We feel reasonably comfortable in stating that Mass Effect is this generation's definitive character-driven series - a miracle of narrative sophistication that also happens, against all odds, to be a miracle of choice and flexibility. With Mass Effect 3 just over a month from curtains-up, is it too early to think about what comes next? Executive producer Michael Gamble is happy to talk possibilities. Check out our chat from last week's EA Showcase below, and head over to the Mass Effect 3 hub for further BioWare insights.
You're on the final straight. Is the game finished?
Do you tend to make many last minute changes at BioWare?
It's all about getting the best quality we can get, so if something has to change, we'll change it. We'll pull out all stops to do it, so it won't prevent us shipping the game. Even in the last week we've made some changes, we've made some tweaks, we're constantly refining things. It's not done till it's literally out of our hands. At the same time you have to be considerate of wanting to hit the ship dates, so it's a bit of a balance.
Why did you delay the demo?
We just wanted to polish it, make it the best possible demo we could have done. We wanted to make it as robust as we could, and add as much stuff in there that was final final content. And that's basically what you'll see on the 14th - stuff that's just days away from final.
There's been a certain amount of fan fracas about the high action content of your trailers. What have you learned about promoting RPGs during your time with Mass Effect?
When you're promoting an RPG, you have to understand what your core strengths are. I think with Mass Effect 3 it's our ability to invoke really tight emotional responses from players. So what you do with demos and trailers is you capitalise as much as you can on that. So for the trailers, obviously we wanted to paint the picture of an impending galactic war.
The Mass Effect series straddles a shift in how RPGs are made - there aren't as many raw numbers floating around, and the choices you make are more intuitive. Can you talk a little about that?
It's definitely a learning process. In between Mass Effect 2 and 3 we took a lot of the fan feedback, a lot of the things that we've seen, and we've rolled some of those changes back in Mass Effect 3. Your story is customised around your Shepard and who you are - we stay faithful to that concept, but we did want to bring back some of the really stats-driven customisation options for those kind of players who like that stuff.
2 comments so far...
DP0000 on 3 Feb '12 said:
Re: next games. I would love to see a game (full sized or perhaps more suited to DLC) played from an Asari viewpoint. The timescale of the game would be hundreds of years, during which time key events prior to ME1 will play out. You might do missions with (or against) certain humans, then decades later meet them again or later work with their children or grandchildren.
Gouldfish on 6 Apr '12 said:
I'd love an MMO of the Cycle before, like what they did with SWTOR then you have a clean slate to do what you please