Bioware: Next Mass Effect on "The Right Track"

[Sidmen]

blah... If you do prequel, well no matter what happens, it all works out in the end because the ME games still happen. There can be no risk of Galactic extinction because the Reaper arc hasn't occurred yet. You can't have it set in the past because we already know how it ends. ...blah blah blah...

You're kidding, right? You can't tell a story because we all know how it is picked up 10, 20, or 30 years in the future? That's so utterly wrong I don't know where to begin, so instead I'll point at another Bioware game that did just that and ended up as my favorite game of all time.

Knights of the Old Republic, begins before the Original Trilogy and tells a completely unrelated story. Did it not matter because somewhere down the line Luke blows up the Death Star... twice? No, it just didn't care about Luke and his gang and used the universe as a jumping off point.

I can think of half a hundred different prequel stories that are worth telling. Not all of them would be worth a trilogy unto themselves, but I have no difficulty playing a single game about fighting pirates and solving mysteries in the Skillian Verge, or about being one of the first Humans on Omega who eventually rises to lead a criminal syndicate that makes the galaxy tremble.

You don't have to keep rehashing the same "save the galaxy" story over and over to use the Mass Effect setting.

 

[Icehearted]

I think it's cute that people think BioWare is still a company and not a corpse stuck on the end of one of EA's tentacles like some gruesome puppet.

 

[The Great JT]

I hope this game is on the right track. Additionally, I hope that track is the one that says, "we're going to make a good game and if people complain about it then whatever, we made the game we wanted to make and we are assured people will like it regardless."

 

[Dragonbums]

I think I'm just going to leave this here.

Pretty much sums up all I have to say in regards to the myth that the people who hated the ME3 endings are a "vocal minority"

http://youtu.be/gu731UtTFqo

Also, how does one add the spoilers tag on the forums?

The guy that made a huge video rant about how Citadel wasn't want the audience wanted right before it was released and it turned out to be EXACTLY what the audience wanted?

Yes. A lot of people were adverse to the Citadel DLC due to the fact that the trailers made it look like a James Bond short as opposed to anything Mass Effect. Especially when people were still majorly pissed at the endings.

Now tell me- how does that have anything to do with the video at hand, and how does an opinion on DLC in any way diminish his arguments filled with links, citations, and actual graph charts.

EDIT: Also thank you all for telling me how to make the spoilers tag. Much appreciated.

 

[Sidmen]

I think it's cute that people think BioWare is still a company and not a corpse stuck on the end of one of EA's tentacles like some gruesome puppet.

I think its cute that people keep thinking EA is some kind of monolithic monster that devours souls.

EA owned Bioware while it released four of my favorite games of all time: Mass Effect 1, 2, & 3; and Dragon Age: Origins (& Awakening, so 4.5 games). Of those, EA owned them during the development of all but 1, the weakest of the 4, Mass Effect 1.

 

[Novaova]

I'll care when ME4 is released and there's some reviews--fan and journalist--to read and think about. Until then I am skeptical and detached. I pre-purchased ME3, and I'm not getting fooled again.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

I think it's cute that people think BioWare is still a company and not a corpse stuck on the end of one of EA's tentacles like some gruesome puppet.

I think its cute that people keep thinking EA is some kind of monolithic monster that devours souls.

EA owned Bioware while it released four of my favorite games of all time: Mass Effect 1, 2, & 3; and Dragon Age: Origins (& Awakening, so 4.5 games). Of those, EA owned them during the development of all but 1, the weakest of the 4, Mass Effect 1.

Mass Effect was announced in 2005, Dragon Age in 2004 and Bioware was bought out by EA in 2007. It may have released them but ownership was only in the late stages, to the point where Bioware had only been in EA possession for a month before the release of Mass Effect (EA deal announcement 11/10/2007, Mass Effect 360 release in the US 20/11/2007)

And considering EA have recently gutted Burnout dev Criterion, people have the right to be sceptical about them.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.828311-A-sad-day-for-Burnout-fans-Criterion-Games-reduced-to-16-people#20152442

 

[Sidmen]

Mass Effect was announced in 2005, Dragon Age in 2004 and Bioware was bought out by EA in 2007. It may have released them but ownership was only in the late stages, to the point where Bioware had only been in EA possession for a month before the release of Mass Effect (EA deal announcement 11/10/2007, Mass Effect 360 release in the US 20/11/2007)

And considering EA have recently gutted Burnout dev Criterion, people have the right to be sceptical about them.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.828311-A-sad-day-for-Burnout-fans-Criterion-Games-reduced-to-16-people#20152442

Indeed, I've already admitted that they didn't own Bioware during the development of Mass Effect, what I consider to be the weakest of the trilogy (what with the uttery crap gameplay). But they did own it for the last two years of Dragon Age's Development, and the entire development time of Mass Effect 2 and 3, both high marks.

