Executive Vice President for EA Studios Patrick Soderlund only revealed recently that the publisher was actively looking into remastering some games, particularly for the Mass Effect trilogy. Peter Moore is EA's chief competition officer, and unfortunately he's shut down any talk of HD remasters, saying that the company is focussed on "delivering for the future".
Electronic Arts never really believed in the remastering of older games, re-releasing them in HD and adding improvements to make them more appealing for the modern era, with COO Peter Moore saying only last year that it "feels like pushing stuff out because you've run out of ideas”. It looks like that's all about to change though, because according to Executive Vice President for EA Studios Patrick Soderlund, the publisher is actively looking into remastering some games, particularly for the Mass Effect trilogy.
The Mass Effect creators, Bioware, has made a conscious decision to not let players continue on from their Mass Effect 3 saves in their latest game, Mass Effect: Andromeda. Bioware explained their decision in an interview with Eurogamer, who confirmed that none of the decisions made in the previous Mass Effect games will have any impact on Andromeda. “We acknowledged it in the endings of Mass Effect 3 and I think that's where we want to leave it for now," said Aaryon Flynn, BioWare studio boss. “We want this to be a new story and it would be very hard to say it's a new story but also that you need to understand how [the past trilogy] ended."
Bioware fans may be a bit disappointed by the showing at EA’s E3 conference, which seemed to be more of a teaser than a full reveal, but a few relevant details did emerge, along with some footage from the game.
E3 is upon us! The Electronic Entertainment Expo has infiltrated the Los Angeles Convention Center, filling its halls with the latest and greatest games all the big publishers want you to know about. GameWatcher will be on hand to report the biggest news and give you hands-on coverage of the show's top games. The show floor doesn't officially open until Tuesday, but most of the big news will be revealed through the press conferences scheduled for Sunday and Monday.
EA's revealed that eight new games have been added to the Origin Access service, which allows consumers to get unlimited access to an instant library of PC Games, including a 10% discount on the Origin store and access to EA's games before they're released. It costs £3.99 a month or £19.99 for a year's subscription. The latest games to be added to the vault includes the complete Mass Effect Trilogy, Trine and Trine 2, Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, Peggle, and Dungeons of Dredmor.
BioWare have announced Mass Effect: Andromeda will be delayed until early 2017, pushed back from its original release date of 2016. Aaryn Flynn’s blog post details the reason for the delay: “As we’ve been playing the game at the studio recently, it’s showing us that we’re taking the game in the right direction. But we also know we need the right amount of time to make sure we deliver everything the game can be and should be – that’s our commitment from all of us to all of you.”
NeoGAF user anexanhume revealed that Electronic Arts has sent out a survey to select gamers that seems to detail the premise of Mass Effect: Andromeda, putting them in a hostile galaxy where humans are the aliens and the targets of a deadly local species.
BioWare isn't above trolling, it seems, as the studio's head of design and art Alistair McNally claims he strolled around the Games Developer Conference wearing a T-shirt with their unannounced IP on it, and no one noticed.
Mass Effect: Andromeda will be launching in early 2017, but it seems that the first glimpses of Shepard have been leaked.
Mass Effect: Andromeda was originally due to be released in 2016, but EA's chief financial officer Blake Jorgensen has confirmed during a presentation at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference, that the game is now targeting a release in early 2017.
There seems to be a trend of distinguished videogame writers leaving BioWare these days. After David Gaider, who'd been working at the company for 17 years before leaving for greener pastures, Chris Schlerf has announced in a series of Tweets he was returning to Bungie after working on Mass Effect: Andromeda.
We're well into the new year and the video game industry is coming out swinging with plans for 2016 and 2017. EA is certainly no slouch. They recently had their Q3 2016 earnings release, during which outside of announcing their sales, they also announced a deadline for the release of Titanfall 2, Mass Effect: Andromeda, and a new Battlefield.
More than a few people were surprised when BioWare Montreal senior development director Chris Wynn announced on Twitter than not only was he leaving the Mass Effect: Andromeda production team but BioWare as a whole.
Some Reddit users have claimed that the N7 trailer for Mass Effect: Andromeda released back on 7 November 2015 had an Easter Egg that revealed the protagonist's last name.
November 7 is N7 day, and BioWare celebrated it in part by releasing a new trailer for Mass Effect: Andromeda, narrated by Jennifer Hale, best known as the voice of the female Shepard. The trailer itself is stirring in a generic "humans will always explore" theme, but using Hale's narration is an unusual choice, because BioWare has sworn up and down that Mass Effect 3 was the last adventure for Commander Shepard, and that Andromeda would take place some 80 years after the Reaper War. All we can say is: stay tuned.
For the last few years, November 7 has been designated N7 Day by BioWare as a way to celebrate all things Mass Effect. This year, the studio is pulling out all the stops save one - there will be no announcements regarding their upcoming game Mass Effect: Andromeda.
The fourth Mass Effect game, Andromeda, won't have Commander Shepard, the iconic operative of the first three games, and BioWare's development director Chris Wynn wants fans to give the game a chance.
Former Mass Effect writer Drew Karpyshyn has returned to BioWare to take up story duties on Star Wars: The Old Republic. Having just finished his own book trilogy, Chaos Born, it's a natural time for Drew Karpyshyn to return to the company where he made his name. "Working at BioWare was a challenging but very rewarding job," he writes on his blog, "and it’s good to be back as part of the team. The thing I missed most about BioWare was the amazing people I got to work with, and luckily for me many of them are still there! I suspect a lot of folks are going to wonder if this means BioWare is about to announce a new project tied to my return. The short answer: no. I originally came to the Austin studio many years ago to work on SWTOR and – at least for now – that’s what I’m focusing on again."
Mass Effect Andromeda won't star any major players from the three previous games in the sci-fi franchise, Bioware's senior development director Chris Wynn confirmed over Twitter. Wynn says that cameo appearances "wouldn't make much sense, story-wise", considering that the upcoming game will be set light-years away, in a brand new galaxy.