Mass Effect: Andromeda release date: March 21, 2017

I'm still baffled this classifies as "polish". I know there is a system in place where they can just replace their placeholders for audio with actual voice acting and they have a system that make lipsync-animations based on sound waves (except not the tone or facial expression; that is either face-capture or hand-animation to be done) but I mean, these things are more like implementation.

I thought polish implied that once you have everything implemented already you can start to go through it again to find inconsistencies, glitches, sloppiness and do smaller final touches.

What needs to be done based on that gameplay trailer and assuming not all content is already in the game implies to me they're still implementing and are on schedule to release a hastily-put-together product in spring that doesn't have the "final touches" or actual "polish".

This is what developers inlcuding Mark Darrah from Dragon Age have to say about what polish means.

Sauce: Gamasutra: The Art of Polish


I guess you can qualify ME:A's current state (seemingly) as "everything in the game works" but Mac has been calling it "polish" since summer at E3 when they didn't even have an ending yet. According to Twitter they reviewed the final mission last month for the first time. That doesn't sound like polish at all.

I would also say the animations. There were literally no animation work or just barely any done on the actual faces. Any time someone looked out there was just blank stares or when Ryder talked or even when she disarmed the gun there's almost no expression as if the animations hadn't even been done or BioWare is just really, really sloppy. I just read a new GameSpot interview with Mac and the first thing they asked was regarding the lacking animations and whether the game really was coming out soon; there's cause for concern. Mac explains that they're in this stage of development where all the final touches that really matter are being done and as typically done (according to him) facial animations are done late due to voice work being put in and stuff, but didn't we have some pretty solid scenes from Mass Effect 3's E3 demo with all that in place, representative of the final product's quality more than half a year from release back in 2011? I'm not really buying it in regards to Andromeda. It seems like they're getting things done in the last minute unless the footage in the gameplay trailer was months old.

Ive heard rumors of it potentially being pushed back

given the fact they're starting to reveal things about the game over the past moth or so since N7 day and such I don' t think there will be any more delays unless they find something serious that needs more work. I have a feeling they are heading for a March release and that's what they'll stick too. Especially as I'v e also heard that they're pretty much done with the game and they'er just polishing and checking for bugs. We may get a little more before Christmas or shortly after so that we get a little bit each month then that is an extra indicator in that they're building up the hype for release. After all we are starting to see info being dropped in short timespans now so to me atm it's starting to look that way and that we're not too far from release. I just hope I'm right.

I guess the Release Date for 21st March 2017 is getting additional confirmation.

titanbooks.com/blog/announcing-official-mass-effect-novels/

dyn4.media.titanbooks.com/filebrowser/masseffectannounce.jpg.size-525_maxheight-346.jpg

They announced novels connected to the plot of Mass Effect Andromeda.
Of course, they would never start releasing the first novel in the series, before the actual game due to heavy spoilers.

So, if the first novel is set for 28th March 2017, then it would make sense if they released the game a week earlier - 21st March 2017

Its amazing how novel announcement can give more information, than it initially seems

At first I was like: Novels? O.. ok... cool I guess.
When does the first one come out? 28th March... ok...

...


...

28th MARCH!?

But that would indicate, that... F- YES!!!

Yea, finally after over 4 years... this beautiful gem is nearing its release.

Indeed I need some more ME myself  been alternating between playing DA and ME almost tconstantly since Inquisition's release 2 years ago. |Will feel great to add a new ME story to that pack. Not long to go. Hopefully we'll get a confirmed date soon then. Hopefully before Christmas or shortly after I'd have thought. Certainly Early to mid January at the latest we'll get confirmation on a date.

I'm sure someone has pointed this out, but 21st of March is 3/21 in the American date system, which would be used as the "3...2...1...liftoff" advertising gimmick.

And the art book release date 'paired' with the game launch.

*Grabs torch and pitchfork* Fearmongerer!


JK


In all seriousness, I disagree but I see your point.



Except that EA is the publisher and Bioware is the developer and despite what EA says, they can very well force Bioware to ship the game out on a whim.