The fourth entry in the Mass Effect franchise will arrive during the 2016 holiday season.
Electronic Arts has announced that the next Mass Effect will be called Mass Effect: Andromeda.
Update: Bioware in a blog post following up on today’s E3 reveal of Mass Effect: Andromeda, has revealed new details about the game and its development.
According to the studio, development of Andromeda has been in production since as early as 2013. The company, the post said, wanted to take the “best parts” of the original Mass Effect trilogy (action, “exciting” worlds, “great character”) and “expand the definition” of what the series could be.
“This game is very much a new adventure, taking place far away from and long after the events of the original trilogy,” said Bioware. “You will play a human, male or female, though that’s actually not the character you saw in the trailer (more on that later). You’ll be exploring an all-new galaxy, Andromeda, and piloting the new and improved Mako you saw. And through it all, you will have a new team of adventurers to work with, learn from, fight alongside of, and fall in love with.”
The blog post finally confirmed that Andromeda will be built with the Frostbite engine.
Original Release: Revealed in the opening moments of the publisher’s E3 presentation, the game was showcased alongside a brief cinematic trailer. The trailer begins with a Johnny Cash song playing while an unseen protagonist surveys a series of alien worlds including desert, ice, swamp, volcanic planets and more. The camera then pulls back to reveal said character wearing combat gear bearing “N7” markings. Selecting the desert planet, they jump to it using a mass relay and then land on its surface in a vehicle similar to the Mako from Mass Effect 1.
The trailer ends with a brief combat sequence where the helmeted protagonist, accompanied by a squad of companions, charges into a firefight and attacks an enemy with an omni-blade. While this is happening, black space craft can be seen emerging from the ground in the background. The screen then fades to black, after which the new title appears on screen along with text promising a “Holiday 2016” release.
The trailer, of course, leaves a ton of questions in its wake, with most of them probably centered around the identity of the mystery protagonist. What do you think? Will Commander Shepard return in Andromeda or are you expecting an entirely new character (perhaps played by Kevin Sorbo)?
