The Mass Effect trilogy remaster that Electronic Arts and BioWare announced late last year received an official launch date today. The Mass Effect Legendary Edition is now slated to launch on May 14, 2021, bringing back the sci-fi epic to modern platforms with various enhancements. Watch the first gameplay trailer of the collection above.
Everything from character models and textures to shaders, lighting, and even the pre-rendered cinematics across the trilogy have been enhanced in this release, letting fans jump in for a 4K optimized experience. Moreover, some locations like Eden Prime, Ilos, and Feros have been given special attention to boost their visuals drastically, while gunplay, squad controls, UI, and even the Mako"s handling have been given modernization tweaks.
Adding to that, the default female Shepard appearance from Mass Effect 3 has been brought back as an option for the first two games, letting players start their journey with that official appearance much like the iconic male Shepard appearance.
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"It’s been an incredible journey revisiting the stories, characters and iconic moments of the Mass Effect trilogy, enhancing the experience for modern platforms while staying true to the spirit of the original," said Mac Walters, Legendary Edition Project Director and lead writer of the original trilogy. "Remastering a game, let alone three, is a huge undertaking as there’s over 100 hours of gameplay included, but we wanted to do this for our fans as well as a new generation of gamers looking to jump into the iconic story of Shepard."
The collection comes with the complete trilogy, all their DLC content from missions to weapons, and even original collector"s edition bonuses. However, the multiplayer side of things is not included in the package.
Mass Effect Legendary Edition is now available for pre-order across PC (Origin and Steam), Xbox One, and PlayStation 4 with a $59.99 price tag. Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5 will be able to jump in using their backward compatibility features. BioWare is also developing a new Mass Effect entry, though the project is still in its early stages and does not have a name attached to it yet.