Bioware reveals axed plans.

I'm actually glad that didn't happen. That being said I would like to see more than the number of worlds we can have outposts in.

I actually like NO Mans Sky and plan to go back to it but yeah I'm glad they didn't do this. No Mans Sky had a lot of potential but it was definitely flawed and that could have easily broken this game.

welp, an entire year wasted on a horrible idea. That might help explain the lack of polish.

When I first played No Mans Sky, it was an empty shell of a game, but the concept was interesting. My first thought was NMS could have been a planetary exploration module in a Mass Effect game. I think they could have pulled it off, I always dreamed about being able to land on any planet and explore in the first ME, but looking at current complaints, many people would have whined about boring empty worlds with no content.

At least they dodged that bullet.

Bioware chasing two hares.

Maybe we can stop scapegoating EA. While they may have final word, they're not in charge of the direction of the game.

BLOODY FOKIN HELL 

To second what someone said on NeoGAF, it sounds like they dicked around with testing new technology for a year or two before realizing it wouldn't work, and thus the process of unfucking the game began, and the focus on the more DA:I-styled game began. I also suspect they had concerns over how much of a mishmash of MET and Halo 4 Chris Schlerf's plot was because it seems all the things that stick out the most in my mind about the story in the game right now are tied to the colonization aspect which really didn't sound like the initial pitch from the leak. It did mention outposts but all seemed to revolve around this "mysterious, ancient evil" concept that has been beaten to death by BioWare already, and it's also what the somewhat mediocre main plot of the game focuses on.

And I agree it might explain why they look to have rebuilt the game.

Why in the hell would they want it to play like No Mans Sky in the first place? When will they learn that their priority should be story and characters and not open world/exploration ffs??

This explains a lot.

My view on procedural generation is always that it's better in situations where it's not core to gameplay. For example, procedurally-generated environments work in Diablo and similar games because exploration is not core to that experience. The best parts of those games are taking your hero and smashing/blasting/murdering enemies, then collecting loot. Exploration is only a means to bring you to your next group of monsters; environments in that situation are just dressing - procedurally generating them is fine.

On the other hand, when exploration is core to the gameplay experience, procedural generation just can't exceed human artistry. At least, not yet. That's why for all we heard about the infinite worlds of No Man's Sky, a common criticism of the game has been that many worlds end up feeling very similar. Programming code can only go so far in bringing about a world (planetary, narrative, or otherwise) to life.

I'm glad that Mass Effect Andromeda did not end up going down this route. But it's somewhat surprising that they needed a year to come to that conclusion.

As a side note, 40 hours in and I'm still enjoying the game.