Mass Effect 4 Release Date News: BioWare Says Game Will Be 'Fresh but Recognizeable,' Many Expect Announcement In Early 2014

A fourth installment in the popular "Mass Effect" franchise has been the subject of a great deal of conjecture and rumor for the past year or so. BioWare, the development company behind the original trilogy as well as the "Dragon Age" games, confirmed the title's existence earlier this year and have been slowly teasing the game while simultaneously keeping their mouths shut about anything too juicy. Now an employee for the company has revealed a little bit about the game on his Twitter page.

Aaron Flynn, the general manager at Montreal and Edmonton-based studios revealed that the game will be "Ambitious. Beautiful. Fresh but recognizable. And fun!" in a tweet sent out earlier today.

Initial reports from earlier this year indicated that some early drafts of the game were being shown internally to some of BioWare's employees. Following that on November 7, otherwise known as N7 day for fans of the trilogy, the developer revealed some image teasers about the upcoming game set in the Mass Effect universe. It mostly showed people in the office hard at work building the game on the already established engine. BioWare has revealed that it will be borrowing a lot of the key game systems from its other hit title "Dragon Age: Inquisition." The game is built on the same engine, which means "Mass Effect 4" could build off of it rather than completely starting from scratch. Unfortunately this has not resulted in the game being released any faster than a usual title launch of this magnitude.

With this much buzz surrounding the game, and with it apparently in enough of a finished state to begin letting employees test drive it, it's likely that fans can expect some big news from BioWare sometime in the very near future. The likely spot will be in early 2014.

Very little is known about the game's plot other than that it will take place in the same universe as Commander Shepard's three-game story. However, in order to let that trilogy remain a self-contained story, the makes of "Mass Effect 4" have said that Shepard won't be back and will definitely not be the new playable character.