Player choices are often critical to the progression of games like Mass Effect 2, though it seems many players are making the same choices in Mass Effect Legendary Edition that they did when Mass Effect 2 first launched. The company revealed its stats among Mass Effect Legendary Edition players in July, which showed patterns in crucial choices such as the fate of the rachni queen in Mass Effect 1 or Wrex's survival on Virmire, and these also showed how consistent player choices can sometimes be - despite how much freedom players are offered.
Everything from Shepard's morality to the survival of different crewmates can be impacted by players, and BioWare collects and analyzes these statistics to help design future Mass Effect games moving forward. Some decisions have been overwhelmingly favored over others - 96% of players pardoned Tali during her loyalty mission in Mass Effect 2 - and others were closer to an even split, such as who is left behind on Virmire. Only 60% of players chose Ashley's survival over Kaidan's.
The nature of many of these choices, alongside additional data from BioWare, seems to indicate that most players choose Paragon over Renegade in the Mass Effect trilogy. This could be because of how beneficial Paragon actions tend to be when compared to Renegade, something that BioWare could adjust moving forward as Mass Effect 4's eventual release approaches. It wouldn't be the first time player feedback and in-game decisions altered the course of a game's development.
BioWare's use of player statistics in its design practices was discussed by developer Casey Hudson with IGN a few months after the initial release of Mass Effect 2. The data provided then revealed that 80% of players opt to play as a male Shepard as opposed to a female Shepard. This still holds true in Mass Effect Legendary Edition, albeit to a lesser extent: 68% of players picked a male Shepard this time around, compared to 32% that played as female Shepards. This could be due to the fact that male Shepard is seen as Mass Effect's default character in much of the game's marketing as well as its character selection screen.
Another stat that holds true across both ME2 and Mass Effect Legendary Edition is the class balance. Soldier was the most played class in Mass Effect 2, reportedly more than any other class in Mass Effect combined. In Mass Effect Legendary Edition, the gap isn't quite so large, with Soldiers making up only 40% of the playerbase. This could likewise be influenced by the fact that default Shepard is a Soldier, though. Vanguard and Infiltrator were the second-highest selections, perhaps indicating that many Mass Effect players prefer to have at least a mix of combat-focused abilities as opposed to none at all. Engineer remained the most unpopular class in both games, however, with only 5% of Mass Effect Legendary Edition players selecting it for their playthrough.
Source: IGN
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