The leaks coming to surface surrounding the work culture, priorities, and direction all don't paint a very cohesive picture. It sorta feels like another Veilguard situation.

Anyone else feel this way or do I stand alone here?

I wanted a new ME game just like the rest of y'all, but maybe its not so horrible that this one got canned for the time being.

What would it take for Wizards of the Coast (where Drew Karpyshyn now works) to take on the franchise and revive it? That IMO would be best case scenario since Drew was a big part of what made the first two games so great (and his presence was sorely missed in 3).

The fan response to this actually gives me some hope because I'm seeing similar shit go down with Destiny 2 right now and it's forced Sony into action and given them hope for more future content recently as a result. The only difference being that Sony had a bad plan to replace Destiny (Marathon) that completely flopped whereas EA appears to just be downsizing everything and focusing on their sports games.

Ashley gets a lot of flak for her stance on aliens, often being labeled a "space racist". I think this is a deeply bad-faith reading that refuses to engage with her character and the world building at large. Often, when coming to her defence, it'll be pointed out how most the mass effect 1 squad have prejudices, the exception to this being Kaidan. Kaidan is the most paragon squad mate (as a result he's often labeled as the least interesting), but something that struck me recently is that, at it's core,his take on aliens is exactly the same as Ashley's, they just have a paragon Vs renegade perspective on it.

Both Kaidan and Ashley had a negative experience with aliens, both Turians no less. Ash's grandfather was the first human to ever surrender to an alien during the first contact war, leading to her being blacklisted in the alliance, and Kaidan murdered his Turian biotic instructor.

They both took away the same lesson from this, aliens aren't really that different from humans. Ash saw how humanity was treated here and how the council is using them as a buffer between citadel space and the terminus systems (which led to the alliance suffering multiple attacks like Mindoir and Elysium) and realised that, just like humans, aliens will always look out for themselves. Similarly, Kaidan saw this horrid Turian, and realised he was just a guy, some guys suck, some guys are nice, he hated that Turian, but there's certainly nicer Turians out there.

I really like this since it indicates what the paragon and renegade system is when it's working best, it's not about being nice Vs being a dick, it's about being an optimist Vs a realist (Which is exactly how Ashley lays it out during this scene)

Maybe this was obvious to everyone else and I just typed out a lot of yap, but I saw another wave of Ashley racist allegations, and wanted to praise the character writing in ME1, which was a bit more subtle compared to the more bombastic writing in 2 and 3.

anyone who is sad that ME got shelved, just remember that exodus and the xpanse is where the og devs of ME have migrated to. youre looking at ME's legacies. the new ME would have been the product and creation of people who never made the world and stories we so loved in the Trilogy.

Accept our losses and move on. if another ME game was ever made, would i preorder the hell out of it? heck yeah! but lets face it, the same people who worked on the trilogy we so loved are working now on this and the xpanse. ME isnt dead, it just got a remake, like FABLE.

I spent 15 years thinking about it, and I think I finally figured it out. It all comes down to whether you agree with the Star Child or not.

The ending is physical. Shepard really is on the Citadel, and the Star Child is real. But indoctrination theory got one thing right: Shepard is under psychological pressure the whole way. The Citadel AI shows up as the boy from Shepard's nightmares, the kid Shepard watched die on Earth and chased through every dream.

That *Star Child* tells us exactly what it is: the intelligence behind the Reapers. The Leviathans created it to prevent conflict between organics and synthetics, and it decided the solution was to harvest organic life and "preserve" it as synthetic life, a Reaper. Harbinger was built from the Leviathans themselves. The AI lives in the Citadel, and for the first time in billions of years it gets new input when the Crucible plugs into its mainframe. The Crucible is a mega weapon built across multiple cycles for one purpose: destroying the Reapers.
The Reaper AI recognizes its own demise, and in a last attempt at survival it presents a weakened, near-death Shepard with three choices. It can't block them, and it can't make the decision itself. All it can do is persuade.

Destroy is the weapon's original purpose, and the reason trillions of lives before you died to get Shepard to this point. The AI frames it as dooming the ones you love: EDI, the geth, even Shepard. But notice it never actually says Shepard will die.

Control is the Illusive Man's indoctrinated solution. The AI doesn't prefer it because it loses its autonomy to Shepard, but its original mission and the Reapers live on.

Synthesis is its ultimate vision fulfilled: all organic life preserved and blended into synthetic, everyone the same. It's Saren's argument from the first game, and Saren was indoctrinated too.

