If it was proper indoctrination, none of the options would be valid. Why give anyone an option. I don't care if it's for the sake of the game, it's terrible writing.

You have to at least give the appearance of an option so the person doesn't think they're indoctrinated.

ORJ, have you read much about the Indoctrination Theory online? There's a big video about it here: Sorry, don't know how to play this video :(
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ythY_GkEBck

I see the appeal of Indoctrination Theory. If that was the actual intent, though, they may have made it a bit too vague for the average player. Plus, why would they show all of the relays getting destroyed and show the crew crashing on some random planet? It seems like a lot of superfluous information for you to dismiss in favor of a rosier assumption of the actual ending.

I haven't read anything about it. I came up with this theory yesterday when I had just finished the game, and was trying to describe my thoughts on the ending to a friend of mine. I'm just now learning that it's apparently a whole school of thought on the internet.

The more I think about it, the more stuff I see that confirms it. I just now realized another thing: How can Anderson be on the Citadel before Shepard arrives? The radio said no one made it through!

I'm so completely sold on this idea, haha, it's awesome.

Okay let me watch that video then, thanks!

The indoctrination theory is extremely popular for a reason. It makes sense. I think it really is the case, but its still an unfinished ending. Hopefully the extended ending will shed some more light on it.

Okay, I just watched that video. Even though that's not exactly my take on it, it's a big reconfirmation for me to see that it mentions the colour reversal/choice reversal I was talking about. It's also making the connections between the control option and the Illusive Man, the synthesis option and Saren, and the destroy option and Anderson. So glad I'm not the only one who sees it that way. There's no doubt in my mind that the idea of the ending is that you need to resist the indoctrination. As for what happens afterwards, that's more or a matter of interpretation, but I'm absolutely convinced of the challenge idea.

It's pretty obvious when you think about it. I'd also like to point out in response to Cool Matty that none of the options are valid. That's the point. They all suck. Two of them are essentially letting the Reapers win, and the third one makes you seem like the galaxy's biggest jerkoff. That's the point. It's about resisting indoctrination.

It's simple really.

Illusive Man thought he could control the Reapers, he was proven to be indoctrinated.

Saren thought there should be synthesis, he was proven to be indoctrinated.

The only way you're going to beat the reapers is by destroying them. Note that this is the only option where Shepard can survive, even though the god-kid says Shepard will die.

There's one thing that supports the indoctrination theory nobody ever mentions: The damned special effects while the citadel indoctrinates you.

Also please stop accusing the citadel of using circular logic. It's perfectly straightforward.

Higher organic life creates machines (for example, Geth, Terminators). Machines rebel and destroy all organic life. The Citadel (God) seeks to preserve organic life. So he destroys advanced civilizations before they can invent machines that destroy everything. Ironically he uses machines to accomplish this, but what do you expect? He's obviously some machine an earlier civilization invented and tasked with preserving organic life.

Not going to buy into the 'it's a dream' theory, though. That would mean that we're still on Earth, and the reapers aren't beat (What happens in Shepard's brain happens for real? Riiiight. Why would the Reapers risk that to indoctrinate Shepard? They'd just kill him.) Shepard is on the citadel, the relay's explode, etc.

Yeah, I've been thinking about it and it's possible that Shepard actually makes it onto the Citadel, and the scene with the Illusive Man and Anderson actually happens. I'm sure the god-kid is only in Shepard's head though, even though Shepard may actually be in that place.

Although I've been looking at that scene where Shepard survives a hundred times, and it's obviously just stone rubble. So either it's on Earth, or it's on the Citadel, but AFAIK there aren't any stones in the construction there.

The relays blowing up and the Normandy escaping is just the 'bittersweet' aspect of the ending, I guess, still unsure.

I've been looking into the Indoctrination Theory on the net now, and found some of the most compelling evidence for it;

If you take the control option, Shepard's eyes turn into the exact same sort of eyes that the Illusive Man has; triangle-like irises and the luminescent dots in the corners. This also happens in the synthesis option. This is absolutely proof that the Reapers win if you take these options.

What is so genius about it is that this is player self-actualization on a level like I've never seen before in a game. Thousands of players might actually be tricked into believing they did the right thing by trying to control the reapers or choosing synthesis. But we know that is the wrong choice, because of Saren and the Illusive Man!

So, if you chose 'control' or 'synthesis', you, the player have actually been successfully indoctrinated, instead of just your player character. I know of no other game that has done this, and it's just utter brilliance, IMO, and it gives me goosebumps.

