BioWare: "We're Not Done" With Mass Effect

[Arkley]

I think I'm pretty much done with Mass Effect. And I loved it, don't get me wrong on that, I loved it, but I'm done with it.

Mass Effect 3's horrible ending pushed me pretty far and the EC didn't redeem it much - I was more concerned with the betrayal of tone, broken promises and major plotholes than the lack of closure - though it didn't push me far enough to retroactively ruin the series for me.

It has, however, potentially ruined the future of the series for me. The way I see it, the only way Bioware could successfully redeem themselves from the travesty of ME3's ending would be if it led to an interesting set of circumstances for a future ME game. Playing in the aftermath of ME3 could be excellent, and if the details of the ME3 ending contribute to an excellent game, then all is forgiven.

But that won't happen.

It would simply be impossible to continue the franchise in the aftermath of ME3, because two of the endings result in a galaxy-wide utopia and one results in (most likely) everyone everywhere being critically dead. The only ending that leaves the door open for continuing the franchise - with or without Shepard - is the "Destroy" ending. And if Bioware actually declared one of the endings to be canonical and continued the story from that ending alone, I'm pretty sure the internet would be utterly destroyed by the sheer volume of gamer rage. I'd be fine with it, personally, but I'll bet my ass I'm among the tiny, tiny minority on that.

So, that leaves only one option for continuing the franchise; set it pre/during-ME3. Frankly, I couldn't give less of a shit about what happened elsewhere, before ME3. I don't want to play through the First Contact War or the Skyllian Blitz, I know what happened and I know it all leads up to ME3's garbagepants ending. So I just don't see how any more ME could possibly interest me.

 

[CronoT]

Say what you want about Nintendo; the truth is, they PROTECT their IP's. We just pretend the Phillips CD-i never existed.

Metroid: Other M [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/lb_i.php?lb_id=13373815860B43920100&i_id=13373815860I43921400&p=1] would like to have a word with you.

This project, wherever it ends up, will be a lame duck. Keep in mind that this was a franchise that the creators had no plans for (and didn't script out any future plans for) until EA came in and ordered further sequels. If anything, EA should be commended for giving Bioware the extra three month delay to finish the game. I shudder to think how much more of a buggy, rushed mess the game would be if they released in December 2011 instead of March 2012.

Any further installment, by necessity, has to be either a prequel or a smaller-scale story. Trying to make an antagonist that "one-ups" the Reapers is going to fail, especially if it's set within the same time period as Shepard and his/her squadmates. The only foreseeable threat, the "tech singularity", by all in-game data, isn't set to show up for hundreds of thousands of years.

Bioware either has a choice of bridging the trilogy with prequels (which, if the response of the fanbase is any indication, will be a failure) or setting the action many, many centuries ahead and lose everything that made the games so unique (the world and characters they set up).

That said, if EA's marketing current strategy is any indication, it will either be filled with multiplayer or a F2P MMO. They turned their back on purely single-player games a long time ago.

Metroid: Other M was a unique game, I'll grant you that. I enjoyed it, but you may not. There are people who say that Metroid Prime ruined the franchise. It has 27 "Perfect 100" Scores on Metacritic. There's an entire SOCIETY of people dedicated to the delusion that the Earth is flat.

My point is, it's not a great game, but it's not a bad game, either. It actually reminded me a lot of Metroid and Metroid II.


(In case you were wondering: http://theflatearthsociety.org/cms/ )