It's been some 12 years, major DLCs and a remastered edition. What is your "verdict" on Mass Effect 3?

[FarSight XR-20]

I'm still upset they ruined Harbinger. From a cool (and talkative) antagonist, with a lot of build up and teasing, to a literal ghost in ME3 that doesn't say anything, is almost never present, is supposed to be the most powerful Reaper of the fleet yet (when he finally shows up) is clowned by Shepard who just runs in front of him and reaches the beam.

And not to mention how they butchered the Illusive Man.

 

[ConVito]

Right from release, it's never stopped being one of my favorite games of all time.

 

[Hello Snake]

I'm still mad about it!

 

[Uzzy]

This guy's after your cereal now.

 

[kurahador]

I can't stop being mad at the ending. It hurts too much and emotionally scarring. There are great moments here and there, but that ending make everything pointless so it's hard to give praise to those.

 

[Greywaren]

Not as good as Mass Effect 2, but still a great time, overall. Could have been much better, could have been much worse.

 

[The Bear]

Weakest game of the trilogy. Writing was pretty messy and uneven. In terms of game design you could see from everything that the game must have been rushed to release. I didn't like how the combat evolved in this game compared to 2. Everything felt too aggressive.

That said, there is good stuff in there. Some of the story arcs presented here are pretty satisfying, there are some good character moments and so on. Citadel DLC gave me the emotional closure to the series that the main game lacked.

 

[Zephy]

I voted that it has some weak spots, but personally it's my #1 favourite game ever, overtaking ME2 as of my last playthrough a couple years ago. Possibly because I have played it the least of the trilogy so I didn't know every beat by heart.

I haven't yet played the remastered trilogy but I most certainly will before the next game releases.

 

[Black Mantis]

It's a very good game, but suffers from pacing issues and went downhill from Operation London.

 

[BubblegumNemesis]

I am never coming near ME again after ME3.

 

[Ushojax]

I ejected the disc when I finished it at launch and I have not touched the series for a single second since then. It really left a sour taste and it still lingers.

It didn't bother me that there wasn't a "happy" ending or that the ending was so badly done. The ending is a minor problem overall. The game as a whole was just a badly written mess that cuts corners everywhere.

Post launch changes are all well and good but the game will always be tainted for me. I don't have any desire to go back to it.

 

[Stiletto]

The multiplayer alone made it a 5/5 game. Sidequests were bad. Main story path had uneven quality. DLC was good across the board, even the dudebro action-focused Citadel one. Jack's redesign mader her top tier waifu. Just overall a good time.

 

[Garulon]

When I'm hanging out with my space friends: Amazing
When I'm playing a aight cover shooter: Cool
When Kai Leng eats my cereal or whatever :(

 

[Sento]

His name was Marauder Shields.

 

[Jawmuncher]

Very Good, biggest issue I have with it is the Side Quest tracking and getting enough "reinforcements" is kinda bad/overly long.

Dunno how side quest info got worse from ME2

 

[UnluckyKate]

The original end sequence fiasco, Javik dlc and try hard villain aside, it's the best of the franchise.

 

[fourfourfun]

It's very good, it just has a greatest of all time game directly prior to it which it is compared to.

 

[Fowler]

To me, Mass Effect 3 ends when you say goodbye to your squad before the final push. That's some of the most beautiful writing in the whole series, enhanced by the weight of your experiences over the trilogy. It's the best of what Mass Effect could be.

After that things don't work as well. But it's been over a decade now. I've made my peace with it, and choose to enjoy the bits that really worked for me instead of dwelling on the parts that didn't.

 

[Brat-Sampson]

I really enjoyed it right through to the credits before seeing how lazily they handled the ending / alternate sequences.

 

[Syne]

It's amazing right up until the final Battle. Not enough to sour me on the whole experience but I'd very much like to see what could've been done with more time. Also it gave us one of the best and funniest DLCs I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing so it gets extra points.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsZG_NbY5OY&ab_channel=FluffyNinjaLlama

 

[Shopolic]

An amazing game with very bad ending (before DLC) and bad ending (after DLC).

 

[Duffking]

It's fine. It's majorly hamstrung by ME2 not actually really moving the story forward at all and leaving ME3 with having to do several nonsensical ass pulls one after the other at the beginning (reapers can just appear undetected in citadel space/earth apparently now without using the conduit, there's a magic superweapon and the plans are on Mars by chance. Also we can build it without the reapers finding because the plot requires it). In fact is opens mind blowingly badly, the Reaper invasion on earth is incredibly half assed and the opening scenes on earth look like the environments were made a week before the game shipped and the dialogue is stilted as hell.

Minus points for shadow the hedgehog Kai Leng

 

[Patapuf]

The Story ist still very disapointing imo.

