This is interesting. Speaking on gaming radio show VGS, the lead writer of Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 has discussed an abandoned concept for the trilogy’s ending.

Drew Karpyshyn left BioWare shortly before work on Mass Effect 2 was complete, but not before an outline for the third game’s conclusion had been sketched out.

According to Karpyshyn, the plot revolved around the spread of Dark Energy, something mentioned in Mass Effect 2 but not really built upon after that.

"Dark Energy was something that only organics could access because of various techno-science magic reasons we hadn't decided on yet,” Karpyshyn.

“Maybe using this Dark Energy was having a ripple effect on the space-time continuum. Maybe the Reapers kept wiping out organic life because organics keep evolving to the state where they would use biotics and dark energy and that caused an entropic effect that would hasten the end of the universe. Being immortal beings, that's something they wouldn't want to see.

"Then we thought, let's take it to the next level. Maybe the Reapers are looking at a way to stop this. Maybe there's an inevitable descent into the opposite of the Big Bang (the Big Crunch) and the Reapers realise that the only way they can stop it is by using biotics, but since they can't use biotics they have to keep rebuilding society - as they try and find the perfect group to use biotics for this purpose. The Asari were close but they weren't quite right, the Protheans were close as well.

"Again it's very vague and not fleshed out, it was something we considered but we ended up going in a different direction."

The abandoned story has been discussed before, leading some fans to believe that it would have provided a more satisfying conclusion than that of Mass Effect 3. But Karpyshyn isn’t convinced.

"I find it funny that fans end up hearing a couple things they like about it and in their minds they add in all the details they specifically want," he said.

"It's like vapourware - vapourware is always perfect, anytime someone talks about the new greatest game. It's perfect until it comes out. I'm a little weary about going into too much detail because, whatever we came up with, it probably wouldn't be what people want it to be."

Among the chatter, Karpyshyn also discussed some other, crazier, abandoned ideas.

"Some of the ideas were a little bit wacky and a little bit crazy,” he said. “At one point we thought that maybe Shepard could be an alien but didn't know it. But we then thought that might be a little too close to [Knights of the Old Republic’s] Revan."

Interestingly, Karpyshyn also discussed an idea he had for the opening of Mass Effect 2 which may have had an influence on Mass Effect 3‘s ending. There’s spoilers in this quote so watch out.

"There was some ideas that maybe Shepard gets his essence transferred into some kind of machine," said Karpyshyn, “becoming a cyborg and becoming a bridge between synthetics and organics - which is a theme that does play up in the game. At one point we thought, maybe that's how he survives into Mass Effect 2."

>>176493
The Dark Energy thing is pretty old news now; still though it's interesting to hear about the "What-Ifs". Shepard being a secret alien though would have been a FAR worse twist than ME3's ending.

>>176497
Better than the fucking tryhard nonsense they did with the Reaper Kid so that basically all choices were the wrong choices in the end aside from Nuking the whole shebang.

>>176500
Nuking everything is one of the worst choices since you're committing slow and painful genocide on two species, and immediately wiping out a third instantly like some kind of hellish Billy Mays order bonus.

>>176502

and the games showed that both the paths of symbiosis and control were false as well. Idiots were too absorbed in making this all Deus Ex "hard decisions" futility garbage.

>>176493
So Mass Effect's ending was originally Gurren Lagann's ending?

>>176544
Kinda sounds like Anachronox as well with the whole prevention of galaxy death.

There history's greatest monster.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-09-23-3ds-fifa-14-has-no-updates-to-gameplay-or-modes

Are you telling me they literally just changed the year and sent it out?

At this point, making the rosters chargeable DLC as they change might actually be more profitable.

>>180941
People who actually buy EA's yearly sports games deserve whatever they get.

>>180941
How much can they keep changing it every year anyways.

Why is that EA (quite deservingly) gets so much shit about FIFA, but nobody ever complains about Konami and PES?

>>181166
PES is more popular on latinamerica than the FIFA games. There's even a PS3 bundle with PES 13 exclusively for said region.

