If Bioware ever decides to choose a canon ending for Mass Effect 3, which one would you prefer?

Synthesis is the most evil ending I've ever witnessed:

1) Every life form that exists, or will ever exist, in the Milky Way galaxy to undergo genetic alteration by force. The genetic rape of an entire galaxy of lifeforms, the consequences of which will last until the Milky Way is no more... or longer, if any future evolved lifeform exists after the MW has merged with Andromeda galaxy.
2) You're allowing sentient, egotistical, monstrous starships that are responsible for untold trillions of deaths over a billion years to live happily and safely. These starships are also capable of destroying entire species on a whim.
3) That's not to mention the husk problem. The husk hit by the wave looks confused and lost, that means that it has sentience of some form... either the wave made it a new lifeform, or the original consciousness of the huskified individual has come to the fore. Either is terrifying, and horrifying.
4) The people of current advanced civilisations would struggle to come to terms with their new form, and if they didn't struggle, then isn't that extremely strange?
5) Primitive civilisations have destroyed themselves or waged genocidal wars over issues such as statues, slights to their leaders or other seemingly trivial reasons. People will kill because they dislike the colour of a persons skin or that they live across a border, or just for pleasure. How many primitive civilisations, or even races, would be wiped out by this enforced change? How many will go insane and kill others, or wipe themselves out? How many civilisations in the midst of a Cold War scenario would doom themselves through nuclear fire (we know of 8 in the lore that destroyed themselves in a cold war scenario)? The death toll would be astronomical.

As such, its the most evil ending I've ever witnessed. Made only worse because it is portrayed as something happy.

Bioware made it as impossible as humanly possible (haha) to ever do anything with the MW going forward, because they decided to end the trilogy with the Deus Ex ending, making sure that no matter what, the galaxy is utterly screwed beyond repair. Which is one of the reasons why the way they ended the trilogy was just poorly thought out and horribly executed. It's the type of ending you write if you never plan to touch an IP again or ever make a game taking place at any point in the future. if they knew going into ME3 that this was an IP they wanted to work with going forward, then making the trilogy end that way was simply irresponsible. Of course I am sure a lot it can be chocked up to the game being horribly rushed, but in the end, I don't really see that as an excuse, as they could have done the more responsible thing for the sake of the Brand, and make just 1 ending, with your choices affecting the flavor of it. Would I enjoy that? not really, and I suspect most wouldn't either, but what it would do, is make debates like this completely non-existent, because then the franchise has a less contrived and less complicated future with which to build from in order to prevent the mistakes that led to that mess in the first place going forward. Never mind that I find it impossible for 1 confirmed ending, could possibly be executed any worse than what we were given. I mean good god, all they would have had to do, was just do the Destroy ending and tweak it based on the players choices. 

I am sorry for the people who find the other 2 choices more interesting (for whatever reason) but the reality is those two (now three) other options, to me, fly in the face of what Mass Effect was about to begin with.

Then why, in ME2, did they tease "save your Save Files for ME3 (and beyond!)" if they only ever planned to do the 3 games? Why do Andromeda at all, and instead have the Montreal team work on a new IP? (I already know the "Cuz EA" answer that is coming with that question). It's easy to say Hindsight is 20/20, but even if the EA answer is valid (and I am not sure that it is, given how Bioware constantly implies they choose their own projects)  then even in that scenario, Bioware should know better than to think EA would let a cash cow franchise simply "end", and create an ending that ensures smooth continuation, knowing EA is gonna milk the IP till it dies. 

I don't agree. My paragon always chooses that. I feel its the best option. We'd eventually get there. My renegade always picks destroy.

Well, destroy being the only option is your opinion, and you're entitled to it. The game gives you the choice. However, I say you didn't take everything into account. We'll get there shortly. There is one huge issue I have with destroy. But before I delve into it, I must say... No... Nothing brings the mirror back to me. The reapers indeed must be stopped, and the game gave you three ways to do that, even though according to you it's only destroy, it isn't. All three do it, but in different ways. The actual real goal is really more about stopping the cycle rather than stopping the reapers themselves, isn't it? It's about being able to survive and not being harvested. We always thought the only way to do that was to blow all the reapers up basically, but we got additional options in the end. I am aware of this slight but important difference in thinking. Are you? 
Ask yourself. Is the anger/vengeance/adrenaline drive more powerful than your logical thoughts?
Do I need a mirror? Not really... I'm not stuck in my old ways. I can adapt to new information, as long as it's sound, I can support it. 
But in any case... Let's tackle the endings...

