Though it's only been out for less than a week, Mass Effect Legendary Edition has already scored the franchises’ highest player count on Steam. Indeed, fans have been waiting a long time for the Legendary Edition, which remasters all three installments of BioWare's beloved sci-fi RPG trilogy and its numerous DLC content with stunning current-gen graphics.
The visuals aren’t the only welcome change brought on by the Mass Effect Legendary Edition update. BioWare went back and addressed some elements that either haven't aged well or were poorly received back when the series debuted in the mid-to-late 2000s, such as the Mako rover’s infamously rocky handling or the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it reveal of Tail’s unmasked face. However, the core gameplay and premise that made the Mass Effect trilogy such a success has remained: as the fully customizable Commander Shepard, players are tasked with gathering a rag-tag group of allies together to save the galaxy from a sinister synthetic race known as the Reapers, with important narrative and dialog choices carrying over from one game to the next.
The love and care brought into bringing the Mass Effect Legendary Edition into the current gaming generation seem to have paid off, as VG24/7 reports that the collection has hit a peak player base of 59,650 on Steam after its highly anticipated release on Friday. Currently, Mass Effect Legendary Edition sits at the 25th spot on SteamCharts, and its player count is the highest of any BioWare title on Steam. In the UK, Mass Effect Legendary Edition has even managed to supplant the equally-popular Resident Evil Village as the highest-selling game in the country.
Things haven’t been entirely smooth sailing for Mass Effect Legendary Edition, as for all of its improvements on the original games there are still a few long-held issues, like Mass Effect 3’s controversial ending - albeit in the form of the improved yet still quite divisive Extended Cut ending. Furthermore, fans have uncovered several bugs and glitches within all three remastered games (some comical, others far more serious, like an Xbox headset-triggered crashing glitch), though BioWare has taken great efforts to smooth them out with patches and updates.
Still, fans are pretty happy with Mass Effect Legendary Edition, jumping right back into the vast and wonderous Mass Effect universe alongside the series' large supporting cast of memorable squadmates – and the game has the Steam player count to prove it. Whether a player wishes to relive the adventure of Commander Shepard or experience it for the first time, Mass Effect Legendary Edition is selling better than ever on modern platforms.
Mass Effect Legendary Edition is available on PS4, Xbox One, and PC.
Source: VG24/7, SteamCharts