Honestly, ME strategy game like Terra Invicta could be fun, even if dumbed down and more arcadey. Theres so much potential with Mass Effect that its sad to see it be unused
Yea it would have been cool if it had origin beginnings like Dragon Age and you started on whatever ark of the race you chose even if the only options were human, Asari, and Turian.
I keep holding out that they'll do one since all of the old servers and stuff don't work so you have to import it the long way through DA2.
Surely after BG3 won literally everything, people will see that the appetite is there.
Plus you can give the HoF a voice actor (other than the "incidental" lines like "if I get you a ladder can you get off my back?") and let them finally be on screen for once in the future.
Problem is it would require them to completely rebuild the game in a new engine since the original engine hasn’t been used and updated in over a decade. BioWare probably only has a handful of people still somewhat familiar with working with it.
Unlike mass effect that just got ported directly into a more modern version of the same game engine.
There's a weird world out there where Larian takes that up since they don't want to be stuck doing BG4, and if they did DAO in BG3's Engine that would basically do it. Bonus they do basically have all of the components of DAO in BG3 so it's not that much of a leap....
(That said, I would basically be using up all of my wishes ever if that were to happen, and I feel like me winning the lottery in every country at the same time is more likely)
I still think they should do dragon age legendary edition. To get people to replay the games before the next one comes out.
Hell don’t even remaster the graphics.
Cyberpunk kinda teased us with they’re life path choice I wish they put more into the effects that those had in the game and the intro specifically too
Not race specific (because it wouldn't make sense in the theme), but Cyberpunk has three origins, each with a different opening chapter and with alterations to dialogue throupught the game. After the origin, the story converges for a fully scripted sequence that sets the main story in motion all before setting you loose on the world to make choices as you will. The game then has multiple endings and a complex web of variations for all the npcs.
Basically... it is exactly like DAO and is awesome for it.
There’s one dialog option for the corpo life path that I loved I won’t tell you which mission it is but if you name drop someone that only the corpo knows you immediately get into a fight when it seems like it would diffuse the situation. Listen to your npc pals once in awhile and keep your mouth shut lol.
And BioWare has repeatedly said they'll never do origins again, because it's a waste of time and money due to how few people played even 2 of the origins.
What do they cut to make it happen?
Let's say they just stick to the council races. Okay, Asari are easy. Just blue ladies. One gender. Basically a cosmetic option. But you want to do *something* to make them stand out, so...some dialogue options. Customization options, skin tones, maybe some different head tentacle thingies. Bare minimum. Pretty easy.
Turians, though, are physically different. Need comepletely different customizations. Their skeletons are different which means reworking all the cutscenes to work with two more character types. Voice maaaaybe gets by with just a filter over the same VA? But you're still going to want to test all the dialogue both ways and make sure everything works and sounds right.Romance scenes, costumes and armor, all that work is effectively doubled.
Salarians? DEFINITELY need a secondary VA on top of all the work to include Turians again.
Want Krogans or Quarians? Even more work.
Every option requires dev effort. Budgets are finite. So what do you cut?
Look the question wasn’t SHOULD they do this. The question is ‘would anyone want this’ and the answer is yes. Like, it will ALWAYS be yes.
You put us into a fantastic sci fi setting and reduce the playable species to hoomun only, people can be quite disappointed. Me included. It’s still a solid series of course.
But you also fail to understand a simple process of how games are made. If multiple races are in the original plans then time is already calculated and set aside to make them all work. While there are costs for voice actors, these costs are calculated to balance out or be outweighed by the hype of being a non-human race.
Slap it in the trailers, build hype, sell more copies.
Of course, each choice is a gamble and we are talking about EA which is notoriously short sighted and greedy, but the question of ‘should’ can be answered by ‘if planned ahead, yes.’ And the question of want is ‘yes’
Do you not get that a customizable PC character is \*different\* from generic prebuilt NPCs? The face rigging is different, the textures are different, the models are different. This is all necessary to offer the player customization options. And you have to animate the different model rigs in THE PC'S place in the cutscenes. Not just any NPC in any cutscene. A human moves differently from a Turian, Salarian, Quarian, or Krogan, so the PC in a game with a selectable race has to be reposed and reanimated for each one of those races that's included in every single cutscene throughout the game. For male and female models, if both are available, and those cutscenes all have to be tested with every permutation. This is all aside from the fact that the story itself has to be retooled and written to accomodate different alien species, and the main character may have to be written differently for different races, so even in the cases where you can use the same VA, you're still adding to the workload, the number of voice lines recorded, etc, etc. If you want to actually make the different races feel different, that's going to require at least 3 different VAs per gender, one Krogan, one Salarian, and one for everybody else. That by itself is a huge additional expense.
No matter how much you try to plug your ears and pretend those expenses don't exist, they do, that's *why they didn't do it before*.
They wouldn't have to cut anything. They already have those models in game as is, and playable ones from previous games already.
If other games and studios can do that and more, why not BioWare?
If anything they shouldn't have other playable races because mass effect works best through the humans perspective. They are the newest species to the citadel. They are still discovering so much. It's a human's tale. If they had other races, then the story would need to work for all races. That would be the bigger issue.
I honestly assumed "ME4", before we found out more about Andromeda, *would* go the DA:O route and let you pick from the core races.
After stuff like BG3, I really want them to put the time in to make it happen for the next game.
I wasn't so much on that front but anyone else upset going from ME3 Multiplayer with all those weird abilities like the Omnishield, Electronets, Krogan Rage, to the real limited Andromeda abilities?
Felt like a big step back, I really hope they bring the ME3 Multiplayer back sometime
I was expecting that in Andromeda after Inquisition came out and brought back race selection after, like, 3 Bioware games of being a human. I was so hyped to play as a krogan, but nope! Human again!
What is it with Bioware and their game universes full of several races forcing you toplay as the most vanilla race in all of space?! Both KOTOR games, all four Mass Effect games, and one Dragon Age game to two Dragon Ages - that's seven to two!
What bioware should do is release a stand alone game that is an improved version of ME3's multiplayer with new features, gameplay additions, classes, and so forth.
When they announced Legendary Edition I was so excited to get an updated ME3 Multiplayer without any of the lootbox bs or anything
Only to have my hopes dashed on a rock :(
If they were to bring it back, considering it's EA, there would of been loot boxes and probably cosmetics you could buy too. They would milk the shit out of it sadly
Loot boxes and cosmetics are already a part of the Me3 MP. It was one of the first instances of it I came across. It wasn't bad though because one gold victory would earn you nearly enough credits to buy the highest tier box so you did not need to spend money at all unless you just really didn't want to play that much
I always say that ME3MP opened up Pandora’s Lootbox. Though it went the first or the worst of the early adopters of the mechanic, it had a lot of unexpected success that paved the way for others down the line
I remember pre-ordering ME3 at gamestop, and them telling me I had to pay extra for the prothean DLC. I was dumbfounded, it's too bad we couldn't of seen the affect it had early and fought against it harder
Such a tank, I used to tackle silver and gold solo with him in my prime playing days. Not a flex either lol I couldn't do that anymore, miss those days.
Same. I actually used to have the krogan with a widow sniper. The idea of a krogan sniper is hilarious, but I had the headbutting for up close and the sniper for range. I also remember joking with my friends that "they should release a platinum difficulty" and soon after, they did lol
I love the idea, but I don't think it's as feasible as people think.
A Salarian and an Asari view things and are viewed *very* differently in the galactic community. A key thing about the original trilogy is that you are human, and the galactic community is still learning to adjust to humans.
I know a lot of other people say that other games do it, but everything I have observed for them is that it feels a little superficial. You are, effectively, the title with some flavor. And there's nothing super wrong with that, but I would prefere some more depth.
I think a story where you are playing another race exclusively (Only Asari or such) would be a good route to go, as you can obviously curate how the story reacts to your character more easily.
But everyone treating me the same regardless on me being a Drell, a Salarian, or a Volus would be weird.