Also, I've heard the only good sports games from EA are the hockey and Madden ones, but I can't really verify that since I never played any of those.

>>181170
That doesn't explain why Konami gets away with a yearly release of an sports game, whereas EA gets lamabsted for it.

Other than being a prettier game, PES 14 actually is inferior to FIFA 14.

>>181171
I don't really care about sports games, but to me it's something non-positive that manages to help keep EA running, and EA is EA.
Also, people probably complain about PES in the 4chan cup threads.

Never forget the victims

THQ Suing EA Sports and Zuffa Over UFC Game License.
http://www.polygon.com/2013/10/9/4820836/thq-ea-zuffa-ufc-video-game-license-lawsuit
http://cdn3.sbnation.com/assets/3362185/thq-v-zuffa-ea-complaint.pdf

>>181503

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucpT9hzTOrY

http://answers.ea.com/t5/Battlefield-4/PS3-to-PS4-China-Rising-Code-EA-says-sorry-your-out-of-luck/td-p/2027409

Well, I'm surprised they went this long without fucking up harder.

And wow, looking into Battlefield 4 it is a spectacular disaster.

I like Chinese media stepping in like "EXCUSE YOU?"

No. It's okay see? They're gay friendly.

>>184216
Yeah, but they forgot about being racist and nationalist.

>>184213
>>184220
Isn't the plot of BF4 a bad chinese general trying to kill a good chinese politician, and using it to justify warmongering, and chinese intelligence cooperating with US spec ops, and then the good chinese politician persuading the US commander to have US troops stand down when chinese military bust in, on the (correct) trust that they will recognize him and defy the general's orders in order to spread the truth, with your last mission being to stop the general from firing on these very men?

Like, I was really impressed by what I saw of the story. It seemed like a near-total lack of ra-ra kill bad guys jingoism. Overall singleplayer gameplay experience seemed awful but the story looked super tasteful.

The creator of Freeman's Mind talks about a weird old game and then proceeds to discuss the early evilness of EA and and about EA as a whole.

http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/teamt/accursed-farms/rgd/41853-zany-golf

Origins hacked and taken offline, saddened no one gives a fuck.

>>184623
As I heard, not hacked but their servers are being DDoS'd

>Sim City now has official offline mode after year of lies
>Battlefield 4 problems exploding into each other
>Another VP just stepped down (or ran from a burning building depending on who you talk to)
>Votes flooding in for EA as worst company of the year when The Consumerist hasn't even started yet.

People still going to bitch about not using that poll to make a stand against "real evil" acting as if big business would give a damn what some web award says about them.

>>184854
It really amazes me that this hasn't dawned upon EA's PR yet; the only reason they get it is because they always respond in hilariously outlandish manners.

>>184855
they buy Tomb Raider off of Square when its shown they don't have any games that actually feature into there whole "spectrum" thing . "No, see got one now." Cause really when have a freaking conference on the issue, you need to make a game where the protag is what you are taking issue with.

And after a brief grace period in which they had an honest to God chance yet continued to be fucking monsters the layoffs continue!!

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/unannounced-need-for-speed-put-on-hold-as-layoffs-hit-ea-uk-studio/1100-6417458/

http://www.polygon.com/2014/2/1/5360976/layoffs-hit-ghost-games-uk-office-unannounced-nfs-title-mothballed

Hilariously they seem to be trying to use the scraps of this and Visceral to make Battlefield 5 as quickly as possible to salvage the brand name from 4 all while having to eat a bucket full of shit as they try to convince those fucked by Battlefield 4 that Titan Fall won't be the same train wreak.

http://www.neoseeker.com/news/24517-ea-assures-titanfall-will-not-be-another-technical-disaster-like-battlefield-4/

And this right on the heels of these layoffs.

http://ca.ign.com/articles/2014/01/30/the-sims-dev-ea-salt-lake-focusing-on-mobile-following-layoffs

All this while screaming "MOBIIIIIIIIIIILE GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMES!!!!!"

