Mass Effect was a critically acclaimed series that plucked at the heartstrings of the millions of people who played it, forcing players to make tough choices that at times let to the decimation to an entire species that you grew to form a bond with. When the tales of Captain Shepard came to an end in Mass Effect 3 back in 2012, players were cast adrift not knowing what to do with their time (most replayed the game and chose different story paths). And then in 2015 at EA’s E3 press conference, it was announced that Mass Effect Andromeda was in the works and would be released in holiday season of 2016.
Alas that appears not to be the case.
Much like The Division, it seems that a release date announced during E3 may not be something you want to swear by. At the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media & Telecom Conference, Electronic Arts Chief Financial Officer, Blake Jorgenson, announced that the game would instead launch something between January and March of 2017.
“So, we’ve got a great year ahead. For the first time I’m trying to tamp down Wall Street expectations than build it up. Good position to be in, I guess. We’ve got our Battlefield first-person shooter game coming in the third quarter, and our third-party title that Respawn, our partner, built, it’s called Titanfall, it’s the second title that they brought into that brand. Both of those are first-person shooters and will be targeted around both the fast, action-driven shooter market, as well as the strategy-driven market in the quarter. We have all our sports games. We have our Mirror’s Edge runner game, that’s first quarter [this year, on May 24], and then we have Mass Effect, which is a sci-fi action game, in our fourth quarter. So, big year ahead and we’re pretty excited.”
– Blake Jorgenson, Electronic Arts CFO
Electronic Arts fourth quarter in this case is between the January and March due to their fiscal year ending on March 31.
However it is probable that the release may be pushed back even further (possibly to the Winter season of 2017) due to EA also releasing titles such as Titanfall 2 and Battlefield 5 in the fourth quarter.
Mass Effect: Andromeda takes place in a different galaxy to the original series and will feature a new cast of characters.