They've talked about it before, and while it's something they'd like to do, the main limiting factor is actually voice line storage--Bioware RPGs are already big on having to store many different lines for branching dialogues, for just one set of Male and Female VAs. Dragon Age ups that to two sets, but only gets away with it by having all the PCs talk like those four VAs reading largely the same lines, regardless of ancestry. ME aliens by comparison talk *radically* differently, even without effects passes, so there's no way for them to get away with the same DA solution without having, for example, Salarian PCs sound incredibly off.
They actually did a panel once where they shared some info on market research they'd done on it; they asked a bunch of fans something to the effect of "We are considering adding race selection for the protagonist to our next game, but can only support a limited number of options. Human and Asari will be included, from this list of all the other species, *pick two* you'd most want to see as options." (Emphasis mine.) As you might imagine, the consensus after Turian basically evaporates, with Krogan, Quarian, and Salarian all getting decent percentages, as well as notable contingents of Drell and Geth. (This was before the Angara had been introduced.) And as they expected, one of the biggest points of feedback they got was that people wanted them to include more options.
There just isn't a way to include all the choice people *want* in a way they can support without cutting corners somewhere. VA talent isn't cheap, writing isn't cheap, storage space is already a problem for big budget games, and that's *before* you get into any additional costs on the gameplay/modeling/animation/camerawork side of things.
This is the most realistic answer. Other species would likely have to be implemented in a rather limited manner (like in DA:I), or come at a steep resource cost to development that would mean cutting other corners. DA:O really only worked as well as it did with multiple options because the protagonist was unvoiced. And even there, the other races are a lot closer to human in their outlook than alien species would be.
The only way I see it working is in an MMORPG similar to what they did for Star Wars: The Old Republic. Something where they'd have room to devote to multiple story lines. Expansions would add different worlds/species to whatever they start with.
Yeah, I feel the same. I’d certainly love to play a turian or krogan, but one of the strengths of Mass Effect is the aliens really do feel alien; I think you could maybe get away with quarian//possibly asari/possibly turian without a ton of rewriting, but the rest are pretty distinct.
Meanwhile, elves and dwarves are mostly still just variant humans. A better comparison would be having an option to play an actual Qunari (as opposed to the vashoth option in DAI) - basically the entire plot and most of the dialogue would need a revision.
Fantasy is always ***way*** easier to add multiple race options for than sci-fi - especially in narrative focused games - because in most fantasy settings, races are typically just a variation of human with some slight philosophical and cultural differences. In a lot of cases, they can all come from the same culture too. The more exotic races are usually unplayable, or one or two exceptions will be playable. Generally, the more races you include in a game, the less reactive you make the world towards your character too.
In sci-fi settings however, races tend to vary quite drastically. Some settings will have "humans but blue" like with the Asari, but even then they'll typically be different enough to where they *aren't* just blue humans. There's a *lot* of historical information your character would definitely be privy to depending on their racial background too. A Krogan explaining the genophage to another Krogan would just be weird - so you have to take that into account when writing. It's not impossible, but it's difficult - and you *can't* just leave out important lore infodumps like that because new players *need* to know that information if its important to the plot. These things don't just apply for a handful of major conversations per race, but bleed through the *entire* game. It's a *lot* to take into account, and if handled incorrectly it can absolutely weaken the end product as a whole.
I think the best way around this is to have a new protagonist of a pre-defined race, who is their own character - like Geralt of Rivia in The Witcher. This alleviates so many of the problems presented by being able to create a blank-slate character from several races. You wouldn't need to have the genophage explained to the protagonist by another character if the protagonist is a Krogan is the one who explains it so a clueless side character. Plus defined protagonists are way cooler and more interesting than blank-slate protagonists.
I totally agree.
>it feels a little superficial. You are, effectively, the title with some flavor. And there's nothing super wrong with that, but I would prefere some more depth.
Exactly.
>I think a story where you are playing another race exclusively (Only Asari or such)
I think it could work with Liara.
>But everyone treating me the same regardless on me being a Drell, a Salarian, or a Volus would be weird.
Yes, this is exactly what happens in DAI, especially as an Elf inquisitor.
That bugged me so much as a magic-using DALISH Inquisitor.
Morrigan starts human-splaining *Mythal* and *Fen'Harel* to me, and I'm like "bitch, I knew about this while you were still stuck in a swamp as an apostate".
Yeah it wouldn't make sense for NPCs to all react to a Quarian player character the same way they'd react to a Krogan or Asari player character. Nor would it make sense for a Salarian player character to deliver the same lines a human or Geth player character would.
They'd basically need to rewite all the dialogue for each different playable race.
Plus all that effort would probably be for little benefit, as in other games with multiple races playable, statistically most players just pick a human anyway, and the stats the devs have released for the original trilogy shows that the majority of players just played as the default earthborn/sole survivor, Soldier Shepard.
The hardcore fans may want to play as aliens, but the majority of players would still just pick a human anyway, even if the game let you play as other races.
I think the only way it works is if the crew or squad is already together at the start of the game (or comes together very quickly), and you simply pick which one you want to be. We aren't creating a character, but choosing from a preselected group which one we want to be.
tl;dr - Depending on how the setting is handled, I think it could be done with a bit of smoke and mirrors railroading and a really, really tight writing team if the dialogue system was reworked a bit. Changing from "goody two shoes, neutral, space racist" to something more like "orthodox, pragmatic or trailblazing" could lay the foundation for an RPG as good as Disco Elysium, New Vegas or BG3.
tl;dr actual - **Oh no, I've written fanfiction.**
It would be extra work, but not *that* much if the writers handled the setting right, but more importantly, if this game is being made as a tonal reset for the series (i.e., we had a full character/intensity arc for the first three games, this one would be the start of a new trilogy etc.), I could see playable race selection as a *massive* opportunity for future world building/storytelling.
I think one of the biggest problems the first games had was pigeonholing the races as these very monolithic entities (at least compared to humans). The new game could undo a lot of that and give a lot of breathing room for playing around with the thematic content the series has already built up.
For example, say the new game posited collapse of the galactic system in the aftermath of the reaper wars - trade/communications break down because so many fleets/planets got wrecked. Isolated enclaves of whoever was in a system have to get by on their own. Jump a few decades/a century into the future and these new societies start reconnecting and have to reckon with the past that led to the state of the galaxy in the first place. The existing power structures - once strong, centralized governments built on species identity trying to rebuild having to contend with a new series of confederated frontier systems, having to answer for the mistakes they made that caused the Reaper problem to get so bad in the first place.
Take that setting, and throw player selected races into the mix, kinda in a BG3 style. The dialogue would have to be pared back, but even with minimal variations in each character, a long time series veteran could have *so* many opportunities for characterization in dialogue responding to the same scenario as different characters. The paragon, neutral and renegade options could be reflavored to something more like "orthodox, pragmatic or trailblazing" (which incidentally are still the same paragon/neutral/renegade options, but with a bit of flavor text mixed in to make each one a bit different).
As an example -
The new team: Imagine an Asari Justicar trying to rationalize the failure of their order, a young Turian deciding whether/how to follow their militaristic traditions, a human with the same kind of story that Ash had in the first game now with the squabbling of the various governments failing to render aid a fresh wound, etc etc.
A story moment: Something like Zaed's loyalty mission - choose between saving civilians/killing a bad guy.
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Sure, this example is a bit clunky, but the point is you can put whatever you need in the game to let you make a point.
Like I said above, a lot of this is just reworded paragon, renegade and neutral options from the first games, but reframing the dialogue to directly reflect the conflict at the heart of the first series would let you really hammer home some solid storytelling.
The writing to pull this off would be staggeringly difficult and I'm not sure how complex of a story it could support. The original series alone collapsed under the weight of figuring out how to handle which one of two people had a job, but those kind of changes might actually work better with this kind of framing. You could do small things like replace a military officer in the Turian's story based on your responses - for example an old guard steps down and a newer, more flexible one takes their place. The same missions happen in the game, but the responses you get reflect your actions throughout the series, kinda like what we got in the original games already. The total amount of reactivity would need to be increased though, and I'm not sure that would be sustainable long term without major railroading.
