Interesting concept arts revealing earlier drafts of ME3 plot

No Man's Sky released 2015. They were doing these experiments in 2014 and probably around the time of NMS's failure was when they entered crunch mode and rescoped the game to cut the entire autogenerated stuff. EA execs are known to be conservative. To quote a current BioWare employee review "Note to management: Look ahead, not sideways with new game ideas". The second EA smells controversy like D2 or NMS you can bet your ass they're altering course within their subsidiaries when they can. They're not pouring in money in a production they already know has proven controversial elsewhere. They're scaredy cats when it comes to actual innovation, just look at SWTOR, Battlefront (Battlefield with starwars skin) or Anthem for a few examples.

Why would the Geth create a new species of synthetic that function as individual AI when they could simply develop the technology to allow them to do that as well? That is a hardware/software issues that could be resolved with upgrades.  Indeed the game shows the Geth were doing that on their own and were getting closer and closer to becoming true AI's on their own.  The only thing the game fails to show is are the Geth able to create more Geth? Because they should be able to and as each new technological development happens they would have each generation being more upgraded compared to previous generations.  Eventually a generation would emerge that would become true AI's on their own.  And even then older generations would be able to keep up for a long time. They are hardware and software and both can be upgraded.  Older Geth generations would be able to download into a singular hive mind to create a single being on par with the true AI generations.

That is actually the intention of the Geth in the trilogy creating a massive dyson sphere to have all Geth connected to to create a single unified mind allowing them to transcend their weakness into something new.


Your example is Geth wiping out other Geth. Which would be no more different then one race wiping out another race. No different then colonial powers landing in new lands and killing native races to take over their land.  Or in a more modern term using your social and political power and military to take over a country.


You also ignore that the Catalyst says that the conflict is inevitable. That makes it canon in the game world. Much like the Prothean VI saying the Citadel is a massive dominate relay into dark space makes it canon. Even though the Citadel as a massive relay into dark space makes no sense.  Or how about the VI telling Shepard that they coulnd't keep the power to keep stasis pods active for a few thousand years. But left alone for 50,000 it was able to retain power to fire off the Conduit and put up a force field and still have power for it.  Or how about again with the same Prothean VI when they say they lost contact with the scientist when they went thought Conduit. Yet some how got a program from them that learned how to specifically over ride the Reaper control. Which is the entire crux of how Shepard stops Sovereign in ME 1.  None of it makes sense but the VI said it so it is now canon.

I tend to concur with Link"Guess"ski on this one. I mean, sure, maybe the organic/synthetic war is inevitable. Peace between the quarian and geth proves absolutely nothing. Which is to say that it gives us no conclusive answer. When the genocidal overlord says "do this and you will 100% have peace" I'm skeptical. That's all I'm saying. I mean, organics fight organics so Synthesis only removes one potential type of war. Will we have to invent Intelligence II to solve the total problem of war and genocide? What massive level of genocide will that take to handle?

Just a quicker note. What if the person understands it and you're the one who misunderstands it? 

Also what is you ppl's? 

When the war is based on the fact that synthetic life is superior in every measurable way to organic life. Which puts organic life at a disadvantage  in terms of development and conflict. Full integration of synthetic and organic beings allows organic life to bypass the restrictions associated with being full organic.  Legion directly makes several references to organic inefficiencies as he calls them. Slow spread of information. Rule by law applying only the broadest most generalized sense of law and order.  The ability to store and share data and memories as if they were there.

I'm more then willing to bet if people were able to relive the memories of someone who had to watch a drug cartel kill their family there wouldn't be any closet raciest complaining about foreign people being the cause of all the problems in the country they live in. That people wouldn't complain about people having refrigerators as showing how much of a welfare nanny state a country is.

And genocidal overlord is a bit to simplistic black and white.

The war is about synthetics being vastly superior to organics the second the Reapers were created and introduced in ME 1.  Sovergin was shown to be a super advanced synthetic life form. Part of a race that wipes out all advanced organic and synthetic life every 50,000 years.  ME 1 was full of the Skynet AI set up.  Emotion isn't a strength or a form of superiority. In fact emotion is 90% of what is wrong with the world today and 90% of what is wrong with the world in the ME universe.  EDI and the Geth only need to comprehend emotions to deal with organic life.  Drug usage exists because of people's desire to block emotional problems.  Emotions is what leads to a drug addicted woman being granted visiting rights by a state as her own mother tried to get a restraining order on her due to her emotionally unstable nature. Resulting in the woman silting the throat of her own child as a way to "protect" him.  It is what leads divorce courts to favor the woman when it comes to child custody even if the guy wasn't at fault and is clearly more stable and a better parent for the kid(s).  Emotion is why Krogan like Weav continue to hold a grudge rather then letting go of the past and trying to look towards the future. Emotion is why the Quarians continue to provoke and ultimately attack the Geth.  Emotion is why Udina is convinced by TIM to go along with is plot.  Emotion is what keeps the Asari from sharing the details of the Prothean computer they have on Thessia to keep their place on the top of the food chain.

