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[Madness]

The asari to me are a glaring example of something seriously fucking up with the toolset during production, or a pipeline issue.

Also 5+ year dev time? It is more than the Asari. If you look at the Salarians, Turians, Krogan, and Humans, you see a lot of asset reuse especially for NPC's. You can see the exact asset for Suvi with different colored hair etc. Identical body types with changed face only.

Maybe these were done early on, and just carried forward? For example, the Tempest docking sequence with the Nexus. That just always screams so low quality to me. Vortex nightclub so limited, as is the cultural center.

 

[Tovarisc]

Also 5+ year dev time? It is more than the Asari. If you look at the Salarians, Turians, Krogan, and Humans, you see a lot of asset reuse especially for NPC's. You can see the exact asset for Suvi with different colored hair etc. Identical body types with changed face only.

Maybe these were done early on, and just carried forward? For example, the Tempest docking sequence with the Nexus. That just always screams so low quality to me. Vortex nightclub so limited, as is the cultural center.

From where that 5+ year dev cycle claim comes from? I have seen it floating and repeated a lot, but not receipts on the thing.

 

[Durrzerker]

I really can't help but feel that somehow, a bunch of placeholders became the final product.

Maybe some important data got lost? Some devastating issue at the last second forcing them to revert?

I simply can't believe that in five years they didn't have more Asari faces than that. Something went wrong.

 

[Maledict]

From where that 5+ year dev cycle claim comes from? I have seen it floating and repeated a lot, but not receipts on the thing.

Bioware developers like Casey Hudson saying work started in 2012 on his twitter feed. It's not made up, they've talked about it themselves.

 

[arts&crafts]

I am having some serious loading problems.

To load a save it takes 2 or 3 minutes. Once I am in the game runs fine and loads new areas fine its just the initial load time. (I am on a ssd and the first 20 hours it was really quick). I am wondering if it is because my save files are too big? If I create a new save will that be a "smaller" save?

 

[Phamit]

From where that 5+ year dev cycle claim comes from? I have seen it floating and repeated a lot, but not receipts on the thing.

https://twitter.com/bioware/status/843869772148281344

but there is more to proof that, like tweets from 2012 talking about the start of the dev of a new ME

 

[Tovarisc]

Bioware developers like Casey Hudson saying work started in 2012 on his twitter feed. It's not made up, they've talked about it themselves.

I just wanted to know from where that claim comes from.

https://twitter.com/bioware/status/843869772148281344

but there is more to proof that, like tweets from 2012 talking about the start of the dev of a new ME

Cool cool.

 

[EatChildren]

Also 5+ year dev time? It is more than the Asari. If you look at the Salarians, Turians, Krogan, and Humans, you see a lot of asset reuse especially for NPC's. You can see the exact asset for Suvi with different colored hair etc. Identical body types with changed face only.

Maybe these were done early on, and just carried forward? For example, the Tempest docking sequence with the Nexus. That just always screams so low quality to me. Vortex nightclub so limited, as is the cultural center.

Keep in mind "5+ years development" does not constitute 5+ years of full production. In almost every game's production pipeline a significant amount of time is spent on stuff that is unrelated to asset variety.

The old PAX leak from waaay back when had BioWare state they were working on tools to hugely diversify the alien and human faces. Like...this was a big point that they were making, having more nuanced differences and details between individual characters.

Given we've also learned of them fucking around with procedural tools, Tempest piloting, and so forth, I honestly believe that a lot of time might have been wasted prototyping tech that never actually panned out for who-knows-what-reason. Maybe the production pipeline suffered as a result; poor planning and management, no real backup plan in place to ensure model diversity was nailed should the toolset plan fall through.

Roll into late production when the team is crippled to its knees pushing out assets for basically the entire game, character model toolset has fallen to bits, and you're left with basically taking the quickest, easiest route to diversifying your NPC models. And in the case of the asari that means slapping on some facepaint and changing the skin hue.

