Mass Effect 5: Story Ideas

[r_debene91]

Hey all, I'm sure many of you may have heard that a new Mass Effect game is in "Very early development." I'm not sure about you guys but that got me excited and I immediately started to think about where the game could go next. So, I figured I'd post my ideas here with the hope that others may share their ideas about where they'd like to see the franchise go next as well. I'll go first.

I'm not sure about the rest of you but I liked Andromeda and I liked the Ryder brother and sister. I'd like the next game to continue their story but this time it could be about them finding a new means of space travel that would allow them to travel between the Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxies in a matter of hours. The reason for them wanting to go back being to set up communications and supply lines. I was thinking with the use of Kett and remnant tech a new means of space travel could be discovered. Once they discover this new means of space travel and get back to the Milky Way, the opportunity for a lot of great stories can be told. Since Mass Effect Andromeda took place 600 years after the Reapers, a lot will have changed when the Ryders and scouting teams return to the Milky Way. It would be interesting to see how Humans, Asari, Krogan and Turian are getting along. It could be possible they've gone back to fighting each other after 600 years. Since Asari and Krogan have long life spans it would possible to see characters like Liara T'soni, Grunt, and Wrex make cameo's. Seeing the Kett make an appearance in the game would also be nice. In any case I would like to see a game that follows this story line.

Post your ideas below.   

[AeromusPrime22]

I really have to stress going back to the Milky Way can't work. Because the player got to choose the end, going back would mean player choice doesn't matter and there is a canonical ending. I don't think they could pull off creating the Milky Way including every player choice. Also remember the Initiative changed from exploration to a last ditch survival effort if the Reapers won. 

I would like to see the Ryder story continue, but I think it needs to stay in Andromeda. There's still plenty of story there. The Remnant, the Angara, the Scourge and the fact the Archon may have been operating independently sets up a lot for the Kett. They left plenty of mystery for a purpose, might as well go with it. 

[r_debene91]

"Because the player got to choose the end, going back would mean player choice doesn't matter and there is a canonical ending."

And that is where you are wrong my friend. There does not need to be a canonical ending chosen if the initiative sets up a supply line with the Milky Way and Andromeda. Let's break this down so you can see why. There were 3 different endings that need to be considered. Destroy, Synthesis and Control; and keep in mind this is 600 YEARS in the future so a lot can change.

When the Ryder siblings and scouting parties from the initiative return to the Milky Way what do they see?

Destroy Ending:

Easy enough. No Reapers because they were destroyed and the Milky Way has healed from its wounds and has now moved on stronger than ever. However, the Milky Way still has its problems with infighting and proxy wars and that can lead to a lot of great stories.

Synthesis Ending:

Everyone has green terminator Eyes. 

So the Reapers didn't die in this ending, no big deal. The Reapers can be around walking on hub worlds doing custodial things like helping out the Milky Way sort of like the Keepers on the Citadel. Maybe have a few of them working on maintaining the Mass Effect relays as you jump from system to system.

OR

Better yet Reapers are gone all together. They self destructed because they no longer had a purpose and started to die off. There can still be conflict among the Milky Way which will still allow for some great story telling.

Control Ending:

Reapers are still around only this time they are being controlled by Shepard. Like in Synthesis, they have become something like the Keepers of Citadel only for the Milky Way as whole. They maintain Mass Effect Relays and can be seen walking around on hub worlds helping with building things. MAYBE you can even have a brief convo with Shep through one of the Reapers.

OR

Reapers are gone all together because Shepard felt as though he was losing control and took the remaining Reapers into dark space and self destructed all of them.

The point I'm trying to make here is that THERE ARE options if we want to return to the Milky Way while also respecting everyones decisions in the previous game. From a developers perspective I don't think Im asking too much to have them render some Reapers off in the distance if they want to have them around. A good enough writer can simply write around it make it so that it's no big deal for a dev.

[AeromusPrime22]

Well that's the thing, its not as simple as that. For destroy there's no Geth but you'll have to incorporate them into the other two. If synthesis, will they want the Initiative to join them in it, or will it start a war? 

Further, its not just the endings, you have decisions to incorporate from back to the original, such as did you kill Wrex and the Rachni queen which can change things substantially. Also, regardless of the ending chosen, the Milky Way now has Reaper tech, far more advanced than what the Initiative has which will change all the weapons and armor.

Also, players have voiced their opposition to a canonical ending because, as I mentioned earlier, it removes all the choices they made. And I don't think players will be satisfied with just seeing a Reaper here and there as a fitting aftermath for the legacy of the trilogy. 

I get what you're saying, but essentially you're talking about two gamed rolled into one: Mass Effect Aftermath and Mass Effect Andromeda 2. Given how bad the development was for MEA I don't have faith this could be pulled off. 

[mcsupersport]

ME3 ending messed up the Milky Way for any future ME game......well other than a pre game or something going on during the later parts of ME-early ME3.  But anything after ME3 would require a cannon ending thereby ticking a whole bunch of people off.

Synthesis(aka StarChild magic ending)...every living things was basically networked together according to what I remember, PLUS if Andromeda team came back, then they would be the ONLY pure biological group in the MK galaxy...thus almost a different race even among their original racial groups.  Since all plants, animals, and races were combined with tech in Syn ending, there is even doubt that non-combined people could survive due to a lack of food, and possibly hostile reactions to micro-organisims who should also be combined.  Since the Reapers were also involved in this, then you would have the combined knowledge of all the Reapers races back millions of years to sort through and integrate into modern technology, thus radically changing everything especially in 600 years time.  Since eveyone is linked and the same, all conflict should be nil and a really boring place for a game.

