Science-fiction role playing game Mass Effect premiered on the Xbox in 2007. At the time, it was lifted from obscurity by controversy around the inclusion of a human/alien lesbian love scene. The game flourished amid that controversy, spawning two successful sequels: Mass Effect 2 in 2010, and Mass Effect 3 earlier this year. (SPOILER FREE: This review talks in general terms about the ending of Mass Effect 3, but does not reveal plot points or 'spoil' the ending.)
Despite meeting critical acclaim, with 89/100 on review score-aggregator site Metacritic, Mass Effect 3 was a game dogged by a totally different and far less beneficial form of controversy. Many players were unsatisfied with the trilogy's ending, with a particularly vocal minority demanding it be retroactively changed by the game's developers, BioWare. Visit: GamePro UK.
In response to the criticism, BioWare on 27 June released Mass Effect 3: Extended Cut: free a downloadable content (DLC) package for all owners of the game on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3. Extended Cut is not advertised as a change to the ending, but as an additional package of in-game cinematics and epilogue content to clarify the game's ending and provide closure to players who found it lacking.
I loaded up a saved game from my review playthrough of Mass Effect 3, made three hours before the end of the game, and replayed from there with Extended Cut installed.
Without throwing any spoilers out there, the ending controversy can be broken down into four categories: plot holes introduced in the game's final sequence, a lack of closure/feeling the ending was too abrupt, a lack of difference between each of the potential endings, and dissatisfaction with the story itself. Here's how Extended Cut does, or doesn't, handle those issues.
Mass Effect 3: Extended Cut - Plot holes:
Some things that happen at the very end of Mass Effect 3 just don't make sense, however you look at them. Most notably characters that are seen, very definitely, to be in one place, pop up in a completely different place with no conceivable explanation.
This is not really surprising -- in a game with a player-influenced story as complex as Mass Effect, where you choose which of several teammates accompany you on missions, it would be easy for such oversights to occur. Accounting for every possibility is necessary, to keep the plot together, but a daunting and difficult task for developers.
These issues are not a matter of taste -- they're simply bugs in the game, just as a weapon that fails to reload or an upgrade that can't be collected is. The plot is a story, yes, but the system that strings it all together based on the player's influence is a piece of code like any other, and is just as likely to be bugged as any other part of the game. Demanding a fix for these issues is not 'player entitlement', and more so than demands for other bug fixes.
BioWare really came through here -- every such bug I noticed in my original playthrough has been 'fixed' in the Extended Cut, through the addition of cutscenes which explain the previously inexplicable. It's a nice way of doing it -- the plot holes are closed, without changing the game's canonical ending.
If, like me, your primary concerns with the ending were the flow-breaking plot bugs, consider them solved and breathe a sigh of relief.
Mass Effect 3: Extended Cut - Lack of closure:
After five years of cutscene and dialogue-heavy gaming in a hugely open world, any ending is going to seem abrupt to the emotionally-invested player. I have personally clocked up over five hundred hours in the Mass Effect universe, and the game's end was always going to be tinged with the same sadness I feel at the end of a brilliant novel.
It was particularly hard to see the game end with little or no indication of what became of your friends, teammates, or the entire galaxy for that matter. Hard, but no less valid an ending than any other.
BioWare didn't have to do anything here, but they stepped up to the plate and knocked out a series of epilogues (one for each ending) that go into a fair amount of detail, both at the personal and galactic level. By the end, you now know what your choices in the game all came to, in a very Fallout-style slideshow with voiceover.
Mass Effect 3: Extended Cut - Differentiation between endings:
Mass Effect is a trilogy influenced heavily by player actions -- it has been from the very start. Mass Effect 2 allowed you to import saved games from the original Mass Effect, and all the decisions your character made in the first game carried into the second. Likewise, saved games and thus the sum of your decisions to date could be carried from Mass Effect 2 into Mass Effect 3.
This is undoubtedly why many players found it so very disappointing that the various endings offered by Mass Effect were all essentially the same, with a different colour filter slapped over the top. You could pretty much experience them all by finishing the game once, and toggling the colour settings of your monitor as you watched the ending.