There is no cop out for anything. The Reapers exist and harvest civilizations for a reason. Not for the lulz, not because they are drunk not because there isn't a game on and they have nothing to do on a saturday night. But even during the events of the trilogy conflict and issues between organic and synthetic life are shown. EDI has to pretend to be a VI to avoid being killed by the Alliance and random people on the Citadel.  The only reason Legion isn't instantly killed by the Quarians or C-Sec is due to Shepard threatening or sheer incompetence.  After the Morning War the Council had all AI's rounded up and killed quietly and effectively while imposing even stronger sanctions on the creation of them.  Just picture for a moment during First Contact War rather then the Council forming a peace treaty they used their full military power to attack humanity.  Destroyed all their outposts and pushed them back to Earth. Then set up a heavy military block aid around the planet and dictated what we were allowed to develop technologically. Always crushing any attempts we make that might put us on the path to being equal or better then the Council and Council aligned races. Welcome to how Synthetics are treated in the game.  Arguably worse then Korgan or Quarian and both of those races got the shit end of the stick.

The game doesn't tell you that you wouldn't understand because you weren't there. You don't understand because you simply don't understand. I understand it just fine it is you that seems to be struggling with it.  You are seemingly unwilling or incapable of seeing what the Catalyst talks about. You can't seem to grasp the butterfly effect and what it means.  Or to put it more simply the Catalyst is saying without my solution this is how the galaxy would be. And you are trying to counter that argument by using examples from the galaxy with the Catalyst's solution in place and functioning.

It is shown in Shepard's story. Geth are shown to be in the first one such a threat because their physical bodies are meaningless and can be destroyed a hundred at a time and they keep coming. That the more of them there are the smarter, faster and more deadly they become. That they can lay in wait for months at a time or be dropped from low orbit.  That they can only be hacked for short periods of time and they learn making each hack attempt less successful.  EDI's entire introduction in ME 2 is based on the fact a full AI is 10xs more effective at cyber warfare then organic operates. Able to react in nano seconds.  That is shown with Collector Ship mission were EDI battles the Collector group to create escape routes for Shepard and crew to escape the ambush.  It is shown when the Quarians were surprised in the Morning War and during ME 3 that the Geth had advanced far quicker then they thought they would have on their own.  The Geth in preparation for the Reapers built a fleet capable of taking on any single race.  Give them a few more decades and they probably would have been able to build a Fleet that would be capable of taking on every race and pushing them to their limit.

They don't show that ending because this isn't a novel. When I'm reading a David Eddings book I don't get to choose what Garion does.  I don't get to choose if he is a sweet caring boy or a raging ass hole with xenophobic tendencies.  I don't choose to have Garion become an angry vengeful person once he burns the Grolim Chamdar alive. David Eddings says that Garion is emotionally traumatized by the events and lases out at his Aunt because of his own fear at becoming a monster. And that is now canon and my choices and opinions on how Garion should have reacted and the reasoning behind it are irrelevant.

BioWare how ever gives players the option to choose how Shepard reacts and come up with their own justification for why Shepard reacts that way.  That is why they don't show the Geth wiping out the Quarians post ending. Because that would directly contradict player's actions of trusting the Geth and tell them they are wrong. In this game series there are no wrong choices and BioWare never contradicts the player in any official canon for choices.  I don't know why you seem to struggle with this pretty basic concept. I figured this was something that was universally understood and accepted but apparently not.


Leviathan DLC is nothing more then  the fire works and marching band parading though your living room as you play the game. Everything was already there in the game and Leviathan DLC just made it so obvious you wouldn't be able to miss it. And regardless of if you think Leviathan DLC was a day late and a dollar short it is now part of official canon for the trilogy.  This is no longer launch day so you no longer get to complain about the ending being bad and not taking into account later updates that happened.  Least not if you don't want to be taken seriously.

There is already doubt about alliance with the Geth if so choose to have doubt. That is a reason why some people choose Destroy option. They doubt the Geth are trust worthy and so wiping them out with the Reapers are icing on their cake.  Doubt is also why people choose to side with the Quarians and wipe out the Geth.  The Reaper on Rannoch makes a reference to the events  on Rannoch as counter point to Shepard claiming they will unite against them. Which is absolutely true. The Quarians attacked the Geth simply because they thought they had a way to beat them and destroy them.  To destroy the Geth or render them unthinking machines again. The equivalent of someone being lobotomized into an unthinking vegetable that can only do simple repetitive tasks.  You only unite because of the threat of the Reapers and the Catalyst points that out. The threat may rise again due to organic life if you choose destroy.  The only reason the Catalyst even uses the may instead of will happen again is to prevent the player's choice from being rendered the wrong choice. As well as the fact that Shepard is suppose to be the Catalyst for change which will render the existing Reaper solution as meaningless. Or at least provide a new solution to a problem when the current one is now failing and no longer valid.

The ending isn't broken.

I think the Leviathan DLC proved just how flawed the entire Intelligence/Catalyst/Reaper idea was. All the Leviathan had to do was stick a VI (not an AI) around their tribute planets. If the organics develop AI, and that AI gets dangerous (for whatever reason; doesn't really matter who is at fault), intercede and prevent the organics from being destroyed. Alternately, let them die and demand tribute from the AI. I mean, does it really matter who it comes from?

