finished me3 last night. at. three in the goddamn morning. my conclusions are thus:
from the POV of a Shepard that has been actively trying to ally as many species as possible Synthesis is the ending that makes the most amount of sense and stands to minimize the most amount of collateral damage
Control is an ending that exists but no goddamn way in hell would I trust it. "ohhh no TIM couldn't control the reapers because he was indoctrinated,, but don't worry ;) YOU are totally not and could pull this off. ignore what I said about me making the reapers do this for logic reasons I will toootally hand you control ;) put baby in pelican mouth" do you think I am stupid.
Destroy single handedly fucked the entire galaxy in an instant MUCH more effectively than the reapers did. Like yeah the reapers were harvesting but Destroy eradicated all intergalactic transport. Goodbye supply lines goodbye medevac goodbye large scale rebuilding. Sorry Kaidan but even if Shepard survived you may never actually be reunited
where the hell did the Normandy even land, anyway???? and where did they get those name plaques for the dramatic cutscene. did they fabricate those on the ship. did they have a stack of them already prepared for in case shit went sideways
lmfao Zaeed
and finally, that little storytelling bit at the end had me crying, not from emotion, but because I was getting hysterically tired and the game would not stop fucking talking, christ on a crutch they should have ended it at the dog tags, that was fully unnecessary
I like this take. But I also like the Destroy option. I think it makes sense if you view it from the eyes of a Shepard who knows better than to trust the Control ending, but is entirely suspicious of Synthesis. Like, would that actually stop the harvest once and for all while leaving galactic civilization in tact? Is it worth it? Or is it better to put everyone in a position where they'd need to rebuild despite even more loss as a result of disconnecting the galactic community? Thus creating a complete and total diaspora of all species?
I also finished my first run of ME3 recently and I had also planned to choose Destroy before I stupidly robbed myself of the option and fucked the galaxy cos' I like the idea of a Shepard who doesn't trust that Synthesis would be a viable solution. I love the conflict of "what the fuck just happened, oh shit we can't leave, oh fuck we have to start from the ground up again!?" because of the supply chain issue. And good god imagine the political fallout that would result. Talk about a power vacuum.
The only time that storytelling bit makes sense is at the end of the 4th ending. Which is the ending I unintentionally got when I recently finished my first run of ME3.
I just wanted to be a silly little asshole....
Oh yeah, don't get me wrong, I genuinely enjoyed the Destroy ending! I like the finality of it. Plus it slots very nicely into the theme of difficult choices in wartime and opens up all sorts of doors to explore post-game. Like, how did all the allied galactic forces get home without the mass relays? How many new colonies popped up because the ships didn't have the fuel to go any further and just had to make do with what wreckage was in the vicinity? How many systems are integrated populations now as opposed to single-species controlled? Presumably communication via the entangled pairs still works even if conventional FTL communication went down with the relays (which it did), but there's woefully few of those, so anyone who does have that access has an insane advantage over everyone else. And not even just politically, rebuilding logistics are so much easier if you can talk to people.
Personally I've been bopping in & around the fandom for a decade so there's nothing left to spoil. lmao. I even know all the hastag discourse, I just had never finished 2 and felt weird doing 3 without it. I knew my options and actually have 3 Sheps that I've been planning for years, but that's different from actually playing the game- I played through this Shep intending to do the Destroy ending all along, I just wasnt expecting the reasoning of the Synthesis ending to fit her character so much better. I still picked Destroy for happily(?) ever after Shepard Survives With Kaidan purposes but the details threw a hell of a wrench in those plans. Like yeah maybe Shepard survived the blast but WHO is going to be in ANY position to get to the wreckage of the Citadel and find their heavily wounded and battered ass in time to get them treatment?? Even if the Alliance sent someone IMMEDIATELY digging through all that rubble will take time. It's such a long shot, and even if they're miraculously recovered before capital-D Dying, how long will it take them to recover? How badly concussed were they by the shockwave? How badly did their cybernetics getting destroyed fuck them up? How depleted are Alliance medical staff? In my playthrough Miranda died, so there's not a single trace of Lazarus staff to be found anywhere to pull off another miracle. If they die, they are gone, if they live, they're a vegetable in a coma.
I'm excited to play through my other 2 planned Sheps just to see what else changes. I may swap around who gets what ending but I gotta see em first. I just. dont know how I'm going to justify doing a Control ending unless I make that Shep a little stupid & arrogant. Like its soooooo fuckin sketchy. I'll still do it, but. "Oh TIM self destructed badly but don't worry 👍 I'm built different" come on man
Oh no, I totally got you. I just wanted to talk about the endings too! My bad for making it seem otherwise. It was also my first time getting to play the third after I've played the first two repeatedly and having been heavily spoiled. That's a funny coincidence. I either dodged the 4th ending being spoiled for me or I totally forgot about it prior to shooting that little shitter. The fact I didn't hesitate to turn on him is evidence enough of the spoils I had lmao I don't know what kind of Shepard I'm gonna play next, maybe an Alliance legacy Shepard, but not a soldier or vanguard. I can't wait to see how the different decisions play out on my next run!
