[Megathread] Mass Effect Andromeda

[unholytestament]

Man, you'd think Andromeda was the only game with janky animations to ever release. Did Uncharted 4's cutscenes become the industry norm while I wasn't looking?

I mean, yes it doesn't look good I agree, but at some point we get it. If I judged every game purely by its animation quality, I'd have to trash most of my favorite titles. I care more about what's under the hood, how's the combat, the writing in general, the side-quest quality.

It's also easy to cherry pick footage from TW3. I'm replaying it on my new computer right now, and while the animation quality is above Andromeda's for sure, it has more than its fair share of janky spots too, especially amongst minor NPCs.

People have been making fun of Bioware's animations for a long time. I can still recall all the silly shit said about the "sex scenes" in the original Dragon Age, and jokes about being covered head to toe in blood while having pleasant conversations, and that's long before we get into the realm of glitches.

But Andromeda was supposed to mark a big change for Bioware. It was supposed to "push the boundaries of what Frostbite can do and what Mass Effect can do”. And here we are with Quality Bioware Animation™ yet again.

So don't pretend this is a new thing. This is same shit, different year.

[Tekkommo]

Currently downloading the game, will see soon(ish) if all these complaints are legit. I doubt most are, people always pick on ME at release because it has a following.

[Deleted]

Let me give you a piece of advice, when defending something that looks animation wise like a turd, so colossal that this game will become historic for it, dont invoke far better games. It just gets people angrier at the ineptude of Bioware even more. Even worse, you take a swipe at Witcher 3, the game that set the bar for RPGs as a whole, a genre that Bioware at one point excelled at.

You have to go out of your way to look for shitty animation in most triple A games. You can get the horse in Witcher 3 to do all kinds of crazy animation shit if you park him near a fence, or on a ledge.

You have to go out of your way to find a string of 3 seconds of animation where Andromeda looks acceptable. Your best bet is to find alien only cutscene, any humans involved and its a trainwreck.


Animation, especially facial is crucial in this game. The entire allure of this series is getting to know the characters. Its one thing if FIFA has shitty lip syncing when the ref is giving a yellow or red card. Or the race driver walks like he has shit his pants in Gran Turismo, it ultimately does not matter in those games. But here it is crucial.

[Lagmonster]

So far I'm not a huge fan of the cover system. Feels way clunkier than both the ME2/3 and the ME1 system. It might just be that I don't fully know how to use it to its full potential yet.

I fully agree with you there. Its nice that you can walk up to cover and go into it and all. But I see no reason why they didn't keep the option for going manually into the closest cover like in the other games. This was way more noticeable during my time playing multiplayer. Mainly because your not needing to go from cover to cover very often during the trial story game play and all.

[Kathandira]

Despite the nay sayers, I am still very excited to play this game. I am also very excited to hear more news about DA:4.

I never was disappointed in any game in either series.

[Tonyman64]

Why should we just accept shitty animations, rather than pushing a studio to improve the quality of their games with each installment? Especially since they're now working with Frostbite, and we've seen how capable the engine is when it comes to detailed, insanely high quality animations.

Instead, we're left with animations that would have looked pretty terrible last generation.

I just do not get how people can excuse and be totally fine with them.



From some of the talk, the remain a problem well past the preview bit. And if they're a persistent problem, especially in cutscenes, then I can absolutely see them losing some points for it. Seriously, as I said, these are animations that would have looked like shit last generation. This shit shouldn't really be acceptable from a AAA studio nowadays.

It's nice that folks are talking up the combat, at least. Just strange that it's getting far more praise than the actual RPG aspects of the game, which is pretty much a complete 180 from how the first game in this franchise was. It amuses me.

I'm not saying be totally fine with them. I'm not fine with them. I'm saying the game is still fun even with bad animations. Looking at some of the comments here and people are getting really down about the game because of the animations, but there is more to the game than that. That's my point.

I've been happy with the RPG aspects so far. I was always a little sad they dialed them down so much in ME1 and 2. Having said that, the jump jets are great. Since playing Destiny I just don't feel like I can move properly if I can go up in the air.

[Deleted]

10 years later and the faces are just as bad as day one. It feels like they've learned nothing.

They dont have to. The hype is enough.

[Tonyman64]

But Andromeda was supposed to mark a big change for Bioware. It was supposed to "push the boundaries of what Frostbite can do and what Mass Effect can do”. And here we are with Quality Bioware Animation™ yet again.

So don't pretend this is a new thing. This is same shit, different year.

The people look terrible, but I'm pretty happy with how everythiing else is looking. The armor is nice, the walls are nice, the rocks are nice. I don't get why the people are so bad, but it's not like the game is a graphics disaster across the board. It's pretty good.

[Jastall]

Let me give you a piece of advice, when defending something that looks animation wise like a turd, so colossal that this game will become historic for it, dont invoke far better games. It just gets people angrier at the ineptude of Bioware even more. Even worse, you take a swipe at Witcher 3, the game that set the bar for RPGs as a whole, a genre that Bioware at one point excelled at.

You have to go out of your way to look for shitty animation in most triple A games. You can get the horse in Witcher 3 to do all kinds of crazy animation shit if you park him near a fence, or on a ledge.

