Mass Effect 5 might use Unreal Engine instead of Frostbite

Publisher Electronic Arts and developer BioWare are seriously considering using Unreal Engine for the next game in the Mass Effect series. This information primarily comes from an EA job listing for a technical director for Mass Effect 5. That post says the publisher is looking for candidates who have “experience with Unreal Engine [or higher].” I’ve confirmed through multiple sources that this is because everything is on the table when it comes to tech for a new Mass Effect — and that includes potentially replacing EA’s in-house Frostbite engine with Unreal.

BioWare built the first three Mass Effect games on Unreal, which is a bundle of tools that devs can license from Epic Games to put together new games. For Mass Effect: Andromeda, BioWare switched to EA’s Frostbite, which developer DICE originally created for its Battlefield shooters. But Mass Effect — and BioWare’s followup Anthem — lost something in the transition from Unreal to Frostbite, and that was apparent in elements like ambient world animation. Where a nightclub in the original Mass Effect would have dozens of dancing characters, Anthem’s characters would remain motionless and still until you approached them.