Bioware Q&A - What would you ask if they had a session?
Jul 17, 2017 14:50:47 GMT
SofaJockey, Hrungr, and 10 more like this
Post by sil on Jul 17, 2017 14:50:47 GMT
The idea behind this thread is to collect a list of questions regarding Mass Effect (both the Original Trilogy and Andromeda) that you would like to know the answer to. There is no guarantee that they -would- do a Q&A, but if we don't make a list (and find some kind soul to point them to the thread via twitter) we'll never know. As people write down questions I'll add them to this opening post, and hopefully we will get some answers in the future.
To make this cleaner, I will be separating it into different sections. Please bear in mind that a Bioware representative would be incapable of answering anything involving a Non-Disclosure Agreement, so discussions about future DLC or working conditions at the company would not be added to the list as they cannot and will not ever consider breaching the NDA to answer them. Remember, if they answer, they will be doing us a favour. They don't have to answer any questions at all.
I'll add my questions to the list at first, and we'll see what else other people write up.
Mass Effect Trilogy Lore Questions
- What was Xeltan's secret?
- Do husks retain memories of who they once were?
- Did the Reapers attack the Raloi despite their attempt to pose as a pre-spaceflight civilisation?
- What cluster is the Yahg homeworld found in?
- Whose memory is more powerful/precise, a Salarian's or a Drell's?
- Why didn't Harbinger have a bigger role in ME3?
Mass Effect Trilogy Art Questions
- Did Bioware make concept art for each of the homeworld's that we never saw such as Dekuuna, Irune Kahje, and Palaven? If so, can we see it?
- Did Bioware ever make concept art for background races such as the Virtual Aliens and Raloi? If so, can we see it?
Mass Effect Trilogy Gameplay Questions
- What mistakes did you feel you made in the OT, mainly in terms of writing, and how did you correct them?
- What decision led to vehicles (Mako/Hammerhead) being removed from ME3?
- Why don't we see both Geth & Qurians at the Earth hub if you make peace? There are audio lines in game for them both talking about peace.
- Why don't we see both Salarians and Krogan at the Earth hub?
Mass Effect Trilogy Multiplayer Questions
- Did you ever discuss showing the unseen homeworlds through new multiplayer maps?
Mass Effect Andromeda Lore Questions
- Where was the Nexus constructed?
- Why no Pathfinders on the Nexus. Wouldn't it have made much more sense to have the Pathfinders arrive first, check out the worlds so that things could have been more in place when the Arks arrived?
- Do the Angara have multiple fathers as well as mothers? How do the men fit into the Angara family structure?
- Have you considered adding a News Terminal Message (text) regarding the Batarian that gets woken up from cryo? It'd be great to see that little tidbit of MP content getting added as lore in SP.
Mass Effect Andromeda Art Questions
- What planet was the hardest to get right visually?
- Were there any interesting planets you had art for which got cut?
Mass Effect Andromeda Gameplay Questions
- Why didn't the Nomad have a gun? I know that they wanted to come in peace, but the Milky Way has its fair share of big alien beasts to fight, I'd have thought they would expect the same in Andromeda.
- Where did the Ancient AI go after the final mission? Is that a bug?
- Do you feel that all the concerns at launch have been addressed in the patches?
- Did the team consider including omni-bows and omni-shields as melee weapons? Will we ever get those powers for Singleplayer?
- Why were squad power commands removed? (Mapping squadmate powers to the D pad, not the radial menu)
Mass Effect Andromeda Multiplayer Questions
- Why did multiplayer support shift from the expansion pack approach of ME3 to a slower, steadier stream of content?
- Would Bioware consider adding area names to multiplayer maps ala ME3 as a quality of life addition to help teams coordinate?
- Did the team consider including omni-bows and omni-shields as melee weapons? Will we ever get those powers back again for ME:A MP?
Other Mass Effect Related Questions
- When will official forums be brought back?
- Will Bioware release an analytics poster like previous games? (% of players picking Scott/Sara, companions and profile/power use)
- How difficult it is to create a new character and not make him/her look like a substitute for an old one?
- Will there be more novels and comics?
The more questions we have the merrier!
Also, if anyone could be kind enough to consider tweeting some of the devs about this thread, then who knows, it may just get a response.
Edit: Ian Frazier, Lead Designer for Andromeda has been kind enough to answer a few questions! Which is awesome, so thank you! The spoiler below will contain all the answers that we have received, and hopefully will receive from Ian and other dev's in the future if they are able to, and I'll edit the questions above to only be those questions we don't already have answers to.