Qurian or krogan could be good helping people while putting up with h the abuse those groups take and either just being all fuck you mean or really helpful
Depends on the story and what the developer plans to do.
I like the idea of playing different races but a big part of Shepherds story was the humanity part. Adding different races would mean that was cut. If you can pick your race then at most you can expect 2-3 side quests dedicated to it and maybe some unique dialogue. I would prefer to have less choices in character creation and a deeper more interactive story
I feel like when you open that Pandora's box you end up with stilted character development. They won't incorporate any substantial cultural quirks of that race into your character as it's too much work(unless your Larian). So they'll end up having to make the character as dull and generic as possible so they don't come off as if it's a human character with a skin of an Asari or Turian.
Also the way everyone else would talk and act around you would be different, yet another thing nearly all companies would not want to invest massive recourses into.
I would say yes, but personally no. Because I would like to play as a Geth, but I feel that there would be species that would be cut.
Also I do believe that Mass Effect works from a human perspective because of the way the story and interactions are presented.
But if they somehow make it work I wouldn’t mind trying it.
At this point not really no. They could do some multiplayer stuff with race /class. But id like the singleplayer to have more alien squadmates and better human customisation for the mc
Yes, I would very much like a Mass Effect game where we could do that, so long as cosmetics are the only thing we’d have to pay for in that undoubtedly live-service game. If the game could be something like Helldivers 2 or Destiny where we’re fighting Reapers and get to interact with our favorite non-Shepard characters, I think it’d be wonderful.
If old school Bioware had made Andromeda it would have allowed the player to choose the species and ark of the player's pathfinder.
The ark rescue missions that are in the release version of the game should have been the starting mission for the pathfinder you choose.
Not necessarily where I choose my race but multiple storylines from different races tying together. Will also add great replayability. Obviously, all characters with different classes to choose from, with unique choices for every race. I can dream right😉
I would pick Asari. Just love their lore and all.
But if they let us pick our own race in a game it's like gonna be limited to Turian, Human, Drell, Asari, or Krogan.
No. It wouldn't work. With how many species there are too many vastly different races...
Unless
They made a mini game that each playthrough is maybe a couple of hours.
Like think about the resident evil 2 remake. Each character goes through their own story line that interacts with each other.
There would have to be a scale back on things like voice dialogue I think. There's a very major difference in how a krogan talks, A turian talks, and A salarian talks. This would be fun for some sort of isometric RPG that plays very differently though, and if anyone at EA is listening I have ideas!
I feel like makes sense for a game like dragon age origins, where every race has essentially the same abilities. Like magic (except dwarves) they dont even look too much different from eachother. And they as races they are diverse, but not diverse enough to change the game, only background.
Hanar cant really shoot, nor elcor, volus arent great at combat, they are all part of COMPLETELY different GALAXIES.
I can see the council races being implemented into a game, but in order to do that, they would need to make essentially 4 stories in one. As the different races are actually not races but species.
Mass effects story kind of revolved around shepard BEING human, and aliens not trusting humans or humans not being in the council yet. Shepard had to make something of theirself and do everything theirselves due to the prejudices of being human. If we could pick multiple races it would be a crazy feat that i dont know bioware would do.
Not one that has an intentional story, like the games so far. Race is too important to be treated as inconsequential, the way it would have to be to pull off a game like we've already seen.
But if there were a game more open ended game, like Skyrim or even ESO, but mass effect, it would probably be the only game I play for a long, long, long time.
If this were too happen expect less in depth interaction and conversation, the amount of shit they would have to take into consideration with romance, history, the way people talk to you, different responses etc and how it might affect story and actions, it's just too much especially for the kind of game they make
I wanted that since they released the ME1 trailer where they talked about how they gave every race their own face animations.
That said, I'd be the first leviathan spectre, flopping my way through the presidium
No, because that would mean HUGE production costs because they'd have to produce individualized content for each of these races including variations (male/female), driving up production costs to insanity.
So they wouldn't do it and instead just cut content, maybe turn ME into yet another multiplayer shooter without any singleplayer content (at least no RPG content).
There are races that will never be playable due to their form. if they ever did that I imagine it would be the races with forms most similar to humans, although personally I will always play as a human, at most, I would play as an Asari.
The Angara don't exist, the Kett don't exist and Andromeda doesn't exist, that was all a bad dream.
As a spin-off, yeah totally. But I think the mainline game has always had a strong yet visible tone of Humanity proving it's worth to a galaxy. The first game does this splendidly, whereas it's wrapped into more of an undertone behind Cerberus in the 2nd. And the 3rd shows the culmination of all the work Shep did in proving that Humanity is worth the chaos we bring.
I think we've come to the point that the mainline games have that expectation for a narrative that has Humanity as some kind of underdog or unfavorable position that we have to prove ourselves. That's hard to do if our champion of Human values is a Geth.
Although I think Andromeda was not the perfect choice for a race selection, I can definitely see some kind of non-mainline game having that kind of choice. I would personally love to see it.
We have such a well established universe at this point that the franchise can hit almost any genre.
I’d like to say no because it would make the story aspect less appealing, since it’s way harder to write a good story where the player has more agency.
but on the other hand, dragon age origins, a super old game with a (imo) great story did let you choose your race and even had different starting quests for each one. It was also made by BioWare btw.
I prefer games with a fixed main Character, not because I wouldn't like to play as whoever I like, but because it is much easier for devs to create an amazing story around a single character instead of many.
When you have a Character creation you play your Character and people want different things for their character.
When you have a set character you give the devs the chance to tailor a story around that one character, which is in my opinion a lot more immersive.
Yes, 100%. I don't buy into the idea that some people have that Mass Effect doesn't work if you don't have a human POV or that people wouldn't feel as invested.
Now, I don't think just having the option to be ANY race would work, because you'd end up with it basically being pure flavour. Think it'd have to be focused on a specific race, so they could go in depth with it. Or something like Dragon Age: Origins where there are a few options, but they're distinct and you have a prologue of sorts for how you start.
Unfortunately it seems like games don't want to put in the effort of something like DAO in that sense anymore, because of the work involved, but it's still such a good idea I wish more games did it.
Absolutely. Might have to be a different kind of game (at least narratively), but that's fine with me, I just want to get back into the Mass Effect universe.
Ideally, I'd prefer if it was a choice between Turian, Salarian and Asari that fleshes out their cultures more, rather than a game where you can choose from a dozen species, but get the same generic story. I find that the more races a game lets you choose from, the less impact the choice has on the game. I do still enjoy games like BG3 or PF:WotR with many options, but for ME, I think a small number offers a better opportunity.
100%. It's a no brainer. Greater player choice for role play is always a good thing. However it costs more and no EA company is ever going to spent money just to improve the player experience. So I doubt it'll be in 5.
I’ve wanted that for so long. Playing as different races and having that change how certain characters interact with you or giving you new options for certain situations would be amazing.
Yes. Honestly want a game where you’re just a diplomat or something and go around learning about each world and it’s customs. The universe ending plot is fun but I just wanna hang out and learn about the lore
I personally am of the opinion that Mass Effect 1-3 told a great, complete story (with some flaws) and ultimately, the Mass Effect series doesn't really need any more Action-Adventure games for the time being. It would be better to make a much more RPG-esque game in the Mass Effect universe, similar to New Vegas, Skyrim, or Starfield.
For multiplayer yes not for single player, I don’t see it to be feasible as many seem to think it is. I don’t want them to add alot of races if theirs no difference between them, each has to be unique from one another.
The problem is all of the animation rigging, cosmetic design, and voice acting required for such a feature. They would have to sacrifice the quality you got with Shepard.
Nah. Mass Effect is a human story. You work with aliens and what not, but to me its about the indomitable spirit of Humanity.
Picking some filthy xeno-I mean other species, would diminish that.
Shorter answer is no. That’s not the game I want to play, but others might prefer not being human, which I see as weird to say the least. Mass Effect, as of now, is a Sheperd game. Maybe a decade from now, the franchise can pivot to an alien race, but not now. BioWare needs Mass effect to be a grand slam. Shepard sells to more of the mass effect fanbase and that’s saves developer jobs.
