Mass Effect Andromeda is only a few weeks away and the game’s producer Fabrice Condominas spoke with VG247 about some of the game’s biggest deviations from the original trilogy such as the opening up of the game’s choices with the removal of the Paragon and Renegade system and what that means for hardcore or completionist players.

In the interview, Condominas also spoke about how the original trilogy slowly lost its space opera roots and how Andromeda is a return to that:

Yeah, I think that’s part of it. It’s also that the story of the trilogy was going narrower and narrower. Obviously that’s because you’re focused on the resolution of your story, so that’s good, but it means that you get away a bit from the space opera, from the main theme at a high level. That is definitely part of the vibe I wanted to bring back. It’s not the only aspect: you’ve got the space travel, the notion of going to uncharted worlds. It’s a bundle of things. But it is part of it.

Condominas also revealed that Mass Effect Andromeda will not have the same time pressures as previous games in the series. Players will be able to take their time doing other activities in the game, such as side quests and exploration, without affecting the game’s main narrative and objectives.

We consciously removed the time pressure. The people in the Ark are waiting for a home, right, but this is why most of them stay in cryo and all that. The idea is, we want you to be able to explore freely. You’re right, in Mass Effect 3 sometimes it was like “what am I doing, people are dying and I’m just hanging around. So it’s a good question. But no, narratively, we did remove the time pressure. We keep the stake – you need to save these people – but you can take time to explore. Also in this game, unlike the others, once you’re done with the story you can keep exploring. [The world state] will remain consistent with the choices you made along the main story, but it’s still open. The game is not done when the story’s done.

Mass Effect Andromeda is coming out on the PlayStation 4 on March 21, 2017 in North America and March 23 in Europe. Watch out for our review, coming soon.

[Source: VG247]