You have to go out of your way to find a string of 3 seconds of animation where Andromeda looks acceptable. Your best bet is to find alien only cutscene, any humans involved and its a trainwreck.


Animation, especially facial is crucial in this game. The entire allure of this series is getting to know the characters. Its one thing if FIFA has shitty lip syncing when the ref is giving a yellow or red card. Or the race driver walks like he has shit his pants in Gran Turismo, it ultimately does not matter in those games. But here it is crucial.

Witcher 3 didn't set any bars for me. It did most things well or very well, but nothing spectacularly. Everything it did, I can easily name an RPG or two I played that did it better. Only bar it set is perhaps for a city's atmosphere, Novigrad did look fantastic albeit I found the story there an absolute chore.

Cutscene animations look fine. Dialogs less so, but even then most of the time it's just the eyes that look stilted. The stuff of memes doesn't happen all that much, albeit maybe it gets worse as the game goes on.

[unholytestament]

I'm not saying be totally fine with them. I'm not fine with them. I'm saying the game is still fun even with bad animations. Looking at some of the comments here and people are getting really down about the game because of the animations, but there is more to the game than that. That's my point.

I've been happy with the RPG aspects so far. I was always a little sad they dialed them down so much in ME1 and 2. Having said that, the jump jets are great. Since playing Destiny I just don't feel like I can move properly if I can go up in the air.

And you have a valid point.

Bioware's older games were far from perfect, but people still loved them. There was a decent balance of gameplay, story, and replayability that caused us to overlook their faults (mostly). But there comes a time where you just have to ask why a certain thing about the games isn't improving. Why do the characters continue to look so messed up? Why does the legacy of Quality Bioware Animation™ continue?

And one of the reasons people point to The Witcher 3 for comparison is because CDPR has shown a tremendous amount of improvement in damn near every way that counts with each game they make. But it will be interesting to see what happens when they mess up. It's bound to happen eventually.

[Sunseeker]

Witcher 3 didn't set any bars for me. It did most things well or very well, but nothing spectacularly. Everything it did, I can easily name an RPG or two I played that did it better. Only bar it set is perhaps for a city's atmosphere, Novigrad did look fantastic albeit I found the story there an absolute chore.

Cutscene animations look fine. Dialogs less so, but even then most of the time it's just the eyes that look stilted. The stuff of memes doesn't happen all that much, albeit maybe it gets worse as the game goes on.

The only reviewer who's gone beyond the 10 hours felt the game got better the longer you played. Almost all of the memes we're seeing are from things within the first few hours of gameplay.

[Edge-]

The only reviewer who's gone beyond the 10 hours felt the game got better the longer you played. Almost all of the memes we're seeing are from things within the first few hours of gameplay.

Which is kinda an issue, because first impressions matter a whole helluva lot. Usually you want to front-load some serious quality to get folks super engaged early on to allow for them to be invested enough to overlook these issues by the time they start really surfacing midway through : (

[Mister Cheese]

The only reviewer who's gone beyond the 10 hours felt the game got better the longer you played. Almost all of the memes we're seeing are from things within the first few hours of gameplay.

Again the "the game gets better after 10 hours in" meme. That's not acceptable. Stop pushing this.

[Orby]

The only thing that bothers me about this game is that it suffers from something every Bioware game suffers with, and that's Muppet arm movement...

I think the facial animation are hilarious

[Asrialol]

Again the "the game gets better after 10 hours in" meme. That's not acceptable. Stop pushing this.

Yeah, totally not acceptable. You go tell'em, boy!

[Jastall]

The only reviewer who's gone beyond the 10 hours felt the game got better the longer you played. Almost all of the memes we're seeing are from things within the first few hours of gameplay.

Then Bioware needs to wow players earlier. Inquisition suffered from the same thing. Most players don't play a game for much more than 10 hours, in fact. So first impressions count.

[Mister Cheese]

Yeah, totally not acceptable. You go tell'em, boy!

I find your condescending post to mean you're missing the point. For what reason is it acceptable to have the first 10 hours of your game be slow, dull, uninteresting, and full of major problems? That's not minutes by the way. Hours. That is a long time. And that can turn a lot of people off. But who gives a shit right? Anyone who shares my opinion must be a fucking retard "boy".

[hellhamster]

HAHAHAHAHHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA.

This is OBVIOUSLY """"Bioware's"""" silent cry for help. There is no other explanation how a multimillion dollar game can launch like this.

[Deleted]

HAHAHAHAHHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA.

This is OBVIOUSLY """"Bioware's"""" silent cry for help. There is no other explanation how a multimillion dollar game can launch like this.

Ahahaha wow. This is great.

[rhorle]

Yep, but again, the game overall was fantastic enough for folks to largely overlook the issues that popped up here and there. Folks expect at least the same level of quality out of BW, as they're working with larger budgets than CDPR had to work with on Witcher 3 IIRC.

So Andromeda will have major launch issues? Stuttering, Save game glitches, foliage issues, invisible swords, shooting friendly npc's, gas clouds spontaneous combusting, blood now properly showing up, graphical bugs in gwent, missing translations, poor performance in cut scene. And more. Yes a lot of this stuff is standard but don't pretend that the Witcher 3 was a perfect came that didn't have issues.
http://www.express.co.uk/entertainme...save-Wild-Hunt