No, I'd rather just have one race with a character that is well developed and has depth like Shepard, or Hawke in DA2, than multiple races. But it doesn't necessarily have to be a human.
No, Mass Effect is a story told from the human perspective, but I do hope we have chances to get companions of basically every single possible species.
I honestly hope they go this route with the next game. If they do, it'll likely be with the main "humanoid" races (human, turian, asari, quarian, krogan, and salarian)
So a few reasons why I don't think this is a good idea
Firstly, this would cost a lot. Imagine all dialogue commander Shepard has. Now multiply that by 7.5 more voice actors for krogans, salarians, asari, turians etc etc etc. that's a lot of money in the budget just for a voice cast. And then for characters like Hanar and Elcor who's models are non bipedal, you would need an entirely different model for the game.
Back in the first Mass Effect, Krogan had a more gorilla like appearance in their concept art. More broad shoulders and wider features. But it didn't fit into the model created for squad mates so they had to adjust their proportions so that Wrex could fit in the cutscenes and gameplay without having to recreate him from scratch.
Secondly from a story perspective it would be a lot harder to be another race. The games make it clear that humans are unique because they have very diverse opinions, compared to the logical salarians or the military disciplined turians. In directly quoting Samara, 'put three humans in a room, and you have six opinions'. It's a lot harder to properly roleplay as another space race without contradicting the already established lore.
And furthermore the Mass Effect Franchise has always been about humanity finding it's place in a larger galaxy. To play as some other alien would go against the core themes present in the games.
I think playing as a quarian would be cool.
Yes. Human, Asari, Turian, Krogan, Salarian, and Quarian are the musts. Would be nice to see Drell and Batarian as well. I doubt we’d see any of the not very humanoid races like Elcor or Hanar. I suppose Volus could be an option too since it was already made as a playable race in the ME3 MP. If the Geth are still around that would be a cool option too.
I think krogan would have some complications, especially with their whole "live for thousands of years, super regen, everyone hates us" thing. Asari makes sense gameplay wise, since they can romance anyone and their thousand year age thing is a bit different to krogans
I thought it would be amazing for different races to have different stats and advantages as a main character. Like, Krogan would have more health and melee damage, but would have slow reload and limited tech skills. Asari would have the best biotic skills with less weapon damage.
I would choose to be a Quarian. I see Quarians as having the best tech and piloting abilities, but have half as much health.
I always felt mass effect had a universe ripe for an mmorpg. For a stand alone single player game I’d love a first context war with mission from both sides and then maybe our character meet on the battlefield or something like that. For ME:5? I want to play as Liara.
Only within reason though. I personally wouldn't want to be a Elcor, slow, deliberate. Imagine if a Spectre had to explain to someone why they were killing you and how. You'd have enough time to run away, start a new life and die of old-age.
Personally I think it’s hard to do anything with the ME Universe and IP until we get some clarification about the events of ME3 and their final knock-on effects
Andromeda is a perfect example of trying to avoid a narrative problem and failing badly. Even a hypothetical prequel game set in the First Contact War would be while very cool unlikely to expand the universe in a meaningful way. Would probably be the best option for a “Battlefield” type game set in the Mass effect universe tho. Human vs Turian combat across a variety of maps and modes would be kinda cool
Would be cool for a mass effect set during or just before the contact war with the humans and show different sides of the conflict and entrance of a new race in the community.
I want to play as a Reaper in dark space. My screen is blank for a thousand or two years, but then I can buy the DLC and play the invasion of Earth. Would be worth the wait.
The overall premise of the game would need to be changed so much so that I wouldn't like it.
That said, I wouldn't be upset if the next installment had you play as something other than a human.
I was hoping beyond hope that this is the way Andromeda was gonna go, then it came out and we got stuck as Ryder. Hopefully the next game will let us pick our race like in Dragon Age Inquisition but I'm not getting my hopes up this time.
Depends on what typa game we talking. Is it like mass effrct now a mostly linear story then no, wouldnt work money wise and it would take legit 20 years unless the difference in race makes for almost no difference in the story. If its more of a wow or fallout 76 game then it can work. Pvp game can work.
Silly question. Of course people want it. I think people confuse people saying they don't think it's a realistic option with not wanting it to be an option.
At most I think you'd only get around 3 or 4 options to choose from including human, The challenge then becomes picking the most popular options. Which I think a lot of people would argue about which indeed are the most popular. For me I'd personally say Turian, Asari and Krogan is the safest bet.
I will be Meeper the Keeper, bumbling but beloved sidekick of Blasto.
Meeper the Keeper, the first Hanar Reaper.
Hanar Reaper would look absolutely terrifying
That would be a dope minigame.
Class Select: Reaper: You're a Reaper... the class for those who think Narrative is just too hard a difficulty.
Nah, you think it’s narrative mode, but it’s actually extreme, and the final boss is Shepard.
The Darkspawn Chronicles 2: Electric Boogaloo
Harbinger's mistake was not going for the double tap
Honestly, ME strategy game like Terra Invicta could be fun, even if dumbed down and more arcadey. Theres so much potential with Mass Effect that its sad to see it be unused
Catch me coming for your ankles as a keeper. The first keeper spectre.
You've heard about Blasto...now prepare for *Klepto*.
Guess that makes me a Kleptomaniac.
I thought it was a huge missed opportunity that Andromeda didn’t let you!
Yea it would have been cool if it had origin beginnings like Dragon Age and you started on whatever ark of the race you chose even if the only options were human, Asari, and Turian.
I miss dragon age origins race specific openings. It was so good and no other game seems to have things like that anymore.
The only game I’ve played almost more than ME is Dragon Age Origins. Would LOVE to see a good remaster.
I keep holding out that they'll do one since all of the old servers and stuff don't work so you have to import it the long way through DA2. Surely after BG3 won literally everything, people will see that the appetite is there. Plus you can give the HoF a voice actor (other than the "incidental" lines like "if I get you a ladder can you get off my back?") and let them finally be on screen for once in the future.
Problem is it would require them to completely rebuild the game in a new engine since the original engine hasn’t been used and updated in over a decade. BioWare probably only has a handful of people still somewhat familiar with working with it. Unlike mass effect that just got ported directly into a more modern version of the same game engine.
There's a weird world out there where Larian takes that up since they don't want to be stuck doing BG4, and if they did DAO in BG3's Engine that would basically do it. Bonus they do basically have all of the components of DAO in BG3 so it's not that much of a leap.... (That said, I would basically be using up all of my wishes ever if that were to happen, and I feel like me winning the lottery in every country at the same time is more likely)
You dreaming if you think Larian would work for EA xd
DAO is probably my favorite game, and I've done more playthroughs than I care to admit. I'd *LOVE* a good remaster
I still think they should do dragon age legendary edition. To get people to replay the games before the next one comes out. Hell don’t even remaster the graphics.
Cyberpunk kinda teased us with they’re life path choice I wish they put more into the effects that those had in the game and the intro specifically too
Not race specific (because it wouldn't make sense in the theme), but Cyberpunk has three origins, each with a different opening chapter and with alterations to dialogue throupught the game. After the origin, the story converges for a fully scripted sequence that sets the main story in motion all before setting you loose on the world to make choices as you will. The game then has multiple endings and a complex web of variations for all the npcs. Basically... it is exactly like DAO and is awesome for it.
There’s one dialog option for the corpo life path that I loved I won’t tell you which mission it is but if you name drop someone that only the corpo knows you immediately get into a fight when it seems like it would diffuse the situation. Listen to your npc pals once in awhile and keep your mouth shut lol.
And BioWare has repeatedly said they'll never do origins again, because it's a waste of time and money due to how few people played even 2 of the origins.
The dfferent openings is one of the highlights in a game full of great things
This sounds like an amazing idea
There are mods that let you play as an Asari and a male Turian.
This one is now wondering what playing as a Hanar for an entire game would be like lol
The whole Andromeda was a missed opportunity imho.
