BioWare Monday: The Mass Effect 3 Ending

Spoiler Warning: This series of weekly posts delves into various BioWare games, and will spoil the hell out of them. Proceed with caution.

I've been teasing this for a while, and it's time to talk about it. The Mass Effect 3 ending.

BioWare games have had some spectacular endings. The end sequence of Dragon Age: Origins is magnificent. The ending of Mass Effect 2 is glorious. And most other games have had solid plus endings.

And then came Mass Effect 3.

The Original Ending

As I mentioned multiple times before, Mass Effect 2 is my favorite game of all time. So when the sequel came out, I was ready. I had pre-ordered it, and cleared my schedule. For days, all I did was play the game. And it is, for the most part, a spectacular game. Some of the emotional beats in the game are simply incredible. But then I reached the end and...

Wait...

What?

No.

That can't be it. It just... can't.

You pick between three colors and get three endings that kinda seem identical? Whaaaaaaa?

I went to the BioWare forums, and almost no one else had finished it. Later, there would be threads where people offered hugs. There would be conspiracy theories and petitions, and there would be a dlc to fix it (which I will also discuss here).

But on that night? There was almost nothing. BioWare is my favorite gaming company (well, Studios within EA, now, but still), and they get a ton of crap they don't deserve. But the original ending of Mass Effect 3 deserved ALL OF IT. It was emotionally devastating, and not in the good, intentional way. I felt personally betrayed.

Mass Effect, as a series, was built on a promise: Your choices matter. From character creation on, the decisions the player makes change Shepard's journey to become the woman who saved the galaxy a lot. And this held true until the ending, where 99 percent of your choices became meaningless. And even the very last one seemed entirely empty.

The Ending As It Is Now

Two major changes happened. The first was the free DLC, released a few months after the game. The second was the optional Leviathan dlc, released later. With both of those, the ending is given much more clarity. Now, if you play Leviathan, you come in knowing what the Reapers are, though not the reasons. And the impact of your decision isn't just the color of the giant beam of power that rips across the galaxy.

It is still deeply flawed. You spend ME3 getting to know EDI, a true AI who teaches herself to be good. You save the Geth, the historically maligned AI race who were baddies in the first game. You help them achieve full sentience, and they become a force for good.

And then, at the end, asshole starchild tells you it is inevitable that artificial life will destroy organic life? Motherfucker, I JUST FIXED THAT. WHY CAN'T SHEPARD FUCKING SAY THAT? Sorry. Got a bit upset all over again. As I said, it is still flawed.

But it is coherent, and it is meaningful. You get three choices, assuming you played a decent game and came to the final battle with your forces in order:

Destroy

You can destroy the Reapers, which will also by the way destroy all non organic life, including the Geth you just saved and your pal EDI. I know people who have chosen this ending, and they tend to justify it with "this way Shepard maybe lives? And I refuse to believe EDI dies." Some of these people are my friends. I judge them for this. I watched this ending on youtube.

Control

This is the ending you spend much of the game believing is impossible. You basically become god, controlling the Reapers (the most powerful beings in the galaxy) for all time, leading to a sort of utopia. I've selected this ending, but it doesn't feel right.

Synthesis

This is the ending you only get if you've played a full game and got your forces in order. It is the weirdest ending. It is ethically troubling, though not as morally fucked as Destroy. Synthesis is a fusing of artificial and organic life throughout the galaxy. The reapers are pals. Everyone is pals. It is a full blown utopia. It's Iain M. Banks' The Culture level Utopia. I have my issues with it, but it is emotionally very satisfying. It's the one I pick most times.

Did They Fix It?

So, did BioWare fix the ending of ME3? For me, they did. For all its faults, as the game stands now, it tells an emotionally satisfying story. That's all I wanted. Some disagree. Some want to WIN. Beat the Reapers without killing the AI pals. And I get that. But ME3 isn't a game about winning. It's a game about trauma and the struggle for survival. And I'm okay with that. It's emotionally devastating in the good way.