EA Bosses Wanted Mass Effect Andromeda to Feel Like a CW Show, According to Former Bioware Lead

At the end of 2020, executive producer Mark Darrah announced he was leaving Bioware after 23 years. Today, the former developer shared some insight regarding his time at the company during a Q&A on his official Youtube channel to celebrate 10k subscribers. And while there were plenty of great questions and answers, arguably the interesting one was about Mass Effect Andromeda.

During the livestream, a user asked whether Alec Ryder would have made a better protagonist, as the Ryder twins felt childish and less serious. Darrah responded to that question with the following:

I don’t think Alec being the protagonist would be better. I did provide feedback on Andromeda that I felt like this feels like a CW show and was told ‘that’s on purpose.’

I’ve actually thought about this more since then and I think Shepard is the protagonist of an action movie from the 80s and 90s. Ryder is a protagonist from the 2000s. So there is essentially an intentional moving with the audience to some degree.

I don’t think this is the biggest problem with the story in Andromeda. They could have told a refugee story; they could have told a story about colonialsm. Instead they chose to tell a story in the middle of that, that isn’t the interesting version of the story.

I gave the feedback that the protagonist was very young, in a ‘I don’t want to do this’ way, but that was on purpose.

Anyone interested in watching the full Q&A can head over to the link, with the question about Mass Effect Andromeda being embedded at the 1:57:00 mark for your convenience.