Mass Effect 3 is shaping up well, but at the heart of all that whizz-bang-whoosh space opera action is a good conversation. BeefJack are reporting that the third game in the series will feature an incredible 40,000 lines of dialogue. It's a figure that is almost as much as both all the lines of Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 combined.

The game's audio lead Rob Blake announced on Twitter that 40,000 lines would be recorded for the final game in the trilogy. The revelation came in response to Twitter users voicing concern over the consistency of volume in Shepard's voice. In response, Blake tweeted : 'We do our best to keep consistency but it's tough with 40,000 lines! We've got new techniques on ME3 that improve it tho!'

To bring this all into perspective, Mass Effect featured 20,000 lines whilst Mass Effect 2 had 25,000. However what is not clear is where these extra 15,000 lines will be featured. With Mass Effect 3 now confirmed to feature a co-operative modes too, will the multiplayer contain as much conversation as the first game, or will most of this extra dialogue go towards creating a richer single-player experience?