Aussie Gaming Video Guy. 250k YouTube. Grump easily placated with memes. All my links: https://xitter.twitterapi.xyz/t.co/k9IU92Abt8 Business: danticsofficial@gmail.com
Melbourne, Australia
Joined June 2018
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The fight to #SaveMassEffect is getting BIGGER!
What started as a hashtag following BioWare's closure has become a massive movement involving fans, developers, voice actors, former BioWare founders, and even Canadian politicians.
Here's everything that's happened:
- Over 300,000 people have signed the petition to save Mass Effect
- Canadian MP Don Davies calling for government support to help developers buy back BioWare
- Formal parliamentary petition exceeded the 500 signature threshold required almost immediately
- BioWare cofounder Trent Oster expressing interest in reuniting original BioWare talent, including James Ohlen
- Fans raising thousands of dollars in minutes to fund awareness campaigns
- Save Mass Effect billboards appearing in Times Square and other locations
- A mobile billboard truck taking the campaign directly outside EA's headquarters (please don't harass EA staff!!!!)
- Owlcat Games, developers of The Expanse: Osiris Reborn, publicly supporting the petition
- Mass Effect voice actors, including Jennifer Hale and Mark Meer, joining the movement
- Original Mass Effect composer Sam Hulick releasing his own rescored Mass Effect Universe trailer and was in talks with the Universe team prior to closure
- Modders keeping the trilogy alive with multiplayer restoration and major updates to Take Earth Back and Diversity
- A new BioWare documentary announced for 2027 exploring their history
Can any of this actually convince publishers to give Mass Effect another chance?
Maybe not. But hundreds of thousands of fans are proving that this franchise and studio is far from forgotten.
Hold the line.
Full video: youtu.be/OdjvWbcBlWA
The Take Back Earth Mod just dropped version 2.0 for N7 day and if you're at all planning on replaying the trilogy, you absolutely should check it out.
It adds so much to the final missions that it's hard to see how I'd play without it now.
youtu.be/OuKok37k1zc
Happy N7 day to everyone who has been a fan of Mass Effect and Bioware in one form or another.
Though celebrations can't be the river of positivity we would have liked - Mass Effect WILL continue, in the very least, in our hearts.
#SaveMassEffect #N7day
The Expanse: Osiris Reborn is shaping up to be much bigger than I expected, with more replayability.
As per a recent developer interview it's confirmed to have an approximately 30 hour main storyline.
Mass Effect 3 was 20 - 25 hours in comparison.
Replay value: 3 character origins that effect entire game, multiple endings, meaningful companion consequences, romances, and tons of RPG gameplay customisation from Owlcats CRPG roots.
I'm personally excited to fully customize my companions weapons and gear with the robust skill tree like modification system unique to each piece.
Having played the game, I'm increasingly optimistic.
Full breakdown: youtu.be/WOBs2ddLpME
Almost immediately after I posted this, Owlcat revealed the NEW Voice Actor for your Male character and your Male Twin: youtu.be/TF8213pGOrY
Actually... seems like a massive improvement.
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Something pretty incredible could be happening.
I really hope industry leads join @TrentOster (Original Bioware Co-Founder) in the #SaveMassEffect movement. At the very least, it would be amazing to hear their thoughts.
My first recruit would be @JamesOhlen gotta go for the design OG. I know he’s cooking hard on his own adventure setting, but I gotta ask. James, you up for a reunion?
Credits roll on the Mass Effect trilogy and it's suddenly raining in here. God damn these games made me emotional before.. but now it feels like there's something else mixed in the onions.
#SaveMassEffect
I put 162.8 hours into Dragon Age: The Veilguard and earned every achievement.
So I think I've earned the right to discuss why it ultimately wasn't great, beyond the fact they didn't listen to outside help - including the community council and seemingly those on the Mass Effect team.
Veilguard feels like ideals were written first, and a narrative and gameplay was stretched awkwardly around that.
To live out one persons ideal fantasy..
Rather than letting players genuinely roleplay.
That's why we can't make honest decisions that go against this fantasy.
That's why so many dialogue choices lead to the same outcome.
That's why we can't make decisions that meaningfully challenge your companions.
