Mass Effect/Dragon Age Interview

[GameBanshee News]

The editors at IGN recently had the chance to grill BioWare's Ray Muzyka about Mass Effect, Dragon Age, the PC market, and more.

On the subject of Dragon Age, we've heard next to nothing for over a year now except for the guys at BioWare claiming it's a dark, more mature kind of RPG. Presumably they've wanted to keep the focus on Mass Effect PC before rolling out more Dragon Age news, which makes sense, so hopefully later on this summer we'll start to hear more about it. Muzyka called it the, "spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate," which should be exciting for anyone who played those Dungeons & Dragons-based PC RPGs back in the late 1990s.

"Dragon Age has been in development for a while," said Muzyka. "Part of that is BioWare's attention to quality and detail and making this rich universe that you want to be part of. Dragon Age is in BioWare's sweet spot; it's the ultimate fantasy-adventure. It's going to appeal to the fans of Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights and it's sort of the next generation of that…We haven't talked about it recently because we're just building up to something hopefully in the near future…I was just playing it last week and it's pretty damn cool."

And that's pretty much all that's being said on the subject for now, so on to Mass Effect. Whether you played the game already on the Xbox 360 or are waiting for it on PC, you should know it's planned as a trilogy, which raises a few questions about continuity between the first game and its sequels. For instance, do you control Commander Shepard in the second game? "Obviously we care a lot about Commander Shepard as a character; we've invested a lot in him," says Muzyka. "The fans certainly reciprocate, they really like him as a character…him or her. It makes sense to continue that. We've got a lot of creative ideas in the mix about how do you build a trilogy and still have this strong character that transcends the different games. We haven't announced any details yet, but I can tell you it's something we're taking seriously."