EA reportedly canned BioWare and Mass Effect 5 to make a new Star Wars: Battlefront instead

According to Bloomberg’s sources, EA saw a new Battlefront game as a less risky investment than Mass Effect Universe. This final factor joined a host of well-discussed reasons for BioWare’s unfortunate demise: Andromeda’s critical reception, Anthem’s live service failure, Veilguard’s sales struggle (pretty good game though), friction between the studio and EA since the very beginning, and, of course, EA’s recent Saudi-Kushner-Private Equity acquisition.

One other added wrinkle: BioWare apparently lost its main ally at the top of the EA org chart. Entertainment and Central Development exec Laura Miele, who historically advocated for BioWare, was “sidelined” according to Bloomberg. EA sports execs David Tinson and Cam Weber were promoted instead. The age of nerds has ended, now begins the long night of the jock.

Overall, this new information doesn’t radically reframe BioWare’s overall story at EA, one of slow decline and mismanagement, or how most observers will interpret it through a culture war lens⁠. Was BioWare too woke? Not woke enough? For the love of god keep it out of our comments section. But now we know why the knife was finally driven home, for what it’s worth.

And I guess we can anticipate a new Battlefront game some time at the tail end of the 2030s. Woohoo. For more on the closure of BioWare, PCG lead SEO editor Lauren Morton spoke to 16 developers who were inspired to join the industry because of the studio about what BioWare meant to them.