UPDATE: Footage of the panel has appeared online, along with a few more details, including confirmation that you'll be playing as a human character. You'll find it below.

The Escapist has video from the event, which includes footage of the Mako in action (BioWare appear determined to make it less horrible to control than the old one, thankfully), some nice conceptual art, and speculation that the game will take place within Shepard's lifetime (although it won't star Shepard). If you saw EA's conference at E3, you'll know that this all part of their new approach to game reveals: ie to reveal things much earlier than before. The next Mass Effect is still years out, according to BioWare, and a lot of this stuff is still up in the air. It does seem like Mako customisation is currently included the game though. Here's the video:



Original story:

It's natural to expect the big game-related news to emerge out of E3 or Gamescom, but BioWare just revealed a load of new details about the next Mass Effect in a panel at Comic-Con, which they reiterate is totally not called Mass Effect 4. The mighty Nerd Appropriate were on hand to take sneaky images, and thanks to their sterling work we now know that the first game's infuriating/awesome spacecar the Mako will be making a return - they even showed footage of the thing in action, although sadly video hasn't leaked of that yet. More details after the break, which may or may not include the letters 'N7'.

Firstly, that image up there, courtesy of The Escapist's Andrea Rene (Thanks, Joystiq). The Mako is back! Along with the words "Your Mako", suggesting an element of vehicle customisation. Similarly, the words "Your hero" were emblazoned above images of male and female player characters that appear to be clad in N7 armour, as seen here:



If you're thinking, "Wait, didn't Shepard wear N7 armour?" you're right, but BioWare reiterated that this isn't Shepard's story, despite the implications of you wearing getup reminiscent of that famous dudette/dude's iconic garb. GameFront's Phil Horshaw was also at the event, and quoted BioWare as saying "our hero has something to with N7", ruling out my pet theory of the player character being a gangly Hanar.

Other titbits, courtesy of Nerd Appropriate: familiar characters might reappear in Not-Mass-Effect-4, while the game's multiplayer component will likely focus on co-op, and have players assuming one of a variety of races. More details are likely to spill out over the next day or so - until then, we'll be reliving our best/worst Mako memories, and imagining how an ME1-style planet might look rendered in the Frostbite engine.

The second GaymerX the LGBTQ-oriented gaming convention took place last weekend. In addition to workshops, parties and more Pokemon-themed competitions than you would think possible, the event also featured a number of guest speakers. Among them, Bioware's David Gaider, Jessica Merizan, Robyn Th berge, Karin Weekes and Patrick Weekes who participated in two panels: "Building a Better Romance" and "Freaking out the Neighbours". Bioware have now uploaded the audio from both talks to YouTube.

Here's Building a Better Romance, described as, "a discussion of how romances came to be in BioWare games."



The second talk, Freaking out the Neighbours, focuses on representation, inclusiveness, and the negative reactions such topics can provoke. "What is 'good representation' in games and why would anyone be opposed to it?" asks the talk's description. "Considering the romance elements in BioWare games, we've heard it all, and it's worth discussing where some of these feelings come from and how it's possible for a developer to be inclusive in a way we can feel good about."



Each talk is just under an hour, but they're both interesting topics and ones that reveal a lot about Bioware's approach and thinking.

BioWare teased the future of Mass Effect during EA s press conference during the first day of E3 today. BioWare Montreal is working on the next Mass Effect game, which will feature new locations, new characters, and new stories.



BioWare Montreal sees it as a clean sheet, a chance to build a new Mass Effect series without being beholden to the story and characters that have become so celebrated in the Commander Shepard games. BioWare won t reveal any details of what they re working on just yet, but it s encouraging to think that we ll get to spend more time in the Mass Effect universe and see it with fresh eyes. The prototype footage shown included a roaring Krogan.

While BioWare Montreal works on the next generation of Mass Effect stories, BioWare Edmonton is developing a completely new, so far unrevealed, concept.

Every week Andy celebrates a great map, level, or location from a classic PC game in On The Level. Warning: spoilers ahead for the entire Mass Effect series.

The Normandy is the most advanced military starship in the galaxy, but it s also home. The hum of the engines, the beeps and chirps of the computers, and the murmur of the crew are the sounds of solace in the Mass Effect series. It s where you regroup after a mission, battered and bruised, and plan your next move. It s where you confide in your crew, reminisce with old friends, and consummate your romances. And even though millions of people have played Mass Effect, it s your ship.

Games like Star Trek: Bridge Commander and Artemis are better at simulating the experience of being in command of a starship, but Mass Effect captures the romantic feel of it; of exploring alien worlds, getting involved in space-politics, and saving the galaxy. It also helps that the Normandy looks so cool. Not just the exterior, but the interior too, which has a hard 70s sci-fi edge to it. This is not J.J. Abrams shiny Enterprise; it s cold and functional, fitted for its military purpose.