Synthesis, was never my favorite, but for a different reason than yours. Maybe it's because its implications are too much beyond what I can actually comprehend. Fusing organics and synthetics together is something I simply cannot grasp. I cannot choose something I cannot grasp. I cannot put the galaxy in a state where I don't know what I'm doing.
Not sure if I buy the homogenization and removal of diversity argument. Everything in the universe is made from the same stuff essentially anyway... So... And there's still enough possibility for diversity. An analogy... Just like there's mac, windows, android, linux in software, despite then all using the same alphabet, I don't think synthesis would remove stuff like diversity and free will. For hardware there's ssd, GPUs, CPUs, all made from silicon, but completely different functions... Same story here. There's enough there within synthesis for diversity and not to have homogenization. I don't think the real concept of synthesis is easy to grasp, and generally people argue against it without understanding it. At least in my case, I am aware that that is the reason I don't choose it. It is simply beyond my understanding, possibly even beyond BioWare's understanding. 

Control... Replacing StarBrat with ShepBrat, like you put it, to me, is the best option of the three. First reason, read below what my main problem is with destroy. Secondly, the reapers have been operating under 'command' of the StarBrat, and it is an AI with a flawed premise and flawed solution. That much is evident. If you can't choose synthesis, and destroy is not an option (read below), this is the ONLY reasonable choice left. Maybe it will be an issue in the long future, but the reapers can help rebuild, they can protect against the Leviathans, they can impose certain limits to either side if required, and their technology is not lost forever but accesible to everyone. How is control a bad ending again? And considering my Shepard, I'm quite sure the solution will be much much better than StarBrat. 

Truth be told... I find the Refuse ending the most elegant... We lost the battle, but ultimately, the galaxy wins the war one cycle later. I find that satisfying to be honest. But because this is a video game, where everyone obviously wants to feel like a hero, nobody would like it as canon. Everyone wants an immediate victory. And I can understand that. If you played three games and lose anyway... It's hard to accept that. But again, it is ok to lose sometimes. It ultimately wasn't for nothing. It has a 300-ish kind of ending to it, which is why I like this ending also.


Let's get to the reasons themselves of why I will never ever choose destroy;
I have considered many implications and possibilities with all the endings. And there is one main issue that I have particularly with the Destroy ending that barely anyone pays attention to. And it is an ginormous issue. Did everybody somehow forget the Leviathans? Did everyone forget that their goal is to make every living thing in the galaxy a zombie that works for them? The only thing that was able to at least limit their scope was the catalyst, or, an AI.
Yeah... I cannot choose destroy, considering the reapers are the only defense against the Leviathans. The only reason they went in hiding was to avoid the reapers. At least with the reapers, the organics had somewhat free reign for 50k years, despite being guided through the reaper technology. With the Leviathans, it would be constant slavery at all times. Remember also that the only reason they choose to help against the reapers is because they consider themselves the best/top race in the galaxy and that they should reign. Outright destroying the only defense against the Leviathans is simply stupid. Especially if you lose all the synthetics in the process, which most likely are immune to the Leviathan's indoctrination powers. Synthetics would be your way out against the Leviathans, and yet you lose those too with this ending. No thank you. It definitely is the worst out of all of them, if you look just a bit beyond. 

That was a well thought out response, I will admit. I'll also agree to disagree with it however. In regards to the Leviathans, I never liked their inclusion to begin with and saw them as nothing more than a half assed attempt to retroactively justify their piss poor creative decisions. So to me, they are not even a factor, because I've removed them from the equation altogether. But even if you don't do that, let's really think for a second. It is impossible for the Reapers to be the only defense against the Leviathans. Why? Because Harbinger. Really sit and think for a moment, if the Reapers were the only thing keeping them in check, then how was Harbinger created to begin with, if he was the first? How did a computer AI with no Reapers at his command, basically butcher almost the entire Leviathan race to create Harbinger?

