Today Electronic Arts held an earnings call for their past fiscal year, and it was packed of not-so-great news from Mass Effect and Dragon Age developer BioWare. It was announced that BioWare’s upcoming original action IP could be delayed until March 2019, and EA CEO Andrew Wilson also addressed the elephant in the room, namely, the extremely mixed reaction to Mass Effect: Andromeda.
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As we’ve covered extensively, Mass Effect: Andromeda was roundly criticized at launch for freaky facial animations, rampant glitches, and generally unpolished gameplay. BioWare has been trying to make amends with patches, but for many it’s too little, too late. Despite the general negative aura surrounding Andromeda since launch, Wilson tried to paint a happy face on the situation…
“Mass Effect: Andromeda is an interesting title; it was in development for a really long time and represented a lot of the great things that BioWare is known for: story, size, depth, breadth, imagination. While overall the aggregate review scores were lower than we would have liked, we did have over 100 reviewers score the game at 80 or higher. So, it represents a fanbase that’s very passionate, that’s looking for very particular things, and many players found exactly what they’re looking for, and some players did not. [Overall we’re] very happy with how BioWare is treating Mass Effect.”
Well, gosh, that’s looking at the bright side! It’s true, some players found what they were looking for, while other did not, but based on online user reviews, the latter group is the larger (and angrier) one. Also, where did they dig up these 100-plus reviewers that gave Mass Effect: Andromeda 80 percent or higher? Not that plenty of reviewers didn’t like the game (we did), but 100 is a big number. But hey, if EA is happy, who am I to argue?
Overall, Wilson says EA still has strong expectations for the Mass Effect brand, which isn’t surprising. There is a Mass Effect movie in the works, and gaming franchises have bounced back from worse than this. Still, a little bit more humility about Andromeda might have been in order.
You can check out all WWG’s Mass Effect: Andromeda coverage, right here.
[via GameSpot]
