Mass Effect 3 Catch-All

Jessica Chobot does not look very attractive in the Unreal Engine.

complexmath wrote:

But will anyone be playing coop when I get around to playing ME3 in N months? I don't want to have the optimal ending effectively unavailable just because people have lost interest in the multiplayer component of my single-player game.

Yeah, that part bothers me too. That said, someone already found the file that determines how many points you get for each war effort portion so there's bound to be one with a better balance of that stuff should the multiplayer be dead one day.

kuddles wrote:

Jessica Chobot does not look very attractive in the Unreal Engine.

Oh god, I completely forgot that was supposed to be her. Agreed, that girl just ain't right in the face.

MojoBox wrote:
kuddles wrote:

Jessica Chobot does not look very attractive in the Unreal Engine.

Oh god, I completely forgot that was supposed to be her. Agreed, that girl just ain't right in the face.

Yeah. On the bright side, her voice acting performance isn't annoyingly bad or anything. Seems to fit right in.

complexmath wrote:
i38warhawk wrote:

I kind of resent Bioware for the choices they've made regarding DLC. The worst part is that after I "finished" the game" they kept throwing plot into the universe. My Shepard's been doing all this sh*t without me apparently. I figured she was in trouble for helping Cerberus or something. Turns out she blew up a solar system? What the hell Bioware?

In Arrival, you aren't really given a choice either--BioWare just wanted that bit to be canon. Their major mistake was not having a recap cutscene when starting a new game.

It is their fault for deciding to add a linking story between the two games by means of DLC no one played. After playing ME3 for 2 hours I went back to Skyrim. I have lost interest and I am not sure if I can get it back. The opening was a huge disappointment and I haven't found anything new to really hook me. Maybe my expectations were too high.

The only way I am going to finish the game is brute force determination. The old spark just is not there.

Just to be clear you can easily max out the slider to get the optimal ending without touching coop. The number of available points with scanning and side missions will get you there even at 50% readiness, I can't get the numbers right now because they are probably filled with spoilers but one of the guys on the giant bomb cast was talking about it, he made it sound like you didn't even have to 100% all of the side missions.

heavyfeul wrote:

The only way I am going to finish the game is brute force determination. The old spark just is not there.

I've got to say, as someone who's played ME1/2 a lot it's a good game, but I agree the first few hours aren't exactly great and someone new to it would be lost (although you could say the same for something like Halo, ME is a lot more convoluted). There's a certain amount of going through the motions to tie things up, I'm not so much drawn on for it's own sake as I am to get closure on the trilogy. Overall it's good, but it's good because it's more Mass Effect than an plot contained within ME3 (say in comparison to how ME1 was fairly self contained), but then, it's part 3 of a trilogy.

That got confusing. Perhaps I should try to follow my own rule of saying less to say more.

Kamakazi010654 wrote:

Just to be clear you can easily max out the slider to get the optimal ending without touching coop. The number of available points with scanning and side missions will get you there even at 50% readiness, I can't get the numbers right now because they are probably filled with spoilers but one of the guys on the giant bomb cast was talking about it, he made it sound like you didn't even have to 100% all of the side missions.

My problem with the Giant Bomb claim is that it isn't substantiated anywhere else. People on forums are saying they can't reach the ultimate good ending without touching multiplayer, and the people who argue otherwise end up finding out they mistakenly thought they got the "good" ending. To be specific numerically (I won't spoil plot points below but just in case):

Spoiler:

It's already been determined that in order to get the proper ending, you need at least 4,000 as your final military score, 5000 depending on certain circumstances. Since your military strength is multiplied by a "galactic readiness" of 50% if you haven't been playing multiplayer, that ostensibly means you need to have at least 8000 in war assets by the end of the game. As Giant Bomb even states, it maxes out at around 6000 as far as anyone can tell.

So... anybody else spent too much time listening to "Blasto 6" audio drama?

heavyfeul wrote:

It is their fault for deciding to add a linking story between the two games by means of DLC no one played.

Exaggerate, much? "No one" played? Show of hands: how many people here played Arrival? *raises hand* Well, then. That's already a non-zero number.

If the intro without a "Played Arrival?" flag checked yes insufficiently explained what happened, then I recognize that you may have a legitimate problem, but your problem =/= everyone's problem.

hbi2k wrote:
heavyfeul wrote:

It is their fault for deciding to add a linking story between the two games by means of DLC no one played.

