The ME3Tweaks group of modders has managed what BioWare couldn't, successfully porting the Pinnacle Station DLC of the first Mass Effect to the Legendary Edition. How did they do that? Well, the lengthy technical explanation is available here, but the short version of it is that BioWare had lost the original source code. The modders, on the other hand, were able to use the Legendary Explorer toolkit which does not need the source code, so it was easier for them than for the game's developers.
The Pinnacle Station DLC mod, only available on PC, needs to be installed through the ME3Tweaks Mod Manager. It does come with quite a few caveats, such as currently only supporting English audio and requiring stronger graphics cards than the base game (because the lighting is calculated in runtime, not prebaked), with the NVIDIA RTX 1070/AMD RADEON RX 580 recommended for 1080p@60FPS.
In related Mass Effect news, N7 Day just passed and BioWare tweeted that Mass Effect will continue, though it'll surely be a few years before we get the next game.
Mass Effect Legendary Edition: Pinnacle Station is an enhanced port of the original Pinnacle Station DLC, which was not included in the Legendary Edition due to lost and corrupted source code. The ME3Tweaks group has ported this DLC across from the original game, while remastering it in the same vein as the Legendary Edition and fixing numerous issues. This is the complete DLC: Pinnacle Station including all simulator maps. No content was cut for this port.
The DLC features a new space station built into an asteroid which houses a combat training facility jointly run by the Alliance Navy and the Turian Hierarchy. Practice and build your combat team using 4 different simulator maps and 4 different combat modes. Beat the other competitors on all 12 simulations to unlock the chance to win a unique prize.
To start the DLC go to the galaxy map on the Normandy and head to the Argos Rho cluster, Phoenix system.
Changes from the Original DLC
We have remastered many areas of this DLC to improve it's experience, including (but not limited to):
- Volcano Insanity Hunt has had it's difficulty slightly reduced.
- All maps now have music. All levels but Warehouse also have a second piece of music that kicks in as the intensity of the scenario increases.
- Fixed geth flashlights floating above their heads.
- Fix bugged spawns.
- Fixed many collision problems.
- Fixed inability to win Survival mode on casual with certain powers.
- Removed a lot of jank, including modal LOADING screens, texture popin, and cutscene timings.
- Survival has been tweaked to increase engagement
Lighting will look significantly different, because we could not use the original lighting, as well as keeping more in-tone with Legendary Edition's lighting.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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