I don't care about my previous choices mattering. But the framing with the starchild, the whole Earth arc. How the Reapers are handled...

Even the phylosophical babble about man and sythethics was pretty weak.

There's a few good questlines and the combat is fine but narratively it's very disapointing

 

[Z'ard]

As someone who played Mass Effect trilogy for the first time when remasters came out it was the best one for sure.

 

[NightShift]

I didn't play it until the Legendary Edition and I had a lot of it spoiled for me over the years so I knew what to expect. My conclusion is that the game's great.

The biggest things I cared about was the Genophage, the Geth war and the characters I got to know over the previous two games. All of which were given fantastic conclusions.

I think the reapers were already ruined in ME2 so I didn't really care about the main plot too much and of course I knew the ending was going to be shit so I was prepared for that. Even though it was bad, it wasn't as bad as people made it out to be IMO. Like it's not game ruining.

Controversially, I think it's better than ME2. Although both aren't as good as ME1.

 

[Unclebenny]

I was very unhappy they seemed to remove the final dash sequence, where all your forces are getting ripped apart and you realise that actually you still getting your arse handed to you by the reapers.

That sequence was the best part of ending for me and they took it out.

(I didn't dream this, did I? It did exist?)

 

[Ant_17]

Great game, horrid ending.

 

[Mr Evil 37]

It's a great game with some of the best scenes, moments and characters of the entire franchise, but it's still not quite as good as 1 and 2.

 

[julia crawford]

It's a game whose only understanding of life is military

 

[Mr Evil 37]

I was very unhappy they seemed to remove the final dash sequence, where all your forces are getting ripped apart and you realise that actually you still getting your arse handed to you by the reapers.

That sequence was the best part of ending for me and they took it out.

(I didn't dream this, did I? It did exist?)

Click to shrink...

If you're referring to the sequence when you're approaching the portal/elevator up to the Citadel, that's still in the game.

Edit: Also I think the outcome here may depend on your galactic readiness.

 

[Voytek]

Pretty mediocre. There were a few good moments but overall the story was rather weak. I didn't really like any of the new characters. Like I'd gladly send James to his death every playthrough if I could. Gameplay felt like simplified barebones action game. It was fine but I just wanted something more from it.

 

[Persephone]

stick in JohnP's alternate MEHEM + Citadel Epilogue Mod and it's my favourite Mass Effect by far.

 

[SilentEagle]

10/10 like other games in the trilogy.

 

[Unclebenny]

If you're referring to the sequence when you're approaching the portal/elevator up to the Citadel, that's still in the game.

Edit: Also I think the outcome here may depend on your galactic readiness.

Click to shrink...

In my memory, you were sprinting for the elevator, you and loads of soldiers an vehicles and everyone is getting blasted apart left and right.

When I played it again post DLC it just seemed to be gone and I can't remember exactly what it is replaced with. Something underwhelming. My second play through might not have had as high galactic readiness though.

 

[Acheteedo]

Man, I was so, SO happy with the game going into that finale, it just blew me away how it all coalesced. But then starchild happened... and it was just so deflating. I went on to wish so hard for indoctrination theory to be true, or to be re-written into it after the backlash, but it wasn't to be. A Game of Thrones style whimper at the end, that undoubtedly damaged the legacy.

 

[Mr Evil 37]

In my memory, you were sprinting for the elevator, you and loads of soldiers an vehicles and everyone is getting blasted apart left and right.

When I played it again post DLC it just seemed to be gone and I can't remember exactly what it is replaced with. Something underwhelming. My second play through might not have had as high galactic readiness though.

Click to shrink...

Maybe your memory was just imperfect. That's still how I would describe that scene in Legendary Edition. But yeah, I think maybe low galactic readiness (and companion loyalty) may impact how savage that scene is.

 

[HellofaMouse]

played it for the first time last year. it's very good, almost amazing.

it has reeeally high highs: wrex scene, mordin scene, thane scene, tali scene, the entire earth section, leviathan, citadel etc. hell even legion gave me the feels which didnt do anything for me in the 2nd game.

held back by an underwhelming ending and a bunch of lore drift. also, the crucible was the hand-waviest thing ever.

 

[ManuZero]

My Legendary Edition replay changed my view on this game a lot. Hated it the first time, but now I love it just as much as the others.
The game both has the lowest lows and highest highs in the trilogy. It also feels way more complete now with all DLC included.
Citadel DLC is amazing, even though it's just fanservice. It all just pays off so much after building deep relationships with your crew for 3 games.

 

[pants]

I really dig that so many of you are still into the Indoctrination Theory.

On replays it genuinely stands out how every indoctrinated person is absolutely convinced they're beyond Reaper influence, up until its revealed they're actually fucked.