So far, I've only been disappointed by one Bioware game: Dragon Age 2. Sure, they created an MMO that I know nothing about since MMOs can all go die in a fire as far as I care, but I don't give up all hope when one semi-bad game comes out.

And with the risk of poking a scabbing wound, I fully expected the ending of ME3 to be almost exactly what it turned out to be. No RPG as far as I can remember has done anything other than "make an important choice, get a crap cinematic" for an ending. I really don't know what was expected that caused so much rage, and why they didn't just end their games when Sovereign comes down and laser beams you to death; that's an appropriate ending if I've ever seen one: you die, the last hope of humanity is destroyed, the reapers win. THE END. But the rest of the game was just about as good as anything I've played. They made me actually care about their NPCs, a rare occurrence to say the least.

 

[Hawkeye21]

So, Bioware is praising Bioware for how good ME4 is turning out to be and how successful its going to be? No wonder they suck lately, too busy circlejerking to do something else.

 

[LaoJim]

Whether on not you think Mass Effect 3 was any good or not...

Spoiler: My opinion if anyone cares

No it wasn't

What I personally dislike is the whole 4th episode to a finished trilogy. Somewhere along the line, whether from Tolkien or Star Wars, people have got the idea that an epic series needs to be done in 3 games/films/books. The general pattern seems to go.

1. Introduce the new IP
2. Capitalize on the first one's success and expand the world.
3. Prevent people becoming bored with the series by promising an epic ending.

And that would be fine, except that they inevitable want a fourth episode to continue making money after they've finshed the epic ending and tied up all the loose ends. So, a la Gears of War Judgement, we get a prequel that feels less than epic.

Lots of us fans want a Mass Effect 4 (a good one) and BioWare wants to make a Mass Effect 4, and they would have known this before making Mass Effect 3, but the trilogy rule kicks in -> people will be more likely to buy this if its the last game.

As a result Mass Effect suffered from what I call the Bablyon 5 syndrom. They spent all this time (2 games or 3 or 4 seaons respectively) saying the Big Bad is coming, get ready it's going to be the mother of all battles and then only 1 game/season fighting the Big Bad, which is really what we wanted to see. Mass Effect 3's story could have been better if they have spread it over two or three connected games. As it was, the story felt rushed with one quest to cure the Genophage, one quest on the Quarian/Geth war, one side quest each for most of the companions from ME2 who weren't granted team status this time around, and then one quest at the start and one at the end to McGuffin the reapers away.

I'd personally prefer to have a Game of Thrones thing going on where the developers say we've got a kick-ass story to tell (worked out, minus some details, from day one) and we'll tell it over however many episodes it seems to fit in.

 

[LaoJim]

Oh and on a completely unrelated note to my post above.

Time Travel.

They won't do a prequel as such, it'll be Time Travel.

 

[Rack]

Never understood the massive hate over an ending like ME3 received. Looking forward to see what they do with the series from here on out.

Despite the loud minority, the community here voted Me3 game of the year. ;-)

Wow, that is seriously depressing. I must have been repressing that particular memory.

 

[Oroboros]

Since Shepard is out of the picture as a playable character, I will be very disappointed if Bioware doesn't take the opportunity to expand our species choices beyond plain ol human. ME series was a bit heavy on emphasizing humans IMO, it would be nice to explore other species. That being said, I have no idea how they intend to continue the series at this point-the ending to the trilogy seemed rather decisive and I'm not sure how they intend to 'top' the reaper conflict.

 

[Ticklefist]

AAAGGGHHH! SHUT THE FUCK UP!!! I fucking hate it when developers do this. All they're doing is setting up high expectations for themselves and the fans, expectations that never meet what we idealize in our own heads. Just shut the fuck up and make the game.

Never understood the massive hate over an ending like ME3 received. Looking forward to see what they do with the series from here on out.

Despite the loud minority, the community here voted Me3 game of the year. ;-)

And ~75% voted against it. I think it's safe to say that Mass Effect 3 caused a splintered vote in which people had to vote for alternatives.

By that logic Mass Effect 3 was the least hated video game since it got the fewest number of people voting against it. However, voting for something =/= voting against something else. It's entirely possible that someone really liked Mass Effect 3, but liked Hotline Miami just a little bit more. And vice versa of course.

