With DA4 shifting to Singleplayer only, should we expect the same for Mass Effect?

If shifting back to single player only shortens the dev cycle for new games, sign me up.

I'm not sure it actually does though...unless your just talking about throwing in some half-baked combat system like ME1 or DAO.  I'd prefer that they not to return to those days.  Of course if it were an either or proposition I'd be in favor of amazing story and RP'ing to just excellent combat.

I didn't say single player vs. multiplayer. I simply stated, that if cutting multiplayer shortens the time needed to bring out a new game (because of a smaller work scope), then I'm supportive of that decision, because these days games simply take way too long. I mean, who wants to wait on a sequel 7 years? That doesn't make sense, when the focus is on single player first. For new IPs, a long dev cycle is fine, but in an established IP?

So my if is just meant as a question. If it takes less time to bring out an ME game without multiplayer, do it! If not, then your points (open world design, fidelity) have to come into question. At least, if devs agree that the development cycles should be shortened.

What I meant is I don't think the time required for single player development against the time for multiplayer to be added is that much of a difference.  The majority of the systems are part of both aspects of the game and also with how the modular design for games something like multiplayer might be in development by people that wouldn't be working on single player content at that time either.  So I doubt it would be really any significant amount of time savings to remove the multiplayer to push a game out faster.  The biggest addition of time going by what was released with Andromeda would have been the store and then the maps themselves.  The rest of the multiplayer is pretty much taken from the single player game.

The thing with sequels and BioWare is that they have one studio making multiple franchises so that was the purpose of BioWare Montreal was allow them to have multiple mainline games in development at the same time.  For the average game takes three to four years to make and since BioWare alternates it pushes the date to twice the length, but the only real way with BioWare to make games faster is to have them only make Mass Effect or Dragon Age games and then is three to four years which is pretty close to industry standard.

The change in perspective on what constitutes a “short” game never ceases to baffle me, especially when we had annualized fertilizer like the Call of Duty games already being made concurrently to these other games with just a few hours of campaign content with no way to stretch that out. I was able to stretch out Dragon Age: Origins to somewhere around 70 hours, but it was a LOT of meandering and futzing about with item management and perusing vendors along that time before hitting the endgame. Frankly, I’ve started tuning these complaints out, because they’re stupid as hell. 

I pay attention just because I want to see where the complaints are coming from.  Never understand them though, for the same complainers will then start going into reason why the games are that long and how their experience is now ruined.  I just wish developers wouldn't give them as much attention and it feels like they do.

Hi, personally I would like to see multiplayer included, being an old bloke I never really played multiplayer games at all, i always tended to stick to single player games and progressed at my own speed. After giving the ME3 multiplayer a try I thought it was exceptional, i loved it. If they do come thru with a multiplayer component, I just hope it's not linked to the single player game, like some galactic readiness thing, the ME3multiplayer was strong enough to stand up on its own...

Would like DA4 to have MP, but ...

looking at the previous MP games to MEAMP and Anthem it is quite clear they werent given enough testing/bugfixing time. I like DAIMP, but the bugs and some crazy decisions make me sometimes want to Alt-F4 out of it (and I do not like me3mp at all).

Maybe ME5 then again.

I think the devs had some tough design choices to face in deciding whether to include MP in MELE. And any option they chose would lead to some pissed off people. Here's a few of the things they needed to figure out:
-- Do you import people's MP status from an existing account or make them start anew?
-- Giving them a choice would likely create a lot of technical complexities and hurdles.
-- If they want to import their previous status, do you then try to keep their account coordinated between old and new? If they play MELE, do you also update their previous MP gen? If they decide to play on the previous gen, do you also update it for them in MELE?
-- Make way for a deluge of support requests from people who lost track of their old account but want it imported to the new.
-- How would their MP choices and play impact galactic readiness in MELE?
-- Should they support cross-platform and/or cross-gen play? (e.g., you're on a PS5 wanting to play with a friend on PS4 and another on PS3.)
-- It would at the very least need to be updated to work on modern hardware.

All that aside, I do think that the presence of MP impacts the design of SP. In ME3->MEA we lost any tactical control (or armor, weapon, and mod choices) for squadmates and the additional talents formerly available on the power wheel. In DA2->DAI, the number of skills loaded was reduced and programmable tactics went away.

Simple for you, maybe. But they'd have a lot more accounts to track, and might still want to keep data that associates your ME3 account with your new, improved MELE account.

It also doesn't address any cross-gen related questions.



Not surprised, and I would expect a lot of ME3 Vets would love to start over. Others might not. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

If BioWare has any intentions to keep multiplayer alive in this franchise, it seems to me that the best thing to do would be to prioritize the upcoming title, rather than dragging the old one out of near retirement. The problem with reintroducing ME3MP in a remaster is that this kind of thing isn't something they can just release as a limited time engagement. They would have to keep this new, remastered multiplayer active while also supporting an entirely new game's multiplayer, both getting their own updates concurrently. That doesn't seem like a reasonable arrangement to me. 

On the other hand, if BioWare has no intentions to make any new MEMP, then that's even less incentive to put any development time in it whatsoever.