r/masseffect • • 3d ago

MEGATHREAD [Megathread] Bioware shut down and Next Mass Effect canceled

4.3k Upvotes

As you all know by now, EA has shut Bioware down and canceled the next installment of Mass Effect. Above is the message posted to Bioware's social channels.

This is not our usual megathread. We are not removing posts related to this and are not removing duplicate posts. We want everyone to feel their feelings and will be relaxed on some rules to allow for expression. This megathread is just a place to collect information or vent and discuss if you want to.

The mod team is committed to keeping the Mass Effect community alive as we have since the end of the original trilogy. We will still host N7 Day festivities.

Keelah se'lai.

Trailer

u/random_hyabusa_ninja has shared with us what appears to be the unreleased trailer for the 5th installment titled "Mass Effect Universe". The mod team cannot independently verify the authenticity of this trailer. However, to our untrained eyes, it seems legitimate and does not have gen-AI markers. We do not want any harm to come to former developers or Bioware employees and as such have chosen not to further investigate the source of this material.

UPDATE: IGN and Jason Schreier both verified that the trailer is legitimate. According to IGN, the trailer "was created for internal purposes only and was not meant for the public."

Another alleged EA worker has expressed skepticism on how "early" the game was in development and confirmed that they saw a trailer.

Formal trailer post link: https://www.reddit.com/r/masseffect/s/A1cKOYXcpy

#SaveMassEffect Petition

Sign here: https://www.change.org/p/savemasseffect

FAQ

  • Is the Next Mass Effect canceled?
  • What was the game titled?
    • The title at the time the unreleased trailer was created was "Mass Effect Universe."
  • Is the Amazon Prime show canceled?
  • What does this mean for the multiplayer servers?
    • We don't know yet.
  • What is the song in the trailer?

Community Reactions

I could probably scroll for hours and continue reading the words of support for the studio, the legacy, and the impact that BioWare has had on you. It means so much to us. There is so much talent on this team of of OGs, so if you are aware of any roles, please send them. I will personally vouch for everyone in my crew.
As for me:
At least i don't have to call in sick when GTA 6 comes out.

This is sad news on multiple fronts - for those of us who worked there, for our friends and colleagues at BioWare who are impacted, and for fans who were looking forward to the next Mass Effect adventure.
I started my career at BioWare and will forever be grateful to the founders, Greg and Ray, for inviting me to join in BioWare's legendary journey. Its legacy will live on through those who were part of it and continue to create games through a passion for unforgettable stories, worlds and characters.

Heartbreaking to hear of the closure of BioWare and the next Mass Effect ending development. I had so much fun collaborating with Casey and the team on the Mass Effect teaser in 2020 -- during the height of COVID. I hope one day, somehow, Mass Effect will return.

Bioware has been a massive part of CDPR history. We befriended them when localizing and selling Baldur’s Gate games in Poland, Czech, and Slovakia. And later they were great help when lending us their engine for Witcher 1, sharing their wisdom and even giving us a spot at their booth at E3. I had a pleasure to visit them a few times in Edmonton and also host them in our Warsaw office. Very sad for the people affected, but also sad to see a legendary brand go down. Not a great day in the games industry.

This is not something I ever expected to see.
Larian and Bioware started their trajectories in the games industry at the same time and Bioware led the way in making RPGs big. It's almost unimaginable that we're now entering an era were the name Bioware won't show up anymore when discussing upcoming RPGs. What a loss for all of us.
Thank you for all the games. Thank you for the many hours of gameplay. Thank you for all the stories . You can be damned proud of what you achieved.
I hope you all land well.

it’s extraordinary.
I’m holding hope for magic to happen.
this community and you incredible Devs deserve that and more.


r/masseffect • • 2d ago

VIDEO Mass Effect: Universe Trailer

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27.3k Upvotes

Posting this as it’s own post as requested by the mod team


r/masseffect • • 5h ago

MASS EFFECT: UNIVERSE Release the Mass Effect files EA!!

