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anexanhume · Sep 6, 2015

Credit to /u/TheDuffman_OhYeah for this post on reddit.

Chris Schlerf, former lead writer for Halo, was introduced as the new lead writer for the mass effect series, with Mac Walters being promoted to creative director. He, among other leads, were introduced in this post. Schlerf's information is now gone, while the others' are intact.

A web archive shows that it was there back in June. Schlerf's twitter profile still lists him as lead writer for mass effect, and there have been no updates from Bioware. Is there something to this, or just an odd coincidence?

DocSeuss · Sep 6, 2015

I hope he's still lead writer, since he's way better than anyone Bioware's had on offer.

pizzacat · Sep 6, 2015

So we're back to fanfiction writing. I don't mind

i do

Sumio Mondo · Sep 6, 2015

Wasn't he the Halo 4 writer? If so, no big loss.

Lakitu · Sep 6, 2015

His Twitter still says he's lead writer.

Patryn · Sep 6, 2015

Oh god. I really hope we don't have a Destiny situation here.

Seriously, you can't overhaul a story a year out from release.

Omega · Sep 6, 2015

anexanhume said:
with Mac Walters being promoted to creative director.

yo this series is fucked.

Guri · Sep 6, 2015

I still don't get the hate for Mac Walters. He helped create some of the most memorable characters in the series, like Garrus, Wrex and The Illusive Man.

Patryn · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
I still don't get the hate for Mac Walters. He helped create some of the most memorable characters in the series, like Garrus, Wrex and The Illusive Man.

All indications are that the ending of Mass Effect 3 can solely be laid at his and Casey Hudson's feet.

I believe sources have indicated that, unlike nearly every other part of the series, the ending was conceived by them with no feedback from the rest of the writing team.

Basically, he can write characters fairly well, but his ability to plan out the major plot of a game is lackluster at best.

diamount · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
I still don't get the hate for Mac Walters. He helped create some of the most memorable characters in the series, like Garrus, Wrex and The Illusive Man.

Nope, he's the sole one responsible for ME3's failings.

dr_rus · Sep 6, 2015

Well, after the ME3 ending and their decision to side-quel Andromeda instead of picking a canon the story would be a clusterfuck anyway so no big loss.

Squire · Sep 6, 2015

DocSeuss said:
I hope he's still lead writer, since he's way better than anyone Bioware's had on offer.

I haven't seen anything that suggests that in the slightest, but I did like his work on Halo 4.

rootbeerafloat · Sep 6, 2015

I expect lots of speculation from everyone until we get an explanation.

Mac Walters... got promoted?

Omega · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
I still don't get the hate for Mac Walters. He helped create some of the most memorable characters in the series, like Garrus, Wrex and The Illusive Man.

also did you even play ME3? think it's pretty obvious. the comics aren't that good either

Frog-fu · Sep 6, 2015

Sumio Mondo said:
Wasn't he the Halo 4 writer? If so, no big loss.

Halo 4 had a great campaign, so it'd be a huge loss.

Clarkus Darkus · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
I still don't get the hate for Mac Walters. He helped create some of the most memorable characters in the series, like Garrus, Wrex and The Illusive Man.

Never took garrus or wrex in my squad much at all, They took a back seat so they werent that memorable to me personally.

But then i thought ME3 was a letdown right from the start of the game, The ending was just another shake of the head moment.

The advert for DLC right at the end was the thing that pissed me off so whoever made that decision needs removing from any creative control.

Lime · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
I still don't get the hate for Mac Walters. He helped create some of the most memorable characters in the series, like Garrus, Wrex and The Illusive Man.

Have you read the comics that he's been responsible for? It's straight up garbage.

Guri · Sep 6, 2015

Patryn said:
All indications are that the ending of Mass Effect 3 can solely be laid at his and Casey Hudson's feet.

I believe sources have indicated that, unlike nearly every other part of the series, the ending was conceived by them with no feedback from the rest of the writing team.

Basically, he can write characters fairly well, but his ability to plan out the major plot of a game is lackluster at best.

diamount said:
Nope, he's the sole one responsible for ME3's failings.

I don't really agree to the idea of ME3 being that flawed because I see ME3 as a whole as the ending to that trilogy, but I do agree that the last 10 minutes weren't as good as we wanted it to be. Anyway, that is a completely different discussion and I can understand why you see the ending to the game as the ending of the trilogy.

