154 réponses à ce sujet

[Shechinah]

I'm remembering the old cover we saw of the book back when it was Mass Effect: Initiation. It had a cover featuring the N7, I believe, and was suspected to be a place-holder cover. Still, I'm wondering if one of the characters in at least one of the books will be the hypothetical sibling character or someone else from the Ryder family. They wouldn't need to mention the player character as anything more than the hypothetical family character having family.

 

I just hope that if it is the hypothetical sibling character or a family member that the team will not rely on the books to inform the audience about the character. That character insight should be as avaliable in the game. There might be small bits and relationships that are only expanded upon in the books and only mentioned in the game but the characterization should come across as strongly in the game.

 

Note: By relationships, I mean a relationship that is formed in the book but only seen by their interactions in the game. Like if the hypothetical sibling character has a close friendship with someone that is inconsequential to the story, we might be told bits about how it was formed like if they did not get along and see how close they are but we wouldn't necessarily have the whole story. 

[Fredward]

Luckily I like reading so I'm covered if they decide to include salient bits in the books.

[CronoDragoon]

Jemisin, as in The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms Jemisin? 

 

Damn... I want to get hyped so bad, but I got epicly burned by Deception last time.

 

Jemisin has written some blogs about ME before. She's a huge fan of the games and is at least analytical of the world and its lore, so a Deception-level disaster is almost assuredly off the table.

[Linkenski]

Mac takes on the last book?

 

Mass Effect Initiative has a bad ending confirmed.

 

Wait, is this actually a book or will it be 3 legit short-stories and a Darkhorse comic book finale with text bubbles that say "pew, pew, BANG!"?

[MissOuJ]

Jemisin has written some blogs about ME before. She's a huge fan of the games and is at least analytical of the world and its lore, so a Deception-level disaster is almost assuredly off the table.

 

Ohh, I'm starting to like the sound of this... maybe even preorder

[CronoDragoon]

Ohh, I'm starting to like the sound of this... maybe even preorder

 

Here's an example:

 

 

How do I love this trilogy; let me count the ways. Well, OK, I hated ME1, and could only bring myself to play it after skipping ahead to ME2 and falling in love with the universe. (What did I hate about ME1? Every Mako mission. The thin-as-paper characterization and the awful combat controls. That. ******. Mako.) But I loved the complex storyline, dead-end plots and all (dark energy? whut?). I loved the characters — yeah, all of them, though some could’ve used better writing. I loved the voice acting, though Jennifer Hale beats the pants off Mark Meer; sorry, mShep fans. I loved that the entire third game was basically an ending, as complexified and drawn-out as a book can never get; you could take as much time as you needed to say goodbye to the characters and universe, and you could do it as sorrowfully or joyfully as you needed to, especially via the Citadel DLC (highly recommended, BTW). I loved that there were women and people of color everywhere — in the background and foreground alike — and I loved that I could make my protagonist another one if I chose. I even loved the combat (by the second game), and I hate shooters.

 

There were of course some flaws. The worldbuilding has the usual SFF issues — e.g., for a global military, the Alliance sure seems awfully North American in its structure and culture. The asari could have been a brilliant idea, as a monogendered species capable of “mating” with anyone, but in actual practice they were just Blue Space Babes. And I hated that their presence apparently prevented the game’s designers from including a logical number of non-male members of every species. (My headcanon is that the volus, the batarians, the vorcha, and the hanar — none of whom even mentioned the existence of other genders IIRC — are also monogendered, presenting as male or agendered. That makes the asari more palatable to me.) I wasn’t fond of some of the character details — Jack and the magical healing ****, Kaidan’s latent sexism that appears only when he’s romanced by a female PC, Jacob’s utterly stereotypical backstory and romance (see previous link for that too). The “endings debate” is basically a nonissue for me; as I said, I consider the whole game to be the trilogy’s end, not merely the red/blue/green options that so many players get incomprehensibly upset about, and I thought the whole thing was brilliant. (Incidentally, I prefer blue.)

 

But these are tolerable flaws given that the game gets so much else right. Hell, part of my problem with Bioshock Infinite is probably that I started it right after finishing an ME3 playthrough. That made the limitations and glaring logic flaws of B:I stand out more.

[Navasha]

That's unfortunate.   Was really hoping the developers would move BACK to games and away from books.   How about putting that stuff in the GAME...  I know, odd idea.    A large part of what should have been an amazing sequence in DA:I (wicked hearts) was completely stupid and pointless because they wrote books about it rather than gameplay.    I seriously hope the ME:A team has more sense than this.

