BioWare and the Stupidity of Arrogance
Well, they did warn us: BioWare made the stupid call back in March to "stand by their endings". That's really not the worst part about how things played out. Sure, there's plenty of lore breaking here (the relays were just "heavily damaged" rather than destroyed - someone with a few working neurons finally remembered the marker they put down in "Arrival").
No, the really stupid part is the "F*** You" ending they added. If you are frustrated by the endings, it's fairly natural to turn around at the end, and take a shot at the "star child". In the original ending back in March, all that resulted in was venting. Now, it immediately ends the game with star child saying "So Be It" angrily, and the reapers wipe everything out - you get a fade to black with a beacon left by Liara as a warning to the next cycle.
That's just arrogance - it's the BioWare team telling the fans "Don't like our endings, well, screw off". Fine - I'll screw off. The Mass Effect 3 franchise is now dead. If you want to treat a paying customer (one who bought the games on PC and XBox) this way, then fine - I don't need to ever buy anything associated with the Mass Effect story again. Or anything that Casey Hudson is associated with, either.
Just to be clear - while I object to the 3 main endings, I don't consider those to be arrogant. It's the new thing they just added that's arrogant. To even get there, here's what BioWare expected us to do:
- Have a save sitting just before the Cerberus attack (a couple of hours of gameplay before the ending
- To get all three options, invest in another 5-6 hours of Multiplayer - your readiness rating rots down to 50% if you - like me - haven't picked up the game in a few months
- After replaying a few hours of the main game, and investing all that time in multiplayer, you might be a bit frustrated. You take that out by shooting star child. BioWare decides you are unworthy at this point
No one needs to reward that kind of attitude. That's business killing stupidity.
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