Would that really have been too much to ask? I'd have looked way more favorably on it if that was included. No, we just get some war assets, a few guns I'll probably never use, and a chessboard in our cabin. Whoop-dee-fuckin'-doo.

 

[RyuRoots]

^At the VERY LEAST they could've had Aria disappear from Afterlife since she had Omega back.

But no, she gives some absurd excuse and hangs out in the place she hates despite being here literally solely to plot her takeback of Omega.

 

[Angel4576]

No, we just get some war assets, a few guns I'll probably never use, and a chessboard in our cabin. Whoop-dee-fuckin'-doo.

Having Traynor as LI, I thought that might be useful. No. Can't do a f*cking thing with it. Seriously, what was the point?!

War assets, Not that anyone needs any more given that they dropped the EMS threshold so low for the best destroy outcome.

I suppose you do get Lash, and more importantly, Flare, out of it though. Flare is just absolute carnage!

 

[Reverend]

Of course it'd be funny if you did Omega before Traynor's game night, have her in your cabin, lamenting not have real chess pieces, all the while that thing is sat right there within arms reach.

 

[TheGodBen]

I doubt that I'll continue with ME beyond ME3

I'm open-minded on the next Mass Effect game, but it's not a guaranteed day 1 purchase like the last two games were, I'm taking a wait and see approach. My fear is that they'll feel pressured to one-up the Reapers and introduce a new threat to galactic civilisation, when it would be best to focus on a smaller threat such as Batarian terrorists, or something like that.

Actually, my biggest fear is that they'll set the game post-ME3 and choose synthesis as the canonical ending.

The best thing LotSB and Citadel had going for them was that they provided "hang out" locations after you finished their stories that you could revisit any time you wished. Slogging through the Omega DLC again the other day I was thinking, why the hell couldn't they let you revisit a reopened Afterlife afterwards? Would that really have been too much to ask? I'd have looked way more favorably on it if that was included. No, we just get some war assets, a few guns I'll probably never use, and a chessboard in our cabin. Whoop-dee-fuckin'-doo.

What makes it even more disappointing is that they already had a hub area on Omega they could use, they just needed to update it with some damage textures, update the stores, and throw in a few characters with those cheap-o ME3 side missions. I'm reluctant to say that it wouldn't have taken much time as I'm not a game developer and have can't speak with authority on the matter, but surely it wouldn't have involved as much work as building Silversun Strip for Citadel. I wouldn't even have minded too much that it was the same area as ME2 because Afterlife was one of my favourite locations in the ME universe.

 

[Angel4576]

Of course it'd be funny if you did Omega before Traynor's game night, have her in your cabin, lamenting not have real chess pieces, all the while that thing is sat right there within arms reach.

That would be amusing. From memory I'm not sure how the sequencing works out but I'd imagine that you CAN actually do that. I think Omega opens up after the Citadel coup attempt by Cerberus. Although Traynor's 'game night' email is before that (or around the same time) you obviously don't have to take her up on it straight away.

Just started my ME3 leg of my trilogy play through so I might give that a go!

My fear is that they'll feel pressured to one-up the Reapers and introduce a new threat to galactic civilisation, when it would be best to focus on a smaller threat such as Batarian terrorists, or something like that.

Based on what they've said so far, what little they've said so far, I don't see them trying to go bigger. Trying to do so would IMO, be a mistake. It would be like the ME version of Babylon 5 and the failed Legend of the Rangers series - "What, we've beaten the ancient powerful enemy, the Shadows, but there's someone even MORE ancient and powerful out there?" - Erm, no.

Actually, my biggest fear is that they'll set the game post-ME3 and choose synthesis as the canonical ending.

Never happen. Although Synthesis might have started out as Mac & Casey's pet ending, the level of resentment towards it from the fandom has rendered it all but impractical. If they go with any canon ending to ME3 then it'll almost certainly be destroy. In every poll I've ever seen around the ending more people opted for destroy than all the other endings combined. They could try and go against the grain and pick the unpopular choice, but seriously, given the sh1tstorm that the game's endings have stirred up since release, I don't think they'll want to get into that.

What makes it even more disappointing is that they already had a hub area on Omega they could use, they just needed to update it with some damage textures, update the stores, and throw in a few characters with those cheap-o ME3 side missions. I'm reluctant to say that it wouldn't have taken much time as I'm not a game developer and have can't speak with authority on the matter, but surely it wouldn't have involved as much work as building Silversun Strip for Citadel. I wouldn't even have minded too much that it was the same area as ME2 because Afterlife was one of my favourite locations in the ME universe.

