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[FunkyMunkey]

Don't shitpost, dude. Sure, they lied up until NMS launch, but take a look at their patch record. Only CDProjekt is in their court. Sure, the game ain't even near what they promised, but they have made big strides in improving on what is there compared to launch. Its completely erroneous to shit on Hello Games' post-launch support.

nah, sean deserves every single ounce of shit he's gotten over nms. it's not close to the game that was promised which is the point. but im sure he's glad he has a defense force while counting his money.

just like bioware is going to patch bugs and the like and leave it at that i would assume. if you think they're going to postlaunch overhaul the character faces, animation, and dialogue, i have a bridge to sell you

 

[hooligan]

Mass Effect Andromeda is in the same league as the trilogy.

GAF is seriously blowing it out of proportion.

I agree I'm actually playing it and it's great.

 

[Agent_4Seven]

Fuck Fem Ryder haters too. I really like her as a person, I like the way she jokes and all that and the way she looks (which is not awful or horrible btw - but they need to add TressFX / HairWorks cuz I FUCKING HATE X360 / PS3 type of hair) just adds +10 to all of this.

 

[Slackbladder]

Which is a completely unsubstantiated rumor literally made up by the person writing the article and one other person, and is honestly a pretty sexist accusation in and of itself.

It's The Scum. Written by and for scum.

The game was rushed out or they had severe issue within the company. DA:I was the first to use Frostbite and came out pretty well with few bugs, at least none that I remember.

Some issues are expected with a game the size of Mass Effect. All previous games have had bugs and so on. But I feel there was a serious lack of care in the development. However, the gaming community and social media is so poisonous and full of scumbags that certainly a lot of the vitriol was pure cuntishness. But there are issues, issues that should not be present in a game from such a company.

 

[Devilinthiscity]

As a Mass Effect fan i'm disappointed with what we ended up getting. The bar has been raised by every other game out there in the genre. I know some people are enjoying the game and I don't really have a problem with that, to each their own, but man, those are some pretty low standards. Good on them for addressing the negative word of mouth from pretty much everywhere I guess.

 

[justsomeguy]

I haven't bought the game solely because of the negative impressions I've read. If they can manage to polish it up a bit more, I'd be sold. Surely there are others like me

Me. I have precious little gaming time, and ME:A was pencilled in to take the majority of my time over then next couple of months. I'm gutted this game is apparently in such a poor state.

 

[Son Of Sparda]

I love how some people try to say that the game doesn't have any big issues and it's just GAF being hyperbolic.

Yep, this is clearly on GAF.

 

[derder]

I don't care for their outward-facing fixes, moreso then the Product managers / owners, QA and planning that should be held accountable for letting this POS ship in it's current state. This is not on the developers. This is pure project mismanagement.

Let me just say that you have no idea what you're talking about. Developers, Product Management, and QA should all be "rowing together" as a team towards the finish line.

Are you implying that QA didn't see these obvious issues which surface within an hour of playtime?
Are you implying that the developers never saw the bug reports?
Are you implying that the Project Managers didn't have a deadline?

The fault should be placed on the assholes who bought it without reading reviews.

 

[UtterlyPerplexed]

Not exactly the bastion of gaming news but UK newspaper The Sun say that Fem Ryder's appearance was deliberately gimped so as not to appear sexist but that Male Ryder was kept attractive.

Well firstly, it's The Sun. It's not exactly the bastion of honest reporting either and it's down there with The Daily Mail, The Daily Star and the Daily Express in the pit of shit that is our newspaper industry. It's most likely they trawled through social media websites, came across the loud alt-right voices claiming those SJWs are ruining video games again and decided to take it as if it's gospel.

It's fucking maddening. Virtually everything I've seen about this game's sub-par animations it's wave after wave of the same chorus about how Mass Effect Andromeda was purportedly made by a white-hating racist, how the lead animator is an inexperienced woman brought on only because of a diversity quota and how the female characters are "ugly" because feminism. I couldn't wait to bail from any ME topics on anywhere other than GAF.

 

[Rezae]

Well at least they met their end of quarter goal. Short-term results are all that matter these days.

 

[The_Endgamer]

I wish people were happier with the news that they'll at least look into fixing the game to the extent that EA is willing to pay and allocate resources for salvaging the product.

