Rookersh posted:

Rookersh posted:

Bioware doesn't exist anymore.

DA:O was a surprise success that took 6ish years to make and almost everyone working at Bioware to put out the door. EA had no faith in it, and suddenly it was one of their top selling franchises. So they did what EA does to highly successful franchises, and asked Bioware to make another one. Except for this new one, they wanted it started and finished in under a year, as they had a dream of an annual RPG franchise. Mind you that's hard enough to pull off for FPS games which are relatively simple to make with multiple teams. Bioware was expected to put together a full length AAA RPG in 6-7 months while also putting out the last of the DA:O DLC.

This killed the company. Huge swathes of people up and quit. They couldn't handle the stress. They couldn't handle what they were expected to do. Every single major program director and creative lead left the company during this year period where they were developing DA2. Go look at LinkedIn profiles for the major people that worked on DA:O, and more then half of them suddenly leave Bioware in 2010. The combat director quit and wasn't replaced for months, so they had no real lead directing what the combat should have been during that period. Major story beats and combat ideas got forced into the game in the final months of 2010 not because they were good, but because the game needed to ship in a few months and it needed to get out the door. To help the DA team actually finish DA2 in a somewhat annual fashion, they drew most of the ME2 team off ME, throwing them into this grinder as well.

By the time DA2 launched, around half if not more of the original "Bioware" was gone. Go through the credits of DA:O, ME1, or ME2 and start LinkedIning people, none of them work for Bioware anymore. Most left between 2010 and 2012.

It's been a pretty steady drain since then. Compare the credits list of Inquisition to the credits list of DA:O or DA2. It's almost an entirely new team, and it's a team that Bioware specifically hired to replace the losses from DA2. It's why so many styles have changed since then, why the gameplay changed so steadily, and why they chose to try so many new things. Because Inquisition wasn't made by the DA:O team trying their hand at open world game design. It was maybe 1/6th of the guys that even touched DA:O/DA2 suddenly getting an influx of new blood, most of it Bioware fans finally getting a chance to work for the company they loved, that had great new ideas for what they wanted out of future Bioware games.

It's the same for the ME team. The brain drain has been bad, and the development of Andromeda has apparently picked off massive chunks of the team. The lead writer of the group was the lead writer for Halo 4, and he apparently clashed with a lot of the senior writers/main writers of previous ME games. A whole bunch of goon favorite ME writers have quit the company, and on various development forums have mentioned it was due to creative differences with the former lead writer. Gameplay leads have been leaving the ME/Bioware teams at a pretty steady pace since the game was developed as well. The story had to be picked up mid completion as the lead writer got forced out/quit and replaced, which likely doesn't mean great things for the narrative ( which we are also seeing here. ). Andromeda has currently had the great slow drip of Bioware talent since the dark days of 2010 when DA2 "killed" the company. They've been forced to cycle talent multiple times during the development of Andromeda, not just in management ( which has seen multiple complete turnovers ), but also among the rank and file people working on the game.

This isn't to say Andromeda can't be great, or that it won't live up to the hype. I'm personally hoping it does because I need something to play right now. But if it's good, it'll be good on it's own merits and it's own merits alone, rather then because "it's a Bioware game, I like Bioware!". Because Bioware doesn't exist anymore, it's a completely new entity and needs to be treated as such. People really need to be viewing this as "EA'S NEW ACQUISITION, BIOWARE VICTORY'S FIRST RPG. HOPE IT'S GOOD." rather then "Bioware always makes quality. I know what I'll get here.". As it is right now, EA is propping up Bioware's corpse with a new studio and hoping people don't notice while they keep using it as their RPG house.

Nazzadan posted:

When was the last time Bioware even knocked the ball past the pitching mound?

Nazzadan posted:

I think it would be pretty funny if it turns out to be great despite the bad animations, bad graphics, bad voiceacting and bad writing. Like if the gameplay is so amazing it overshadows all of that, that would be fantastic.

It would/will also be funny when the game is garbage and everyone that has been shitposting about it since the first trailer is proven right.