Destroy...my cannon....ok, is it low or high destroy??  Low would possibly take thousands of years to fully recover with much of human and other races being destroyed, thus not much left to come back too.  High destroy, would be best, allowing full recovery, lack of AI, Geth or Reaper based....  Which the Geth angle still makes absolutely no sense, due to GETH BEING SOFTWARE!!!!  Geez, Bioware forgot their own story, since the red god wave shouldn't be able to distinguish between one 1010110 and 0101011001 which is all the difference between a Geth and a Suit repair program....Geth were living in and helping out Quarian bio-suits, for goodness sakes...  But then you have possible wars, between Krogan, random new race, maybe a newer AI going wild.....

Control, there should be enforced peace by Shepchild and possibly strafe and resentment....or he is Emperor of the Galaxy by this time, no telling, but by no means should they be gone....

Oh, and don't forget Walk away...reapers win and the cycle starts again....

There isn't a good way to handle all these options with just a handwave of oh, it has been 600 years.....which both the Asari and Krogan live longer...maybe everyone in StarChild magic ending....because in two of the endings, you have peace, and Reapers, one you can't probably live off of the supplies it would give, one possible to still be in ruins, one possible in war or wiped out by AI, one ending you would been seen as a possible threat to his control, one ending you are a threat or lesser race due to being pure Biological, and one ending where nothing of the old worlds exists and it is a new cycle...

Yeah, leave the MK galaxy as the burning trash heap that Bioware created and walk away to the new better and still open to new ideas Andromeda Galaxy.  I wish people would stop pining for the old ME galaxy, cause Bioware put paid to it, and that Trilogy is done and they burned the bridge behind them.  Do I wish it wasn't this way....yeah, they could have done a much better ending, much more lore friendly and made a future possible, but they didn't and thus without stepping on many feet and burning many choices they are stuck.

Now will they burn those choices...maybe, they are the ones who came up with the stupid idea anyway....I still think if you want a future in the MK galaxy, then they needed to make the indoctrination theory cannon and make different endings....Shepard wakes up on a lifepod after the destruction of the Normandy, and all of ME2 and ME3 was a dream....

LOL, that would chap some people, but to me it would still be better than the ME3 endings.

[r_debene91]

All I can say to both of your responses is that 600 years is a LONG time for things to happen. By the time the Pathfinders returns to Milky Way, there could possibly some cataclysmic event that wiped out all life in the Milky Way that has nothing to do with the Reapers and thats what they return to. That in itself could be a good story. You absolutely can write around the endings and make it so that you can return to the Milky Way while also respecting the the alternate endings in ME3. I think the problem that most people have with the Mass Effect universe is that they can't move on from the Shepard trilogy.

I've been ready to move on from the Shepard trilogy and would like to see more of the Ryder trilogy while also bringing the the Milky Way into the fold. Will they be able to pull it off? Maybe but their track record says otherwise. I hope they have good writers for this next one because they need to do a complete overhaul of Ryder's character. 

For the love of GOD's I hope they don't do a prequel. Never understood the appeal with those when you already know how things end for that charchter.

[AeromusPrime22]

 I agree with you that the ending can be written around and players can't get past the Shepard trilogy. However the latter is really the big problem as MEA showed just how big that problem is. It was a good game but people found every problem they could with it. 

I honestly feel just expanding Andromeda is the way to go as there is so much potential laying around; it was just screwed by bad development from the get go.

I also agree they shouldnt do a prequel. It would obviously be the Turian conflict but i dont see much story there. I think people who want that are just desperate to get back to Shepard.

[r_debene91]

"It was a good game but people found every problem they could with it."

It did have a lot of problems though and a lot of patches needed to come out to fix the issues it had. The other issue it had was that the story was awful and the characters were so uninteresting. They did have some interesting story bits with the Kett infighting involving the Arcon but as a whole the Kett were kind of boring. I guess the good thing about the Kett in Andromeda was that they were only the spearhead of a much larger whole. Maybe the more "genetically pure" Kett will make an appearance later or at least I'm hoping. The benefactor was another interesting angle with the murder of Jien Garson but thats it. Squad mates were 1 dimensional and the Angarra had the same issues the Kett did; They were dull. The story stuff can be fixed by expanding on the lore of Andromeda and more importantly the Jardaan/Remnant.

Personally, I just want to have access to the Milky Way so that I can revisit Earth, Thessia, Tuchanka, Paladin and Rannoch as hub worlds. Not access them all at once though, maybe stretch it out over however many games they end up doing. They could have it so that the things you do in Andromeda have positive impacts back in the Milky Way and you see it on the hub worlds.

Either way these are just things I've been thinking about that they could do but I don't have much faith that it will happen. They have a lot to overcome with their past mistakes. Maybe their New Years resolution can be to return Bioware to its former glory...    

[r_debene91]

Started replaying Mass Effect Andromeda today. It got significantly better since I last remembered it do to the patches that came out which was nice. For whatever reason while I was playing it I got to thinking about "Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway" and its combat mechanics. Not sure if any of you ever played it but you if you haven't, it had a squad similar to the Mass Effect games. The only difference was that you had a two man team for a machine gunner team, a one man team for a sniper, and a three man team for a fire support team. It was a very tactical game for a WW2 game and thought it would be a nice evolution for the combat in Mass Effect. Was wondering what other peoples thoughts might be.

Also from a story standpoint who do you think would win in a fight? An Architect or a Reaper. I say Architect and would really like to see that fight in a future Mass Effect game. Was thinking it would be cool if we could invade the Milky Way with rem-tech and weaponized scourge. 

[RedDawnbreaker]

@r_debene91 

Actually i would not mind to see the management section of the game to evolve any further. A more thought out colonization screen for example, or a fleet combat piece... more units to control on the battlefield, but that might be another game all together