From reading on the Bioware Wiki, I found that they're making Mass Effect 2 (Release TBA 2009). This is a pretty interesting turn for games:

Quote :

"Casey Hudson, Project Director for BioWare, has said that players should keep their Mass Effect save-files,[3] because decisions made by the player in the first game will continue to have influences on their character in the sequel.[4] Players who have not played the first Mass Effect will start a new character in Mass Effect 2, and will be brought up to speed on the story elements that have taken place thus far in the series.[5] It is highly recommended, however, that people play the first game before playing the sequel. Hudson also states that characters from the previous game will return, provided that they were not killed.[4]"

Also, it should be a good continuance of the original game as far as play style and the like:

Quote :

"It has been confirmed that the same team that worked on Mass Effect will be working on Mass Effect 2.[6] ; He mentioned a Windows version of Mass Effect 2 would eventually become available.[7]"

Hopefully they put more into the storyline and optional story arcs.

12/13/2008 3:13:30 PM

Bioware has done importing of characters before (Baldur's Gate 1 -> BG2, for example), but pretty much the only things that transitioned were the character's stats and whatever was in the party's inventory.

Good to see they've refined the concept. Not only are they checking the Mass Effect 1 saves for major decisions (like the ending), but they're even going so far as to see which old party members were still alive.

Though...

**** SPOILERS!!! ****
I'm curious to see what they're going to do with the final decision --
to save the Council or let humans rule, and (if you let the council die) who
the main character chooses to instate as leader of the new human government.
**** [/SPOILERS] ****

That sort of thing could have major effects on a lot of factors throughout the game. It almost seems like they'll need to write multiple different plots for a large portion of the game, assuming they don't do something early-on to remedy this huge divide in player choice.


Will definitely be renting or borrowing (don't have a 360... just a memory card). Looking forward to it.

[Edited on December 13, 2008 at 3:22 PM. Reason : made spoilers less stand-out]

12/13/2008 3:21:14 PM

sweet

12/13/2008 3:34:18 PM

^^if they did it far enough in the future, its possible they could just do the whole 'this, this, and this happened' via a dialogue and then no matter what, this person was instated as the leader.

12/13/2008 3:58:21 PM

Yeah, but that would be a huge fucking cop-out, and would also mean that the whole "decisions made... will continue to have influences" stuff would be, at least partially, bullshit.

If Bioware is promising us that past decisions are going to have an effect in the second game, then I trust them enough to think that said effect would be more than just a few lines of "here's what happened in the past" from some NPC or another. Perhaps (even hopefully) the old choices won't dictate a large portion of the plot in this one, but at the very least it'll probably equate to differences in a few quests.

12/13/2008 4:04:39 PM

I think the true question on everyone's mind is how many Asari do I get to bwn this time?

12/13/2008 4:53:33 PM

Quote :

"I think the true question on everyone's mind is how many Asari do I get to bwn this time?"

12/13/2008 5:46:48 PM

ttt

5/29/2009 5:49:19 PM

I wonder if you'll be able to jump in this version.

5/29/2009 7:29:02 PM

I'm pretty sure i blew up those council fucks.

this may give me motivation to finish my 2nd play through so i can see what the differences are by choosing the alt ending.

I hope they let players use more weapons this time. I thought limiting the assault rifle just to the soldier class was dumb. Though I am stoked about this game coming out.

5/29/2009 8:22:34 PM

E3 teaser: http://www.gametrailers.com/video/e3-09-mass-effect/49798

5/29/2009 11:56:11 PM

Pretty awesome info

http://blogs.ign.com/BW_MassEffect/2009/06/17/123208/

6/17/2009 9:51:07 PM

^umm...are those actual gameplay screenshots or just pre-rendered cutscenes. I can't tell

6/17/2009 10:11:08 PM

1st and 3rd are gameplay, 2nd might be a drawn concept shot

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Je38gwUcO1g

6/17/2009 10:56:29 PM

so what happens if u play through twice. Would mass effect 2 choose the last play through?