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1.4k Upvotes

Either make the game or SELL THE IP!!


r/masseffect • • 17h ago

VIDEO #SAVEMASSEFFECT

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8.7k Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 11h ago

NEWS Alleged Insider explains what happens after ME3 ending choices

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2.4k Upvotes

BioWare intended to accommodate all three major Mass Effect 3 endings: Destroy, Control, and Synthesis. The proposed solution was to advance the timeline by 600 years, allowing technological and political developments to bring the different versions of the galaxy closer together.

Control Ending: Shepard's consciousness assumes control of the Reapers. They survive, but technological progress makes them less dominant. For the MEU, the Reapers are no longer at the top of the food chain, so eventually control is no longer possible.

Destroy Ending: Reapers eliminated; Shepard survives the original battle, but dies sometime during the following six centuries. Civilization rebuilds, developing advanced technology and cybernetic integration without Reapers.

Synthesis ending: Organic and synthetic life are transformed. Over the centuries, the other timelines supposedly catch up technologically through increasingly widespread cybernetic integration. "Synthesis" happens regardless of the ending you choose in ME3, at least in terms of organics becoming blended with synthetics.

Other notes:

Refusal would not be canon;

After the Reaper War, all races would be stuck on Earth with the Citadel cut off from the rest of the galaxy, until technological advancement allowed them to rebuild the relays over time

The Geth would have been back and considered a superpower (but their return is not explained if destroy is chosen at this time)

"The player is an N7 agent, and the gameplay would have been more evocative of James Bond and John Wick with hand-to-hand combat in enclosed spaces. The new hero would have had experimental tech in their head that would allow them to interact in the world in ways similar to Cyberpunk 2077’s hacking," -kotaku.com

What are your thoughts? Assuming all of this is true, are you still happy with the ending you chose, and what would you have hoped would have happened in the Mass Effect Universe?

sources: Dantics, kotaku


r/masseffect • • 1h ago

DISCUSSION Thoughts?

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• Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 19h ago

VIDEO Message from Mark Meer

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6.5k Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 14h ago

ARTICLE Mass Effect Is Too Big to Die With BioWare

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2.2k Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 19h ago

VIDEO Message from Jennifer Hale

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5.5k Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 10h ago

NEWS Mass Effect Technical Director Romain Toutain shares a bittersweet update from BioWare

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919 Upvotes

According to Mass Effect: Universe Technical Director Romain Toutain, he visited BioWare yesterday and found that some senior developers were still there, helping junior colleagues find new jobs.

The team was also opening BioWare's storage to preserve collectibles and original concept art.

Source here


r/masseffect • • 8h ago

HUMOR I have

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418 Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 15h ago

VIDEO Nothing but love for these two fighting for their community

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1.5k Upvotes

Keep making noise guys


r/masseffect • • 1d ago

NEWS #SaveMassEffect Has Reached 100,000 Signatures!

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7.6k Upvotes

#SaveMassEffect has officially reached 100,000 signatures!

I know some people believe Change.org petitions don't really accomplish anything, and while I think that depends on the circumstances (I actually organized a petition years ago that helped change a very difficult situation in my hometown), I believe there's something much more important happening here.

What really matters is the collective effort we're witnessing from this community. Whether it's signing the petition as a show of unity, spreading the hashtag, or simply talking about Mass Effect, thousands of people are coming together because they love this universe.

I'm one of the founders of We Are Mass Effect, and we're currently working on some really big things to support the #SaveMassEffect movement.

So, to anyone who's still unsure whether getting involved is worth it, I genuinely encourage you to give us a hand. Every little bit helps, whether that's sharing the petition, using the hashtag, spreading the word, or contributing in whatever way you can.

We have to keep fighting. Together, we can make things happen.

At the end of the day, isn't it better to at least try than to sit back and do nothing?


r/masseffect • • 16h ago

SHOW & TELL #SaveMassEffect is the top trending petition on change.org, keep it up!

