BioWare Says Sorry For ‘Mass Effect: Andromeda’ Transgender Character Following Backlash
“Mass Effect: Andromeda” developer BioWare is now apologizing for its portrayal of a transgender character in the action RPG. The Edmonton, Canada-based video game developer is reportedly saying sorry after it received a lot of criticism over its new NPC Hainly Abrams.
In a statement the developer published on Twitter this Wednesday, BioWare admitted that it did not think carefully on how to present the transgender character in the new “Mass Effect” game. The company then apologized and vowed to fix the problem by releasing a new update that will change Abrams’ dialogue in the game.
“In ‘Mass Effect: Andromeda,’ one of our non-player characters, Hainly Abrams, was not included in a caring or thoughtful way. We apologize to anyone who interacted with or was hurt by this conversation,” BioWare stated. “This was never our intent, and was an unfortunate byproduct of the iterative process of game design and a change in the structure of the character's dialogue.”
According to Eurogamer, players were not pleased with how Abrams is presented in the game. Apparently, when players encounter the transgender NPC, the scientific director will immediately reveal her backstory and her former identity as Ryder. This is upsetting players because the inclusion of the character feels forced considering that she’s detailing her life story even though she’s a complete stranger to the players.
BioWare shared that is it has already consulted members of the transgender community, both internally and in the broader community, as it works to remedy the problem. The developer added that with the upcoming update, Abrams will only talk about her former identity once she has developed trust with the player.
BioWare’s apology comes a day after it revealed via its blog that the new patch (1.05) is coming to “Mass Effect: Andromeda” players this Thursday. The update is going to include character creator options, general character appearance improvements and fixes for syncing problems with the lips and facial acting of characters in some conversations. The new patch will also enable players to just skip the autopilot sequences in the galaxy map.
Check out the release notes for patch 1.05 below:
- Improved tutorial placement
- Increased inventory limits
- Single player balance changes: Ammo crates, armor, weapons, nomad, profiles, attacks, and progression
- Multiplayer balance changes: Weapons, cover, and enemies (check back for detailed notes on balance changes)
- Improved matchmaking and latency in multiplayer
- Added option to skip autopilot sequences in the galaxy map
- Decreased the cost of remnant decryption keys and made them more accessible at merchants
- Improved logic, timing, and continuity for relationships and story arcs
- Improved lip-sync and facial acting during some conversations, including localized VO
- Fixed an issue with Ryder’s movements when running in a zig zag pattern
- Improved the appearance of eyes for human and asari characters
- Fixed various collision issues
- Fixed bugs where music or VO wouldn’t play or wasn’t correct
- Fixed issue where global squad mate banter sometimes wasn’t firing on UNCs
- Fixed issue where player was unable to access the Remnant Console Interface after failing decryption multiple times
- Fixed issue where fast travel is sometimes disabled after recruiting Drack until the player reloads a save
- Fixed issue where Ryder can become stuck in the start of Biotic Charge Pose
- Fixes issues related to some saves
- Fixed issue where objective sometimes becomes un-interactable for players in multiplayer
- Streaming and stability improvements
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