Bioware listens; plans to "extend" ME3's ending
BBC News - Mass Effect 3 to get extended ending at no cost to gamers
So this is pretty unprecedented for a really big video game from a big publisher, or really any big media production in general: Bioware is listening to feedback and changing things. AFTER their game has already been released and sold millions of copies.
"Extended" endings will be available as free (!) DLC this summer.
Pretty great, no?
Meh
I laughed because they aren't going to be satisfied with the new ending.
Watch them charge it as DLC
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Master of the Fork
Cid's Knight
Actually there was something pointed out that it could come out sometime before spring 2013 or something xD So it might actually not come out till who knows when. It's great that they are doing it but I'm worried about how this will affect the gaming industry. If enough people bitch, video games have to be altered? I dunno. I don't want people to be bitching about every ending of every game form now on.
Maybe developers will put more thought into things before they release games then. Instead of beta testing paying customers.
Not having played ME3, I can't really comment on that specifically though.
It is ridiculous and a big insult to the story writers and artists. People claiming a different ending aren't writers. They are not professionals. Game developers should not listen to them.
Let's compare it to other great things non-game designers have brought to the game universe. Like the levels made in Little Big Planet and Modnation Racers. Were they good? No; 99% of user-generated content is absolutely unplayable. Why? They are not level designers, just as these people demanding a new ending are NOT story writers. It shouldn't happen.
A dark day in history of gaming.
I don't think its a dark day, it's a lesson to game makers, don't be cheap with your ending or you will earn the players wrath.
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I actually have to disagree here. They didn't change it just because the fans dissented; they changed it because they realized that the fans had a point. Let me copypaste something I wrote earlier:Originally Posted by Pete for President
On a game-playing level this doesn't affect me because I haven't played ME, but as an artist and writer I believe they're doing something amazing. They are interacting with the people they, as entertainers, are giving their creations to. And that's great.I can’t express how much I love this. I am of the firm belief that when you make something creative and then publish it— whether it is a book, movie, game, or whathaveyou— that thing then belongs to the people. To the fans. You make it for them and it stops being yours and becomes theirs. I was taught this when I went to university for Media/Theatre/Film and I still believe this strongly.
The fact that Bioware realizes this and listens to their fans is so neat to me. If I ever make it big as an author and I publish a book and a huge portion of my fans dislike a part of it and explain to me why they didn’t— I hope I have the humility to similarly listen to the people I wrote the book for and change it if I agree with them.
Yeah and 99% of professionally-produced games are terrible and should be avoided at all costs, notwithstanding the paid level designers and storywriters. In point of fact, the tremendously terrible ending to Mass Effect 3 proves very handily that just because someone has a job title does not mean they are above either error or reproach
I agree with Pike.
Let this be a lesson to them: If they do a half-ass job the first time around, it's going to blow up in their face and they're just going to have to replace the whole thing.
On a completely unrelated note, I wouldn't recommend letting me try to fix a gas stove. Again, completely unrelated to my previous statement...
This isn't the first incident of this. The only difference is that the previous publisher to change an ending to a game over the fans disappointment in the original ending was Bethesda with Fallout 3 and they charged for it, it was Broken Steel which was well received. The only major difference here is that if you download the DLC for Mass Effect 3's "Extended cut" before April 2014 you'll get it for free.
I think it wasn't a case of that, I genuinely believe Bioware thought the ending would be sufficient in wrapping up the game plots. However they tried to introduce the unexpected ending to a series which took hundreds if not thousands of hours to complete within 14 lines of dialogue. It also disappointed the fans because regardless of the story you'd built over 3 games, who lived, who died, the endings were all on a level which didn't incorporate that they just totally disregarded it. I found it funny that in the final moments of the game (just prior to the part where you meet the AI on the Crucible) you can still earn renegade and paragon points for your actions and yet the minute you board the crucible firing room there is no changes to the ending based on these points that are earnable. It felt more like a different team worked on the ending than on the actual story of the past 3 games. The dark visual overtone that there could be no happy ending option for Shepherd also didn't feel right in the eyes of the players. Or even the option of a sad ending but one where the player rejects the Catalyst's "choices" and decides that the galaxy will win without firing the crucible or die trying. (this ending in particular would have given Bioware an awesome excuse to show Shepherd taking down Harbinger in any way possible up to and including the use of the Normandy as a bullet to the face in a suicide run where he is simply so unforgivingly determined to destroy the reapers it's deemed necessity for victory at any cost, this would've been an awesome Renegade Shep ending)Maybe developers will put more thought into things before they release games then. Instead of beta testing paying customers.
Not having played ME3, I can't really comment on that specifically though.
