BioWare: Next Mass Effect Isn't Mass Effect 4

[Proverbial Jon]

This whole statement sounds needlessly defensive.

"OMG guys! Don't call it Mass Effect 4 because it really is nothing like that last game you now all hate. Really, not even connected."

Seriously?

I don't know how I feel about this. I know the Mass Effect universe is huge, but for me ME was purely about Shepard and the reapers. Much like Halo 4, I'm not sure I'm ready to welcome more stories in that world.

 

[Screamarie]

An EA-executive and a Bioware-representative in a meeting.

"So Chris, buddy, what do you plan next? C'mon, you guys are a cash cow, people will buy anything you put out,no matter what you do and daddy needs a new condo."

"Well, actually we have some nifty ideas, considering a new setting, some new gameplay ideas and we finally wrote another script, so we don't have to recycle the Kotor-story for the 20th time."

"Uuuh, Chris, Chris, Chris, what did we say about the n-word? C'mooooon guys, you know how this works: I ask what your next game is and you put a number behind a title I already know. What about.... *scuffles through a little folder* ...this Mass Effect-stuff? I mean that's a safe shot, right? Most controversial response I ever saw about one of your games and the bloody masses still bought it like the little sheep they are supposed to be."

"Well...I guess you're right but...we kinda concluded the story, you know? We made a pretty big deal out of it being the end of the trilogy? And our rep DID suffer some serious blows and I don't think the dust settled on this one yet."

"Hm, I see where you're coming from. How about that: It's Mass Effect....but not the Mass Effect they know?"

"What, you mean like a reboot?"

"Uuuuh no. No. Nonono. Evil word, very unpopular. People HATE that word. No reboot."

"So...you WANT a sequel?"

"No sequel, no. You just said it, you concluded the..erm..what's the word again?" -"Story?" -"Yeh, that's it, story. No, you need to rework the existing story."

"But... if we use the Mass Effect name and set pieces...but cancel out everything we established about it before...that's a reboot, right?"

"....Okay, Chris, love your work so far but...here...we have a seminar, over at our place...come there next friday, 3 a.m., we have an amazing guy, he'll teach you everything about how to describe that rework-thing without using that nasty "Reboot"-word, alright? Alright!"

"Okay, I guess...but what should we name this re...work then?"

"Why, Mass Effect 4 of course. It is the fourth game in the series, isn't it?"

"....I'll see you at the seminar."

Yeah that's kind of the vibe I kept getting as I was reading the article, as in giant neon letters with airhorns, sirens and confetti cannons saying "REBOOT."

I'm not necessarily against change...but I am very much against someone fucking up the game series I love more than anything other game ever, even with the horrible ending thing. But...everyone deserves their chance I guess and maybe they'll do a really good job and I'll be super happy with the developers...That's possible right?....

Right?

*crickets*

RIGHT?

 

[Erttheking]

I want to be excited, but I can't help but ask "so, is this one going to be shit too?"

 

[Frontastic]

I'd actually like to see a different galaxy. The Reapers must have sent a few scouts to other galaxies to see how they're evolving.

 

[Nimcha]

This whole statement sounds needlessly defensive.

No defense is needless when there is this much attack.

 

[weirdee]

what i really want is a break away from the humans for a while

just exploring what the other races were like beyond their stereotypes

 

[AlexLoxate]

In other words: "We ain't touching that (ME 1-3 storyline) with a ten foot pole again." What you get when you're under papa EA's roof.

 

[spartandude]

I think/don't think that Bioware are/are not talking total bullshit to distance/not to distance their new game from the previous games and the shitstorm that did/did not happen over the ending. They blatantly want/don't want to have to spend time and effort dealing/not dealing with the utter omnishambles that the ME3 finale was/wasn't. Trying to further explain/not explain what the fuck the Starchild was going on about/wasn't going on about would/wouldn't drive any writer insane.

...man, this double-speak stuff is hard. Props to the Bioware guy for being so fluent in it.

Thanks i really needed this, ive had such a bad day but you helped me laugh from reading this

 

[Mike Richards]

An EA-executive and a Bioware-representative in a meeting.

"So Chris, buddy, what do you plan next? C'mon, you guys are a cash cow, people will buy anything you put out,no matter what you do and daddy needs a new condo."

"Well, actually we have some nifty ideas, considering a new setting, some new gameplay ideas and we finally wrote another script, so we don't have to recycle the Kotor-story for the 20th time."

