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Post by ariatloak on Aug 21, 2017 19:35:41 GMT
It wouldn't surprise me, even though it's very strange for an AAA game from Bioware, because the game had an unprecedentedly bad level of development. I truly believe all the reports about the game basically being overhauled completely a year from release, obviously it was delayed multiple times, I think it's certainly possible many people involved at the inner level secretly did not expect dlc to be profitable
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 17:30:32 GMT
Thank you everyone for replying, I have really been interested to read your posts.
I've thought about it a lot and read some of the stories now dripping out (apparently MEA sold so badly target donated boxes to good will - this doesn't surprise me as I work at best buy and have never seen it not on sale) and I do think the question of whether dlc was ever even intended deserves legitimate thought. Obviously we can never know for sure, but we do know game development was nothing short of chaotic, and the game basically entirely remapped and recreated in only a year and a half. We know it was delayed frequently. We know Montreal's future as a studio was in doubt long before the game hit the shelves due to the impending merger (which I definitely dont think could have been done without years of planning.) They also clearly did tease something with the quarian ark. I find it very easy to believe that dlc was planned but not in any realistic sense, as they were so desperate to make the game even ready to ship, had to frantically repair the animations for multiple months, all while suffering the backlash that I'm sure lost people their jobs and perhaps even expedited the rate at which Montreal became a support studio again. We know MEA was a financial success, but also that it's sales figures plummeted after the initial few weeks. All of this probably created a perfect storm where dlc was impossible or unlikely in a purely practical sense.
But I do think the vitriolic hate campaign initially - which was not based on a substantiative discussion of the story, which I agree with most of you was poor - severely damaged their prospects to pull off the small miracle that dlc might have been. Without that initial fury and disdain, if the games main reviews were bumped up even slightly to the 80s in metacritic (80 still indicating significant problems as big AAA titles can practically promise themselves 9s at this point) I do think we would be seeing at least one dlc, provided it was financially feasible. It just seems like so dramatic an admission of failiure to me to break with precedent this sharply, and I think they would have tried to save face if the had the ability. After all, dai had huge story and sidequest druggery issues, and they used dlc to respond to that.
So while on an absolute level I think its chaotic development cycle ultimately doomed dlc prospects, I really think we can't underestimate how damming the backlash being very strongly rooted in "this game is so bad it's funny" was. Obviously no one factor holds all the blame but I think those, and dropping sales figures, were all much more significant than the story being poor.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 5:24:15 GMT
I don't see ME or DA as particularly niche. I think DAI is probably the most niche game of the lot because I find it hard to imagine enjoying it without a significant investment in the lore and characters like Hawke and Morrigan. But DAO is your standard fantasy fare that's only limited in playability due to its shoddy graphics and gameplay, but as accessible as game of thrones or lotr or whatever. And the ME trilogy is fairly straightforward.
I think MEA is definitely a game where you have to be a specific kind of person to enjoy it, which can't have helped.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 5:06:02 GMT
Another thought...and you can reply to me or not, I'm not going to waste time arguing with people over this. On the one hand I am very sad to see the death of what is probably my most favorite game franchise ever. But on the other, I'm happy that Bioware took a hard hit because of the level of preaching their politics in their games they have reached. They couldn't make Foster Addison not look like a creature from your worst nightmare or Cora not walk like an ape...but they damn sure shoveled in their trans character, their multiple gay characters, and diversity in that most of the leaders or strong people were female. Of course there are other things too...but most people remaining here are blind to it anyway and will just use this post as an excuse to virtue signal anyway. Dude, do you think trans and gay people and women don't exist in real life or something? I guess you think it's more likely to run into a korgan? DAI was phenomenally successful in comparison to MEA and featured a lot more lgbt content than MEA did. So no, I don't think it was that.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 5:01:51 GMT
I would say so. The animations made for some nice memes and should have made the developers embarrassed to have released the game in that condition, but it isn't the sort of thing that gets your studio shuttered and the series put on indefinite hiatus. Animations weren't the bulk of MEAs problems, just one of the most cringeworthy. I agree, and think ultimately the blame lies with the fact people obviously lost their jobs over how much disarray the support studio was in making such a huge game. But I do question if they'd really cut the plug so dramatically had it not been for that two week or so period where every article abt mea was 'mea looks hilariously bad' and almost entirely about the animations. If you asked someone who didn't play it but followed games vaugely about it they'd say "oh right, the one with the god-awful animations right?" And I think becoming a laughing stock prior to release had a pretty bad impact. It also stole absolutely all their launch thunder. But no, it shouldn't have been enough to cause a (I think temporary) shutdown of the franchise.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 4:58:09 GMT
It's because of the awful story and amateurish fan fiction tier writing. I agree that the story is terrible, but I've read a lot of fan fiction significantly better written then MEA. If anything, bioware is quite adept at the fanservice-y, funny, character driven writing you would expect to find in fan fiction (think the citadel dlc, lots of da2 banter) but MEA did not have very much of it.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 4:55:12 GMT
I mean da4 hasn't even really started full on development yet, and dai came out three years ago. And I don't see people calling dragon age dead. The game being left alone for years doesn't always equal dead.
