The fine internet tradition of digging through resumes and LinkedIn profiles has revealed that multiple former Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning developers have now joined up with BioWare Montreal.

Colin Campbell, lead world designer, and Ian Frazier, lead game designer, have both revealed that they’ll be working with BioWare on the game that is NOT Mass Effect 4.

The developers were formerly working on an Infinity Blade project for Epic Games, who bailed out a large number of Big Huge’s employees when the company collapsed.

Source: Kotaku

BioWare’s Chris Priestly has taken to the company’s forums to claim that labelling the next game ‘Mass Effect 4′ is to do the game a disservice by implying it has to continue the story of the previous three games.

“To call the next game Mass Effect 4 or ME4 is doing it a disservice and seems to cause a lot of confusion here. We have already said that the Commander Shepard trilogy is over and that the next game will not feature him/her. That is the only detail you have on the game,” said Priestly.

“I see people saying ‘well, they’ll have to pick a canon ending’. No, because the game does not have to come after. Or before. Or off to the side. Or with characters you know. Or yaddayaddayadda. Wherever, whenever, whoever, etc will all be revealed years down the road when we actually start talking about it.”

As Jess pointed out, the reason people might be calling it ‘Mass Effect 4‘ is because… it’s the fourth game set in the Mass Effect universe. Which, you know, makes sense. But Priestly doesn’t call it that at all.

“I do not call the game ME4 when I talk about it ever, because that makes people think of it more as ‘what happens after Mass Effect 3‘ rather than “what game happens next set in the Mass Effect Universe”, which is far more accurate at this point. Obviously fans are going to speculate content, character and story until we actually reveal details in the years or months to come as you have almost no actual details, just don’t get bogged down in ‘well how are they going to continue ME3…’.”

Well… what do you call it, readers? As for me, I’m just going to go ahead and tag this article ‘Mass Effect 4′.

Source: Blue’s News

UPDATE: In a statement given to Cinema Blend, BioWare categorically deny ever interviewing Gamer Syndrome and claim that the interview we referenced below was “entirely fabricated”. The original interview has now been taking down.

ORIGINAL STORY: Mass Effect 3‘s Mike Gamble has revealed that BioWare is aiming to launch the next instalment in the series in “late 2014 to mid-2015.” However, a more precise date could not be provided because “full development on the game [only] started a month or two ago.”

During the same interview with Gamer Syndrome, Gamble revealed that Mass Effect 3 originally planned to feature a mission set on Palaven during the Reaper invasion.

“One of the mission ideas that got scrapped was actually going onto Palaven, the Turian home world, and being able to see what their world was like,” Gamble said.

“We also scrapped the original ending for Mass Effect 3. We were gonna have it as a “boss battle”, where Commander Shepard would go up and fight The Illusive Man who has been transformed by The Reapers. We scrapped that idea because way too many [games] have that as their ending, some final boss fight.”

Source: Gamer Syndrome

BioWare have continued their trend of seeming not to know what their next Mass Effect game is going to be about: first they asked you for general ideas, and now they’re asking you where you think (chronologically) the next game should be set.

“Parsing through your thoughts on the next #ME game,” wrote Casy Hudson on Twitter. “Would you be more interested in a game that takes place before the trilogy, or after?”

Personally, I’d be pretty keen on a prequel or three, since — as Jess pointed out to me recently — it’d be a lot easier than trying to represent all the literally galaxy-changing choices you make in Mass Effect 3. What do you lot reckon?

Source: Eurogamer

When Casey Hudson quizzed the Twittersphere on what it wanted to see in Mass Effect 4, that was both a) A colossally bad idea, never ask Twitter anything especially if 99% of your followers are entitled nerdlingers, and b) Not exactly illuminating.

Predictably, a whole bunch of people just starting taking pot-shots at Mass Effect 3’s ending, like there was a tremendous point to doing so and they simply had to be heard. Again. For the millionth time. What was slightly more surprising was that nobody really seemed to have any good ideas, or their ideas simply stemmed from their dribbling ME3 rage, ie. “The sooner BioWare moves away from the Catalyst/Reaper mythology that got them into trouble, the better.”

Yeah, no.

Just yesterday we posted that BioWare were looking for input on what you, the fans, wanted from Mass Effect 4. Today, BioWare have pulled back the curtain on some of the groundwork they’re laying down, and it’s looking very interesting.

BioWare Montreal Studio Director Yanick Roy revealed in a BioWare blog post that the Montreal team would be the one to take the reins from the core Edmonton studio, although they clarified that Casey Hudson would remain the Executive Producer overseeing the project. Yanick promises that the Montreal studio will be “very respectful” of the heritage of the series established so far.

Also revealed in the blog post is the fact that the game will use EA’s Frostbite 2 engine as its foundation, “enhanced by many of the systems that the Dragon Age III team has already spent a lot of time building”. Intriguing.

What do you think, sports fans?

Source: BioWare Blog

I suppose we could have guessed from when Fabrice Condominas, the man with the amazing name, said that Mass Effect‘s next protagonist wouldn’t be ‘Shepard 2′, that they were on their way to making the next installment.

In any case, there has been confirmation that the next game in the series — what we’re tentatively calling Mass Effect 4 — is on the way, and that it’s in it’s very very early stages. Casey Hudson, the man behind the series, reached out for feedback on Twitter recently, asking what players would like to see in the next chapter — and at the same time confirming that they were in the early stages of the game’s design.

It’s a good question though. What would you like to see in the follow-up chapters of Mass Effect. Please keep “A better ending, LOL” comments to a minimum.

Source: VG247

The next Mass Effect – or not-Mass Effect – will not star Shepard. *Gasp!* I know, that is a shock to no-one. But who will it star, instead? Well, not ‘Shepard 2′, according to BioWare Montreal producer Fabrice Condominas, owner of a pretty amazing name.

Speaking with VG247, Condominas said of the next installment, “There is one thing we are absolutely sure of – there will be no more Shepard, and the trilogy is over. This is really our starting point. Now the Mass Effect universe is vast, and very, very rich. So at this point in time, we don’t even know what kind of time frame we’re going to be in. All we’re doing is more gathering ideas from the teams, gathering feedback to see several things.”

“So first, we don’t want to make ‘Shepard 2′, or Mass Effect 4 with like, ‘oh there’s no more Shepard but you’re a soldier in the universe’,” Fabrice went on. “So this will be a very, very different context for sure, and nothing has been decided on the rest.”

What do you think? Would you rather see someone completely new step into the series, or see the focus shift to one of Shepard’s cronies? Human or alien? Sequel? Prequel? The possibilities are endless!

Source: VG247