Whoaaaa slow down there. They haven't done anything yet to fix the game quite yet...

 

[WITHE1982]

I'm still not sure what the problem is.

They've done a great job in cornering a niche end of the market. The space comedy genre is so underused and it's good to see EA/bioware embracing it. In the past I've enjoyed games such as Space Quest and Her Majesty's SPIFFING, as well as series like Red Dwarf and Futurama, but with ME:A I've not laughed as much since watching Spaceballs.

Spoiler

what do you mean it's not meant to be a comedy? OK yeah, right. Do you think I was born yesterday?

 

[KageMaru]

I can sometimes look past the laughably bad animations but how the hell would they fix the writing? I'm only about an hour in and the writing is amateur at best. It's odd how I play these games for the story and that's turning out to be one of the worst parts of this game.

 

[Snagret]

Whoaaaa slow down there. They haven't done anything yet to fix the game quite yet...

Lime didn't say they fixed anything yet, they just said we should commend that Bioware has come out and said they've listened to the criticisms and are looking into potential fixes. Which is not something they should be criticized for.

 

[Felix Lighter]

Not exactly the bastion of gaming news but UK newspaper The Sun say that Fem Ryder's appearance was deliberately gimped so as not to appear sexist but that Male Ryder was kept attractive.

Looking at the difference between the Fem Ryder actress and model they seem to have increased her nose size and de-glamourised her.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2948293/bioware-accused-of-making-mass-effect-andromeda-female-characters-ugly-in-bizarre-sexism-row/

This is GG bullshit. It's been spreading around that circle since early demos.

 

[LexW]

I can sometimes look past the laughably bad animations but how the hell would they fix the writing? I'm only about an hour in and the writing is amateur at best. It's odd how I play these games for the story and that's turning out to be one of the worst parts of this game.

The writing improves a great deal. I have no idea why they frontloaded so many shit bits, like Liam being a cretinous floating rock enthusiast, or Commander "My Face Is Tired" Addison, it just makes no damn sense, but by 20 hours in most of the characters are distinctly more likeable, you probably haven't talked to Addison in person for 15 hours, and the whole thing is looking up.

Just stay away from "Casual" as a dialogue option, if you don't like cringe-y stuff.

 

[TannerDemoz]

Priced at just $9.99

 

[oti]

Really curious about this.

 

[BRocknRolla]

I can sometimes look past the laughably bad animations but how the hell would they fix the writing? I'm only about an hour in and the writing is amateur at best. It's odd how I play these games for the story and that's turning out to be one of the worst parts of this game.

Highly doubt they'll acknowledge anything about the low quality of the writing. They probably think it's great.

 

[le.phat]

Let me just say that you have no idea what you're talking about. Developers, Product Management, and QA should all be "rowing together" as a team towards the finish line.

Are you implying that QA didn't see these obvious issues which surface within an hour of playtime?
Are you implying that the developers never saw the bug reports?
Are you implying that the Project Managers didn't have a deadline?

The fault should be placed on the assholes who bought it without reading reviews.

I work in SaaS development, as a UX designer. I know EXACTLY how internal goals, chain-of-command, shoddy hand-off, or a too strong focus on sales can lead to product owners getting backed in a corner, don't have the full overview, or have become detached from their audience to the point that they only work to serve the manager/director/VP one level above.

I'm not suggesting QA didn't see these oversights. I'm saying that their reports were cast aside or not assessed with the correct gravity.
I'm not saying that the developers ignored bugs. I'm saying that they didn't get the time or resources to elevate the overall quality.
I KNOW that a product manager has deadlines. But it's their job to make sure that their product has the product/market fit that's expected by its users. Especially in a AAA established series.

QA, devs, product managers, they all have leads they report to, who report to directors, who report to presidents. And somewhere in this chain, someone deemed the results 'good enough to ship'.

I'm calling out the process, not the devs or QA. They develop and report. I'm calling out the individuals responsible for maintaining quality, vision, and making sure the product is up to snuff.
Which is why i feel that any tweaks/fixes or other forms of olive branches are irrelevant. Fix your goddamn process.

 

[mindsale]

The second this is $30 or less I am jumping on it for the multiplayer.

 

[BrassDragon]

Mass Effect Andromeda is in the same league as the trilogy.

