Mass Effect Andromeda II: Stay Strong and Clear!

[tonberrian]

You know I'd appreciate profiles a lot more if they allowed you to switch up how you assigned your level-up perks. So vanguard has a full vanguard-build, but you could switch to tech-sniper and be completely different, instead of having to fit tech sniper and vanguard into the same level up pool and splitting your focus.

[GungHo]

You know I'd appreciate profiles a lot more if they allowed you to switch up how you assigned your level-up perks. So vanguard has a full vanguard-build, but you could switch to tech-sniper and be completely different, instead of having to fit tech sniper and vanguard into the same level up pool and splitting your focus.

That would be entirely too much fun.

I'd also have liked the powers to be linked to profiles... as in, change profile and get the linked powers, so that you can toss someone with throw as a biotic and change to combat and hit them with a concussion round as a soldier. (I realize you can do that now, but Daddy Ryder got to flip his around on demand) Again, way too much fun. I'd be fine with fewer powers in exchange, especially where the powers lack differentiation.

[Psyren]

Trip/Frag/Flak are also good to dump points in if you need to level combat. Stick them on a profile, pop them off when you need an alpha strike, then switch to your actual combat setup. (Also remember to switch back to them after a fight to recharge)

This is a great idea. It seems fitting too - I'm lugging all those power cells around on my Adept for no reason, might as well make grenades.

You know I'd appreciate profiles a lot more if they allowed you to switch up how you assigned your level-up perks. So vanguard has a full vanguard-build, but you could switch to tech-sniper and be completely different, instead of having to fit tech sniper and vanguard into the same level up pool and splitting your focus.

This is one game where "New Game+" feels like the way the game was meant to be played. At higher levels (60+) you have more than enough points to throw around to switch from Vanguard to Sniper as you please.

[LibraryOgre]

UGH. Trying to get my infiltrator to level through MP in ANNOYING. I loved the Vindicator. BOOM and running a shotgun. Now, with the infiltrator? I've got almost no powers (just cryo and grenades, plus the cloak), and I achieve almost nothing. (ME3, incidentally)

[Psyren]

With the exception of the Asari Huntress and N7 Shadow, Infiltrator is a combat class. If you don't have a decent gun, it will underperform; the powers are there solely to supplement your gunplay. Treat it like a soldier that can sneak around, and use bursty guns like shotguns and sniper rifles rather than sustained dps like ARs and SMGs.

[Inarius]

Welp, I guess its official. ME:A is dead for single player. It will only recieve MP updates from now on and the Quarian Ark will be resolved via a novel or comic at some point in the future.

Link

Not exactly surprising, though I am a little disappointed. I Figure if they do revisit Mass Effect it will probably be back in the Milky way though it's not going to happen anytime soon with Anthem and DA4 in the works.

[factotum]

Possibly the least surprising news since the sun rose this morning, considering how EA dropped the project like a hot brick as soon as it didn't sell according to their requirements.

[Caelestion]

Well, that's a bummer. A clear sign of executive meddling - shipping it out too fast and then abandoning it because sales were affected by shipping it out too fast.

[Morty]

Revisiting the Milky Way would be tricky, unless they just remaster ME1. The original setting was kind of unsustainable outside the original trilogy.

[Archpaladin Zousha]

I'll be honest, part of me feels guilty. Like, by demanding more Mass Effect despite the Trilogy's sheer END, were we inevitably going to get something that was never going to measure up, and thus condemning the entire franchise to its grave? Let's be honest, who here actually reads the tie-in novels and comics besides obsessive-completionist canon-loonies like me?

[Caelestion]

I read one of the novels when I had nothing else better to do.

[factotum]

I'll be honest, part of me feels guilty. Like, by demanding more Mass Effect despite the Trilogy's sheer END, were we inevitably going to get something that was never going to measure up, and thus condemning the entire franchise to its grave?

This is EA we're talking about. They would have continued a successful franchise like ME regardless of how much the fans asked for it, and it's also them that decided to use an untested team who'd never worked on a Mass Effect game before to produce this new one, so Bioware could keep producing the other cash cow Dragon Age.

[Psyren]

I'm... pretty disappointed. Not much else to say really.

Anthem is probably the first Bioware game I won't be preordering as a result, if I get it at all. The MMO-shooter genre is already looking to get more crowded (Destiny 2, Warframe-PoE etc) so I'm okay sitting that title out to convey my displeasure. At the very least, it'll have to blow me away to be worth a purchase at this point. I don't know if I'm quite ready to sharpen my pitchfork and join the #BoycottAnthem movement whole-hog, but I can definitely identify with the sentiments of those who do. And who knows - if the backlash is loud enough, we might get a bone like the Sense8 crowd did from Netflix.

Having said all that - concerning the franchise's future, we got a hopeful message from Casey.

I'll be honest, part of me feels guilty. Like, by demanding more Mass Effect despite the Trilogy's sheer END, were we inevitably going to get something that was never going to measure up, and thus condemning the entire franchise to its grave? Let's be honest, who here actually reads the tie-in novels and comics besides obsessive-completionist canon-loonies like me?

More Mass Effect was never the problem, and Andromeda's story is fine. It's just that between some strange design decisions (e.g. the three power limit) and the facial animations utterly dominating the conversation at release, MEA never stood the chance it deserved.

[Archpaladin Zousha]

I'm just worried this'll mean no more Mass Effect at all... like, EA will basically go "Why would we let BioWare make more Mass Effect games if all you ingrates do is complain about them like you did with Mass Effect 3 and Mass Effect Andromeda? You've already proven you hate it."

[Psyren]

That's definitely a possibility, and we're seeing it with the likes of Silent Hill and Megaman, both of which are much cheaper to make than a Mass Effect game.

