Former BioWare producer says a lot of Anthem’s problems “come from a misunderstanding about multiplayer games,” which the Mass Effect leadership team weren’t equipped to deal with
Former BioWare producer says a lot of Anthem’s problems “come from a misunderstanding about multiplayer games,” which the Mass Effect leadership team weren’t equipped to deal with
Anthem arrived backed by EA’s weight and the pedigree of Mass Effect’s creators at BioWare, so why did it crash? According to ex-EA executive producer Mark Darrah, many of its stumbles sprout from “a fundamental misread of what multiplayer, live-service titles need.”
In a fresh clip uploaded to his YouTube channel, Darrah unpacks his tenure on the project. “These were the people who shipped Mass Effect—one, two, three. They’d been in the trenches together for years,” he notes.
“They’d honed a very specific rhythm. For the bulk of that stretch they followed Casey Hudson’s lead. Their DNA is single-player, narrative-driven action-RPGs.”
So when the studio—famous for solo epics like Dragon Age—revealed a persistent, squad-based online world, heads turned. Naughty Dog actually killed its own The Last of Us online project after Bungie spelled out how brutal the shift to live service would be.
What Happened on Anthem – The Mark Darrah Years (Part 2 2017-2019) – YouTube
“If you examine Anthem’s biggest stumbles, many trace back to confusing a solo narrative with a shared world. The plot pacing pretends you’re alone, but other players can derail the moment at any second,” Darrah notes.
That clash has always bugged me in MMOs too—how am I the prophesied savior when twelve other “chosen” heroes are loitering behind me waiting to hand in the same quest?
Beyond story woes, “The in-game economy never planned for years of operation. Long-term balance is critical for a live service, yet nearly irrelevant in a one-and-done single-player adventure.”
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Darrah points out that these problems were ultimately uncovered, but “because, in typical BioWare fashion, the project only truly came together in the final months, the issues weren’t visible in the code until it was frequently far too late to address them.”
He also mentions that developers in Austin had been “shouting” about these concerns for a long time, attempting to highlight the state of the endgame, but “due to the breakdown in leadership and the fractured communication lines between Edmonton and Austin, those warnings largely went unheard.”
Leadership isn’t only faulted for communication failures. Darrah adds that while the central team was undeniably talented—having delivered Mass Effect 2, BioWare’s most critically acclaimed title—”they mistakenly equated their proven game development skills and their experience playing games with the ability to design a type of game they had never actually built.”
All of this, compounded by the project’s massive scope and the lack of proper documentation, meant that when Darrah came on board, he often had to guess how many systems were supposed to function.
In the meantime, take a look at the top online games that are still thriving today.
I’m Issy—a freelance writer you’ll now occasionally see here on GamesRadar. I’ve always loved gaming, but I learned how to write about them while studying Film and TV at the University of Warwick and contributing to the student publication, The Boar. After graduation, I worked at TheGamer before leading the news team at Dot Esports. These days, I freelance for Rolling Stone, NME, Inverse, and more. I’m especially drawn to horror, story-driven, and indie titles, and I mainly game on my PS5. Right now, I’m working through my backlog and thoroughly enjoying Dishonored 2.
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