6/18/2009 7:38:11 PM

I'm sure you pick which character to continue.

Or are you talking about twice with the same char? I don't think you keep all of your levels anyway.

[Edited on June 18, 2009 at 8:53 PM. Reason : ]

6/18/2009 8:52:45 PM

both kinda haha

I have two characters; but my 2nd one i "restarted" a game but am still on the first planet.

Does this "reset" my decisions

6/18/2009 9:30:27 PM

Quote :

"Does this "reset" my decisions"

^ probably only if you finish your second play through

6/18/2009 10:24:04 PM

Aight,

I played the first Mass Effect. But I played it VIA steam and on the PC. Man, good game.

I dont know if this was like other peoples experiences but it had major sound glitches and graphical issues. I assumed it was because it was converted to PC.

Now the second one is coming out for PC and X-Box at the same time. Should I expect the carry over to be better? I mean it was real rough at times. Like the ground being completely black on 1 level. Loosing sound all together, etc.

Also, anyone played both PC and X-box versions. I feel I might have cheated myself because of the ease of FPS's on the PC.

Thoughts?

7/8/2009 11:06:47 PM

The Xbox version had some graphical glitches, where sometimes the bump maps didn't load up at the start of a cinematic for a few seconds, making everything look smooth and plain. Apparently that was a glitch caused by the Unreal engine they couldn't fix completely in the first one.

7/8/2009 11:13:32 PM

Besides slow texture-loading times in the XBox version (usually only took a second too long or just happened in cinematics), there really weren't any glitches that I noticed.

Sometimes the ally pathfinding kind of sucked, and they never even tried to dodge anything, but neither of those are what I would call glitches.

7/8/2009 11:15:50 PM

Cant wait. I will definatly get this for PC then.....I only hope it scales correctly. In that the difficulty is the same for PC and X-box.

On a side note, I watched a video about mass effect 2 and they talked about some changes like being able to tell each party member where to go individually instead of both together. This was already implemented in the PC version I played.

Would they actually improve the later released PC version of it after the x-box was already released?

7/8/2009 11:17:19 PM

Why do people insist on putting a dash in Xbox? it's not x-box. That just looks retarded.

[Edited on July 8, 2009 at 11:21 PM. Reason : I'm gonna go listen to music on my i-pod now.]

7/8/2009 11:20:50 PM

^^Bioware, being one of the few development studios that actually cares about the quality of its PC ports (instead of just porting a virtually unchanged and glitchy version, then using a patch to make the game actually playable, like a lot of others do), likely would add extra features to a later PC release. It wouldn't surprise me.

Also, it's worth noting that it's not always the development studio that fucks up PC ports... sometimes the publisher (especially if it's EA) will just port it themselves and ignore important things like making sure it actually works.

7/8/2009 11:25:46 PM

Quote :

" able to tell each party member where to go individually "

ya that was kinda annoying about the first one. I could never send the angry alien monster or the soldier chick into battle and the weak support character would have to tag along getting killed

7/9/2009 10:20:14 AM

the biggest problem with the pc port was the UE3 engine is total garbage. Not only that but they left all the configuration options to what they were on the 360 so theres no AA whatsoever unless you tweak some of the files by hand or force it via the driver.

Nasty shadows, texture pop, ugly post processing effects. Welcome to UE3

7/9/2009 12:31:20 PM

^You think the same thing will happen in this next version?

7/9/2009 9:25:04 PM

New video

http://www.gametrailers.com/video/exclusive-reveal-mass-effect/52551

Pretty awesome, but sometimes I think they reveal too much of the story in these videos.

7/10/2009 12:07:51 PM

Quote :

"I could never send the angry alien monster or the soldier chick into battle and the weak support character would have to tag along getting killed"

Same thing with me. Anytime there was a battle I had to tell them to hold back, else they would just run out there with a pistol and die.

Other than that though, I really loved everything about the game.