I should probably say something more encouraging here but I got nothing.

At least we know that, if ME is indeed cancelled for good, that it won't be because Bioware didn't want to make more (as evidenced by Casey's tweet.) It'll be due to the EA suits who are to blame for all the other woes of the franchise.

[Morty]

Controversy over facial animations aside, Andromeda had a lot of various problems, smaller and greater, that made its overall reception pretty lukewarm. Like the three powers limitation, which is a solution in want of a problem. I found it less enjoyable on a replay, and trying to play a caster with the three power limit was no doubt part of it.

Either way, even if Mass Effect comes back someday, it won't be soon. Returning to the Milky Way would be problematic, to put it mildly, but Andromeda's reception might convince the executives that it's the way to go. But we'll have to wait some years to find out.

[LibraryOgre]

Soo.... what's the chance this will lead to a reasonably priced release that includes DLC?

[factotum]

Soo.... what's the chance this will lead to a reasonably priced release that includes DLC?

Wouldn't that require them to have actually created some DLC? And there certainly won't be any forthcoming now, this announcement specifically says no singleplayer DLC will be created.

[Psyren]

It's already pretty heavily discounted (especially on console) if that's what you're asking Mark.

Forbes has weighed in - the backlash is now spreading to even the more favorable reviewers, and with good reason.

[LibraryOgre]

It's already pretty heavily discounted (especially on console) if that's what you're asking Mark.

I'm just grumpy. I've looked into filling out my DLC collections for 2 and 3, and have better things to spend my money on.

[Mudpitmissfit]

At the high risk of sounding hysterical, I am now DONE with bioware.

This isn't purely really a reaction to the delivery of MEA (although that is a big contributing factor)

It is more final straw if you will , the cheap DLC plugging in DAO , the ME3 day one DLC and ending, the "made for PC experience" of DAI (which had a gimped UI and tactics interface to streamline console adoption).

Now while the game itself was fun , I only put in 100 hours , this compared to Me3 which has 1200 + in terms of playtime, I feel no pull to do another run through , nor really engage in the MP aspect , the whole game just feels hollow and unfinished. Add in that the 10 hour early access trial has appreciably more content than the mid point of the game , makes the hollow feeling worse IMO.

I doubt I will be buying Anthem , not out of sense of moral outrage , more out of thorough disinterest in MMO shooters.

And DA4 well , I might look at it for game of the year , but any brand traction bioware had with me is long gone.

[Inarius]

I think the biggest shame really is that DLC is where Bioware has really shone over the past several games. They tended to have more polish and tighter more focused stories that were fairly interesting standalone questlines, on top of that they also tended to have some fairly interesting mechanics added onto the base game.

I think making MEA a huge sprawling game was definitely a mistake especially for a new studios first try at the game series. It probably would of done better off if it was smaller in scope and focused more on either the story or exploration aspects of the game.

[Caelestion]

Unlike, say, the ME3 ending controversy, this is an issue where it's clearly EA at fault, rather than Bioware. Bioware don't get to decide to make more DLC if EA rules that it's not financially viable, they presumably didn't get a choice about which studio with which to make the game and if EA starts closing down their studios and cannibalising their workforce, their only option is to leave EA's employ entirely.

[factotum]

their only option is to leave EA's employ entirely.

If you're talking Bioware as a whole, the only way they get to leave the mothership is if they're fired out an airlock. History is littered with the corpses of development studios that EA has canned because their latest game didn't meet expectations--Westwood, Pandemic, Maxis, Mythic, the list goes on.

[Chen]

Yeah I'm not sure how Bioware could "leave". EA bought them. It's not like they're in some sort of equal partnership. They're a subsidiary of EA.

[darksolitaire]

Earlier I tried to board Nomad but the enter button doesn't prompt to me anymore. Glorious. So here's to last patch.

If you're talking Bioware as a whole, the only way they get to leave the mothership is if they're fired out an airlock. History is littered with the corpses of development studios that EA has canned because their latest game didn't meet expectations--Westwood, Pandemic, Maxis, Mythic, the list goes on.

Hey, at least this image is now accurate.

Spoiler

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Personally, I blame No Man's Sky from this debacle.

[Caelestion]

I meant the actual workforce for the last option, but otherwise I agree.

[Psyren]

Yeah I'm not sure how Bioware could "leave". EA bought them. It's not like they're in some sort of equal partnership. They're a subsidiary of EA.

The developers and creatives can leave, but they can't take anything (including the names "Bioware" and "Mass Effect") with them.

Personally, I blame No Man's Sky from this debacle.

That's a great summary of how godawful this is by the way - even freaking No Man's Sky got story DLC! How bad is it when No Man's Sky can dunk on you?

[warty goblin]

That's a great summary of how godawful this is by the way - even freaking No Man's Sky got story DLC! How bad is it when No Man's Sky can dunk on you?

At this point I'm actually having more fun with No Man's Sky. Sure the combat sucks, but so long as one approaches it as a weird mellow sort of thing where you tool around and look at stuff because you want to tool around and look at stuff, it's really quite a good time.

[RCgothic]

This news has made me realise I've not picked up MEA in months or even finished the single player. I'm still just after the first time Sara meet Jaal.

Given how much time I spent with Shepherd and that playing ME3 I was on 4hrs sleep a day until I finished it, that makes me quite sad. I'm even contemplating a new maleshep trilogy run!

In ME3 MP I'm now just two Gold solo extractions away from Best Of The Best. Attempted it twice and so far meet my end at the sticky fingers of a Banshee twice! I'm going to need to stock up a bit on high level ammo and consumables before attempting it again though.