"Uuuh, Chris, Chris, Chris, what did we say about the n-word? C'mooooon guys, you know how this works: I ask what your next game is and you put a number behind a title I already know. What about.... *scuffles through a little folder* ...this Mass Effect-stuff? I mean that's a safe shot, right? Most controversial response I ever saw about one of your games and the bloody masses still bought it like the little sheep they are supposed to be."

"Well...I guess you're right but...we kinda concluded the story, you know? We made a pretty big deal out of it being the end of the trilogy? And our rep DID suffer some serious blows and I don't think the dust settled on this one yet."

"Hm, I see where you're coming from. How about that: It's Mass Effect....but not the Mass Effect they know?"

"What, you mean like a reboot?"

"Uuuuh no. No. Nonono. Evil word, very unpopular. People HATE that word. No reboot."

"So...you WANT a sequel?"

"No sequel, no. You just said it, you concluded the..erm..what's the word again?" -"Story?" -"Yeh, that's it, story. No, you need to rework the existing story."

"But... if we use the Mass Effect name and set pieces...but cancel out everything we established about it before...that's a reboot, right?"

"....Okay, Chris, love your work so far but...here...we have a seminar, over at our place...come there next friday, 3 a.m., we have an amazing guy, he'll teach you everything about how to describe that rework-thing without using that nasty "Reboot"-word, alright? Alright!"

"Okay, I guess...but what should we name this re...work then?"

"Why, Mass Effect 4 of course. It is the fourth game in the series, isn't it?"

"....I'll see you at the seminar."

A Mass Effect fan and anti-fan meeting on a forum.

"Hey guys, look, Bioware is talking about taking ME in some new directions. It'll be interesting to see what they're talking about and judge whether or not it looks like a good idea once we actually know anything about it and can form a more informed opinion."

"No, they're just milking a dead franchise because EA told them to! EA! EA! EA! EEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

"But... the world was clearly created to be larger than just one storyline. There's a lot of room for other things to explore, and it's clearly a universe they have a lot of love for. And take Star Trek as an example, it's gone off in a lot of other directions that reference previous stories but don't-"

"No, they're clearly doing a reboot because it doesn't involve the old story but they can't call it a reboot because they know everyone hates reboots. Bioware is dead! EA! EA! EEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

"Ok, so, you want them to do something new and different then? New setting, new characters, new gameplay, all that? Even though they've already done that three times in the past ten years, which is something of an impressive achievement for a major company in the current market, and every time it seems like people complain that they were too different from the things they used to make."

"No, no, no. Don't you know how this works yet? They announce anything and everyone says they don't care anymore because reasons. Something about endings and hamburgers and how awesome Balder's Gate used to be. That's just how it works I'm afraid. Either they're not innovating enough or have strayed too far from that one thing that everyone liked. Either they're phoning it in or they're doing what they want instead of giving us exactly what we want without challenging us at all. Either they're a hollowed out shell of evil people intent on draining every last cent from their fanbase or they're a hollowed out shell of sympathetic people being manipulated by evil people into draining every last cent from their fanbase. Take your pick, no one can seem to come to a concise agreement on why we don't like them anymore, except things are different and we don't like different. And EA! EA! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

 

[Proverbial Jon]

This whole statement sounds needlessly defensive.

No defense is needless when there is this much attack.

You make a valid point.

I'll readily admit that I was quite bitter for a time after the whole Mass Effect 3 ending issue. I just couldn't understand how such an infuriatingly broken ending was greenlit, especially from within Bioware of all devs. But I never allowed any of it to ruin the rest of the trilogy for me. In fact I'm playing through the whole trilogy again right now.

I shall watch "Mass Effect 4" with great interest; it will most likely be a game I'll be interested in playing. I just want to see Bioware move on from the ME3 ending stigma. Then again, there's still EA's business practices to provide the haters with negative ammunition.

EA! EA! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

I'm going to have to go back to calling them Electronic Arts after reading this. It's honestly quite dizzying!

 

[daibakuha]

A Mass Effect fan and anti-fan meeting on a forum.

"Hey guys, look, Bioware is talking about taking ME in some new directions. It'll be interesting to see what they're talking about and judge whether or not it looks like a good idea once we actually know anything about it and can form a more informed opinion."