It doesn't excuse the situation, but it's so abnormal that it's what I suspect happened. Plan A was lofty and promising, but it didn't pan out. Plan B was implemented too late into production.

 

[Madness]

From where that 5+ year dev cycle claim comes from? I have seen it floating and repeated a lot, but not receipts on the thing.

They themselves said it several times. Once the ME3 ending fiasco and post-launcb DLC was done, Montreal got the greenlight to do a new game and they had plans to avoid ME3 altogether. They were asking people what they wanted to see. A prequel set in the time of the First Contact War, a game non-Shepard set between ME1 to ME3 etc. Plus, like others posted above, they acknowledge it took 5 years etc.

@EatChildren, my point more about how some parts of the game feel like they were finished much earlier, other parts feel like they were added in later. Maybe the assets were done earlier using older tech and they focused elsewhere when it came time to finishing. But your point also makes sense. All the delays and crunch and schedules coming in fast meant cutting corners. Probably why things like the UI are very non-intuitive, things like that thread we had of the Codex using images sourced quickly from deviantart.

I wish we would get a comprehensive breakdown on this games development.

 

[ScientificPizza]

if ME1-3 is TNG, ME:A is Voyager

Spoiler

i like Voyager

 

[Matush]

Any news when new patch should drop? The ammount of game/quest breaking bugs I'm experiencing is jarring.

 

[Lime]

All in all, this is an unfortunate turn of events for everyone involved: I can't imagine how awful it must be to have worked for 3-5 years on this project and probably crunched to get the product out in time even though it still ended up in a very unpolished state. At the same time, it is terrible for Mass Effect fans and potential newcomers to be excluded from an unfinished and unrealized creative experience, especially after five long years of dormancy, silence and lack of transparency. And finally, it is bad for EA in the sense that they invested a lot of money into this project and had faith in Montreal/Edmonton/Austin reaching the finish line in a proper manner after five patient years. And in total the Mass Effect brand will be somewhat damaged with any potential sequel (if EA doesn't shelve it) having an uphill battle of regaining lost trust and faith in the brand and product.

Clearly no one wanted this and it is simply an unfortunate result of things we can only speculate about - project mismanagement, complexity of new tools, development of new pipelines, scrapped ideas and concepts without backup plans, etc. We know that several people left around end of 2015/beginning of 2016, so perhaps that was back when the game got retooled into something else. Regardless, it would be interesting to read a transparent post-mortem.

I hope for the best in terms of post-launch support and given what I've heard, there'll be some blog post next week or so. But I wonder how much can be saved at this point.

 

[Familienoberhauptvogel]

There definitely had to be something that went wrong in development and time ran out. Which is a shame because there's a good game buried underneath that.
Despite what some people say there's some real quality writing and missions in the game. Cora' s loyalty mission was awesome for instance and had many small touches to it that painted a picture of what happened.

It also showcased the dichotomy of the game that had a custom handcrafted area contrary to all the reused assets otherwise. They didn't just use the Hyperion they destroyed it and added different areas.
Fighting

Spoiler

in open space

dampened all sound and made for an incredible vista.

 

[Madness]

if ME1-3 is TNG, ME:A is Voyager

Spoiler

i like Voyager

I was watching Star Trek Beyond for the first time on Netflix yesterday and couldn't stop thinking about ME:A.

Any news when new patch should drop? The ammount of game/quest breaking bugs I'm experiencing is jarring.

They're being worked on. Big issue is the fact a lot of different consoles have separate issues. PC has its own issues, PS4 Pro version has more technical stuff. Then Xbox has to go through MS certification. Hopefully it is comprehensive and out soon.

 

[Bisnic]

Any news when new patch should drop? The ammount of game/quest breaking bugs I'm experiencing is jarring.

Considering the amount of bugs like you said, they're probably trying to put as many fixes as possible in a single patch since they have to pay Sony/Microsoft for each patches... is that right?

