Trelfar’s Legendary Troubleshooting Guide for MELE

Overview

How to fix some issues I wasted far too much time on with Mass Effect Legendary Edition.

MELE Launcher will not load at all

The new PC Launcher should have been a simple, straightforward tool to launch the 3 games in the trilogy but EA still managed to screw the pooch. There were multiple bugs on launch day that caused the launcher to either not load at all, or load but not launch the individual games. Most of those bugs could be worked around using one of the 10(!) different suggestions found here: Possible workarounds for Mass Effect Legendary Edition launch problems.

Most of these issues were patched as of the June 7 2021 update, but you may still encounter the same problem of trying to launch the game either from Steam or Origin and nothing happening (i.e. the launcher doesn’t appear at all), especially after a patch or Origin update.

In this case, you need to clear your Origin local cache. This gets suggested a lot by EA support so you might think there would be a button in the Origin settings to do it. That would mean admitting Origin has problems, so it’s not there. Instead, you’ll need to consult this help article or use the quicksteps here (for Windows):

1. Quit Origin. Make sure it is closed in Task Manager > Processes. Make sure that Origin.exe and OriginWebHelperService.exe aren’t listed. If they are, use the End task button to kill them.
2. Quit Steam. (Open this guide in a web browser window first).
3. Delete everything from the %ProgramData%Origin folder except for the LocalContent subfolder.
4. Delete the entire %AppData%Origin folder.
5. Delete the entire %LocalAppData%Origin folder.
6. RESTART YOUR COMPUTER before trying to load Mass Effect again. If you just do the earlier steps without restarting, it won’t work and you’ll need to start again from step 1.

Mouse causing stuttering when moving the camera

You might notice that even on a high-end computer, moving the camera using the mouse causes what looks like poor frame rates. In fact, your FPS isn’t taking a hit at all but the mouse input is stuttering. Using a gamepad (even in the same game session) will still be buttery smooth, but if we wanted to play on a gamepad we’d buy a PS5.

The problem (unsurprisingly) is Origin. Specifically, the Origin in-game overlay.

Turn off the in-game overlay via the Application Settings > Origin In-Game tab, or disable it just for MELE as follows:

1. Right-click Mass Effect Legendary Edition in My Game Library and select Game Properties
2. Uncheck the Enable Origin In Game checkbox.

Surprise! Origin games that were purchased on Steam complete ignore the above settings. There is no supported way to disable the overlay and EA Support have maintained for years that this is a Steam problem so refuse to address it. But the unsupported way is simple once you know the trick, thanks to

:

• Go to the %ProgramFiles(x86)%Origin folder (normally C:Program Files (x86)Origin)
• Delete the igo64.dll file (and only that one. Leave igo32.dll alone or Origin will not run)

You’ll need to repeat this every time Origin receives an update.

Stuck on the Loading screen travelling between systems

If you get stuck on an infinite Loading screen then you have some corrupt or missing files. I hit this just a couple days after a fresh install of Mass Effect 1.

1. Right-click Mass Effect Legendary Edition in My Game Library
2. Click Repair

1. Right-click Mass Effect Legendary Edition in Library and click Properties
2. Click LOCAL FILES
3. Click the Verify integrity of game files… button

Cutscenes & conversations locked to 16:9

If you have an ultrawide monitor you’ll know that while the open-world and combat parts of the game now support ultrawide, cutscenes and conversations are locked to 16:9. This isn’t a bug – it’s by design. Bioware weren’t given the resources to revisit every scene to make sure they worked when the camera can see wider so they locked them down to the original frame ratio.

If you want, you can force those scenes to use the full frame of your ultrawide monitor, using a lightweight and free tool called Flawless Widescreen[www.flawlesswidescreen.org]

1. Download and install Flawless Widescreen[www.flawlesswidescreen.org]
2. Run it and find Mass Effect Legendary Edition in the available plugins list. Selecting it will automcatically install the plugin and activate it.
3. Make sure the Flawless Widescreen app is running each time you load MELE and it will automatically enable ultrawide cutscenes and conversations.

Of course, there’s a catch. I mean, if it’s that simple, why didn’t Bioware just include the option in the shipped game? Well, scripted cutscenes often use “off-camera” tricks like loading the whole scene but putting NPCs just out shot until they are needed, instead of loading them on the fly and hoping your PC can keep up. Or an NPC whose lines are done will walk off camera and then be made invisible ready for the next camera angle change – and as soon as they hit the border of the original 16:9 frame, they pop out of existence instead of finishing their walk away.

These tricks results in better performance in cutscenes, but it means that the guy who appears in the background halfway through the scene might actually be mugging “off camera” close to the action up until that point, and once you expand the camera frame, you can see him when you’re not supposed to.

Most scenes won’t have any noticeable issues like this, but some will, and sometimes it will be more obvious than others. It can break immersion slightly and that might be a dealbreaker for you. Personally I prefer seeing the expanded scene and can live with the occasional oddities. And hey, it’s a free tool – if you don’t like it, just don’t run the Flawless Widescreen app next time you play and you’ll be back to the shipped 16:9 experience.