Studio Bioware is famous for its openness and taking on difficult, social topics in its productions, often causing waves of criticism among the audience.
Thanks to the news of the Mass Effect remaster , fans are increasingly remembering the iconic trilogy and discussing what to expect in the new games. A large part of the audience believes that the possible romance options will be adjusted, which have become one of the key elements of the game. Gamers expect Studio to approach the topic more liberally than more than 10 years ago, when the developers were faced with a lot of controversy on this issue.
Bioware games are known for a wide representation of LGBTQ + environments, but the creators did not always have the opportunity to act freely in this matter. For the original trilogy, the studio faced huge criticism from the American station Fox News, which is one of the more conservative foreign media outlets. The opposition concerned especially the character of Jack, a prisoner whom the main character (or heroine) recruits to take part in a suicide mission to stop the Collectors that threaten humanity. In a recent interview with The Gamer , one of the creators of Mass Effect 2 , Brian Kindregan, revealed that the heroine was to identify as pansexual. These plans, however, were abandoned, following criticism from the station.
This caused quite a surprise among fans who expected Jack to become a romance option not only for the male gamer. The actress herself, who gave the heroine her voice, also spoke. She herself had always viewed Jack as a pansexual and was as surprised as the players were when it turned out otherwise. Kindregan also admitted in an interview that at the time of changing the decision about the sexual orientation of the character, the game was already at an advanced level of development, so the changes in this matter were difficult and not everything could be undone.
The creator also said that the change of the heroine’s orientation was not a decision of one, reluctant to this subject. It was related to the general controversy with which Mass Effect 1 was then struggling. In 2007, sexual themes were considered a kind of taboo, the more that the first installment of the trilogy allowed the player to have a homosexual romance. However, he was safer in terms of public opinion, since the Asari race with whom the love plot could be undertaken is same-sex. After all, it was not without criticism. The game was also accused of brutality and objectifying the female body. Fans stood up for the defense, who consider the game to be one of the best representation of a strong female character in the history of RPGs.
However, not all is lost. With the passage of time and a socially freer approach to the topic of sexual orientation, Bioware games began to gain more and more representation. Pansexual characters have already appeared in the history of the studio (eg Iron Bull in Dragon Age: Inquisition ), so perhaps with the remaster players will gain access to the hearts of more heroes. Brian Kindregan himself gives hope for this in an interview, saying that perhaps one day we will see Jack in the original version.