During a livestream from PAX East, Mass Effect: Andromeda Creative Director Mac Walters revealed that the highly-anticipated new installment in the series has more then 1,200 speaking characters, a number equivalent to Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 put together.

As you may, the last game in the series, Mass Effect 3, had 670 unique characters who would speak to you, which means Andromeda is nearly double Mass Effect 3 in this department, which is impressive because I personally thought Mass Effect 3 had a ton of dialogue and unique speaking characters.

Producer Michael Gamble added (relayed by PC Gamer) that not only is the number of characters much more vast, but the amount of stuff you and that character talk about is much larger as well. Gamble specifically said the following:

"The lines of dialogue we have in Andromeda is like Mass Effect 2 and 3 combined. So the number of characters is vaster, but the amount of stuff you and that character can talk about is also larger—especially the squad, we definitely focused in on the squad. We made sure the squad was beefy, and developed, and that you could do different things with them and then that information would basically carry through the conversations. That was a large focus. Yeah, in terms of the amount of writing, that was increased, and the number of characters was also increased."

When asked whether or not the 1,200 includes roles as small as shopkeepers, Gamble replied with the following:

"Uh, not that low level, not that low level. I’d say maybe like one step above that."

Mass Effect: Andromeda is set to launch on March 21, 2017 for PS4, Xbox One, and PC in North America, and worldwide two days later on March 23rd.