Mass Effect 2’s Cut Content to Resurface in Mass Effect 3

OXM UK is offering up the results of a brief conversation they had with BioWare’s Mac Walters, during which the lead writer confirms that some Citadel-based missions that were cut from Mass Effect 2 will be making an appearance in Mass Effect 3 instead. He also questions the way that they ended up handling ME2’s ending:

“There was a Mass Effect 2 plot that was a kind of callback to the first Mass Effect that was going to be on the Citadel, and we cut it. But now it’s made a resurrection in Mass Effect 3, so I’m happy, but I can’t say what it is. That’s the nice thing about trilogies, sometimes you get a second chance.”

Mass Effect 2’s premise and possible endings were a headache to write around, Walters admitted, particularly given the need to prepare the ground for a threequel.

I don’t think I’d call it ‘trapped’,” he explained, when asked how he felt about having to accommodate several possible player decisions at key plot junctures. “They’re more hurdles. Sometimes they’re hurdles that we’ve given ourselves, so we kind of smack ourselves in the head and say ‘What the hell were we thinking? Why did we do that?’

The classic example is ‘Hey, let’s make the ending of Mass Effect 2 a suicide mission where all your henchmen can possibly die, and Shepard can even die!’ Oh right… and then we’re gonna do another game after that. What the hell are we gonna do with all those guys?”