BioWare director stands by Mass Effect 3 ending, promises single-player DLC

BioWare's Casey Hudson stands by the "polarizing" ending of Mass Effect 3, which has been the focus of furious fan criticism.

In an interview with Digital Trends, the director said he planned for Mass Effect 3's ending to be somewhat controversial.

"I didn’t want the game to be forgettable, and even right down to the sort of polarizing reaction that the ends have had with people–debating what the endings mean and what’s going to happen next, and what situation are the characters left in," he said.

"That to me is part of what’s exciting about this story. There has always been a little bit of mystery there and a little bit of interpretation, and it’s a story that people can talk about after the fact."

People are certainly talking about the ending; some are so distressed by it that they have launched a surprisingly hefty campaign to get it changed. Despite that, Hudson stuck to his guns, saying what he's "most proud of" is that the story "will be remembered", and added that BioWare pays "very close attention" to fan feedback.

"It’s very important to us and we will always listen to feedback, interpret it and try and do the right thing by our fans. That’s why if you look at Mass Effect 2 we knew that people wanted to spend more time with a character like Liara, and so we created an ongoing storyline with her as part of the comics and then built it into the DLC stuff, and we’re always listening to fans," he said.

"We have some really great multiplayer content and some really great single-player content coming over the air, and their feedback will become part of how we design that."

Hudson gave another concrete example of how feedback has shaped the series - the inclusion of Tali and Garrus as love interests.

"From the outset, we didn’t envision them as characters that people would want to have a romance with," he said.

"And yet they were successful as characters, and so popular amongst a lot of people that people really wanted to develop a relationship with them, so we integrated that from Mass Effect 2 and it’s become a big part of the series."

Thanks, GameFront.