All we can do is speculate, but I think it's safe to assume Casey Hudson would not sleep well at night knowing people view Andromeda as both a huge failiure and the end of the mass effect franchise. I would imagine he is very concerned with bringing its reputation back. But obviously Anthem and da4 are the priority for a long, long time. Thus I think the earliest date for a sequel is in like 5 years, and as of right now, I highly doubt there are any concrete plans. So that might equal dead to some, but no, I don't think we can safely say there will never be another mass effect game.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 4:49:36 GMT
If MEA was released as patch 10 version - so with the animations pretty much completely addressed but the same basic issues (which you may or may not have) existing with writing, characters and story - would we still be in the same position today?
While I found the animation memes funny, I do consider them extremely low on my prorities, and was much more disappointed by other things that did not make MEA into a laughing stock the same way the hilaribad gifs did. It seems to me like that particular strain of backlash, which was very unforgiving and meme-focused, really posioned the well.
On the other hand, MEA clearly had an extremely chaotic development cycle, and we know now the Montreal Motive merger was planned, almost certainly long in advance. It's certainly possible that, short of critcial acclaim and a huge financial windfall, dlc was unlikely and they knew that from the begining.
We will never know the full extent of which factors determined what, but I'm interested to hear how much blame people lay at the feet of that initial, quite superficial backlash - because we know the game was at least moderately financially successful, and the reviews certainly weren't DIRE - they averaged in the 70s, not the 50s
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 2:34:40 GMT
Off topic, but am i the only one who thinks me3 is far and away the best game, and would like a potential sequel to imitate it? Nothing can beat the narrative satisfaction to me of curing the genophage and reuniting the quarians with rannoch, every main mission is unique, long and exciting, I love the music, and I love the ending (always destroy). All I wanted to do was kill the reapers and have Shepard live, and the game gave me that. I agree the prior to the extended cut ending really needed the epilogue it got, but I was very happy with it.
Just a little surprised at how much comments there are saying a sequel should be me2 level instead of me3. I enjoy me2 a lot, but the collector story is as threadbare as Andromeda's. Sometimes I think Andromeda would have been as good as me2 if it also had recruitment and (long, interesting) loyalty missions.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 20, 2017 0:58:42 GMT
I'm really torn. I think Andromeda should have been shelved for another three years. It could have been really good if they actually created an interesting story with the Jardan and the building a new galaxy aspect. I still think a sequel could be really good, even one continuing basically where we left off. But at the same time I think the fact they're not even making dlc suggests MEA is effectively unsalvageable.
I don't really know what a sequel to me3 would be, either. Honestly "to escape the reapers, a group of MW races travel to Andromeda to start a new life" is a better story idea than anything I can think of post me3.
