Despite the finality of the game’s ending, Mass Effect 3 players shouldn’t retire their Shepards yet: today EA and Bioware officially announced the first major story-based DLC for ME3, entitled “Leviathan.”
According to Bioware, the new DLC will further explore the origins and motives of the series’s mysterious antagonists, The Reapers. In Bioware’s words: “Something lurks in the dark corners of space, something powerful enough to kill a Reaper. Shepard must discover the most closely guarded secret in the galaxy before the Reapers silence it forever. Discover more about the origins of the Reapers as you race across the galaxy to find the Leviathan. Unravel the dark history of the Reaper Race before it is too late.” Early rumors from a few months backed mentioned that Bioware was developing a DLC chapter that had to do with a “rogue Reaper,” and this appears to be it. This new chapter takes place before the game’s ending, and adds in new weapons, new planets, and new areas on the Citadel. The Leviathan DLC will be released sometime later this summer for $10.
In addition to the story based DLC, Bioware is also preparing a new weapons pack that will give players two new weapons to use in the single player campaign. The weapons pack will run you $2.
Nintendo fanboys also have some Mass Effect goodness to look forward to, as EA also showed off the upcoming Wii U port of ME3 today. The game is more or less identical to the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of the game, but it will include a special interactive “motion comic” by Dark Horse Comics that will allow players to experience a special digest version of the first two Mass Effect games and make a few choices that will effect their adventure in ME3. The Wii U version lets players map skills or weapon changes to customizable hotkeys on the system’s touchscreen, which also doubles as a map and a radar. In addition to the new controls and recap comic, the Wii U version will ship with some new exclusive weapons, the free Extended Cut DLC that fixed the original game’s ending, as well as all of the currently released multiplayer add-ons. The game is currently scheduled to be a launch title for Nintendo’s new system.
I still can’t imagine why you’d want to jump into the series with Mass Effect 3, since the game’s story is dependent on the choices you made in earlier games, but hey, there are probably some hardcore Nintendo fanboys out there who refused to play the series until it appeared on a Nintendo system, so this release is probably targeted towards those poor misguided souls.
Anyway, I still stand by my review – Mass Effect 3 was a great action-RPG, and I think Bioware should be commended for how they responded to the overly butthurt fan back-lash. Sure, the game definitely has it’s problems, but I think when you look at the game objectively — the fun gameplay, the well-written story (outside of the ending,) the beautiful graphics, and the way that Bioware has spent the last few months actively trying to fix all of the problems of the original release — you’ll find a lot to like. But hey, if you want to continue acting like Bioware RUINED EVERYTHING FOREVER and want to continue spouting hyperbole about how this video game ruined your life and physically and emotionally victimized you, that’s your choice. Meanwhile, the rest of us who are still willing to give Bioware and Mass Effect a fair chance have more of a great game to look forward to.
