Originally Posted by shrike4242 Most likely, they're already in the planning stages for whatever follows, though it just better not be a MMO. Something in the past makes sense rather than future.

Yeah, I'm not into MMO's at all so I hope they don't go that route. Or if they do it doesn't mean there isn't a single player ME series continuing.

Agree with the above that it would be too tough to tie it in. I was underwhelmed by the impact decisions in ME1 had on ME2 personally. And honestly I expect more of the same in ME3.

It's just hard to tell a strong and coherent story if you have too many user affected options that directly impact the main plot. It's easier to have more subtle impacts that affect sub plots, affect which characters are around to fulfill certain roles etc. But hard to have it have major impacts on the main plot and still tell a great story IMO.

All right, please bear with me, I've been thinking about this waaaaay too much and I just need to get my thoughts out on paper.

Let's imagine a points system where each potential ME3 squadmate can score a point in the following categories that presumably make them more likely to return. (Ashley and Kaidan will count as one squadmate.)

+ Playable in Mass Effect
+ Playable in Mass Effect 2
+ Cannot die
+ Love interest in Mass Effect
+ Love interest in Mass Effect 2
+ Fan favorite (of course this is subjective, it's just my own judgment)
+ Included in base game, not DLC (ME1 squadmates earn this point by default)

Liara +_++_++ = 5 points
Garrus ++__+++ = 5 points
Tali ++__+++ = 5 points
Ashley/Kaidan +_++__+ = 4 points
Miranda _+__+++ = 4 points
Wrex +____++ = 3 points
Jacob _+__+_+ = 3 points
Jack _+__+_+ = 3 points
Thane _+__+_+ = 3 points
Mordin _+___++ = 3 points
Legion _+___++ = 3 points
Grunt _+____+ = 2 points
Samara _+____+ = 2 points
Kasumi _+___+_ = 2 points
Zaeed _+_____ = 1 point

Of course, we already have confirmation for Liara, Ash/Kaidan, Garrus, and Tali, which fits right in to the list starting from the most likely.

My personal predictions, which I will be referring back to in the coming months when we know more:

- Anyone with 3 or more points will be a playable squadmate in ME3. This includes everyone guaranteed to be alive, all love interests from either game, and fan favorites Mordin and Legion.

- Grunt will join the squad only if Wrex is dead. If Wrex is alive, he will join instead.

- Samara, Kasumi, and Zaeed will not be playable squadmates.

Now. This is already a lot of potential squadmates. Add in new recruits (which there will be a few of) and things are starting to get out of hand. Here is how I think things are going to work: ME3 recruitment will be built around mutually exclusive pairs of squadmates that we will need to choose between, either at the time of recruitment, or at some later point when they come into conflict. Like the Jack/Miranda and Legion/Tali confrontations in ME2, except these will directly result in one member leaving or not joining. Again, my predictions:

- Wrex/Grunt vs. Mordin

- Ash/Kaidan vs. Miranda

- Legion vs. Tali

This leaves a final list of:

- Liara
- Garrus
- Legion or Tali
- Ashley or Kaidan or Miranda
- Wrex or Grunt or Mordin
- Jacob
- Jack
- Thane

Eight returning squadmates (minus anyone who died in ME2 of course), plus maybe two newcomers and two more DLC-exclusive newcomers makes 12. There you have it! Thanks for indulging my long and pointless rant.

They changed the game quite a bit between 1 and 2. I hope they work on the gameplay more than anything else. I appreciate a good playing shooter more than I appreciate great graphics. There is a lot of hype for this game though, which will ruin it for some people I'm sure.

Ryuukishi, I think you have some great points in what you put out there for squadmate options in ME3.

Going back to the storyline we have in ME2, I could see there being a Grunt vs. Wrex or Grunt vs. Wreav conflict for the leadership of Clan Urdnot, so we might have that happen sometime in the ME3 timeline.

I know we'll be seeing the Mordin vs Wrex/Grunt conflict as well as the Legion vs Tali conflict (again) in the ME3 timeframe, especially with the lead-up they've done in ME2. Jack vs Miranda is another one that is likely to show up again. Ash/Kaiden vs Miranda is likely to be due to Alliance vs. Cerberus, I'd think. Though, with the spin-doctoring that is likely to happen with the incident in Arrival, that may be different than we expect.

