With the imminent release of Mass Effect 2 tomorrow, buzz around the series has reached a fever pitch (how sweet was that ad during the NFC Championship last night?!) and earlier this month Dark Horse capitalized on the buzz by releasing the first issue of Mass Effect: Redemption a four-issue comic series, written by BioWare lead writer Mac Walters, scripted by John Jackson Miller (Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic, The Invincible Iron Man), and drawn by Omar Francia (Star Wars Legacy).
Now, the comic series will soon be making the leap from the beautiful comic pages of yesterday to the iPhone’s digital screens of tomorrow. The first issue of Mass Effect: Redemption will debut on iTunes February 3, just in time for the release of second issue of the series in print form.
The comic tells the exciting back-story that led up to the events of Mass Effect 2, while exploring the exotic and dangerous future Milky Way of Mass Effect. It will also reveal previously unseen locations, aliens, and enemies of the rich science fiction landscape found in the game.
Mass Effect: Redemption is actually the fifth Dark Horse title to appear on the iPhone, following such notables as Gerard Way’s amazing Umbrella Academy: Apocalypse Suite, Hellboy: Seed of Destruction, Terminator: Death Valley, and a multitude of titles from the critically acclaimed line of Star Wars comics.
In a press release from Dark Horse Comics and Electronic Arts, Dirk Wood, the Director of Communications for Dark Horse, offered these insights,
“We’ve been trying to figure out a way to not only profit from these new technologies, but to use them in a way that it would drive customers into the stores of our loyal retailers. We came up with the idea of this staggered release in hopes of accomplishing just that.”
Marvel tried a similar staggered release with the Spider-Woman comic/motion comic and it just did not work for me. I was able to finish the motion comic series months before the print version wrapped up and I didn’t like that.
I love the Mass Effect franchise but I’m also not 100% on board with reading comics on my iPhone. The portability is great but you just can’t beat those physical pages!
For more information, check out http://www.darkhorse.com/Features/Mobile.