To make this cleaner, I will be separating it into different sections. Please bear in mind that a Bioware representative would be incapable of answering anything involving a Non-Disclosure Agreement, so discussions about future DLC or working conditions at the company would not be added to the list as they cannot and will not ever consider breaching the NDA to answer them. Remember, if they answer, they will be doing us a favour. They don't have to answer any questions at all.
I'll add my questions to the list at first, and we'll see what else other people write up.
Mass Effect Trilogy Lore Questions
- What was Xeltan's secret?
- Do husks retain memories of who they once were?
- Did the Reapers attack the Raloi despite their attempt to pose as a pre-spaceflight civilisation?
- What cluster is the Yahg homeworld found in?
- Whose memory is more powerful/precise, a Salarian's or a Drell's?
- Why didn't Harbinger have a bigger role in ME3?
Mass Effect Trilogy Art Questions
- Did Bioware make concept art for each of the homeworld's that we never saw such as Dekuuna, Irune Kahje, and Palaven? If so, can we see it?
- Did Bioware ever make concept art for background races such as the Virtual Aliens and Raloi? If so, can we see it?
Mass Effect Trilogy Gameplay Questions
- What mistakes did you feel you made in the OT, mainly in terms of writing, and how did you correct them?
- What decision led to vehicles (Mako/Hammerhead) being removed from ME3?
- Why don't we see both Geth & Qurians at the Earth hub if you make peace? There are audio lines in game for them both talking about peace.
- Why don't we see both Salarians and Krogan at the Earth hub?
Mass Effect Trilogy Multiplayer Questions
- Did you ever discuss showing the unseen homeworlds through new multiplayer maps?
Mass Effect Andromeda Lore Questions
- Where was the Nexus constructed?
- Why no Pathfinders on the Nexus. Wouldn't it have made much more sense to have the Pathfinders arrive first, check out the worlds so that things could have been more in place when the Arks arrived?
- Do the Angara have multiple fathers as well as mothers? How do the men fit into the Angara family structure?
- Have you considered adding a News Terminal Message (text) regarding the Batarian that gets woken up from cryo? It'd be great to see that little tidbit of MP content getting added as lore in SP.
Mass Effect Andromeda Art Questions
- What planet was the hardest to get right visually?
- Were there any interesting planets you had art for which got cut?
Mass Effect Andromeda Gameplay Questions
- Why didn't the Nomad have a gun? I know that they wanted to come in peace, but the Milky Way has its fair share of big alien beasts to fight, I'd have thought they would expect the same in Andromeda.
- Where did the Ancient AI go after the final mission? Is that a bug?
- Do you feel that all the concerns at launch have been addressed in the patches?
- Did the team consider including omni-bows and omni-shields as melee weapons? Will we ever get those powers for Singleplayer?
- Why were squad power commands removed? (Mapping squadmate powers to the D pad, not the radial menu)
Mass Effect Andromeda Multiplayer Questions
- Why did multiplayer support shift from the expansion pack approach of ME3 to a slower, steadier stream of content?
- Would Bioware consider adding area names to multiplayer maps ala ME3 as a quality of life addition to help teams coordinate?
- Did the team consider including omni-bows and omni-shields as melee weapons? Will we ever get those powers back again for ME:A MP?
Other Mass Effect Related Questions
- When will official forums be brought back?
- Will Bioware release an analytics poster like previous games? (% of players picking Scott/Sara, companions and profile/power use)
- How difficult it is to create a new character and not make him/her look like a substitute for an old one?
- Will there be more novels and comics?
The more questions we have the merrier!
Also, if anyone could be kind enough to consider tweeting some of the devs about this thread, then who knows, it may just get a response.
Edit: Ian Frazier, Lead Designer for Andromeda has been kind enough to answer a few questions! Which is awesome, so thank you! The spoiler below will contain all the answers that we have received, and hopefully will receive from Ian and other dev's in the future if they are able to, and I'll edit the questions above to only be those questions we don't already have answers to.
- Was the ability to stow weapons in ME3 removed due to memory issues or was it removed purely for gameplay reasons?
I wasn't on ME3, but from what I've heard from the team, it was 100% a memory limitation.
- There are a number of unused and incomplete maps that have been discovered, is it possible to learn what those levels were going to be?
On both ME3 and MEA, the team tried a variety of different MP map ideas. Sometimes you try something out in the "white box" (very rough geometry and first pass cover layout, no textures) and it proves to just not be any fun at all, so you trash it and try something else. At this stage, often there's no real substance to the level from a narrative/aesthetic standpoint--it's pure layout. So it's not like "we cut the level with the crazy windmill made of guitars over a river a lava*," it's like "we chose not to develop the grey level with the long grey hallways, because everybody hated the corridor fighting."
