Mass Effect: Andromeda

I'm hoping that the demos stressing 4k means that they will not pull that stunt again.
 
I'll bet that the game is being up-scaled from 1080P or a lower resolution to 4k for the consoles.
 
Flogger23m said:
After playing each map once you literally saw everything the MP mode had to offer. I would've preferred another DLC mission over it. That is just my opinion though.
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How is that any different from most other multiplayer games out there?
Blade-Runner said:
Would have been better if the progression mechanics were not a thinly veiled monetised slot machine.
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I never spent a cent on equipment crates and I got every item in the game. Bioware also released free content updates regularly.
 
Mr. Bluntman said:
They don't have the guts. And if they did it would be twice as boring as DA:I.



I agree, it's completely stupid. I think there was plenty of room for new threats in the existing framework, like the Leviathans getting a big head and wanting to dominate the lesser races again, or perhaps a new undiscovered aggressor race that evolved independently of mass effect tech set a few years after 3 after much of the rebuilding has been done.

But nope, rather than challenging themselves to fix things BioWare wants to distance itself as far as possible from the ending of 3, taking the easy way out, as I've said many times before.
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And on the other hand if they followed your advise people would complain they rehashed the story by continuing to stay in Milky Way. I love sequels to my favorite IP's but sometimes you need a clean slate to tell an even better story or perhaps correct issues from pervious one.
And this butt hurt from DAI is getting so old. It wasn't perfect but it was clearly a great day and one of my favorites. If they take some framework elements from DAI and implement into MEA, I will be super happy and it will be a day one purchase.
 
fdiaz78 said:
And on the other hand if they followed your advise people would complain they rehashed the story by continuing to stay in Milky Way. I love sequels to my favorite IP's but sometimes you need a clean slate to tell an even better story or perhaps correct issues from pervious one.
And this butt hurt from DAI is getting so old. It wasn't perfect but it was clearly a great day and one of my favorites. If they take some framework elements from DAI and implement into MEA, I will be super happy and it will be a day one purchase.
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I certainly don't begrudge their decision to make a new story in a new location, especially after ME3's ending. It will be good to move on from that. And I don't mind that they borrow some of DA:I more enjoyable elements, I just want it to stay Mass Effect, and not be a rehash of other successes with a new paint job. They admitted the exploration in ME1 was no where near what they wanted it to be because of the limitations of consoles at the time. They have also said they'd like an opportunity to do that right. I hope they do, and there is some interesting places to explore, but not at the loss of a solid, focused, story. That is what has always set ME apart for me, if they lose that trying to be too many things I will be disappointed. But we can't know any of this until the games release, all we have now is what the marketing department wants to show us, and that is not enough info to make a judgement.
 
fdiaz78 said:
And on the other hand if they followed your advise people would complain they rehashed the story by continuing to stay in Milky Way. I love sequels to my favorite IP's but sometimes you need a clean slate to tell an even better story or perhaps correct issues from pervious one.
And this butt hurt from DAI is getting so old. It wasn't perfect but it was clearly a great day and one of my favorites. If they take some framework elements from DAI and implement into MEA, I will be super happy and it will be a day one purchase.
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I would've preferred a true clean slate. Keep the key mechanics in, but create entirely new lore. Nothing reused.
 
Armenius said:
I never spent a cent on equipment crates and I got every item in the game.
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And how much grinding did you have to do to achieve that? I spent several hours playing the MP but all I got from the randomised loot system was garbage consumables and a couple of mediocre non-exotic weapons. All the more galling was the requirement to randomly receive the same weapon multiple times in order to upgrade its firepower. The intention behind making the progression system such a chore is self evident.....to incentivize users to purchase weapon crates to speed up the process. Yes you didn't have to spend any money, but quite frankly the gameplay from my perspective was simply not compelling enough to warrant grinding for hundreds of hours in the hope of better loot. If we were talking about cosmetics then I wouldn't care, but instead Bioware adopted a very specific design philosophy that had a material influence on gameplay for the purpose of exploiting and profiting from end user psychology.
 
Blade-Runner said:
And how much grinding did you have to do to achieve that? I spent several hours playing the MP but all I got from the randomised loot system was garbage consumables and a couple of mediocre non-exotic weapons. All the more galling was the requirement to randomly receive the same weapon multiple times in order to upgrade its firepower. The intention behind making the progression system such a chore is self evident.....to incentivize users to purchase weapon crates to speed up the process. Yes you didn't have to spend any money, but quite frankly the gameplay from my perspective was simply not compelling enough to warrant grinding for hundreds of hours in the hope of better loot. If we were talking about cosmetics then I wouldn't care, but instead Bioware adopted a very specific design philosophy that had a material influence on gameplay for the purpose of exploiting and profiting from end user psychology.
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I don't remember how long it took. I was enjoying the game too much. I played the ME3 multiplayer practically every day for around 6 months, and I never continued playing just to unlock more stuff. It never felt like a grind.
 
Armenius said:
I don't remember how long it took. I was enjoying the game too much. I played the ME3 multiplayer practically every day for around 6 months, and I never continued playing just to unlock more stuff. It never felt like a grind.
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Although I didn't play that much that's exactly how I felt about it too. It was just fun to play, I never played to get better weapons or to reach a goal.