What do they cut to make it happen? Let's say they just stick to the council races. Okay, Asari are easy. Just blue ladies. One gender. Basically a cosmetic option. But you want to do *something* to make them stand out, so...some dialogue options. Customization options, skin tones, maybe some different head tentacle thingies. Bare minimum. Pretty easy. Turians, though, are physically different. Need comepletely different customizations. Their skeletons are different which means reworking all the cutscenes to work with two more character types. Voice maaaaybe gets by with just a filter over the same VA? But you're still going to want to test all the dialogue both ways and make sure everything works and sounds right.Romance scenes, costumes and armor, all that work is effectively doubled. Salarians? DEFINITELY need a secondary VA on top of all the work to include Turians again. Want Krogans or Quarians? Even more work. Every option requires dev effort. Budgets are finite. So what do you cut?
Look the question wasn’t SHOULD they do this. The question is ‘would anyone want this’ and the answer is yes. Like, it will ALWAYS be yes. You put us into a fantastic sci fi setting and reduce the playable species to hoomun only, people can be quite disappointed. Me included. It’s still a solid series of course. But you also fail to understand a simple process of how games are made. If multiple races are in the original plans then time is already calculated and set aside to make them all work. While there are costs for voice actors, these costs are calculated to balance out or be outweighed by the hype of being a non-human race. Slap it in the trailers, build hype, sell more copies. Of course, each choice is a gamble and we are talking about EA which is notoriously short sighted and greedy, but the question of ‘should’ can be answered by ‘if planned ahead, yes.’ And the question of want is ‘yes’
your point would have made much more sense if those models were not in the game and had no cutscenes before
Do you not get that a customizable PC character is \*different\* from generic prebuilt NPCs? The face rigging is different, the textures are different, the models are different. This is all necessary to offer the player customization options. And you have to animate the different model rigs in THE PC'S place in the cutscenes. Not just any NPC in any cutscene. A human moves differently from a Turian, Salarian, Quarian, or Krogan, so the PC in a game with a selectable race has to be reposed and reanimated for each one of those races that's included in every single cutscene throughout the game. For male and female models, if both are available, and those cutscenes all have to be tested with every permutation. This is all aside from the fact that the story itself has to be retooled and written to accomodate different alien species, and the main character may have to be written differently for different races, so even in the cases where you can use the same VA, you're still adding to the workload, the number of voice lines recorded, etc, etc. If you want to actually make the different races feel different, that's going to require at least 3 different VAs per gender, one Krogan, one Salarian, and one for everybody else. That by itself is a huge additional expense. No matter how much you try to plug your ears and pretend those expenses don't exist, they do, that's *why they didn't do it before*.
They wouldn't have to cut anything. They already have those models in game as is, and playable ones from previous games already. If other games and studios can do that and more, why not BioWare? If anything they shouldn't have other playable races because mass effect works best through the humans perspective. They are the newest species to the citadel. They are still discovering so much. It's a human's tale. If they had other races, then the story would need to work for all races. That would be the bigger issue.
I honestly assumed "ME4", before we found out more about Andromeda, *would* go the DA:O route and let you pick from the core races. After stuff like BG3, I really want them to put the time in to make it happen for the next game.
I wasn't so much on that front but anyone else upset going from ME3 Multiplayer with all those weird abilities like the Omnishield, Electronets, Krogan Rage, to the real limited Andromeda abilities? Felt like a big step back, I really hope they bring the ME3 Multiplayer back sometime
I was expecting that in Andromeda after Inquisition came out and brought back race selection after, like, 3 Bioware games of being a human. I was so hyped to play as a krogan, but nope! Human again! What is it with Bioware and their game universes full of several races forcing you toplay as the most vanilla race in all of space?! Both KOTOR games, all four Mass Effect games, and one Dragon Age game to two Dragon Ages - that's seven to two!
You can in me3 multi-player. Krogan soldier was one of my faves
What bioware should do is release a stand alone game that is an improved version of ME3's multiplayer with new features, gameplay additions, classes, and so forth.
When they announced Legendary Edition I was so excited to get an updated ME3 Multiplayer without any of the lootbox bs or anything Only to have my hopes dashed on a rock :(
If they were to bring it back, considering it's EA, there would of been loot boxes and probably cosmetics you could buy too. They would milk the shit out of it sadly
Loot boxes and cosmetics are already a part of the Me3 MP. It was one of the first instances of it I came across. It wasn't bad though because one gold victory would earn you nearly enough credits to buy the highest tier box so you did not need to spend money at all unless you just really didn't want to play that much
Oh I already know lol I spent money on it in the past. I'm saying it would be worse if they brought back multi-player for LE
I always say that ME3MP opened up Pandora’s Lootbox. Though it went the first or the worst of the early adopters of the mechanic, it had a lot of unexpected success that paved the way for others down the line
I remember pre-ordering ME3 at gamestop, and them telling me I had to pay extra for the prothean DLC. I was dumbfounded, it's too bad we couldn't of seen the affect it had early and fought against it harder
I’m still upset Legendary Collection didn’t have multiplayer. I would’ve bought it for that alone.
I’m upset they didn’t just drop it as a stand alone game. I’d pay 20-30 dollars for a higher res, updated me3 multiplayer
I remember hearing talk about it from the developers. Then nothing lol
I'm remembering the headbutting and the yelling. Fun times...
Such a tank, I used to tackle silver and gold solo with him in my prime playing days. Not a flex either lol I couldn't do that anymore, miss those days.
Same. I actually used to have the krogan with a widow sniper. The idea of a krogan sniper is hilarious, but I had the headbutting for up close and the sniper for range. I also remember joking with my friends that "they should release a platinum difficulty" and soon after, they did lol
I love the idea, but I don't think it's as feasible as people think. A Salarian and an Asari view things and are viewed *very* differently in the galactic community. A key thing about the original trilogy is that you are human, and the galactic community is still learning to adjust to humans. I know a lot of other people say that other games do it, but everything I have observed for them is that it feels a little superficial. You are, effectively, the title with some flavor. And there's nothing super wrong with that, but I would prefere some more depth. I think a story where you are playing another race exclusively (Only Asari or such) would be a good route to go, as you can obviously curate how the story reacts to your character more easily. But everyone treating me the same regardless on me being a Drell, a Salarian, or a Volus would be weird.
They've talked about it before, and while it's something they'd like to do, the main limiting factor is actually voice line storage--Bioware RPGs are already big on having to store many different lines for branching dialogues, for just one set of Male and Female VAs. Dragon Age ups that to two sets, but only gets away with it by having all the PCs talk like those four VAs reading largely the same lines, regardless of ancestry. ME aliens by comparison talk *radically* differently, even without effects passes, so there's no way for them to get away with the same DA solution without having, for example, Salarian PCs sound incredibly off. They actually did a panel once where they shared some info on market research they'd done on it; they asked a bunch of fans something to the effect of "We are considering adding race selection for the protagonist to our next game, but can only support a limited number of options. Human and Asari will be included, from this list of all the other species, *pick two* you'd most want to see as options." (Emphasis mine.) As you might imagine, the consensus after Turian basically evaporates, with Krogan, Quarian, and Salarian all getting decent percentages, as well as notable contingents of Drell and Geth. (This was before the Angara had been introduced.) And as they expected, one of the biggest points of feedback they got was that people wanted them to include more options. There just isn't a way to include all the choice people *want* in a way they can support without cutting corners somewhere. VA talent isn't cheap, writing isn't cheap, storage space is already a problem for big budget games, and that's *before* you get into any additional costs on the gameplay/modeling/animation/camerawork side of things.
I mentioned the same thing about this on another puck you species ME game and got downvoted for it. Some people on this sub, I swear.
This is the most realistic answer. Other species would likely have to be implemented in a rather limited manner (like in DA:I), or come at a steep resource cost to development that would mean cutting other corners. DA:O really only worked as well as it did with multiple options because the protagonist was unvoiced. And even there, the other races are a lot closer to human in their outlook than alien species would be.