[Edited on July 10, 2009 at 7:29 PM. Reason : ]

7/10/2009 7:24:23 PM

Yeah, I want to try to solo most of the game on a harder difficulty by putting my squad mates off in a corner somewhere.

7/10/2009 8:24:26 PM

There are alot of additions in the PC version of mass effect 2 that are not in the original 360 version. New abilities, interfaces, controls. I think Mass Effect 2 will be very polished because they did the work over a year ago.

So, if you think you are bad ass, prove it and buy the PC version and play it again.

7/12/2009 10:39:54 AM

ibt'PC vs Console' war

7/12/2009 12:24:54 PM

i usually side with the console being better on most types of games except games that require a shit-ton of buttons like strategy games and roleplaying games. so yea this game probably is better on PC.

i just remember battle was a bit hard because you had to pause and switch out stuff and tell your squad what to do. Also this game reminded me of Advent Rising and I wish they would come out with a Advent Rising 2.

7/12/2009 12:32:10 PM

I've just assumed that any computer I get to play games will be outdated and unable to play any games a month after I buy/build it, so I stick to consoles now.

I do kind of feel like booting the original back up and seeing the state of my game...I think I killed off the guy soldier or something.

[Edited on July 12, 2009 at 12:49 PM. Reason : build]

7/12/2009 12:49:21 PM

I knew there was going to be a sex scene at some point so I saved the human chick at all costs. Fuck that guy soilder.

I wish I could just play console games and be satisfied. But I never am. I feel way more connected at my PC because it has all the internets aim etc etc etc. But yea, teh gay to upgrade.

7/12/2009 10:27:24 PM

I think I ended up being friend zoned by the human girl soldier

7/13/2009 12:10:59 AM

Box art

7/31/2009 1:21:38 AM

Trailer introducing a new Krogan (seems like a possible companion).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mi7H-AUw8JA

Also you get that blood dragon armor at the end with purchase of Dragon Age. Not sure if you can do cross platform though. Planning to get ME2 for xbox and DA for PC.

8/18/2009 12:29:06 PM

New character - Subject Zero.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LD0AdV6-rAY

Looks pretty sweet.

10/2/2009 4:53:44 PM

10/2/2009 6:41:30 PM

^^ Wow. Just wow.

10/2/2009 7:40:08 PM

^^,^^^ Looks great

10/2/2009 7:49:46 PM

Gonna be on 2 discs
http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/105/1052167p1.html

Quote :

"Just how big is Mass Effect 2? If the number of discs the game ships on is any indication, players should prepare for an even longer campaign. BioWare Community Manager Chris Priestly states on the official forums Mass Effect 2 will be split onto two separate discs for both PC and Xbox 360. The PC will not require any disc swap since the game will need to be fully installed. Xbox 360 owners, however, will need to perform one required swap. "Even though there is a disc swap, it occurs at a carefully planned place in the game (that does not interfere with gameplay) and is done once," Priestly said. "You do not swap back and forth. One swap and then done." The Collectors' Edition of the game has a third disc, which contains 'making-of' sections and other bonus information. "

12/4/2009 9:04:36 AM

This game is going to be legit

12/4/2009 1:14:46 PM

Yea, this game is going to be boss.

12/4/2009 2:15:04 PM

Trailer looks choice, bro, I am STOKED

12/4/2009 3:46:31 PM

I hope there's more controversial alien fucking.

12/4/2009 3:48:47 PM

I better see some alien nips this time or I'm going to

12/4/2009 4:02:12 PM

i've been trying to play the original mass effect, but just can't get into it. i don't have the time to sit down and play for hours at time, maybe that has something to with it. i might play 2 hrs/week, at best.

12/4/2009 6:43:51 PM

Voice actors revealed

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/masseffect2workingtitle/video/6242706?hd=1&tag=topslot;title;1

Some good talent going on here

There will also be a cinematic trailer on TV, Fox at 7:30 on saturday

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/105/1053855p1.html

12/10/2009 7:13:18 PM