BioWare Shuts Down
BioWare's official announcement – the studio is now closed
Nobody is surprised.
BioWare is closing its doors after more than 30 years. EA just announced it today, along with ending early development on the next Mass Effect game. They're laying off around 400 people across the company, with about 50 of those tied to BioWare's Edmonton office.
This one hits different. BioWare used to be the gold standard. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, the original Baldur's Gate games, Dragon Age Origins and DA2, the Mass Effect trilogy... those were the games that made you sit up and pay attention. Great stories, memorable characters, choices that actually mattered. We grew up on that stuff in the late 90s and early 2000s.
Then things changed. Anthem was a mess. Andromeda tried but didn't land. The latest Dragon Age, The Veilguard, came out swinging with all the heavy-handed messaging and characters that felt like they were written to check boxes instead of tell a story. It wasn't just checking boxes though. They wanted to force everyone into their perverted fantasy that is a massive minority of the general population that actually wants any of this crap. They aren't representing some significant group of people. This is a deviant subset of people that do not reproduce due to their weird fantasies. They can only recruit. And the sales reflect that. They came in at about half what EA was hoping for. Fans noticed, and a lot of them walked away.
Now EA's under new ownership after that big private buyout earlier this year. Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund led the $55 billion deal and they did us all a favor. Different priorities when you're not chasing the same corporate trends that have been pushing into games lately. They're focusing on the stuff that actually makes money like Apex, Battlefield, sports titles, new Star Wars stuff. Makes sense.
BioWare had a hell of a run in the early days. But they've been dead to most of us long before this. The people who made those classics deserve better than what the last decade turned into. But the writing was on the wall for a while. This isn't some big shock – it's the result of years of chasing the wrong direction while the audience that built the studio moved on.
We'll see what EA does with the IP going forward. For now, it's another reminder that good games sell themselves. The rest is just noise.
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