I could see why you'd think that Kasumi and Samara won't return in ME3, though I hope they do come back as I think they're both characters with a lot of potential if given the legs in the story to be more fleshed out. The issue with Kasumi and Zaeed being semi-flat characters is that they weren't integrated into the storyline of the entire game since they were DLC-based.

According to Jarrett Lee on the BioWare forums, the same cutesy non-confirmation confirmation that applies to Tali also applies to Jack. I think we can very safely assume at this point that all ME2 love interests will be included in the ME3 squad.

I think it'd be relevant to analyze things from the worst-case scenario perspective...exactly how few former squadmates can someone enter ME3 with? Only Kaiden/Ash and Liara are guaranteed to be alive. From ME2, you're going to have at least two, but you can't guarantee which two...as mentioned, seems unlikely that Zaaed and Kasumi would return, but if they were the only two you had, then what?

Could also see this factoring into potential conflicts. If there was a Miranda - KaiAsh conflict, and Miranda was one of your two surviving crewmembers, forcing you to pick one would result in only three returning members on your team.

Seems to me that they'd need more than just two new crew members...that is, if they don't want to gimp players who really screwed up in ME2. Doesn't mean they all need to be available to all people...just to kind of fill in the gaps.


Samara would be an interesting inclusion, purely because of the entire "Samara might be Morinth" angle.

Originally Posted by Salamando3000 I think it'd be relevant to analyze things from the worst-case scenario perspective...exactly how few former squadmates can someone enter ME3 with? Only Kaiden/Ash and Liara are guaranteed to be alive. From ME2, you're going to have at least two, but you can't guarantee which two...as mentioned, seems unlikely that Zaaed and Kasumi would return, but if they were the only two you had, then what?

That's a really good point. Maybe BioWare would throw in alternates (like, if Wrex and Grunt are both dead, you get Wreav, but in no other circumstance).

One thing worth remembering is that in ME1, it was technically possible to get to Virmire and have no one else on the team but Tali. If that happened, the game punted and just made a copy of Tali to fill in the third squadmate spot. So it is possible that BioWare would decide that it's not worth catering to the 1% of masochist players who completed ME2 with only Zaeed and Kasumi alive, and just throw in some kludge.

Or maybe they're just going to give us Liara, Ash/Kaidan, everyone from ME2 who was recruited and alive including Zaeed and Kasumi, and 4-5 newcomers too. Standing room only on the Normandy.

As long as there are two surviving crewmembers besides yourself, you can not die at the end of ME2. Any gamesave that has a dead Shepard at the end of ME2 can't be used for ME3, so you have to have two left.

There are a couple crewmembers that survive no matter what unless you specifically try to kill them off in the endgame, with Zaeed and Kasumi not being the ones in question.

I'd like to see Kasumi and Samara carried into ME3 for numerous reasons, mainly because I think they both have good points to move forward into further development, now that their "big thing they've been striving towards" has been fulfilled. Kasumi has Keji's graybox (or doesn't, depending on what you do) and experienced the memories within, so she has her closure with him. Samara has killed Morinth (or been killed by her, again, depending on what you do), so she's fulfilled her life's mission and has her closure. Both of those characters may have some finding of a path to follow after those items have been fulfilled.

Zaeed's gotten his revenge, and from what he's talked about in his loyalty mission, he's tiring of the gun for hire route, so he may be looking for something to end his life with/go out on a high note. He's talked about finding somewhere to pack it up and retire, so in that way, I could see him coming back / not coming back and be fine with either event.

I think Bioware easily made sure in their planning for ME3 that all the ME2 love interests moving forward into ME3, so I know we've covered six of the squadmates. Out of the rest, I can't see them kicking Mordin and Grunt to the curb so quickly, with the effort they put in with their character development in ME2. The rest, I'd like to see Samara and Kasumi come back for obvious reasons, though Zaeed and Jacob, I'd be fine with them coming back or not coming back.

Originally Posted by Ryuukishi That's a really good point. Maybe BioWare would throw in alternates (like, if Wrex and Grunt are both dead, you get Wreav, but in no other circumstance). Or maybe they're just going to give us Liara, Ash/Kaidan, everyone from ME2 who was recruited and alive including Zaeed and Kasumi, and 4-5 newcomers too. Standing room only on the Normandy.

You're going to have to work out the Mordin / krogan situation (via Wrex, Grunt or Wreav), though there's much too much left in limbo without resolution to let that go by the wayside.

I'm sure we may see some changes in quarters on the Normandy if we're suddenly up to having more than the ME2 crew onboard.