GAF is seriously blowing it out of proportion.

I agree with the latter part... it's an average AAA game title which deserves its 7/10 reviews and has some fun combat and narrative beats if you stick with it. People are painting it as the worst release of the year... those people need to chill out and look at some of the truly crappy games out there.

But the first part... ohh boy, just can't agree with that at all. For all their faults, the first three games were not average. They were elevated by the sum of their parts, while Andromeda just has some fun parts to help you overlook the mediocre parts.

It never gels together in the way the first three games did. Bland character arcs and a general lack of emotional conflict, an aversion to story branching based on your choices, worldbuilding that trips over itself to make everything as close to the Milky Way as possible, hardly any cinematic flair in the cutscenes, an uninspired barely-there soundtrack that breaks with the established motifs of the franchise, unremarkable even boring design of armors and aliens, a bloat of game systems held together by a poor UI, environments that are expansive at the expense of interesting features etc. etc.

It's an okay game that can't climb out from under the shadow of its predecessors on the strength of its combat loop alone.

 

[Clear]

Honestly, for me this game has the most unappealing art-direction of any AAA title I can remember. Competence doesn't come into it ; from the first trailer I just looked and went, nope.

 

[Snagret]

Highly doubt they'll acknowledge anything about the low quality of the writing. They probably think it's great.

It's also likely outside the scope of a fixable issue at this point, given they'd have to bring back in all the voice talent to redo dialogue, which probably wouldn't help that much anyways.

I feel like at various points in the game that many single scenes were recorded across different sessions. The characters don't really respond to each other's tone and vocal emotions very well which contributes to so much of the dialogue falling flat. They could have them come in and read better lines, but it would likely still sound stilted and unnatural.

 

[stan423321]

What? CDPR's "free" support was a bunch of forgettable DLC that didn't even matter, love or hate NMS but their post launch support has been pretty stellar in what it adds to the game.

People bringing up CDPR have W1 and W2 in mind, not W3. W3's "free DLC" was a marketing spin but ultimately harmless. W1 and W2 were a different kettle of fish.

 

[VectorVictor]

Just so I'm clear, the problems with this game include:

• Poor voice acting/direction
• Poor facial animations/lip syncing
• A story that isn't nearly as well-crafted as the original trilogy
• Numerous bugs and defects that impact gameplay and game saves/loading
• Subpar graphics and animations
• Subpar character design models and options
• The inability to customize and assign equipment for your companions
• Missing ME favorite species (e.g. Quarians)

I'm just trying to get a consolidated list of complaints here. I just started the game, and I personally see at least a third of where these concerns are coming from already, and I just got the Tempest.

And what I'm trying to get at for the list is that most of these won't be something they can fix with a simple patch. It goes back to the concerns that the game was knowingly shipped out by EA half-baked.

Also, why are we even acting like the BioWare we knew and loved from the KOTOR and original ME days is still around? IIRC, the founders cashed out some time ago, and EA is running that ship (aground).

 

[Fox Mulder]

I haven't bought the game solely because of the negative impressions I've read. If they can manage to polish it up a bit more, I'd be sold. Surely there are others like me

No way they will improve awful animations, voice acting, and writing though.

 

[Jumeira]

Just so I'm clear, the problems with this game include:

• Poor voice acting/direction
• Poor facial animations/lip syncing
• A story that isn't nearly as well-crafted as the original trilogy
• Numerous bugs and defects that impact gameplay and game saves/loading
• Subpar graphics and animations
• Subpar character design models and options
• The inability to customize and assign equipment for your companions
• Missing ME favorite species (e.g. Quarians)

• Poor amount of new species, the ones they have created pale in comparison to the OT and just look out of place
• Choices in dialogue wheel dont offer variation in consequences
• Lazy variation of alien faces
• Awful character creation mode
• Lots of filler from DA:I

Mass Effect Andromeda is in the same league as the trilogy.

GAF is seriously blowing it out of proportion.

I think GAF/disgruntled ME fans are being reasonable

Note: Up to 74 since image was published.

ME introduced a vast galaxy of planets, technology, species with fascinating backstories of wars, social makeup and co-habitation. ME:A barely added to it (2 new species right? that look like they dont belong in the universe) with awful art/design and a poor Pathfinder initiative backstory. Thats just scratching the surface.

