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Fans of Western RPGs were left reeling recently when Electronic Arts announced it had closed BioWare, the legendary studio behind titles such as Mass Effect and Dragon Age.
Founded by Greg Zeschuk, Ray Muzyka and Augustine Yip in 1995, BioWare was acquired by EA in 2007, and Zeschuk – who has been speaking to 80.lv (thanks, PC Gamer) about the closure – retired from the games industry in 2012.
As a co-founder, Zeschuk has a unique perspective on the news, but admits he has put some emotional distance between himself and the company he helped establish.
"I wasn't there to share in the moment, which in some ways was nice because I was able to kind of just take my time with it," Zeschuk tells 80.lv. "I’m not saying it doesn't hurt and doesn't suck... honestly, it’s not my rodeo. I had to break with it emotionally 15 years ago…It’s so much healthier just to really, truly create that emotional break. Or else you’ll forever be second-guessing it and hovering.”
Zeschuk says that when he heard that EA was being purchased for $55 billion in a leveraged buyout led by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, it was "the final nail in the coffin" as far as EA becoming the kind of organisation where an outfit like BioWare could fit comfortably inside of.
He cites EA's focus on tentpole properties like Battlefield and EA Sports FC as a potential reason for the closure. “Everything else is kind of extraneous, I suspect,” he says. “BioWare makes these kind of unusual games that take a long time, and they're complicated, and so it's easier just to pump out sports games every year, and that's a better business model in some ways.”
He also blames the people at the top for closures like the one which has just impacted BioWare and its staff, saying that the executives making these choices are often ill-informed and lack industry experience:
“There’s this weird belief that you can just kind of recreate great games with random people and AI. It doesn’t work. The other harsh reality of almost all these companies, the people that go down the business track never really come from the development track. Because none of these people have ever made a game, like, never really sat and made one, like, from start to finish, even a small thing, they just don’t know how it works.”
Does Zeschuk harbour any intention of picking up some of BioWare's key properties and reviving them – something many Mass Effect fans are hopeful for?
Sadly, it's a negative:
"For me it was time to go, and I kind of walked out of the games business without any intention of ever returning. I’m happy being a consumer and playing games. I have my opinions on how to make stuff, but as enticing as it would be, it’s just not [worth] the personal struggle and cost and effort required to make a great game. Having gone through the crucible of game development, I’m not going back in there."
You can read the full interview with Zeschuk here.