So nicely in fact, that the game has a playable version. According to Aaryn Flynn, the General Manager of Bioware Montreal and Edmonton, the game is “fresh but recognizable”. And he seemed to be having a lot of fun playing it. Jealous? We know we are!
https://twitter.com/AarynFlynn/status/413432165100433408/
Now don’t get super excited just yet. Mass Effect 4 is a long way from launching still. Remember, we haven’t even gotten any official screenshots yet either. Based on the projects the studio is working, I’m guessing a realistic expectation for Mass Effect 4’s game launch is somewhere around the middle of 2015. Bioware Montreal, the studio behind the game, is also behind Dragon Age: Inquisition, and that project is in a far more advanced state, so until that project is launched (somewhere towards the end of 2014), it’s unlikely we’ll get any solid info on the future Mass Effect.
Still, we do know a couple of things. For one, Shepard isn’t coming back. This shouldn’t take fans by surprise, given how the previous trilogy has ended. We’re not sure if it will be a sequel, a prequel, or an entirely different story-line that happens to take place in the same universe. Still, the devs have promised to respect the legacy of the previous games.
Mass Effect 4 will also use the Frostbite 2 engine, which means some greatly updated visuals, but which also implies some drastic changes to the gameplay. Bioware officials keep hinting that the game will be something completely new, so it’s not too far-fetched to consider that it might not play as a shooter anymore either.
For now, we can only hope that Bioware will have mercy on us and feed us a few bites to chew on, in the form of a trailer, some gameplay footage or at least a couple of screenshots.