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Five New Mass Effect 3 Details You Might Want To Hear


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Mass Effect 3 executive producer Casey Hudson spoke with UK magazine Xbox World, divulging some mid-production intel about Shepard and company. The info is scattershot; little pieces of unconnected details about many different aspects of the game. Still, they help to create a larger picture of BioWare's vision for the game. For those of you who want stay spoiler-free, here's a broad over-arching synopsis. If all goes according to plan, Mass Effect 3 is going to be bigger than its predecessors: It's also going to be more detailed than ever before. BioWare's goal is to create a realistic physical world worthy of holding the epic universe they created and that their fans love.

 

Warning: Spoilers below. This is the point of no-return. Reading past this point will reveal information vital to the plot of Mass Effect 3

 

1. Mass Effect 3 will have fewer party characters than Mass Effect 2

Don't expect to have nearly as many characters in Mass Effect 3 as you did in ME2. ME2's large crew—12 playable characters—was necessary for the game's posse-building storyline, but was a little large for BioWare's taste.

"Twelve was a big number in Mass Effect 2 - almost too big", says Hudson. "We're focused on a smaller squad with deeper relationships and more interesting interplay in Mass Effect 3' he explains. "We're not going to have twelve again but we are going to do more with the characters on your squad including Liara, and Kaidan or Ashley. And we're bringing everyone back - every main character is in Mass Effect 3 somewhere."

So yes, it is very possible that you might not get to control your favorite ME2 character. That said, every character from the game has a role to play in the story, provided they survived your trip through the Omega-4 relay.

 

2. You will travel to new worlds.

This one's kind of a no-brainer. Many of the planet you'll visit in ME3 are places you've only heard about in previous games. Hudson mentions that you'll see Palaven (the Turian homeworld) and Rannoch (the Quarian homeworld) in the game. It's also confirmed that you will return to Krogan homeworld Tunchaka.

As you might have already guessed, Shepard will also be going to Earth in this game. Hudson said that players will get to see "a Seattle/Vancouver megacity" both before and after the Reapers destroy it. Connecting the world of <Mass Effect to our own, the city is designed to look just like Vancouver. "If you Google Map Vancouver the layout is pretty much the exact same as our map," according to level artist Don Arceta.

 

3. Those worlds are going to be big.

Reapers are big. In order to have accommodate fights with them, or even having them nearby means designing levels much larger than the usual spaceship corridors that make up a large portion of Mass Effect's locales. Many of levels will include more open spaces. BioWare plans to make the shift in a way a dramatic way, claiming that some levels that are not only larger than anything ever seen in a Mass Effect game, but larger than any game built with the Unreal Engine.

Think of it this way. At least one level has to be big enough for Shepard to fight using a 50-foot tall Cerberus mech.

 

4. In combat, you'll need to think on your feet

The gunplay in Mass Effect 2 is mostly standard cover-based shooter fare. It was often OK to hide behind cover, picking off enemies at the back of a room while directing your teammates. The ME3 team plans to change that. They want you to be forced to scramble. To do that, BioWare is putting enemy tactics at the forefront. Different types of enemies will not only have varying abilities, they'll those skills in tandem. "Some will provide covering fire for snipers, some will deploy smoke to hide advancing comrades, others will coordinate subordinate units, and one will stomp around consuming its fallen friends to fuel itself," according to the feature.

 

5. Weapons are going to be much more customizable and detailed

In keeping up with their pledge to create a "deeper RPG experience" this time around, you'll be able to fine-tune your weapons in Mass Effect 3 much more than the last two games. "Every weapon is modular and can be customised with up to five modifications; scopes increase a rifle's zoom factor, new barrels increase accuracy or damage," Says Hudson. "Sling your gun on a workbench and it can be customised for a job at hand." Based on that last part, it sounds like it may be important to not only upgrade your weapons, but adjust them to suit different situations.

Hudson also mentioned that the team has been mixing it up with members of the DICE team, getting advice on how to make the guns sound realistic in varying environments.

 

Now that you've read all that, you're probably not happy that you'll have to wait until 2012 to finally get your hands on it.

Source: Five New Mass Effect 3 Details You Might Want to Hear

 

 

That's right, I'm "in" the game.

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Okay, reading this nearly got me a brain orgasm :p

 

2. You will travel to new worlds.

This one's kind of a no-brainer. Many of the planet you'll visit in ME3 are places you've only heard about in previous games. Hudson mentions that you'll see Palaven (the Turian homeworld) and Rannoch (the Quarian homeworld) in the game. It's also confirmed that you will return to Krogan homeworld Tunchaka.

