Mass Effect 3 Multiplayer Previews and Interview

In addition to a hands-on preview of Mass Effect 3, Xbox360Achievements.org has cranked out an interview with BioWare Edmonton’s Aaryn Flynn about the game’s newly added co-op multiplayer. An excerpt from the latter:

So, are there any RPG elements that you’ve taken from the main game across into the co-op or is it all about the shooter action?

The foundation for the four-player online co-op is the really cool single-player gameplay we’ve upgraded in Mass Effect 3, so new animations, tons of fun stuff there, more and more action stuff. Then from there, inside the co-op, you’ve also got stuff you can do to customise your character, customising your weapons, upgrading them through stuff you earn and purchase inside the game, etc, etc, so lots to do there.

So there’s a ranking system too, right? How does that work?

Yeah, you can level your character up as well, you can upgrade your skill tree and do more and more stuff, for that character specifically inside the co-op campaign as well.

And for something a little different, we’ll send you over to GameInformer for five reasons why multiplayer in Mass Effect 3 is a good idea:

3) The Depth Is There
The goal in co-op mode isn’t just to survive waves of bad guys until you are eventually overpowered. Each mission has a finite number of waves, and if you make it all the way through, you get a nice experience bonus. But even if you fail, you retain the XP you gained. That XP is the core of my favorite part of ME3’s multiplayer: the leveling. Each class has a full set of skills like you’d see in the single-player campaign, including different branches for each power. As your character gains levels, you earn more skill points to apply to your abilities, like increasing health, learning new biotic powers, or decreasing cooldown times. All of these upgrades carry over from match to match, and the persistence gives you the satisfying sense of building a powerhouse from the ground up.