On Wednesday came the news that EA was shuttering BioWare and cancelling its upcoming “Mass Effect” game, leading to an outcry.
Within one day, a pre-production trailer for the game (titled “Mass Effect: Universe”) leaked online, and fans began flocking to a petition in the hopes of saving the franchise.
That petition, #SaveMassEffect, has racked up nearly 100,000 signatures in the 48 hours it has been online, surpassing the original goal of 30,000. Interestingly, the petition doesn’t ask EA to reinstate BioWare, but to either license out the IP so it can live on and let another studio develop the project.
IGN recently spoke with industry analyst Joost Van Dreunen about the possibility of the IP living on, he said: “BioWare’s IP is in the same boat as some of the other studios we recently saw being divested. They are all well-known and too expensive for most buyers. Capable publishers like CD Projekt Red already have their hands full with their own projects.”
Meanwhile, YouTuber Dantics has spoken about being on the ‘Mass Effect Council’ – offering regular feedback on what the developers were working on. In a video posted on his channel, he offers some story details.
The project is set over six centuries after the Reaper War, the mass relays have been rebuilt, and technology has advanced so much that even the Reapers are considered outdated.
Rather than a large external threat like the Reapers, here the galaxy is in a state of Cold War with three major factions – one is an alliance of Humanity, Krogan and Batarians; one is an alliance of the other Council races; and the third is the Geth who are building megastructures to connect the Milky Way and Andromeda.
Whereas Shepard was a more shoot-first kind of guy, the customisable N7 agent protagonist is dubbed a cross between “John Wick and James Bond”. You’re a super spy set out to investigate an unknown enemy operating behind-the-scenes.
The game boasts handcrafted missions like the original trilogy but offers “Hitman-style freedom” in terms of how you complete them. He adds “BioWare was making Mass Effect for us, the fans, not for people who don’t exist.”