That's why the stakes often feel strangely low, even when the world is supposedly on the brink.
Ideals, like being kind, are great. Messages have been in RPGs since the 90s. The difference is a good story was the focus first with messages fitting around it. Being good is meaningless if you have no capacity for evil.
Underneath Veilguard, there are flashes of a genuinely great Dragon Age game. Which makes it even more disappointing. I enjoyed some of the gameplay including combat.
But it never felt like it was made for players like me, it felt like it was made despite us.
Mark Darrah ex-Dragon Age executive producer served as a consultant during the final stages of Dragon Age: The Veilguard after leaving BioWare in 2021🚀
He made a statement about ignored advices that he gave to the team, in an interview with Eldorado GG:
✅BioWare dismissed many of his recommendations while he was consulting, which he described as frustrating.
✅Some of his suggestions were only accepted later after a different team made the exact same recommendations.
While EA has been historically known to have the worst leadership and makes statements that clearly show how detached from reality and gaming audiences they are, some of BioWare leadership appears to have also been part of the problem why the studio has been going downhill since at 2014.
That said, Mass Effect Universe showed great promise and I still believe they need to either sell the IP to another studio or help BioWare go independent with the IPs to finish Mass Effect, and have another shot.
Especially that right now, more people than ever are showing love for the brief glimpse they saw from the game.
#SaveMassEffect
No one wanted to believe, believe it even existed.
and when the truth finally dawns, it dawns in desert!
But, there's one they fear. In their tongue it's Elder Scrolls, Sentinel!
FUS RO DAH!
The sands of Hammerfell are calling.
So Owlcat is going to stream Mass Effect and I'm pretty excited to see how they do it. This is a win for them.
Think of all the amazing companions we had across Mass Effect. Somehow, we still barely scratched the surface of races. We get:
- 10 Humans
- 4 Asari
- 3 Krogan
But we really could have used more of these:
- 2 Turian
- 1 Salarian
- 1 Quarian
- 1 Drell
- 1 Geth
- 1 Prothean
- 1 AI
- 1 Angara
BUT we never had a...
- Batarian
- Volus
- Vorcha
- Hanar
- Elcor
- Yahg
- Rachni
& more
Imagine the possibilities.
A Batarian trying to earn the trust of a human crew. A Volus who is genuinely dangerous and potentially a biotic god. A Vorcha who slowly becomes more intelligent and capable – or stays dumb and extremely hard get off your new rug. An Elcor heavy weapons specialist calmly announcing: "With barely contained excitement: I have a solution." A Hanar assassin who makes Thane seem talkative.
We had some incredible companions in Mass Effect but after four games, there were still entire cultures we had barely experienced from the inside.
Which race deserved a squadmate the most?
We have every reason to feel down lately. It may feel like the shit keeps piling on.
When you feel it's all too much, just remember the wisdom imparted to us by our Mass Effect friends.
In the words of the great Garrus Vakarian:
Remember to stay hydrated.
In the words of the wise Kasumi Goto:
It could be worse. It could be filled with rats.
Mass Effect Universe was not going to be open world.
Mass Effect 5 Would Have Been The 'Ultimate Open-World Game' polygon.com/mass-effect-5-ul…
ALT Mass Effect 5 Would Have Been The 'Ultimate Open-World Game'
How powerful is Commander Shepard, really?