- Were Hanar and Elcor ever considered options for new MP Characters?
Definitely something that's been talked about, yes. Will it ever happen? I can't say.
- Did each Ark and the Nexus have QEC's that connected back to the Milky Way?
We never directly state this in the game iirc, but the implication is that the Nexus (and perhaps even the arks) did have a QEC link back to the Milky Way but it went dark at some point while they were en route, for reasons that should be pretty clear if you've played ME3.
- Did the Andromeda Initiative bring any mechs with them such as LOKI's and YMIR's?
Yes.
- Was there a long process of redesigning to update the appearances of the original trilogy species or were old designs reused?
We always start with reference from the trilogy, but then there's a whole new round of concepting to see how we want to bring things forward into the next generation. How much concepting is required varies depending on the technical needs (does this species need a custom animation rig?) and how central that species is to the story--the Batarians, for instance, were relatively quick to re-concept, whereas we spent a very long time on the Krogan.
- Will MP weapon balance be ported over to SP?
Probably not. As a rule, behavioural changes to guns and bug fixes apply to both SP and MP when we patch, but raw numerical changes apply only to MP. The primary reason for this is that the balance changes we've made to guns/powers, etc. are generally intended to address MP-specific feedback or done in tandem with other MP-specific changes.
- Have other maps, enemies and objectives been considered for MP?
Tons of things have been considered over time, yes.
- Have you considered adding a more advanced and detailed Codex to your website that is updated frequently with more background lore for both the Milky Way (pre-Reaper War) or Andromeda? I'm thinking along the lines of the Pottermore website or like the Warcraft Chronicles tomes that are being released.
No, but that's a cool idea.
- Why weren't the arks made up of multiple races? That way if only one ark made it all races would still be represented in Andromeda.
Because the biological needs of the various species were different, so it was easier/cheaper for the Initiative to optimize each ark around a smaller set of constraints.
I wasn't on ME3, but from what I've heard from the team, it was 100% a memory limitation.
- There are a number of unused and incomplete maps that have been discovered, is it possible to learn what those levels were going to be?
On both ME3 and MEA, the team tried a variety of different MP map ideas. Sometimes you try something out in the "white box" (very rough geometry and first pass cover layout, no textures) and it proves to just not be any fun at all, so you trash it and try something else. At this stage, often there's no real substance to the level from a narrative/aesthetic standpoint--it's pure layout. So it's not like "we cut the level with the crazy windmill made of guitars over a river a lava*," it's like "we chose not to develop the grey level with the long grey hallways, because everybody hated the corridor fighting."
- Were Hanar and Elcor ever considered options for new MP Characters?
Definitely something that's been talked about, yes. Will it ever happen? I can't say.
- Did each Ark and the Nexus have QEC's that connected back to the Milky Way?
We never directly state this in the game iirc, but the implication is that the Nexus (and perhaps even the arks) did have a QEC link back to the Milky Way but it went dark at some point while they were en route, for reasons that should be pretty clear if you've played ME3.
- Did the Andromeda Initiative bring any mechs with them such as LOKI's and YMIR's?
Yes.
- Was there a long process of redesigning to update the appearances of the original trilogy species or were old designs reused?
We always start with reference from the trilogy, but then there's a whole new round of concepting to see how we want to bring things forward into the next generation. How much concepting is required varies depending on the technical needs (does this species need a custom animation rig?) and how central that species is to the story--the Batarians, for instance, were relatively quick to re-concept, whereas we spent a very long time on the Krogan.
- Will MP weapon balance be ported over to SP?
Probably not. As a rule, behavioural changes to guns and bug fixes apply to both SP and MP when we patch, but raw numerical changes apply only to MP. The primary reason for this is that the balance changes we've made to guns/powers, etc. are generally intended to address MP-specific feedback or done in tandem with other MP-specific changes.
- Have other maps, enemies and objectives been considered for MP?
Tons of things have been considered over time, yes.
- Have you considered adding a more advanced and detailed Codex to your website that is updated frequently with more background lore for both the Milky Way (pre-Reaper War) or Andromeda? I'm thinking along the lines of the Pottermore website or like the Warcraft Chronicles tomes that are being released.
No, but that's a cool idea.
- Why weren't the arks made up of multiple races? That way if only one ark made it all races would still be represented in Andromeda.
Because the biological needs of the various species were different, so it was easier/cheaper for the Initiative to optimize each ark around a smaller set of constraints.
