Mass Effect

[Steve]

Spoiled little brats in adult or teenage bodies, IMHO.

[excalibur]

Facebook memories today reminded me of about this time last year when gamer bros lost their shit over the protagonists of ME: Andromeda being announced as being brother and sister. Phrases like "political correctness run amok" and "SJW" were thrown around.

To this day I still have no fucking clue what these people were whining about. Of course, these are the same people who throw a hissy fit over the mere existence of (purely optional and almost never default) easy settings or think death threats are an acceptable response to a journalist doing badly at a demo that he played while tired, so I guess it doesn't matter.

I remember my first reaction to ME Andromeda was a cautious optimism. It's meant for the newer console, so better graphics, gameplay and bigger story. I actually didn't know that regardless of which gender, you get a twin sibling until much later but buy then, I grind through Assassin's Creed Syndicate, which had a similar idea of playing sibling twin characters...which also failed to deliver a good story for an endearing franchise.

When I got to play ME:A, my suspicions were confirmed that your twin is utterly useless throughout the entire story.

I also didn't like the fact that I'd still have a limited choice in romances. I wanted to romance the Asari doctor on your ship over the in your face immature Peebee (who is just a Liara clone with some personality twicks). Vetra is basically a gender swapped Garus with zero romance scenes. Just a bunch of fade to black. Everyone in the game are less people than a collection of character traits and tropes.


Unlike some people, I actually write down constructive criticism and welcome debate

[Riedquat]

i didn't really have any expectations for Andromeda, aside from some eye-rolling about setting it there in the first place (an obvious cop-out if ever there was one). Probably why I found a lot of the negative reaction to it over the top. Most of the criticisms I found valid, but not to the degree. I enjoyed playing it at any rate, it was a decent enough game even if it wasn't anywhere near being a great one. It could've been a lot more - the twin was definitely a wasted character, and I also wished the doctor was romancable, her being one of the few asari I don't find annoying.

[CharlesPhipps]

The Crucible origin is idiotic.

There, I said it.

Because if they can pass down, "This is an incredibly powerful Reaper-killing weapon" over a million cycles, they can pass down, "By the way, Cthulhu is real and a robot coming to kill you all."

[Fixer]

The Crucible origin is idiotic.

There, I said it.

Because if they can pass down, "This is an incredibly powerful Reaper-killing weapon" over a million cycles, they can pass down, "By the way, Cthulhu is real and a robot coming to kill you all."

There was an excellent deconstruction of the problems with the Crucible made by Mr. Btongue back when the ME3 ending extended cut was released.

The star child simply states he wont give any information on the crucible's origin. So pretty much any fan theory is as valid as the official one.

Somehow an ancient race managed to figure out that the way to solve the problem with the Reapers was to make an energy source to power the Reaper controlling AI. So that it would then allow someone to control the Reapers, Blow them up, or merge all life. Somehow.

After designing the device. They put the plans somewhere the next cycle could discover them. This is despite the Citadel trap being successfully launched every time but in the most recent cycle. Our cycle being the only one to have a chance thanks to the Prothean's extremely advanced science allowing them to figure out how to make mass relays, giving them a back door to the citadel.

Somehow, the plans for the crucible managed to pass through each cycle. Being added to by additional scientists and engineers despite them not know what it was created to do. The Crucible plans then appears suddenly the same time the Reapers attack.

As in the other thread, it makes sense to think of this as a highly convenient way for the Reapers to give hope to the harvested and make them waste precious resources on a useless device.

I did think about how to fix this mess:

Change the origin. Instead of it being a device passed down from cycle to cycle, instead it's a weapon developed by the Ilos team.
The Ilos team discovered on the Citadel that there were still Reaper agents active in the galaxy in the form of the collectors.
Concerned that the plans would be discovered prior to the Reapers arriving and the device being able to wipe them all out, they set their beacons not to reveal the plans for the device until the Reapers were confirmed to be in the galaxy.

[CharlesPhipps]

I have a different view.

Make the Crucible a device created by the Leviathans. You know, the people who have existed for literally a billion years and created the Reapers. Maybe the Protheans discovered it (i.e. it was left for them to find) and the whole idea is that the Leviathans have constructed a way to hack the Reaper's Central A.I.

That, admittedly, would require the vitally important plot DLC to be included in the game, though.

[Admiral X]

I honestly didn't care for the Leviathan arc either, as it explains the origin of the mysterious space Cthulhu creatures. This is also part of why I don't care for the catalyst or the ridiculous ending, but then the ending is only part of why I don't care for the third game. Actually I don't much care for the second game either, as it is essentially a reboot. And while the combat is better, they took a lot of the RPG elements out of my RPG.

[CharlesPhipps]

I like the leviathans because they actually would have been a good follow up villain for the Reapers.

After they're gone, you have Cthulhu but one which isn't EVIL.

Just "you kind of are insects to us so either get out or obey."

[GloatingSwine]

Somehow, the plans for the crucible managed to pass through each cycle. Being added to by additional scientists and engineers despite them not know what it was created to do. The Crucible plans then appears suddenly the same time the Reapers attack.

Yeah, that's one of the problems most people have with it. Nobody knows what it is or what it does, but somehow everyone manages to add some functional component to the design and somehow it does anything at all.

It's bad enough that it's nothing to do with anything the player is doing all game, it's just dumb.

If the Crucible was going to be introduced at all, the player should have been finding that and figuring out how to make it work.

[CharlesPhipps]

I think if I were to rewrite ME3 with a minimum of changes I'd do the following:

* Make Javik part of the main game
* Make the Leviathans part of the main game
* Have the Crucible be made by the Leviathans
* Have whichever two companions you take with you on the final mission die (because ANGST)
* Have the Crucible just be a big bomb that blows up all the Reapers in the system
* Have Edi and the Geth survive if you got over X amount of points but die if it was under it
* Have Shepard live (Anderson dying was enough angst)
* Have the ending include slides.