gizgal Posts

Video games, art or not, are created with the intention of selling to a consumer. The consumer has every right to critique the product they receive. Mass Effect 3 was not art for art's sake, it was art produced to be consumed. Many argue that asking for a different ending sets a bad precedent, and asking the artist to alter their work is inappropriate. Historically speaking this is not uncommon in art or setting any precedent good or bad. The precedent has already been set. Lets look at some examples:

Great expectations by Charles Dickens: At the end of the original version Pip meets Estella on the streets, who
has remarried after her abusive husband has died. Pip says that he is glad she is a different person now from the coldhearted girl Miss Havisham reared her to be and that "suffering had been stronger than Miss Havisham's teaching and had given her a heart to understand what my heart used to be." Pip remains single. Following comments by Wilkie Collins that the ending was too sad, Dickens rewrote the ending so that Pip now meets Estella after the death of her husband in the ruins of Satis House with the suggestion that they will marry. Early 20th century writers including John Forster, George Bernard Shaw and George Orwell felt that the original ending was "more consistent with the draft, as well as the natural working out of the tale"; modern literary criticism tends to support the more common second ending. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Expectations

Sherlock Holmes novels by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: Wanting to devote more time to his historical novels, he killed off Holmes in "The Final Problem," which appeared in print in 1893. After resisting public pressure for eight years, the author wrote The Hound of the Baskervilles, which appeared in 1901. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_Holmes

Little Shop of Horrors the film: The original conclusion to the off-Broadway musical was filmed and preferred by Frank Oz the director and the majority of the actors. However, test audiences disliked how Audrey and Seymour, the main protagonists, were both killed by the evil alien plant, and the ending had to be re-shot so that their deaths were removed. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternate_ending

Some of the world's greatest artists changed their work or others changed it after they finished because the consumer demanded it. The infamous "fig-leaf campaign" of the Counter-Reformation, aiming to cover all representations of human genitals in paintings and sculptures, started with Michelangelo's works. To give two examples, the marble statue of Cristo della Minerva (church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, Rome) was covered by added drapery, as it remains today, and the statue of the naked child Jesus in Madonna of Bruges (The Church of Our Lady in Bruges, Belgium) remained covered for several decades. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelangelo

The music industry's "clean versions" are in response to consumer demand. These are just a few of the many examples of "art" that was changed because of consumer demand. The argument that gamers are being "entitled brats" is hardly truthful or relevant.

Truthfully these "entitled gamers" may be entitled to a more satisfying ending. This entitlement has been created by Bioware itself.

Mike Gamble (Associate Producer):
“And, to be honest, you [the fans] are crafting your Mass Effect story as much as we are anyway.” www.computerandvideogames.com...issing-in-me2/

“There are many different endings. We wouldn’t do it any other way. How could you go through all three campaigns playing as your Shepard and then be forced into a bespoke ending that everyone gets? But I can’t say any more than that…” http://www.360magazine.co.uk/intervi...erent-endings/

Casey Hudson (Director):
“For people who are invested in these characters and the back-story of the universe and everything, all of these things come to a resolution in Mass Effect 3. And they are resolved in a way that's very different based on what you would do in those situations.” http://www.gameinformer.com/b/featur...-effect-3.aspx

“Um… You know, at this point, I think we’re co-creators with the fans. We use a lot of feedback.” http://venturebeat.com/2012/03/02/ca...ans-interview/


One could argue that gamers are "entitled" to an ending based on these statements made by the producer of this piece of "art".

TL;DR
Saying a new ending sets a bad precedent for games as an art form is incorrect. Art has been changed based on consumer input for centuries. Gamers are entitled to a different ending more in line with what Bioware itself promised.