

Jaal in a member of the Angara species native to the Andromeda galaxy. First, the opening of the Mass Effect 4 teaser trailer shows both galaxies, which BioWare's Project Director Michael Gamble described as "intentional." Second, the "mudskipper" image which also provides the basis for the final shot in the trailer shows a silhouette based on the character Jaal from Andromeda. There are two main hints that Mass Effect 4 will find a way to connect the events of Andromeda to the Milky Way. Waiting out the journey in cryogenic sleep, Andromeda's player character Ryder awakens around 600 years after the events of the original Mass Effect trilogy. Mass Effect: Andromeda begins before the ending of Mass Effect 3, when a series of ships known as Arks leave the Milky Way as part of a multi-century journey to the Andromeda galaxy. Despite its problems, it may be Andromeda which provides a solution.

In short, BioWare appears to be making the Destroy Ending canon. This has the potential to undermine one of the main choices made in the original trilogy and in the upcoming Mass Effect Legendary Edition, which is set to remaster the first three games. If Mass Effect 4 takes place after the Destroy Ending, then the other two main endings to Mass Effect 3, and the experiences of the players who chose those options, are eradicated. This is also the only ending where Shepard is implied to survive if the player has accumulated enough Effective Military Strength by the final encounter. The Reapers were only killed in Mass Effect 3's "Destroy Ending," in which Shepard uses the Crucible to deactivate all synthetic life across the galaxy. This trailer showed fan-favorite companion Liara T'Soni scaling the husk of a dead Reaper and discovering a piece of N7 Armor lost in the snow. The next chapter in the Mass Effect series, for now known colloquially as Mass Effect 4, got its first trailer at the Game Awards 2020.
