New Mass Effect novel announced

By Fred Dutton Published 5 April, 2011

Deception due out later this year.

A fourth Mass Effect novel is on its way to bookshops, publisher Del Rey has announced.

Mass Effect: Deception will continue the story of enigmatic biotic Gillian Grayson, who was introduced in the second book in the series, Mass Effect: Ascension.

It's being written by one-man game tie-in factory William C. Dietz, who has also churned out books expanding the Resistance, Hitman, StarCraft and Halo universes.

It's unclear if the book will link in with Mass Effect 3, though they're both due out in the same Q4 timeframe.

Picture of Fred.

About Fred Dutton

Fred Dutton is Eurogamer's US news editor, based in Washington DC.

Read more articles from Fred by visiting the Fred Dutton archive page.

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Comments (18) Latest comment 1 year ago

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  • DarkOni #1 1 year ago

    Not written by Mr. Karpyshyn?

    *Whines as manly as possible tears of sadness*

  • Subdominator #2 1 year ago

    I doubt there are any connections between the game and the new book since all previous books avoided the games as much as they could for continuity reasons (male/female Shepard, the decisions you make in the game ...). And since Gillian is only a small child during ME 2 ( I think she is nine at that time?) it's safe to assume that a book about her will be after her education at the Grissom Academy. So about nine years after ME 2, which should be quite some time after we successfully fight off the Reapers in ME 3. :)

  • Eraysor #3 1 year ago

    Real shame that they've decided to replace Karpyshyn (whose last 3 ME books have been absolutely brilliant) with Dietz, who wrote one of the worst books I have ever read (The Flood)...

  • Jonathan_Fakenham #4 1 year ago

    Karpyshyn is also off ME3 as lead writer though, as he went off to do his own thing (i.e. books/screenplays). I hope this book#4 (and ME3) is as good as the other ones.
    Edited by Jonathan_Fakenham at 06/04/11 @ 00:20

  • TheTingler #5 1 year ago

    Crap, Drew Karpyshyn is an excellent writer. I'm actually less excited for Mass Effect 3, knowing that both him and the ME1/2 soundtrack composers are off.

  • Markitron #6 1 year ago

    These comments have thoroughly depressed me, Drew Karpshyn is an excellent writer. His star wars novels are definitely worth a read

  • Razorus #7 1 year ago

    Man, I'm sick of Grayson! Move along to something else please!

  • Miths #8 1 year ago

    I wasn't even aware there were ME books, but since I've been taking up my old hobby of actually reading fiction again - after a few too many years of resorting to TV, movies and games for that kind of entertainment - I think I'll throw in the first three books with my next Amazon order.

  • Stompy #9 1 year ago

    Post deleted at 23:13:35 17-04-2012

  • Subdominator #10 1 year ago

    #4 No, he did not. He switched from Mass Effect to the The Old Republic team but it's safe to assume he wrote the general storyline of ME 3 before that. He simply doesn't have the time to write a ME novel this year.

  • Caimbeul #11 1 year ago

    i didnt realise Drew Karpyshyn was not involved with ME3!! now i am very worried about the quality of the game given the disaster (for me at least) that was DA1 & 2.

    crosses fingers.

  • Daikon #12 1 year ago

    People read books based on video games?
    What's next, video games based on books?

  • Jonathan_Fakenham #13 1 year ago

    #10 My mistake on him completely doing his own thing; Drew's own site (drewkarpyshyn.com) has lots of mentions of his book ideas and projects, also SW:TOR wasn't on his "games" list there.

  • tyrant1 #14 1 year ago

    Yeah, while Im disappointed that Drew isnt writing this novel, Im pretty sure his contribution to the Mass Effect storyline was done already, so not worried about him not doing this somehow meaning he did nothing for ME3. I think the general storyline was written ages ago for the trilogy. Whats left now to worry about is whether Mac Walters and his band of retards are going to piss all over it and write about a dozen short character stories with no depth at all and waste everyones time again, or if they are actually going to get back to writing an epic storyline like ME1 had.