So honestly they should probably just retire the franchise.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 9, 2017 9:40:29 GMT
I would have prioritised game development around 10-15 long, narrative-ladden. missions that all felt and look distinct from one another as in ME2 and 3, and completely dismissed the open world idea or made it entirely optional and a small part of the game as opposed to essentially it's main basis. I really think that is the core of MEA's problem - it has FOUR (not counting loyalty, which were all shorter and less morally interesting than me2's) missions in 80+ hours of mostly sidequests gameplay. Inexcusable, imo
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 5, 2017 22:16:49 GMT
I have to wonder if EA is telling the truth about MEA's success, why not make DLC? If DA2 got DLC, why not this one? It just does not makes sense EA would pass up the opportunity to squeeze several million or more out of this game . . . I understood that usually game developers/publishers go into the process with DLC as almost certain, even Watchdogs 2, Sniper 3 got it, and they did not do well commercially . . . so what is the problem with EA and maybe not doing DLC for Mass Effect for the first time in any of their franchises' history? There's no way that lying is worth it for them; lying about financials can screw over management the moment a disgruntled employee leaks the real numbers. But a lie wouldn't be necessary. EA booking a boatload of revenue for ME:A and ME:A not making its projected revenue are not incompatible facts. Yeah, absolutely. The wording they used was very careful. I think MEA made a lot of money, but made a lot less money very quickly (eg suffered a huge sales dropoff after initial backlash) and didn't make the numbers they were privately aiming for. That doesn't mean it was a financial failure as they would have to admit that, but the downward curve of sales might be so drastic that their understanding is dlc would be unlikely to recoup the money it would cost to make.
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 5, 2017 21:08:12 GMT
I liked Ryder a lot. Much more than I cared about Shepard from me1 alone, but definitely less than I cared about Hawke, my fave bioware protagonist ever. Don't really understand how anyone could care about the warden? No voice, level of origins stories / amount of personality options meant you were essentially playing something entirely your own imagination. I get that a lot of people enjoy that but it's more like a DND character than a video game character and thus you can't really ask bioware to bring them back exactly as you envisioned
I think a hard reboot of mea would suffer similar problems. I like the idea of a sequel with Ryder still the protagonist, keeping some squadmates and having others in the game but not as squadmates a la me2/3. I don't care about the kett or angara at all but the jardan have the potential to be very interesting and that's what I'm hoping they shift the focus to, along with discovering other heleus species so it's not just the angara and kett. Setting it a few years later would help
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Post by ariatloak on Aug 3, 2017 8:59:28 GMT
I'd like dlc, but I don't think it's happening. I work at a store that sells MEA and it's been on sale forever. That's obviously just one tiny snapshot in a huge market but anecdotally I have tons of longtime trilogy fans who either couldn't finish it or played it once and haven't touched it since. I'm sure EA has origin numbers that reflect this. I imagine it sold well largely due to preorders and the inbuilt loyal base, but tapered off quickly. The reviews were fairly unanimous in calling in bad to mediocre - I think it's clear to EA something went really wrong, and dlc hasn't been deemed cost effective to produce.
This is all just me speculating, but I would bet money on there being no dlc ever at this point.
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Post by ariatloak on Jul 31, 2017 6:33:47 GMT
Does anyone know of a way to voluntarily take the survey? Would booting up MEA on my PC trigger it maybe? Would genuinely love to give my thoughts
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Post by ariatloak on Jul 31, 2017 5:59:28 GMT
Haven't read the whole thread but wanted 2 add my lesbian 2 cents
I think Andromeda majorly dropped the ball w gay content, personally. Peebee barely counts as gay/bi rep to me, because they have tried to no homo asari in the past, both explicitly and implicitly by showing how they're encouraged not to have relationships with each other, etc. It's great that Vetra was bi, but I fully believe the suggestions that this was only due to Sheryl Cree fighting for it. Gil and Suvi are completely side characters compared to the squadmates, with kisses that the camera obscures, and Gil's storyline in particular is incredibly badly handled from a gay perspective, Reyes' animations with m!Ryder were so much worse and still haven't been fully patched, and Jaal not being bi at launch was a huge blow to m/m players and a step back from ME3.
There's really no level at which I feel MEA handled gay/bi chrs better than previous games, and it repeated and compounded upon mistakes of the prior games. It's one of its worst qualities as a game, imo.
