Andromeda was a financial success.

Less linear than DA2 - and brings back the tactical camera from Origins. DA2 is the action adventure "push a button something awesome happens" black sheep of the franchise.

Are you serious right now? That makes it like Origins?

I guess you weren't around when the game released and this forum was filled with people saying the game was absolute trash and nothing like Origins. Oh, and also how it was a failure and the end of the franchise.

Kinda exactly like what you've been doing with Andromeda for the past 6 months.

Wonder what Bioware did to people to make them this upset about their games.

Also, that tactical camera was a mess. How you dare bring it up as a good thing is beyond me.

That Andromeda made money was never in question. Being very pessimistic it sold at least 2 mi copies, but almost certainly considerably more. But we still don't know how well it sold or if it met EA's expectations. 

But I think you're right, and it's what many people believe even since we got the news that Montreal was "axed". Mass Effect will come back, we do know how, but it will most certainly come back. Hopefully in the hands of a more capable development team and/or leadership. 

Seeing as people have used actual logic to prove that the first-week sales were at least three million, the word you're looking for isn't "pessimistic", it's "delusional".

How's that? 2 mi units sold is quite a considerable number. ME2 for example shipped that number of units in its first week and it was quite acceptable. 

1. ME2 wasn't released on PS3 until a year later, otherwise ME2 would have sold 3 million copies on first week.

2. EA expected 3 million copies to be sold on first week, to be on par with ME3. Anything less would have been a failure for EA.

As I said, discussing sales number is a fruitless endeavour. But I believe I don't think any report release so far allow us to say Andromeda met EA's expectations.

Which is also relative. Tomb Raider reboot failed to meet Square Enix's expectations, yet it got a terrific sequel that I consider to be the best Tomb Raider game ever released.

I'm glad ME:A was able to do something at least, though the people who want to see it fail will find a way around this information. Even if Andromeda was a massive success, I'm not convinced it would be prioritized over Anthem and DA4. I feel like at most we would (could) still see at least one DLC with other loose threads tied up in comics. Perhaps they've decided to hold off on it until post DA4. Anthem will continue to get support, the DA4 team could be moved elsewhere after it's release.

I don't think that's quite how it works.

IIRC, fully staffed, full production for MEA only took ~ 18 months.

I believe the reality is that each franchise has a small core team (consisting primarily of leads in their respective areas) that is fully devoted to that franchise.  They're the ones who determine the scope, storyline, quest structure, choose character/archetype concepts, art styles, mechanics, etc.  I also believe that once they've figured out what they think they want to build, they prepare a budget to present to EA for funding/green-lighting.  Once the project is approved, the core team can start nailing down designs - starting at higher levels, then drilling down to the point where you have a design (and perhaps some prototypes) with enough detail that a production worker can actually produce that piece of work.  The core team probably already has some high-level concepts cooked up for MEA2 - they did build some story threads into MEA that they apparently intend to develop down the line.

The vast majority of the production staff will move from project to project, franchise to franchise, depending on where they're needed and which project is in full production.  At this point in time, it's apparently Anthem.  DA4 may be the next BioWare franchise to move to full production (it's probably still in pre-prod at this point).

Honestly it isn't really clear that Montreal has been dismantled at all.

Two positive earnings reports for Andromeda certainly point to more optimism rather than more skepticism regarding all things Andromeda and Mass Effect.

I don't think this a surprise. I expected EA to make a profit from MEA. Of course it helped revenue in the quarter because that's when it was released.