What I don't agree is to put blame on Mac Walters and just assume that anything he does from now on is going to be awful. Like I said, he wrote amazing characters. Plus, although BioWare always planned a trilogy, the writing team wasn't planning that ahead. Drew Karpyshyn didn't write ME1 already thinking about what these characters would do in the last game, for example. But I think the biggest proof was that the "Suicide Mission" theme of ME2 was amazing if you consider that as standalone, but it cornered them in the sequel, because not everyone would have specific characters, so they couldn't make them have a bigger participation in the story.

Mac Walters made some mistakes. BioWare made some as a team. But that was part of a learning process for the first ever game trilogy with actual consequences between games. Why is it fair to assume anyone would only write awful stuff from now on?

Patryn · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
I don't really agree to the idea of ME3 being that flawed because I see ME3 as a whole as the ending to that trilogy, but I do agree that the last 10 minutes weren't as good as we wanted it to be. Anyway, that is a completely different discussion and I can understand why you see the ending to the game as the ending of the trilogy.

What I don't agree is to put blame on Mac Walters and just assume that anything he does from now on is going to be awful. Like I said, he wrote amazing characters. Plus, although BioWare always planned a trilogy, the writing team wasn't planning that ahead. Drew Karpyshyn didn't write ME1 already thinking about what these characters would do in the last game, for example. But I think the biggest proof was that the "Suicide Mission" theme of ME2 was amazing if you consider that as standalone, but it cornered them in the sequel, because not everyone would have specific characters, so they couldn't make them have a bigger participation in the story.

Mac Walters made some mistakes. BioWare made some as a team. But that was part of a learning process for the first ever game trilogy with actual consequences between games. Why is it fair to assume anyone would only write awful stuff from now on?

Speaking personally, I'm one of the crazy people who prefers Mass Effect 1 to the later games.

So if I was less than impressed with the two games that he's the lead writer of, and I'm thoroughly unimpressed with his comic work (basically meaning any time he's done any plotting or writing beyond simply writing for a single character), does that not entail me to be less than pleased he's now creative director?

anexanhume · Sep 6, 2015

Patryn said:
Speaking personally, I'm one of the crazy people who prefers Mass Effect 1 to the later games.

So if I was less than impressed with the two games that he's the lead writer of, and I'm thoroughly unimpressed with his comic work (basically meaning any time he's done any plotting or writing beyond simply writing for a single character), does that not entail me to be less than pleased he's now creative director?

I don't think that's crazy. Many people prefer ME1 and there's a reason they are calling back to ME1 when they talk about the feelings they want to evoke.

Guri · Sep 6, 2015

Patryn said:
Speaking personally, I'm one of the crazy people who prefers Mass Effect 1 to the later games.

So if I was less than impressed with the two games that he's the lead writer of, and I'm thoroughly unimpressed with his comic work (basically meaning any time he's done any plotting or writing beyond simply writing for a single character), does that not entail me to be less than pleased he's now creative director?

OK, great point, because I also liked the first more than the others. So I can really see what you mean here. But here is the tricky part: Drew Karpyshyn was the lead writer for ME1 and ME2. Mac Walters only got that role for 3, which had two years of development, the shortest in the whole franchise.

Both of us loved the first one. And Drew Karpyshyn wrote that and ME2, which was not as good as for us. So can you see why I find it weird to put the blame in one person specifically?

The issue here is that writing a franchise as huge as Mass Effect is much more complex than one person being completely responsible for everything, including the comics. There were over 15 writers handling the Mass Effect universe throughout the first trilogy. That including people who left early and others who came after it started. Then you include other directors (Creative Director, Design Director...), producers and even feedback they got, which made them change a few things, or technical limitations.

Like I said, I do acknowledge the issues the franchise had, but I can't really point my finger to one or two people and say that if they left, everything would be better.

Instead I prefer to hope that the team handling Andromeda, including Mac Walters, can learn the lessons from previous games and do an amazing job, which I think everyone here would like.

Bornstellar · Sep 6, 2015

Clarkus Darkus said:
Never took garrus or wrex in my squad much at all, They took a back seat so they werent that memorable to me personally.

But then i thought ME3 was a letdown right from the start of the game, The ending was just another shake of the head moment.

The advert for DLC right at the end was the thing that pissed me off so whoever made that decision needs removing from any creative control.

Blasphemy.

Patryn · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
OK, great point, because I also liked the first more than the others. So I can really see what you mean here. But here is the tricky part: Drew Karpyshyn was the lead writer for ME1 and ME2. Mac Walters only got that role for 3, which had two years of development, the shortest in the whole franchise.

