Marking ten years since his first animation test for Mass Effect, Lead Animator Jonathan Cooper tweeted a clip of the animation depicting Commander Shepard, and revealed that the character was originally supposed to be a female. Watch her first steps below.
Ten years ago this month, my very first anim test for Mass Effect. Yup, Commander Shepard was originally a woman: pic.twitter.com/FhC2E0FSrA
— Jonathan Cooper (@GameAnim) January 9, 2015
And another one. A parametric incline blend based on checking ground normals. Some games still don't do this. pic.twitter.com/BNwvp1LXDY
— Jonathan Cooper (@GameAnim) January 9, 2015
In response to fan questions, Cooper further revealed:
For those asking, I repurposed mocap from Jade Empire. Shepard was always planned to be both male & female after JE’s pre-set characters.
Jade Empire is BioWare’s 2005 action RPG that was quite well-received by critics.
According to Joystiq, BioWare reported in 2011 that 13 percent of Mass Effect 1 and 2 players chose to play as a default male Shepard, and out of the 83 percent who chose to customize their characters, only 18 percent chose a female version.
What did our readers prefer to play as?
[Source: Jonathan Cooper (Twitter), Joystiq]
