ME:A Ending Thread (EXTREME SPOILERS)

Still not comfortable with giving the keys to all of Andromeda's habitable planets to a race that's not even indigenous to the galaxy. What makes it even worse is that everyone is A-OK with it. You do not want to be a non-human character in the Mass Effect series at this point.

Finished the game around 10 minutes ago, still digesting it.

I thought the final mission was really exciting and quite heart-pounding. I literally lived every second of it, and felt genuine fear that Ryder's sibling wasn't going to make it.

I felt that some of the middle sections of the game were a bit of a slog, but the final mission burned along with never a dull moment. Also very pleased not to be forced into a predictable, derivative boss fight with the Archon. I was expecting some big, tedious boss battle, involving all the usual cliches, avoiding AOE, firing when weak points were exposed etc.. and when I saw the big Architect rise up and attach to the Archon, I signed, and prepared myself for yet another one of those kind of fights.. only tougher. What a pleasant surprise to end up in a big horde mode battle instead.

The post credits stuff was very welcome and unexpected too. It left me with a fair bit to do, including talking to squad, visiting habitat 7, and completing 'Path of a Hero'. Each trip off the Nexus revealed an additional squad conversation, involving a final resolution of the Gil/Kallo conflict.

In conclusion - very satisfied, and very satisfied with the game as a whole. If I'd listened to the critics I'd probably not have even bought it - but the critics, for the most part, were full of shit, and many of them - especially the 1/10 brigade on Metacritic clearly had a political agenda on behalf of the 'alt right' fighting against their imaginary 'SJW's. If I have to read one more five-line review on Metacritic, from some asshat, using the word 'cucks' to describe the developers, I swear I'll scream.

On purpose, yes.  But I don't think they had a clue where they were going next at the time.

Reject was just a passive-aggressive way to respond to people who didn't like the endings "Don't like our art?  F*ck you!  Rocks fall!  Everyone dies!"

The whole let's-base-our-civilization-on-alien-tech-we-don't-understand had a very Prothean/Reaper vibe to it.

Still don't know what the Scourge is.
Still don't know what the Remnant and Jardaan are.
Still don't know who the Kett are (guess their empire will be coming again soon now that the Archon is "dead")
Still don't know how the vaults terraform planets (space magic?)
Don't know what happened to the Archon at the end (letter indicated he might have been "uploaded"?)

DAI got it's real ending with tresspasser. ME3, well, that's not how any game should end. This ending was OK. No overall complaints. The only thing bothering me a bit, is that the Archon could be brought down by simply pushing a few buttons on the usual consoles. That could have been a bit more imaginative.

Looks like we may not find the answers anytime soon if the rumor is true and they put MEA franchise on indefinite hiatus. Ok it MIGHT be to patch and fix MEA1, but... BW Montreal is for sure being turned into a supporting studio which isn't a good news.

This happened before: It just means they're assigning people to different studios. Montreal was ill-equipped to make a full game. And it showed. 

As for my take on the ending:

The NPC Ryder was used very well, and I loved it. At least, from a plot standpoint. Gameplay wise, it was annoying to go back to lvl 1. But plotwise, I liked to see Sara struggle with the Archon. Maybe could've used a little more, like the Archon trying to herd you into a trap, only for Sara to stop it at the last minute. Would've been a bit more pulse pounding. 

Seeing and hearing the people I obtained over the course of the game felt rewarding because of the effort I put into it. I didn't get a good look at the Moshae with Raeka, though. I know she was holding up a barrier, but did she also have a sniper rifle? I liked having Hayjer with me when I fought, it was just a little extra awesomeness. Dunn was pretty cool, and I'm glad I made it so that she lived. 

How did Meridian work while it was disconnected? I got that the seed world was the engine, but I thought it needed to be connected. 

Also, where did Sara go at the end of the game? When I was at the party, she was in Dad's room, but now she's vanished after I left Meridian. Did I just miss something? 

Packing up and going on the next adventure just felt like a way to say "hey yeah, you can wander around the game after you beat the final boss." They could've just written a "I'm going home" kinda thing, and just let us continue on without a ceremony. Nothing wrong with it. 

and better than how ME3 treated the choices from 1 & 2

The rejection ending was a snarky response to the fans upset with the R/G/B vanilla endings.

I think the Liara message wasn't an indicator of the Reapers winning, but remember how it wasn't until 3/4 of the game you find out about the Catalyst, so that could just be her SB practical side speaking. No contact doesn't mean a lot when the Milky Way was burning, if anything, the transmitters would have been cannibalized for needed parts for the war effort and the information about the Arks lost so no-one even realizes they left for Andromeda. 

Well - they only would have to infiltrate and capture the Hyperion. No need to go to through the Nexus, because the Hyperion has docking ports too. They can use captured ships to hide the fact that it are kett forces.

Once the Hyperion is captured and all entrances to and from the Nexus are blocked, there is not much the Nexus defense force can do.
And after taking control of the steering systems by the Kett and undocking the Hyperion they have a ship full of human hostages. All that the Nexus defense force can do is blow up or damage the Hyperion, and that would put the not only the Kett in danger, but also everyone else on board of the Hyperion. In fact - every action by them would bring all that colonists in Cryo/Statis in mortal danger (malfunctions) and we are talking about tens of thousands of people here.

The Kett actually do not need anything from the Nexus at all. All they need is SAM and the Ryder twin, and both are on board of the Hyperion.

Finished the game earlier tonight and I loved seeing all of my hard work pay off, and was glad that there was no final good or bad choice in the game
I think that dropping the Alignment system only helped the game and roleplaying

I'd also want a scene of Captain Dunn going "Dammit WHY ARE THERE NO GUNS ON THIS SHIP!!!!?"