I was disappointed that Afterlife was the only bit from Omega that I actually recognized. I'd been irked originally that there was no Omega or Illium hubs in ME3. In fact no hubs at all apart from the Citadel, which was a fraction of the size of the Citadel in ME1.

The whole Omega thing was just so disappointing, especially given the £/$ tag. It really doesn't inspire much confidence in the Montreal team, and goes some way to explaining why I'm still far more interested in what Edmonton's new IP will be rather than where ME goes next. Given that the MP side of ME3 was the one area that got near universal praise, and now they've put the development team behind ME3's MP in charge of the next game's SP, then I'd be worried. Especially considering Omega.

 

[Evil Twin]

That would be amusing. From memory I'm not sure how the sequencing works out but I'd imagine that you CAN actually do that. I think Omega opens up after the Citadel coup attempt by Cerberus. Although Traynor's 'game night' email is before that (or around the same time) you obviously don't have to take her up on it straight away.

You can actually do Omega as early as prior to Sur'Kesh. After Palaven, talk to Aria in Purgatory, and you should get the meet her at Dock 42 email upon your return to the Normandy. Probably the best time to do it story flow wise, right after you unite the mercenary groups for her. That's what I did on my current vanguard playthrough. One minor thing I noticed is that if you haven't picked up that one Turian assault rifle on Tuchanka yet, you can find it in Omega.

 

[Angel4576]

You can actually do Omega as early as prior to Sur'Kesh. After Palaven, talk to Aria in Purgatory, and you should get the meet her at Dock 42 email upon your return to the Normandy. Probably the best time to do it story flow wise, right after you unite the mercenary groups for her. That's what I did on my current vanguard playthrough. One minor thing I noticed is that if you haven't picked up that one Turian assault rifle on Tuchanka yet, you can find it in Omega.

Nice. Did not know that.

I think I still prefer to hit Omega after the Citadel coup attempt though, it's a nice retaliatory gesture against TIM and Cerberus.

Although I may now do it earlier, just to get the chessboard earlier for amusement's sake!

I really need to use a wider range of weapons this time around, I always get lazy and rely on the particle rifle. That being said, I'm playing Adept and chose Flare as my bonus power so probably won't need to be using conventional weapons much anyway!

 

[LeadHead]

I think I still prefer to hit Omega after the Citadel coup attempt though, it's a nice retaliatory gesture against TIM and Cerberus.

Agreed. I usually will have done the meeting with Aria prior to that, so I can basically, as soon as I've visited Thane at his deathbed, head back for the Normandy, bring back the Virmire Survivor, meet up with Arias fleet and go get some payback.

I usually play that dlc renegade (even if I'm a paragon) because Shepard is PISSED at Cerberus and only is able to get his anger over the attack and Thanes death behind him after he has won a major victory against them and watched Aria kill Petrovsky.

 

[Angel4576]

^^ I do like the new reputation system in ME3 - it's certainly more forgiving of the paragade amongst us!

I do tend to try and play the game from a meta-perspective, hence the retaliatory strike against Cerberus after their coup attempt, and the first part of the Citadel mission gets played directly after Thessia. Then more than ever, Shepard, and the crew need a break. The party, sometimes I play after Sanctuary, sometimes I play after I've finished the game and revert back to Cronos.

 

[Reverend]

^Interesting, when I got to it with my Infiltrator playthrough, my thinking was that Citadel should go *before* Thessia. the idea being that the ship had just been in a major fleet battle (hence the need for maintenance) and everyone is on a high after taking down a second destroyer. I guess I just can't see anyone in a party mood after Thessia. Plus of course you're called back to the Citadel by the Asari councillor prior to that mission anyway.

Omega and Leviathan can fit just about anywhere, but I tend to place Omega before the coup attempt to make it seem as if the coup was a reaction to the increased pressure and losing their free reign of the terminus systems. My original thought was that it'd be between Sanctuary and Cronos as part of the "take down Cerberus" campaign. Indeed, had it been part of the main game I'd have had Omega being where you get the location of Cronos, but as it stands the lack of Normandy/squadmate involvement rather spoils it from a narrative perspective.

Leviathan...it's a bit harder to place, but I think the best place is after the Asari monastery (so not to spoil the Banshee reveal) but before Rannoch. Of course the way the quest chain works you can spread it out across the whole game, which actually might work better as a sort of running sub-plot.

Either way, in my mind once Thessia falls the game enters the final act and the plot starts to go at a dead run. At which point, if it were a book, film or TV series I don't think the story needs any more side stories or other distractions, so I like all the DLC over and done with by then.

