Mass Effect 3 Message Board  

I've been reading a lot on the Bioware forums. There are some threads trying to say that the three endings are not real. The Reapers are trying to indoctrinate him. It does make some sense. Everything past you getting up from Harbinger's beam attack is not real. It is attempted indoctrination. The Reapers want you to choose the blue or green ending because they will win. The red ending is bad for them because you reject their indoctrination. It is also the only ending that will show you in the rubble of London breathing.

How else could your squad suddenly get back to the Normandy and for some reason the Normandy left Earth in the middle of the fight for the galaxy. Will the DLC coming give us the "real" ending? Here is a twitter response from one of the game producers

Michael Gamble ‏ @GambleMike (March 9)
"Hardest. Day. Ever. Seriously, if you people knew all the stuff we are planning...you'd, we'll - hold onto your copy of me3 forever. "

That could mean a lot of things, but who knows.

Glad I'm not the only one who noticed my squad getting back to the Normandy. I took Tali to Earth with me for the final lap, then she walks off the Normandy at the end. Kind of a "...Whut?" moment. I think it's just a plot hole though.

I've seen the things of the endings not being real, but I dunno... I said in another thread that if the end was "all just a dream" then it was all pointless. Well, that last part where you don't actually do anything except talk, but it was still a pretty lengthy sequence, part of which the outcome depended on your Paragon/Renegade level, so you do work towards it.

I won't complain if they add a new ending, but if it turns out to be "not real", I'll be disappointed. Either way, I'm definitely excited to see what they'll do next.

My own opinion on the Normandy being chased from the system by the energy field is that once the citadel started bowing up and spewing green/red/yellow **** everywhere, I imagine Hackett would order a speedy retreat, as they wouldn't have a clue whether or not it'll pass them by or blow them up. As it is it caused the Normandy to crash.

[Edited by Skyheart, 3/13/2012 2:36:17 PM]

I dunno. The whole indoctrination theory just doesn't vibe well with me. For all accounts throughout the ME series it's stated that indoctrination takes quite some time for it to take effect, being subtle at first.

If the ending sequences really just were an indoctrination hallucination why the hell didn't sovereign just use that in ME1 during the Citadel account to hold Shepard away from the controls.

I don't know there's a lot of speculation out there but the endings just don't make sense to me, no matter how you put it

The only time Shepard even comes close to a reaper artifact, is during Arrival DLC. However, they can't assume everyone played that. Then again I guess they could. Since Liara is the Shadow Broker, even if you did not play LoTSB.

I know what you mean, but I have been thinking that the endings are most likely a set-up for the next part of the story set in the same universe. Kind of like reading a book that is part of a series, the ending only makes sense for that specific book, but not the entire story the author is attempting to write.

@Lizml86
I believe they did assume you played the Arrival DLC, because Shepard had been held on Earth for six months to keep the Batarians from starting a war with the Alliance, over the destruction of one of their colonies.

[Edited by ZZGashi, 3/13/2012 3:58:12 PM]

We'll on the demo was the only time that the Batarian massacre wasn't mentioned. (i played arrival on my play-throughs) and they made it sound like it was because I worked with Cerberus.

It definitely assumes you've played Arrival. Anderson points out that you're on Earth because you killed hundreds of thousands of Batarians (though I thought it was only 3000). The only one I remember making a big deal out of working with Cerberus is Ash/Kaiden.

I'm playing through again, and I dunno... the theory is that the kid isn't really there in the beginning sequence and only Shep can see him, the dreams are indoctrination, and the child all along is the Avatar. What's to say that the child is really there and blown up in the shuttle, that the dreams are just the writers way of showing us the stress and mental state of Sheps mind, along with a kind of survivors guilt, and that the Avatar only takes the form of the boy because it can see into his mind, and chooses the boy from that memory as its appearance.

[Edited by Skyheart, 3/13/2012 4:45:26 PM]

Huh, I wonder if that is due to save importing. Since I remember reading a short synopsis, and according to that Shepard was supposed to be on trial on Earth when the Reapers hit, but the game did not make it seem that way. Again, probably because of save importing, and whether or not you actually played through Arrival.

Looks like Skyheart beat me to it, thats what I had thought, was that the game assumed you had. And it was 300,000 some Batarians that died.

[Edited by ZZGashi, 3/13/2012 4:49:41 PM]

[Edited by ZZGashi, 3/13/2012 4:53:07 PM]