Another example of excellent analysis of why the ending fails. It's kinda long, but well worth it because it's both spot on, and in parts it's very funny! (Replaying parts of the ending with the hologram kid, but overlaying it with Benny Hill's Yakity Sax music is just almost indescribable win! But then, most things are made inherently funny by Yakkity Sax. 
)
I especially appreciated him bringing up the point that dark story moments are not necessarily profound and that
there's nothing wrong with rewarding players with a bit of hope. I'm
just going to quote him directly since this is something that's pretty damn important to me.
"Get the mood right:
Back
in the olden days, when dinosaurs still roamed the earth and the
internet backlash about the ending was just starting, many people
assumed that the primary objection to it was that it too dark or too
sad. This wrongheaded assumption lead to a wrongheaded retort, which is
that people are fine with sad, they just wanted the ending to make sense
on some kind of basic level. I don't necessarily disagree with this
retort so much as I think it gives credibility to a false choice.
People have been confusing dark with profound ever since the first
obnoxious 10th grader started writing terrible poetry. Dark is not
necessarily good, nor is bright bad, nor vice versa, nor any combination
of anything in between.
Mass Effect was entertaining because
it hit more than one note. Sure, there were dark things about the
story. Remember the impaling and the robot zombies? The codex entries
that told you that more than a million humans were dying every day for
most of third game? The psychological horror of indoctrination? The
body horror of being turned into a husk or worse?
But that's not
all there was. There was also drunk Tali, and Elcor Hamlet, and the
Garrus and Joker Comedy Hour. You had opportunities to build close
relationships and do real good. Moreso than there was light and dark
there was balance, variety and contrast. The grimness of circumstances
was offset by the humor and hope of the personal element. The ending
shouldn't be saccharine, but neither should it be depressing. And it's
ok to reward the player with a little bit of happiness after they've
gone through so much."
)I especially appreciated him bringing up the point that dark story moments are not necessarily profound and that
there's nothing wrong with rewarding players with a bit of hope. I'm
just going to quote him directly since this is something that's pretty damn important to me.
"Get the mood right:
Back
in the olden days, when dinosaurs still roamed the earth and the
internet backlash about the ending was just starting, many people
assumed that the primary objection to it was that it too dark or too
sad. This wrongheaded assumption lead to a wrongheaded retort, which is
that people are fine with sad, they just wanted the ending to make sense
on some kind of basic level. I don't necessarily disagree with this
retort so much as I think it gives credibility to a false choice.
People have been confusing dark with profound ever since the first
obnoxious 10th grader started writing terrible poetry. Dark is not
necessarily good, nor is bright bad, nor vice versa, nor any combination
of anything in between.
Mass Effect was entertaining because
it hit more than one note. Sure, there were dark things about the
story. Remember the impaling and the robot zombies? The codex entries
that told you that more than a million humans were dying every day for
most of third game? The psychological horror of indoctrination? The
body horror of being turned into a husk or worse?
But that's not
all there was. There was also drunk Tali, and Elcor Hamlet, and the
Garrus and Joker Comedy Hour. You had opportunities to build close
relationships and do real good. Moreso than there was light and dark
there was balance, variety and contrast. The grimness of circumstances
was offset by the humor and hope of the personal element. The ending
shouldn't be saccharine, but neither should it be depressing. And it's
ok to reward the player with a little bit of happiness after they've
gone through so much."