Both of us loved the first one. And Drew Karpyshyn wrote that and ME2, which was not as good as for us. So can you see why I find it weird to put the blame in one person specifically?

The issue here is that writing a franchise as huge as Mass Effect is much more complex than one person being completely responsible for everything, including the comics. There were over 15 writers handling the Mass Effect universe throughout the first trilogy. That including people who left early and others who came after it started. Then you include other directors (Creative Director, Design Director...), producers and even feedback they got, which made them change a few things, or technical limitations.

Like I said, I do acknowledge the issues the franchise had, but I can't really point my finger to one or two people and say that if they left, everything would be better.

Instead I prefer to hope that the team handling Andromeda, including Mac Walters, can learn the lessons from previous games and do an amazing job, which I think everyone here would like.

Drew and Mac were the co-head writers of Mass Effect 2.

Aurean_Mentat · Sep 6, 2015

A story is only as good as its ending, really, because that's what going to stick in your mind. If you had the most awesome sandwich ever, but the last bite contained a deer turd in it, all you're going to remember is the deer turd. 'But the rest of the sandwich was awesome!' some might say. Doesn't matter, there was still a deer turd is the last bite of it.

The people I trusted at Bioware are gone, and the ones presumably in the lead right now have used up all of their credit with me. It's important to keep in mind that the same people in the lead for the new Mass Effect game trumpeted from the rooftops how the previous Mass Effect trilogy was your story, Shepard was your Shepard, and the story would reflect your decisions and it would be your ending. They took the 'your ending' part, substituted one of their own, and it was pretty shit. When people dared to point this out to them, they defended their 'artistic integrity' and called everyone who pointed this out to them 'entitled babies'.

So, why on Earth should anyone have any faith in the Bioware of today? The Bioware of yesteryear (which was amazing) is gone. A fair number of the key people in charge of the shitshow that was the ME3 ending are still there, still in lead positions (especially if the Halo 4 writer is gone. I liked the Halo 4 campaign a lot!), and have used up all of their credit a long time ago.

Its easy to forget that they are a business, owned by EA, whose games have been (at best) hit or miss lately instead of amazing. At this point, its on Bioware to prove why they deserve the benefit of the doubt and the faith that some people still have in them. At this point, from what I have seen, they really don't.

Guri · Sep 6, 2015

Patryn said:
Drew and Mac were the co-head writers of Mass Effect 2.

Exactly. Which is what I was saying before: we can't put the blame in one or two when there was a whole team involved in the process.

Patryn · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
Exactly. Which is what I was saying before: we can't put the blame in one or two when there was a whole team involved in the process.

However, my point still stands. Outside of some character writing, I have seen nothing from Mac Walters that I am impressed with, and I feel that I have a large enough body of evidence to draw from.

I feel totally justified being wary about the future. You, naturally, are free to be more optimistic.

Caronte · Sep 6, 2015

that omega guy said:
yo this series is fucked.

Yep. All hope I could possibly have for the new game is gone.

Squire · Sep 6, 2015

Aurean_Mentat said:
A story is only as good as its ending, really, because that's what going to stick in your mind. If you had the most awesome sandwich ever, but the last bite contained a deer turd in it, all you're going to remember is the deer turd. 'But the rest of the sandwich was awesome!' some might say. Doesn't matter, there was still a deer turd is the last bite of it.

"It's the journey, not the destination."

Or any nonsense about deer shit.

Kadayi · Sep 6, 2015

Maybe he played TW3 and thought about how ME4 is going to have to meet that bar if it's not going to get slated.

Bessy67 · Sep 6, 2015

Didn't Eric Nylund recently leave Amazon game studios? That would be a pretty nice fit...

diaspora · Sep 6, 2015

Aurean_Mentat said:
A story is only as good as its ending, really, because that's what going to stick in your mind. If you had the most awesome sandwich ever, but the last bite contained a deer turd in it, all you're going to remember is the deer turd. 'But the rest of the sandwich was awesome!' some might say. Doesn't matter, there was still a deer turd is the last bite of it.

The people I trusted at Bioware are gone, and the ones presumably in the lead right now have used up all of their credit with me. It's important to keep in mind that the same people in the lead for the new Mass Effect game trumpeted from the rooftops how the previous Mass Effect trilogy was your story, Shepard was your Shepard, and the story would reflect your decisions and it would be your ending. They took the 'your ending' part, substituted one of their own, and it was pretty shit. When people dared to point this out to them, they defended their 'artistic integrity' and called everyone who pointed this out to them 'entitled babies'.

