The Mass Effect Remastered Trilogy has been rumored for years, but ever since EA announced an “HD Title” due before the end of the current fiscal year, a remaster has appeared more likely than ever.
There were many aspects of the original trilogy that were intended for retail release but were cut or edited for various reasons beyond the control of the game developers. Here are 5 changes that have been a long time coming for the Mass Effect Remastered Trilogy.
Tali’s face reveal in Mass Effect 3 was extremely controversial. Only revealed in a nightstand photograph for a Shepherd who romanced the Quarian, the image was quickly discovered to be a lightly edited stock photo of a real-world model. Considering the fact that Tali was one of the best received Mass Effect companions and the fact that this reveal also unveiled the faces of the entire Quarian species for the first time, many fans were underwhelmed.
It is likely this decision was made to save time during Mass Effect 3’s tight production schedule, which has been speculated to have been imposed upon BioWare by EA. Tali’s original concept artist Matt Rhodes has stated before that he considers some of his early art, done before it was decided that Tali’s face would be covered, to be the actual canonical face of the character. These older concepts could be used as the basis in the remaster.
Javik from the From Ashes DLC for Mass Effect 3 was originally intended to be a far more central character to the plot before he was repackaged as a DLC character and had to be made nonessential to the main story. It was the Prothean who was originally the only character able to communicate with the Prothean AI to reveal the true nature of the Citadel.
It is very likely that the remaster will include all DLC at launch, so BioWare should take the opportunity to restore Javik’s relevance and reintegrate the character into the plot so that he feels like a truly essential part of the story. The same can be said for other DLC companion characters like Zaeed from Mass Effect 2 who could also do with restoration that makes them feel a little more integrated than they were in the retail release.
Mass Effect 2 involves recruiting Shepherd’s squadmates for the ultimate suicide mission after The Illusive Man gives the player a few dossiers at a time and allows them to explore the galaxy and piece together their team. However, it was originally intended that the player would receive every single dossier at once, allowing for a far more customizable and uniquely non-linear experience of the game.
This feature was cut at the last minute when it was realized that, in order to split the game onto two discs to accommodate its release on the Xbox 360, the game would need to have some missions which were not available until the second half of the game. As a result ,characters like Legion the Geth get less development time as they appear far later in the game, so BioWare should allow Mass Effect 2 players to approach the dossier missions in any order.
Ashley Williams is not the most beloved of the Mass Effect companions for many fans. Assuming she survived the Virmire mission in Mass Effect 1, the character rejects Shepard in Mass Effect 2 and is hostile for a decent part of Mass Effect 3, although this does make the romance more interesting. However, one cut piece of dialog could be restored to help flesh out Ashley’s character a little more.
In one cut Mass Effect 3 conversation, Ashley asks Shepard what they saw when they died, and Shepard tells her that they saw nothing. Her wavering faith in Shepard gains a little more thematic resonance when seen in parallel with her own struggle to maintain her faith, and helps make the character more sympathetic. The Mass Effect trilogy is full of similar cut content and one-off lines that the BioWare team could restore that add a lot of depth to the game.
There were several confrontations in Mass Effect 2 between squadmates which Shepard has to resolve. For example, Legion and Tali, whose species have been at war, will get into an argument that can only be resolved without taking sides if the player has committed fully to Paragon or Renegade dialog options throughout the game so far. Once such cut confrontation is between Mordin and Grunt.
Mordin helped to create the genophage that rendered Grunt’s entire species infertile. If the confrontation was kept in the game, then it would make their relationship far more interesting as well as make Mordin’s sacrifice to end the plague he created, already one of the best moments in the Mass Effect series, even more emotionally resonant.
These confrontations between squadmates would also work better if the dossiers were available in any order, as it would mean players could spend more time with all of the characters, making the decision more complicated than it was in the game’s original retail release. It is harder to side with Legion over Tali, for example, because Tali returns early in Mass Effect 2 while Legion isn’t available as a recruitable companion until relatively late in the game.
BioWare should’t change too much in the Mass Effect Trilogy Remaster, but should take the opportunity to restore some of the decisions originally intended for the games’ first retail release. Changes like these are complementary and could help keep the Mass Effect trilogy feeling dynamic and fresh a second time around. Many of the changes are small enough that a lot of fans would be unlikely to notice them right away, but would still experience the narrative improvements these small changes add up to. While fans shouldn’t expect bigger edits to things like Mass Effect 3‘s controversial ending, many will be looking forward to N7 Day in hopes of official news about the remaster.
Mass Effect Remastered Trilogy is rumored to be in development.
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