BioWare is Going “All Hands on Deck” for Next ME3 DLC

I may have been underwhelmed by Mass Effect 3’s Leviathan DLC but I was more underwhelmed by the follow-up Omega DLC. What was expected to be ME3’s equivalent to Lair of the Shadow Broker turned out more like its Overlord. For the third post-launch DLC, BioWare has gone all hands on deck. Most of the production team’s major players from the full game are back to work on this DLC. That includes the writers, composer Sam Hulick and even voice actors from the main cast.

SPOILER WARNING: While no plot points are discussed in this post, locations and characters involved in the as yet unnamed DLC are included.

The rumours about this DLC have been around since the release of Leviathan. Fans mined the DLC’s data and found evidence of the Omega DLC and a second set of new levels in the updated level listing. These were tagged “Cit” but were listed after the new Omega levels and weren’t part of the launch campaign or the Leviathan DLC. For now, folks are unofficially code naming this the Citadel DLC.

It’s important to note that this DLC is being developed by BioWare’s Edmonton studio. The Edmonton team was the primary development team for the single-player campaign, the Leviathan DLC and the Extended Cut. The recent Omega DLC was completely under the watch of BioWare Montreal who are also in charge of Mass Effect 4. Changing studios may not make much of a difference in terms of the quality of the gameplay, the visuals or the audio but it could mean a re-emphasis on the story and Mass Effect lore when one uses Edmonton’s Leviathan and Montreal’s Omega as a basis for that assumption.

While none of your crew made an appearance in the Omega DLC, it looks like you’re getting the band back together for this new DLC. Seth Green was unofficially confirmed to return as Joker thanks to a tweet by a BioWare voice director. Rafael Sbarge said on Twitter that he recorded lines for an ME3 DLC. If Sbarge is back as Alenko, Kimberly Brooks automatically has to return as Williams.

The writing team will be nine people strong and includes ME3 lead writer Mac Walters. This isn’t the first DLC that BioWare has used all of the game’s writers. There was a little one back in June called “Extended Cut” that all the writers were consulted on. While that doesn’t guarantee that the DLC will be massive in scope, it likely means that all of your squadmates will be back as the writers are responsible for writing for an individual character. It also means there will be a lot of input into this DLC and hopefully some excellent story and missions are a result.

Lead composer of ME3 Sam Hulick confirmed his return to the game in a series of tweets describing music he was working on for the DLC. He also suggested that their was a “high potential for tears.” The composing duo of Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco also confirmed that they would be working on music for the DLC. Dikiciyan told Eurogamer that there would be more music in the upcoming DLC than the other Mass Effect DLCs.

The DLC is probably pretty far along in development. Mike Gamble tweeted that he played the DLC for two hours the other day. Jos Hendricks, a BioWare level designer, has already tweeted that he’s completed preliminary work on his part of the DLC. He later clarified on the BioWare forums that there was still polish work to be done so it’s not finished.

Apart from knowing that the next DLC is on the Citadel and will involve your crew in some capacity, details are scarce. I won’t begin to speculate what this DLC will involve. Given that BioWare has stated that there won’t be any more DLC relating to the ending, it limits what can happen to the main characters that would have the potential for tears. All secondary characters I would consider memorable have their stories wrapped up during the main campaign. I can’t think of any character who has an obvious loose end still needing to tie up that could result in tears.

What we can be fairly certain of is that this DLC will be big as evidenced by the use of the full writing staff and most of the score composers. However, slightly important bits of information like a release date and price are still unknown. If Omega was a $15 DLC, I wouldn’t expect this Citadel DLC to be any less than that.

Sources:
CVG – Mass Effect 3 DLC: BioWare ‘all hands on deck’ for next add-on
Eurogamer – BioWare “all hands on deck” for new Mass Effect 3 DLC