So, why on Earth should anyone have any faith in the Bioware of today? The Bioware of yesteryear (which was amazing) is gone. A fair number of the key people in charge of the shitshow that was the ME3 ending are still there, still in lead positions (especially if the Halo 4 writer is gone. I liked the Halo 4 campaign a lot!), and have used up all of their credit a long time ago.

Its easy to forget that they are a business, owned by EA, whose games have been (at best) hit or miss lately instead of amazing. At this point, its on Bioware to prove why they deserve the benefit of the doubt and the faith that some people still have in them. At this point, from what I have seen, they really don't.

I would frankly take the output of Bioware today rather than of "yesteryear".

JeffZero · Sep 6, 2015

I dunno how much faith we can place in the Twitter account. He seems pretty inactive. If BioWare has missed the call there (somehow) then it could be outdated.

Or maybe there's been a restructure and he's still on the team but not as the lead. I don't know. I'm concerned.

HP_Wuvcraft · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
I still don't get the hate for Mac Walters. He helped create some of the most memorable characters in the series, like Garrus, Wrex and The Illusive Man.

He's a good background player. He should never be in charge of the bus.

Much like Moffatt on Dr. Who.

Aurean_Mentat said:
A story is only as good as its ending, really, because that's what going to stick in your mind. If you had the most awesome sandwich ever, but the last bite contained a deer turd in it, all you're going to remember is the deer turd. 'But the rest of the sandwich was awesome!' some might say. Doesn't matter, there was still a deer turd is the last bite of it.

The people I trusted at Bioware are gone, and the ones presumably in the lead right now have used up all of their credit with me. It's important to keep in mind that the same people in the lead for the new Mass Effect game trumpeted from the rooftops how the previous Mass Effect trilogy was your story, Shepard was your Shepard, and the story would reflect your decisions and it would be your ending. They took the 'your ending' part, substituted one of their own, and it was pretty shit. When people dared to point this out to them, they defended their 'artistic integrity' and called everyone who pointed this out to them 'entitled babies'.

So, why on Earth should anyone have any faith in the Bioware of today? The Bioware of yesteryear (which was amazing) is gone. A fair number of the key people in charge of the shitshow that was the ME3 ending are still there, still in lead positions (especially if the Halo 4 writer is gone. I liked the Halo 4 campaign a lot!), and have used up all of their credit a long time ago.

Its easy to forget that they are a business, owned by EA, whose games have been (at best) hit or miss lately instead of amazing. At this point, its on Bioware to prove why they deserve the benefit of the doubt and the faith that some people still have in them. At this point, from what I have seen, they really don't.

Yes, BioWare is up its own butt.

But this post is ridiculously fanboy.

"faith"
"trust"

whut? Like, do you personally know people at BW?

Oh, and "the ending ruins a 20+ hour game for me".

nocturnalis · Sep 6, 2015

Conversation I just had with my sister:

Me: Apparently Mac Walters just got promoted.
Sister: To what?
Me: Creative director of ME:A.
Sister: No! No, no no. NOOO!!!!!! I'm not even excited anymore!

JeffZero · Sep 6, 2015

nocturnalis said:
Conversation I just had with my sister:

Me: Apparently Mac Walters just got promoted?
Sister: To waht?
Me: Creative director of ME:
Sister: No! No, no no. NOOO!!!!!! I'm not even excited anymore!

He's been Creative Director for Andromeda for a while, though!

nocturnalis · Sep 6, 2015

JeffZero said:
He's been Creative Director for Andromeda for a while, though!

We didn't know though. Multiplayer had better be tight. I always rolled my eyes at the people that multiplayer was better than single player, but I think they were right.

Grewitch · Sep 6, 2015

RobertoSAGuedes said:
Exactly. Which is what I was saying before: we can't put the blame in one or two when there was a whole team involved in the process.

We can if it's true that one or two people were responsible for the ending of ME3 and the other members were left out. That only holds true for that specifically and not the whole game when everyone had some input.

So yeah, you can blame him for that one part.

Guri · Sep 6, 2015

Patryn said:
However, my point still stands. Outside of some character writing, I have seen nothing from Mac Walters that I am impressed with, and I feel that I have a large enough body of evidence to draw from.

I feel totally justified being wary about the future. You, naturally, are free to be more optimistic.

Being a Creative Director is very different from being the Lead Writer, though. Maybe he nails that, but I respect you being wary.