The answer is never explicitly stated, but I feel there is only one possibility. Somehow the AI brought the organic slave races under his command, and used them to harvest the Leviathans. Think about it, if the Leviathans are so overwhelming, so powerful, why do they need to brain wash people in order to keep them line? Why not simply use Force, fear and intimidation, as all egocentric entities do? Again I feel the answer is obvious. Because they are actually incredibly weak, and were only able to establish dominance over very primitive races due their ability to brain wash people. The races of the Milky Way are more than capable of figuring out counter-measures for the brain hacking, and are hardly too primitive to resist with force.

My biggest problem here is "the final evolution". The final evolution is death. During life, we continue to evolve. If that's taken from us, we've really lost out. Setting that aside, I'm not even convinced that the Reapers won't find some other reason to attack the weaker races. Hell, I can imagine the Leviathan taking control of them and using them to conquer.

It's important to note that this is not Shepard. It's an AI based on Shepard. Imagine a Renegade Shepard using Control and behaving in a way consistent with Renegade. Wiping out any race that it considers a threat. Then we've got killing machine Reapers all over again. No, sorry, but I don't trust anything with that kind of power no matter who is behind it.


Elegant? Your race and every other race in the galaxy is murdered so that, hopefully, the next cycle can figure out the Crucible? I mean, assuming the Reapers don't destroy Liara's beacons. I want to imagine humanity die just for the sake of hope. Not for surety but for hope.


I didn't forget them. I have a long history of posts about how they should be the next big threat. I'm willing to risk it to get rid of the Reapers. Beyond that, I believe the Leviathan are currently too few in numbers to be an impossible threat.

Refuse is not a good ending, because all Refuse is, is the next cycle using the Crucible in one of the 3 ways we were given. They had the same 3 choices, and they picked one. That is literally all it is. So Refuse is literally our entire cycle dying for basically no reason. Refuse ending, despite the epic Shepard monologue is really nothing but Bioware giving the fans who didn't want any of those choices the finger. This idea is only further reinforced by the fact that shooting the StarBrat triggers the refuse ending, because shooting it was the fans favorite thing to do in literally every video and how StarBrat gets all super pissy and screams "SO BE IT!" Harbinger style because the player refuses to participate in their Deus Ex rip off ending. The info about the next cycle btw, was confirmed by a Bioware Dev's tweet, so that is not in dispute. 


Again, Extended Cut is canon. We can see, definitively, that society rebuilds itself after the Destroy ending. Not only that, but they rebuild themselves to a high enough level where they can build new AI systems if needed, and the Leviathans are no where in sight during that epilogue. For example, a great way to incorporate player choice. if the Quarians and Geth made peace, then have it so the Quarians rebuilt the Geth and restored their intelligence to them. What would be a more clear sign of proving StarBrat wrong about it's idiotic conclusions? Destroy is hardly the worst option, I will always argue, that it is, and always will be, the best option available.

I never thought of it that way.  Damn.

It is always surprising to me, how so many people never stop to really think about what Refuse ending really is. It was an ending, made by a studio out of spite, during a time where they publicly said their entire fan base was just too stupid to comprehend the artistic brilliance of their ending. Really the entire Extended Cut oozes with cynical, barely contained rage at the player. It hypes up Synthesis as this perfect Literal Magic Utopia when it is by far the least popular and most criticized option among the fan base. Control is implied as the new ShepAI basically being the Dictator of the Universe, more so if Renegade, but Paragon is still heavily iffy. Destroy is depicted actually realistically, heavy hearts and heavy losses, but with renewed hope and joy for the future. But most importantly, the Reapers are actually dead. 

It's also an ending we begged for. The most common complaint about the final choices pre-EC was that "my Shepard would never make any of those choices." Well, we got what we asked for.

The problem was that a lot of us were lying about what we didn't like.

No, the problem was, there was zero chance of getting what fans actually wanted, which was an ending that didn't involve contrived, out-of-nowhere choices that abandoned the core of what mass effect was. So instead fans just begged for whatever more they could get, namely "Closure" and "I don't want to make these choices" ultra vague and none descriptive requests that are easily attainable for a company that refuses to budge. 

I do agree however, those people who asked for that, got exactly what they wanted.