I think I liked it because it didn't feel like other mulitplayer games because everyone was focused on the goals, there was almost zero idle time and zero chitchat. Everyone knew what to do and everyone was doing it to the best of their abilities. And the matchmaking system seemed to work well, because the players it paired me with were very similarly skilled.
 
Armenius said:
I don't remember how long it took. I was enjoying the game too much. I played the ME3 multiplayer practically every day for around 6 months, and I never continued playing just to unlock more stuff. It never felt like a grind.
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I didn't enjoy the game enough to play it everyday for 6 months. For people who are going to sink hundreds of hours anyway it may not make a difference, but for anyone else the progression system is simply tedious for the sake of encouraging you to spend money, and that is total bullshit as a general rule of thumb for any game that isn't F2P. Bioware didn't have to design the progression system that way, there are innumerable other ways it could have been done, but they did it for a very specific reason. Jim Sterling has ranted about these types of "optional" micro transactions for years, and I agree with him except in so far as cosmetics are concerned.

 
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Dan_D said:
I would be willing to bet that we will get a straight port of the console version of the game.
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Nowadays that's not as big of a problem as you'd think console architecture is not that different from the PC as used to be with previous generation consoles. The same engine is running the game on both platforms. If they don't mess up the controls, and provide high resolution textures to the PC, which is as much effort as generating them separately with higher resolution from the raw textures. Then there is not much you can mess up with a "straight" port.
 
M76 said:
Nowadays that's not as big of a problem as you'd think console architecture is not that different from the PC as used to be with previous generation consoles. The same engine is running the game on both platforms. If they don't mess up the controls, and provide high resolution textures to the PC, which is as much effort as generating them separately with higher resolution from the raw textures. Then there is not much you can mess up with a "straight" port.
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I'm not suggesting that a straight port would be a huge pile of shit. I'm doubting that EA/BioWare will bother to give us higher resolution textures because they've never done so with any previous Mass Effect game to date.
 
DWolvin said:
Entirely new = not Mass Effect.
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why would anyone want a 'clean slate' and a completely new universe when Bioware built an amazing world, mythology, characters, species with the first trilogy?...that's like saying Star Wars needs a clean slate and to forget about the amazing world they built...there are tons of stories left to tell in the previous ME games...this whole new world is an over-exaggeration by Bioware because of the fallout from the ending to ME3
 
polonyc2 said:
why would anyone want a 'clean slate' and a completely new universe when Bioware built an amazing world, mythology, characters, species with the first trilogy?...that's like saying Star Wars needs a clean slate and to forget about the amazing world they built...there are tons of stories left to tell in the previous ME games...this whole new world is an over-exaggeration by Bioware because of the fallout from the ending to ME3
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I was answering Flogger23m- and I agree that they made an amazing universe and hope it continues. I think jumping to Andromeda is simply to prevent the continuity issues with the end of the series (M3, that is), because much of what made the first couple of them great was the exploration. Hard to get a great story when you need to either leave the universe in a set state for the game history we already know, or have to figure out how to pull a rabbit out of a hat and start after 3 while still getting the fans to put down the pitchforks...
 
polonyc2 said:
why would anyone want a 'clean slate' and a completely new universe when Bioware built an amazing world, mythology, characters, species with the first trilogy?...that's like saying Star Wars needs a clean slate and to forget about the amazing world they built...there are tons of stories left to tell in the previous ME games...this whole new world is an over-exaggeration by Bioware because of the fallout from the ending to ME3
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I have a feeling that this clean slate is not as clean as we were led to believe. I bet if they wouldn't have told us that it is taking place in another galaxy, we wouldn't know the difference.
 
Well, they did cover that it's a 'generation ship' style exodus from the Milky Way, and that sets the baseline for the entire story. I doubt there will be much of the original three other than what the (I think it was) three species ships and the main central ship (forget the names right now). At least that would be prime. What we will get isn't really worth getting to spun up over until more info drops.
 
polonyc2 said:
why would anyone want a 'clean slate' and a completely new universe when Bioware built an amazing world, mythology, characters, species with the first trilogy?...that's like saying Star Wars needs a clean slate and to forget about the amazing world they built...there are tons of stories left to tell in the previous ME games...this whole new world is an over-exaggeration by Bioware because of the fallout from the ending to ME3
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Clean slate meaning new set pieces and characters. The writers can use elements of the Mass Effect universe and apply them to new characters so it feels familiar and feels fresh. Speaking of Star Wars, how many of us here would have loved to have seen backstories of some of the characters in new settins that did not involve the empire? Heck look at God of War, they are changing the entire mythology setting. He's still badass Kratos but in a different mythos. Looking forward to that.
 
New initiative video out. Nothing really new, other than the main station will be mostly constructed on the other side of the trip.
 
Game Informer has an interview with Mac Walters up, for those who are interested:



I did not hear anything I would consider a major Spoiler, but I easily could have missed something. There are definitely minor spoilers, but Mac is being careful not to reveal too much.
 