Okay, maybe that's a bit harsh, but I've seen far hasher sentiments expressed on forums, in comments and elsewhere in the Mass Effect fan community. Critical Miss gaming web-comic creators Cory Rydell and Grey Carter summed it up brilliantly, though to quote them on it would be to spoil the game's end somewhat. If you know how it goes, check out the relevant strip at escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/comics/critical-miss/9611-Wise-Counsel (contains mild adult themes and language).
This is one thing Extended Cut does not really address. The addition of detailed epilogue scenes does make the existing endings each feel much more unique. However, when playing each ending -- one after the other, for the sake of review-science -- many parts of them were still remarkably similar. Perhaps this is because despite my final choice in the game, all endings came from the same playthrough.
I'm working on a second playthrough of the full trilogy at the moment, and will update this piece if it makes a difference. However, I really don't get the feeling that it would.
If you're expecting Extended Cut to add entirely new endings, or story branches, it does not. It's exactly what its name says: an 'extended cut' of the game's existing story, with more detail.
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Comments
Sol said: You msised some thingsThe fact the catalyst even exists is the biggest hole in the entire series His presence breaks the plot of the games Especially Mass Effect 1 He is a Deus Ex Machina he resolves the entire plot without any indication of his existence prior to his appearance Hes also the most important character in the entire series even more so than Shepard He makes no sense and makes his entire section of the stroy seem forced and nonsensialSecond Harbinger The biggest baddest most powerful Reaperand my personal favourite sits by while the Normandy evacuates your team Seriously The guy who sent a cruiser to lay a trap and kill one person just sits by and lets his biggest enemies fly awayThird Back to the Catalyst he says his solution wont work anymore yet if you refuse his solutions he goes right back to it --The Normandy fleeing While this was given an explanation it still leaves a fair bit open Like why your love interestGarrusLiara tells joker to leave These people would not simply accept you as dead and fly off Liara especially who risks her life just to get your corpse Orders be damned some of them turned their back on their leaders in the past simply to follow youThe only one truly fixed is the Mass Relay explosions now theyre merely damaged if you did enough work Although how they can be rebuilt in destroy when no one knows anything about building them is unknownTheres a couple more but i cover them below Now for explantions The explanation for the catalyst about himself and the crucible is utter nonsense and makes everyone in the galaxy look like idiots The Catalyst himself was made to be a diplomat between organics and synthetics however he decides thats stupid and to murder his creators and turn them into the first reaper He never says how he was able to kill off the entire race that built him why he couldnt try something else or even who his creators were He still insists that the created will rebel against their creators except for the Reapers apparently He now says he not only controls the Reapers but he is the combined intelligence of them all That would be fine but it further reinforces his breaking of the plot No reason is given why he could not do Sovereigns job for himThe Crucible is revelaed to be a giant battery Really Now this is just stupid The greatest minds in the entire galaxy could not figure out they were building a huge duracell Theres also the fact that the previous cycles were making a giant battery instead of a giant weapon That makes no sense When youre outgunned you build a better gun not something that benefits you in no way whatsoever They couldnt also write down that was what it was either Good job guys The expanded endingsSynthesis still makes no sense You cannot say it does Its able to morph every single form of life in the entire galaxy into something else regardless of the vast differences in genetic code or complexity The reason for this has changed from DNA to essense probably ebcause eevryone ever pointed out hat machines have no DNA The Catalyst thought this the best solution but says organics werent ready before No explanation as to why we just werent Husks apparently regain their minds too i dontknow why thats good Theyre now horrible mutated monstersi dont think they will enjoy that Control is actually the one that makes the most sense You do take full control of the Reapers essentially replacing the Catalyst No actual problems with this except why such a mechanism was there in the first place Destroy is given the explanation as to why ALL synthetic life is that the crucible doesnt discriminate Problem The crucible is a power source it doesnt do anything unless its hooked up to the Catalyst Second is that the Catalyst has godlike power in synhesis but cannot just destroy his own creations Yeah right Third why the hell am i shooting this tube This plot resolving tube Refuse The Catalyst says his solution will not work anymore and finally finally we get an option