Mass Effect 4 Shouldn't Play It Safe with Any Companions

Mass Effect 4 Shouldn’t Play It Safe with Any Companions

• Allowing for squadmate deaths in the next Mass Effect could enhance replayability and create vastly different playthrough experiences.
• Mass Effect 4 has the opportunity to give players never-before-seen companion dynamics, drawing inspiration from modern RPG trends.
• The next game could offer the freedom to let the entire party perish, leading to more meaningful routes and worldbuilding after the events of the original trilogy.

Commander Shepard had a level of control over the narrative that allowed for optional companions to be left behind in the original Mass Effect trilogy, and this kind of dynamic has the potential to make the next game feel properly tailored around the player’s desires. With some of the most memorable examples of these situations involving the deaths of existing or potential companions, however, allowing the entire squad to end up dead in the next Mass Effect would serve to represent a remarkable example of freedom in a party-based RPG.

Skipping out on characters is an interesting way to shape the game around an individual’s preferences, but killing them off can make for vastly different playthroughs that enhance long-term replayability. Considering that Mass Effect’s sad companion deaths are already some of the most memorable in modern sci-fi RPGs and design trends have been shifting towards this direction in the industry as a whole, the next game should have plenty of inspiration to draw from.

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How Mass Effect 4 Can Flip the Script with its Companions

Mass Effect 4 is the perfect opportunity to give players something they’ve never seen before from the series by tapping into the rich lore.

Some of the Mass Effect Trilogy’s Most Intense Moments Involve Squadmate Deaths

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Wrex on Virmire and ME3’s Galaxy of Consequences

In a moment that is emotionally difficult for many players, Wrex threatens to betray the party during the original Mass Effect’s divisive Virmire mission. He can die right there and never appear again in the series or be talked down with sufficient skill, and the same mission requires the player to let either Kaidan or Ashley die. By the time of the final entry, Shepard has so much influence in the galaxy that the player can allow entire planetary populations to die out, leading to the tragic loss of a mainstay like Tali and other companions from previous titles.

ME2 and Its Suicide Mission Are a Masterclass in Modular Gameplay

Not only can players choose to leave many of their companions behind in the first place, but Mass Effect 2’s Samara can be killed straight up and replaced with her vampiric daughter, for example. The final Suicide Mission allows Shepard to assign roles to the party, and making the wrong choice here will prove permanently fatal for them. This can act as a moment of narrative consistency or an instance of the player sending these characters to their deaths, but the level of choice it represents is its biggest achievement.

The Next Mass Effect Should Give Players the Freedom to Let the Entire Party Perish

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Creating Meaningfully Distinct Routes and Worldbuilding After the Reapers

Any number of characters dying throughout the original trilogy was generally handled by replacing them with a more generic NPC filling the same role in terms of narrative, and BioWare going into the next ME with this type of design philosophy could lead to even more variation in these sorts of playthroughs.

Since the next game will likely see a rebuilt galaxy after the Destroy ending of Mass Effect 3, it could even make narrative sense for certain companions to be relegated to conflicting factions which push the player to side against certain options. It’s unknown if the next protagonist will be as much of a heroic icon as Shepard, so there’s more room than ever for morally ambiguous actions like killing squadmates.

How BioWare-Influenced Titles like Baldur’s Gate 3 Handle Killing Companions

It might be true that routes like the one involving Shepard’s death in ME2 due to having no living companions aren’t usually able to be canon to series lore in RPGs, but this doesn’t mean elements of it can’t be managed effectively. Titles like Pillars of Eternity and Baldur’s Gate 3 have utilized similar formulas, but feature no limits on allowing the player to kill the entire party and end up completely alone.

BG3’s Dark Urge Origin even focuses on this concept in specificity, showing how some of the most notable modern RPGs have been able to make the most of companion deaths. Whether or not the next Mass Effect prominently features returning characters, building up its roster just to let them be torn down could be one of its most effective emotional tools.

Mass Effect: Legendary Edition

Mass Effect: Legendary Edition is a three-game pack, featuring the original Commander Shepard trilogy. Players will have access to each game, as well as all of the appropriate DLC. The titles feature graphical enhancements and other small tweaks.

FranchiseMass EffectPlatform(s)PS4, PC, Xbox OneReleasedMay 14, 2021Developer(s)BioWarePublisher(s)Electronic ArtsGenre(s)Action, RPGEngineUnreal Engine 4ESRBM for Mature: Blood, Drug Reference, Partial Nudity, Sexual Content, Strong Language, Use of Alcohol, ViolenceHow Long To Beat100+ HoursX|S EnhancedYesFile Size Xbox Series21 GB (November 2023)Metascore87