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Release date March 21

https://www.masseffect.com/news/mass-effect-andromeda-coming-in-march

By Aaryn Flynn, General Manager of BioWare

On behalf of our teams across Montreal, Edmonton and Austin, I’m excited to announce that Mass EffectTM: Andromeda will be launching in North America on Tuesday, March 21, 2017 and beginning Thursday, March 23, 2017 in Europe. We appreciate your patience (and in fact, even your lack of patience in some instances) as we’ve been focused on completing the game. Here’s a little bit of context into how we’ve gotten here.

Mass Effect: Andromeda is our most ambitious Mass Effect game to date. We’re telling completely new stories, creating new characters, new planets, new species, and introducing new gameplay systems. And for the first time, we’re bringing Mass Effect to the FrostbiteTM game engine, an incredible engine that’s delivering a tremendous graphical jump from the trilogy to Mass Effect: Andromeda. To deliver on this, we’re taking all the time we can to make sure you’re getting the best possible experience.

Over this holiday break, developers at BioWare took home a version of the game in what we call the “holiday build”. This is a longstanding studio tradition that goes back to the early days of the original Mass Effect. Many load up a PC or console and go home to play as much as possible at their leisure. Coming back from holiday, the feedback has been great. Getting the endorsement from members of our studio, many of whom played key roles on the original trilogy, was definitely a key factor in helping us lock in on the date.

Even more exciting for us over the last couple of months has been seeing the excitement build in the community as we’ve started to share more about the game. The passion you have for the franchise continues to drive us. And now, we’re just a couple of months away from delivering a brand new Mass Effect experience to you for the first time in five years – richer, deeper and ready for exploration. We’re excited about how far we are going with the franchise, and we hope you find it’s been worth the wait.

See you in Andromeda,

Aaryn
 
So basically, EA shoved their boot up BioWare's ass. The game seemed destined to be a Fall '17 release.
 
Megalith said:
So basically, EA shoved their boot up BioWare's ass. The game seemed destined to be a Fall '17 release.
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Don't know where you got that from. An early 2017 release has been alluded to since at least E3 last year. Mass Effect also has an historic precedence of releasing in this timeframe (May, January, March).
 
I pre-ordered the previous games, and I'll probably cave before release day and pre-order this one too, but my gut tells me to wait for reviews. I want this to be good, but so far the trailers have been.... off. I have a bad feeling in the back of my head that won't go away. I will gleefully be wrong, I WANT to be wrong, but until we know for sure, I'll be leary.
 
Frraksurred said:
I pre-ordered the previous games, and I'll probably cave before release day and pre-order this one too, but my gut tells me to wait for reviews. I want this to be good, but so far the trailers have been.... off. I have a bad feeling in the back of my head that won't go away. I will gleefully be wrong, I WANT to be wrong, but until we know for sure, I'll be leary.
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The cringe-inducing moment in the gameplay trailer where the female lead takes the gun away from the Turian gives me that bad feeling that the writing is going to be really shitty...
 
Domingo said:
Good/Bad/Marginal, I have a feeling I won't see my wife for at least a week after this hits. She marathonned the previous ones.
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I'd love to meet a woman like that, but I'm about 20 yrs too old (I'm 48). Woman my age still react to "video games" like you must be the guy living in your parents basement. Woman, you couldn't afford my basement!
 
Dan_D said:
A 5GB day one patch wouldn't be unprecedented.
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Neither would a 10gb patch, devs/publishers are pushing the boundaries of absurdity. Just finish your fucking games instead of shoveling out what you must know is half baked broken trash....is that really too much to ask? Evidently it is.
 
Looks interesting to me, I wish they had not used a dark planet to show gameplay (but I'll see it later on a good monitor), and it's clear that the person driving was on the lowest difficulty level, or completely in godmode. Still, can't wait!
 
DWolvin said:
Looks interesting to me, I wish they had not used a dark planet to show gameplay (but I'll see it later on a good monitor), and it's clear that the person driving was on the lowest difficulty level, or completely in godmode. Still, can't wait!
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Knowing the history of gameplay trailer vs. reality with Mass Effect, I'll have to agree. Sometimes I believe the higher difficulties are never tested with how absurd some of the armored enemies were in ME3 on Insanity, which ironically were balanced fine in the multiplayer on Gold and Platinum.
 
Just make it exactly like the first 90% of ME3 and I'll eat it up. Might have been (IMO) one of, if not the, best games of all time, since it wrapped up a really strong trilogy, if not for the epic faceplant at the end. Not just the ending itself, but that whole last chapter... :(
 
Truth, to both of you. Make is as good as ME2/3 as far as gameplay, and as long as we are spitballing hopes, lets toss in ME3 multi, which was surprisingly good (other than that grind for boxes).
 
Armenius said:
Knowing the history of gameplay trailer vs. reality with Mass Effect, I'll have to agree. Sometimes I believe the higher difficulties are never tested with how absurd some of the armored enemies were in ME3 on Insanity, which ironically were balanced fine in the multiplayer on Gold and Platinum.
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Absurd were the krogans in ME1, where they regenerated health faster than you could lower it with your weapons due to overheating. Plus add adrenalin burst they were literally indestructible.
 
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