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Post by ariatloak on Jun 26, 2017 8:15:06 GMT
^^^^^ Just a reminder. Took a decade but we can play Mass Effect as it was intentioned finally. Happy Pride!!! -And as ariatloak points out, the mod is available for Xbox as well. - The original reddit post I believe: https://www.reddit.com/r/masseffect/comments/5vvrz9/samesex_romances_mod_for_me1_released/ Wait what? How is it available for Xbox? The mod itself isn't, but the same effect can be achieved by editing some code in your save on the computer. The reason it's possible with Xbox and not PlayStation is because Xbox saves can easily be transferred to a USB - not possible on PlayStation. I wrote a guide on how to do it here kinneys.tumblr.com/post/150191460967/how-to-make-me1-gayer
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Post by ariatloak on Jun 11, 2017 15:31:46 GMT
Hey y'all. I'll give the demon it's due. Bioware stepped up and fixed their mistake. I think I will actually purchase Andromeda now...when it goes on sale. There's no way in The Water Temple Bioware is getting $60+ outta me after all this shit. In the meantime I'll be occupying myself with this: www.nexusmods.com/masseffect/mods/80/?This is a mod for Mass Effect 1 that allows same-sex romances without the often associated issues. It uses unused dialog so your Shepard is not misgendered and uses same-sex silhouettes during the sex scene. The save carries over to ME2 and ME3 but the issues within those respective games remain. Enjoy. For the record this is possible on Xbox too! Not ps3 tho.
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Post by ariatloak on Jun 7, 2017 3:49:30 GMT
Mixed feelings me, dunno how to feel about changing sexuality/revealing sexuality/adding sexuality to a character but at the same time this wasn't a cut/dry scenario, regardless of how people might (and will) characterize it. Would've liked expanded Reyes more BUT HAPPY GAY. The fact it isn't cut and dry is why I'm pretty okay with it. Jaal never turned Scott down, the romance just didn't come to fruition. It felt unfinished and strange. So this makes a lot more sense than changing Gil, for example. And the fact m/m was the only orientation not to get a squadmate option was definitely an inexcusable mistake they couldn't just brush aside. I would be deeply unhappy if this set a precedent, because it could just as easily be used to take away gay rep as to give it. But I'm fairly confident the uniqueness of this situation means it will be a one off. My bigger fear is that bioware say to themselves wow we gave the gays a big bone here, we can rest easy now! - when there are still so many issues W reyes and Gil etc.
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Post by ariatloak on Jun 6, 2017 19:39:43 GMT
Congratulations, guys! I fully admit i NEVER thought this was a remote possibility. I'm happy to be proven wrong. Jaal really isn't my bag myself - would much rather if Liam was bi - but I'm so thrilled that you're getting the squadmate romance you deserve.
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Post by ariatloak on Jun 5, 2017 0:24:20 GMT
It's certainly actively cruel of them to like random makejaalbi tweets. I truly don't see them making jaal bi as even slightly conceivable, it's a pretty drastic precedent and they've already proven how homophobic they are. So idk what they're playing at liking tweets about it
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Post by ariatloak on May 11, 2017 20:05:38 GMT
The reason why catering to straight men isn't the same as catering to gay men or any other orientation is that catering to straight men is frequently synonymous with misogyny. Lots of what centers around straight male desire in this world is fundamentally rooted in a devaluing of women as anything other than objects for male desire, and as fundamentally very susceptible to male control. This is pretty basic, obvious stuff. The camera zooming in on Cora as she winces during the exact moment of penetration because the totally hetero Scott has a huge dick is a misogynistic moment. Cora saying things like "don't be charming when I'm mad at you" plays into straight male desires about how their charm can woo women out of facing consequences for their actions, the whole loveable rogue thing is very rooted in a sexism. There is no equivalent system in place for gay male fantasies within bioware as it is overwhelmingly clear the devs for MEA are all straight men. When they animate Cora's ass and linger on it lovingly to titillate straight dudes, they're going an extra mile they'd never go for any other group and feeding into objectification of women in the process. When they don't follow through on m/m improvements but take the time to add makeup to Sara because straight men complained she's ugly, that's feeding into misogynistic straight male fantasies that women are always peak fuckable all the time, even in wars and comas, as demonstrated by countless apocalypse TV shows where all the women still have perfectly shaved body hair just to name one example. That's what makes it stand out as incomparable to any other orientation. Reyes doesn't get a scene where the camera lingers on his bare ass for ten minutes, and it never would. What gay men fantasise about isn't considered a priority whatsoever. What straight men fantasise about, no matter the sexist consequences that might entail, is priority number 1. As a woman I am appalled at this, yet I agree that it was done for the reasons you posted, and understand and accept this is what they do. Interestingly enough, Jaal's romance has taken heat too because he calls Sara a "Temptress" and some women have rioted over that, and said his romance is about seducing Sara into sex and then he's done with her. Yeah, it shows how much gender and sexuality is intertwined. These things are upsetting to gay men, but straight/gay/bi women, too. I actually wouldn't say jaal's romance is particularly sexist. In general I think bioware have fared quite well with f/m romances where the protagonist is female (though there have been noticable exceptions.) Ryder, Shepard and Hawke were all written with men in mind and gender swapped after the fact, often with little changes, so especially in the bi romances there tends to be a more even footing than most media where the writers clearly feed their unconscious sexist biases into how they write women in love. That said, straight femshep is still expected to downplay her own skill to stoke garrus' ego in a romance scene, an obviously sexist idea, f!inq is buck naked for an extended period of time while you never even see Blackwall shirtless, etc etc. So they are not in the clear there either. showing Jaal going down on Sara and being incredibly openly affectionate with her however was definitely pretty good I think. Deeply unrelatable and alienating to me personally as a lesbian, but still having some positive representation value for straight women, who suffer from their gender in a way that interacts with sexuality even if they don't suffer for their orientation itself.