Let's look at the evidence:
- Became an N7 before Mass Effect even begins
- Elysium: single handedly held off a pirate army during the Skyllian Blitz
- Torfan: led the assault that wiped out the remaining slavers - dealing a phycological blow the Batarians never recover from
- Akuze: sole survivor of a thresher maw attack that killed 50 marines
- Became humanity's first Spectre
- Defeated Saren and his Reaper enhanced form
- Helped destroy Sovereign
- Died... then came back with a cybernetically reconstructed body
- Can reinforce their bones until they're "almost unbreakable"
- Can augment their muscles and skin with synthetic fibres
- Killed a thresher maw on foot - something not done in generations
- Went punch for punch with the Shadow Broker, a massive Yahg
- Can compete with Garrus in marksmanship
- Crossed the Omega-4 Relay and can complete the Suicide Mission without losing a single squadmate
- Destroyed the Collectors and their Human Reaper
- Resist's contant Reaper indoctrination attempts
- Can survive every wave protecting Object Rho until the artifact itself incapacitates them
- Wakes up and immediately tears through Project Base completely alone
- Broke the Armax Arena scoreboard with 9,999+ points alone
- A TEAM of krogan battlemasters had tried and failed
- Survived Fatal Error when the Arena's safety systems failed and it tries to kill them
- Defeated their own clone
- Helped kill a Reaper on Tuchanka
- Stood in front of a Reaper Destroyer on Rannoch, avoided its attacks, and directed the fleet's fire onto it
- Can end 300 years of war between the geth and quarians
- Can unite krogan, turians, quarians, geth, humans, asari and salarians against a common enemy
- Can convince Saren to kill himself
- Can convince the Illusive Man to do the same
- Resisted Leviathan's attempt to dominate them and convinced the Leviathans to join the war
- Leviathan concludes Shepard's victories are "more than a product of chance"
- Became such a threat that the Reapers knew Shepard personally
"Harbinger speaks of you."
And ultimately...
- Did what countless civilizations across countless cycles couldn't.
Shepard broke the Reaper Cycle.
So, how powerful is Commander Shepard?
Full breakdown: youtu.be/LwVcYcRKYCQ
This took a hell of a lot of effort to make so I really do appreciate the love.
Gameplay in the Mass Effect series was, and still is, a lot of fun.
With Mass Effect Universe, the intention was to give you more freedom in how you approached situations. That's why I make the comparison to Hitman.
Think back to the first time you arrive on Noveria in Mass Effect 1.
You need a pass to leave Port Hanshan and pursue Benezia. But how you get that pass is largely up to you. You can talk your way through problems, exploit the people and politics around you, find alternative solutions, or simply let your gun do the talking.
That philosophy was being pushed much further in Mass Effect Universe. You could play the space super spy - infiltrating, manipulating systems and quietly eliminating enemies.
.. Or if you loved traditional Mass Effect combat, you could kick down the front door and go guns blazing.
The point wasn't to take away the Mass Effect gameplay you loved. It was to give you more ways to finish missions. Your mission. Your approach. Your choice.
#SaveMassEffect
I can finally talk about Mass Effect Universe.
Since Bioware closed I can now reveal that I was part of the Mass Effect Council, saw what BioWare was building, and provided feedback during development.
• Set 600+ years after the Reaper War
• You play as a customizable N7 agent
• Instead of being a walking gun rack, you're a cross between John Wick and James Bond
• Shepard's legacy preserved, regardless of your ending
• A galaxy divided into three major factions
• Humanity, Krogan, Batarians, and more allied together
• Council races forming their own alliance
• The Geth emerging as a third superpower
• A galactic Cold War instead of another Reaper style invasion with a shadowy adversary
• Geth-built megastructures
• Connections between the Milky Way and Andromeda
• Experimental technology implanted in you as a unique point of difference
• Hacking and manipulating the environment
• See through walls, identify systems, remotely trigger hazards and more
• Handcrafted missions like ME1-3
• But with Hitman-style freedom in how you complete them
• Brutal close-range executions
• Squadmates who can clash with each other
• Romance wasn't being sanitised
• Liara returns - now an incredibly powerful Asari Matriarch
From what I saw, BioWare was making Mass Effect for us, the fans, not for people who don't exist.
It looked incredible.
And now we may never get to play it.
Find out more here: youtu.be/ZOWrTNazZxM
#SaveMassEffect
We may never see a trilogy of games like Mass Effect again.
I don't love Mass Effect because of the combat. I love seeing Garrus calibrating, Tali spying on Engineering, Mordin humming while synthesizing, and Joker being sarcastic to the AI.
Few games have ever made companions feel so much like people you genuinely knew, and even fewer have delivered the character growth, relationships and consequences that Mass Effect could build across three entire games.
Choices made years earlier could come back to reward you, haunt you, or completely change the fate of someone you'd grown attached to.
And that's the part I'm worried we may never quite get again.
Because when developers talk about making games like Mass Effect today, one thing comes up repeatedly - planning an interconnected trilogy from the beginning is insanity.
Maybe they're right.
But that insanity is also part of what made Mass Effect special.