BBB Says Mass Effect 3 Was Falsely Advertised

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The Director of Communications for the Better Business Bureau says that Mass Effect 3 was falsely advertised and offers advice to game developers on how to avoid making the same mistake.

The issue at stake here is, did Bio Ware falsely advertise? Technically, yes, they did. In the first bullet point, where it states “the decisions you make completely shape your experience”, there is no indecision in that statement. It is an absolute.
 
Hmm. The whole statement is kind of vague in the first place. Seems like it would be hard to quantify that.
 
Lots of very linear, heavily scripted RPG's and action games are advertised as completely dynamic experiences. It would be good if that were to change, so the game described on the box/on its Steam page is the same game that you end up buying.
 
My son was excited about this game even though I had mentioned there were a lot of people that thought the ending sucked. He continued anyway. Finishing the game the other day he let me know, "Yeah, the ending sucks."
 
I bought the first two games (collectors edition on ME2), and I skipped ME3 based on the feedback. Money talks.
 
If a game has a plot, it is at least partly scripted, there is no other way. Even in games when your choices effect the outcome there are still pre-defined paths that you follow to get there.
 
But false advertising pays off so much better in an industry with no return policy! Just ask a snake oil salesmen of yesteryear.

False advertising in a traditional retail industry with legally mandated 30 day return periods doesn't pay off nearly as well as in software, because when people find out you sold them a bunch of lies they can just return it and demand their money back.
 
BBB = biggest scam on the planet

I sent in a complaint to the BBB about BF3, after about a week I was contacted by an EA rep and was given a credit for the full purchases price. I bought the game from amazon so they couldn't directly give me a refund. I used the credit to pre-order ME3 for my bro's B-day. I wonder if I'll be able to make yet another complaint and get another credit / refund?

If EA keeps up their cycle, I'll keep up my cycle.
 
Heck, she didn't even get into the flat out lies the dev team told, you know, like...."You will NOT be getting an A, B or C ending!"
 
Personally I am all for doing something about advertising. Even if companies just learn from mistakes.

6 endings where there are slight changes (and 2 different colors) does not constitute "radical" changes in story or gameplay.

As mentioned in games it truly is difficult to tell a story and somehow give complete control to the player. Though honestly if anyone could do it, it would be mass effect. They already track all sorts of stuff and change some details in the story to reflect that.

All it would have taken is multiple endings being produced with DIFFERENT cut-scenes based on an equation of that data.

They pretty much already did it in ME2 to a smaller scale, determining the survivors of the last mission.
 
The ending was not even original. It was a near direct ripoff of the original Deus Ex's ending.
 
I did the best thing the 3+ million people should of done. Not buy it until some real feed back (not the bullshit reviews) were posted. After Dragon Age II I knew better. Fool me once, shame on you, but fool me twice....not going to happen.
 
Would like to add, that you're flat out lying to yourself if you think EA or Bioware care. With the 3+ million copies sold, their "success" is already in the bank.
 
If I hated something which had wronged me so much that it was completely worthless, i'd not want another one...

If you hate EA games so much, don't buy them. :p

I bought BF3 with expectations...they couldn't give me a refund, so I took the credit, I got another game of theirs (for free), and now it has issues. I haven't "bought" another title. I also don't buy DLC, so their hopes that getting me on that later down the road isn't happening. If every disgruntled gamer did what I did, EA would have a real financial concern to deal with, and nothing speaks louder than $$$ to them.
 
What do people have against the BBB?

To put one of their stickers in your window you only need to pay the BBB money...the BBB will only listen to your complaints if you pay them $5 per report.
 
I really wasn't upset about the ending after my first playthrough. It certainly didn't end the way I expected/hoped, but I didn't feel cheated. However, as I was running to the beam which shot Shepard up to the Citadel, near the end of play #2, I just stopped because I had no desire to see the end, again. I played ME1 and 2 dozens of times just to see the subtle changes in plot/dialog when I made different choices. With ME3, BioWare, has stolen that enjoyment from me.
 
I bought BF3 with expectations...they couldn't give me a refund, so I took the credit, I got another game of theirs (for free), and now it has issues. I haven't "bought" another title. I also don't buy DLC, so their hopes that getting me on that later down the road isn't happening. If every disgruntled gamer did what I did, EA would have a real financial concern to deal with, and nothing speaks louder than $$$ to them.

What exact expectations did you have that were so unfufilled the entire product was rendered completely worthless?

If every disgruntled gamer did that there would be no probably be no games industry.
 
What exact expectations did you have that were so unfufilled the entire product was rendered completely worthless?

If every disgruntled gamer did that there would be no probably be no games industry.

