JamesMoriarty123 wrote...
Now comes the hoping against hope of the smallest section of the fanbase...
Smallest section? I know about 25 (give or take a couple) people who have and play Mass Effect, to varying levels (very casual to finish a playthrough in a day and know everything about it). A third of these people couldn't give a *** about the romances except for the promise of bewb (something Bioware also seemed to have left out compared to ME1)
Another third are big into all the options romance or otherwise that Mass Effect gives, and very much support m/m and f/f (they'll either play a character with it, or at least like that others can enjoy this), but its not a *big* deal, just an interesting one.
The last third consider the romance options a staple of Bioware and part of the selling point that Mass Effect has. They either love their options, or are either female or a gay male (and actually one of them is a straight male sad about lack of lezbo, haha). They're pretty much burned by this and are already right now telling me that they may not be interested in a ME3 after reading Ray's 'reason'.
It's not a small part of the fanbase, not by a long shot. Bioware's also got to keep in mind that the *strictly mainstream shooter* fan is a very fickle one in their own way, and are quick to abandon a game that doesn't have enough marketing or hype attached. They lost me as a fan, but its not like I'm going "O MAN EFF MASS EFFECT MAG IS OUT!" - I'm willing to see what happens.