Until Cerberus get their hands on it, that is. What I love about Mass Effect is that even though you re always in command of some version of the Normandy, in each game it has a very different ambience. The original model, the SSV, was built by the turians and the Systems Alliance, which explains its utilitarian military design. But when Cerberus rebuild it in the second game, naming it the Normandy SR2, they make it a little more hospitable. They add a bar, luxury quarters for Shepard, a spacious office for Miranda, and brighten the lights with a warm, orange glow.

But in Mass Effect 3, where Cerberus become the enemy, the SR2 falls into the hands of the Alliance, who don t hesitate in getting it back up to military muster. The warm lighting is gone, replaced with colder tones, reminiscent of the SSV. Wires hang from loose panels on the walls and ceiling, showing that this was a hasty retrofit. The Reapers are coming, after all: hardly time to worry about tidying up. Some comforts remain, namely the bar, which now has a card table, but this is a far cry from the cosy SR2. The Alliance obviously don t want soldiers getting too comfortable in times of war.



BioWare have a long track record of manipulating players emotions, and they use your love of the Normandy against you on a number of occasions. The second game opens with it being unceremoniously destroyed by the Collectors. Later you visit the crash site, picking through the shattered remains to find your sadly departed crew s dog tags. Then, near the end, the Collectors board the ship, snatching the crew as you sneak Joker to safety. It feels like a home invasion, and suddenly your safe haven doesn t feel so safe anymore. If you didn t drop everything and immediately go through the Omega Relay to rescue the crew, you must have a heart of stone.

Does the Normandy sit alongside the likes of the Millennium Falcon and the Enterprise in the pantheon of great fictional spaceships? Maybe not, but it means more to me than either of them, and this is coming from a pretty huge Star Wars and Star Trek fan. We all played the same game bar a few branching paths and moral choices and commanded the same ship with the same layout and crew, but Mass Effect feels like a curiously personal game to me. When I think about the series, I don t think about Shepard or the Reapers or the grand space opera; I think about the soothing purr of the drive core, the spinning galaxy map, and the stars streaking past the windows.

Here's the Mass Effect edition of Andy's video series, Other Places. Andy recently wrote about some of his favourite scenic walks in gaming for The Guardian.

As a jerk, I'm tempted to shout "HEY EVERYBODY, LOOK AT THIS IMPORTANT NEWS ABOUT THE NEXT MASS EFFECT." If you want that, though, you're going to need to leave this website, get into a time machine, and travel a year or so into the future. What we have here is good ol', entirely inconsequential teasers. A series of pictures were tweeted over November 7th (or "N7 Day" as BioWare so desperately want people to rechristen it), showing Mass Effect developers working on a Mass Effect game. If you really, really squint, you might even see a tiny bit of some new Mass Effect.

In order of tweeting, then.



"The next chapter of Mass Effect is upon us!!" Upon them? Yes. Upon us? Not so much.



"...with new characters to fall in love with..." the tweet-fest continues, showing us concept art of a new character who is growing an artist out the left side of his body.



"...new enemies to encounter..." is a pretty mean way to refer to one of your staff members, guys.



...and new worlds to explore!"

And that is all the Mass Effect news we're likely to get for a while.

Thanks, IGN.

Were you hoping for Commander Shepard to make a triumphant reappearance in the next Mass Effect, after that thing happened at the end of ME3 that a lot of people got quite upset about? (I seem to recall that he/she turned the island off and on again, and then it turned out everyone was dead all along.) Well consider your hopes dashed: Mass Effect 3 lead writer Mac Walters has explained to Complex that BioWare want to move the series on. "The idea is that we have agreed to tell a story that doesn't relate necessarily to any of the Shepard events at all, whatsoever".

"That's what we've been deciding for a while," Walters continued. "But throughout it all, one of the key things is that it has to be Mass Effect. It can't just feel like a spin-off. It has to feel like a Mass Effect game at its heart, at its core. Just without the Shepard character or the Shepard specific companions." Mordin, we hardly knew ye.

Walters went on to talk about Mass Effect 3's controversial ending.

"It's been 18-19 months since it came out and my thoughts on it are that we addressed it the best we could in the Extended Cut. We're obviously not going to be changing anything now. We're only going forward.

"To be fair, I get people, especially at the conventions, who will say, 'I loved it. It was heart-wrenching, but I felt it was right for my Shepard.' And to me, that's why it was the right path. But because there was no choice, it was going to be right for some people, and for others, in the middle, and other people were obviously very upset about it. In hindsight, I don't think there was anything we would have changed about that, but it is a really good lesson learned."

What else do we know about the next Mass Effect so far? Pretty much zip, other than that it will share its "core systems" with Dragon Age: Inquistion.

Thanks, Eurogamer.