A glimpse at what could have been softens the original blow.
When I originally finished Mass Effect 3, it was about a week after the rage started about the ending. I had no idea what to expect, but I managed to make it to the end without any spoilers. I will also grant you, the reading audience, the same courtesy. There will be a spoiler break where you can cut off and go back to your spoiler-free realm and drink spoiler-free beverages.
I initially thought the ending was good, but I could see where people had problems with it. As time went by – maybe a day – I realized the ending was disappointing. That said, I was not on the ending revision bandwagon. While I do think the creators of a product owe quality to their consumers, and the ending definitely was not consistent in quality with the rest of the story, I could not summon the ill will towards BioWare that many people were feeling. The fact is, Mass Effect, as a whole, is an amazing series of games. They are a lot of fun, and you meet so many wonderful and memorable characters along your adventure that you will genuinely care about almost all of them. The ending sequence and following cutscenes were subpar, but whether you have played the game or are thinking about it, I can assure you that the entirety of Mass Effect 3 is the ending to the series. You get so much closure on almost every open topic brought up within the Mass Effect universe that the disappointing last 15 minutes should not be permitted to taint what is such a quality experience. Naysayers may contend that there were also some gameplay features which did not meet the quality of the first two games, but I honestly think they were nitpicking. There is so much rewarding content in the final entry in the series that I did not feel anything lacking.
I could have handled a sad ending; I could have handled a major character dying if it was executed well. However, whether all of Earth lives or dies, the ending BioWare offered was not executed well. The biggest problem is a giant rabbit as big as the universe being pulled out of a hat, and in turn, it makes almost everyone act out of character. Then, it's over. There are so many huge questions left to ask about what you just witnessed, and BioWare responded to their fans claiming that they had no idea we would want something more.
What?!
Regardless of the fact that the game serves as the ending itself, it is not such an ambitious leap of thought to think that the people who spent upwards of $180 to play all three games, excluding DLC, would want
- A long, satisfying ending sequence that sufficiently wraps up storylines without creating new ones.
- For the ending not to offer events in which characters act contrary to their personalities or where the rules of the universe you created are disbanded for the sake of wrapping up.
- Some kind of acknowledgement for being a paragon or a renegade throughout your play experience.
- A big party.
Lo, the fans did not receive any of these things. Well, some received what they wanted. People who enjoyed what the original ending had to offer are more than entitled to think so. With expectations set so high, it is understandable that not everyone will be pleased. However, I do not think it is hard to imagine where people started having problems with what they were being fed.
Moving on, BioWare responded with a compromise: they were going to offer up more closure and fill in plot holes, but in acknowledgement of their great effort being offered completely free, the core of how the game ends would not be changed. Before playing, I knew I could accept this. They went above and beyond to please more fans, in my opinion, and they were entitled to not have to undo everything they worked hard on. It did mean keeping the giant rabbit, but all of his little furry friends were put back in their cages one way or another.
Back to the point of this unintentional word dump, does the Extended Cut makes things better? I can say, "Yes," without hesitation. Despite what I would argue is the silliest of concepts to maintain, the extras offered in this ending serve to soften the blow of what used to be an utter disappointment. There are still going to be people who played the original ending and are left disillusioned. To some, the arrow hit their hearts already, and BioWare is only dressing the wound. You will either acknowledge the effort they put into the Extended Cut, or you won't, and I obviously will not sway you either way. Still, if you have not yet finished the game, I am happy to let you know that what you will experience will not be perfect, but you will not feel the rage. You can continue (or start) playing, and I feel you will enjoy what they've given you.
As far as what they have provided, there are a number of additions. For the most confusing parts of the original ending, especially those regarding the rabbit (I promise it is not a real rabbit), they added a ton of new dialogue that makes it easier to understand and/or swallow. And if you do not want to take it as it is, they have even given you a new option to utterly reject it. I did not experiment with this option, but I know it made some people feel better. Along with the dialogue, the ending features extremely important new engine and pre-rendered sequences, which offer plausible explanations for the character and universe-defying events of the original. What is still disappointing is that they did all this work, but they opted to throw in motion comic-style animations for the first time in the entire series. I am not sure how the decision was made, but it does not take much away from the overall better quality of the Extended Cut DLC.
While I am happy BioWare decided to respond to the outcry over the original ending to Mass Effect 3, I am cautious about the precedent this may have created. If enough people don't like something about a future game, will it just take the rallying cries of a disheartened populous to make a developer spend a lot of extra time and money to please them? Sure, this was the ending to a revered series of games with a rich lore spanning comics and novels, too, but what will stop the villagers from lighting their torches over something arguably petty? So kudos to BioWare for placating a section of their fan base, but I think they should stop there.
No images provided because there aren't any!
Spoiler City Limits
There are spoilers living beyond this line.
I stand by everything I just wrote, but I'd like to offer a couple more specific complaints about the new content we were given. For the record, I played both the blue and red endings, as they are called. I played the blue ending starting from where BioWare suggested, which is before the attack on Cerberus. What a waste of time. Although that mission was as fun and exciting as the first two times I played it (I have two Shepherds), if there was anything new to experience, hear, or see from that point, I must have missed it entirely. Take my advice, and load a game as far into the London mission as you possibly can. The latest you can save a game there is before you are tasked with defending the second missile launcher. Launch those missiles, and everything you will need to experience will be laid out before you. My initial response to the first added cutscene, which answers the question of how any of your teammates on the ground survived, was out loud: "Well, this already makes a ton more sense!"
If you have played the Extended Cut, let me note my problem with it. The Normandy is called in to pick up your teammates during an extremely dangerous event. There is a giant Reaper shooting his giant red death laser all along the hill, and Shepherd sees that as the best time to be more of a hero. Not only could the Normandy be completely blown to bits, killing everyone, but the amount of time it takes to get your wounded teammates on the ship and to argue with one of them is implausibly unsafe. It would just make more sense to kill off the teammates who join you, I think. However, in the heat of the moment, it is easier to suspend your disbelief for this moment than it is to understand how they are alive after witnessing them die.
Getting more spoilerific here, the red ending still offers the two-second cutscene where Shepherd presumably survives. Too bad, huh? Without any of the closure of the Extended Cut, this sequence offered a glimmer of hope for him/her albeit a bittersweet one. However, knowing all the stuff that happens after the ending sequence, it is pretty clear that Shepherd will just die slowly in the remains of the Citadel. Assuming his/her synthetic parts are definitely dead, he will die within three days without water. Watching your romantic interest place his/her name placard on the wall of people who died in service suddenly feels mildly premature. You just want to reach out to him/her/it and say, "Hey, um, you might want to check the ruins first." But then you realize that there is no actual way to get there, so you just shut your mouth.
Finally, although both the blue and red ending offer repairs to the broken mass relays, I still wonder just how displaced everybody is until that point. For example, where does the Normandy go after it takes off from the jungle planet? Where can it go? For their sake, I can only hope that they are reasonably close to a populated planet.
One more. I wish they removed the Buzz Aldrin scene completely. It's so lame.
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