to tell the Catalyst to stick his choices We instantly lose and he just goes back to it Thats cheap no explantion is given as to why the reapers cannot be beaten conventionallyread Thanix cannon the crap out of them the Thanix is supposed to be an extremely widely used and powerful weapon but is NEVER shown and we dont even get to see everyone going down in a blaze of glory You can have the entire galaxy at your back every single race including batarians geth volus elcor and it all means nothing There was literally no point to all those sidequests Next Liaras capsule thing is shown reading its message to a race in the next cycle Who according to twitter built the crucible and used it for one of the choices What is with people and building things with a 0 success rate Theres been some speculation that the Yahg find the capsule use the technology within to take over the galaxy and just kill all the reapers Now thats how its done The epilogue Now really this should have been in the original endings its the end of a trilogy with a great storyaside from where the catalyst shows up Whoever thought it was a great idea not to put it in is an utter moron But theres still some problems with them for starters its very short Second it doesnt show anything of what happens to your crew Former crew yes everyone else nopeSynthesis is just crazy for starters the Reapers are morphed by synthesis despite the fact theyre already organicsynthetic hybrids Second they suddenly do a 180 and actively help everyone There is no reason for this but better yet everyone immediately accepts the help from the genocidal monsters when a very short time ago they were murdering everyone No that would not happenControl is once again leading in the sense and coolness department CatalystShepard is the one helping everyone using the reapers as his tools and using them to fix everything This comes with a particularly badass narrationDestroy Is pretty mcuh what you expect although its not stated if every VI in the galaxy was also erased along with AIs and Reapers However evreyone rebuilds but the geth and EDI are all dead You can also now get the breath scene without playing multiplayer but it doesnt expand upon it at all Closure Not achievedI was expecting at least an epilogue like Dragon Age Origins which went through every single character and told me what happened to them it made all the extra quests and stuff feel like hey mattered While there are some things like the krogan rebuilding their civilisation and the Quarians settling down it doesnt show what happened to everyone It actually leaves out huge scores of people mostly those on the citadel who you still have no idea if they all died when the Reapers moved the citadel or not Your crew too You have no idea if liara continues to be the shadow broker if garrus sees his father and sister again if Javik decides to kill himself because of the memory shardor because the murderers of his civilisation still live or live peacefully You have no idea Theres also the fact they somehow know Shepard is not dead but have this whole memorial thing instead of say searching for youME2 romances like Jack and Miranda dont even get to be at the memorial they get an epilogue slide and thats it No reunion nothing Shepard just bleeds to death why everyone looks thoughtful All this might be overlooked if one thing had happened War Assets These essentially contributed nothing aside from 2 scenes Yet so many are missing most notably the geth if you made peace withthe quarians You have spectre units justicars a really impressive volus dreadnought an enormous army of geth drell commandos Arias pirate fleet the batarian fleet an elcor fleet a salarian fleet rachni a bombing fleet and none of it ever shows up or is shown If this stuff had been added i might have been to overlook the enormous list of things above but that really got to me That very few of the huge force i had gathered bothers to back me up really ticks me off What this has done with the endings is change it from a 919 split to a 5545 split I give it 35 on its own The original endings were a 055 while the extended cut is vastly better Anything would have been Theres a comic done by Penny Arcade where you turn the reapers into ice cream even that would have been better than the originals I had high hopes for the extended cut but it fails to meet even half my expectations
Lachlan said: Matt in Choose Your Own Adventure books If you dont like the ending you can turn back the page and get a different one Im happy that Bioware did this I didnt really have too much to complain about the endings despite the palette swapBut the additions they made were a welcome touch offering clarity without destroying their initial artistic vision
Matt Egan said: What about the Choose Your Own Adventure books Ill get my coat
Diredragon said: There is one big hole in the video game to novel comparison It is true that you dont write an author to request that they change the ending of a novel Howeverauthors also never ask their readers to decide what kind of personality their protagonist should have what gender they should be whether character A or character B dies in a given scene which character the protagonist should fall in love with etc Novels are offered as is The reader plays no part in the crafting process