[Element Zero]

This is pretty surprising, given that I've heard nothing but how unprofitable the tie-in novel business is in connection with some of my other nerdish interests. I enjoyed Karpyshyn's Mass Effect novels, and I'm looking forward to these. It's great that they've enlisted such a respected novelist to get things started.

Even if he weren't plastered all over the possible cover art, I'd predict the N7 operative to be a main character of the novel. It just makes sense. It will make any action involving him all the more meaningful for the novel readers, much as with "Mass Effect: Ascension" and David Anderson.

[Beerfish]

I don't mind the books themselves in the genre but having actual characters in the games sets up a massive bias for or against those characters when i encounter them in games that is tough to over come.

 

Kahlee Saunders I thought was a total dimwit in the books thus when i met her in game that's what I took with me.

 

I had a huge bias against Cole in the book and had to over come that in the game.  (BioWare wrote him skillfully enough that they more or less pulled it off.)

 

I would not have been able to avoid my book bias if they had included Rhys or evangeline in the last game as meetable people.

[DarkKnightHolmes]

Gonna wait it out a bit before considering even buying it. Don't trust the ME books yet.

[MrFob]

Don't know the author but on first glance, this is great news. I liked Drew's 3 novels well enough, from what people say here, Jemisin seems like a fine writer and having a bit more ME stuff to read is always nice (well, unless it's Deception of course ).

[dreamgazer]

(squints)

... four?! Sweet baby Space Jesus.

This much can be said: I don't think they would flesh out four tie-in books for a new game they weren't confident in.

[Element Zero]

(squints)
... four?! Sweet baby Space Jesus.
This much can be said: I don't think they would flesh out four tie-in books for a new game they weren't confident in.

True. Makes me wonder about the potential for big DLC expansion packs. One thing at a time, of course.

[BSpud]

Someone tell me Melinda Snodgrass is one of the yet-to-be-announced authors pls.

[Barquiel]

They didn't really show anything substantial this week and the first novel explaining the backstory of the game is supposed to come out in less than two months? I won't complain, it's a bit strange though.

[dreamgazer]

They didn't really show anything substantial this week and the first novel explaining the backstory of the game is supposed to come out in less than two months?

 

It totally explains why they're not divulging more information at this point.  They're want to sell copies of the first book.

 

Come, say, mid-September, they'll probably do a whole lot more talking about the premise, characters, setting, blah blah blah. 

[Shechinah]

It totally explains why they're not divulging more information at this point.  They're want to sell copies of the first book.

 

Come, say, mid-September, they'll probably do a whole lot more talking about the premise, characters, setting, blah blah blah. 

 

They did say they were going into details sometime in fall.

[Iakus]

 

"The novels will act as prequel and sequels to the events in the games and will become part of the overarching

Mass Effect saga. They will focus on key characters and answer the many questions fans have been asking."

 

This has me very nervous. 

 

I'd rather not have to consult outside sources to know what the frak is going on in a game.

[Arcian]

The last one will probably be a chose your own adventure with three endings.

The last one will probably be a prank book that shoots out a spring-loaded boxing glove into the reader's face when opened.

[Shechinah]

Hmm... I wonder if a liveblog thread is in violation of the Site Rules. I might be a bit interested in making one for the first book if I decide to buy it since it seems like it is going to come out before I go on blackout. Think I'm going to ask a moderator if I can figure out how.

 

I'd still write a spoiler-free review.  

[Monster A-Go Go]

That's great!  I love the Mass Effect books.  I hope that Dark Horse also gets the go-ahead to give us a few more comics as well.  I really enjoyed...

 

Spoiler

...seeing "Maya Brooks" make her way into the Citadel DLC.  Made that reveal so much more satisfying.

[ddraigcoch123]

I'm pretty sure they will start their 'prequel' well away from anything to do with the 'endings' so it will be interesting to read about all this Ark building while Shep is running around like a blue arse fly getting ready for the final confrontation...

[shepskisaac]

Even if the dates changed, I still think 1st book (Andromeda Initiative) will be out months before the game. August 2016 is definitely multiple months before any initial Holiday 2016 release would've been

[The Dystopian Hound]

Can't wait to read them. Getting the paper version. **** The eBooks.

[shepskisaac]

First one gonna be hella interesting. From the title alone, it sounds like it wil have all the key answers to the background of Andromeda journey we've been speculating/guessing on for the past few years