I hope they have TONS of squadmates to choose from. Obviously we're going to get a few new NPCs, but I'd love to see 15-17 options in ME3. They greatly expanded the number between ME1 and ME2, so I'd like to see it again expanded in ME3.

Threads I look forward to being wrapped up in ME3:

Alliance vs. Cerberus (Miranda stays with Shep?)
Batarians vs. everybody else
Geth (and heretics)- what part do they play?
Krogan factions (conflict with Mordin)
Romance battle (I romanced Ashley then Miranda - this should be a great showdown)
The motha- Rachni
Blasto, the first Hanar Spectre - IS HE REAL???

High quality (readable) Game Informer scans.

Readable? Hardly.

I read it.

To be fair it's much easier to read on a touch screen mobile device as you can zoom in on the pics.

Anyone remember the final mission from Wing Commander 4? You had a 1v1 dogfight with this genetically engineered superhuman, then you went to Earth to defend yourself vs. Admiral Tolwyn on charges of treason.

If you didn't give the correct responses during the trial, you would be found guilty. If you did it properly then Tolwyn would be found guilty.

It would be cool to me if ME 3 did something similar with the trial on the beginning, at least that the events of the trial led to some of the possible endings.

I just got my issue of GI. I'm more spoiler-phobic than I've ever been since the opening of ME2 was spoiled months in advance. But, it's hard to not read the article. Some of the new, what I'm assuming are, baddies look a hell of a lot like Raiden from Metal Gear Solid 4. While it's a cool look, I don't know if it gels with the ME universe. Time will tell, I suppose.

Spoilerific Spoilers/Awesome Game Info Warning: http://www.xbox360achievements.org/news/news-8147-Even-More-Mass-Effect-3-Details-Reveal-New-Locations--SWAT-Moves-and-More.html

No vehicles! YES! Worst part of both ME games hands down.

All of the locations sound awesome.

More acrobatic Shepard sounds all right. Not sure about laying turrets as an Engineer though. Even ME2 was fast-paced enough that a stationary turret wouldn't help much. If this game is going to be even faster and more movement oriented, it seems like a useless skill.

I think I'm the only living being that enjoyed the Mako stuff. That is one of the iconic parts of ME1. I remember driving on the moon for the first time with Earth in the background. Powerful stuff.

Firewalker.....not so much.

Originally Posted by chubbyninja1319 I think I'm the only living being that enjoyed the Mako stuff. That is one of the iconic parts of ME1. I remember driving on the moon for the first time with Earth in the background. Powerful stuff. Firewalker.....not so much.

It's like... I hated the Make at the time, and it was really aggravating, but in retrospect it wasn't that bad.

Honestly, I still prefer mining for minerals over the Mako...

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I liked the Mako for exploration. I just hated it for combat since the shields took such a stupidly long time to recharge.

Firewalker's main problem was being to weak, and the missions not having check points many times so you'd die toward the end of one and have to do the whole thing over.

But yeah, I'd just prefer not having any vehicle sections and mineral scanning with the faster scanner we got after the patch. Keep it mostly focused on on foot missions as that's the core of the game.

Originally Posted by chubbyninja1319 I think I'm the only living being that enjoyed the Mako stuff. That is one of the iconic parts of ME1. I remember driving on the moon for the first time with Earth in the background. Powerful stuff. Firewalker.....not so much.

I agree about the driving on the moon and looking up at the Earth being a very impressive in-game piece.

Some of the other planets had some impressive views, though getting to them was a PITA at times. Mainly because the layout to get to the mining areas or other areas you needed to get to redefined the term obtuse.

Originally Posted by dmaul1114 I liked the Mako for exploration. I just hated it for combat since the shields took such a stupidly long time to recharge. Firewalker's main problem was being to weak, and the missions not having check points many times so you'd die toward the end of one and have to do the whole thing over. But yeah, I'd just prefer not having any vehicle sections and mineral scanning with the faster scanner we got after the patch. Keep it mostly focused on on foot missions as that's the core of the game.

The Mako did take a good pounding over the Hammerhead, though the shield weakness was a real irritant in comparison.

The "no checkpoints" in those Hammerhead missions was ridiculous. No reason for it whatsoever.

Given the choice between the two, I'd have to lean towards mining over vehicles, though between the Mako and the Hammerhead, there's enough good between the two to make one vehicle that works with the best of both.