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Post by ariatloak on May 11, 2017 19:37:17 GMT
The reason why catering to straight men isn't the same as catering to gay men or any other orientation is that catering to straight men is frequently synonymous with misogyny. Lots of what centers around straight male desire in this world is fundamentally rooted in a devaluing of women as anything other than objects for male desire, and as fundamentally very susceptible to male control. This is pretty basic, obvious stuff. The camera zooming in on Cora as she winces during the exact moment of penetration because the totally hetero Scott has a huge dick is a misogynistic moment. Cora saying things like "don't be charming when I'm mad at you" plays into straight male desires about how their charm can woo women out of facing consequences for their actions, the whole loveable rogue thing is very rooted in a sexism. There is no equivalent system in place for gay male fantasies within bioware as it is overwhelmingly clear the devs for MEA are all straight men. When they animate Cora's ass and linger on it lovingly to titillate straight dudes, they're going an extra mile they'd never go for any other group and feeding into objectification of women in the process. When they don't follow through on m/m improvements but take the time to add makeup to Sara because straight men complained she's ugly, that's feeding into misogynistic straight male fantasies that women are always peak fuckable all the time, even in wars and comas, as demonstrated by countless apocalypse TV shows where all the women still have perfectly shaved body hair just to name one example. That's what makes it stand out as incomparable to any other orientation. Reyes doesn't get a scene where the camera lingers on his bare ass for ten minutes, and it never would. What gay men fantasise about isn't considered a priority whatsoever. What straight men fantasise about, no matter the sexist consequences that might entail, is priority number 1.
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ariatloak
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, Mass Effect Andromeda
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Post by ariatloak on May 11, 2017 4:36:12 GMT
I still can't get over sexified Sara. I really hope we can get them to make that a toggled option. It's soooooo stupid and glaringly offensive
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ariatloak
N1
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, Mass Effect Andromeda
Posts: 45 Likes: 230
inherit
5168
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230
ariatloak
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March 2017
ariatloak
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, Mass Effect Andromeda
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Post by ariatloak on May 11, 2017 1:55:40 GMT
There's no not homophobic reason to say making a character bi would ruin them. It carries exclusively negative connotations, and is equivalent to saying bisexual = bad, plain and simple. That doesn't mean not wanting bi jaal in and of itself is homophobic - I openly stated I wasn't comfortable with the idea of a bi jaal patch because I really do think that will inevitably lead to bi suvi, but at no point did I say anything like it would ruin him, because I'm gay and not a homophobe.
Even seeing anyone complain about "heterophobia" proves the chips are stacked against us. There's no such societal force equivalent to homophobia, and when people pretend there is and give it equal weight, they are opening the floodgates to let straight people continue to say subtlety homophobic things but get away with it. Even seeing the ridiculous statement over and over that bioware neglects straight women as much as gay/bi men is a form of homophobia in that it's objectively false....Homophobia isn't always saying "gay people suck," it's a wealth of statements and beliefs designed to downplay and erase us and the specific ill-treatment we've faced at bioware.
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