"No, they're just milking a dead franchise because EA told them to! EA! EA! EA! EEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

"But... the world was clearly created to be larger than just one storyline. There's a lot of room for other things to explore, and it's clearly a universe they have a lot of love for. And take Star Trek as an example, it's gone off in a lot of other directions that reference previous stories but don't-"

"No, they're clearly doing a reboot because it doesn't involve the old story but they can't call it a reboot because they know everyone hates reboots. Bioware is dead! EA! EA! EEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

"Ok, so, you want them to do something new and different then? New setting, new characters, new gameplay, all that? Even though they've already done that three times in the past ten years, which is something of an impressive achievement for a major company in the current market, and every time it seems like people complain that they were too different from the things they used to make."

"No, no, no. Don't you know how this works yet? They announce anything and everyone says they don't care anymore because reasons. Something about endings and hamburgers and how awesome Balder's Gate used to be. That's just how it works I'm afraid. Either they're not innovating enough or have strayed too far from that one thing that everyone liked. Either they're phoning it in or they're doing what they want instead of giving us exactly what we want without challenging us at all. Either they're a hollowed out shell of evil people intent on draining every last cent from their fanbase or they're a hollowed out shell of sympathetic people being manipulated by evil people into draining every last cent from their fanbase. Take your pick, no one can seem to come to a concise agreement on why we don't like them anymore, except things are different and we don't like different. And EA! EA! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

You hit the nail squarely on the head with this one. I see no reason to judge a game harshly when you literally know nothing about it. We haven't even seen a single screenshot or been told what it's going to play like.

 

[Sheo_Dagana]

It would have to be set in a different universe entirely, just based on the perspective of story. The stakes pretty much can't be risen anymore than "save the galaxy from being completely wiped out by hyper-advanced synthetic lifeforms who are roughly the size of space ships."

It's kind of hard to take a step back after that. However, put it all in an entirely new universe and you can build up to whatever kind of story you want. If it's clear that this story does not take place in Shepard's universe, you won't be expecting anything, and the new threat can be slowly unveiled until the end of the over arcing plot. If it's set in the same universe, it's kind of hard to pull out a villain that's just as powerful, threatening, and equally built up to as the Reapers, who can also be somehow fit into the existing canon.

Looking forward to getting more information as it arrives!

 

[daibakuha]

It would have to be set in a different universe entirely, just based on the perspective of story. The stakes pretty much can't be risen anymore than "save the galaxy from being completely wiped out by hyper-advanced synthetic lifeforms who are roughly the size of space ships."

It's kind of hard to take a step back after that. However, put it all in an entirely new universe and you can build up to whatever kind of story you want. If it's clear that this story does not take place in Shepard's universe, you won't be expecting anything, and the new threat can be slowly unveiled until the end of the over arcing plot. If it's set in the same universe, it's kind of hard to pull out a villain that's just as powerful, threatening, and equally built up to as the Reapers, who can also be somehow fit into the existing canon.

Looking forward to getting more information as it arrives!

The stakes don't have to rise. The villain doesn't have to be as bad or worse as the previous ones. There is nothing wrong with the story having a smaller scope than the previous games.

 

[DementedSheep]

I?m pretty sure they have been saying ME4 would not be a part of Shepards story since before ME3 even came out.

It would have to be set in a different universe entirely, just based on the perspective of story. The stakes pretty much can't be risen anymore than "save the galaxy from being completely wiped out by hyper-advanced synthetic lifeforms who are roughly the size of space ships."

It's kind of hard to take a step back after that. However, put it all in an entirely new universe and you can build up to whatever kind of story you want. If it's clear that this story does not take place in Shepard's universe, you won't be expecting anything, and the new threat can be slowly unveiled until the end of the over arcing plot. If it's set in the same universe, it's kind of hard to pull out a villain that's just as powerful, threatening, and equally built up to as the Reapers, who can also be somehow fit into the existing canon.

Looking forward to getting more information as it arrives!

That doesn't matter, you don't need to have a bigger threat every single time especially when your not even using the same character. Not everything needs to about saving the whole universe and the Reapers existence dose not invalidate every other problem.

 

[hentropy]

It should be obvious, but you can see how many dumb people can assume "direct sequel" upon hearing "Mass Effect 4". The rest of it is them saying in a roundabout way that they haven't decided what the next game is going to be, which is fine as far as I'm concerned, the longer they think about it, the better. But any tiny thing from Bioware is going to be shredded and pure hatred and vitriol will be spewed towards them. It might be a little bit deserved, but at the same time we can't condemn every future Bioware game because people weren't satisfied with the last 10 minutes of an otherwise pretty good ME3.

 

[saleem]

I really hope they go with the everyman hero route in the next installment instead of the galactic hero theme in 1,2 & 3. Something smaller with the characters dealing with events and problems that dont have the universe hanging in the balance. Just like in the movies you can get a lot of enjoyment out of stories that are small and personal.

