Mass Effect Andromeda

[the_dog_days]

As I said in the comment section of that same video, wait until Nexus gets ahold of the game. One of the first mods to come out for any BioWare game are the "everyone is bisexual" mods.

[ktchong]

PewDiePie on Mass Defect: Andromeda, "Where did it go wrong? What happened? WTF?"

 

 

PewDiePie has 50+ million subscibers.  When he bashes the game, it will impact the sales.

 

Mass Defect: Andromeda is already a MEME, even other game developers are rubbing it in:

 

Edited March 20, 2017 by ktchong

[213374U]

So the game isn't even out yet but you can already assure us that it's a "bad, poorly made game" and "a new low point for Bioware"?

 

Whew, it's a good thing that I heed the advice of internet randos with obvious chips on their shoulder. Thanks dude, you saved me some money.

Edited March 20, 2017 by 213374U

[Lexx]

Is there even any reason to have this father Ryder dying thing going on? Couldn't they just make the player the "pathfinder" right from the beginning, making the start of the game much less awkward?

[kirottu]

Is there even any reason to have this father Ryder dying thing going on? Couldn't they just make the player the "pathfinder" right from the beginning, making the start of the game much less awkward?

But that wouldn't have all the feelings in it.

Edited March 20, 2017 by kirottu

[ktchong]

The review embargo has lifted.    The Metacritic scores for Mass Defect: Androgynous is currently 75% for the PS4 version (12 reviews) and 77% for the Xbox One version (6 reviews).  The PC version has only 3 reviews so an average/Metacritic score is not yet available.

 

Those Metacritic scores, based on the let's play videos I've seen, are about right: an uninspired story (or at least an uninspired first act of the story,) lackluster dialogues, poor animations, and ugly character models (especially for the female characters.)   I'd probably score it between mid-60 and low-70, if what I've heard about the bugs is true, (i.e., Mass Defect: Androgynous is the buggiest BioWare release ever.) 

 

As of now, Mass Defect: Androgynous is the BioWare game that debuted with the lowest Metacritic scores, even lower than Dragon Age 2.

 

EDIT: The Metacritic scores have dropped to 73% for the PS4 version (15 reviews or 2 additional reviews) and 75% for Xbox One (7 reviews or 1 additional review.)  Still waiting for an average score for the PC version.

Edited March 20, 2017 by ktchong

[Lexx]

I really don't get why folks are still writing storylines like that. Shouldn't everyone know by now that the player never ever feels connected to a character that dies in the first few minutes, even if it's the father, mother, daughter or however close the relationship is? Either these kind of stories are always written by noobs or they expect their story to make a difference, I dunno.

Edited March 20, 2017 by Lexx

[kirottu]

I really don't get why folks are still writing storylines like that. Shouldn't everyone know by now that the player never ever feels connected to a character that dies in the first few minutes, even if it's the father, mother, daughter or however close the relationship is? Either these kind of stories are always written by noobs or they expect their story to make a difference, I dunno.

Andromeda does a double whammy in this case by also having your brother/sister be in a coma right from the start.

[213374U]

I really don't get why folks are still writing storylines like that. Shouldn't everyone know by now that the player never ever feels connected to a character that dies in the first few minutes, even if it's the father, mother, daughter or however close the relationship is? Either these kind of stories are always written by noobs or they expect their story to make a difference, I dunno.

 

Well, otherwise it's hard to justify that the wet behind the ears protagonist was given the responsibility for saving the world yadda yadda. They'd have to make you play as someone more seasoned like Shepard, which doesn't mesh well with the kind of juvenile power fantasy that is so common in games these days.

 

I mean, inheriting the position because your pops kicked the bucket and there was no one else to promote isn't as bad as retconning admiral Hackett into a total moron for putting a kid in charge of things from the get-go.

[ktchong]

The first act is very important.   In today's competitive market, a video game has 30 minutes to an hour to "hook" a player with a great introduction.  I have been more than generous to watch a few hours of the playthrough and story. 

 

213374U may complain about how people who have not played the game should not judge the game.   I do not even want to get into the gameplay aspect of Mass Defect: Androgynous.   I could see from the videos that Mass Defect: Androgynous has cringeworthy  dialogues and an uninspired story.   I could already see the game has terrible character and facial animations.  I do not need to play the game myself to know the dialogues are awful, the story is uninspired, and the animations are bad.  I can find out all that from watching videos on YouTube.

 

Look, here is the thing.  When I watched the playthrough of Horizon: Zero Dawn, I got an urge that I wanted to keep watching to find out more about the story and the character.  I felt that, wow, I had to buy a Playstation 4 (which I did) because I wanted to experience that story and that character myself.  On the other hand, I did not get that feeling from watching Mass Defect: Androgynous.  At some point, (maybe about two hours into the let's play videos,) I thought that the story is uninteresting, the dialogues are awful, and the animations are painful to watch.  I decided Mass Defect: Androgynous is a disappointment and not a game I want to play anytime soon.

Edited March 20, 2017 by ktchong

[Bartimaeus]

https://twitter.com/TypeANumber2/status/843424531880595457

 

This clip isn't as funny as the others, sadly. Just cringe - poorly voiced dialogue, bad writing, and terrible, terrible animations.

