Multiplayer not ruled out for Mass Effect 2

By Robert Purchese Published 1 April, 2009

Could a co-op mode be in the works?

BioWare doctor-bosses Greg Zeschuk and Ray Muzyka have hinted that a multiplayer mode could still feature in Mass Effect 2.

"Well, we haven't disclosed a feature set at this point," Doctor Greg told MTV Multiplayer, when asked if there are plans to support co-op in the game.

Doctor Ray interceded: "But multiplayer is something that, at a broad level, BioWare is interested in exploring in our games in the future."

"Yeah," continued Doctor Greg, "[multiplayer] has to be central to the game to make sense. I think you see examples of games that have thrown in multiplayer modes that don't make any sense and then you see games that are built from the ground up as co-op experiences."

BioWare has offered relatively few details for Mass Effect 2. We do know, however, that game-saves will be reusable across the trilogy. But exactly how is to remain a "mystery" for the time being.

One obvious effect will be the impact of pivotal story-decisions during Mass Effect 1. A central character killed because of your actions will remain dead in Mass Effect 2, for example. But there are also plenty of unexpected twists and turns along the way.

"Yeah, we actually get gasps and things. Because you don't know what you're going to see, and I guess that's the thing about the games we make. We always want that unpredictability to always be a part of that experience," said Doctor Greg. "Because with shooters, you have all these bad guys and then eventually you shoot the boss at the end - you know what's going to happen.

"What we make is purposefully designed, and you'll see it in both Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age: Origins. It's getting more and more grey and complicated in terms of who's the good guy? Who's the bad guy? It's not as clear, and I think that it's exciting to make entertainment that's got mature themes.

"There's also mature writing, the complexity," he added. "I think our industry gets a lot of knocks on the quality of the stories, but there are certain examples of where it's really progressing. We think our stuff is one [example]."

Fan feedback, Doctor Ray went on, played an important role when addressing gameplay mechanics that worked in Mass Effect 1, as well as those that didn't.

"So some of [the changes are] about amping up the intensity; ME2 is an RPG but it's a shooter-RPG. We're really focusing on the intensity of the action experience," said Doctor Ray. "Also, tightening the exploration. Uncharted worlds, they're still optional, but we want to make all of them feel important and feel like they're all augmenting and improving your main passage through the game. You're going to really feel rewarded for having gone through them. It's a much tighter experience as a result.

"Moment-to-moment intensity - being able to grab control of the conversations - we didn't do in the first game. Small things too, like reducing the elevator speed times and things like that. Those are important to fans. We recognise that.

"Mass Effect 2, I'm really excited about it," he added, "because it's really taking the Mass Effect franchise to another level."

Mass Effect 2 will be out on Xbox 360 and PC next year.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

You may also like...

Comments (24) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Widge #1 3 years ago

    "One obvious effect will be the impact of pivotal story-decisions during Mass Effect 1. A central character killed because of your actions will remain dead in Mass Effect 2, for example. But there are also plenty of unexpected twists and turns along the way."

    I would say that pretty much is a No to the PS3 joining in at the second game of the series. They'd need to port the first game really.

  • LHH #2 3 years ago

    Co-op Mass Effect. Do not want.

  • AphoticCosmos #3 3 years ago

    I want a fantastic single-player game. Co-op might be a nice addition if it doesn't detract from the main singleplayer game, but absolutely no to deathmatch play.

  • Thalanos #4 3 years ago

    One conversation I would like to see in Mass Effect 2:

    "Welcome back to the Normandy Commander Shepherd. While you were away we took the liberty of oiling the elevator. It runs much faster now."

  • Moonprince #5 3 years ago

    Zelda's had multiplayer. It was awesome fun.

  • morriss #6 3 years ago

    NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

  • menage #7 3 years ago

    Do not want as well. We already have every major game being fucked by co-op. ME2 with co-op would be a disaster. Combat would work maybe, the rest, no way.

  • Darren #8 3 years ago

    I can't say I'm interested in co-op Mass Effect 2 either but so long as the game's quality and length don't suffer because of it then I'm OK I guess with it being included for those that do. My only concern is that, like Resident Evil 5, we'll end up with a much shorter, more linear game because of it. Prove me wrong, BioWare!

  • thenastypasty #9 3 years ago

    Can someone please tell me why every game developer feels the need to shoe horn muti-player and co op into every game that they release, dont they realise that the single player game suffers all i want is a game i can play on my own and get right into it.

  • RedSparrows #10 3 years ago

    They said Bioware were thinking of multi, across their titles, not just ME2. It's all speculation.

  • Britesparc Verified Creative, ITV #11 3 years ago

    I wouldn't mind a co-op system similar to Fable II's, or maybe a system whereby a second player can pick up a pad and take control of another squad member in a fight, but I'd rather they focused on a quality single-player experience. Besides which, I like the pause-time aspect of ME; one of the reasons I preferred KOTOR's combat was because there was more empahsis on the pause-time dynamic.

  • Doctor_What #12 3 years ago

    "Can someone please tell me why every game developer feels the need to shoe horn muti-player and co op into every game that they release"

    Because pulishers ask for it and it reduces the amount of games resold second hand.

  • ardamillo #13 3 years ago

    It will be interesting to play all 3(?) games back to back when they're all out, and see how well it all hangs together. Continuity is an interesting idea but I'm already struggling to remember which of my characters did what back in 2007.

  • coomber #14 3 years ago

    I don't believe for a moment that co-op will feature in this game. Surely Bioware aren't stupid. Co-op would spoil the single-player experience (which is still what this game is all about) in the same way it did games like Resident Evil 5. Developers waste time working on co-op to the detriment of the single-player campaign.