 

[Spartancarver]

Price drop to $10-15

Or they dispatch ninjas to everyone's houses and confiscate the copies until they can actually finish the damn thing.

 

[Venom.]

This is GG bullshit. It's been spreading around that circle since early demos.

Maybe it is unsubstantiated but that doesn't mean it's GamerGate related. There should be a place for people to comment on perceived political correctness without it meaning they are sexist. The Sun article was written by a woman.

 

[JayB1920]

No way they will improve awful animations, voice acting, and writing though.

Well the voice acting and writing isn't awful all the time and it's not realistic to expect either. There are quite a few good character and story moments.

 

[UnluckyKate]

I wish people were happier with the news that they'll at least look into fixing the game to the extent that EA is willing to pay and allocate resources for salvaging the product.

Honestly there is not much they can do.

They can fix the charater creation and PNG creation tools to improve it.

They can make better algo for procedural animations during conversations...

But that is just cosmetic...

It will never fix the game's structure that feels like a mmo, the terrible fetch quest, the uninteresting writting and all over the place voice overs... (they won't, VA are too expensive to redo)

It can't fix the unbrearable scanning (both in space and on land, they rely WAY to much on this batvision hand mounted scanner) because it's too important because you NEED these rare material to craft and you have to grind every unit of them because they are so rare and the game economy balance is so grindy... So you run the entire game with your scanner up and it's just plain not fun.

They can patch the game but they can't fix a broken spine.

 

[UCBooties]

"...Incredible response from our passionate fans... minor technical issues... we're always listening... blah blah blah..."

"And now we're proud to announce the schedule for our upcoming DLC to add more content (and micro-transactions) to expand the Mass Effect Andromeda world, and story, in ways you never thought possible."

Please be excited.

 

[BrassDragon]

Well the voice acting and writing isn't awful all the time and it's not realistic to expect either. There are quite a few good character and story moments.

Stuff like that is only getting 'addressed' with story DLC. We'll probably hear some noise about how they'll carry our feedback forward into exciting new chapters. There's not much else they can do, really.

Personally, considering the many broken promises from ME3 onward, I don't put much stock in their PR statements. I'm more interested if ME:A's critical reception will shake up their leadership/pipeline structure because for an outsider looking in, there seems to be some flaws there. It's going to take a while to see those effects shake out.

 

[Real Hero]

We are proud to announce andromeda 2 will try to have better writing

 

[AlexFlame116]

I'll keep an open mind until we see what the announcement is all about. Meanwhile, I guess I could play Metal Slug 3 until the announcement.

 

[Deleted member 752119]

I'm interested to see what they have planned. Though I think a lot of the backlash is overblown. I'm like 32 hours in and still having a good time. It has plenty of warts, and isn't as good as the triology by any means, but it's still solid and I haven't hit many glitches. They can't fix the writing etc. so that's going to remain lackluster (though I still think it's not as bad as many think and easy enough to shrug off the terrible bits here and there as the series always had those).

 

[Northeastmonk]

It makes me think: Mass Effect: Andromeda Reborn or something

Something must have pinched a nerve with them. The backlash wasn't exactly something they could ignore.

I just wonder what they're actually going to address. I had a few instances of AI stuck in place, drop ships making weird sharp diagnol turns, and not being able to fire upon enemies until they hit the ground.

 

[bigdaddygamebot]

Only need to look at how this thread is starting off to see that even if they knocked it out of the park with this game, it simply wouldn't have been enough for some people. Anything Bioware does or says, you've got people ready and willing to jump down their throats over it.

If they knocked it out of the park this would not be happening. Stop framing Bioware as a victim. Yes. People on the internet have targeted specific employees and that's complete bullshit but Bioware has earned the spite being displayed.

 

[OléGunner]

Hopefully they can do a good job of cleaning up the litany of bugs plaguing the game.
For me the ship has sailed for an early purchase, the game has a slight stink to it and there's a wealth of other high quality software on offer.

Still as an ME fan, I'll pick this up once it's in better shape and around the <£30 mark.

 

[KageMaru]

The writing improves a great deal. I have no idea why they frontloaded so many shit bits, like Liam being a cretinous floating rock enthusiast, or Commander "My Face Is Tired" Addison, it just makes no damn sense, but by 20 hours in most of the characters are distinctly more likeable, you probably haven't talked to Addison in person for 15 hours, and the whole thing is looking up.

