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I was just mad that they changed it... They took out the MJ zombie and replaced him with a generic Disco zombie after Michael died... I liked the MJ zombie. Who cares if MJ is dead now, the zombie character was still amusing.
Well Mass Effect 3 will probably be the last Bioware game I buy in a long time. Not that it was a bad game overall but the ending left something to be desired. I'm not nerd raging though, I still got my money's worth and it was all on me to buy it because I wanted to complete the trilogy.
Though given the retardation that was Dragon Age 2 I'm not really surprised they ultimately dropped the ball on this last Mass Effect game. Considering the company seems to have a preoccupation with catering to the masses by concentrating on silly things like gay romance options rather than genuine game play and given the large amount of nerd rage generated by said masses, they didn't even get that right this time, though the ending is what is pissing everyone off the most. It's really quite amusing to scan their forums and see the power drunk mods ban people and lock every thread that openly criticizes their games.
Also makes me glad we have forums like this one that is a fucking pit of chaos and revels in its obscenity and freedom!
In the meantime, I'm going back to Kingdoms of Amalur which is a much better example of a CRPG as far as the basics go. You're killing a bunch of shit and gaining a bunch of loot, not playing psychologist to all your emotionally crippled followers in your spare time.
Also picked up a post apocalyptic game called I Am Alive. Pretty cool so far, though difficult. It has a more realistic setting in that there aren't mutants or anything like that, just opportunistic thugs and heavy dust areas from "The Event" which can drain your strength if you linger too long.
You have to find food and water to keep your endurance up since you have to do a lot of climbing to keep above the heavy dust areas. Bullets are hard to come by as well, but you can scare off people by bluffing with an empty pistol. Doesn't work on everyone or necessarily for very long though.
I just finished Mass Effect 3 as well and I gotta say I may jump on the band wagon of not purchasing another Bioware game again. The day 1 DLC debacle coupled with the atrocious ending makes me realize that Bioware doesn't really give a crap anymore and are just milking us dumb dumb gamers for every penny they can squeeze out.
However I am torn as Mass Effect 3 was an amazing game with improved gameplay over the previous titles as well as having a great story and characters. It was the final 10 minutes of the game that destroyed everything that has proceeded it. While I don't think it was the worst ending ever, it was extremley dissapointing for a company that prides itself on story telling excellence. But everything leading up to that final 10 minutes was fantastic so I don't know exactly where I stand.
The multiplayer isn't very fleshed out, but I always felt like it was an added bonus for a series that is mainly a single player experience. I enjoy the multi mainly because the teams have to work together so the trash talking is usually kept to a minimum. Overall I'd highly recommend Mass Effect 3 if you don't mind terrible endings. The rest of the game is totally worth it.
The endings themselves are sort of a silly "space magic/cyborg wizard did it" thing with some pseudo philosophic excuse tacked on in an attempt to make it deep, which it failed to do, because really it's not a deep game to begin with. The story at its core is simple: It's about Commander Shepard being a pushy human, kicking giant omnicidal robo-cthulhu ass and fucking his blue alien nerd girlfriend on the side. (Okay so maybe he fucked the other alien gypsy nerd girl too as well)
Despite that, the way they tried to wrap things up still isn't the problem. The problem is it doesn't give any indication of what happened to everyone afterwards. The galaxy got changed pretty severely regardless of which one you pick (and they're all pretty much the same) and while I don't mind an ending where I die, or even if everyone dies, I would've liked a proper epilogue of the various races and characters that had been helping me over the course of all three games. That's also one of things where Dragon Age 2 failed, so one would think they would've learned their lesson, especially given how really creepy some of their fanbase is with getting overly attached to their romance options. Now Bio's got a riot on their hands. Lol.
The multiplayer bit is another complaint from people since you really can't get the "Best" ending unless you play it which I have no interest in doing so. Your war asset will never reach the top possible score and I did every mission over the course of all 3 games and united all the races to my banner, still didn't have anywhere near 5000 EMS (Had around 3600 and chose the "green ending" where organics and synthetics merge with each other since my character was going to die anyway)
Anyway, I was glad of getting the DLC though since Javik was about the only party member I liked taking on missions since his dialogue was more on the ruthless side and I couldn't get a krogan like Wrex or Grunt this time. I settled on Garrus as the other main party member since he wasn't as boring this time around.
Writing: It's more fun than a barrel of Ebola ridden monkeys!
I'm having a hard time even playing Mass Effect 3. I keep discovering that the decisions I made in the previous games really didn't make much difference. Every few minutes I get really pissed and turn off the console and sulk.
The Citadel was one of my favorite areas in ME 1, and even in ME 2 I enjoyed wandering and exploring. The Citadel is so BORING in this game, when I visit, I often discover there is absolutely nothing to do. The same conversations keep cycling through, there's nothing new to buy.
There aren't enough decent male romances. I have to romance the gender neutral Asari Liara, which makes me feel all lezzed out. I liked Thane a lot in the second one, and I'm not sure why Shepard would bother trying to cure the genophage but not bother to try and save Thane.