So it's a win/win for me, I either get a good game or a good laugh.

Poops Mcgoots posted:

Whether Bioware deserves it or not, I'm not sure, but I'm open to developers trying new things since the alternative is Ubisoft releasing a bunch of open world games where you climb towers to reveal a hundred icons on your map.

Nazzadan posted:

When was the last time Bioware even knocked the ball past the pitching mound?

Deakul posted:

Realtalk:

I just want a pulpy scifi adventure with fun combat, plenty of loot, and a decent amount of exploration.
I really don't care how intellectual the story is as long it's just fun to follow and think about amidst all the shooting and looting.

Big Bowie Bonanza posted:

i turned on one of the streams and it was a guy pulling enemies and then dropping them off cliffs

goty

Milky Moor posted:

sure

on the other hand, these tepid-at-best reviews have got me so hyped man, i'm so hyped, i've preordered the super deluxe edition to show all the bad frogger goons!!

Rookersh posted:

Bioware doesn't exist anymore.

Digirat posted:

I'd need to compare it with mass effect 2 and 3 to see if I'm remembering them with rose tinted glasses and this is actually totally normal for the series

BrianWilly posted:

Combat does seem cool from what these vids show, despite some...sigh...really poor playing. Everyone seems to think that the only way to deal with enemy shields is to just...shoot them with your gun, despite the fact that Liam (who's been in every squad so far) apparently has Overload. That one Video Game Sophistry guy who's doing in-depth videos looks to be playing a Sentinel, but I've yet to see him use a single power and, from what I can tell, he seems to have gone through the entire first mission without ever equipping a second power.

Funky See Funky Do posted:

Holy poo poo. This review is scathing.


https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2017/03/14/mass-effect-andromeda-review-opening-hours/

Big Bowie Bonanza posted:

i turned on one of the streams and it was a guy pulling enemies and then dropping them off cliffs

goty

Fojar38 posted:

ME2 and 3 were meme generators because of some of their odd expression animations

Case in point:

Digirat posted:

Everyone remembers this one because it was horrifying, but also because it was an outlier.

Haledjian posted:

This is pretty damning, but having just replayed the original trilogy, I'm kind of mystified at him saying he expects "splendid writing" from a Bioware game. All the stuff he's criticizing is thoroughly present in the first three games.

I always thought the draw was that the writing was not that it was good so much as good enough to get players invested in the Choose Your Own Adventure mechanic. It was never "splendid," it just went from above-average to below as it got outstripped by other studios.

marshmallow creep posted:

Well while I was able to download files, I am still not able to install them. Origin keeps asking for permissions from administrator, and no amount of administrator privileges or running as Administrator or compatibility modes or reinstallation or cache clearing or .NET Framework updates seems enough to get me past this point.

8-Bit Scholar posted:

I am starting to worry this isn't going to be a good game should I get Star Ocean instead???

Ainsley McTree posted:

If "a character holds a gun backwards once" and "the faces look funny" turn out to be the biggest problems with this game then that will rule

Nazzadan posted:

But they seem to be issues that playing multiplayer would alleviate.

Funky See Funky Do posted:

My deal with DA and ME games is that they're the only game of that type there is. They've never told amazing stories or been incredibly well written, but yeah, they've been good enough. Just fun sci-fi/fantasy pulp. If other companies made these types of games I'm willing to bet they'd poo poo all over Bioware.

comatose posted:

Like not having to deal with the story in singleplayer?

Doctor Spaceman posted:

No AI companions either.

comatose posted:

Like not having to deal with the story in singleplayer?

OctaMurk posted:

The Bill Kristol, actually

Digirat posted:

This is just a personal gripe, but I'm also not liking how they keep the camera centered behind you and controllable during normal conversations, unlike ME 1/2/3's close-up diagonal shots.

GreenBuckanneer posted:

Spider makes some bioware style games.

Rookersh posted:

Bioware doesn't exist anymore.