HP_Wuvcraft said:
He's a good background player. He should never be in charge of the bus.

Much like Moffatt on Dr. Who.

This I can agree with, haha! But of course, a TV series is completely different from the first ever trilogy of games with consequences.

Grewitch said:
We can if it's true that one or two people were responsible for the ending of ME3 and the other members were left out. That only holds true for that specifically and not the whole game when everyone had some input.

So yeah, you can blame him for that one part.

I don't know all the details for that, so I don't really like to point fingers, but I do believe that part was not as developed as it could have been. Still, again, it is part of a much more complex process. If they planned ahead from the start, they could have tried something more ambitious. Hopefully they now understand what a suicide mission could do to a sequel. Maybe it would have been better for ME3, not 2.

theWB27 · Sep 6, 2015

Kadayi said:
Maybe he played TW3 and thought about how ME4 is going to have to meet that bar if it's not going to get slated.

Completely different games and TW3's story isn't winning any nominations. Not sure what bar it set for ME in particular.

Bessy67 · Sep 6, 2015

Kadayi said:
Maybe he played TW3 and thought about how ME4 is going to have to meet that bar if it's not going to get slated.

I really don't get why people seem to think Witcher 3 is some benchmark of RPGs now. Don't get me wrong, I love the game, but a good chunk of the sidequests are "go to yellow circle, use witcher senses to find a trail, follow trail, kill thing". And they tout it as having 20 some endings but

it's really only 3 with slightly different states for the characters involved.

JeffZero · Sep 6, 2015

nocturnalis said:
We didn't know though. Multiplayer had better be tight. I always rolled my eyes at the people that multiplayer was better than single player, but I think they were right.

I actually love ME3 and I'm not a MP dude, but yeah, unpopular opinion there, it seems.

diaspora · Sep 6, 2015

Bessy67 said:
I really don't get why people seem to think Witcher 3 is some benchmark of RPGs now. Don't get me wrong, I love the game, but a good chunk of the sidequests are "go to yellow circle, use witcher senses to find a trail, follow trail, kill thing". And they tout it as having 20 some endings but

it's really only 3 with slightly different states for the characters involved.

You also need to escort a goat.

Bessy67 · Sep 6, 2015

JeffZero said:
I actually love ME3 and I'm not a MP dude, but yeah, unpopular opinion there, it seems.

I love the multiplayer but I also really liked the campaign. I think that people's hatred of the ending makes them forget that some of the best moments of the entire series were in the game as well. Tuchanka and Rannoch were particularly awesome IMO.

HP_Wuvcraft · Sep 6, 2015

Kadayi said:
Maybe he played TW3 and thought about how ME4 is going to have to meet that bar if it's not going to get slated.

Um.... please explain what that bar is.

nocturnalis · Sep 6, 2015

Bessy67 said:
I love the multiplayer but I also think that people's hatred of the ending makes them forget that some of the best moments of the entire series were in the game as well. Tuchanka and Rannoch were particularly awesome IMO.

It's not just the ending for me. Personally, I expected to get let down somewhat because I noticed patterns in the previous MEs. I just didn't understand how bad it would be.

EatChildren · Sep 6, 2015

The amendment is pretty damn weird if nothing has changed internally. Maybe he left or got the boot.

JeffZero · Sep 6, 2015

EatChildren said:
The amendment is pretty damn weird if nothing has changed internally. Maybe he left or got the boot.

I went ahead and made a thread on BSN (attributing the proper channels of course) and we'll see where that goes. Almost certainly nowhere, of course, but at least we'll have a couple of places reaching out.

Tweeted Mr. Schlerf as well, but, I mean, he hasn't even posted anything since a month ago.

wolfhowwl · Sep 6, 2015

After the last thread on Chris Schlerf, I thought he wasn't very popular.

Anyways a plot that makes sense would be a first for Mass Effect so best of luck to whoever ends up in charge.

Patryn · Sep 6, 2015

EatChildren said:
The amendment is pretty damn weird if nothing has changed internally. Maybe he left or got the boot.

Wasn't Halo 4 the first game he'd worked on? I can see him possibly being in over his head working on a game with a more wide-open scope.

JeffZero · Sep 6, 2015

wolfhowwl said:
After the last thread on Chris Schlerf, I thought he wasn't very popular.

Anyways a plot that makes sense would be a first for Mass Effect so best of luck to whoever ends up in charge.

Thanks for the tip about there having been a previous thread on this over at BSN.

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