You don't know of any other game because it didn't happen. There's a long-ass list of reasons why this is stupid.

1. All three choices as presented are terrible choices. Life ends up sucking for someone.
2. There's no reason to believe that the third option is any better than the other two, other than it just hasn't been "tried" so to speak.
3. There's no reason to believe that what the Illusive Man and Saren attempted would not be the right solution if carried out properly.
4. The reapers, being super intelligent, shouldn't be proposing options that could wipe them out, even for the purpose of indoctrination. Lying is a perfectly valid option when indoctrinating someone (and often is the primary method).
5. The "whoops, roll back" idea of handling the loss of the relays shown is ridiculous. Why bother showing it if it didn't happen? The developers obviously thought that information was important, providing strong evidence that this proposed theory was never even intended as an interpretation.

And that's just what I think of in my sleepy stupor.

But you see, it doesn't have to be a roll back. Shepard could survive and still be on the Citadel; even though the stone rubble looks more like London, we don't know.

I am now actually convinced that everything on the Citadel actually happened. The indoctrination is coming from the kid. The player is being indoctrinated by Shepard going along with the kid and the way the choices are presented.

The Mass Relays blowing up and the Normandy fleeing is just intended to be bitter-sweet. The fact that the Normandy lands on a garden planet proves that the relays didn't go nova after all.

'Properly executed'? That's what Saren and TIM must have thought as well. Surely the kid must be right! I am Shepard! They can't control me! Successfully indoctrinated.

I'd like to point out something that could have been, but wasn't. I hate doing this sort of thing, because it's really just a waste of time, but just imagine with me that this is what happened. First, we need to familiarize ourselves with the scenario I'm going to lay out a what-if replacement for: The hologram kid at the end. Throughout the game we see the kid in Shepard's dreams, after we see him bite the dust at the beginning of the game. I'm actually kind of alright with it. It's kind of Contact-esque in a way. It's obviously designed to get us to sympathize with what the hologram is saying. I like where they're headed with the core idea, but it could have been so much more.

Skip the bit at the beginning where Shepard sees the kid die. We can keep the dreams and keep the hologram at the end. But instead of the kid, have it be the crew member we lost on Virmire. You might say that would make the indoctrination aspect of it a little too obvious. Well, if you ask me, it could stand to be a little more obvious.

It's bloody obvious as it is.

I can't understand for the life of me why people are taking at face value what the god-kid says.

By introducing an entity that is said to control the Reapers, they give credibility to the control option. But can we trust that identity? An identity that repeatedly refers to the reapers as 'us'?

The kid basically goes: You can control us! Yeah, Illusive Man thought that too, but we controlled him. But not you, Shepard! We don't control you! I swear! YOU can control us! Really!

I mean, come ON!

Especially when Shepard simply goes 'Ah, so the Illusive Man was right after all'.

Whatever happened to: 'Are you willing to risk humanity's existence if you won't be able to control them?'?

Whatever happened to: 'You want power that is too great to be wielded!'?

Shepard just forgets about that, just like that? She's just buying what that kid from her dreams is telling her? And she's not indoctrinated? Yeah, RIGHT.

Considering indoctrination was apparently not the intended interpretation in the first place, I don't know how you can say it's obvious.

I've had to skip a lot of the conversation for fear of many spoilers. But I did want to say that I was very happy with the Tali reveal. I would have been miffed if we never got to see her; it was a massive distancing act to keep her face from us even when our Shepard was romatically involved with her. But the reveal wasn't too showy, it was just a nice insert. (It's the photograph by your bed if you have her as your romance option). I'm not at the end yet. I'm sort of slowly going through the game. Savouring it. Kind of hoping to get the DLC stuff before I finish it :rolleyes:. Online is a nuisance for me because I'm in China. Stupid Chinese Internet.

How do you conclude what was or was not the intended interpretation?

I've been reading a TON of articles on the controversy ever since, and so far there really isn't anything that properly debunks the theory. And some of the stuff that 'literalists' claim debunks it, actually is taken out of context and gives indoctrination more credibility.

Someone went into the game assets and checked some of the properties and code. The name for the pillars of the 'control' option is called "End_Choice_BadA_01". How about that?

The programming code for choosing the control option is 'BecomeAReaper'. How about that?

A poster (Leto_Galt) on the Bioware Social Network found this interesting gem...

