In Mass Effect 3 there is one particular ending that just doesn't seem to add up for most fans and gamers in general. In this article the "Synthesis" ending is analyzed and compared to New World Order conspiracy theory as well as real life while the plot holes about it are looked at as essentially the synthetics brainwashing humanity and using them as willing slaves.
Bioware had a lot of interesting endings with the Mass Effect 3 title, some disappointed gamers while others may have given us an insight for the world even further than previously thought of. Video Games, like all creative works of fiction often feature allegories or elaborate mirror-image style metaphors of our real lives. Much like the advanced science fiction theories of Hollywood that came true over time and now exist in our everyday lives or immediate future, Mass Effect 3′s Synthesis ending spoke to me as more than just an ending scene to a video game.
The Synthesis ending concludes with the Mass Effect 3 title seeing all humans and organic life essence combine with the Crucible. The film The Matrix featured a simliar disposition between the human race and a machine species which ultimately ended in a long, drawn-out war which later was silenced by mind-splitting revelations about the world around us.
Mass Effect 3 attempts to answer the question to one of our possible futures as well. Artificial Intelligence on Earth is predicted to inevitably reach a level of intelligence higher than every individual in the human race combined. At this time it is said to become self-aware, and thus a freely thinking species of its own. The combination of Organic Life with Synthetic Life in the Synthesis ending for Mass Effect 3 is reminiscent of these themes. It is offering the solution, ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em’.
Flash back to real life, there are already successful experiments being done in Government projects to locate the “human soul” and it is now said to be discovered and identified by such research as the Biometrix Light Matrix of a person. It is said that a person’s entire consiousness (personality, memory, and self) can be combined with synthetic life forms’ consciousness in the same way seen in the ME3 Synthesis ending. Somehow they are now all the same after this ending. There is no more war, everyone is synthetic and organic.
This ending is controversial because humanity seems to have their emotions stripped from them if such a thing happens. It could also been seen as sacriligious or just strange to become a fully ethereal and digital being after being born organic. The world could truly become faced with a real life dilemma centuries, or even decades from now such as that seen in the Mass Effect series. At that time it will be the fate of our species to be forced to make the same decisions that are being hypothetically acted out for us in these entertainment works.
Click here to skip to the part where this ending is explained and then chosen, or watch below for the full video gameplay of Mass Effect 3 Extended Cut’s Synthesis Ending. Drop a comment and let us know if you think this ending is flawed, an allegory for a New World Order future that could really happen, or something else.