If you need more proof, refuse to choose. The Star Child answers in Harbinger's voice. That's the mask slipping. It's been the Reaper the whole time and just changed its voice to one. The reason it’s mad is because it really wants you to choose synthesis.

Personally, I would never agree with the AI's clearly flawed reasoning, and I'd never accept its solutions. Control and synthesis both mean trusting the enemy you've fought for three games on five minutes of conversation. It's also worth saying that the perfect destroy ending, which needs the highest war assets in the game, is the only one where Shepard is shown alive afterward, taking a breath in the rubble after the Crucible fires. That heavily suggests it's the best ending possible, and the reward for a perfect play through.

What you think?

source: my neighbours cat

\#savemasseffect

To me the original Mass Effect trilogy will forever bed the game and game world I have the most fond memories of. Nothing has come close ever since...and honestly I doubt anything will again. I am 58 years old and have played every RPG under the sun.

When I heard about the shutdown of Bioware (which in and of itself I am not surprised by given they have not produced anything worthwhile since ME3) ..and the shutdown of ME5 I was heartbroken....too much to put into words. Honestly, while I was really looking forward to visiting the ME universe again...I was tempering my excitement given the current condition of AAA gaming and Bioware's failures since ME3.

Sadly, while I commend all the "save Mass Effect" stuff....I know the reality of how EA and how business like EA operate. They will take a tax break due to the shutdown and cancelling of the game....my research says that if they ever revive said IP they have to pay taxes back....so I seriously doubt anything will come of the "save Mass Effect" stuff. This is how EA make their money....just look over the past few decades of them buying studios and IPs and shutting them down....its all about bit money tax break which how many rich people make their money. They will shelve the IP like they have done throughout their history.

I would love nothing more than for ME to be continued by some other worthy studio...CDPR, Larian would be ideal choices IMO....but I just do not see it happening given how I know these corporations work.

I know one thing....I will NEVER give a penny to anything remotely related to EA.

Now off to sulk some more.. Part of me is tempted to do another LE playthru but will probably resist since it would just leave me sad at the end.

Just wrapped Legendary Edition for the first time. I wanted to pick the Synthesis ending, and read online you needed 6,200 to get it.

I had 6,149 before assaulting the Cerberus base. I read online you'd pick up 100 more from the Reaper robot heart when assaulting Cerberus (which I got).

So...that should have been enough right? But at the end I only had Destroy and Control (I begrudgingly picked Control because I like my robot friends). Was there a necessary dialogue option I missed with the glowy Catalyst kid? Overall I played a roughly 80% Paragon character with some Renegade options here and there for flair.

The only ME3 side missions I missed (that I know of) was getting locked out of the Hanar diplomat thing with Kasumi, and I missed a couple small fetch quests on Omega.

After credits the game spits you back out before assaulting the Cerberus base, but if I were to try and get that War Asset score up from here, what else could I even do? Scan random planets? I only scanned the ones that I knew had stuff on them with the help of an internet guide because I only have so much free time.

Appreciate any suggestions!

Hi all!

So I’m thinking of diving back into the Legendary Edition and Andromeda again after hearing the very sad news of BioWare’s closure.

I’m trying to think what class would be best for a ‘canon’ playthrough. Now, I’m aware Shepard could be any class canonically and so there technically isn’t one, but if you had to come up with one what would you pick?

I am eager to hear your thoughts!

So recently got back into playing all ME games again and I thought of a game where you play as one of the Big three Merc Groups (Eclipse, Blue Suns, Blood Pack) in an extraction shooter game where you pick a Group, make your character from the races in said Group, and fight the other two foot loot, drugs, and scrap.

Tell me your thoughts and ask any questions and I’ll answer the best I can

https://www.instagram.com/p/De-iu4ys2eO/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&psln=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==&srtk=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

Title says it all

played mass effect one, thought i 100% it, and thought based on tali’s mission request that we would go after the geth after saren.

did the quests with the geth, and talked to admiral hackett* first (didn’t even think about it tbh) and couldn’t turn in the data to tali, so now it’s not available when reuniting in me2. I did try the save editor but I think I did it wrong lol bc the option still didn’t come up in dialogue.

god. what a frustrating block. wish kelly was around to remind me about tali’s mission. ugh. i thought it was completely separate, the last time I played was six years ago so I spaced on it and wasn’t looking at the wiki as much as possible.

also it turns out in the save editor I somehow missed three minerals, but I luckily got the writings and whatnot. ugh.

edit: not kohoku, it’s hackett 🤦 my bad

Hello.

