Mass Effect Andromeda
Mass Effect is a game series that dominated the 2010’s in a plethora of ways thanks to its great writing and deep, personal character relationships. Each character had a deep backstory that enriched their relationship with Shepard which would then be carried over between games, leading to the feeling of an epic space drama that spanned many hours. So when Mass Effect Andromeda was announced in June of 2015, many were excited. Although Mass Effect 3 ended on a divisive note, the world the series had built was continuing.
However, once this highly anticipated sequel was released, fans were less than thrilled. Andromeda can only be described as a shadow of its former self due to the things that made the original trilogy so good, like the writing and characters.
The dialogue system itself was overhauled to be less straightforward than in previous games. The player always knew which option was Paragon and which was Renegade. The new dialogue options were made so the player couldn’t guess what outcome would come of each choice, meaning dialogue was often vague.
Mass Effect Andromeda was also riddled with technical and visual bugs, glitches, and bad animations. Something on top of the already bad dialogue system was the emotionless facial animations that never seemed to fit the mood of the conversation being had. There were also horribly awkward scenes like the one with Ryder where they exclaim that their father is dead with no weight or emotional undertone and there is no impact to the dialogue.
One conversation, in particular, was made into a huge meme where a character mentions she has a tired look on her face and her look is completely blank with an emotionless stare. So much about Andromeda’s visuals hit this uncanny valley where everything looks inhuman and creepy. Screenshots of these bugs started to circulate and the game’s reputation has been tarnished since then.