As you might have already guessed, Shepard will also be going to Earth in this game. Hudson said that players will get to see "a Seattle/Vancouver megacity" both before and after the Reapers destroy it. Connecting the world of <Mass Effect to our own, the city is designed to look just like Vancouver. "If you Google Map Vancouver the layout is pretty much the exact same as our map," according to level artist Don Arceta.

 

I can't wait to see this.

 

However, I read somewhere that Tali will NOT be in your party, which makes me kinda sad since she's my favourite character :( I hope you'll be able to interact more with Kasumi though, she's my second favourite character in the game.

 

Maybe I was wrong about Tali. This is taken from the Mass Effect 3 wikia page:

 

Squad Members

 

As with the previous games in the Mass Effect trilogy, Shepard will be able to recruit companions that can follow Shepard into battle. Currently, these are known to include:

 

Kaidan Alenko

Tali'Zorah vas Normandy

Liara T'Soni

Garrus Vakarian

James Vega

Ashley Williams

 

Guess there's still hope^^

Edited by Angelwork
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However, I read somewhere that Tali will NOT be in your party, which makes me kinda sad since she's my favourite character :(

 

I can kind of see Tali not being playable unfortunately. After her loyalty mission, if you talk with her about the vacant Quarian Admiralty Board position she mentions that her name has been considered to take over for her father. If they follow through with that and if we really are going to visit the Quarian homeworld, she might have her hands pretty busy.

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Tali was confirmed to be playable to some extent. Maybe not a full-time squadmate but at the very least a temporary squadmate like Liara in LotSB and dr. Kenson in Arrival.

 

As for Tali becoming an admiral - double facepalm. The girl is like what - 20? She's a complete mess and a horrible, horrible leader with no charisma. She couldn't even make a little squad of quarians follow her orders on Freedom's Progress, how is she supposed to be a leader to 18 million people?

I'm not Tali hating here. She's a fine person and an asset to Shepard's team but she's not a leader material so giving her a place at the admiralty board would be a big mistake. If Bioware goes along with this I will lose any respect for them, because developers who only act to please the fans deserve none.

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Tali was confirmed to be playable to some extent. Maybe not a full-time squadmate but at the very least a temporary squadmate like Liara in LotSB and dr. Kenson in Arrival.

 

As for Tali becoming an admiral - double facepalm. The girl is like what - 20? She's a complete mess and a horrible, horrible leader with no charisma. She couldn't even make a little squad of quarians follow her orders on Freedom's Progress, how is she supposed to be a leader to 18 million people?

I'm not Tali hating here. She's a fine person and an asset to Shepard's team but she's not a leader material so giving her a place at the admiralty board would be a big mistake. If Bioware goes along with this I will lose any respect for them, because developers who only act to please the fans deserve none.

 

 

lol I wasn't saying she was cut out for the job, I was just giving a theory on what I could see them doing with her character. As young and inexperienced as she is, wasn't she already in charge of that covert science team (or whatever it was) during her recruitment mission.

 

idk I just think that they'll work in a few of your old squadmates by having them in leadership positions that you'll encounter while looking for allies against the reapers.

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lol I wasn't saying she was cut out for the job, I was just giving a theory on what I could see them doing with her character. As young and inexperienced as she is, wasn't she already in charge of that covert science team (or whatever it was) during her recruitment mission.

 

idk I just think that they'll work in a few of your old squadmates by having them in leadership positions that you'll encounter while looking for allies against the reapers.

 

True, they probably will - I can totally see Wrex being a leader for united krogan clans, becasue he's, well, one already in ME2.

- Legion too maybe, not as a leader (it's hard for me to imagine the geth to have any kind of "leader") but an intermediary between organics and synthetics - after all that's what he was created for.

- Mordin? Sure, why not - he's with STG after all.

- Garrus - unlikely. He's a small fry among turians. An ex-cop gone rogue? Yeah, that's not something a turian society will respect.

- Liara - also unlikely. She has better and more important things to do, what with being a Shadow Broker and stuff.

 

As for tali - again, I understand, that Bioware might go this way with her, if only to please the taliban. I just think that this choice will make no sence in-universe wise - she has already been in charge twice, and how did that work out for her? The first team didn't obey her orders (which means that she has neither will nor charisma to be a leader), and both teams were wiped out most likely due to poor planning and/or strategy (which means that she lacks skills important for being a commander of armies).

She shouldn't be going anywhere near the Admiralty Board, and do smoething she's actually good at. Like all the technical stuff.

Edited by purifico
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