- Jul 4, 2017
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A fan of Mass Effect before it was ever a concept ... tell me time traveller, what are the lottery numbers for next weekend?
Also, avoid the internet completely, it's full of Mass Effect futa.
Also, avoid the internet completely, it's full of Mass Effect futa.
EA had nothing to do with the creation of either franchise.
Bioware was already working on Dragon Age: Origins (work began in 2002/2003, when KoTOR was wrapping up for release, initially as a PC exclusive until purchased by EA) whilst Mass Effect was being developed as an XBox 360 exclusive, for Microsoft, published by Microsoft. No EA involvement.
Hell, they started Origins' pre-production before Mass Effect was greenlit, wanting to make a spiritual successor to their two Baldur's Gate games (and expansions).
EA bought Bioware/Pandemic (Bioware owned Pandemic studios at the time) in 2007 (same year Mass Effect released on 360), by buying the private equity fund that Bioware/Pandemic partnered with.
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The attitudes of people in this thread toward the dev... I'm glad I was raised better.
- Jun 24, 2017
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It was more about Anthem than BF2 - pretty much the entire BW Montreal team was immediately redirected toward it; just a skeleton crew to patch things up.
Damn game's not even out yet and it already pisses me off; it's taking up so many resources that should be going toward ME and DA
I kind of doubt it - I've seen interviews with certain EA execs (including one of their VPs, can't remember who) expressing confidence in the future of BW's other properties (yes, including ME), so unless Anthem absolutely tanks I think we'll be seeing more of each - though not for quite a while; DA4 is already looking like 2020
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EA execs... Pride and accomplishment?
Seriously though, the reports of devs at Bioware being concerned about Anthem's success/failure holding sway over the future of Bioware is much more believable than "certain EA execs" expressing confidence in the IP. Especially given the reports of senior devs (including lead positions) leaving the company, all who were working on Anthem.
Compounding things for Anthem, is the confidence EA had in Battlefront 2 sales, then blamed missing sales targets on fan reaction to the lootbox/p2w backfiring in their faces. It backfired so badly, DICE was directed to basically rebuild the game's progression system, and turn lootboxes in cosmetics only.
- Jun 24, 2017
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A meme resulting from a stupid PR rep does not a corporate position make
Where have you seen these reports? I've heard plenty about the negative impact of Anthem development on other games' development, but that's all been more related to how it's starved other teams of resources.
Weren't these folks who were originally on other teams, and got shunted over to Anthem? In which case it's hard to know how much of their decision was based on uncertainty and how much was on being forced into an undoubtedly highly-stressful project they weren't interested in in the first place.
You say "blamed" as if it's a scapegoat - I'm inclined to believe that's absolutely the case. I couldn't even begin to count the number of folks I saw talking about how much they'd been looking forward to the game but flipped to a hard no after the beta showed how fucked up progression was (myself included - though for me it was "until/if it's fixed" rather than "never")
No, but it does reference the "official line" when EA believed they were still going to get away with what they were doing at the time, because they and other publishers had been getting away with increasingly more, and more unethical practices in their insatiable hunger for profit.A meme resulting from a stupid PR rep does not a corporate position make
What comes to mind at the moment, was from an article on Kotaku, as far as devs feelings regarding the fate of the studio hanging on Anthem's success.
Much the same as Bioware Montreal's future was pinned on ME:Andromeda's.
Funnily enough, both games have been having eerily similar development drama with people in senior positions leaving during development, people who's job role and position in the company doesn't stop during development.
Granted we don't know how bad things have been at their worst so far during Anthem's development, but I sincerely hope it's nowhere near as bad as it was with Andromeda's.
It's history repeating itself with Andromeda's development, and no, they weren't positions where it was someone from another studio. These were people who were long term, due to the nature of their positions - senior positions, the equivalent of a department manager.
Not to mention, pooling from the remains of one studio (Montreal) and from another active studio (Austen), is an effort to throw more manpower at Anthem. Which I hope works.
Given that there's little doubt Anthem had a similar system with lootboxes to what Battlefront 2 did, how intricate it was to class progression, I'd say they've been throwing as much as they can into both rectifying that decision (in the wake of the shit storm EA found itself in) and the work already done on it, as well as continuing onward.
Ironically, the one studio they should have pulled in support from for Andromeda's development, and to help with Anthem right now, is DICE LA.
DICE LA's experience with Frostbite3, and fixing a "broken" game on that engine is the only reason Battlefield4 still gets such good player numbers today.
You missed the part of my words where I said it backfired on them. I didn't imply that they were scapegoating, but that their optimistic sales predictions were entirely wrong, because of a corporate mandated integral design element - Lootboxes.
ME:Andromeda also had "optimistic sales predictions", and that was a huge backfire as well, arguably worse than with Dragon Age 2. At least that game got 2 out of 3 pieces of story DLC. (The third was reworked into being Inquisition.)
I'm right there with you and so many others.
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Whilst I reiterate that I hope that throwing more manpower at Anthem works out, at the same time it's very concerning that it won't be enough, and Anthem will suffer from one particular issue that plagued Andromeda, and Dragon Age 2... Needing more time than EA was willing to give.
The funny thing is, that was the problem with Battlefield 4's launch. It wasn't ready.
DICE LA was created out of the closure of the studio Danger Close, and was tasked with fixing Battlefield 4. Which it did. Then kept improving the game throughout the release cycle of DLC, and beyond.
EA let DICE fix the game they forced them to release before it was ready, but because Dragon Age 2/ME:Andromeda didn't have the same profit potential with microtransactions and unlocks, they didn't get the chance to be fixed or improved upon that they needed, especially in the case of Andromeda.
Anthem might, if its initial impact is positive enough. So, fingers crossed for that at least.
- Jul 4, 2017
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This is complete and utter bullshit ... what kind of abomination is this?
There is no way Jack would fuck Allers over Miranda.
There is no way Jack would fuck Allers over Miranda.
I'd just like to add that the exec in question was Casey Hudson, aka the main guy behind Mass Effect who was with BioWare since the Baldur's Gate days and now is the head of the stuidos. It was mentioned during various E32018 interviews, where he spoke somewhat about Dragon Age 4 as well, which is still in deep developement. The majority of those more negative views from people have been from entirely anonymous sources (so 50 % certain to be made up), and from various people making assumptions over news like Drew Karpyshyn left the studio again after having finished his work on Anthem.
However just going by EA's track record as an Evil Stuido Killer, yeah unless Anthem does really well I think Bioware is going to be dismantled, or at least significantly restructured and put into a pure MMO/Live Service type studio. Most of my hope for the future of RPG mostly rests on folks like Obsidian, Lariat (both of which have several ex-Bioware folks now) and CD Projekt RED.
Casey Hudson who left in 2014, and returned in 2017 after the mess that was Andromeda, conveniently not around for Andromeda's release and comes back after the worst of it... Call me cynical, but I'd say he was offered a lot of money with his offer of a higher job position.
I think the EA executioner put his hood on and started sharpening his axe, just in case, around the same time Ray & Greg left their long standing positions as two of the founders of Bioware entirely.
I'd surmise that they knew which way the wind was blowing, and bailed while the going was still good for them.
- Jul 4, 2017
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That is exactly what happened, Casey said it himself when he accepted the position.Casey Hudson who left in 2014, and returned in 2017 after the mess that was Andromeda, conveniently not around for Andromeda's release and comes back after the worst of it... Call me cynical, but I'd say he was offered a lot of money with his offer of a higher job position.
It wasn't a secret.
- Jul 3, 2021
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- Jul 3, 2021
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- Jul 3, 2021
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