Dragon Age: The Veilguard‘s reviews went live yesterday ahead of its release later this week, and naturally that ignited a lot of chatter from folks who’ve already played the game and those who’re planning to. Among this noise was some talk about Bioware’s other beloved RPG series, Mass Effect, with the developer currently leading work on the next entry having decided to broadly outline some stuff it’ll do.
“Lots of people asking me about Mass Effect now that Veilguard reviews are out, and Oct 31 is close,” Bioware’s Michael Gamble – who’s currently leading the team of vets working on the “next Mass Effect game” – tweeted, no doubt dragging a whole bunch of people who’ve rather enjoyed watching their character awkwardly flirt with half of the galaxy to the edge of their seats.
“Both are from the studio, but Mass Effect is Mass Effect. How you bring a Sci Fi RPG to life is different than other genres or IPs…and has to have different kinds of love,” the developer wrote, adding in response to a comment suggesting Veilguard’s been compared to Mass Effect 2 that he thinks the former does have “some Mass Effect vibes”.
That said, Gamble seemed keen to emphasise that he’s planning on trying to make sure the two heavyweight franchises maintain their own distinct identities. For example, he responded to another comment comparing Veilguard’s art style to Pixar movies: “I’m not sure I agree with the Pixar thing, but Mass Effect is photorealistic and will be as long as I’m running it.”
He added that this next Mass Effect game will “maintain the mature tone of the original trilogy”. As one fan pointed out, the series has always had some humour to it and in a response, Gamble seemed convinced the serious and silly can exist in harmony, suggesting that these funnies usually come from “serious characters put in some humorous situations”.
So, there you go, some very, very broad strokes about what your next serious, mature alien shagging adventure full of incredibly luxuriously-rendered faces will be attempting to deliver in comparison to Veilguard.
If you haven’t already, make sure to check out our review of Dragon Age: The Veilguard, penned by Alex, who’s legitimately more RPG than man at this point.