DA:O was a surprise success that took 6ish years to make and almost everyone working at Bioware to put out the door. EA had no faith in it, and suddenly it was one of their top selling franchises. So they did what EA does to highly successful franchises, and asked Bioware to make another one. Except for this new one, they wanted it started and finished in under a year, as they had a dream of an annual RPG franchise. Mind you that's hard enough to pull off for FPS games which are relatively simple to make with multiple teams. Bioware was expected to put together a full length AAA RPG in 6-7 months while also putting out the last of the DA:O DLC.

This killed the company. Huge swathes of people up and quit. They couldn't handle the stress. They couldn't handle what they were expected to do. Every single major program director and creative lead left the company during this year period where they were developing DA2. Go look at LinkedIn profiles for the major people that worked on DA:O, and more then half of them suddenly leave Bioware in 2010. The combat director quit and wasn't replaced for months, so they had no real lead directing what the combat should have been during that period. Major story beats and combat ideas got forced into the game in the final months of 2010 not because they were good, but because the game needed to ship in a few months and it needed to get out the door. To help the DA team actually finish DA2 in a somewhat annual fashion, they drew most of the ME2 team off ME, throwing them into this grinder as well.

By the time DA2 launched, around half if not more of the original "Bioware" was gone. Go through the credits of DA:O, ME1, or ME2 and start LinkedIning people, none of them work for Bioware anymore. Most left between 2010 and 2012.

It's been a pretty steady drain since then. Compare the credits list of Inquisition to the credits list of DA:O or DA2. It's almost an entirely new team, and it's a team that Bioware specifically hired to replace the losses from DA2. It's why so many styles have changed since then, why the gameplay changed so steadily, and why they chose to try so many new things. Because Inquisition wasn't made by the DA:O team trying their hand at open world game design. It was maybe 1/6th of the guys that even touched DA:O/DA2 suddenly getting an influx of new blood, most of it Bioware fans finally getting a chance to work for the company they loved, that had great new ideas for what they wanted out of future Bioware games.

It's the same for the ME team. The brain drain has been bad, and the development of Andromeda has apparently picked off massive chunks of the team. The lead writer of the group was the lead writer for Halo 4, and he apparently clashed with a lot of the senior writers/main writers of previous ME games. A whole bunch of goon favorite ME writers have quit the company, and on various development forums have mentioned it was due to creative differences with the former lead writer. Gameplay leads have been leaving the ME/Bioware teams at a pretty steady pace since the game was developed as well. The story had to be picked up mid completion as the lead writer got forced out/quit and replaced, which likely doesn't mean great things for the narrative ( which we are also seeing here. ). Andromeda has currently had the great slow drip of Bioware talent since the dark days of 2010 when DA2 "killed" the company. They've been forced to cycle talent multiple times during the development of Andromeda, not just in management ( which has seen multiple complete turnovers ), but also among the rank and file people working on the game.

This isn't to say Andromeda can't be great, or that it won't live up to the hype. I'm personally hoping it does because I need something to play right now. But if it's good, it'll be good on it's own merits and it's own merits alone, rather then because "it's a Bioware game, I like Bioware!". Because Bioware doesn't exist anymore, it's a completely new entity and needs to be treated as such. People really need to be viewing this as "EA'S NEW ACQUISITION, BIOWARE VICTORY'S FIRST RPG. HOPE IT'S GOOD." rather then "Bioware always makes quality. I know what I'll get here.". As it is right now, EA is propping up Bioware's corpse with a new studio and hoping people don't notice while they keep using it as their RPG house.

AngryBooch posted:

Underdog humans are in a race to activate/deactivate ancient relics of an extinct advanced race. Humanity's best hope rests on the shoulders of one soldier who is bound to an AI.

The loving Halo writer turned Mass Effect into Halo.

AngryBooch posted:

Underdog humans are in a race to activate/deactivate ancient relics of an extinct advanced race. Humanity's best hope rests on the shoulders of one soldier who is bound to an AI.

The loving Halo writer turned Mass Effect into Halo.