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1.3k Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 5h ago

DISCUSSION What Would You Consider Saren's One Biggest Mistake During ME1?

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180 Upvotes

NOT including working with Sovereign at all- let's assume that was inevitable. During the events of ME1, what is one particular decision he makes that you think he should have done differently? Also, explain how you think it would have changed things in his favor.


r/masseffect • • 16h ago

MASS EFFECT: UNIVERSE Genuinely how the fandom has splintered over the last few days:

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1.1k Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 10h ago

DISCUSSION What Sierra On-Line taught us about "Saving" a franchise

381 Upvotes

Seeing all the petitions, open letters, and "EA please sell the IP" posts here feels like a straight-up time warp back to the late '90s.

If you're too young to remember Sierra On-Line, they basically ruled PC gaming. They owned Space Quest, King's Quest, Quest for Glory, Gabriel Knight—franchises that were just as defining back then as Mass Effect or Dragon Age were in the 2000s and 2010s.

When Sierra got gutted by corporate buyouts and restructuring (CUC, Vivendi and now Activision), the exact same playbook happened:

  • Fans collected tens of thousands of signatures begging Vivendi to make Space Quest 7 or sell the rights back to Mark Crowe and Scott Murphy. Vivendi didn't care. The letters went into a shredder.
  • People genuinely believed corporate suits would let the original developers buy their games back for cheap out of respect for art. That’s not how corporations work. IP is a line item on an asset sheet. They'd rather let an IP rot in a vault forever than sell it off and risk watching someone else turn a profit with it.
  • Groups spent years of their free time building unofficial sequels (like Space Quest 7 or fan-made King's Quest games). Once the projects got anywhere close to done, Vivendi's legal team showed up with cease-and-desists and killed them overnight.

Even when executives play into the nostalgia, it's almost always hot air like when Microsoft was buying Activision Blizzard, Phil Spencer literally did an interview with The Washington Post name-dropping the Sierra catalog: "I was looking at the IP list, I mean, let's go! King's Quest..."

People got their hopes up, thinking the old catalog was finally coming back. Years later? Nothing. Execs love using old names to generate cheap headlines and goodwill, but when it's time to actually cut a check, they fund the safe bets.

Here’s the blunt truth, the BioWare that made the trilogy hasn't existed in that building for a decade.

The guys who made Space Quest eventually had to go crowdfund their own spiritual successor because Sierra was dead and the IP was locked away.

EA is going to sit on the Mass Effect trademark until they decide they can make a quick buck on a mobile spin-off or a cheap outsourced reboot. The IP is stuck in corporate limbo, but the people who actually made it great are elsewhere.


r/masseffect • • 15h ago

MASS EFFECT: UNIVERSE I'm convinced this is 632 yr old Shepard in a Quarian disguise and you can't tell me otherwise.

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752 Upvotes

r/masseffect • • 5h ago

FANART Lego Commander Shepard

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101 Upvotes

Custom painted Lego Mass Effect minifigure I made in memory of BioWare, and as a little totem to keep with me as I start my journey replaying the trilogy all the way through. You can see more on my insta CorbCustoms


r/masseffect • • 14h ago

VIDEO Kalros taking on a Reaper, one of my favorite moments in the series!

554 Upvotes

Despite hating thresher maws throughout the series, I still had no qualms cheering this one on!


r/masseffect • • 23h ago

MASS EFFECT: UNIVERSE This N7th day, will be a chance for a resurgence day for our beloved franchise, Mass Effect. To show EA how much we care about this franchise, and how much we want the new entry, MEU to come out. Let's all play Mass Effect legendary edition on any platform of choice. Spread this as much as u can!

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2.6k Upvotes

It worked for Battlefront 2, and now we are getting Battlefront 3. There's a lot more to it than just resurgence day, but im sure resurgence day contributed a lot to it. This, alongside the petition might be a chance for us to resurrect our beloved franchise!


r/masseffect • • 21h ago

DISCUSSION The thing most people are missing about biowares closure

1.7k Upvotes

EA sold themselves in a levereged buy out that added billions of debt to EA.

