[A_D_E_P_T]

> Mass Effect was a game principally composed of components that everyone involved has built many times before, and where most of the difficult problems are already solved.

This is emphatically not the case. In its time, Mass Effect was considered very innovative -- one of the first "cinematic" game experiences, if not the first. (e.g., https://www.wired.com/2007/07/preview-mass-ef/ )

They did a lot of stuff with in-game cinematography and character face/voice acting that seemed extremely advanced at the time. Don't forget we were just a few years removed from 2D RPGs.

> A single feature of "being a person who walks into a ship, sits in a pilot seat, flies up into space, lands on a space station, gets out of ship and into the station, without clumsy transition screens in which you just magically become the ship" is a promise that many games (including EvE, Elite Dangerous) have promised and spent money trying to build for many years, and eventually given up on. Only Star Citizen has actually managed to deliver on this.

Okay, this is interesting.

[silentsanctuary]

You're totally right that it was considered innovative - I was speaking mostly comparatively. Mass Effect did solve new and interesting problems, but my view is that the scale and inherent risk in those problems were on a different level. For example, Mass Effect released at the same time as Uncharted, which (though a shorter game) arguably outdid Mass Effect in terms of "cinematic" feel, quality of animation, etc. The big industry players trying their hand at the problem were able to meet them head on and solve them. Whereas when we look at the problems Star Citizen is trying to solve, several big players in the field have made substantial investments trying to solve them, but most have given up, and only CIG has actually managed to make substantial progress so far.