No.
I told Zephyr the ending was bad, and not because it's a poor choice to end an 80-hour game of obscene difficulty this way. It reminded me a lot of something Yahtzee said while reviewing Halo Reach. All of the characters are in too much of a hurry to win the "noblest self sacrifice" contest to do anything demonstrating the least bit of competence that could get me invested in their deaths. As with everything else, I only gave Zephyr suggestions on how his tragic ending could be better executed, and for a brief alpha update, a much better ending existed. But in the end, he changed it back to his "original vision," and all I can do is shrug. He made his questionably-sized bed, let him shit in it.
The Warmaster's pre-fight cutscene is the high point of dramatic tension for me and apparently a few other people too, but unfortunately, I have to take partial credit for the plot-armor-shattering moment. That was originally just my headcanon, as far as I know. The original cutscene didn't word it very clearly if that was the intent, but I saw the potential there, so I asked Zephyr to more clearly address it if that was the intent. I never got a straight answer to the question, but the "that rule doesn't apply to you" line made it in, so here we are.
The idea to use Kirby instead of Jeremy to deus-ex-machina the player's abilities back was also per my suggestion (it's a weak twist either way, I know). The music choice was also mine. (Zephyr chose the music for the fight though, despite it also being of Wild ARMs origin.)
This reminds me. The epilogue sucks too. It ruins the mood by hastily addressing every lingering question nobody had. THIS is an important plot hole, and it's never addressed. Are Jerry, Jeremy and Claire actually dead? Yes they are, but because Zephyr says they are, is the answer.Greader wrote:So, when's the sequel coming out where Chao breaks out of the program to go inside the recycling bin of whatever the program is stored on to save her friends
The latter half of the Warmaster's cutscene kind of rambles on in the same way, again killing the tension with questions nobody asked.
All in all, the other 99.99% of the game, give or take a few more decimal points for the player being completely unprepared for the Warship's difficulty spike, is just fine, and the game does explore enough gameplay ideas to actually justify its length to me, enough for me and any other fan to play the game multiple times despite it rivaling sandbox RPGs for hours of game time. It's only really a problem for people who weren't going to play it anyway. It's a fine game nonetheless and anyone who says otherwise is being "Mass Effect 3 sucks" levels of petty.