That's not entirely accurate. Books can have alternate endings, you shouuld take a look at the "goosebumps" novels.

Game developers are given economic security by the customers. If it doesn't please customers then the developers have failed. Customers having paid money are entitled to be entertained as expected. Bioware should listen and please. Anyone stating otherwise has a foolish opinion as far as I am concerned.

I think the entire gaming community should view this episode as a blessing in disguise, rather than a screw-up.
We all aspire to have greater interactive control over the games we play. Obviously it would be better if the choices we wanted to make were available in the game when it shipped, but if that doesn't happen, can't we all agree that adding them later on is a step in the right direction? In terms of advancing the interactive experience at least, if not from an economical point of view...

Personally I think the best option would be to allow custom mods in order to create your own ending. The downside to this may be that creating such a polished and cinematic experience as Mass Effect may be difficult to accomplish for the modding community, so any such fan-endings would potentially feel equally out of place, but for different reasons. If that is the case then why not have bioware give players more options? Isn't that what we all want out of our games in the end?

It sounds to me like people are actually bitching about having to spend more money, which is perfectly understandable, but isn't really the point of discussion. Nobody seems to mind paying more for better graphics, or new upgrades and modes... Why should the demand for more interactivity be ignored?? Especially when at the end of the day what we gamers want is the power to change the game?

Here's my view, as an outsider who hasn't played any Mass Effect games:

All this talk, this controversy, actually makes me interested in picking up the game. However, if they cave and redo the ending, I will lose any and all respect for the developers and will most certainly lose all interest in the Mass Effect series. Seriously, I just don't see the point in getting into a story, crafted by the developers, if they're willing to alter their vision, their story, just to appease some whiners. (from my perspective, that's what people griping about the ending are...whiners)

Forbe's responce:

Well for film and TV thery use focus groups. The focus groups give feedback on what they liked and didn't like and the studio makes changes. No doubt they even make changes to the ending in some cases. Sure it's not possible to change the ending of a movie after it's been released, but that's what remakes are for.

I liked the ending of the original 'Girl with a Dragon Tattoo', I didn't like the ending of the Hollywood re-make, though over all I liked it. See remakes, which I have to pay to see just like the original, can be equated to alternate ending DLC for a game.

Things are no where near as black and white in other entertainment mediums as people like to make out. Bioware wouldn't be setting a ruinous new precedent, they would be evolving an existing practice from pre-release focus group modification of a product to post-release public feedback modification.

I also think authors may possibly make changes to upcoming volumes in multi-book series based on fan responses to plot developments in the published volumes. Perhaps they don;t change the fundamentals of the ending of their story, but they might make non-trivial changes to various plot elements.

This all seems ridiculous to me. People didn't like the ending? Too bad, get over it. Criticize the hell out of Bioware and hope they get the hint and next time do a better job. You know, like everything else. Tons of games/movies/books have had bad endings. Chalk it up to "it was a good game, but the ending sucked" and move on. Seriously, i don't have any idea where these fans are getting the idea they DESERVE to have an ending remade just to fit their infatuation with a series. It's not as if the original ending would disappear from peoples minds anyway. How on earth would people be content with the new ending knowing it was only made due to subdue the backlash at Bioware?

Do I agree having a single ending to game where decisions were supposed to have an effect on the outcome of the story is crappy? Yes I do, especially when they stated the ending would be directly affected. However, I think people should just leave it the way it is. Honestly I don't even care about Mass Effect, i'm just concerned for what kind of precedent this will cause.

This is just my opinion though, and unlike some people who have posted in this thread, i don't think anyone who disagrees with me is foolish or wrong. We just have different stances on the matter.

Your logic is both flawless and whatever's-the-opposite-of-specious. Until and unless we go and talk to every single player, we not only can but must assume that the dissenters are the only people who dislike the ending. Extrapolation is for the weak!

But it's art. And art is sacrosanct.

If that's your stance, you should just lose interest now, seeing as how several elements in this and the previous game were done specifically at the request of the fanbase, rather than the developer's sole impetus. Or does the "creators' vision" card only come into effect when a product is released?

That's pretty standard, for fans to influence game development.  But it sounds to me like this story, this ending, was very specifically created, like it or not, for a puprose.  Gameplay elements change all the time.  There's nothing wrong with that.  But you never change a story, unless you're George Lucas and even then people hate him for it.  I just feel like making a change to the ending would be disastrous, no matter how bad the ending sucks.  I completely agree 100% with Levine...it just woulnd't be right...couldn't be real.   I mean, if the perpetual revisionist Lucas were to change how Episode 6 ends, with Vader survivng and going on to live the rest of his life as a good guy, I couldn't accept that as the real ending even if I wanted it to happen.  (which I don't, nobody wants that)  I just feel like, as far as story goes, once it's done, it's done.  Don't go back and change the story, it makes no sense whatsoever and detracts from the game, and any future games the developers make.  Why get invested in a story if the storymakers can just go "lol jk" and rewrite it whenever people get a little upset?

@zero - yeah, of course.  Though I can't play ME1 as I don't have a 360 so I think I'll have to start with ME2. :( 

The changes I alluded to earlier were actually made to the story and characters, not just the gameplay, although I might be mistaking your meaning there. In any case, the ending of this game was actually changed fairly late in development. There's an appstore app ("The Final Hours of Mass Effect 3") that goes into more detail, but suffice it to say that this ending was not exactly what was originally envisioned, and there's some reliable evidence that it was done solely by two people, while the rest of the series has been a team effort.

That aside, I still can't agree with you. Changing a story after release is not unusual for any medium, not even videogames. Blade Runner's Director Cut is a classic example, and you'll find few people who argue against that change. Charles Dickens had essentially finished Great Expectations, but because he had the luxury of releasing it as a serial he was able to rewrite the ending before that portion was publicized. Even recent gaming has seen the ending of Fallout 3 completely revamped; I don't recall many people complaining about that. Works of fiction are not set in stone. And if the final product is not pleasing to the consumer, I see no harm in making it better.