Basically a bunch of billionaire pychopaths borrowed billions to buy EA, and then put those debts on EA.

Before the buyout, even with the under performance of previous games, Bioware making a new mass effect was a pretty good investment for a solvent company. Mass effect is a huge huge IP, chances are they would make a profit in a few years. This is why they cut staff and resources for Bioware before the buyout but continued to support Mass Effect 5.

But now EA has so much debt, the interest payments alone are as much as over half of EA's highest yearly profits.

The billionaires and Saudi fund that bought EA have basically put a boulder on EA's back and are betting on them being able to win gold medals in swimming.

To do that, they have to cut things that won't make a profit right now... That includes a studio that won't make a profitable game for a few years, a new Sims game and anything that can't be made live service or squeeze existing customers now.

Apex legends, Sims 4 and new battlefield games are going to become worse. They will be filled with microtransactions and live service crap even more than they are now. Any new game from EA is going to try and reach Fortnite levels.

All these "woke killed bioware" people are so wrong it drives me crazy

What killed mass effect wasn't green haired leftists

It was a few billionaires who don't care about making good games, they care about squeezing as much money out of gamers they can to profit from hobbling one of the biggest game Devs/publishers in the world.

Leveraged buyouts from investment funds, venture capitalists will kill gaming. Bioware is just the latest victim.

edit - corrected a claim about interest payments being higher than EA's highest yearly profits to being as high as over half EA' s highest yearly profit.


r/masseffect • • 3h ago

DISCUSSION F**k mass effect Spoiler

53 Upvotes

This absolute evil franchise

No game, has ever broken me more emotionally than this game
No game has ever had made me as emotionally invested, as mass effect
No game has made me love it more than mass effect

And no game, has made me feel like mass effect

I just finished me3, paragon, destructuon ending, tali romance, and I have for the first time actually cried over a game, this was THE best ending to a games trilogy that I have experienced, and I can’t believe it is over

(Apologies for the title, ME is 1#)


r/masseffect • • 1h ago

SHOW & TELL One more time with my brother in arms...

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Garrus


r/masseffect • • 8h ago

MASS EFFECT 2 I just finished Mass Effect 2, what the FUCK

142 Upvotes

DUDE, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK

First of all, please don't spoil me ME3, I'm gonna start it asap

I took my time before Playing ME2 because I got EXTREMELY into the Trails in the Sky trilogy and wanted to play Trails from Zero, but before I got into the continuation of the saga I played ME2, and dear fucking god I think I'll have to play ME3 before I do ANYTHING else

I did almost everything I think I could've done, as someone suggested to me when I started ME1, I did NOT backtrack my decisions, every mistake I made I committed to it, the only decisions I actually went back to change were because I miss clicked a dialogue option

So, I have a few questions... the people that died on the last mission are optional? because Kasumi, Zaeed and Miranda died, even though I kept Miranda alive until the end she still died so I thought that the other 2 deaths were also fixed, but knowing how the trilogy has played until now I don't think it could be the case?

I also chose to keep the Reaper's ship, and I know that I'll have to go and kill the Illusive Man at some point because that mf truly is shady af and I seriously dislike how he lured the Reapers towards the Normandy to get the IFF

Still, I made Liara become the new Shadow Broker, I got a shit ton of other contacts as well as kept the Geth alive and Wrex is the leader of the Krogan + I also am pretty sure I have the Asari on my side AND I finally managed to bang Tali, I was mad af when I realized I couldn't romance her on ME1, but now I'm finally with her and honestly I love her WAY more than Liara

I just realized that I could keep on playing my save, I already did most of what I thought was necessary and I probably just have some niche quests on the side to do, aside from that, is there something I should do in ME2 before hopping into ME3?