I was looking through some save game editing plot flags and noticed that the line for End001 (Destroy) is different than End002 and End003. Destroy Sets 3 PlotIDs for the future.Not only do Synth and Control not set 3Ids. They do not even set 1.

End001,
PlotIDSet=(20894,19290,19286),
PlotIDClear=(),
PlotInts=((ID=10185,V=26),(ID=10303,V=25)),
PlotCond=())

End002,
PlotIDSet=(),
PlotIDClear=(),
PlotInts=((ID=10202,V=21)),
PlotCond=())

End003,
PlotIDSet=(),
PlotIDClear=(),
PlotInts=((ID=10203,V=22)),
PlotCond=())

I don't understand exactly how the game engine uses these PlotIDs, but from a layman’s point of view it looks like it's either;
Pick destroy, and have a future, or Synth/Control and not have a future.
Bioware does not even bother to track which one you picked if it wasn't destroy.
As far as they are concerned synthesis & control are the same thing. = Indoctrinated.

There were a couple of things said in this thread that I wanted to address but it keeps turning into a huge post and I really don't want to get involved in the indoctrination theory debate. Not because I don't think it's correct; it's largely quite compelling. I just don't have the energy for it and I actually enjoyed the ending for what it was (although I am looking forward to the Extended Cut DLC, even if it's just a Baldur's Gate or Fallout style synopsis of "what happened next"). But I'm limiting myself to this one thing for now (I may revisit the other post I was going to make another time):



"He was right all along", as in "he was correct that the Reapers could be controlled". Not in the sense that "Ah, TIM was on the right path", just that he was right that it could be done. The entity was also demonstrably telling the truth when he said that TIM couldn't have managed it due to being heavily indoctrinated while Shepard could do it; if you pick that ending you see the Reapers pack up and leave. Would they do that if they were lying to Shepard just to get him to fry himself? More likely the ending would involve Shepard disintegrating before cutting back to the Reapers continuing to kill everyone rather than just floating off.

There isn't anything that debunks the theory? Are you kidding? I just posted a long list of questions that you can't even answer that basically spell out why this is dumb. Forget it, let the "indoctrination supporters" be indoctrinated. It's ironic.

There's just that thing about how Casey Hudson said that the destroy ending is the only good ending, and if you picked one of the other two you essentially lost the game.

This is the problem with people, though. Even if it was intended to be that way all along, and the extended ending supports that notion, people like you will still say that wasn't what it was.

No I wouldn't. I'm just not willing to take bull**** excuses for a sorry-ass ending. In fact, I would be willing to suggest that if it was indoctrination as the plan for the ending, then Bioware screwed up even more than I thought.

I like how you're more angry about the ending at this point than any of us, and you haven't even played the game.

He hasn't played it? What are we even talking about then. That's like having an opinion of a book based on reading the synopsis.

CM, as far as I'm aware I addressed the majority of your points, while you seem to be ignoring most of the points I'm making. No hard feelings though, I just can't understand how you can be so passionate about something you haven't even played. =\

If you'd played the story, you'd know the god-kid is just about lying about everything. He's the textbook example of the unreliable narrator.

Even most players that hated the ending will agree that the game is 95% pure epicness. Most people I know of, anyway. IMO it's totally worth it, even if you don't like the ending.

I was looking forward to the game more than any of you.

Just play it already. It's absolutely worth it.

Is it $2? Then no, it's not worth it. EA crapped all over this game, not just storyline, but with Origin as well.

i suppose you'd turn down the piracy option due to SHOCK and MORAL OUTRAGE

No point in taking the risk of pirating a game that's only worth $2.

No point in getting upset about a game that's worth only $2.

The storyline is great. Then again, you wouldn't know, because you haven't played it.

Check this out:

You haven't said anything that praises it that much. Just pirate it and stop bleeding from your ****.

ORJ_JoS;

The poses or the WARNING/DANGER/CAUTION?

Yeah, overall the game is still incredible. The ending is just really frustrating.

The ending isn't, which is arguably the most important, AND EA managed to screw it up with Origin. Honestly, that alone is plenty reason to stay far away.

Here comes the part where CoolMatty goes on a tirade against Origin based on how terrible it is because it's essentially a less polished version of Steam that is owned by EA and not Valve, so it's terrible and evil.

Here comes the part where everyone tries to show off their e-penis

Like you didn't have problems with it.

Sure, I've had my problems with Origin. It really pissed me off, and there's nothing I can do about it. That doesn't make Mass Effect 3 terrible. It has little to do with the game itself.

I had no problems with it.