>>185225
You honestly can't fucking blame them for laying off people. Their awful business decisions have caught up with them. Their reputation is ruined forever. Yes, they are a blight on the industry, but as big as they are, they're also providing a lot of jobs. Getting rid of evil mega-corporations might seem like the absolute greatest thing in the world, but you have to realize that there's going to be a substantial amount of "broken eggs", as Senator Armstrong would put it. If EA truly does go under, it's gonna cost a lot of earnest and nice people their livelihood, while the people, who are actually responsible for all the abominable things you want them to go under for, will come out of all of it squeaky-clean, with a polster of several million dollars under their ass and the next management job at another big company already waiting in line.

>>185226
I'm sorry but I have zero sympathy, it's a shit situation but it's not like it came outta the blue, the writings been on the wall to abandon ship for YEARS.

>>185228
Yea especially to those on the inside that EA couldn't manage a hole with both hands and a flashlight. Only reason they made it this long is just dumb luck that the teams stayed cohesive enough to have one major success regularly for the last few years.

Nerd³ 101 - Dungeon Keeper (Mobile)

>>185240
and further showing that EA can't die off soon enough.

>>185240

I actually downloaded Dungeon Keeper not knowing what it was. Aside from the paywall, it was actually pretty good, and I can see how this could be a fun game if the pay wall weren't there. Then again, without the Paywall, the game would actually need an added layer of complexity and variety.

That being said, I dislike needing to wait to have fun and ended up deleting it. At least I didn't let it become the money sink that Puzzels and Dragons, I'm ashamed to say, became. So many little micro-transactions were made on that game while I kept whispering to myself "This is the last time."

>>185306
>>185240
On the subject of Dungeon Keeper mobile

http://metro.co.uk/2014/02/04/dungeon-keeper-review-microtransaction-hell-4289901/

>In Short: Dungeon Keeper is not a video game, not any more. Instead it’s just a virtual beggar, constantly demanding your spare change and offering nothing in return.

>Pros: Older smartphones aren’t compatible.

>Cons: A sickening perversion of the whole concept of video games, with nothing in the way of gameplay just constant cajoling for you to bribe your way to victory.

>Score: 0/10

>>185306
>Then again, without the Paywall, the game would actually need an added layer of complexity and variety.
Ah, but that's the thing. We do know what this game is like without a paywall. And it was a fantastic game. Perhaps that is the problem with this release. While the wait is indeed atrocious and agonizingly long, it's not too different from what other free-to-play titles have done. However, this is a special case as we actually have a fine point of comparison to the same idea without the addition of microtransactions. It's like placing on a pedestal the horrifying truth of what we are doing to our games in this day and age.

>>185240
>>185309
I'd rather see the Chinese MMO. That'd have the benefit of being more of an offshoot than a sequel, and hopefully get set relative to the standards of free-to-play on desktop games instead of what phones have.

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/ea-gets-perfect-score-on-corporate-equality-index/1100-6416632/

Well isn't that nice, they are apparently a really nice place to work, as long as you've got a game in production, and if you aren't a consumer.

Yes. From what I understand they're actually a very nice company to with/for.
Shame about literally everything else.

>>185664
if they were in any other industry they be great, maybe. Shame they are in one where they have to be judged on their products and their attitude towards the people that purchase those items.

>>185668
http://www.theverge.com/2014/2/9/5395338/ea-dungeon-keeper-review-scam-google-play-store
http://baylorlariat.com/2014/02/21/editorial-ea-cheats-system-isnt-gamer-friendly/

really wish there was a way for Bioware to leave this abusive company, though their founders already sold them out and fled, so that point is moot. Its even sadder hearing the Dragon Age Writer talk about what they want to do with character representation, and knowing the next Dragon Age is likely the last game Bioware will make before EA guts them like a fish like they just did to Visceral.

I'm actually horrified by how little we've heard about the game and what micro transaction bullshit they'll put into it, bet its related to relationships.

More layoffs.

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/ea-cuts-jobs-at-plants-vs-zombies-studio/1100-6418302/

When I'm EA