And then factor in Shepard being exposed to like ten to twenty times more Reaper tech/influence than even those people.

Its the weird case of a fanbase's close reading of a game's story being better than what the writer's came up with — even if its depressing as hell.

(Thats what Citadel is for btw <3)

 

[Unclebenny]

Maybe your memory was just imperfect. That's still how I would describe that scene in Legendary Edition. But yeah, I think maybe low galactic readiness (and companion loyalty) may impact how savage that scene is.

Click to shrink...

I'll have to give it another go one day.

Maybe I can play through with my kids when they are older. Although they might not enjoy watching their dad seduce everything that isn't nailed down.

 

[LastNac]

Highest Highs of the trilogy

 

[VPplaya]

The initial release of ME3 was pretty fantastic up until that infamous last hour of the game. It really turned me off of the series for quite a long time, but a few years later I replayed it with all of the DLC + new ending scenes and it was a marked improvement. There really was no defending the initial bizarre lack of closure for most of the major characters and ambiguous status of the universe, but the additional scenes wrapped things up more neatly for me.

The Leviathan plot really should have just been incorporated into the main game from the start, seeing as it actually explains the Reapers' origins. The additional moments with the Crucible(? its been a while) explaining that the entire Reaper cycle was born out of a Rogue AI really complemented the larger AI v Organics narrative that had been present in the series from the start.

Omega is a fun romp through a fan favorite area of 2, and Citadel is an obvious passion project made for the fans. It was the perfect epilogue to the trilogy.

I still think 3 has some issues, in particular with the missions involving the party members from 2 where it seems like your decisions from the previous games really doesn't matter. For example, regardless of whether you kill the Rachni queen in ME1 there will still be Rachni enemies in ME3 with the only difference being some more war resources.

I bought the Javik dlc at launch, but in hindset it was very obvious that he was cut from the main game into the dlc. He is integrated far too nicely into the main game to come across as an "extra" character. Luckily, the METrilogy includes him from the start.

 

[KingOfIceland]

It's probably the most disappointing piece of media I've ever experienced, I had 6 fully leveled characters (1 for each class) that I took through both games, And I only finished this game once before trading it in less than a month later. Haven't played it again since it came out.

 

[lairo]

Just like GOT, such a bad ending sadly soured the whole thing retroactively for me. Could have been the game of all time if they'd gone with the indoctrination ending, even with a recon, but fuck no they were too proud. Stupid starkid.

 

[Kutaragi]

A great ending that becomes a masterpiece in light of the IT theory


View: https://youtu.be/BSE0osxQvA8?si=YISU6jCe17pxf3Qk

 

[J_ToSaveTheDay]

The ending didn't ruin anything for me but I do feel like it's the weakest point of the whole trilogy. It was always less than I wanted but never a big enough negative to sink any of the rest of the Mass Effect experience.

That said, 90% of ME3's content is still incredible and kept the momentum built up by 1 & 2 for me. I haven't revisited the franchise in any way since 3's launch, though.

 

[nihilence]

The ending was a little bit of a let down. But I'm not sure how they could have wrapped everything up. The ABC COLORS didn't help.

I still have dlc on my 360 I didn't finish, like Leviathan. Bought the Legendary, not sure if I should finish dlc or just start a new journey.

 

[KDC720]

Having just finished a trilogy playthrough last week after having not played them since they released, I think 3 may have some of the highest highs and lowest lows of the whole trilogy.

In hindsight, most of the big decisions you make in the trilogy don't matter too much, and they were games very much limited by the hardware they were designed for. But my goodness does 3 really have this palpable apocalyptic feeling to it. It still hits hard near the end, seeing how nervous your crew is, the final goodbyes to everyone, it's surprisingly touching.

Although, the actual endings are still not great for the most part. Kai Leng is also still completely dumb and forgettable.

Citadel is still a banger DLC imo. It's in a weird place considering the backlash against the quippy Whedon-esque style it employs (mostly due to its use in MCU movies), but its a much needed palette cleanser given how dire the rest of the game is.

 

[SofNascimento]

A great ending that becomes a masterpiece in light of the IT theory


View: https://youtu.be/BSE0osxQvA8?si=YISU6jCe17pxf3Qk

Click to shrink...

It struck me recently how much Illusive Man is a good "billionaire" antagonist. Denying reality and thinking things can be the way he wants them to be simply by "screaming" and throwing money at the problem.

 

[Phinor]

Really high highs, Citadel DLC was a great send-off, Leviathan needed to be in the core game. But the ending ruined the franchise for me. It went from possibly my favourite gaming setting/universe of all time to something I largely forgot soon after.

However indoctrination theory, now that I can stand behind. They are truly playing the long game by still not revealing that it is in fact true. Just need to keep believing and it will happen one day.