    Disappointed to hear that the pointless option to explore uncharted worlds is still there. "I must save the universe...wait, let's check this whole planet to see if I can find an unrelated alien artifact first."
    Edited by 1 at 01/04/09 @ 12:16

  • makeamazing #15 3 years ago

    Not interested in Co-op, this game really does not need it.

  • bad09 #16 3 years ago

    Right let's get this straight games industry.

    I like online, I like it a lot. That DOES NOT mean I want it in every game!!!! It ruined RE5, KOTOR has become a crappy MMO and ME would not be the same with with it IMO.

    Leave the MP to games that need it, and stop killing off the single player experience by dumping in a co-op mode constantly.

    / prays this never happens to ME2

  • jonbwfc #17 3 years ago

    "I would say that pretty much is a No to the PS3 joining in at the second game of the series. They'd need to port the first game really."
    Um. No. IIRC there's only two 'path decisions' in Mass Effect that lead to the permanent death of one of you party (one of which inevitably does, it's just a question of who). So just as many people will have a given character alive as dead in their saves. So if they want to support previous saves, they have to build the game to be able to cope with all/any of the three characters involved (I'm trying not to spoiler here) still being alive. So if you're playing and you don't have a save - which is equally possible for 360 owners who may just have not played the first game remember - the game just treats things as if all the characters are still alive. It's perfectly technically feasible to have a branching storyline that copes with all the required possibilities. Remember Shepherd has also been.. er.. romantically linked with one of three people depending on the choices you made, they're going to have to cope with that too.

    It's a relatively limited set of possibilities in fact. One character is either alive or dead, one of two characters is dead and the other is alive, or they're all alive. That's actually only five possible combinations.

    Jon

  • JensonJet #18 3 years ago

    Wow, what a selfish bunch of gamers on this forum. Just because you don't like co-op you want it ignored?? Until COD; MW I never played adversarial games, but not for a second would I want every gamer that enjoys that game style to suffer because it didn't suit me.

    Co-op has proved to be an excellent way of making really good online friends. People, perhaps you need to learn to work within a team, and improve your conversational skills, then you'd find co-op gameplay to be as fun as the rest of us that love playing games that way.

  • ardamillo #19 3 years ago

    "Co-op has proved to be an excellent way of making really good online friends. People, perhaps you need to learn to work within a team, and improve your conversational skills, then you'd find co-op gameplay to be as fun as the rest of us that love playing games that way."

    I'm surprised that someone with such great conversation skills has completely missed the point of this thread.

  • jim1975 #20 3 years ago

    one of the main complains of the 1st game was your squads AI, which was pretty bad to say the least. if two as my friends could drop in and play as my squad that would be fantastic. i dont see how anyone could see that as a detriment to the game. you are constantly accompanied in the game by your squad anyway. i could choose to use this or i could choose not to use this.

    i dont get this, adding coop automatically equals crap bullshit i see each time a game is reported to have coop play. IF YOU DONT LIKE IT JUST DONT FOOKIN USE IT. simple.

  • qoobah #21 3 years ago


    It's a relatively limited set of possibilities in fact. One character is either alive or dead, one of two characters is dead and the other is alive, or they're all alive. That's actually only five possible combinations.


    Thing is, the way I understand it, the choices aren't only about who lives and who dies. There are preatty salient decisions you need to make during gameplay (Noveria and endgame choice for instance) and, especially the latter one, need to be carried over to the next games if there is to be any continuity and coherence. It really isn't that simple, to the point where it got me wandering if it's at all possible for them to include so many permutations, which will grow even more with the choices made in ME2 that would need to carry over to ME3.

  • metalangel #22 3 years ago

    If you can both wander off and do your own thing (so on the Citadel, a soldier class goes off to fight Fist while a infiltrator goes to hack systems, for example) as well as travel together, that would be amazing. One player contacts another - "Fist is dead but I can't hack his safe" so the other makes their way over to help.

  • JensonJet #23 3 years ago

    GhenghisNaan, I think your post says everything we need to know about you. You pretty much hate other gamers, fine. There are plenty I've not got along with too, but on the whole I'll give anyone a chance. I have met some really good people on Live. Gamers who are skilled that I can learn from. Gamers who are a really good laugh. I've met some interesting gamers that have shown me new tatics or ideas on how to approach situations in games. However good I believe myself to be at games, I'm happy to learn from others, and generally enjoy other peoples company. And if I'm not happy with who I'm playing with, I just leave the server and find another. What a wonderful invention choice has turned out to be! I guess it's safe to assume I'll never have the displeasure of bumping into you online.

    Just because you meet people you don't like during the day doesn't mean we're all sick of friendship, conversation or interaction after work. I know many gamers who feel they're better than everyone else at games, and have nothing to learn from others, or just plain can't work within a team. Fortunately for them they have single player in every game released. For those who enjoy beating other people, but don't care for teamwork, they have adversarial type games. But for those of us who can enjoy the social aspect of gaming and enjoy gaming alongside real people as apposed to dumb AI characters we have co-op. Apart from Mass Effect, unsurprisingly I'm not into the games you like at all. But not for one second would I suggest because they're not for me they shouldn't exist.

  • monkeywithnoeyes #24 3 years ago

    co-op in a story driven rpg where every choice effects the outcome? hmmm i dont see how it can work to be honest. Plus Mass effect is not something to be rushed through... which is always the danger when focusing on co-op.