    Difficult to say for sure really. ME2 was able to waste time because it was doing it until ME3 comes along. Hopefully now they have no choice but to concentrate on writing a good story. Cant really have 12 brief, disconnected character stories making up for a larger main story when its the final game. Just make up a smaller, better written and developed band again like in ME1 and have them join Shepard in a nice, LONG, CONNECTED and CLEVER story.

    Not the kind of plot hole filled fan fiction level crap we got with ME2: "YOU DIEDZORZ BUHT TEH SERBERUZ REZRECTED U COZ DEMZ R TEH COLLZORZ! NO DETAILZ BIATCHEZ U JUS ALIVE AGAIN!"

    I shouldnt even have to also mention Mordins ghost seeker and the random trip to nowhere on the shuttle to let the collectors come take over the ship..... Just awful.

    Anyway, in short, sorry Mr.Dietz - Im gonna give this one a miss. I have enough trouble wondering if the current writers will do a good enough job on the final game without worrying about if you suck at writing the Mass Effect Universe in novel form.
    Edited by tyrant1 at 06/04/11 @ 11:31

  • Jonathan_Fakenham #15 1 year ago

    I'm secretly hoping that ME3 will put your imported team straight on an epic questline, after ME2 completely focused on the entire traveling around, recruiting your team and doing their backstory quests thing..

  • tyrant1 #16 1 year ago

    Not likely. Not only is starting with the ME2 squad not at all in line with Biowares games, its also not friendly on newbs.

    Bioware wants all three mass effect titles to be able to "stand alone" and introducing a full squad with a relationship with Shepard at the start is the anti-thesis to that end.

    It would also screw with the games progession, and we havent even started on how many are dead and what happens if they need replacements.

    In short: too much work, not enough payoff.

    I think the best thing to do is pick your favourite character and hope they get a squadmate role, or at least a great supporting role.

    Im sticking with Liara. The relationship between her and Shepard is one of the few things Ive been able to choose that has some small effects on the game. If she isnt part of his team again, Ill struggle to care about Shepard or any new teammates. After all, what attracted me to mass effect was always the idea of taking the protagonist through three games with close companions and see their relationship grow throughout all three.

    So far Ive had a bit of a carryover to the Shadow Broker DLC, and thats it. And even that was influenced by the reset at the start of ME2 so it was like "starting over again".

    So yeah, Liara is my hope for squadmate in ME3, because if not, my already weak enthusiasm for the game drops (remarkably) even lower.
    Edited by tyrant1 at 06/04/11 @ 14:06

  • Ror1984 #17 1 year ago

    @tyrant - I'm thinking it'll be a bit of a mix of characters from the first two, with just maybe 2-3 new characters to recruit. I'd hope at least Garrus and Tali make it through into all three games, as they are fan favourites for a reason, and I'm thinking Liara will be playable again after the Shadow Broker DLC. At the very least she'll be an important source of information.

    As for who they could lose? Thane could die between games, and Samara has fulfilled her life's work, so they could both be out of the picture in the canon. Zaeed and Kasumi were really more bonus characters, so they could go their separate ways too I'd imagine.

    I also expect Ash/Kaidan to make an appearance, possibly playable, as Bioware make an effort to record the state of that relationship through ME2 from what I've read - so if you cheated on them, that should come back to kick you in the arse.

    Edit - on topic, I'm also a bit sad that Karpyshyn isn't writing this. The only book of Dietz's I've read (The Flood) was painfully boring. I am, however, willing to hope that was a weak link in his work. At any rate, as much as I enjoy the ME books (and absolutely adore the universe itself), I don't find them as good as the better Halo books, or Karen Traviss's Gears books.
    Edited by Ror1984 at 06/04/11 @ 19:12

  • mukki #18 1 year ago

    Books based on games... Errr come on. No, I think I will wait for movie!! Those are usually much much better ;)