Exaggerate, much? "No one" played? Show of hands: how many people here played Arrival? *raises hand* Well, then. That's already a non-zero number.

Agreed. Arrival was great! You know why? Precisely because it was a canonically important chunk of the game, delivered to you for cheap and around the time that I was starting to think about the fact that ME3 was coming in the future. It's almost exactly what I want out of Mass Effect DLC.

And is it a shock that newcomers are going to be confused if they jump into the 3rd title in a series? Would you recommend people start with Return of the Jedi?

kuddles wrote:

My problem with the Giant Bomb claim is that it isn't substantiated anywhere else. People on forums are saying they can't reach the ultimate good ending without touching multiplayer, and the people who argue otherwise end up finding out they mistakenly thought they got the "good" ending.

Both Arthur Gies (The Verge) and Ludwig Kietzmann (Joystiq) said on twitter that they got the "good" ending prior to playing MP.

hbi2k wrote:
heavyfeul wrote:

It is their fault for deciding to add a linking story between the two games by means of DLC no one played.

Exaggerate, much? "No one" played? Show of hands: how many people here played Arrival? *raises hand* Well, then. That's already a non-zero number.

If the intro without a "Played Arrival?" flag checked yes insufficiently explained what happened, then I recognize that you may have a legitimate problem, but your problem =/= everyone's problem.

Even having played Arrival, I still got a line or two from Anderson to the effect of "It caused a lot of problems when you destroyed that Batarian system by blowing up the relay to stop the Reapers." If one is still confused as to what happened after that, I'm not sure what to tell them.

SpacePPoliceman wrote:
hbi2k wrote:
heavyfeul wrote:

It is their fault for deciding to add a linking story between the two games by means of DLC no one played.

Exaggerate, much? "No one" played? Show of hands: how many people here played Arrival? *raises hand* Well, then. That's already a non-zero number.

If the intro without a "Played Arrival?" flag checked yes insufficiently explained what happened, then I recognize that you may have a legitimate problem, but your problem =/= everyone's problem.

Even having played Arrival, I still got a line or two from Anderson to the effect of "It caused a lot of problems when you destroyed that Batarian system by blowing up the relay to stop the Reapers." If one is still confused as to what happened after that, I'm not sure what to tell them.

More by accident, I didn't end up playing Arrival. As a result, I wasn't quite sure of the sequence of events leading up to the first 4 minutes of the game. By the time the tutorial was done, I never gave it another thought.

SpacePPoliceman wrote:

Even having played Arrival, I still got a line or two from Anderson to the effect of "It caused a lot of problems when you destroyed that Batarian system by blowing up the relay to stop the Reapers." If one is still confused as to what happened after that, I'm not sure what to tell them.

I can see players who finished ME2 being confused though: "I did what now? When was this?" With ME2, the opening of the game was basically a playable prologue to fill the gap between ME1 and ME2. It would be nice to see somewhat of the same treatment with this.

Regarding multi... I don't suppose it's possible to host a game and just solo for a while to achieve the same end? I guess I'll have to install the demo and see how this all works.

I read somewhere that the demo's multiplayer might be shut down.

Scratched wrote:

I read somewhere that the demo's multiplayer might be shut down.

I couldn't get into any games on Sunday or Monday, whenever it was I tried, so yeah I think it's down.

So all you have to do is max the slider right? If it is proportional looks to me like it only takes 3500 ish points, is there something else that plays into the ending?

MojoBox wrote:
kuddles wrote:

Jessica Chobot does not look very attractive in the Unreal Engine.

Oh god, I completely forgot that was supposed to be her. Agreed, that girl just ain't right in the face.

Had to look this up on Wikipedia to figure out what you're talking about. And yes, she does look odd in the game. I sent her packing, though. Don't need a reporter crowding up my ship.

Also, is it super cold on the Citadel or something, cause even Avina is flashing the high-beams.

mwdowns wrote:

Also, is it super cold on the Citadel or something, cause even Avina is flashing the high-beams.

Speaking of that... while some of my former/current squad are really putting it out there this time around... one thing I haven't seen is the usual Asari exotic dancers I ran into at bars everywhere in the first two games.

Don't tell me the club on the Citadel is too high class. I see elevator dancing girls off to the side of the main dance floor. It's crazy in there.

