Mass Effect Andromeda region lock and possible solution

huh ... I installed the language pack as well (as soon as it was available - shortly after release) and since then: ALL of the game is in English - the text as well...

Can 'language packs' be shared across installations? (It's obvious where I'm getting with this.)

Isn't that..illegal? I don't want to risk anything and honestly I have no knowledge in this matter.

I guess I can understand why people would be upset...as well as perplexed as to why the hell it would matter to Bioware/EA what the hell language people ordered their game in.

Yes, exactly!

RU\PL origin version comes with no option to change the language. If we're 'lucky' then they only force the text (which is all of the UI, subs, codex etc), but sometimes there's also a hard-locked VO (e.g. Battlefield 4, SW:battlefront). It's been like that since ME3. 


Steam normally locks the region using the IP, they have 'can buy' and 'can play' flags, but they don't mess with the content. It means that I can only buy& play where I live, I can't gift it into the other region. Origin can't do that. So they came up with the idea of locking away the 'cheaper' regions...which makes people from those regions buy from the English-speaking cheap-regions (Brazill, Mexico).   

As for DAI & its mysterious 'language packs' - they had only contained the VO. Some countries require 100% localization for the games, and that's what they had. People from France, Germany and (I htink) Italy could download the original VO as a free day-1-DLC, they already had an option to switch the texts.

The easy way to make DAI English again had been found within a couple of weeks, once people had figured how those files worked. 

Does it mean if I don't see a specifically stated warning about a region lock on the digital store page, I will get the normal international English version at least?

To be frank, I think that's a plus in games. Good voice actors are an extremely rare breed; and -- although this is changing now -- the dubbing technique they use (recording actors all by themselves in a booth, with no idea as to who they're talking to, what the environment is like) makes proper acting, even correct declamation an impossibility. So when people try to act it ends up being an exercise in painting badly written, meaningless text with a thick coat of fake emotion. Yuck.

So I like the pedestrian style of German voiceovers.

I can understand that. And it is always a mystery to me why voice actors don't get proper instructions or/and an indeep sight about the characters & the project they working on. Makes no sense at all - an actor studies his character as well and gets insight from writers & directors at a movie so that he can play the right way, right? Though they play the role not in physical form, voice actors transport a certain atmosphere into a game, movie or series.

I liked german translations as well in my younger days, most of them aren't bad but if you hear english voice over or (for anime) the japanese - I personally - hear always a huge difference in the quality - except for movies and american sitcoms. Same for the acting - I'm not a big fan of most german actors - not all but most, because their acting feels weird to me, not that natural. But that is a question of personal taste. Like I said in my post above: other people might think differently about that and for me that is okay.

I have no idea what could be the reason. Well, Poland is quite an intolerant country, but I don't think that's what this is about. It's frustrating that no one is trying to explain the situations, even EA employees are recommending getting the game on Amazon or from third party sellers.

Actually, it's also true for Ubisoft. All the latest games Assassins Creed, Watch Dogs, Far Cry only available in Russian, I had to stop buying all their games

I agree, this is crap. I'm getting the game on PS4 and I assume that I'm stuck with Polish dubbing only, right?