People don't return things because they're completely worthless, they return things because the item isn't what they wanted. If you buy a pair of pants, get them home, and it turns out they don't fit as well as you thought they would and are actually really uncomfortable, do you really go "Well, they're not COMPLETELY worthless, I mean they still cover my legs...I'll keep em"?
 
People don't return things because they're completely worthless, they return things because the item isn't what they wanted. If you buy a pair of pants, get them home, and it turns out they don't fit as well as you thought they would and are actually really uncomfortable, do you really go "Well, they're not COMPLETELY worthless, I mean they still cover my legs...I'll keep em"?

If you expect a full refund for the entire product, it would kind of make sense that the entire product was completely worthless. If you can only watch half a film, then you should receive half the money back. Thats logical.

The pants thing is the entire thing. They don't work to the intended purpose. But it's not really comparable as they are only single faceted. :p
 
Your decisions shape the experience just like it did in ME2, but not the ending. I wasn't expecting a different experience than the additional dialog from party members. The most surprising impact on the story is probably Thane vs Kai Leng.
 
Not playing games solves this problem and trivializes much of the worrying over whether or not a computer will do everything you need it to do.
 
What exact expectations did you have that were so unfufilled the entire product was rendered completely worthless?

If every disgruntled gamer did that there would be no probably be no games industry.

Well I never claimed the product was "rendered completely useless". You're using some twisted logic to come to that conclusion. I wanted a full refund, which would be equivalent to "returning" the product (which is technically impossible due to it being a digital download).
The issues I was concerned with were multiplayer issues, centering around the hacking which was so rampant in the dec-jan time frame that server admins were being booted from their own servers due to glaring open security holes Dice left in the code, even after being told about them during alpha testing. And that's in addition to all the usual aimbotting, insta-killing, etc asshattery that usual comes with a hacker in an FPS. Add in that there was zero communication from DICE/EA regarding the issues until ... well actually I don't think they ever admitted there were issues... so yeah, hence the complaint. I also touched on a multitude of other things in my complaint, from Origin and it's spying, to Battlelog, to lack of "basic" pc shooter features, etc etc.

If every disgruntled gamer stood up for themselves and their (assumed) hard-earned money, then we might have a games industry that is both flourishing and fair to consumers. Personally I don't want the games industry to become a mirror image of the film or music industry.
 
To put one of their stickers in your window you only need to pay the BBB money...the BBB will only listen to your complaints if you pay them $5 per report.

^^^ This! ^^^

They are high pressure sales, and last time I checked it was costing $500 for a business to renew with them. It's insane. And once they get their hooks into you, they'll say all sorts of stuff to get you to keep renewing.

The whole company is slimy. They don't have any altruistic concern for consumers, they are looking out for lining their pockets and that is ALL.
 
I think you managed to wander in the wrong forum sir...

Nonsense! Hardware enjoyment and interest does not require one partake in gaming. Such a thing is a good excuse, but not the only excuse or reason to pop in on such a location as this.
 
Your decisions shape the experience just like it did in ME2, but not the ending. I wasn't expecting a different experience than the additional dialog from party members. The most surprising impact on the story is probably Thane vs Kai Leng.

^^^^This.

While some of the developer stuff implied we would get more input into the endings then we got and in a way we did (whether you have an issue with the choices and not knowing their effects it is actually a lot more of a controllable ending then we at least saw in ME1). We did have a game modeled after our choices in the first game (though it should be noted that there have been choices completely skipped over), and that is what made it such a powerful game for me.
 
I sent in a complaint to the BBB about BF3, after about a week I was contacted by an EA rep and was given a credit for the full purchases price. I bought the game from amazon so they couldn't directly give me a refund. I used the credit to pre-order ME3 for my bro's B-day. I wonder if I'll be able to make yet another complaint and get another credit / refund?

If EA keeps up their cycle, I'll keep up my cycle.

Amazon was giving people full refunds for ME3 if they called and spoke to a rep based on plenty of posts on the BW forums.

Heck even BB supposedly was doing it too.

If you didn't like ME3 and bought from Amazon, give em a call.
 
To put one of their stickers in your window you only need to pay the BBB money...the BBB will only listen to your complaints if you pay them $5 per report.

And? Doesn't a cost of entry to a complete help weed out illegitmate claims?

Do you want the complaints to be filed for free? Really? Over the internet? And you don't see a problem with this?
 
I'm a big fan of this series but I didn't preorder ME3 because of my backlog as I wasn't in a hurry. Now with the negative word of mouth, who knows when I'll play ME3.
 
Isn't every game "falsely advertised" by these standards? Also BBB is a toothless private entity. Most gamers believe it's some government agency. It's not.
 
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