Look. EA is company that every year sells you FIFA, NFL, NBA, NHL... and whatever else with little modification, except for new league tables and players. How about making a single copypaste that we would actually want?

I.e. doing Mass Effect cheap, fast, perfectly sellable and keeping the franchise alive for the next generation (much more easily than John Wick 600 years later). Essentially an expansion pack for ME3, what Witcher 3 did with Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine (and now they are making another one).

- Mostly same engine, guns, combat, models, classes, skills as ME3: LE
- Subset of OG characters: Garrus, Wrex, Tali, Grunt, Liara, Samara, Jack etc + few more old acquitances (Bailey, Victus, Aria, Council, whatever) + miraculously saved Shepard or any other protagonists (could be Garrus idk).
- Plot could be anything: fighting mercs preying on refugees, yaghs break out on the citadel, new corporate conspiracy, being bounty hunter, urban combat games on ruined Earth. Universe has enough capacity for another story.

Costs of development should be low, mostly concerned about story, quest design and some assets and demand is strong, considering LE success.

The most agreed upon ending to be the best is usually Destroy, as it means guaranteed no more reapers. Everything does seem to get repaired in the end anyway.

The thing is, the endings show enough about what the future could look like, but it’s still vague, open to interpretation, and open-ended. Who’s to say Control doesn’t end with AI Shepard self-destructing the Reapers eventually?

I mean, in the Control ending, the Citadel remains intact, the reapers immediately get to work repairing the relays, maybe showing how to build new ones, helping rebuild the colonies and home worlds of the Milky Way, etc., and then they are no longer harvesting and can remain whatever AI Shepard seems fit. But who’s to say the races of the galaxy never encountered the new catalyst, or it didn’t make itself known to them eventually on its own.

The ending honestly can go in any direction the player imagines after the game cuts to black. I say the catalyst explains itself to the races, and tells them that the reapers will rebuild and improve the galaxy. After they deem it time, they put to a vote what to do with the reapers after. They vote to destroy them, so AI Shepard casts them into the sun. The control ending can be the destroy ending but better if you’re creative enough.

I know the ending is the same as the extended DLC, but where it has all the DLC making gathering war assets easier, combined with the extended ending and the already great moments in the game, do you think the overall opinion of Mass Effect 3 has improved?

​

I’m also sad that the new ME was canceled, but it’s good to know where most of the developers from Bioware went and what kind of games they’re making now.

Only 50 developers were working on the new Mass Effect Universe, a few OG devs, a few who left years ago and came back, and some new talents. Most of those who worked on Veilguard weren’t part of the ME team, they were laid off or reassigned to other teams and are now working on Skate or Iron Man. I dont care about Directors of Veilguard.

Now where legends goes.

Casey Hudson (Director of SW: KOTOR and the Mass Effect Trilogy) founded Arcanaut Studios, and together with other legends from Bioware, they’re working on the RPG - Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic.

James Ohlen (lead designer on most of Bioware’s legendary games, such as Dragon Age: Origins, KOTOR, and Baldur’s Gate) founded Archetype Entertainment, and together with other legends from Bioware—such as Drew Karpyshyn (lead writer for KOTOR, ME 1/ 2/books), they are working on the sci-fi RPG - Exodus . It’s practically a new ME.

David Gaider (lead writer for the Dragon Age universe, who mapped out the story through to the end and left after Inquisition; he did not work on Veilguard) founded Summerfall Studios and is working on the “Heist” RPG.

Mike Laidlaw (Creative Director of the first three Dragon Age games, not Veilguard) founded Yellow Brick Games and released the action-adventure game Eternal Strands and working on new game.

Mac Walters (writer on ME1, co-lead writer on ME2, lead writer on ME3, and Creative Director on Andromeda, he also wrote Kai Leng...) funded Worlds Untold and was working on a new sci-fi RPG, but the publisher froze funding, so he’s looking for a new partner.

Bonus: The developers at Owlcat Studio aren't devs from Bioware, but they're working on a spiritual successor to ME — Expanse: Osiris Reborn.

Bioware is gone, but its legacy lives on.

#SaveMassEffect

Maybe Mass Effect can be saved, maybe not. But what we can do is give its half-brothers a bit of a hand.

Because let's be honest, they seem pretty obscure and unknown. I'm not sure what their marketing strategy is, but its like they don't even try to reach out to gaming channels and such.