The development of Mass Effect 5 will start in full only in 2023

Most likely, Mass Effect 5 will be created on the Unreal Engine 5 engine, but the development process itself will begin "in full" no earlier than 2023.

A new job listing from EA says BioWare is looking for a CTO for Mass Effect 5 with "Unreal Engine 4+ experience." This suggests that the studio is considering using a new engine for the upcoming project.

The first three games in the series were created on UE, but after EA bought BioWare, the studio switched to the Frostbite engine, created by DICE and used in games such as FIFA , Madden , and Star Wars Battlefront . Mass Effect Andromeda , Dragon Age: Inquisition, and Anthem were built on it, but Jeff Grubb states that "everyone is ready for new technology for the next Mass Effect."

In a series of tweets, Grubb says that "EA and BioWare are looking at every possibility for Mass Effect 5" and that the developer "wants to use next-generation visual technologies." By 2023, when Mass Effect 5 begins "in full" development, according to Grubb, the Frostbite engine will no longer meet these visual requirements.

BioWare's next game, Dragon Age 4 , is scheduled for release in 2023 and will be released on the Frostbite engine. So, if development on Mass Effect 5 doesn't start before Dragon Age 4, then we shouldn't expect a fifth entry in the sci-fi franchise before 2025.