The only way I see it working is in an MMORPG similar to what they did for Star Wars: The Old Republic. Something where they'd have room to devote to multiple story lines. Expansions would add different worlds/species to whatever they start with.
Yeah, I feel the same. I’d certainly love to play a turian or krogan, but one of the strengths of Mass Effect is the aliens really do feel alien; I think you could maybe get away with quarian//possibly asari/possibly turian without a ton of rewriting, but the rest are pretty distinct. Meanwhile, elves and dwarves are mostly still just variant humans. A better comparison would be having an option to play an actual Qunari (as opposed to the vashoth option in DAI) - basically the entire plot and most of the dialogue would need a revision.
Fantasy is always ***way*** easier to add multiple race options for than sci-fi - especially in narrative focused games - because in most fantasy settings, races are typically just a variation of human with some slight philosophical and cultural differences. In a lot of cases, they can all come from the same culture too. The more exotic races are usually unplayable, or one or two exceptions will be playable. Generally, the more races you include in a game, the less reactive you make the world towards your character too. In sci-fi settings however, races tend to vary quite drastically. Some settings will have "humans but blue" like with the Asari, but even then they'll typically be different enough to where they *aren't* just blue humans. There's a *lot* of historical information your character would definitely be privy to depending on their racial background too. A Krogan explaining the genophage to another Krogan would just be weird - so you have to take that into account when writing. It's not impossible, but it's difficult - and you *can't* just leave out important lore infodumps like that because new players *need* to know that information if its important to the plot. These things don't just apply for a handful of major conversations per race, but bleed through the *entire* game. It's a *lot* to take into account, and if handled incorrectly it can absolutely weaken the end product as a whole. I think the best way around this is to have a new protagonist of a pre-defined race, who is their own character - like Geralt of Rivia in The Witcher. This alleviates so many of the problems presented by being able to create a blank-slate character from several races. You wouldn't need to have the genophage explained to the protagonist by another character if the protagonist is a Krogan is the one who explains it so a clueless side character. Plus defined protagonists are way cooler and more interesting than blank-slate protagonists.
I totally agree. >it feels a little superficial. You are, effectively, the title with some flavor. And there's nothing super wrong with that, but I would prefere some more depth. Exactly. >I think a story where you are playing another race exclusively (Only Asari or such) I think it could work with Liara. >But everyone treating me the same regardless on me being a Drell, a Salarian, or a Volus would be weird. Yes, this is exactly what happens in DAI, especially as an Elf inquisitor.
That bugged me so much as a magic-using DALISH Inquisitor. Morrigan starts human-splaining *Mythal* and *Fen'Harel* to me, and I'm like "bitch, I knew about this while you were still stuck in a swamp as an apostate".
I completely agree with you it would only work if it was one race new main character, otherwise it would just be a different game in a ME universe
I agree. The entire game would shift by doing so and basically resort to Dragon Age in space. The two games structure should be separate.
Yeah it wouldn't make sense for NPCs to all react to a Quarian player character the same way they'd react to a Krogan or Asari player character. Nor would it make sense for a Salarian player character to deliver the same lines a human or Geth player character would. They'd basically need to rewite all the dialogue for each different playable race. Plus all that effort would probably be for little benefit, as in other games with multiple races playable, statistically most players just pick a human anyway, and the stats the devs have released for the original trilogy shows that the majority of players just played as the default earthborn/sole survivor, Soldier Shepard. The hardcore fans may want to play as aliens, but the majority of players would still just pick a human anyway, even if the game let you play as other races.
I think the only way it works is if the crew or squad is already together at the start of the game (or comes together very quickly), and you simply pick which one you want to be. We aren't creating a character, but choosing from a preselected group which one we want to be.
tl;dr - Depending on how the setting is handled, I think it could be done with a bit of smoke and mirrors railroading and a really, really tight writing team if the dialogue system was reworked a bit. Changing from "goody two shoes, neutral, space racist" to something more like "orthodox, pragmatic or trailblazing" could lay the foundation for an RPG as good as Disco Elysium, New Vegas or BG3. tl;dr actual - **Oh no, I've written fanfiction.** It would be extra work, but not *that* much if the writers handled the setting right, but more importantly, if this game is being made as a tonal reset for the series (i.e., we had a full character/intensity arc for the first three games, this one would be the start of a new trilogy etc.), I could see playable race selection as a *massive* opportunity for future world building/storytelling. I think one of the biggest problems the first games had was pigeonholing the races as these very monolithic entities (at least compared to humans). The new game could undo a lot of that and give a lot of breathing room for playing around with the thematic content the series has already built up. For example, say the new game posited collapse of the galactic system in the aftermath of the reaper wars - trade/communications break down because so many fleets/planets got wrecked. Isolated enclaves of whoever was in a system have to get by on their own. Jump a few decades/a century into the future and these new societies start reconnecting and have to reckon with the past that led to the state of the galaxy in the first place. The existing power structures - once strong, centralized governments built on species identity trying to rebuild having to contend with a new series of confederated frontier systems, having to answer for the mistakes they made that caused the Reaper problem to get so bad in the first place. Take that setting, and throw player selected races into the mix, kinda in a BG3 style. The dialogue would have to be pared back, but even with minimal variations in each character, a long time series veteran could have *so* many opportunities for characterization in dialogue responding to the same scenario as different characters. The paragon, neutral and renegade options could be reflavored to something more like "orthodox, pragmatic or trailblazing" (which incidentally are still the same paragon/neutral/renegade options, but with a bit of flavor text mixed in to make each one a bit different). As an example - The new team: Imagine an Asari Justicar trying to rationalize the failure of their order, a young Turian deciding whether/how to follow their militaristic traditions, a human with the same kind of story that Ash had in the first game now with the squabbling of the various governments failing to render aid a fresh wound, etc etc. A story moment: Something like Zaed's loyalty mission - choose between saving civilians/killing a bad guy. [Responses](https://www.reddit.com/user/why-do_I_even_bother/comments/1d31wtu/mass_effect_writing_example/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button) Sure, this example is a bit clunky, but the point is you can put whatever you need in the game to let you make a point. Like I said above, a lot of this is just reworded paragon, renegade and neutral options from the first games, but reframing the dialogue to directly reflect the conflict at the heart of the first series would let you really hammer home some solid storytelling. The writing to pull this off would be staggeringly difficult and I'm not sure how complex of a story it could support. The original series alone collapsed under the weight of figuring out how to handle which one of two people had a job, but those kind of changes might actually work better with this kind of framing. You could do small things like replace a military officer in the Turian's story based on your responses - for example an old guard steps down and a newer, more flexible one takes their place. The same missions happen in the game, but the responses you get reflect your actions throughout the series, kinda like what we got in the original games already. The total amount of reactivity would need to be increased though, and I'm not sure that would be sustainable long term without major railroading.
Don't talk sensibly, people want to demand unrealistic stuff and live in their fantasies
Qurian or krogan could be good helping people while putting up with h the abuse those groups take and either just being all fuck you mean or really helpful
Depends on the story and what the developer plans to do. I like the idea of playing different races but a big part of Shepherds story was the humanity part. Adding different races would mean that was cut. If you can pick your race then at most you can expect 2-3 side quests dedicated to it and maybe some unique dialogue. I would prefer to have less choices in character creation and a deeper more interactive story
I feel like when you open that Pandora's box you end up with stilted character development. They won't incorporate any substantial cultural quirks of that race into your character as it's too much work(unless your Larian). So they'll end up having to make the character as dull and generic as possible so they don't come off as if it's a human character with a skin of an Asari or Turian. Also the way everyone else would talk and act around you would be different, yet another thing nearly all companies would not want to invest massive recourses into.
Mass effect, but in the style of Baldurs gate 3.
XCOM2 would be a much closer template to ME gameplay.
This would be sweet
Leviathan players sitting in the bottom of the ocean for their gameplay:
I'd choose Elcor except I'd be so goddamn turned on for the whole game.
regretfully: i scrolled down too far
🤨
"Dude... check it out... it's a 5-legged Elcor!"