 

[nOoblet16]

if ME1-3 is TNG, ME:A is Voyager

Spoiler

i like Voyager

ME1-3 is more like TOS, it has far too many stupid stuff and camp for it to be TNG.

 

[Familienoberhauptvogel]

Considering the amount of bugs like you said, they're probably trying to put as many fixes as possible in a single patch since they have to pay Sony/Microsoft for each patches... is that right?

didn't MS drop that cost considerably?

 

[Tovarisc]

didn't MS drop that cost considerably?

Even if cost was lower or fully removed they still need cert every patch they want to push to PS4 or XBO, that takes time too.

 

[eot]

Was really noticeable on the Asari ark mission. It is things like this that add up. Very elementary game dev 101 no-nos. It is what it is. Like above, post launch DLC aka Omega style is the only hope we have for new assets, new visual fidelity stuff.

Omega is a bad example since it's shit tier DLC by the series' standard.

 

[Tovarisc]

Omega is a bad example since it's shit tier DLC by the series' standard.

... What?

If we want talk about shit tier ME DLC then we need bring up that shitty tankthing DLC for ME2. By comparison Omega is waaay better.

 

[Familienoberhauptvogel]

ME1 also had awful DLC

Shadowbeoaker is the GOAT

 

[Madness]

Omega is a bad example since it's shit tier DLC by the series' standard.

More to the point of adding an entirely new Female Turian asset for the DLC. It was all done post-launch. So my point was, any DLC for Andromeda would be better visual and technical fidelity and possibly improved assets. Omega wasn't a Lair of the Shadow Broker, but was okay. Way better than things like Pinnacle Station, Overlord etc.

Imagine the Quarian Ark being found and then an entirely new part of the Nexus being added and we get new Quarian assets, Drell, Hanar, and also everything updated etc.

Edit: Asari Pathfinder spoiler.

Spoiler

Did anyone snitch in Sarissa but keep her as Pathfinder? Does she still help save Captain Dunn or no? Some sites say she won't unless you convince her at Pathfinder HQ before Meridian. Is that true?

 

[EatChildren]

Omega is superb and has some of the best encounters and pacing in the entire series.

I love how the characters in Andromeda really start coming into their own and opening up as the narrative goes on. I thought Liam's

Spoiler

car moment

was super sweet and humble.

 

[ChemicalCutthroat]

More to the point of adding an entirely new Female Turian asset for the DLC. It was all done post-launch. So my point was, any DLC for Andromeda would be better visual and technical fidelity and possibly improved assets. Omega wasn't a Lair of the Shadow Broker, but was okay. Way better than things like Pinnacle Station, Overlord etc.

Imagine the Quarian Ark being found and then an entirely new part of the Nexus being added and we get new Quarian assets, Drell, Hanar, and also everything updated etc.

Edit: Asari Pathfinder spoiler.

Spoiler

Did anyone snitch in Sarissa but keep her as Pathfinder? Does she still help save Captain Dunn or no? Some sites say she won't unless you convince her at Pathfinder HQ before Meridian. Is that true?

Yeah, I'm hoping for the DLC to be the other Ark, as it could be a big, exciting sort of event with a lot to do. There is a lot of potential there.

 

[CrichtonKicks]

Ugh, two times in two hours I've had saves that won't load. In the Nomad both times.

 

[arts&crafts]

One of the most annoying (albeit small) aspects of the game is

Not an actual spoiler

Spoiler

that all the planets have the same 2-3 kinds of animals on them and the there are like 10 animals on the entire planet.

An ice planet has the same animals as a desert planet light years away!

Ugh, two times in two hours I've had saves that won't load. In the Nomad both times.

I had the same problem last night, I left it "loading" for 5 minutes and it eventually went in...¯\_(&#12484_/¯

 

[Wunder]

Is there a point in doing certain Tasks? I just got 100% viability on

Spoiler

Eos and Havarl

and still have unfinished tasks. The fact that it gives waypoints for some of them and nothing for others is frustrating. I think I'm just gonna let them sit there if there's nothing valuable I get out of it.

