Mass Effect Isn’t Dead Yet!
In case you weren’t aware, the reactions to Mass Effect Andromeda were…chaotic at best. On one side you had longtime fans who enjoyed much of what the game had to offer but were severely disappointed in certain areas. On the other side you had fans who were so resentful towards the game that you’d think they had just seen the ending to Mass Effect 3 for the first time.
While Andromeda may have been something of a rocky ride, that’s not to say fans don’t want to return to the franchise. After all, these are the video games that gave us Garrus Vakarian, Urdnot Wrex and Tali’Zorah Vas Normandy, of course we want to see more! Maybe this fourth entry was just a bump in the road.
However, with Andromeda now receiving no further DLC and Bioware preoccupied with their new dream project Anthem as well as Dragon Age 4, the future of the franchise has been thrown into doubt.
Fear not! In an interview with Gamereactor, one of the big wigs at EA reassured fans that Mass Effect was far from finished.
EA’s Executive Vice President Patrick Söderlund was in attendance at Gamescom in Cologne recently, and we couldn’t resist talking to the man about all things EA, including Mass Effect: Andromeda. When we asked about his views on the franchise right now, and where it needs to go in the future, he had some very interesting things to say on the matter.
“Well I think, my personal opinion is, I think that the game… I usually don’t do this, but this is one of those places where I feel like the game got criticised a little bit more than it deserved,” Söderlund said. “I think the game is actually a great game. Yes, we have to acknowledge the fact that there were some things that maybe we could have done better, absolutely, but as a whole, if you go in and you buy the game today with everything that’s in it today, I believe that that’s a game worth buying, personally.”
“So that’s the first thing I’ll say. The second thing I’ll say is, for Mass Effect as a franchise, that has such a big fanbase, and you know I’ve seen people saying ‘Oh, EA’s not making another Mass Effect’. I see no reason why we shouldn’t come back to Mass Effect. Why not? It’s a spectacular universe, it’s a loved series, it has a big fanbase, and it’s a game that has done a lot for EA and for BioWare.
“What we need to be careful though of is, whenever we bring Mass Effect back again, we have to make sure that we bring it back in a really relevant way, and in a fresh, exciting place. That’ my job, and that’s Casey’s Hudson job, and BioWare and the Mass Effect team’s job, to figure out what that looks like, and that we don’t know yet, but we will.”
Guess the series needs a bit more calibrating before it makes a triumphant return.