The party is the only exception to that as tonally, it best fits *after* playing the ending. I won't pretend that Shepard survives and everything turned out fine, so if I ever do it that way, it's hallucination/afterlife type situation...since, after all, you *do* meet Garrus at the bar.....

 

[Angel4576]

I did consider playing Citadel prior to Thessia, and there's a definite argument for it. Ultimately I went the other way though - Thessia's pretty much Shepard, and Liara at their lowest ebb - they needed the break as things were starting to fly apart at the seams. Plus we were about to go on the offensive against Cerberus by tracking them back to Horizon, hence a good time to give the ship a once-over.

The problem I had with placing it prior to Thessia was that once you learn about the Prothean artifact on Thessia it's pretty much a race against time to beat Cerberus to it. From a story-flow perspective I thought it worked best to keep that pace rather than interrupting it with a side mission. Of course the same could be argued about placing it after Thessia as well though, so it was a close call. With this being the first time that Shepard's been bested, a pause seemed appropriate.

Omega - Well I guess you really could play that one either way. Prefer it after the coup myself - what with Thane's fate, and potentially the VS's as well, it put my Shepard in the right frame of mind to just go there, and shoot the sh1t out of anything and everything with a Cerberus badge on it.

Leviathan tends to be the one that I seem to play at different places every time I play it. I do however always leave the final mission from Leviathan until quite late in the game, otherwise it gives Shepard knowledge that doesn't quite fit with the narrative of the earlier missions.

The Citadel party - well my Shepard lives, so that isn't a problem, however EDI dies. There's an argument among'st some fans that Starbrat might have been lying about killing ALL synthetics - unfortunately, the evidence doesn't bear that out - EDI's name's up on the memorial wall at the end, hence she died. As such I have no problem in playing the party after the end of the game and treating it as a LOST finale-type ending.

The MEHEM guys are missing a trick with the memorial wall scene - they should swap out the destroy version and replace it with Control - EDI's name doesn't appear up there in the Control ending, and hey, if you want it to be THE happy ending then really, the sexbot should live too.......!

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

It's Mass Effect week on Kotaku, apparently.

 

[Evil Twin]

since, after all, you *do* meet Garrus at the bar.....

I finally did Citadel on my Garrus-romancing infiltrator recently, and man was that dance number a hoot. Probably the best date cutscene I've seen so far. Good thing I made a hard save right before it so I can revisit it whenever I want.

As for Leviathan, I'd say it's probably best to always wait til after Rannoch, since you have all of your squad by that point, and even if you don't use all of them on the missions, they at least have unique post-mission dialogue back on the Normandy.

 

[TheGodBen]

When I replay ME3 with the DLC, my plan is this:

Omega comes after the Cerberus coup. Omega's biggest problem is that it's so far removed from the rest of the Reaper war that you're left wondering why Shepard even bothered to tag along. By placing it after the coup, it can be justified as a retaliatory strike intended to weaken Cerberus so they can't make a direct attack on the Council races again.

Citadel comes after Rannoch. The Normandy has just spent several days or weeks on the far side of the galaxy attempting to resolve the Geth/Quarian conflict, and after that the ship needs repairs and the crew earned some shore leave. It also works as the final "fluff" piece before heading into the dark final act, sort of like DS9's Badda-bing, Badda-bang.

Leviathan comes after Citadel and before Thessia. The reveal at the end of Leviathan is so huge that it doesn't make sense for nobody to react to it in the rest of the game, so it needs to be placed as late as possible. But Thessia is the start of the endgame, from there it's a linear path against the clock to Earth.

Based on what they've said so far, what little they've said so far, I don't see them trying to go bigger. Trying to do so would IMO, be a mistake. It would be like the ME version of Babylon 5 and the failed Legend of the Rangers series - "What, we've beaten the ancient powerful enemy, the Shadows, but there's someone even MORE ancient and powerful out there?" - Erm, no.

Well, I've not been following ME news of late so I don't know much of what they've said about the next game in the series. Whatever they do, the next ME game will be an anticlimax after the spectacle of the Reaper war, and I hope they acknowledge that and choose to tell a smaller story instead of fighting against inevitability and trying to tell an even more epic story.

And yes, The Legend of the Rangers was in the forefront of my mind when I originally posted that.

 

[LeadHead]

Omega comes after the Cerberus Coup, as I said before, Shepard is very angry and takes the opportunity to kick some Cerberus butt in retaliation over the attack and out of rage at Thane's death. The way I envision it, after coming back to the Normandy but before going off with Aria's fleet, there should've been some sort of conversation with Garrus or Liara or Joker about it being too dangerous to go off on this one. Especially alone, reminding Shepard that his last major solo mission ended in the destruction of a mass relay and him being up on charges for it.

