“EA said make this a live service”: Dragon Age veteran says the fourth game’s multiplayer pivot was a “rationalization” to move devs onto Anthem, and “I wish that pivot had never occurred”

The title that eventually evolved into Dragon Age: The Veilguard went through an extensive period of development at BioWare. During this time, the project transitioned from a solo RPG to a multiplayer live-service model and then reverted. According to studio veteran Mark Darrah, this significant shift toward live service was in part to reallocate resources from Dragon Age to Anthem.

“The rationale for redeploying staff away from Dragon Age was this shift from a single-player experience to a multiplayer live service,” Darrah explains in a video discussing BioWare’s transformation in 2017. “I think that a considerable portion of that change was simply a way to justify why we were removing everyone from Dragon Age.”

Darrah further emphasizes, “there’s no need for all these individuals on the project since they are returning to square one, because we are now creating a live service title. So we can reset fully.”

The timeline Darrah presents aligns with findings from an extensive report on Dragon Age 4’s development, penned by Jason Schreier at Kotaku in 2019. This report states that DA4, initially codenamed Joplin, faced a hiatus in late 2016 to assist in completing Mass Effect Andromeda.

By 2017, Joplin was essentially scrapped in favor of the new, service-oriented Dragon Age 4, dubbed Morrison, with much of the DA team redirected to finalize the troubled Anthem, paralleling their efforts with Andromeda the previous year.

“I wish that had never taken place,” Darrah reflects in his video. “I wish that shift had never occurred. But this is the outcome. EA instructed us to create a live service. We said ‘we lack the expertise for that. We should essentially restart the project.’ Thus, Joplin transitioned into Morrison, and several senior team members, including myself, shifted to Anthem.”

Darrah’s video presents a bleak view of the recent BioWare era, and while he admits there’s some personal frustration involved, numerous other BioWare alumni have
has been sharing the video and suggesting that it resonates with their experiences at the studio during that period.

“I discussed quite some time ago how EA acquires studios and subsequently consumes them,” Darrah wraps up, “and they begin to lose their identity within the larger EA culture. In my view, it seems 2017 marked the point when EA completed the integration of BioWare, which they had purchased nine years prior in 2008.”

This may not convey the most positive outlook regarding what we can expect from Mass Effect 5, but Darrah expresses a sense of hope in the comments of the video, stating that “BioWare and EA appear to be fully supporting the upcoming Mass Effect.” Here’s to hoping that commitment endures over time.

BioWare is known for creating many of the finest RPGs ever developed.

Dustin Bailey became part of the GamesRadar team as a Staff Writer in May 2022 and is presently located in Missouri. He has been reporting on games (with occasional ventures into anime and pro wrestling) since 2015, initially as a freelancer and then as a news writer at PCGamesN for nearly five years. His passion for gaming was ignited sometime between Metal Gear Solid 2 and Knights of the Old Republic, and these days, you can often find him dividing his leisure time between retro gaming, the latest major action-adventure game, or a lengthy session in American Truck Simulator.