 

[yankeehater]

Got with a group on gold last night that knew where to hide on the maps it was so great. Got a full extraction first gold match and no one even got downed. Sucked the second match with them I got disconnected on wave 4. I really hope they patch the MP soon.

 

[FrontalMonk]

Omega is a bad example since it's shit tier DLC by the series' standard.

The series standard for DLC has always been really inconsistent. Like, if you really look back on it, you had:

ME1: Bring down the Sky, Pinnacle Station
ME2: Shadow Broker, Firewalker, Overlord, Arrival, Kasumi, Zaeed
ME3: From Ashes, Leviathan, Omega, Citadel

In all cases the quality ranged from bad to excellent.

 

[bonesmccoy]

After some 20 odd hours, I ran into my 1st legitimately annoying bug. One time thing though.

PeeBee spoilers:

Spoiler

Went up to her apartment on the Nexus after having triggered the scene where she moves out, and there she was again! Couldn't start a dialogue with her. Then, minutes later, I came across her on the Hyperion, were she references how she doesn't spend time on the Nexus anymore.

 

[CrichtonKicks]

The series standard for DLC has always been really inconsistent. Like, if you really look back on it, you had:

ME1: Bring down the Sky, Pinnacle Station
ME2: Shadow Broker, Firewalker, Overlord, Arrival, Kasumi, Zaeed
ME3: From Ashes, Leviathan, Omega, Citadel

In all cases the quality ranged from bad to excellent.

Eh, I think the series (and Bioware in general) has historically had really excellent DLC since they first got serious about it with DA:O.

Even DA2, maligned as it was, had some pretty awesome DLC.

 

[Tovarisc]

Imagine the Quarian Ark being found and then an entirely new part of the Nexus being added and we get new Quarian assets, Drell, Hanar, and also everything updated etc.

Edit: Asari Pathfinder spoiler.

Spoiler

Did anyone snitch in Sarissa but keep her as Pathfinder? Does she still help save Captain Dunn or no? Some sites say she won't unless you convince her at Pathfinder HQ before Meridian. Is that true?

I love it how you spoiler tag Asari thing, but just throw Quarian thing out there

Ugh, two times in two hours I've had saves that won't load. In the Nomad both times.

They load, but it just takes looong time. I don't understand what triggers it, but some times save takes forever to load if it loads save where you are in Nomad.

One of the most annoying (albeit small) aspects of the game is

Not an actual spoiler

Spoiler

that all the planets have the same 2-3 kinds of animals on them and the there are like 10 animals on the entire planet.

An ice planet has the same animals as a desert planet light years away!

Tagged thing kinda makes sense as you progress further into the game.

After some 20 odd hours, I ran into my 1st legitimately annoying bug. One time thing though.

PeeBee spoilers:

Spoiler

Went up to her apartment on the Nexus after having triggered the scene where she moves out, and there she was again! Couldn't start a dialogue with her. Then, minutes later, I came across her on the Hyperion, were she references how she doesn't spend time on the Nexus anymore.

One of those things devs didn't have time to clean up.

 

[MeisterLeder]

Im really getting kinda tired of the planet formula...

Land on planet, get first contact, do some fetch quests to boost percentage for life, activate 3 monoliths etc...

 

[Meifu]

I havent completed the priority storyline yet, but if the writing is as underwhelming as some people are describing ughhhhh.

Can Bioware Just put Drew Karpyshyn on the sequel for this please? And perhaps get EA to bait Casey Hudson back?

 

[RAIDEN1]

Any updates on patches? Stability issues?

 

[Johannsson]

Great OT.

 

[Bisnic]

One of the most annoying (albeit small) aspects of the game is

Not an actual spoiler

Spoiler

that all the planets have the same 2-3 kinds of animals on them and the there are like 10 animals on the entire planet.

An ice planet has the same animals as a desert planet light years away!

To be fair, the original trilogy also had thresher maws and pyjaks on different planets too.

