A Mass Effect Thread: Shepard Lives! Maybe?

[Mightyblue]

So yeah, the Game Awards teased a new game in the ME series coming at some point from Bioware (beyond the coming remaster of the OG trilogy):

Looks like they picked the Destroy ending as the canonical one for 3 since I don't see any glowy green circuit lines to indicate Synthesis and dead Reapers would probably nix Control. I've honestly got no real expectations for this despite hearing that they hired back most of the original creative team for the original trilogy; the Bioware that was responsible for ME 1 and 2 was already mostly gone by the time 3 was released, and neither Andromeda or Anthem have exactly filled me with much confidence about the capabilities of modern Bioware.

It is nice to see Liara again tho

 

[Neo Skimbleshanks]

I hate the idea behind the destroy ending so I’m sorry to say I’m kind of annoyed. I’m sure I’ll think whatever this is is “fine, at least.”

I do hope it’s a corridor shooter again! No More Open Worlds.

 

[Regulus]

Yeah, might as well be called the Genocide Ending.

I think making a sequel that makes any of them canon is a bad idea. Andromeda was a good way of handling it... it's just too bad the game itself was pretty mediocre.

 

[Violentvixen]

I loved the original series so I'm interested to see if they can recover from Andromeda. Liara got a lot less annoying after the Shadow Broker stuff but I still can't really stand her. Her contacts and the fact that she left the final message if you failed makes her the best candidate for all of that though I suppose.

I want more Garrus in my life but am worried it wouldn't meet my expectations.

 

[Bongo]

Watch them start the game with an original state of affairs that doesn't follow from any of the three endings, while the remastered trilogy replaces the ending with the setup for the sequel.

 

[Juno]

If the combat is straight out of ME2 or 3 and nothing like Andromeda I'll probably skip this. Whatever other problems there were, I loved how Andromeda felt in combat compared to the original trilogy. Plus, it was a much more flexible and interesting progression system- being able to freely respec abilities and change specializations was great.

 

[Adrenaline]

I imagine that they'll take the good bits from Andromeda and fit them into something that feels more like 1-3 but with some shitty AAA microtransaction stuff thrown on top

 

[chud_666]

If the combat is straight out of ME2 or 3 and nothing like Andromeda I'll probably skip this. Whatever other problems there were, I loved how Andromeda felt in combat compared to the original trilogy. Plus, it was a much more flexible and interesting progression system- being able to freely respec abilities and change specializations was great.

Personally I think Andromeda was greatly underrated. I loved the expanded exploration, and the combat was wild. Issues with game are how the story plays out, and how little effect your choices had. If they can re-add that aspect to Andromeda's general gameplay - I'd love it

 

[Falselogic]

I keep thinking about playing Andromeda. I hate the discourse almost always so I don't know why I let it effect me so much in this instance.

Of course, my Shepard died when my 360 did... So, it doesn't even matter in whatever this next ME is going to be.

 

[Alixsar]

The destroy ending is the good ending, get mad about it nerds

Shitposting aside, Casey Hudson left Bioware AGAIN and the head of the Dragon Age series also left Bioware, both about a week or so ago. Who even works at Bioware anymore? Bioware made Inquistion, a good game, Andromeda, a flawed-but-good game, and Anthem, an absolute trainwreck disaster. They've been on a downward trajectory every since ME3, a game that itself was met with lots of criticism (though mostly about the ending, but not entirely), and one of the commonly cited reasons for all of this is poor management. With senior management AGAIN leaving the studio, it's not too hard to imagine seeing another Kotaku "here's why the latest Bioware game sucks" article coming in, say, 3 years.

I dunno, I'll get excited about it when I see something worth getting excited about, ya know?

Also, if the gameplay holds up (Andromeda's was fantastic), I hope they put in another multiplayer mode. I played, like, 140 hours of multiplayer in Andromeda and loved it. The rest of my play time was single player which was...eh...

 

[estragon]

With senior management AGAIN leaving the studio, it's not too hard to imagine seeing another Kotaku "here's why the latest Bioware game sucks" article coming in, say, 3 years.

I think pretty much all of those articles were written by Jason Schreier who has left Kotaku so now it will be an article at Bloomberg or something he saves for a book.

(I get the point you are making, just saying this to highlight Schreier specifically as someone who does excellent reporting on this kind of thing.)

 

[chud_666]

The destroy ending is the good ending, get mad about it nerds

Shitposting aside, Casey Hudson left Bioware AGAIN and the head of the Dragon Age series also left Bioware, both about a week or so ago. Who even works at Bioware anymore? Bioware made Inquistion, a good game, Andromeda, a flawed-but-good game, and Anthem, an absolute trainwreck disaster. They've been on a downward trajectory every since ME3, a game that itself was met with lots of criticism (though mostly about the ending, but not entirely), and one of the commonly cited reasons for all of this is poor management. With senior management AGAIN leaving the studio, it's not too hard to imagine seeing another Kotaku "here's why the latest Bioware game sucks" article coming in, say, 3 years.

I dunno, I'll get excited about it when I see something worth getting excited about, ya know?

Also, if the gameplay holds up (Andromeda's was fantastic), I hope they put in another multiplayer mode. I played, like, 140 hours of multiplayer in Andromeda and loved it. The rest of my play time was single player which was...eh...

I'm bummed the 1-3 remasters won't have the Horde mode, or whatever it was callled

 

[Dracula]

(beyond the coming remaster of the OG trilogy):

Whoa heck, this is actually happening? Ever since I sold off my 360 I was hoping I'd have a chance to replay the MEs someday. I've had an idea for my builds on a second playthrough since I originally beat it, even.

Is it coming to Switch???

 

[chud_666]

Whoa heck, this is actually happening? Ever since I sold off my 360 I was hoping I'd have a chance to replay the MEs someday. I've had an idea for my builds on a second playthrough since I originally beat it, even.

Is it coming to Switch???

No - PC, Xb1, PS4 with some forward compat options for ps5 xbsx etc

 

[Falselogic]

On PC I think all three Mass Effects are still compatible. And on Steam? I can't actually check because Steam is downish.

 

[Mightyblue]

Yeah, at least the base games for all three are on Steam now. DLC might be a different question, as the stuff for the first two games predated centralized buy/install processes like Steam/etc have now and I don't know if EA brought over the single player DLC they sold on Origin.

 

[Alixsar]

I played ME2 back on 360, and I have it for PC on Steam, but I remember trying to access (in 2015 or 16 or so) EA's servers and having to log into Bioware's forums and a bunch of wild shit so I could buy the Phalanx/Mattock, and I ultimately just gave up.

Remember a decade ago when we were buying Dr. Pepper for ME2 helmets? What a time to be alive.

 

[Falselogic]

All the multiplayer is gone isn't it? I really enjoyed that in ME2. I think it was ME2. It was so long ago...

 

[R.R. Bigman]

It was in 3. It was tied to the “Galactic Readiness“ stat that ended up playing a not very big role in what color you wanted the background of the slideshow ending to be.

I think Mass Effect’s time has come and gone. BioWare could try to make a cool Star Trek game. From what many people say, their Star Wars game was very good!

 

[Mightyblue]

Mass Effect isn't really Star Trek though; it's much closer to The Expanse than anything else (and predates that by a bit).

 

[Aleryn]

Here's another take of not caring cuz they went with the destroy ending. Just knocks the whole progression back to Act I.