This review contains spoilers
It's been a while since I played this. I played it as soon as it came out and probably beat it in a week. After that, I played the multiplayer for a month before finally stopping. When the extended cut ending was released, I watched it on Youtube.
I had probably three or four Shepards I'd taken from Mass Effect through Mass Effect 2. I was ready to see all their stories to the end, then I saw the end.
An ending is only a small part of a game, but it's important. When the game itself is an ending to one of my favorite trilogies, there's so much more pressure on it. If you know anything about Mass Effect 3, you know it had a bad ending.
But the ending wasn't the sole thing that kept me from coming back. The lovable characters are still there, but different. Many characters I liked only get small parts and others are changed rather drastically. Garrus is still great though. Absolutely no qualms with Garrus, he excels at every moment.
But then there's The Illusive Man. He's evil. That's it, Cerberus and him are just evil. The Reapers are barely present with Harbinger getting no lines. Wrex loses his weariness and wit to become a bro. Thane shows up to die fighting a ninja. And yeah that ninja is horrible. People forget about him, but he's the worst.
There are good moments here! The ending of Conrad Verner's saga made me laugh hysterically and seeing Tali planning to build a house with Shepard was genuinely touching. But throughout that is so much nonsense with Cerberus.
Without the dark 80s action-inspired tone of the second game or the tragic eldritch story of the first game, what's left is a series of setpieces that feel incidental building up to a finding the new super-maguffin. And when you're ready to finally defeat the Reapers, the game stops you. It asks you which universe would you like to create.
That's what I hate about the ending. It shouldn't be a choice. Shepard has always fought to defeat the Reapers. Shepard and I don't want to revolutionize the universe with synthetic hybrids. We just want to save the day at last.
I had probably three or four Shepards I'd taken from Mass Effect through Mass Effect 2. I was ready to see all their stories to the end, then I saw the end.
An ending is only a small part of a game, but it's important. When the game itself is an ending to one of my favorite trilogies, there's so much more pressure on it. If you know anything about Mass Effect 3, you know it had a bad ending.
But the ending wasn't the sole thing that kept me from coming back. The lovable characters are still there, but different. Many characters I liked only get small parts and others are changed rather drastically. Garrus is still great though. Absolutely no qualms with Garrus, he excels at every moment.
But then there's The Illusive Man. He's evil. That's it, Cerberus and him are just evil. The Reapers are barely present with Harbinger getting no lines. Wrex loses his weariness and wit to become a bro. Thane shows up to die fighting a ninja. And yeah that ninja is horrible. People forget about him, but he's the worst.
There are good moments here! The ending of Conrad Verner's saga made me laugh hysterically and seeing Tali planning to build a house with Shepard was genuinely touching. But throughout that is so much nonsense with Cerberus.
Without the dark 80s action-inspired tone of the second game or the tragic eldritch story of the first game, what's left is a series of setpieces that feel incidental building up to a finding the new super-maguffin. And when you're ready to finally defeat the Reapers, the game stops you. It asks you which universe would you like to create.
That's what I hate about the ending. It shouldn't be a choice. Shepard has always fought to defeat the Reapers. Shepard and I don't want to revolutionize the universe with synthetic hybrids. We just want to save the day at last.