 

[nOoblet16]

Is there a point in doing certain Tasks? I just got 100% viability on

Spoiler

Eos and Havarl

and still have unfinished tasks. The fact that it gives waypoints for some of them and nothing for others is frustrating. I think I'm just gonna let them sit there if there's nothing valuable I get out of it.

Outside of some exposition and XP ? No..no point.
Some of the tasks do lead to bigger chains though and stuff like that reporter can lead to romances too.

 

[ArmGunar]

I just completed Liam and Cora's loyalty mission
It was pretty cool but the realization lacks ambition, it lacks cutscenes too

 

[semiconscious]

Also 5+ year dev time? It is more than the Asari. If you look at the Salarians, Turians, Krogan, and Humans, you see a lot of asset reuse especially for NPC's. You can see the exact asset for Suvi with different colored hair etc. Identical body types with changed face only.

Maybe these were done early on, and just carried forward? For example, the Tempest docking sequence with the Nexus. That just always screams so low quality to me. Vortex nightclub so limited, as is the cultural center.

you're saying that basically what was supposed to be placeholder stuff actually made it all the way to the final release? yes, i'm pretty sure what we're seeing is a game that's riddled with 'we'll get back to that' stuff that no one ever got back to. period...

 

[Steve.1981]

I think one thing this game has going for it is how the setting lends itself naturally to the side-quest design. Almost every small task feels believable as something you would want/need to do in this situation.

For example, someone on the Nexus asked me to plant broadcast probes on planets with outposts, so he could set up a kind of radio station that everyone could connect to. That kind of thing makes sense. I find myself wanting to do all these smaller tasks because they all feel like useful things for the Andromeda Initiative in general.

Of course, whether you find doing these tasks fun or not is another question. I understand a lot of people just hate this stuff, I've been down on it in the past myself. Just thinking that the small stuff actually makes sense this time, in this setting.

 

[Wunder]

Outside of some exposition and XP ? No..no point.
Some of the tasks do lead to bigger chains though and stuff like that reporter can lead to romances too.

I want to do 'em but for some where I have to find datapads on the entirety of Havarl with no waypoints? I ain't wandering around for hours trying to find that stuff. Good to know it's just XP and stuff though, thanks!

 

[Tovarisc]

I havent completed the priority storyline yet, but if the writing is as underwhelming as some people are describing ughhhhh.

Can Bioware Just put Drew Karpyshyn on the sequel for this please? And perhaps get EA to bait Casey Hudson back?

Compared to something like TW3 and its DLC's? Yeah, it's somewhat underwhelming.

Compared to other BW games? Same quality.

 

[AsianOni]

For those having infinite (or very long) loading, you may try to reboot your PC. Didn't come across the bug again so I'm not sure if it actually works.

 

[nOoblet16]

So as I mentioned yesterday, I've been playing ME3 again and man the game is quite infuriating with its writing and such. The fact that there's a war going on and you spend half of it or more fighting shitty Cerberus and throughout the entire game you barely fight the reapers is so silly. Then there's that kid, Kai Leng, the synopsis that reapers were created by an AI to kill organics which was in turn created by organics so that other organics won't make AI that kills organics. Just lol

I want to do 'em but for some where I have to find datapads on the entirety of Havarl with no waypoints? I ain't wandering around for hours trying to find that stuff. Good to know it's just XP and stuff though, thanks!

Most of the time you'll have waypoints, if you don't have them then just skip it..it's not worth it.

 

[SlimySnake]

Been playing since Thursday and I have a few questions.

• Is there a reason why I can only have 3 biotic powers? I could swear the previous games had more. I feel so limited.
• Can I respec? I put in like 4 points in Pull and now I am using singularity with shockwave and nova and it doesnt make sense to have more than one combo primer.
• Why do guns feel so weak?
• Is there a way to turn on damage indicators like in Destiny? I want to how much damage each attack does.
• how do you hover? I am playing as a biotic.