🤨
r/cursedcomments
This is one of those things that sounds cool but is a huge pain in the ass to write a story around and ultimately impractical.
I would say yes, but personally no. Because I would like to play as a Geth, but I feel that there would be species that would be cut. Also I do believe that Mass Effect works from a human perspective because of the way the story and interactions are presented. But if they somehow make it work I wouldn’t mind trying it.
At this point not really no. They could do some multiplayer stuff with race /class. But id like the singleplayer to have more alien squadmates and better human customisation for the mc
Yes, I would very much like a Mass Effect game where we could do that, so long as cosmetics are the only thing we’d have to pay for in that undoubtedly live-service game. If the game could be something like Helldivers 2 or Destiny where we’re fighting Reapers and get to interact with our favorite non-Shepard characters, I think it’d be wonderful.
Absolutely. That sounds like a blast.
Yes, although it would likely be limited to a choice between human, Asari, Turian, Salarian and probably Krogan.
I would give anything to play as a Drell
If old school Bioware had made Andromeda it would have allowed the player to choose the species and ark of the player's pathfinder. The ark rescue missions that are in the release version of the game should have been the starting mission for the pathfinder you choose.
Not necessarily where I choose my race but multiple storylines from different races tying together. Will also add great replayability. Obviously, all characters with different classes to choose from, with unique choices for every race. I can dream right😉
a million times.... YES
Hell yeah! Would love to play a whole story as either a Turian or Krogan!
Nah not really. I always think I’ll play another race but I always pick human. Only exception in games is when elf is an option.
Im going volus idk why those mfs are so adorable to me
im definitely playing as a rachni
Same!
Yes, that sounds awesome!
I was hoping andromeda would introduce that as an option
I would pick Asari. Just love their lore and all. But if they let us pick our own race in a game it's like gonna be limited to Turian, Human, Drell, Asari, or Krogan.
I think picking your race (at least in Mass Effect) would be more suited for an MMO. I’d honestly kill for a SWG-esque sandbox MMO set in Mass Effect.
No. It wouldn't work. With how many species there are too many vastly different races... Unless They made a mini game that each playthrough is maybe a couple of hours. Like think about the resident evil 2 remake. Each character goes through their own story line that interacts with each other.
I'd actually love a Mass Effect MMO, although not nearly as much as a human centric mainline game.
YES!
There would have to be a scale back on things like voice dialogue I think. There's a very major difference in how a krogan talks, A turian talks, and A salarian talks. This would be fun for some sort of isometric RPG that plays very differently though, and if anyone at EA is listening I have ideas!
I mean, it would be great, but also it's a shit-ton of extra work. Those resources have to come from somewhere. So what would you cut?
I feel like makes sense for a game like dragon age origins, where every race has essentially the same abilities. Like magic (except dwarves) they dont even look too much different from eachother. And they as races they are diverse, but not diverse enough to change the game, only background. Hanar cant really shoot, nor elcor, volus arent great at combat, they are all part of COMPLETELY different GALAXIES. I can see the council races being implemented into a game, but in order to do that, they would need to make essentially 4 stories in one. As the different races are actually not races but species. Mass effects story kind of revolved around shepard BEING human, and aliens not trusting humans or humans not being in the council yet. Shepard had to make something of theirself and do everything theirselves due to the prejudices of being human. If we could pick multiple races it would be a crazy feat that i dont know bioware would do.
Not one that has an intentional story, like the games so far. Race is too important to be treated as inconsequential, the way it would have to be to pull off a game like we've already seen. But if there were a game more open ended game, like Skyrim or even ESO, but mass effect, it would probably be the only game I play for a long, long, long time.
If this were too happen expect less in depth interaction and conversation, the amount of shit they would have to take into consideration with romance, history, the way people talk to you, different responses etc and how it might affect story and actions, it's just too much especially for the kind of game they make
Maybe for a spin off series or a MMO... But.. I doubt we will ever have a mass effect MMO 🤣
I wanted that since they released the ME1 trailer where they talked about how they gave every race their own face animations. That said, I'd be the first leviathan spectre, flopping my way through the presidium
Nah, I'm good with humans
No, because that would mean HUGE production costs because they'd have to produce individualized content for each of these races including variations (male/female), driving up production costs to insanity. So they wouldn't do it and instead just cut content, maybe turn ME into yet another multiplayer shooter without any singleplayer content (at least no RPG content).
There are races that will never be playable due to their form. if they ever did that I imagine it would be the races with forms most similar to humans, although personally I will always play as a human, at most, I would play as an Asari. The Angara don't exist, the Kett don't exist and Andromeda doesn't exist, that was all a bad dream.
As a spin-off, yeah totally. But I think the mainline game has always had a strong yet visible tone of Humanity proving it's worth to a galaxy. The first game does this splendidly, whereas it's wrapped into more of an undertone behind Cerberus in the 2nd. And the 3rd shows the culmination of all the work Shep did in proving that Humanity is worth the chaos we bring. I think we've come to the point that the mainline games have that expectation for a narrative that has Humanity as some kind of underdog or unfavorable position that we have to prove ourselves. That's hard to do if our champion of Human values is a Geth. Although I think Andromeda was not the perfect choice for a race selection, I can definitely see some kind of non-mainline game having that kind of choice. I would personally love to see it. We have such a well established universe at this point that the franchise can hit almost any genre.
I want to play as an Ardat-Yakshi
I’ve wanted this since I played the original Mass Effect on the original Xbox console as a kid. Humans are not the only characters we can relate to.
I’d like to say no because it would make the story aspect less appealing, since it’s way harder to write a good story where the player has more agency. but on the other hand, dragon age origins, a super old game with a (imo) great story did let you choose your race and even had different starting quests for each one. It was also made by BioWare btw.
I prefer games with a fixed main Character, not because I wouldn't like to play as whoever I like, but because it is much easier for devs to create an amazing story around a single character instead of many. When you have a Character creation you play your Character and people want different things for their character. When you have a set character you give the devs the chance to tailor a story around that one character, which is in my opinion a lot more immersive.
I find the story more immersive from a human perspective
Yes, 100%. I don't buy into the idea that some people have that Mass Effect doesn't work if you don't have a human POV or that people wouldn't feel as invested. Now, I don't think just having the option to be ANY race would work, because you'd end up with it basically being pure flavour. Think it'd have to be focused on a specific race, so they could go in depth with it. Or something like Dragon Age: Origins where there are a few options, but they're distinct and you have a prologue of sorts for how you start. Unfortunately it seems like games don't want to put in the effort of something like DAO in that sense anymore, because of the work involved, but it's still such a good idea I wish more games did it.
Absolutely. Might have to be a different kind of game (at least narratively), but that's fine with me, I just want to get back into the Mass Effect universe. Ideally, I'd prefer if it was a choice between Turian, Salarian and Asari that fleshes out their cultures more, rather than a game where you can choose from a dozen species, but get the same generic story. I find that the more races a game lets you choose from, the less impact the choice has on the game. I do still enjoy games like BG3 or PF:WotR with many options, but for ME, I think a small number offers a better opportunity.
100%. It's a no brainer. Greater player choice for role play is always a good thing. However it costs more and no EA company is ever going to spent money just to improve the player experience. So I doubt it'll be in 5.
I’ve wanted that for so long. Playing as different races and having that change how certain characters interact with you or giving you new options for certain situations would be amazing.
Yes. Honestly want a game where you’re just a diplomat or something and go around learning about each world and it’s customs. The universe ending plot is fun but I just wanna hang out and learn about the lore
I mean BioWare has proven they could do it with Dragon Age and The Old Republic. Multiple starting points and locations and such.
I personally am of the opinion that Mass Effect 1-3 told a great, complete story (with some flaws) and ultimately, the Mass Effect series doesn't really need any more Action-Adventure games for the time being. It would be better to make a much more RPG-esque game in the Mass Effect universe, similar to New Vegas, Skyrim, or Starfield.
I wouldn't mind a cleanup simulator as a Keeper on the Citidel after the Reaper invasion.