Just stay away from "Casual" as a dialogue option, if you don't like cringe-y stuff.

That's good to know. Even though I'm not far at all, it's just been pathetically bad so far.

Highly doubt they'll acknowledge anything about the low quality of the writing. They probably think it's great.

That's what I'm afraid of.

 

[Harlequin]

I love how some people try to say that the game doesn't have any big issues and it's just GAF being hyperbolic.


Yep, this is clearly on GAF.

Different people have different experiences with a game. For example, I haven't come across too many big glitches or bugs. That doesn't negate your experience with the game but at the same time, you having had a lot of problems doesn't mean others can't have had a different experience.

 

[Garrett Hawke]

Maybe it is unsubstantiated but that doesn't mean it's GamerGate related. There should be a place for people to comment on perceived political correctness without it meaning they are sexist. The Sun article was written by a woman.

Ummm, no.

The Sun is a steaming pile of homophobic, sexist, racist, islamophobic etc bullshit and the idea that a feminist conspiracy is making ugly women in games is KotakuInAction stuff.

 

[afternoon delight]

I guess I just never knew how literal Microsoft was being with this generation's penchant for beta testing the future.

Available today, Mass Effect trilogy HD remaster.

You jest and jab but

 

[Zakalwe]

Mass Effect Andromeda is in the same league as the trilogy.

GAF is seriously blowing it out of proportion.

I'm really enjoying my playthrough, much more than I thought I would, but the above isn't true at all.

Mass Effect: Andromeda feels like a game made out of Mass Effect assets by committee. By people who played the original games ages ago and can't really remember what made them great.

The thing is, the template is a very appealing one; Mass Effect is a /very/ particular itch, and the template can almost support a game by itself.

It lacks the great story of 1.
It lacks the atmosphere and exceptional character work in 2.
And while combat is improved in many ways, it can often feel like a step back from 3 /especially/ in multiplayer.

The sense of exploration is by far the best its been in the series, but the delivery isn't quite there.

 

[Harlequin]

I also really hope that they won't just address the technical issues but also the M/M romance issue but I'm not so sure that they will. We'll see soon enough, I guess.

 

[RPG_Fanatic]

I didn't think DA2's issues were focused on Hawke specifically. From what I remember, it was more the technical limitations, cliffhanger ending, stuff like spawning monsters, lack of polish, etc. Maybe the overarching story was a bit dull? But I rarely see complaints against Hawke as a character specifically.

But I only played about 5 hours of it (and enjoyed what I played) so I'm not sure.

As someone who played through the game and was very disappointed with it, I can say Hawke himself was never a negative for me. In addition to what you mentioned above, I will add

Spoiler

copy paste dungeons with walls over door to make them different, way less customization options for party members including the inability to change their armor, the annoying dialogue wheel that made it unclear what your choices were due to not even showing you what Hawke will say. The First Act is wasted potential since instead of exploring Hawke's first year struggling to survive with either the mercenaries or smugglers, you skip that and get told to go do side quests until your character is strong enough to handle the dungeon at the end of Act 1. Act 2 was by far the best part of the game. I loved that part of the game and how Hawke actually earned his title instead of it just being given to him. The last Act was just bad, where everyone became a stupid asshole and the only person who didn't got blown up. Then you pick sides but have to kill everyone anyway because reasons. It was really stupid.

Spoilering to be safe.

 

[Intel_89]

Does it involve a gas can and a lit matchstick?

 

[RE4PRR]

Ugh the shit CC is putting me off a FemRyder Playthrough. Completed on Default MaleRyder but not going to do a full 100% run on FemRyder if there's any chance they'll sort shit out. Also impatiently waiting for Gibbed Savegame Editor.

 

[Garrett Hawke]

I also really hope that they won't just address the technical issues but also the M/M romance issue but I'm not so sure that they will. We'll see soon enough, I guess.

Tbh it would invite a shitstorm but a possibility could be if they just made Cora and Liam bisexual. It's not perfect but it would be better. They could even re use most of the dialogue and animations from their straight paths.

But exclusive new m/m content would be great, I just dunno how feasible it would be