I don't really get why I was imprisoned at one point. Clearly, if I was imprisoned at one point, it was because the human justice system is broken. How dare they ask me for my assistance after wrongly taking my freedom. They can all go to the Reapers!
Why did Bioware set up Multiplayer for this game? I don't want to play with other people, if I wanted to play with other people, I'd pick up a board game.
Lately a lot of games have really let me down. I loved Saints Row 2, but The Third was dumb. They ruined the characters, and by "streamlining" and including only the best diversions they took out most of the fun stuff and all of the options. Fable 3 sucked so much I couldn't play more than five minutes. Dragon Age 2 was inferior to Origins, and had zero replay value. Even Soul Calibur V let me down by not telling the character's stories.
I'm tired of companies miscalculating what users value.
The Mass Effect games always evaded my attention and the only Fable I ever played was the truly dreadful Fable: the Lost Chapters for the PC. The same stupid ghoul-things kept respawning, and all the more humanoid characters just looked like chubby little gnomes in need of some Jenny Craig. Major thumbs down on that one.
What I'm particularly miffed about though, is Skyrim. After all my hemming and hawing, I finally managed to convince a friend to put her laptop on long-term loan to me on the condition that the game would stay with the machine (I continue to be a determinedly non-console player). Anyway, it was cool at first, mostly just because I was back in a familiar universe hearing the names of some old friends, like my crazy old patron saint Sheogorath and all the other daedric role models. Very quickly, however, it turned into what felt very much like a glorified treasure hunt. I understand that this is one of the major drawbacks of some of the MMORPG's, which I assiduously avoid--but I really thought that since Skyrim is a self-contained entity, the developers would have pumped a bit more juice into story and plot development and just...variation. Every big flying lizard in the game makes for the same tedious kill, the dungeons and mines and forts, etc., while certainly bigger than they were in previous games, are more frustrating as well. I especially hate all things Dwarven. The worst thing, though, is the dialogue. If I had a penny for every time I have lost patience and screamed, "SHUTTT UUUPPPPP!!!" at my computer... I'm holding out some hope for the inevitable expansions. After all, Shivering Isles really pumped a lot of life back into Oblivion and was a huge part of my enjoyment of the whole game. Overall though, I can't help but feel that Skyrim is a let-down.
But there aren't any Dwarves in the Elder Scrolls world though, unless you're talking about the Dwelmer, but they're not really dwarves (They aren't even short) they were just subterranean elves that embraced technology instead of magic.
As for Skyrim, I was actually surprised by that one. I didn't like Oblivion and by the time I even bothered with the Shivering Isles I was too bored with the game to even finish it even though it was one of the better written areas (along with the Dark Brotherhood quest) Everything else was just sort of bland in general.
Skyrim was a much more interesting setting to me. As for the dialog, Bethesda has always sucked in the writing department, but I thought they tried a little harder this time around. Their strength has always been with creating an open world for lots of fighting and exploration rather than character development and main quest lines, which is the exact opposite of Bioware who concentrate on making a story driven game.
The Fable series just got more retarded as the series went on, I won't be continuing that one either. At this point the only CRPG series that I'll probably be continuing to follow is Fallout and hopefully Bethesda continues to improve their writing on it, or at least hire writers from Obsidian to do the writing for them.
Writing: It's more fun than a barrel of Ebola ridden monkeys!
Just got a game called King of Dragon Pass for about 8 bucks and its probably got more depth than most 60 dollar games passing themselves off as RPGs nowadays.
Takes place in a fantasy setting where you are in charge of one of the MANY barbarian clans trying to rise to power. Unite the clans into a tribe, become tribal chieftan and hold it for ten years. If you're really amibitious and playing the long game, you also have to forge a kingdom and become a proper king (or queen), not just some barbarian with a bone crown on their head.
It all sounds simple enough, but there's a shitload of stuff you need to keep track of.
First off you've got a bunch of gods that all do different things and you need to build shrines and such for them to favor you. You of course also need to keep track of how many warriors, farmers, cattle and food you got how to best use them. If you're into the whole slavery thing, you can keep thralls to work for you. (Though the game says they aren't slaves, we all know they really are!)
You also have a number of elite clan members that form your council or ring. They'll all advise you on different stuff, but of course you get the final decision. They'll also get older as the years go by and they can eventually die of old age or sometimes combat. You also send out these types with a few warriors to explore the surrounding territory since the map isn't completely known to you. You can find major treasures and knowledge or you could fail completely and get your expedition annihilated by whatever was lurking in the unknown lands.
Most of it plays like a strategy game like Civilization, but there are RPG elements as well. The overall layout is similar to a CYOA though, because inbetween deciding who to raid, ally and trade with you're getting text heavy CYOA style events that pop up. These can range from fairly mundane to really serious. Depending on what you've been doing (Warring with everyone, playing nice, etc.) certain choices are going to be better than others and they still might have negative consequences for your clan In fact it might not come back to bite you until a couple seasons or even after a year passes.
