Mass Effect 3 feelings!
I got through Mass Effect 3! I have so many good feelings about this game and its blatant emotional manipulation. It felt like the last season of a good TV show, trekking on through a bunch of old dangling plot threads and getting some resolution to them, getting to revisit old friends and old enemies.
The apocalyptic wartime ambiance of the game is pretty amazing, I think. It hangs over everything you do, every choice you make, every place you visit. I love the little moments where you can carve out little pockets of happiness amongst all the darkness. It's kind of weird to admit this, but I don't think I particularly cared deeply about the story of this series until this game. You run around doing all this stuff, and it's supposed to feel urgent and personal and connected to you and your character, but it doesn't, not entirely. I am usually pretty good at doing pure paragon and pure renegade playthroughs because I don't care enough about the choices to make a huge decision. On the other hand, this one punched me in all my feelings everywhere. I'm not sure I could do a renegade playthrough. It would be too emotionally painful.
Anyway, I'm guessing you're here to talk about the ending (if you've gotten there).
To be honest, considering the hooha I've been seeing around the internet, I was expecting something far worse than what we got. Granted, it is benefiting from lowered expectations, but you know, that's how I ended up watching it. I chose the Synthesis ending, though in retrospect it's hard to say if the other two are any better. The Synthesis ending feels super old school scifi metaphysical, like the ending of 2001, except without the giant space baby, just you know, Shep sacrificing herself to become a theoretical space baby.
I can understand the anger, though. It feels like Bioware were trading epicness (see: ending scene with the father and child) for the more personal stories we'd come to care about. Destroying the mass relays in every option is an incredibly world-shaking event, and having your crew stranded on a strange planet felt, I dunno, incredibly unbearably sad. Even sadder than if they'd all died during the attack. I wanted to see the aftermath on Earth, to see it slowly rebuilding. Jumping that far into the future gives the universe a sense of scale, but I think it's too vague to give it really weight or meaning.
On the other hand, I loved that your final boss fight is basically just a convo battle with the Illusive Man. Martin Sheen, you are still my favoritest. And Anderson! Ugh, that moment of just sitting down, staring at the stars. My feelings are everywhere.
I have more feelings if you want to talk about them! ALL THE FEELINGS.
This entry was originally posted at http://thedeadparrot.dreamwidth.org/509177.html. You can comment there using OpenID or you can comment here if you prefer. :)
comments there
The apocalyptic wartime ambiance of the game is pretty amazing, I think. It hangs over everything you do, every choice you make, every place you visit. I love the little moments where you can carve out little pockets of happiness amongst all the darkness. It's kind of weird to admit this, but I don't think I particularly cared deeply about the story of this series until this game. You run around doing all this stuff, and it's supposed to feel urgent and personal and connected to you and your character, but it doesn't, not entirely. I am usually pretty good at doing pure paragon and pure renegade playthroughs because I don't care enough about the choices to make a huge decision. On the other hand, this one punched me in all my feelings everywhere. I'm not sure I could do a renegade playthrough. It would be too emotionally painful.
Anyway, I'm guessing you're here to talk about the ending (if you've gotten there).
To be honest, considering the hooha I've been seeing around the internet, I was expecting something far worse than what we got. Granted, it is benefiting from lowered expectations, but you know, that's how I ended up watching it. I chose the Synthesis ending, though in retrospect it's hard to say if the other two are any better. The Synthesis ending feels super old school scifi metaphysical, like the ending of 2001, except without the giant space baby, just you know, Shep sacrificing herself to become a theoretical space baby.
I can understand the anger, though. It feels like Bioware were trading epicness (see: ending scene with the father and child) for the more personal stories we'd come to care about. Destroying the mass relays in every option is an incredibly world-shaking event, and having your crew stranded on a strange planet felt, I dunno, incredibly unbearably sad. Even sadder than if they'd all died during the attack. I wanted to see the aftermath on Earth, to see it slowly rebuilding. Jumping that far into the future gives the universe a sense of scale, but I think it's too vague to give it really weight or meaning.
On the other hand, I loved that your final boss fight is basically just a convo battle with the Illusive Man. Martin Sheen, you are still my favoritest. And Anderson! Ugh, that moment of just sitting down, staring at the stars. My feelings are everywhere.
I have more feelings if you want to talk about them! ALL THE FEELINGS.
This entry was originally posted at http://thedeadparrot.dreamwidth.org/509177.html. You can comment there using OpenID or you can comment here if you prefer. :)
comments there