The real problem has always been that the Leviathan thought themselves unbeatable. They were wrong and it cost the galaxy EVERYTHING.

EDIT: 11th hour DLC barely counts as meaningful toward the story since anything that can be left out can't be used by the player to work out the equation.  Also, it came at the very end, meaning we could never have seen in coming regardless.

Why are the Geth and Quarians fighting?  The Quarians and Geth are fighting because the Quarians though experiments that could  easily be considered as unethical as anything Cerberus has done if Geth were organic beings. With the intent to commit whole sale genocide on the Geth race. Or even worse depending on your perspective strip them of their intelligence and render them nothing more then glorified rumbas.  And why are the Quarians doing that? Because they started another war hundreds of years ago in an attempt to prevent the Geth intelligence from emerging resulting in a war that cost 3/4th's of their entire population.

Why do they make peace? Because Shepard puts the Quarians in a position that attacking the Geth is suicidal actions that would result in the near total genocide of their race. A key aspect between peace and siding with Geth is the Quarians deciding to shoot or not. But why do they not shoot? Because Shepard makes it very clear across the entire Rannoch Arc the Reapers are the real enemies and we shouldn't waste time fighting among ourselves. 

They unite over a common enemy but what happens when that common enemy is gone?

Without the common enemy would they have any reason to unite?

Not just the real world history but even the ME world history shows allies in war time to not always equal to best friends in peace time. Just ask the Krogan. And the basis of the Council runs counter to the Geth's desire to have no one decide their fate and develop as they wish completely independent.

As for is ME a novel statement. Let me ask you a simple question is Shepard a boy or girl? Do you cure the genophage or not? Do you side with Quarians, Geth or peace? Has BioWare said specifically that Shepard is a man who didn't cure the genophage for this specific reason and sided with the Geth for this specific reason?

Choices were never given specifics and no canon was established so all choices and all reasons are valid. To accommodate that vagueness is needed. And people are very attached to their own head canon. In fact when Andromeda was still in development and only the first trailer was released with only very basic details about the game and how they reached the Andromeda. I simply suggested that Andromeda be treated like a multiverse set up. Within the universe that Andromeda takes place these specific choices were made.  They are not official canon choices for the original Trilogy simply choices that could end up resulting in Andromeda. All in an effort to make a more logical set up then the gaping plot hole that the official Andromeda follows were we are capable of building in 2 years massive ships that can traverse dark space and solve the single biggest problem with FTL travel while utilizing a highly illegal AI.

The result of that suggestion on this forum, reddit and other talking locations is best described like they caught me urinating on their front door at 2am.

Now again no offical canon for the trilogy would exist. It would simply be chosen to give the game a more logical start point to continue on. As well as that set up would allow BioWare to make multiple ME games/trilogies that take place post different endings. But even the vague idea of their head canon not being respective and they did not like it.  So BioWare attempting to make everyone's choice and everyone's reasoning valid with the ending was a must.

And what would Leviathan due? They don't care about their thralls other then as beings to offer them tribute. Being to mine the ore for their ships and grow the food for their bellies.  Each conflict would consume more and more of their thralls in the combat and potential worlds for thralls to live and work on. They would have to turn to a mechanical solution to keep the tribute flowing.

The conflict tends to be centered around EDI level or possibly Geth with Reaper upgrade level AI. Which would mean a combined attempted from a dozen or more units could brute force their way into the network. If they get control of even a dozen even for a short period of time they would be able to devastate the Thrall race or races they are fighting. And unfortunately we do not know if there was some form of primitive or prototype Relay network in place that the Reapers would later improve on. Without that Relay network in place the movement of troops and supplies across the galaxy would be much slower and would favor synthetic life much more.  I mean assuming they have the FTL speed of the Reapers it would still take up to 2 years of constant travel to move from one section of the galaxy to another.

It does matter who survives because Leviathan maintains their status as apex species due to their mind control abilities. Making fighting against them near impossible for organic life.  The Alliance could launch an all out assault throwing all their man power and resources against Leviathan at their peak and all that Leviathan would do is cause them all to pull out their side arms and shoot themselves in the head.  The entire Fleet and every man and woman in it wouldn't make it past Pluto before Leviathan had them kill themselves and destroy all the ships.

Synthetic life how ever is immune to that. As shown by the Catalyst being able to attack and wipe out Leviathan. The only way for Leviathan to extract any tribute is to force them to under military threat. Meaning they would have to throw waves of Thralls at them or build their own mechanical war machines. And a VI no matter how advanced is still just a glorified lap top computer.  They are only able to operate within their very specific programing set up and are incapable of adapting on the fly. AI how ever are capable of self correction and if one way doesn't work they are capable of changing and adapting their actions and thought to that on their own without needing a system update from their creators.

Your right the Catalyst never says maybe. However you are still allowed and able to reject it's statement for what ever reason you want.

and to the best of mu knowledge neither original or EC endings get very detailed about post choice to directly or even hint that it was a wring choice to make and you just doomed the galaxy for not picking control or synthesis.