[ktchong]

Metacritic update:

 

• 75% for the PC version, 7 reviews

 

• 75% for the PS4 version, 23 reviews

 

• 77% for the Xbox One version, 17 reviews

 

Seems like this one is heading towards as having the lowest Metacritic scores for a BioWare game - and the first BioWare games to score below 80% overall.  (Dragon Age 2 was the lowest at 82%.)  

 

Does anyone want to make a prediction as to where the final scores will be?

Edited March 20, 2017 by ktchong

[ShadySands]

I'm really curious as to how those animations passed any of the checks I'm assuming they would have in a major game release from a big publisher

Edited March 20, 2017 by ShadySands

[ktchong]

One of the Big Three industry reviews is out: GameSpot gives it a 60%.

Edited March 20, 2017 by ktchong

[the_dog_days]

I honestly think this game deserves to get hammered. Talked to a reviewer and the lack of quick save option or to manual save during the main quest line aren't features, just screw ups. As are the heads being rendered too large on NPCs heads, as is your visor not interacting with environments, pop-in etc, etc, etc. BioWare literally handed off their flagship IP to some complete newbies and tried to have the A-team fix over the last month in a desperate attempt to fix all the problems.

 

Mass Effect: Andromeda is the Assassin's Creed Unity of Mass Effect. Most of these problems aren't getting patched, guys.

Edited March 20, 2017 by the_dog_days

[Lexx]

https://twitter.com/TypeANumber2/status/843424531880595457

 

This clip isn't as funny as the others, sadly. Just cringe - poorly voiced dialogue, bad writing, and terrible, terrible animations.

 

I wonder if they wrote this with Felicia Day in mind. Would totally fit the cringe level.

[Azdeus]

More or less, yes. The game is not made by BioWare proper (i.e. the Edmonton company), but rather BioWare Montreal, a sub-company formed in 2009 to make crappy DLC. This is their first game. Yes, EA thought that handing over one of its biggest franchises to a brand new developer was actually a good idea.

 

Mind dropping me a reference to that?

[Sakai]

https://twitter.com/TypeANumber2/status/843424531880595457

 

This clip isn't as funny as the others, sadly. Just cringe - poorly voiced dialogue, bad writing, and terrible, terrible animations.

Man, i was expecting it to be bad, but this bad? 

[HoonDing]

https://twitter.com/TypeANumber2/status/843424531880595457

 

This clip isn't as funny as the others, sadly. Just cringe - poorly voiced dialogue, bad writing, and terrible, terrible animations.

so many anime avatars circlejerking

 

the irony

[Barothmuk]

This game looks aggressively mediocre.

 

Not surprising - it was outsourced to some nobody studio with the Bioware label on it. Shame though, despite the decline in quality with ME2 and the total ****ting the bed with ME3 the set-up for this game wasn't half-bad given what they'd written themselves into. Missus still wants to play it so I'll probably end up giving it a go.

Edited March 20, 2017 by Barothmuk

[ManifestedISO]

IGN, pretty funny ...

 

 

My wife’s reaction as I sealed the deal with human biotic commando Cora was to state, matter-of-factly, that, “This is porn. And it looks weird.” She’s not wrong on either count – especially since male Ryder appears to have painstakingly removed every hair on his body below the neck –

 

[Raithe]

Polygon - ME Andromeda Review

 

In many ways, this does sound like the first ME.  Rough bits and flaws, with some elements of spectacular or emotionally moving space cheese.  I think it's going to be one that's hard to decide upon until you've really gotten into it for a good chunk of the game rather than just the opening hours and introduction.

[Katphood]

So the reviews are in and the game is exactly what I thought it would be: a mediocre rpg with lifeless characters and boring fetch quests. I'll buy it when it's 30 bucks.

[Barothmuk]

IGN, pretty funny ...

 

My wife’s reaction as I sealed the deal with human biotic commando Cora was to state, matter-of-factly, that, “This is porn. And it looks weird.” She’s not wrong on either count – especially since male Ryder appears to have painstakingly removed every hair on his body below the neck –

 

Burgers and their puritanism. A pair of breasts and some ass is hardly "porn".

 

Tbh I'd be cool with romances and Witcher-tier nudity if it didn't have to come with the perverse Bioware romance cult.

Edited March 20, 2017 by Barothmuk

[Zoraptor]

I'm really curious as to how those animations passed any of the checks I'm assuming they would have in a major game release from a big publisher

 

It is a newish studio doing their first game as well as being a major release from a big publisher. I'd say there have definitely been production issues there.

 

It looks like the animations just plain weren't ready when the rest of the game was and the choice was to wait for the animations or ship the game as is and they went for the latter. That's definitely a production issue where a Producer didn't do their job properly- make sure others did their jobs properly and stuck to deadlines. It's even possible, though unlikely, that the problem is not the animations themselves but the rigging of the models.

 

I think I said a few pages back that perhaps they outsourced to aliens who'd only had humans described to them rather than seen them. After seeing a few videos I'm not absolutely sure that isn't exactly what happened. And to be fair to the animators/ modellers even the voice acting seems to be, uh, off shall we say. Even when Bioware's writing has been shaky to shonky the voice acting has been generally good to excellent despite it. I've only seen videos, but their voice direction seems to have largely deserted them as well.