You're comparing a game trilogy made up of 90% story development to a game like little big planet which is approximately 10% story development. That's like comparing a Chimp to a Human because we share 10% of the same DNA as them. Or an apple and an orange because both are round and both are fruits. It's not plausible to see where you are going on this. You claim it is a dark day for gaming history, I like Pike and Huxley am somewhat of a writer, though I freely confess, Pike is better than I could hope to be because unlike myself she had the guts to get something published. The ending as I pointed out to Julian, jarred badly with the story of the games and also with what Bioware's development team promised the fans. They promised us wildly different and diverse endings based on the decisions made over the course of 3 games. These endings based on player decisions never materialized, instead we had 3 ending choices which were pre-determined, poorly explained and required little to no choice from the player and did not rely at all upon the decisions made in the 3 games. I suppose the only thing which did get determined by the decisions made in previous games is who out of your crew (also considering the blast by Harbinger should have killed your companions in your party it was more than a little weird for myself to see EDI on board the Normandy completely unscathed when Shepherd himself was nearly killed and his N7 armour was all but totally destroyed) would be alive to randomly selected to appear on the Normandy fleeing the explosions of the Mass Relays. Something which in itself was never explained, especially considering Joker would never have fled that battle. I doubt this extended cut dlc will answer every players questions, as do I doubt that it will provide an adequate ending for Mass Effect in the eyes of a majority of players. I do however feel it is far from a dark day in gaming history and the world will not crumble overnight as a result of this being done.
I think this whole event is good because it raises the bar for game storywriters. There are plenty of terrible story writers in the game industry, we should let them know when they come up with things that are just not adequate. Not saying Bioware's writers are all terrible, my comment is more aimed towards games in general. I don't want the writers in the video game industry to be second-rate writers compared to those in movies and stuff, and telling them about it when they do terrible smurfups that lead to enormous plot holes is just one way to let them improve themselves.
The problem I have with ME3's ending (except the fact that it disregards almost every player choice up to that point in the game) is that there are so many plot holes. Now, before anyone screams INDOCTRINATION THEORY, I want to say that yes, I have watched those theory videos and they are pretty convincing, but even if you go by this theory as what actually happened, there are still a zillion plotholes. If the indoctrination theory is correct, we never actually got to see the crucible in action, we never even got to know if the reapers were even defeated.
everything is wrapped in gray
i'm focusing on your image
can you hear me in the void?
The only insult was to the paying customers when Bioware decided to release that ending as the finale to a 3 game long space epic. It is not an insult to writers to tell them their ending sucked. It is not an insult to writers to tell them they should change it because fans deserved a lot better than what they paid good money to get.
It's entirely up the Bioware if they wanted to amend the ending, but considering how widespread the backlash was, they really didn't have much choice. They could either try to appease fans who paid good money and invested hundreds of hours, or they could do nothing and piss them off more.
More importantly, fans aren't asking that they be allowed to re-write the ending. This is not going to be some troutty user generated content. This is going to be Bioware trying to fix an ending which they made that was utterly terrible. Hell, all I did was watch the endings on Youtube and I can see why fans were pissed off. There was no artistic integrity there in that mess. It looked like they slapped it together without ever really taking the time to revise and work on as though they were in a rush to get it out of the door.
I don't think this will happen for one very simple reason: the amount of time and money players invested is on a completely different scale with ME than most series, and the type of game is completely different. Players paid for three titles, followed the story and characters for over a hundred hours minimum, and more importantly, made decisions which were supposed to carry over into each of the games. The amount of psychological investment in that series if you followed it all the way to the end is huge. It's one thing to make a fairly stand alone title, or even an entry in a series that's only loosely connected, or where you know up front that decisions made in different games don't affect each other, and include a terrible ending. People will still hate it, but they'll move on with their lives pretty quickly and simply be wary of buying the next game. But when you play through 3 titles being promised that your decisions will matter and becoming more invested in the story and characters because you're making decisions, and then they yank the rug out from under you in the last 10 minutes, that is a whole different ball game.
I'm sure there will be games where people hate the ending and ask that it be changed, but the outcry won't be nearly as widespread unless someone else decides to pull a Mass Effect and drop the ball at the end.
Now regardless of whether fans get an ending that doesn't suck out of this, I think this is a damn good thing. Fans got something that can only be described as an insult and a slap in the face, and they actually stood up and told Bioware to go smurf themselves. This pleases me greatly because I usually find the gamer community to be filled with a combination of apathy and apologists who will try to explain why developers are right to screw them over. To see things swing so wildly against such a popular developer who screwed up so badly is heart warming. And I think it will serve as a lesson to other developers that they had better step up their game already because this trout doesn't fly.
Also, I agree with Pike and MILF, though I should make that my sig with how often it happens.
This. All the complainers are still going to say it's not good enough and bitch about how they responded to their initial bitching. They're going to complain that BioWare tried to appease them. They're going to insist on not forgiving BioWare for their terrible transgression by giving their game an ending that didn't meet their expectations. Nothing BioWare does is going to make the majority of complainers happy, especially if they're "extending" the ending, as that means everything all those people complained about in the ending is still going to be there.
It's cool that they listened to the negative feedback though, albeit mostly silly.
Last edited by DMKA; 04-06-2012 at 06:19 PM.
I like Kung-Fu.
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