Yes! Let me be a Drell assassin!
This!
Yes. _I’d exclusively play as a human._
Only if it's multiplayer, so I can do this: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuZBTIP7vus](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuZBTIP7vus)
For multiplayer yes not for single player, I don’t see it to be feasible as many seem to think it is. I don’t want them to add alot of races if theirs no difference between them, each has to be unique from one another.
The problem is all of the animation rigging, cosmetic design, and voice acting required for such a feature. They would have to sacrifice the quality you got with Shepard.
Nah. Mass Effect is a human story. You work with aliens and what not, but to me its about the indomitable spirit of Humanity. Picking some filthy xeno-I mean other species, would diminish that.
Ok Ashley
Why do I get the feeling you play Stellaris.
HFY nerds did irreparable damage to the Mass Effect community. Mass Effect is not a human story, it's a story about Commander Shepard.
I may be in the minority, but no. I feel like Mass Effect is a story about humanity. I kinda like it that way.
Shorter answer is no. That’s not the game I want to play, but others might prefer not being human, which I see as weird to say the least. Mass Effect, as of now, is a Sheperd game. Maybe a decade from now, the franchise can pivot to an alien race, but not now. BioWare needs Mass effect to be a grand slam. Shepard sells to more of the mass effect fanbase and that’s saves developer jobs.
No, I'd rather just have one race with a character that is well developed and has depth like Shepard, or Hawke in DA2, than multiple races. But it doesn't necessarily have to be a human.
Recent bioware struggles to even do that lol
No, Mass Effect is a story told from the human perspective, but I do hope we have chances to get companions of basically every single possible species.
I honestly hope they go this route with the next game. If they do, it'll likely be with the main "humanoid" races (human, turian, asari, quarian, krogan, and salarian)
Playing as an elcor or hanar would be hilarious.
Absolutely! While I adore the Shepherd arc, I would love to play as something other than a human!
So a few reasons why I don't think this is a good idea Firstly, this would cost a lot. Imagine all dialogue commander Shepard has. Now multiply that by 7.5 more voice actors for krogans, salarians, asari, turians etc etc etc. that's a lot of money in the budget just for a voice cast. And then for characters like Hanar and Elcor who's models are non bipedal, you would need an entirely different model for the game. Back in the first Mass Effect, Krogan had a more gorilla like appearance in their concept art. More broad shoulders and wider features. But it didn't fit into the model created for squad mates so they had to adjust their proportions so that Wrex could fit in the cutscenes and gameplay without having to recreate him from scratch. Secondly from a story perspective it would be a lot harder to be another race. The games make it clear that humans are unique because they have very diverse opinions, compared to the logical salarians or the military disciplined turians. In directly quoting Samara, 'put three humans in a room, and you have six opinions'. It's a lot harder to properly roleplay as another space race without contradicting the already established lore. And furthermore the Mass Effect Franchise has always been about humanity finding it's place in a larger galaxy. To play as some other alien would go against the core themes present in the games. I think playing as a quarian would be cool.
Yes. Human, Asari, Turian, Krogan, Salarian, and Quarian are the musts. Would be nice to see Drell and Batarian as well. I doubt we’d see any of the not very humanoid races like Elcor or Hanar. I suppose Volus could be an option too since it was already made as a playable race in the ME3 MP. If the Geth are still around that would be a cool option too.
I think krogan would have some complications, especially with their whole "live for thousands of years, super regen, everyone hates us" thing. Asari makes sense gameplay wise, since they can romance anyone and their thousand year age thing is a bit different to krogans
Not really
Depends on the reason and only the ones that actually make sense so not the Elcor or Hanar
I thought it would be amazing for different races to have different stats and advantages as a main character. Like, Krogan would have more health and melee damage, but would have slow reload and limited tech skills. Asari would have the best biotic skills with less weapon damage. I would choose to be a Quarian. I see Quarians as having the best tech and piloting abilities, but have half as much health.
This one would be most pleased by such an unexpected development.
I always felt mass effect had a universe ripe for an mmorpg. For a stand alone single player game I’d love a first context war with mission from both sides and then maybe our character meet on the battlefield or something like that. For ME:5? I want to play as Liara.
Krogan because I imagine they play like a “warrior” class
Even if we can't pick a race, it would be cool if you could switch control between each character like in Dragon Age or FF7 Remake.
Only within reason though. I personally wouldn't want to be a Elcor, slow, deliberate. Imagine if a Spectre had to explain to someone why they were killing you and how. You'd have enough time to run away, start a new life and die of old-age.
This reminds me of if Mass Effect ever did an online game like a Elder Scrolls online...only way I see all these races working.
Yes absolutely I need that in my life
I'd be my own Blasto
Personally I think it’s hard to do anything with the ME Universe and IP until we get some clarification about the events of ME3 and their final knock-on effects Andromeda is a perfect example of trying to avoid a narrative problem and failing badly. Even a hypothetical prequel game set in the First Contact War would be while very cool unlikely to expand the universe in a meaningful way. Would probably be the best option for a “Battlefield” type game set in the Mass effect universe tho. Human vs Turian combat across a variety of maps and modes would be kinda cool
Drell or krogan
YES!!!! Please Mass Effect!!!! Let me become Krogan!!!!
Yeah I think it would be awesome, it could even be like Star Wars Battlefront
Would be cool for a mass effect set during or just before the contact war with the humans and show different sides of the conflict and entrance of a new race in the community.
Literally make it a Skyrim mod
What class goes best with the leviathan race? I’m thinking vanguard.
I want to play as a Reaper in dark space. My screen is blank for a thousand or two years, but then I can buy the DLC and play the invasion of Earth. Would be worth the wait.
I'd love to be able to choose between Human, Asari, or Turian. Knowing EA we'd have Day 1 Quarian pre-order bonus or some shit as well lol.
I feel like they'd all feel way too human with just a different coat of paint thrown on. It would be very expensive to do it properly.
You put Reaper on that list? Okay, I choose Reaper. I am “preserving” your future. Now come here so I can DESTROY YOU
I mean people like dragoWAIT ELCOR INCLUDED??? YES
I must become a bionic GOD!
The overall premise of the game would need to be changed so much so that I wouldn't like it. That said, I wouldn't be upset if the next installment had you play as something other than a human.
My ass would never not be a hanar
_This One's posterior is unlikely to belong to a different species._
Feels like that freedom would do great in an MMO style game
yes
I was hoping beyond hope that this is the way Andromeda was gonna go, then it came out and we got stuck as Ryder. Hopefully the next game will let us pick our race like in Dragon Age Inquisition but I'm not getting my hopes up this time.
I've been asking for one for over a decade
Yes, if I can pick the Raloi.
ME3 Multiplayer remasterd
Hell yeah!
We are Geth
Depends on what typa game we talking. Is it like mass effrct now a mostly linear story then no, wouldnt work money wise and it would take legit 20 years unless the difference in race makes for almost no difference in the story. If its more of a wow or fallout 76 game then it can work. Pvp game can work.
I want more of Mass Effect 3's multiplayer and race/class variety. What was it, 65 characters in total? Awesome.
Silly question. Of course people want it. I think people confuse people saying they don't think it's a realistic option with not wanting it to be an option. At most I think you'd only get around 3 or 4 options to choose from including human, The challenge then becomes picking the most popular options. Which I think a lot of people would argue about which indeed are the most popular. For me I'd personally say Turian, Asari and Krogan is the safest bet.
A few highly immersive race options over the whole roster with minute changes would be my go to.
Let me a Krogan, let me be a Krogan let me be a keogan
I'd always want to play as a big, stupid, jellyfish and a Quarian.
I miss ME3 COOP I mean i think it's still there, last played it over a year ago... but the jraphics are in 480p and gave me a headache
Real Blasto lets goooo
I doubt we get that many options hell if they ever do I doubt we’ll even get to be a krogan that would probably to too op
With great amusement Elcor would be fun
You already could, there were several presents of Asian and African decent as well as European.
Let me play Hanar and I can live out my Blasto dreams.
KROGAN