I like the game overall. the premise is nice and despite all the issues the story is still better than 90% of the games out there. i just think it's bizarre that people are hung up over animations when there are very serious issues with the gameplay that can be fixed relatively quickly.

 

[Madness]

I love it how you spoiler tag Asari thing, but just throw Quarian thing out there

Quarian thing is hypothetical and something BioWare publicly said a few times, in interviews, panels etc.

you're saying that basically what was supposed to be placeholder stuff actually made it all the way to the final release? yes, i'm pretty sure what we're seeing is a game that's riddled with 'we'll get back to that' stuff that no one ever got back to. period...

No, again more like they modeled an Asari, most likely Lexi T'Perro, and as time got closer to the end, found it easier to just use her asset, give other npc clothes like the human researchers or military and change up some face markings etc. It is essentially one face, one model asset reused for everything non-PeeBee.

 

[Royal_Phalanx]

I havent completed the priority storyline yet, but if the writing is as underwhelming as some people are describing ughhhhh.

Can Bioware Just put Drew Karpyshyn on the sequel for this please? And perhaps get EA to bait Casey Hudson back?

Didn't Casey Hudson do ME3? The ending which everyone hated? Also the lack of detail and polish despite 5+ years is likely due to the development hell this game went through. Tons of people quitting the project (even the head writer quit after a few months) means that time is needed to replace them all because of how long it takes to recruit+interview people, and the team has to develop their specific areas of the game and they don't have time to try picking up the pieces. I'm not familiar with video game development (don't know if Bioware or the game industry uses Agile development practices to begin with) but I'm pretty sure there's internal deadlines to meet. If so they likely half assed the nightclubs and other less important stuff to just put something out there.

Also I think they didn't have 5 years of actual development time, a significant amount of time is needed to plan the direction of the project, do concept art, write the scripts, etc. A dev said they thought of making the game like No Man's Sky until they dumped that whole idea.

 

[Tovarisc]

For those having infinite (or very long) loading, you may try to reboot your PC. Didn't come across the bug again so I'm not sure if it actually works.

It happens at random. Some save for some bizarre reason will take few minutes to load up and next time same save takes few seconds.

Makes no sense.

Been playing since Thursday and I have a few questions.

• Is there a reason why I can only have 3 biotic powers? I could swear the previous games had more. I feel so limited.
• Can I respec? I put in like 4 points in Pull and now I am using singularity with shockwave and nova and it doesnt make sense to have more than one combo primer.
• Why do guns feel so weak?
• Is there a way to turn on damage indicators like in Destiny? I want to how much damage each attack does.
• how do you hover? I am playing as a biotic.

I like the game overall. the premise is nice and despite all the issues the story is still better than 90% of the games out there. i just think it's bizarre that people are hung up over animations when there are very serious issues with the gameplay that can be fixed relatively quickly.

1. It's how game is designed. 3 active skills, unlimited passives. Swap profiles / favorites that have different active skills. And so on.

Do not spread out points too much early on tho. Aim to get Biotic profile to Rank 6, get your core active abilities high up in effectiveness and dip into other passives too. Game becomes artificially hard if you spread out points early on.

2. Yes, go to medbay on Tempest.

3. Because they are quite weak. On Insanity it takes 2 headshots from Black Widow to kill most basic Kett soldier, that is with damage boosts from augs, mods and skills.

4. No damage numbers

5. Jump and aim your weapon

 

[sangreal]

Been playing since Thursday and I have a few questions.


[*]Is there a reason why I can only have 3 biotic powers? I could swear the previous games had more. I feel so limited.

I guess because the prev. games didn't allow you to learn so many different powers. You can set up 4 'favorite' profiles and swap between them from the wheel

Can I respec? I put in like 4 points in Pull and now I am using singularity with shockwave and nova and it doesnt make sense to have more than one combo primer.

yes, in tempest medbay on the far wall

Why do guns feel so weak?

They shouldn't? use different guns

how do you hover? I am playing as a biotic.

jump plus hold lt (or equivalent)