Mass Effect: Andromeda - Free Trial (All Platforms)

Exactly. They have only 2 ways to make money on MEA:
- MEA is going to EA/Origin Access and they are making profits on subscriptions;
- MEA is going to EA/Origin Access, they are releasing DLC and there is a good chance that more people will buy it that way.

Like Battlefield 1 - main game is in Access, but to have a real fun from it you still need to buy DLC's or Premium /as i did/.

Indeed. We still don't actually know anything about the future of MEA but I'd have to admit that showing it off to potential players and letting the game being judged on their experience as opposed to clickbait is an odd tactic to play for a game that's been abandoned.

Then again I thought it was odd to suggest that the game had been abandoned when it kept receiving patches and updates, from a dev studio that apparently had no devs no less. What do I know.

Sure. Edited my post, though I thought that was clear.

I'd say at this point they would have it pretty established to have 1-2 DLC release. Its the 2-3 range (I doubt 4, looking at the DLC pattern over the years from Bioware) that is more unknown and may depend on the Summer-Fall reception of the game and first DLC(s). We might have to 'prove' we should get a 'Citadel', a 'Trespasser'. (Whereas DA2 was the last game that didn't, so they moved on to DAI 'prematurely'.)

Sequel is not happening 2018 and almost certainly not happening 2019. But perhaps things will influence the outcomes:
-no more ME games
-indeterminate length of time until any ME game
-wait more than a few years (~2022-2023; early to mid 2020s)
-priority after DA (2020-2021; around 2020)

I'm still leaning on the last two possibilities, but the initial MEA situation has me not confident about them yet, and has many worried about the case being one of the first two possibilities. But I think, at this point, it isn't wise to presume the first possibility (no more ME ever).

I really think 20 hours would be more appropriate. Sure there could be speedrunners (if there isn't a programmed wall for them to hit against like the vault door in the early access trial), but I don't think that's a big deal. 20 hours for casual newcomers should get through the intro, main story of Eos, and actually opened up to the bigger journey like the first trial should have done anyway (why lock out Eos vault? pointless imo).

I think with 1.09 they have the aesthetics where they want them. Maybe they hope those who were avoiding it strictly for the animation/uncanny valley issues will see that the animation memes are no longer representative and buy the game now.

What I really don't get is, if ME:A is such a failed game, why bother with any of this?
BW continually patches it then EA puts it on sale for really great deals and gives prospective buyers demos, and otherwise try to shine a spotlight on the product.

That doesn't scream "failed game" to me.

Your argument doesn't make much sense given the amount of work poured into fixing the SP.

If earning MP microtransations are the only goal, then why bother doing all of the work that they have done on the SP?
Far more work has gone into fixing the SP then adding a characters/maps here and there and patching weapon balance in MP.
Why not just say "fuck it" and let SP rot and only work on the MP?

Sorry, but I'm not buying it.

It's kind of giving fans the finger if they didn't give it patches failed or not (and very few bad games actually drop patches and leaves everything as is). The demos and the sales can literally be argued both ways though, it can be encouraged to get more players playing by generosity or doing so to make up for the lack of sales I.E. people won't pay full price so instead drop it to 30$ to give them a better deal.

I have yet to seen any game get the kind of improvements that ME:A has gotten through patching. A failed game my get bugfixes, but never have I seen one get new and improved content alongside those patches.

Correlation does not equal causation.

"People like you."   I couldn't give a fuck less about the MP. CS:GO is my MP game of choice if I want that sort of thing. Co-Op MP sucks assholes, imo. :dumb:

In reality, the add for the free trial is marketing 101. The unlimited MP (up to 10 hours) is first because it is more positive. The "play SP up until the 1st planet" is significantly less positive, hence why it is put second.

I have read the patch notes, and as someone who helps patch software as part of my profession, I can tell you for a fact the the changes made in the MP patches are a cakewalk compared to the kind of things patched in the SP with the exception of maybe the netcode.

I know you have a preset worldview to conform to, but these types of actions don't pantomime a failed product, quite the opposite actually.