Going to the Milky Way in Sequels

I agree - and the more it actually is like a new world with little connection to the old one, the better.

Uhm... no.

The endings (and by extension the Milky Way) are FUBAR. There is no cleaning them up. Yes Bioware won't admit their mistake but this isn't news. Four years ago it might've been infuriating but now? It's over. They had one chance to come clean and fix it, and that was pre-EC, when the heat was really on, the fanbase was united and people were paying attention. Instead they divided and conquered (you can thank the "closure" people for their part in that). So, no it's done, finished. Time to move on. But if we move on, the least they can do is respect the last thing we did in that trilogy, bullshit though it may have been. They've shit on player choice and wishes in the past sure, but at least now at the end, let something stay, bullshit "art" though it may be.

And for the record, it wasn't the ruination of the Milky Way that set people on fire, it was the ruination of the franchise. At the time the two were synonymous, but not anymore. As long as ME continues the way we remember and loved for 2.5 games, who gives a fuck which galaxy it fictionalizes? Have you personally visted the Hades Gamma Cluster or whatever and just loved how accurate it was to your experience? Do the names of the planets we scan or do donuts on matter? No, they do not. Home is where the heart is and as long as they get the ME "feels" (which let's face it boils a lot down to which rubber forehead alien we get to bang) it'll be Mass Effect all over again.

I was skeptical this franchise could be revived, with a sequel being impossible and so many people against prequels/interquels. But against all odds, they found a way. And for that, if nothing else I'm grudgingly impressed.

To respond to the topic directly, my views should be clear by now. Milky Way is done, bury it. No going back, only forward. As long as we bang, decide whether to help people or tell them to fuck off, fight legions of similar mooks and explore, roughly in that order, Mass Effect endures.

If they do, it'll be a mistake in my view. The reasons we can't continue in the Milky Way won't diminish with time. There's still no way to reconcile the vast differences without steamrolling overthem or ignoring them altogether.

I agree. I think they have to be done with the Milky Way. The endings saw to that.

I'm not talking about inventing a different method, I'm talking about increasing the efficiency of the FTL technology that already exists.

And yet you would trust the Reapers on how to kill them? 

"Oh yeah, shooting the thing that you built to stop us will definitely work. Once you destroy that, we'll be gone." 

EDI mused on the prospect of them achieving immortality. She never says that actually occurred, just that it may be possible.

I know, but that still would need to be addressed.

After all the backlash, I don't think they would fold now and make synthesis invalid--not after sticking to their guns like they did. Thus, I don't think they would move the story back to the Milky Way. I think they'll take it slower this time so there is more of the galaxy to explore and leave themselves room to maneuver if they mess something up like they did with the endings of ME3. 

There is no franchise-breaking issues with that ending. The Extended Cut leaves what happened very vague other than the broad strokes which can be handled in future games. 

To bring this back to the Milky Way, them leaving the Milky Way is the biggest mistake they made in the entire franchise. 

Leaving is the best way to fix it. Otherwise, they will have to pick an ending to make it work. Having them retcon everything is no fix--it's lazy and insulting. It would make people super angry all over again, and I really think they are going to try to stay away from that can of worms as much as possible. It's really too bad they ended ME3 as they did because they poured a lot of time and work into building the Milky Way, which is totally wasted now.

Most likely, they'll stay with Andromeda but scale the access we have back. My guess is that we'll have less scope in the galaxy but deeper exploration.