Mass Effect: Andromeda Features More Than 1,200 Speaking Characters

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Mass Effect: Andromeda Features More Than 1,200 Speaking Characters

//cdn.themis-media.com/media/global/images/library/deriv/1388/1388691.jpgYou'll have plenty of people to talk to in Mass Effect: Andromeda, as the game has over 1,200 NPCs with speaking parts.

Mass Effect games have always had plenty of people for you to talk to, but Mass Effect: Andromeda is taking that to a new level. During a PAX East livestream, creative director Mac Walters said that while Mass Effect 3 had "something like 670 unique characters who would speak to you," Andromeda cranks that number to "over 1,200."

Andromeda producer Michael Gamble elaborated a little more on this. Speaking to PC Gamer [http://www.pcgamer.com/mass-effect-andromeda-has-over-1200-speaking-characters/], he said, "The lines of dialogue we have in Andromeda is like Mass Effect 2 and 3 combined. So the number of characters is vaster, but the amount of stuff you and that character can talk about is also larger-especially the squad, we definitely focused in on the squad. We made sure the squad was beefy, and developed, and that you could do different things with them and then that information would basically carry through the conversations. That was a large focus. Yeah, in terms of the amount of writing, that was increased, and the number of characters was also increased."

Gamble also said that the 1,200 characters didn't include small roles like shopkeepers, but was counting characters "like one step above that."

Mass Effect: Andromeda launches on March 21 for PC, PS4, and Xbox One. If you're an EA or Origin Access member, you'll get access will be limited [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/169343-Mass-Effect-Andromeda-10-Hour-Early-Play-for-EA-Access-Origin-Access].

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[Neurotic Void Melody]

"We has the most mouth speaks EVAR!!"

I appreciate the pride in your ample waffle, Bioware, but it's a rather weird detail to focus on. I have enough voices to separate from reality already. Are any of those human noises Stephen Fry or Hugh Laurie? Or that one narrator from Bastion? Or the sweet serenade of a lusty bush warbler in spring? Come back when you have those please. All of them.

Also; one step above a shopkeeper? What's that..their accountant? Their cat trainer?

 

[Zydrate]

Also; one step above a shopkeeper? What's that..their accountant? Their cat trainer?

I guess they mostly mean any NPC not in a vendor-like or informational kiosk type capacity.

 

[Cether]

Yes but how many voice actors? "We have 1,200 characters who will talk to you, in the voice of one of 4 people!"

Also, how many Carth Onasi's do you have this time?

 

[SmugFrog]

I'm reminded of Oblivion where every race character sounded almost identical because they spent their budget on Patrick Stewart only to kill him off during the tutorial section. Hey, that Krogan sounds just like that Krogan... whoopee! I can only hope by increasing the dialogue they've gone back to how the elevators in Mass Effect 1 would allow for those wild conversations between your squadmates depending on who you had with you.

My personal favorite between Wrex and Garrus:

Wrex: "Garrus, who would win in a fight between you and the Commander?"
Garrus: "I would never dream of fighting the Commander!"
Wrex: "And that is why you would lose."

I actually laughed out loud, man Wrex has some balls.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

That's not nearly as important as what they have to say. Quality writing is infinitely more important than the quantity of characters.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Yes but how many voice actors? "We have 1,2000 characters who will talk to you, in the voice of one of 4 people!"

Probably more than four people, at least. After all, we're not talking about Bethesda here.

 

[BloodRed Pixel]

According to the first 10 hour impression by RPS, none of them has anything to say.

 

[MHR]

Hopefully Shadow of War does a similarly good job characterizing the orcs. You know, since that's all Shadow of Mordor did very well, was the nemesis system making otherwise painfully samey orcs have a degree of individuality to them.

Who am I kidding, I've played over a hundred hours in Shadow of Mordor and still hear lines I've never heard before. I can't imagine it not being the case.

 

[Czann]

But they will all share 9 voices.

 

[Mortuorum]

According to the first 10 hour impression by RPS, none of them has anything to say.

Well, when you spread 6 hours of meaningful dialog over that many characters - yeah, most of them aren't going to be saying anything meaningful.

What really caught my eye was the stat Walters provided for ME3... the 670 (approximately) characters who would speak to you. Really? How many of them were memorable? I've played through ME3 three times, most recently a couple of months ago (warming up for Andromeda). If I had to, I doubt I could remember more than 100 - and that's including "the three guys who died in the opening scene" and "guy who operates the phone in the endgame." (Was that the ME1 requisitions officer? Looked the same.)

If most of the 1,200 speaking characters are as memorable as ME3's, that's not really that impressive a statistic.

 

[Imre Csete]

According to the first 10 hour impression by RPS, none of them has anything to say.

As much as I don't have any faith in ME:A, I have even less in John Walker reviews.

He gets pissed off on something and rants about it, that's his shtick. Bonus points if he pulls "20+ years a gamer" rank in the comments section to prove his point.

Grain of salt advised.

 

[DrownedAmmet]

Damnit, I liked Mass Effect because it had less characters than Elder Scrolls games, and therefore they were much more memorable

Though Souls games take the cake. There's only about a dozen characters in each game, and I remember practically all of them

 

[Bilious Green_v1legacy]

But are they interesting and well written? Lately Bioware has been failing on that department; going bigger has not made Bioware's games better.