@theht: I'll refer back to my previous comments. In essence what you're suggesting is making the species of the MC not matter. In essence making him/her act like a human with a different character model.
You could say that exact same thing about the gender of the character, too. Shepard, be it male or female, is the exact same besides whoever he/she can fuck and of course the voice.
@yummylee: I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. Bioware doesn't have infinite ressources to make this game and I like that they're focusing on humans instead of spreading themselves too tin.
I think you're really overestimating what adding in multiple races would cost. I'm no game developer so obviously I can't be certain but ,again, most of it would presumably be writing and voice work, and these games always have an astronomical amount of that in there to begin with. What else then? A more expansive character creator? They fitted a rather fleshed out creator in Inquisition, why not Andromeda?
@bisonhero: @yummylee: I think that until voice acting becomes as glamorous as regular acting, the pool of voice actors is going to stay incredibly small. And let's face it, the promise of becoming a TV or movie star is a lot more attractive than a voice director.
Thing is there's of lot voice talent out there, it's just that developers seem intent to keep on playing it safe with the likes of Baker, Bailey, and Willingham because, well, they're hottest of shit. Probably also helps that they're all really close - Laura & Travis are married, and Travis was also Baker's best man for his wedding. Probably some small print on a contract that states if you hire one you hafta hire the other two.
@yummylee: I don't know about you but I remember jack shit about my character in Dragon Age origin. He was a noble black dwarf with dreads, that's about it. Focusing a single species for the role of protagonist enabled Bioware to infuse a lot more personality into Shepard than with the DA:O protagonist. I personnaly like my characters to have some character and it's just not possible when you have to take into account the 3 different ways they might feel about any given issue depending on their species.
Whether or not the MC has character is down to the writers, not having to account for multiple variables. Yes, there has to be more writing, but there's no reason why a new Mass Effect protagonist couldn't have just as much personality as Shepard despite having to account for whether he or she is an Asari or a Turian. And to be quite frank, Shepard wasn't an especially interesting character anyway. I had much more attachment to the 5 or so characters I made in Origins because how much more malleable they were, as opposed to Shepard who got more and more pre-determined per game. Hell in ME3 Shepard would speak for him/herself for like 40% of the dialogue, which was ludicrous.
They wouldn't even need to hire multiple voice actors like in Inquisition, they could just have the one male, one female, and then apply filters depending on the race. Deepen it up for a Krogan, heighten it for a Salarian ect.
That was somewhat misleading. You actually have a bit more control over Shepard's dialogue in ME3 than it seems like you do. A lot of the dialogue choices are you choosing a branch for the conversation that results in a back and forth between Shepard and the other character(s). You may only make one dialogue choice that results in Shepard saying a lot more than a single line, but you've chosen the direction the conversation goes. There are certainly instances where Shepard speaks pre-determined dialogue that you have no control over, but many cases of Shepard "talking on autopilot" are actually lines determined by a dialogue choice you've made earlier in the conversation.
So it's the same as it was in DAII then, and I didn't like it in there, either. They tried to frame it as some sort of advancement towards letting you sculpt your character by having it naturally evolve dependant on your choices, but really all they were where instances to take control away from you in order for them to steer the character instead. You played Hawke sarcastically, so now he's going to keep being sarcastic throughout the conversation regardless of whether you want him to or not.
@yummylee: I don't know about you but I remember jack shit about my character in Dragon Age origin. He was a noble black dwarf with dreads, that's about it. Focusing a single species for the role of protagonist enabled Bioware to infuse a lot more personality into Shepard than with the DA:O protagonist. I personnaly like my characters to have some character and it's just not possible when you have to take into account the 3 different ways they might feel about any given issue depending on their species.
Whether or not the MC has character is down to the writers, not having to account for multiple variables. Yes, there has to be more writing, but there's no reason why a new Mass Effect protagonist couldn't have just as much personality as Shepard despite having to account for whether he or she is an Asari or a Turian. And to be quite frank, Shepard wasn't an especially interesting character anyway. I had much more attachment to the 5 or so characters I made in Origins because how much more malleable they were, as opposed to Shepard who got more and more pre-determined per game. Hell in ME3 Shepard would speak for him/herself for like 40% of the dialogue, which was ludicrous.
They wouldn't even need to hire multiple voice actors like in Inquisition, they could just have the one male, one female, and then apply filters depending on the race. Deepen it up for a Krogan, heighten it for a Salarian ect.
Seriously. I'm still very miffed that we're once again restricted to that of a human. Not only would it be awesome to play as such an iconic race like an Asari or Turian from a narrative perspective, but this would also force them to actually diversify the appearance of the races courtesy of the character creator. Instead of having all Turians look the exact same minus their skin patterns. Inquisition introduced a lot of variety to how the Qunari could look thanks to its character creator.
Being able to play multiple races would be a terrible idea from a narrative standpoint. It bearly worked in Dragon age and the protagonist in that game was super blend because the writing was spread too tin across different races and origin stories. I much prefer a more focused approach with humans as MC and other races represented through squad members.
I get some people really like their character creators too but I find that I can't come close to matching the quality of really good default look. I'm glad they seem to be sticking to that default idea for Andromeda. That way I get the best looking character and I see her in all the trailers too!
In Origins at least the multiple races were handled really well, because they didn't infringe too much on the overall story but there was still plenty of references and such to still make you feel like you're playing a dwarf or an elf. Not to mention unique dialogue you could choose depending on your race also, as well the added bit of character to sequences like returning to Orzammar as a dwarf - of either Commoner or Royalty origin. We've alreadyhad three bloody games where you play as the most boring race amidst a galaxy of weird sci-fi people, so I would have hoped that anything beyond that would actually allow a little more roleplaying to the proceedings.
Seriously. I'm still very miffed that we're once again restricted to that of a human. Not only would it be awesome to play as such an iconic race like an Asari or Turian from a narrative perspective, but this would also force them to actually diversify the appearance of the races courtesy of the character creator. Instead of having all Turians look the exact same minus their skin patterns. Inquisition introduced a lot of variety to how the Qunari could look thanks to its character creator.
Yeah, as well as Two-Face and Robin in Arkham City, and the Arkham Knight as well. He was Rhyse in Tales from the Borderlands too, and Laura Bailey voiced Fiona. It's honestly ridiculous how video game developers keep pulling from the same small handful of voice actors. Now, yeah, obviously they have range, but Baker & Bailey's range in particular has been spread pretty thin - it's impossible not to immediately hear them as Baker & Bailey now. Even Nolan North wasn't this overbearingly prominent during his heyday.
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