The version I paid 80 bucks for is on sale for $8 this weekend. 10% after 18 months. Minority. Right.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

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Yes! Lets redo what they did in KOTOR 2 and Dragon Age 2! Because it worked so f-ing well in those games, right? Just keep riding the same damn horse until its well beyond the point of dead. KOTOR 2 was terrible by every imaginable, measurable definition. That's why you're not getting a KOTOR 3 - except for a...what was it again...and MMORPG? No that can't be right -that'd validate my earlier point, so lets just ignore it. We can always go with DA2, a game so universally panned they made ME2 and ME3 to bleach the memories of Dragon's Age from our minds and risk a completely unrelated relaunch of the franchise. If you think those are SMART decisions, then by all means, have Bioware make a new Mass Effect game set in downtown Citadel with a few patched together characters with implied depth and meaning. I'm sure it wont be seen as a cheap knock off and desperate attempt to cash in on fan's love and loyalty. Not at all. Nothing Bioware has done would ever, EVER even hint that something like that could happen.

You're good to go. Hope it pays off mate,

 

[LetalisK]

The version I paid 80 bucks for is on sale for $8 this weekend. 10% after 18 months. Minority. Right.

You better tell Steam that sales of year and half old games = shit, then. EA too, since they're trying to copy Steam's model even after criticizing it. Or really anyone else for that matter. Not to imply the person you were talking to was any better, but you are using some horrible logic. Hell, it could be that a majority thought it absolutely stunk, but you're not doing yourself any favors in proving that with your absurd arguments.

 

[WarpZone]

When Commander Sheppard defeated the Reavers and destroyed all Mass Effect devices everywhere in the universe, billions of alien soldiers were left stranded in the Sol system, along with their faction's entire fleet bristling with high-powered energy weapons. They desperately needed food, water, and energy. And the only place to obtain these things was Earth.

Commander Sheppard either rallied Humanity in a desperate preemptive strike against the collective Fleet OR ELSE urged calm and hashed out negotiations, HISTORY IS DELIBERATELY VAGUE ON THIS POINT. But either way the result was a totalitarian state on Earth where everything is desperately rationed and billions are dead from starvation and conflict.

In the middle of all this, a mining team discovered a small Reaver artifact that was inexplicably neither activated nor destroyed following the initial Reaver invasion. It can send a single individual back in time, but the Desperate Alliance wanted to take it apart in an attempt to reverse-engineer Mass Effect technology and reestablish contact with their respective empires.

Sheppard either fights his way into the facility where the Artifact is being housed OR ELSE is unanimously voted as Organic Life's last best hope, and is sent back in time to try and prevent this impossible situation from happening. Then the Desperate Alliance takes the Artifact apart to reverse engineer Reaver technology, because you can do that just as easily after a device's batteries have been depleted as before, you idiots.

From this point you can re-play the game as many times as you like. It hits the major points of events in the first 3 games. Your goal is to ensure that EVERY NPC and race survives and achieves their full potential, that the endgame fight is choreographed and leverages that fucking doomsday device you managed to recover but didn't destroy in the final battle. It's almost impossible to predict how your minor decisions will affect the course of history, but fortunately Sheppard keeps a diary so that each time he reaches the endgame and goes back in time, he can mark which choices he made and what the effects of those choices were.

If you get 100% completion, your shots will turn blue. The rest of the time, your shots are red. If you play the entire game from start to finish, you see the tear-streaked face of a Bioware writer, superimposed over an image of the Galaxy, as he whispers "I'm sorry... we're all just... so... SORRY!"

Then Sheppard presses a button that removes all the oxygen in the universe. Then a Bioware PR rep holds a press conference where he says everyone survived.

There, I just wrote the ultimate sequel to Mass Effect. You're welcome.

 

[misg]

so people didn't like the ending of Me3... ok? Bioware went to a lot of effort to add extra content after the fact to "fix" what people didn't like. Now if they didn't do that, and say something like "deal with it" I could understand people being upset still.

Comments like "biggest waste of 60 bucks" come on, get a life and realize not everything revolves around your persona opinion of what a game should be. Was it a misstep sure, was it a colossal failure? not even close. It may not of been the best game Bioware released but it's still a good game a good ORIGINAL IP (which we are lacking these day) and it's still better then 90% of the crap studios throw at us. Perfect? no. Hatred justified? Absolutely not.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

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Not really? I replay ME2 all the time because a. I want to do all the romance options and b. because I'm fully aware its one of my favorite if not my absolute favorite game of all time. I know games don't get much better than this. But here's the thing. It already exists and is part of a greater universe. Why remake it? Why do another game aping to have the same appeal without the foundation(me1) and the conclusion(me3). the mass effect series works because very specifically its part of something greater than any one games. through all of me2 shepard never misses a beat to say the reapers are and always will be the ultimate threat. Ultimate being a very literal word, mind. Anything as ultimate and monumental as the reapers can't be followed up by just crime fighting in neo space tokyo. It really leaves the gamer with a sense of futility and deminsihment. they tried that in DA2 and it was terrible. I know of only one person who actually liked that game - not more than the original, he just saw it as something more than terrible.

I really, REALLY don't want to see that happen to Mass Effect.