Man this game has some weird issues with side missions. I had 3-4 collection quests I had done, then headed back to the Citadel after completing a primary mission, and there was another priority mission on the Citadel. After doing that, now my side quests are greyed out? Apparently uncomplete-able because I didn't make a special return trip to the Citadel for a bunch of deliveries before continuing with my main mission?

sh*t, I thought the reapers were on the move and maybe I should make as few hops around the galaxy as possible. Guess next run I will tediously turn in every little thing ASAP.

complexmath wrote:

I can see players who finished ME2 being confused though: "I did what now? When was this?" With ME2, the opening of the game was basically a playable prologue to fill the gap between ME1 and ME2. It would be nice to see somewhat of the same treatment with this.

I can, too, but that confusion shouldn't last long--it should, in fact, be the very next thought: "I did what now? When was this? Must have been after 2, but before now." The only playable prologue I'm aware of is the interactive comic that came with the PS3 version, and that was only good because it let me save Wrex, I'd hardly want it here.

mwdowns wrote:
MojoBox wrote:
kuddles wrote:

Jessica Chobot does not look very attractive in the Unreal Engine.

Oh god, I completely forgot that was supposed to be her. Agreed, that girl just ain't right in the face.

Had to look this up on Wikipedia to figure out what you're talking about. And yes, she does look odd in the game. I sent her packing, though. Don't need a reporter crowding up my ship.

Is that who that was supposed to be? I specifically remember thinking how weird it was that every female character in the game had gotten totally sexied-up except the one who's supposed to be on TV in-universe, and that one looks like some kind of weird saggy-faced bulldog alien.

SpacePPoliceman wrote:

Even having played Arrival, I still got a line or two from Anderson to the effect of "It caused a lot of problems when you destroyed that Batarian system by blowing up the relay to stop the Reapers." If one is still confused as to what happened after that, I'm not sure what to tell them.

I hadn't played Arrival and Anderson's line to me was something like "After the sh*t you've done, you're lucky not to be court-marshaled". No mention of the events from Arrival. I assumed Shepard's being locked up had something to do with having worked with Cerberus.

But yeah, by the time the title came up I didn't care.

Luggage wrote:
primer28 wrote:

After typing my rant i realized that not cheapening the game is worth sacrificing all my old decisions. New game created

Or you could use the Gibbed editor for ME2 saves to open your latest save of your ME2 Shep, set him to level 1, save it and import that for your ME3 Shepard. Your decisions stay with you, but you start at level 2 instead of 30.

First off, i want to thank you for giving me the heads up to that. Got to keep all my choices and not have the cheapness of 50 sp to spend.

Secondly, want to thank everyone talking about vanguard and nova/charge. I never played vanguard in me2, but it is friggin awesome in me3. Very stressfull but very in-your-face brutal combat.

Im finally enjoying me3

El-Producto wrote:

Can't wait to play this, but I'm going to wait until the inevetible 50% off sale from Origin in a month or so, just like BF3.

Hopefully someone will get a hi-rez texture mod done as well.

ENB mod confirmed!

So I started playing single player and I am getting a bit annoyed. I do not hear the crew talking to each other, but I can see that they are in deep conversation. Does anyone else have an issue with the normandy sounding like a ghost ship?

I also have the issue of firing up the game and sometimes it says that my dlc is corrupt and to redownload. Has anyone else had this issue?

Bonnonon wrote:

So I started playing single player and I am getting a bit annoyed. I do not hear the crew talking to each other, but I can see that they are in deep conversation. Does anyone else have an issue with the normandy sounding like a ghost ship?

I tend to accept that as an iconic representation of talking.

I found it's possible to disable the 60FPS cap on PC, and even to set your own cap. However, after doing so the controls felt different, very loose especially when running. Seems like they capped it for a reason.

4xis.black wrote:
Bonnonon wrote:

So I started playing single player and I am getting a bit annoyed. I do not hear the crew talking to each other, but I can see that they are in deep conversation. Does anyone else have an issue with the normandy sounding like a ghost ship?

I tend to accept that as an iconic representation of talking.

Funny. I remember in Me2 I could hear people talking, and I was thrilled. In ME3 in the medical ward on the citadel I could over hear conversations, but for some reason the normandy is full of mimes.

Well made my first wrong choice of the game fortunately it didn't save until after the cinematic so I quit and redid it