Mass Effect: Legendary Edition will stick to a faithful retelling of the game’s story and already-made DLC, with no new narrative elements on the way. Speaking about the enhanced trilogy during a briefing, project director Mac Walters said while the team did consider incorporating new content, ultimately, BioWare decided against it. “Honestly we had looked at, is there stuff on cutting room floors and things like that that we could bring in?” Walters said. “And a lot of times that isn’t really in a state where you can just resurrect it and use it. It actually would require rebuilding from scratch and at that point you’re diverting effort away from the remastering of everything else.”
That also applies to hopes that the game might incorporate more queer romance options. “We’re not changing anything in the story or the way the characters or the plot points worked out,” Walters told The Verge in a separate interview. Earlier this month, TheGamer reported that Mass Effect 2’s crewmate, Jack, was originally conceived as pansexual. Mass Effect 2 writer Brian Kindregan told the outlet that “the short version is, a lot of us were asked pretty late to focus the relationships on a more traditional kind of vector.” On Twitter, former BioWare cinematic animator Jonathan Cooper said that another crewmate, Jacob, was also once intended to be romanceable for same-sex characters.
Asked about the allegedly cut relationships, Walters said that “no one ever said we couldn’t do it.”
“Honestly the writing team generally, and all the creators, are given a ton of freedom in bringing their vision — obviously we compromise with each other,” he told The Verge. “You work together to sort of build a great character or story moment or something like that and there’s compromise there.” In regards to media scrutiny from outlets like Fox News, Walters said that it would have “probably spurred us on to do other things” in the series. “No one has ever come to me and said we can’t do this because the media says so,” Walters said. “Never.”
Mass Effect: Legendary Edition will launch May 14th on PC, PS4, and Xbox One.
