I personally loved everything about the game apart for the reasons I stated in the video (which goes into greater detail than the short written blurb) but at no point did I state that my view was the end all be all. I am not trying to sell a product or conversely put others off playing/experiencing it; my reviews are purely a personal reflection of a game.

However, thank you for sharing your opinions on the game and why you didn’t feel it was worthy experience for loyal Mass Effect gamers.

I think that Shepard died before activating the terminal for the Crucible. He didn’t go to the console and felt on the floor before Hackett said that nothing is happening. Then a light called him to somewhere. I think this is a figure of something religious like a calling to the doors of the after life. So Shepard died with Anderson and Cerberus.

The Catalyst seems to be the “God” who acts on the galaxy by the Reapers and is the answer between life and death. He is the ones who regulates the civilisations. So the Universe is governed by a God and the Reapers are the “after life”. If you look at zombies you fought, if you look at what said the Catalyst it seems to be clearly the afterlife coming out.

Then when you step up to the Catalyst “level” you see that the Citadel is opening and all around just Reapers. Nobody seems to fight and I think that they all died during the battle. Earth is on fire. The cycle seems to be already done because you, as Shepard, increased the speed of the Reapers duty.by bringing the whole galaxy against them.

When you are with the Catalyst he gives you 3 choices. In fact there is no choice at all for the real world of Mass Effect. But for Shepard, there is a real choice for his choice of the after life.

a) Destroy the Reapers
If you do that, then synthetics will destroy organics and some kind of other Reapers will come again someday. So you just won some 10 000 years more maybe before the cycle comes again.You just won’t earn the after life as a Reaper but some will in maybe 60 000 years later.

b)Control the Reapers
If you control the Reapers then you become a Reaper. If you become a Reaper then you changed nothing to the situation of the cycles. You are just the commander of it and you will keep being a commander of the “afterlife” called “order”.

c)Synthesis
If you choose the synthesis option you won’t change anything because the Reapers are already the synthesis between the organics and synthetics. So you just become one of the Reapers.

The 3 solutions are, to me, exaclty the same because you can’t stop the cycle of it. It is the order of the world. But if the indocrination theory is right then I m in the wrong analysis of Mass effect 3 end.

Hope that you enjoyed reading that.

I played as a Soldier MaleShep importing my ME 2 character with supposedly perfect finished and all the DLCs,  still I had to play online to get enough EMS despite doing all the scannings and side missions to get the “best” ending.

I played also as an Infiltrator FemShep, without being able to import character, same thing – I had to use online play if I wanted “best” ending.

With that said, the indoctrination theory fits. It makes sense that it was cut out of the game because the game had already been delayed a few months and supposedly was quite over budget. And, y’know, EA publish it. They’ll milk a successful franchise any way they can, even if it’s as ridiculous as selling the ending seperately. I know the DLC is actually free, but only because of the backlash in my opinion, EA had no choice.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCPHS1GFlKw&feature=plcp&context=C48b94b1VDvjVQa1PpcFNyUnuxM_r0jja3mfTDGga2bpxQfcbZAyU%3D

Reapers cannot indoctrinate Sheppard, he’s been drafted by the being in the citadel. The area there where no one can gain access short of the little crawlers Shep helped snoop on years before by scanning them. The system of events points at three antagonists: organic life, the child shaped being/program/citadel entity/pure intellect and three the reapers/workers/memory cells. Then the three choices for everything in, oh, about 30 or so seconds..YIkes!!. Hard to cram that into the last, what, ten minutes of a trilogy. NO wonder the questions outstrip the answers, even the finale cut scenes cannot speak the thousand plus words required to explain a few million years old misunderstanding between two super races and the rest of the galaxy.Read more: Mass Effect 3 Review & Ending Discussion! http://www.videogamesblogger.com/2012/03/23/lets-talk-mass-effect-3-review-the-ending.htm#ixzz1qwtyJo9F

Destroying
the reapers is the real ending to ME3, and this is why. There are 2 reasons.

Reason 1: If Shepard weren’t indoctrinated

Firstly, the
AI in the citadel is wrong. It is making its decision to harvest all advanced
organic life based on the mistakes of his civilization. Remember, the reapers
looks like the race it harvests and the race that made sovereign also made the
keepers (hints: Chorban). Since sovereign said in ME1 that the citadel and the
mass relays were made by them, the patterns start to show. The first
civilization in the galaxy looked like sovereign and harbinger and they made
the citadel, the mass relays and the keepers. Something went horribly wrong
though and the reapers somehow took control. Presumably the first civilization experimented
with organic and synthetic life and something went wrong in the process,
leading to the annihilation of the species and reaper dominance.

The AI in
the citadel witnessed this and concluded that all organic life will inevitably
make the same mistakes his civilization did. Though his logic doesn’t make
sense to us, think of edi or the geth and they tirelessly trying to understand
organics.

Remember,
the AI also said that the reapers were his solution. This leads me to believe
that he/it somehow took control of the reapers and used them to harvest all
advanced organic life to – as he says himself-“Protect us”. But we have already
shown to ourselves that it is possible to coexist with synthetics (geth) and
that the AI in fact were wrong.

With this
in mind:

Why
choosing synthesis isn’t the way to go: Shepard isn’t god. I believe nature should be
allowed to go its own path, and if evolution one day brings us to that point,
then it was the nature’s intent all along. But as I said nature must figure
that out not Shepard.  By picking
synthesis you practically bypassed nature and decided the fate of all life in
the galaxy before it is ready for it.

Why
controlling the reapers is wrong:  We don’t even know if we
actually have control. Either way the reapers have been terrorizing the galaxy
for millions of way killing organics in the most horrific ways. They are even
made from organics! Something like that shouldn’t be allowed to live anymore.
Anyways, another good reason is that organizations like Cerberus will rise
again, and what if they get control of them? 
No, no one should be allowed to possess power like that.

Why
destroying the reapers is the right thing: As I said earlier, we have already proven
that organics and synthetics can coexist (geth), and that the AI in the citadel
is wrong. Unfortunately the geth and edi dies, but then again something has to
be sacrificed in this war for the greater good. It just happened to be the
geth. But if you think about it isn’t all that bad. Synthetics are created by
organics, if synthetics are extinguished, we can simply create more of them. We
can create more of geth, because that was how synthetics were supposed to be
created…. by us. If organics were to be annihilated, that unique organic
life form (humans, asari) is lost forever. Who created us??? You see my point?
We do not know why we exist, what our purpose is. Synthetics do.  

Destroying
the reapers end the cycle, avenges the countless of organics lost to the
reapers, and the geth can be rebuild. Also Shepard survives the explosion. BEST
ENDING PERIOD!

PS! The
only reason why destroying the reapers is marked red is because edi and the
geth dies. If you ask me red and blue should switch spot. Controlling the
reapers is far worse.

Reason 2: If Shepard is indoctrinated:

Back in
London, after Shepard gets hit by harbingers laser (molten metal) he doesn’t
wake up. The ending part represents the reapers trying to indoctrinate Shepard.
If you choose control or synthesis the reapers succeeds, but if you choose the
destroy option you break free of the indoctrination and wake up in London. This
means ME3 isn’t the end of the series. BEST ENDING PERIOD!

Now a little of topic:

To those of
you who think that all organics are doomed on earth because the mass relays are
no more: If you had paid attention, you would have known that FTL is possible
without the mass relays. How do you think joker escapes the collector ship in
ME2? Or just listen to edi in ME3 when you explore the galaxy. She says “faster
than light acquired, reapers eluded”. Why do you need fuel to travel to other
systems in the same nebula? It’s still light years away you know.