I'd love to see a ME game where your actually on the other side of the law, maybe working for a small smuggling or criminal outfit then based on your decisions either you steer the outfit to be outright evil or more of a robin hood setup.

 

[Headbiter]

-snip-

a) Don't do this kind of thing, you lack any of the subtlety necessary for a sketch dialogue.
b) You missed the point so bad...mainly because I didn't say anything of what you..erm...try to parodize there. But I guess with critical texts of anykind, you're always being torn apart to the most basic level of idiocy. Because you know, criticism bad.

You hit the nail squarely on the head with this one. I see no reason to judge a game harshly when you literally know nothing about it. We haven't even seen a single screenshot or been told what it's going to play like.

Actually, he missed the board....of an entirely different structure.
I particulary don't care much about the ME-franchise. Not so much because I think it's bad but rather...well...it never got me all that interested in it. Maybe I got pretty tired of the standard formular, maybe I thought Shepard was bland...whatever it was I never got into the franchise.

And you know what? You're right, there is no reason to judge the game yet. And the attentive reader, few in number as they are, will notice that I didn't do that. The thing I'm taking issue with - and by god, that is a thing that so smells of standard marketing-decision - is that what Chris Priestly describes there is, in fact, a reboot. Is that a bad thing? Obviously I don't know. But as you said, there aren't even screenshots out for the game and already this guy sounds like a sleazy phone salesman who suffers from flopsweat due to nervousness.
Why not simply say "Hey, it's a reboot with different characters!"

As to why I'm concerned with this...well, I have this thing called pattern recognition. And sorry, but given the long-term history of EA and the short-term history of EA-Bioware, one really has to shut off all sensory functions to not feel a bit iffy with a project that starts with such a weasely statement.

 

[Notsomuch]

I hope it's an RTS.

 

[Gennadios]

Dead Space 3 is Mass Effect 4.

Seriously, my Origin account has ME3 on it and I got a bonus N7 suit thanks to that. Been playing with it on ever since.

I honestly can't tell which franchise I'm playing, mostly just wandering where the Quarians are, there's some prime salvage.

But any tiny thing from Bioware is going to be shredded and pure hatred and vitriol will be spewed towards them.
...

we can't condemn every future Bioware game because people weren't satisfied with the last 10 minutes of an otherwise pretty good ME3.

Thing is, Dragon Age 2 had exactly the same end-game problem, except that they were overshadowed by far deeper problems that people paid more attention to. ToR also had major writing issues that were sadly consistent with recent BioWare games.

I'm not condemning future BioWare games on ME3 alone, I've just seen enough of my favorite writers leave the studio and BW's current writing standards have been consistently sloppy for a good 4 years.

 

[UrinalDook]

And the attentive reader, few in number as they are, will notice that I didn't do that. The thing I'm taking issue with - and by god, that is a thing that so smells of standard marketing-decision - is that what Chris Priestly describes there is, in fact, a reboot. Is that a bad thing? Obviously I don't know. But as you said, there aren't even screenshots out for the game and already this guy sounds like a sleazy phone salesman who suffers from flopsweat due to nervousness.
Why not simply say "Hey, it's a reboot with different characters!"

No dude, what Chris Priestly describes there is a spin-off.

The last Star Trek was a reboot, because it took the same characters used in the original series but had them played by different actors, on different sets with swankier visuals and paid only lip service to previously told stories. The recent Colin Farrell film 'Total Recall' was a reboot of the original Total Recall because it featured the same characters and largely the same plot, only played by different actors on different sets with swankier visuals and in complete isolation of the original plot. The Amazing Spiderman was a reboot of Raimi's Spiderman because it featured, yeah you guessed it, the same characters and essentially the same origin plot, only played by different actors on different sets with ever so slightly swankier visuals and a mild tonal shift, while largely ignoring previously told stories.

By stating pretty categorically that this new game will not feature Shepard, and is therefore not retreading the exact same story as the existing trilogy, Chris Priestly has pretty succinctly described a spin-off; an addition to the existing universe, not a rewrite of it.

By your bizarre interpretation, the X-Wing series was a 'reboot' of Star Wars. Vice City is a 'reboot' of GTA III. US Marshalls is a 'reboot' of The Fugitive. And that ain't right, son.

Spin-off =/= 'reboot'. Stop trying to be edgy and cynical.

Edit: Just to be clear which side of the coin I'm coming down on here, @Mike_Richards - you're on the money.