I’ve been thinking a lot recently about the Mass Effect series. Specifically, what I remember from my time playing it. I recalled some of the set pieces and encounters no double - but the things that really stick out to me, that make be nostalgic about the series aren’t the times I’m shooting a gun. It’s the interactions with the characters and the conversation and decisions I’d made along the way.
So why can’t we have a Mass Effect game designed around a Telltale/Life is Strange/Until Dawn style? Specifically - dialogue with characters, important choices, and heavily reliance on story. Don’t waste time on combat encounters and balancing weapons - focus on the things that have made the series special from the very start. Strip the series down to it’s core.
It might work well for the style of story telling they lean towards but I would be so bummed out by it myself. I don’t much care for the pesudo choices games provide and without the hook Bioware’s gameplay systems provide I’d rather just go read a book.
I’m right there with you OP. In fact, I wouldn’t mind more big budget games with less reliance on combat mechanics. I’m playing Breath of the Wild right now and though I still love the exploration and puzzle solving, the combat got stale around hour 20. Hell, Persona 5 would have been a much better game with shorter and fewer dungeons.
I’d be interested in this, but I think that Bioware’s games need a tighter focus rather than less interactivity. The games are too concerned with feature sets and the like, rather than really focusing on a central theme or narrative element. ME1 and 2 were really memorable games, despite their flaws, because they managed to really hone in on some fascinating ideas. They are admittedly still large and unwieldily games, but their best moments come because of this focus.
Maybe this is just a side effect of modern AAA development and is essentially unavoidable, but I hope that quality over size or feature set still counts for something.
Agreed. Although I think Breath of the Wild’s combat problems might have more to do with power creep than unsound ideas.
Still haven’t gotten that far in the game though, so idk.
While I think going that way could be successful, it’s not what I necessarily would want out of the series. I’m not even super enamoured with the combat as such, but what I’d really like to see is for them to lean into character creation choices having more story impact. The first one had those origins (earthborn, spacer, or colonist and sole survivor, ruthless, or war hero) which, while the impact was minimal, made some difference, but as the series as moved on, they’ve moved away from it. Class mattered too, in terms of some conversation lines you would see if you were a biotic, which in Andromeda, with its classless approach has also been filed away.
i think saying that the core of the series is just the storytelling and choice making is kind of… i dunno. i guess i think the story of the first three was tied a great deal to the fact that you were a soldier, and it was pretty fun/goofy combat too. telltale style would be nice because they could focus on telling the story of someone who wasn’t a combat specialist. i’d be super into a neo-noir detective game set entirely on the citadel or something
My dream has always been a buddy cop game on the Citadel, with a cool Turian and a hot headed Krogon that have to work together to solve a mystery of some new drug that’s entered the Citadel underground.
Low-level stories are more interesting, give me those instead of saving the world over and over again, please.
yeah i keep thinking about how many opportunities there are for interesting low-level stories in the mass effect universe! like you could be a mechanic on an alliance fleet, or someone doing anomaly research on some scientific colony. they set up a really wide setting for themselves so always having to see it from the perspective of the galaxy’s most special boy is kind of a shame. hopefully they’re more willing to give the mass effect IP more experimental games in the future?