As I mentioned its a fantasy setting, but it isn't the typical orcs/elves stuff. There are creatures like trolls and centaurs, but most of the time you're fighting other humans and that's enough. Magic plays a large part, but it's mostly in the form of getting help from shamen, witches or sacrificing cows (or thralls!) to the gods.
The neat thing is the game actually records your clan's saga from year to year keeping track of the most important events. I was doing pretty well at first raiding everyone and striking fear into my enemies, then a series of bad events occurred. Half of my cattle got sick and died, my clan started fighting amongst itself so much it split into smaller clans, people started starving from a lack of food (Not even raids could supplement it and I lost a lot of warriors through unhappiness), and a bunch of beastmen killed one of my best generals. It was a wonderful failure!
Anyway, it's a cool game.
Writing: It's more fun than a barrel of Ebola ridden monkeys!
Purchased King of Dragons Pass based on EndMasters impression of the game. Gotta say it was totally worth it as I have devoted a number of hours to playing this game. Met some grizzly ends on my first couple tries, but just managed to beat the short game by remaining king of the tribe for 10 years. Quite a tough little game!
The CYOA elements are implemented fantastically. Certain events can go on for a long period of time, lasting generations. A simple family feud that started with the theivery of a horse; led to an arson, fights between the feuding families children, then eventually the children became adults and were killing eachother off! I had to pay off one of the families with goods just to stop the escalation so I'm not sure how much worse it could of gotten. This is just one example, there were many other instances of events that lasted "years" depending on your actions.
Playing this game kind of depressed me though as I realized there really is nothing else quite like it and probably never will be again. The game isn't new, in fact it was released in the 90's and was just ported over to smart phone and tablet devices. Wasn't a very popular game, probably because of the difficulty and lack of animations. A shame as I can't even begin to fathom how amazing a modern iteration of this game could be. I've always loved the idea of ageing characters that will all die at some point and continuing the game through generations. Something I was hoping Fable 3 was going to be, but didn't really live up to the hype. This type of game NEEDS to be made. Ideally it would be a mash up of Civilization, Fire Emblem and King of Dragons pass. My personal wet dream of a game. Mmmmmm....
My gaming desires that will never come to fruition aside, anyone else hear that the developers of Mass Effect 3 are going to make downloadable content to change the ending, due to the massive fan outcry? I guess this just proved how Bioware totally dropped the ball on the ending for the game. A shame for such a good game to be ridiculed for the last 10 minutes that were abysmal, yet this sort of makes me happy. Mass Effect deserves a good ending and hopefully they will provide that now that the fans have raged all over the web. Maybe this will send a message to George Lucas to scrap the prequels and start fresh, with a new director and writer perhaps? Now I'm just dreaming too much.
I figured that they were going to change the ending after all the outrage. The cynical side says they might've planned to do something like this all along, but given that it's Bioware they probably really believed the crap ending that they put out was actually good. So I think they're probably just making the best out of a bad situation now.
Of course if Bio really wants to prove themselves, they'll make the DLC completely free, but I think we know THAT isn't going to happen, I mean there's profit to be made here for goodness sake!
As for Dragon Pass, I'm currently been taking a break from playing the long game. I think I've been successful so far since I've gotten one of my ring members to be queen of the tribe for about twelve years so far and she's still popular.
I think the events are starting to kick in for creating a kingdom, there was some woman claiming that she was destined to rule the pass as queen and even persuaded some of the surrounding tribes to start pledging allegiance to her, but I managed to show her up as the fraud she was. Encountered her a few years later and she was reduced to petty banditry. I ended up killing her.
One thing they weren't joking about is you do have to read the manual to get a better understanding of some of the game. Learning and memorizing the little myths is pretty necessary to completing the heroquests and even then sometimes the myths still won't exactly go according to how they should.
Writing: It's more fun than a barrel of Ebola ridden monkeys!
The cynical side says they might've planned to do something like this all along...
Given how quickly they're able to make the DLC, I kinda suspect they had it planned. I bet it was supposed to be a "here's a bonus epilogue" patch, not a "here's the fixed ending" patch... but, still. That is the direction the industry seems to be taking, as far as how it handles DLC.
Originally posted by Ryan_DuBois
Usoki, you're the crankiest asshole we know. Not that it's a bad thing, it just means that you smell funny and are best left hidden in darkness.
And it's embarrassing when you make any noise at all.
Also, what they are officially saying is not "fix the ending" but "better explain the ending." They have never said they were going to change the ending, only add some DLC that "explains" it better. I don't see that as a flip-flop on their part at all... and is most likely something they planned as an epilogue all along, but are now rushing out and adding a little more to help explain the meaning of what they did already.
Personally, I'm behind them telling whatever story they want. They are the authors of it. The readers shouldn't have any say in how an author tells their story. Most movies that end up with crappy endings happen that way because of the studio doing "test screenings" that they think go badly. So they use their leverage to force the filmmaker to change the ending to something more along what they want, usually ruining it. I'd hate to see that become the standard method of authorship in all forms of media.
The way I feel about it is let the creator create what they want. If you don't like the ending of a story, bummer. It's not your story. If you want a different ending, write your own story. The same should go for movies and games and everything.
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