Leviathan usually starts right after returning from Omega at the citadel, do the beginning and then return to it on the way back from Rannoch. I typically will try to squeeze in the ardat-yakshi monasary in there somewhere before the mining colony so banshees have been revealed.

Citadel I do at the end. It makes the most sense to do it after Horizon to me. You're prepping for the final battle, the ship needs an overhaul before you go. The endings are crap, I'm sorry to be blunt, but they are. So the party is after the Earth mission and the starbrat lied, EDI is not dead, the citadel was repaired, Thanks to the Geth, they didn't die either. After the party, Shepard is thinking about the challenges ahead of rebuilding the galaxy, will the alliances hold? What threats do they face given the heavy losses in the war? Will his crew have to go their separate ways?

 

[Angel4576]

Re my earlier comment about the MEHEM - the latest version does appear to have EDI alive (she's in the memorial wall scene, and her name's not up on the wall) - also the Geth appear in the slideshow, as does Aria and Bailey.

Edit: Hurrah, Modders 1 SuperMac 0 - Bailey/Aria live!

 

[The Squire of Gothos]

Edit: Hurrah, Modders 1 SuperMac 0 - Bailey/Aria live!

At the end of ME I was a little sad to think the Elcor ambassador and his Volus office mate were probably dead and at the end of ME3 I was sad to think that Bailey was probably dead too. Funny how the series makes you think of some of the less galactically important characters like that too.

I'm probably asking about something the internet beat to death a long time ago, but if ME4 is to leave behind Shepard and the Reapers, and destroy becomes the canonical ending, I take it we miss out on all the big battles that finally over came the Reapers?

 

[Angel4576]

I'm probably asking about something the internet beat to death a long time ago, but if ME4 is to leave behind Shepard and the Reapers, and destroy becomes the canonical ending, I take it we miss out on all the big battles that finally over came the Reapers?

If they canonize the destroy ending then that wipes out all of the Reapers anyway.

The only ending where there'd still be conflict with the Reapers is the refuse ending, which has about as much chance of being canonized as hell freezing over.

 

[Jeyl]

There is an article over at Kotaku about the series' villains and unfortunately their service had an error that prevented me from adding a little something to the Cerberus organization, so I'll post it here.

The problem with Cerberus in Mass Effect 3 was that the writers didn't take the organization's "humans first" ideology to the extreme, instead resorting to the vague, out of nowhere and totally out of place "Control the Reapers!" plot point that didn't amount to a hill of beans.

Than I thought about the Collector Base in the center of the galaxy. What if Cerberus, in their attempt to make mankind the dominant species in the galaxy, actually 'allowed' the Reapers to go through with this cycle of genocide? What if the Collector Base was just a ruse in order to deceive Shepard into ensuring TIM's bigger plans for that part of space? Whether the station was destroyed or not, Cerberus would have control of that region of space. Think about it. If Cerberus could inhabit that area of the galaxy, seal it off and hide there till the Reapers were done with their cycle, than humans would not only be the dominant race, but also the only technologically advanced race in the galaxy. And with their knowledge of the previous cycle, they would also be prepared for the Reaper's next cycle.

This sort of planning would not only explain why Cerberus is sabotaging everyone's efforts to stop the Reapers, it would also explain why Cerberus specifically took over the Omega station. They wanted control of the system that housed the Omega 4 Relay, which was the only means of safely entering that region of space. Once everything was set and the galaxy was beyond hope of fighting the Reapers, Cerberus could have destroyed the Omega 4 relay just as Shepard destroyed the Mass Relay in "The Arrival" (Wow. This idea even justifies that DLC's existence!) and remain totally isolated from the rest of the galaxy, even the Reapers.

And imagine the kind of realization that Shepard would have when she realizes that all the things she tried to accomplish in ME2 only resulted in Cerberus' benefit, not the rest of the galaxy's. She would have unknowingly set in motion events that would doom the other races of the galaxy including a majority of humans who believe in alliances and unity with the other races. And to make it worse, TIM would be congratulating her for it and even have her be remembered as a hero who made all of it happen. Cerberus' future humanity will never know of her alien allies or the alien worlds she worked so hard to protect, because thanks the Reapers their entire existence will be wiped out.

But instead of anything like that, all we end up with is a jerk who does nothing but gloat and ends up killing himself. Way to go on the "His weapon is his intelligence" route on that one Bio.